Peter Scazzero’s book, Emotionally Healthy Discipleship, gives some important correctives to the modern church’s approach to discipleship. Sadly, many churches tolerate immaturity and emphasize “doing” over “being,” and mistakeactivity for spiritual maturity. This leads to an undercurrent of sin and unaddressed hurts under the surface. Everything may look good, but at the smallest pin prick and behind closed doors, the ugly reality shows. 

The book contrasts the “shallow” traditional model, which focuses on attendance and service within the church building, in contrast to the “transformative” model, which focuses on deep, long-term heart change. For us to have in-depth discipleship, Scazzero says we must do at least four things: 

1. We must emphasize being with God over doing for God. 
2. We must not tolerate emotional immaturity. 
3. We must not ignore the treasures of church history. 
4. We must not define success wrongly. 

The book also helpfully gives seven marks of healthy discipleship:

1. Be Before You Do
2. Follow the Crucified—not the “Americanized”—Jesus
3. Embrace God’s Gift of Limits
4. Discover the Treasures Hidden in Grief and Loss
5. Make Love the Measure of Spiritual Maturity
6. Break the Power of the Past
7. Lead Out of Weakness and Vulnerability 

The illustration that stuck with me the most is Scazzero’s reference to Oliver Sacks’ book, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat. It tells of a 60-year-old woman who was born with cerebral palsy. She never used her hands for any functional purpose because she was literally spoon-fed and waited on hand and foot. She learned helplessness. She lived as if she had no hands. 

However, when Dr. Sacks saw her, he eventually left food just out of reach, which forced her to use her hands. This led to her not only gaining the use of her hands but also discovering a talent for sculpting. She eventually became locally famous for her sculptures. 

This is a disturbingly similar dynamic at work in our churches. Too many people are spoon fed and babied. Tragically, many churches are disabling people spiritually. Each and every Christian is gifted and empowered by the Spirit, but is too often crippled by pastors who do the ministry instead of equipping the saints for the work of the ministry (Eph. 4:12). 

Also, too often, ministry is seen as happening inside the four walls of the church building. So, if people are equipped for ministry, it’s ministry connected to the institution of the church—ministry like childcare, security, greeting, and leading a Bible study. One of the concerns here is that even the equipping the church does essentially takes people away from being the light of the world they are called to be, and shuts them up in a church building. Instead of the church making disciples, it makes props within the business of the Sunday service. 

Here are some quotes I found helpful:

An emotionally healthy disciple refers to a person who rejects busyness and hurry in order to reorient their entire life around their personal relationship with Jesus, developing rhythms, setting limits, and following him wherever he leads. At the same time, they intentionally open the depths of their interior life—their history, their disorientations, their areas of brokeness, and their relationships—to be changed by Jesus. And they are deeply aware how everything they have and all they are is a gift. So they carry a profound awareness of stewarding their talents as a gift to bless the world for Jesus.

God came to earth, not in a flashy show of signs and wonders, but as an infant born into poverty and obscurity. After living as a refugee in Egypt, he returned to grow up in Nazereth, a backwoods town a long way from the big city. He waited thirty hears to begin any public ministry, and even then, refused to do miracles on demand on overwhelm people with his brilliant intellect. His ministry was small and almost invisible by the world’s standards.

Do not be in a rush. We didn’t get into the problem of shallow discipleship overnight. And neither will we solve the problem overnight.

When we define success wrongly, it means our best energies will be invested in things such as cutting-edge weekend services, cultivating our brand, and preparing captivating messages. Little is left over for discipleship our own or that of others especially when it produces what appears to be such a small and slow return.

With the little time left to invest in the messy work of discipleship, we do the next best thing. We standardize discipleship and make it scalable. Our approach resembles more of a conveyor belt in a manufacturing plant than the kind of relational discipleship Jesus modeled for us. We like standardization. Jesus preferred customization.

Work for God that is not nourished by a deep interior life with God will eventually deteriorate-and us with it. Over timeour sense of worth and validation gradually shifts from a grounding in God’s love to the success or failure of our ministry work and performance. And that’s when the peace, the clarity, and the spaciousness of our life with Christ slowly, almost imperceptibly, disappears.

Much of discipleship in the church today is the spiritual equivalent of cladding… On the surface, everything looks like the real thing. Our people are upbeat and optimistic, filled with faith that Jesus will get them through crises and valleys. They are uplifted spiritually through moving worship experiences and dazzling messages… And yet, their transformation in Christ remains at the level of cladding, a thin veneer on a life that has yet to be touched beneath the surface.

Normally, our goal is to build a church in which people attend worship services, participate in small groups, invest financially, and serve. We assume that active participation in these activities means people are maturing in a vital, personal relationship of loving union with Jesus.

We assume wrongly. It does not.

In fact, I marvel at how many excellent communicators lead as if discipleship takes place primarily through sermons. That is like going to the nursery, spraying the babies with milk, and walking away claiming we fed them.