When we say that we are making a disciple, what do we mean? What is the definition of disciple-making? How do you know when you have done it?

Do you simply “know it when you see it”?

Or maybe you have completed your job of discipling another person when the person that you have been teaching is ready to win a competition regarding their Bible knowledge? Or possibly they are ready to debate others and win based on their understanding of the scriptures?

To answer this question, to truly understand what it means to make a disciple, let’s go back to Jesus’s command to his disciples to go and make disciples:

Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Matthew 28:18-20

OK, so what we want to try to understand is this: What did Jesus mean when he told his disciples to go and make disciples? What was Jesus’s definition of what it meant to make a disciple? I believe he explains himself very well:

First, he says that, if you are making a disciple, you will baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

But make sure and note that this is the first step, not the last step. Frequently, our practice can be that we meet with someone to teach them to believe in Jesus, we baptize them, and then we are done! We think that we have completed our job, we have fulfilled the commandment of making a disciple.

But if we do that, we will not have fulfilled Jesus’s commandment. Jesus didn’t stop there. He doesn’t just tell his disciples to help people to believe. He goes on further to say:

…and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.

If baptizing someone is a first step, these words can give us the rest of the definition of what it means to make a disciple. Let’s walk through what Jesus says step by step:

…and teaching them

Teaching the new disciples each of Jesus’s commandments is an important step. We must teach the person that we are discipling what Jesus has said. We must teach them and show them what Jesus has commanded. However, simply teaching them is not the end of what Jesus said we are to do.

…and teaching them to obey

This is a different level altogether. Teaching someone is one thing. Teaching them to obey is another.

Jesus said that if we love him, we will obey his commandments. So in fulfilling the Great Commission, we are actually teaching people to love Jesus by obeying him. We are teaching them to do what Jesus said to do, and by doing so, they will be showing love to Christ.

It is not enough for someone to have the knowledge of what Jesus said to do. Our role, as we disciple another person, is to teach them to do what Jesus said to do. So, as an example, if Jesus commanded his disciples to love other people, we must teach them to love other people in the way that Jesus taught us to love. Or if he commanded us to baptize other people, we must teach them to baptize.

And so this leads me to the final part of Jesus’s definition of making a disciple:

…and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.

If we are making a disciple, we are teaching them. And when we teach them, we teach them to obey, to do what Jesus said to do. But Jesus does not say that we should teach them to obey certain things that he commanded his disciples to do. No, he says that we are to teach them to obey everything that he has commanded us to do.

So if making a disciples means that we are to teach someone else to obey everything that Jesus commanded his disciples to do, that means that there are no special classes of people, where some people can do some things and other people can do other things. No, each person who is going to be taught to be a disciple of Jesus should be taught and equipped to do everything that Jesus commanded his disciples to do. Jesus’s definition of making a disciple is that we teach this person to obey, to do, everything that Jesus commanded us to do.

It isn’t just knowledge about Jesus that makes someone a disciple of Jesus. No, instead, it is obedience to the commands of Christ, and the teaching of others to obey Jesus as well, that makes them a disciple of Jesus. If we are to make a disciple and fulfill the command of Christ, our role is not only to baptize them, not only to teach them, but we also teach these new disciples to obey Jesus and his commands. According to Jesus, to make a disciple is to teach them to do, to obey everything that he commanded his disciples to do.