Deep Discipleship: How the Church Can Make Whole Disciples of Jesus

Everyone is being discipled by something—the question is what. J.T. English argues that many Christians today are shaped by popular media, flashy events, and folk theology because churches have abandoned their responsibility to make disciples. The church, he contends, is God's primary platform for growing people into the image of Jesus, not a secondary one. Church leaders therefore have a primary responsibility to create environments and relationships where people can be trained, grow, and be sent as disciples. English identifies three essential elements of discipleship: learning to participate in the biblical story through the Bible, growing in understanding of who God is and who we are through theology, and regularly engaging in intentional private and corporate spiritual disciplines. Deep Discipleship provides churches with tools to reclaim their role in discipling people at any stage of their spiritual journey.