When we boil everything down that we do, it would be this: ‘develop multiplying disciples to impact lostness.’ This happens because we build on the foundation of relationship with Jesus that leads to holiness and furthering God’s Kingdom in all that we do. Both of these have their roots in equipping disciples. This happens when we disciple and train them in these ways, but this last value moves beyond only equipping. That is the foundation we will create as we move to developing multiplying disciples, but to get there we must take another step forward. This step we can see in Ephesians 4:11. Paul says this: “to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ.” Here he says that it is more than simply equipping disciples by teaching them to do the work. The end goal here is not equipping, but to build up the body of Christ. How do we do that? We empower them for the work! That means they are repeating the process we modeled for them.

But before we can explain more on empowering, we must understand something about this value and how we attain it. The only way to attain this value is by beginning with it even before we lead someone to Jesus. The reason for that is found in Luke 10:02, where Jesus says, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few, therefore pray to the Lord of the Harvest that he raise up laborers from his harvest.” Jesus sent out the 72 and their entire DNA was set to pray with the mindset to ‘equip to empower and release.’ This value must happen from the beginning. Why can we trust that? Simple, Acts 1:8, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” He is saying that at the moment of our salvation we have received power to fully live out the life he has called us to live. We are not ready to run yet, but we must begin to ‘equip to empower and release.’

In this entire process, because discipleship is lifelong process, we must understand that modeling through relationship is center and that begins from the very start. Although to move from equipping to empowering and releasing it will take more than only modeling. To empower and release someone for the work of the ministry it means we give the keys to the kingdom away to them. We keep nothing for ourselves, but we release them. Why? Because we have rooted and established them in a healthy relationship with Jesus that is reflecting His glory! Paul writes in his final letter to Timothy this in 2 Timothy 2:2: “what you have heard me teach in the presence of many witnesses, teach to faithful men who will be qualified to teach others.” Paul was not only concerned for the work he was doing for the kingdom, but that the work for the kingdom would go on and impact generation after generation. With this in mind our pathway forward with every disciple is this: Disciple, Train, Mentor, Mobilize. Our goal for every disciple is to give the keys of the kingdom away to them, and they will in turn give them away to their disciples, generation after generation. The only way for us to do that though is to empower and release them by trusting the Holy Spirit in them.

In this way everything we do culminates to our mission: ‘develop multiplying disciples to impact lostness in Brazos County and in the world.’ We do this in 3 ways:

1. Seek Jesus in relationship that leads to holiness
2. Invest in furthering God’s Kingdom
3. Equip to Release and Empower