I don't have the time...

I heard it again yesterday as I spoke with a dear friend in ministry. "The young men are too busy to disciple someone." I responded with a hint of sarcasm, "yeah, one day when these young men appear before Jesus, I can hear Him saying, 'oh, you were from (insert your town)? I totally understand! It's much more difficult there than it was in corrupt Corinth or Jerusalem in the first century.'"

Do we really think it is more difficult to make disciples in (your town) than making disciples in the Arab world where being baptized can cost you separation from your family and your livelihood? Is it more difficult than on the African Continent where people make $1 a day, battling malaria and corrupt governments, lack of clean water, air or consistent electricity? How about discipling in China under threat of persecution?

When we don't believe that people have the time, the desire or the ability to disciple others, we can come up with a myriad of excuses that make sense to us, but not to Jesus.

As Peter Drucker said, “In a few hundred years, when the history of our time will be written from a long-term perspective, it is likely that the most important event historians will see is not technology, not the Internet, not e-commerce. It is an unprecedented change in the human condition. For the first time— literally— substantial and rapidly growing numbers of people have choices. For the first time, they will have to manage themselves. And society is totally unprepared for it.”1

The tyranny-of-the-urgent in life has always screams more loudly than the important. We must discern what is most important, the fewer and finer things that matter and will last for eternity.

Jesus put it this way,

Discipling others is all about priorities and a willingness to obey Jesus' clear command to pass it on. The nature of a disciple is to disciple others.So what is your excuse? :) Do you really think it will hold up before Jesus when all our works will be judged?

When we use the word “priority,” it is supposed to be singular! What is the most important priority for every person on the planet? To love God wholeheartedly. Out of that love comes a love for others. When the first priority is in place everything else works!

1. McKeown, Greg. Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less (p. 14). The Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. ↩