Practicing Christian Leadership, Student Workbook, SW11

/ 4 7

P R A C T I C I N G C H R I S T I A N L E A D E R S H I P

Effective Christian Education Incorporating, Parenting, and Discipling

Welcome in the strong name of Jesus Christ! After your reading, study, discussion, and application of the materials in this lesson, you will be able to: • Identify the critical steps in welcoming and integrating new believers into the Church. • Define the meaning of incorporation from a biblical point of view, and recite some of its key implications as it relates to practicing Christian leadership. • Articulate the key elements of incorporation, including bringing new believers into the body of believers, accepting new believers on the basis of their repentance and faith, grounding new believers in the truth of Jesus, guiding them into body life, and finally the importance of introducing them to pastoral care. • Outline the concept of spiritual parenthood, biblically defining what precisely is the definition of parenting new and growing believers in the Lord. • Explain the nature of spiritual parenthood in the framework of the Apostle Paul in the New Testament. • Lay out carefully the elements of spiritual parenthood and relate how these elements relate to the spirituality and growth of new and immature urban disciples of Christ. Read Ephesians 4.7-16. Perhaps nothing in all the world is sweeter than seeing a little new born grow from infant, to child, to teenager, to adult. The growth we experience from a toddler to an adult is an amazing and challenging process. Each stage is filled with its own wonder, struggles, and reward, and all of us undergo these phases in our own unique way. It is not unusual, therefore, for the Apostle Paul to use this growth process as one of the central metaphors to explain the nature of the Christian life. The walk of a Christian is likened to a little baby that is born, that continues to grow through the loving care of its parents, that undergoes discipline from wise oversight, and that emerges after such nurture and care into a full grown adult, ready and willing to have her own family. “Act Your Age!” No Longer a Kid in the Faith

Lesson Objectives

2

Devotion