It was a proud moment . . . we had just commissioned eighty-three new members. The newly initiated throng made their way off the platform, while I descended the steps to get closer to the congregation to begin my sermon.

"This is great, isn’t it?" I began.
"But before we get too giddy
about new members,
let me ask you a question.
Why should we bring
eighty-three new people
into something that is not working?"

That was the first time in thirty years of ministry that I had admitted that something I was leading wasn’t working. It appeared to be working, but it just wasn’t.

"Something is wrong. It has been tormenting me for several years. All the formulas, strategic planning, mission statements and visionary sermons are not making disciples." Indeed, I was haunted by it. We were engaged in a studied routine of religious activity without change. Where was the personal transformation after all the effort we put into weekend services, Bible studies, small groups and outreach events? We were stuck in the same rut that so many find themselves in – religious activity without transformation.

I felt like an ice skater gliding over the ice, and beneath the surface I could see transformation, I just couldn’t get at it. That icy barrier was church infrastructure, customs and traditions . . . an institutional community held together by roles and hierarchy, rather than a relational community based on relationships of trust. It was a pastoral model that insist pastors be CEOs and/or leaders of church growth, instead of what to me feels more like Christ’s model of helping people go deep into the life He has for us. Yes, too often those two models are mutually exclusive! It all depends on what you value.

As I stood before the people
that morning,
I was prepared
to pour out my soul,
even my desperation.

I was nearing the end of a three-year reshaping of my person and I had morphed in such a way that I could never go back to the way it used to be. Bill Hull, the Disciple Making Pastor, had been broken and now God was starting to put me back together again.

For three years people were steadily leaving our church. I wouldn’t support or agree with much of what they said or did, but God used them as a gift to me. It was the most painful experience of my pastoral life and so many times I wanted to run away. But God spoke to me very powerfully one morning as I lay prostrate on my office floor. "Bill, I am going to break you, don’t run." I talked about running, I prayed about running, I asked others about finding a better fit (running), but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Sometimes from pride, "what would others think?" or "I won’t let the weenies win!"

Everything looked better, a "barista" at Starbucks, a sports writer, or a bag boy at Ralphs. I lived most days hour-by-hour in the survival mode, every day I was getting older, 54, 55, 56 . . . I started getting senior discounts. I would turn my head away from retirement commercials. Every day I was less relevant . . . every day less people cared about me and what I did.

During this "dark night of the soul," I poured my life into three younger men and one-by-one they rejected me and left the church. I had trusted them with me and they betrayed that trust. A plague had descended on us, and most plagues must run their course. People leaving a church is contagious, just like people going over to a new churches is contagious. It’s not like everyone does a lot of research then acts in accordance with biblical truth. Most are swept away by their feelings and by the opinion of friends.

I was boring . . . I was aloof . . . I wasn’t caring or welcoming. They got the feeling that I was on a mission and they were pawns in my plan . . . Bill Hull’s projects. But all I was doing was what I had been taught. I based much of it on what I had read about leadership in the 21st Century. I really thought there was no way I could stay, and there was no place to go. I was in some serious pain.

Then the plague began to subside, attitudes began to change and it all became . . . sweet. What happened? Well, what happened primarily happened to me, and then it spread.

When I humbled myself
and expressed my frustration and pain . . .
when I admitted that something was wrong
and that I was as tired of it
as everyone else,
we all sighed a gargantuan sigh of relief,
the masks came off
and we were on our way.

When I finished telling them what God has shown me, they rose up and said YES in a way that I have never experienced before in thirty years of ministry. They knew that they were no longer my project, they understood deep within that what I was telling them was true. They sensed that something prophetic was happening and it changed our church.

What I told them was that:

1. The Great Commission was more about depth than it was strategy or technique.

2. Discipleship was not optional.

3. Being spiritually transformed is the primary and exclusive work of the church.

4. The evidence of being a follower of Jesus is following Jesus.

5. Believing the right things was not enough, that true belief included behavioral verification.

6. The most important question we face is who is saved and who is not (see #5).

7. Discipleship is a choice, we don’t drift into it or amble our way half-heartedly down the path of obedience.

8. We had accepted a non-discipleship Christianity and we must confess this sin to the Lord.

9. What's more, I was going to evangelize them.

I was going to engage them in "discipleship evangelism" ², calling on them to "Choose The Life" . . . the life of following Jesus, the life of spiritual formation, the life that is the answer to the weakness of the church and the boring ineffectiveness of our lives.

When I changed from the strategist to the shepherd . . . when the thrust of my teaching was perceived as my loving them, then the congregation melted in my hands.

To many of you reading this you may say that "discipleship is a tired word" and that you already know about it. You might even say, "I’ve read Bill Hull’s stuff, I know what he has to say." But could it be that like me, you got tired of discipleship because you didn’t see it working? Could it be that you tried it and it didn’t work because of your impatience, your need to succeed now? Could it be that like me you left something important out?

Yes, there are still problems and there are people who still resist the call to the life. But we now have created a Choose The Life Society composed of those who desire transformation. I invite you to go join me in a journey of personal transformation. I hope your resistance if any exists, will melt away, not into my hands, but into the hands of Christ so He can shape you into His image. And remember, don’t run, because it is so sweet on the other side.