ADT Overview
Advanced Discipleship Training
Christian Discipleship and Spiritual Growth & Maturity
Advanced Training Overview
There is a fresh interest in the church today for Christian Discipleship. Many churches and denominations started to realize that there is a need for spiritual formation; therefore some churches increase their budgets and staff for this purpose. Since I love discipleship, this is music to my ears and it makes my heart beat faster.
I am a beginner in the area of spiritual formation and I am still learning. Approximately fifteen years ago, God inspired me to take discipleship seriously. At that time, I knew almost nothing about spiritual formation. I just responded to the leading of the Holy Spirit and His calling in this area. I named this work – Spiritual Growth and Maturity. You could call it the way you feel comfortable: Christian Discipleship, Spiritual Formation, Spiritual Growth and Maturity. All of these terms, in one way or another, describe the process of being conformed into the image of Christ; this is why the Church is here on earth – to make disciples not mere converts. The Church is primarily called to facilitate an environment where the Holy Spirit could spiritually form new people into the glorious image of Jesus Christ. The Church is called for The Ultimate Intention.1
In a nutshell, this is the main purpose and the highest objective of Upper Room Fellowship Ministry. 2 That is – to provide the environment, the tools, and the teaching through the Advanced Discipleship Training so that the Christian discipleship and spiritual growth and maturity process could take place in the lives of interested individuals. The Church today is full of converts, but so few of them are truly disciples of Christ. We must pray and get out of our comfort zones – be discipled and make disciples. We should treat The Great Commission found in Matthew 28:19-20 literally and not transform it into The Great Omission.3
1 See The Ultimate Intention section of this manual 2 See the Mission Statement of URFM section of this manual
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Yes, there is a fresh interest for spiritual growth and maturity, and I am glad for it, but
there is so much to do and it appears that we are running out of time. Most Christian leaders
agree that there is a lack of biblical discipleship in the church today. Most churches focus on
evangelism but forget almost entirely about discipleship. Eventually they win some converts but
fall short of the Great Commission’s requirement of making disciples not just converts. In his
book, The Divine Conspiracy, the renowned author and promoter of spiritual formation, Dallas
Willard, states that “Non-discipleship is the elephant of the church.” It appears that we, the 21st
century church, have missed the real meaning of discipleship. In the New Testament era, when
Jesus said “make disciples,” the apostles understood that Christ’s intent was not simply getting
someone to believe in Him (convert them), but to help those believers become what Jesus
intended them to be (disciple them). In an article titled, The Discipleship Challenge, Winfield
Bevis writes, “Perhaps one of the greatest challenges to discipleship is that churches have
become complicated and over programmed.” The church became its own worst enemy and the
biggest obstacle against making disciples. In other words – we do not make disciples because we
are too busy with our own programs.
~4~
Advanced Discipleship Training
Christian Discipleship and Spiritual Growth & Maturity
Regardless of what you read so far, I want to ask you a few penetrating questions from my heart to your heart: Are you hungry for the Word of God? Do you feel that you have not grown spiritually for the last several years? Are you ready to pay the price and let the Holy Spirit make you and mold you more and more into the likeness of Christ? Do you want to follow in the footsteps of those who followed Jesus? Do you really desire to become all that God intends for you? Are you passionate to let Christ make a difference in you and around you? If your answer is “Yes!” to one or more of these questions, you are the perfect candidate, the perfect mathetes 7 for the Advanced Discipleship Training offered by URFM.
Welcome aboard! Whoever you are, I am glad to have you in this class and part of this amazing and life-transforming opportunity. Let’s have a nice journey together with others who are hungry for the Word of God. God bless your decision!
With LOVE in HIS Service,
Valy Vaduva URFM / President / Director of Training
