[00:00:00] Hey everybody. Welcome to the EquipCast, a weekly podcast for the Archdiocese of Omaha. I'm your host, Jim Jansen. Now let's dive into some encouragement and inspiration to equip you to live your faith and to be fruitful in your mission. Let's go.

Hey everybody. Welcome to the Quip Cast Coaches Corner, where I break down important topics to equip you and your team for mission in your family, in your church, and in your ministry. My name is Jim Jansen, and today I'm gonna share four metaphors for a clear path of discipleship. So, right, like, truth be told, I just, I love metaphors.

I don't know if it's a charism that's like not on the list or unnamed, but I love them. I, I love teaching, and I love metaphors, and although building a clear path of discipleship [00:01:00] isn't rock and science, it is different enough from how we typically operate in many of our ministries or in the way we structure our parishes, that some metaphors will help our understanding.

This is gonna apply whether you're thinking about building a clear path in your ministry or in the parish at large. So, let's start with this definition. A clear path is a ministry framework for a parish at large, or a specific ministry like youth ministry or religious education to help make and mature disciples by the power of the Holy Spirit.

So, couple of thoughts there. First off rate. A clear path is a communal context that assists missionary disciples as they accompany people through their journey of faith. When God brings us to the point where we begin to recognize how he's working in those around us, and we feel his call [00:02:00] and his invitation to accompany them on their faith journey.

We recognize pretty quickly that they need more than just us, right? They need a whole community of faith, and they need some specific ministry context retreats, faith formation classes, small groups. They need these key moments for us to help them grow in their journey. A clear path is a, is a plan for how a community of faith helps people connect to that community.

How they help people come to know the person of Jesus and surrender their lives to him. How they help people grow as disciples, that in the knowledge and the habits of what it means to be a follower of Jesus. And finally, how they are sent out as missionary disciples, right? Every parish, every ministry should know how they help people connect, how they help people know Jesus, how they help people grow, and how they send them out as missionary disciples.

You have to know where these things [00:03:00] happen in your community and ministry, and that's what a clear path does. Now, to be clear, little disclaimer here before we jump in, no metaphor is perfect, especially when we're on the sacred ground of evangelization and talking about God's work in the human soul. But each of these does highlight a particular aspect of the clear path that I, you're.

A clear path of discipleship is a lot like a school. Now, I'll offer, uh, credit for this one. Uh, Fr. Scott Hastings was the first one to suggest his metaphor. This metaphor highlights how a clear path of discipleship helps people grow and move. I. I'm gonna contrast the school to a mall. Now, I know some of you had like if like depending on your age, you're like, I don't even remember.

What is a mall? Well, malls used to be these big buildings, which would have all sorts of little shops in them, and if some would go into one [00:04:00] shop and then skip the next five, then gonna go to another one and then leave, there was no problem there. Right. The, those shops are not connected to one another.

There's no progression, nothing's wrong if you, if you walk into JC Penney's and then you walk in to the, uh, it store and then leave, you don't have to go to every shop. You don't have to go to one shop before another. Schools are different though. Schools are designed for growth and maturity. There's an expectation of progression.

Something has gone terribly wrong if someone never leaves third grade. So too, the ministries of the clear path are built so that the participants will leave and graduate. They're not permanent residing spots. These ministries can define their success, not by how many people come and stay, but how many people are, are sent?

How many people are [00:05:00] graduating? I. That's how a clear path of discipleship is like a school. Okay? Metaphor number two. A clear path of discipleship is more like an athlete training table than a buffet. So, think about a buffet, right? A buffet is just an overwhelming number of choices. Way too many desserts, right?

Way too many carbs. And that choice often leads to paralysis and, uh, being overwhelmed and sometimes overeating. It's kind of like, you know, for, for the guys out there like the smelly candle stores, you know, like too many choices. They've actually studied this scientifically. Too many choices leads people to not choose.

A training table, on the other hand, fixes that problem by providing foods that are crafted specifically to meet the athlete's needs for where they're at in their season. This is actually the hardest part about building a clear path [00:06:00] to discipleship, providing simplicity and clarity because we're Americans and we think that options are helpful, and so we provide too many options to the point that they're not helpful.

It reminds me a little bit of, uh, what to me sounds like a reference to this concept in the prophet Isaiah chapter 35 verses four through eight. Where it talks about a clear, smooth highway of people coming to the Lord, and even a fool can't get lost on this highway 'cause it's clear and smooth and it leads to the Lord.

That's what we wanna try and do. We wanna create something like a training table, A simple, clear way to help people get what they need as they grow and mature on their way to the Lord. Number three. A clear path of discipleship is like a trellis, right? A trellis is just a structure to help what is already going to happen with nature, with greater [00:07:00] fruitfulness.

So, grapevines just make grapes and with a little bit of pruning and a trellis, they bear even more fruit. Same thing with missionary disciples. Missionary disciples just bear fruit. It's, it's the product of the Holy Spirit at work in them, their prayer, their sacrifices. But they bear a lot more fruit when they have the benefit of a communal structure from making and maturing disciples.

'cause as it turns out, evangelization is a team sport and it's too much for most of us, even those of us who have been trained as professional missionaries to provide everything that our friends need at every stage of their spiritual journey. It's a great joy to be able to connect our friends to other people who have gifts of teaching, other people maybe who are really gifted at proclaiming the gospel.

Others that are really gifted at helping encourage and equip people for their personal mission, whatever it is. We're all called to accompany people through their spiritual journey. But there's something special [00:08:00] about being able to do that in a community and it takes what, what is already happening natural for us, and it makes it all the more fruitful when we have a trellis.

That's what a clear path to discipleship does. Finally, for all you nerds out there, a clear path to discipleship is a lot like an operating system. So, what I mean by that is think like windows, or think about the operating system for Mac. They provide this overarching structure so that the individual.

Applications or programs like Word or PowerPoint or Excel, those things can perform their particular function together and in harmony, so right. We have ministries in our parishes, and we have little sub events within youth ministry, right? We have that welcome barbecue, and we have the mission trip, and we have the weekly small groups.

Those individual events or ministries all have different functions, but with an operating system, [00:09:00] they can work together seamlessly to make and mature disciples. Right. The key is having mature missionary disciples that work as connectors accompanying people as they grow and mature. All I might add at the pace that the Lord leads, when you have an operating system in place, you can spend as much time as you need getting the job done in Microsoft Excel.

And similarly, for people who need a long time to process through the hurts and challenges of their life, those who maybe haven't come from a Christian background and need to spend a lot of time in faith formation to learn and grow and absorb the habits when you have a clear path of discipleship. You have a space for them to do that, and they can take as long as they need as the Lord leads them and matures them in that spot, and then when they're ready, they have someone to help them move to the next place on the journey where they can continue to grow and mature.

[00:10:00] Let me pray. Oh, father, we thank you and we praise you just for the good things that you're doing in the hearts and minds of all of your children. We thank you for the communities of faith in our youth ministries, our religious education, and the parishes that house them. Lord, we thank you for clear path for Discipleships that are drawing people to you, that are providing a place for those who you've called to accompany others on the journey, ask Lord that you would continue to open our minds and hearts.

Of your spirit is stirring and inspiring in your church today. Amen. Alright. What are your thoughts? What are your metaphors? Speak my love language. I'd love to hear your thoughts and your metaphors. You can respond back to this episode in the chat@quip.archomaha.org. Again, that's quip [00:11:00] arch omaha.org.

Thanks for listening to the EquipCast. We hope this episode is inspired you to live your faith and equip you to be fruitful in your mission. Stay connected with us by going to equip.archomaha.org. God bless and see you next time.