Discipleship Sucks!
Because it’s hard!
When, as a young man of about twelve or thirteen I got saved, it was kneel, confess your sins, accept Jesus as your saviour, Amen. Stand up and now you are a fully formed child of God.
That was Sunday night. Monday at school I told the guys I was saved.
They first wanted to know, “Saved from what?”
I didn’t really have an answer.
Then they asked if this happened in church. I nodded. They laughed.
My Christian life crashed and burned right there, and it wasn’t until a number of years later, when a more mature Christian took me under his wing and started showing me the truth of what being a Christian actually means, that I could confidently stand on my own two feet and tell the world that I’m saved.
As time went on, by no real plan (that I was aware of), I fell into working with some new Christians to help get them established in their faith. I later learned that this is called discipling.
Well, the years have gone by, and after having taken some Christians through the discipleship process and then waving them off on their voyage of building their relationship with God, I have arrived at one very real conclusion and one heartfelt wish.
The conclusion is that discipleship is hard.
The wish is that I wish Christians were more Christian!
Because honestly, discipling Christians would be considerably easier if Christians consistently behaved more like Christians!
But they remain human. Very human.
Which is the material that God has given us to work with. The human being, made in the image of God!
Discipleship is not about teaching people Scripture. It’s about guiding the disciple toward a rich and fulfilling personal relationship with God.
Because God has a unique relationship with each one of us and the discipling process allows the disciple to discover and understand the dynamics of that unique relationship.
So before anything else, discipleship involves patiently walking people through understanding and buying into what being a child of God means personally and out in the real world.
Discipleship guides the new Christian in developing:
so that over time they build a healthy, stable and real relationship with God.
Thinking back to a time before I was discipled, I once asked my father a serious question. I was going through a major crisis of faith and was looking for some answers.
I asked him: “If one day when you die you discover it was all a misunderstanding — no God, no heaven and no hell — would you regret being a Christian?”
His answer surprised me. “Not at all,” he said. “Because I enjoy being a Christian.”
At the time I didn’t fully understand what he meant and it was not the answer I was looking for, but it stuck with me.
And now I know what he meant. A true disciple of the Lord does not merely follow Jesus because of rules. We follow Him because we love Him. We enjoy following Him. Not because being a disciple is easy. It Isn't.
It reshapes the human being, and that can be painful.
Because it confronts:
In a way, we as disciplers, are the facilitators of Romans 12:2, “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” Our job as disciplers is to walk disciples through the “renewing of your mind”.
And this article is a very poor attempt at giving some ideas to make a very complex and sensitive process as non-stress inducing as possible.
I learned about God from my goldfish
One of the strangest things about discipleship is that often the deepest lessons about God come from the simplest places.
In my case, one of those lessons came from a goldfish.
When I was very young, I had a goldfish in a goldfish bowl. All day he would swim around the bowl, not stopping until I entered the room. Then he would swim right up to the glass and watch me. If I moved to a different area of the room, he moved too – and stayed watching me. All the time. I quite enjoyed it and had great fun telling people that my goldfish loves me. In fact, I brought some of my friend’s home with me to see my goldfish that loves me.
In a way, that goldfish taught me about God – when I’m in His presence, I am 100% in His presence, and so is He 100% in my presence. The lesson was that if I wanted God to be with me 100% of the time, I had to make sure that I was with Him 100% of the time. Like going to be with my goldfish. Simplistic? Sure. But remember, I was a kid learning about God.
As I grew up, this kid’s lesson never left me – God’s presence in my life is my responsibility to maintain. And I use the story of my goldfish when introducing new Christians to their relationship with God – He is always with you.
I have just come back from my doctor. I have a sinus infection.
He is not a Christian, but every time I see him, we somehow end up talking about faith, God and the Church. Today was no different.
A fifteen-minute doctor’s appointment turned into a one-and-a-half-hour conversation about Jesus.
The way he was talking made me realise that he was wrestling with some deeply theological issues. So I listened carefully until eventually he slowed down and smiled.
That’s when I told him about my goldfish.
He looked at me rather strangely and wanted to know what my goldfish possibly had to do with all these theological questions.
“Nothing,” I said.
“But it has everything to do with your relationship with God.”
That’s when he started listening properly.
Over the years I’ve realised that when talking to a new Christian — or even someone searching for God — I am often really talking to a spiritual baby.
After all, we call them “children of God,” don’t we?
And babies need baby food.
Simple things. Understandable things. Things they can absorb and grow from.
My doctor and I have been having these conversations for about a year now and each time I can see that he is getting closer and closer to making a commitment to the Lord.
And this has taught me something very important about discipleship.
Just as I can’t force my doctor into relationship with God, neither can I force Christian growth.
Growth happens at its own pace.
Our responsibility as discipler’s is not to force transformation, but to patiently walk alongside people while God performs it.
A horsey tale….
Many years ago I wanted to learn to ride a horse. I was duly taken to and enrolled at a riding school. I was put on, what I was told, is the most passive and docile horse they have. Boy was I happy. So being led by the instructor, away we went – instructor, horse and I. But I was a bit impatient. I wanted to do some of the stuff I saw the other children doing, cantering, jumping etc. So I sawed on the right rein to turn the horse. Nothing happened. I then sawed on the left rein. Still nothing happened. The instructor ignored what I was doing and just carried on walking. Then I pulled on the reins to stop the horse. No response. Then I kicked my heels into the horses flanks and found myself on the ground on my back. I gave up on horse riding lessons saying that horses are dumb.
In many ways this is the disciples walk. There will be times when the disciple wants to try something, or is unsure but in reality is sure – they are really just testing you, and at times like that it is important that God, who we can always depend on, and the discipler, stay consistent in behaviour and teaching. Just like the horse and the instructor. At the first sign of wavering from the discipler, the devil will put the impression in the disciples mind that for some things in the Christian life there is wiggle room, if you press hard enough.
One of the things I learned as I grew spiritually, is that God is really very clear about His relationship with us.
He does not negotiate for partial lordship.
God wants to sit on the throne of your life, and He does not share that throne.
Only we can remove Him from that place — usually by slowly allowing something else to become more important than Him.
And that “something else” can be absolutely anything:
I make this clear early in the discipleship relationship, and once that foundation is properly understood, many discipleship conversations suddenly become much richer.
Because almost every spiritual struggle eventually comes back to one question:
Who is really sitting on the throne?
Out of the Mouth of Babes
I’m 72 at the time of writing, and I know by the tone of this piece, it would seem that I have discipled hundreds of people. Not so. Over the years I have worked with about twelve or thirteen and at the moment I am busy discipling three disciples. One eighteen years old, one thirty three years old and one forty seven years old.
And if there is one overriding impression I have from these years, it’s this: the more I disciple the more I realise I still have tons to discover about my God.
I believe that discipling is a calling, but more than that it is a privilege. A privilege to take someone by the hand and lead them into the Holy of Holies to meet their and my Heavenly Father. To know that God has brought me and the disciple together for a reason that sits squarely in His will for the two of us. Therefore, because of this awesome responsibility on the discipler, discipleship is messy and it can be downright ugly. There are successes that I rejoice and dance over and failures that drive me to my knee’
+s day after day. But at the end of the day, discipling is the most rewarding thing I know to do.
We as disciplers reflect Jesus into the lives of disciples. And that reminds me of once when I was discipling a fourteen year old boy. We were in the middle of an argument where he wanted one thing, and I maintained that it’s not pleasing to God. He challenged me to find support for my argument in the Bible and try as I might, I couldn’t find any! This young man then looked at me with a look bordering on pity and said, “Uncle Mark. I really love what we’re doing here, but please don’t try to turn me into a clone of you.” That rocked me back on my heels. My job as I said was to reflect Jesus, and here I was bringing my personal preferences, likes and dislikes into the conversation. Like I said, discipleship can be messy – and challenging.
Bon Voyage
There comes a time in every disciple/discipler relationship that we have to say goodbye to each other. The disciple needed the discipler for a specific area of growth and now has to go off on their own to use and practice what has been shared and taught, hopefully to disciple someone.
But this sending a disciple off on their discipleship life journey is painful. We have shared some really difficult moments which drew us closer. But they have to go, and this is where my real concern surfaces. If the church that they attend or are members of, has a deep, vibrant and active Body of Christ within the church, the disciple is going into safe hands. Its always an idea for the discipler to go and meet with that Body at least once. But where there is no Body support for the new disciple, well, I just keep them close until we can find a supportive body. I will only agree to let go when I know they will be spiritually supported.
So, discipling sucks? Yes, sometimes. But most times it sits in my memory as the best thing I have ever done. Yes its messy. The discipler gets into the blood and guts of the disciples life. But so did Jesus. When He commanded us to go and make disciples, He never said it would be easy. In fact what He was saying in that great commission was, “Go and teach others all that I have taught you.” And that is what we as disciplers have been called to do. Do it Jesus way. It’s the only way that works.
Author: Mark Deavall 16 June 2026
© Mark Deavall 2026