New Discipleship Resource from Greg Laurie: Start to Follow
“When you hear the word disciple, what comes to mind? Maybe you think of the twelve disciples who tramped along behind Jesus through the Judean wilderness and the dusty streets of Jerusalem? Maybe you visualize their faces in a stained glass church window or in some old painting with little halos over their heads?
“But here’s the real question: When you hear the word disciple, do you think of yourself? Do you consider yourself a disciple of Jesus Christ? Do you know what it means to be one (p. 7, Start to Follow).”
If you’re looking for a discipleship resource, you need to take a look at Start to Follow by Greg Laurie. The pastor of Harvest Christian Fellowship, Laurie is the author of over 30 books and the founder and featured speaker for Harvest Crusades. One of America’s best known evangelists, it’s hardly a surprise that he’d have a well thought out resource for making disciples.
A short 125 pages, I can see Start to Follow being used to equip and encourage disciple-makers. I can also imagine it being used as a follow up tool for new believers. Several of the chapters include a simple set of discussion questions. Written from an “ensure understanding” standpoint, the questions would need to be reinforced by additional questions to encourage a deeper discussion.
Additional leader helps and learner tools are available online by subscription at lifebiblestudy.com. You can preview it free right here. I found the online helps to be quite extensive. Although I found the lesson I previewed to have a learner orientation (as opposed to an experiential or application orientation), it should provide a good overview when used in combination with the book and the leader’s personal experience.
If you’re familiar with Laurie’s preaching style, the writing will seem very familiar. Packed with biblical references, even the illustrations are drawn from other passages in the Bible.
Although very basic in its approach, Start to Follow provides a helpful new addition to the discipleship resource collection. If you’re developing a discipleship track or follow-up program, you’re going to want to take a look at this one.
Mark, lifebiblestudy.com offers a small group version for group meetings also. I wrote it and it is based on small group principles and practices. Bottom line… there are two versions, one for small groups and one for other types of groups.
Thanks Rick! Where is the small group version? My review is based on the free preview available at http://lessons.lifebiblestudy.com/onefree/
mark
A small group discussion guide preview is included when printing the Free Lesson preview – it is at the end. Rick did a great job with it!
If purchasing the study, the small group discussion guide is available in its entirety as a free download under a “Free Resources” tab. Other free resources include a Daily Devotional Guide and Church-Wide Discipleship Campaign leadership guide also created by Rick.
Thanks Jeremy! Good to know that it’s in the download. I just took a look and there’s some great stuff there. That should absolutely be emphasized and highlighted on the “view online” tab!
mark
Great look Mark. You can’t go wrong taking a look at a resource from Greg Laurie. Thanks for the heads-up on the new book!
Thanks for jumping in here Joe!
My pleasure Mark. Thanks for all the great content you’re sharing. Very helpful.