Pace of Multiplication Matters

Pace matters because where we all spend our eternity is determined in the short time we call “life”.

God’s Word tells us that God is patient with us - not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to turn around and follow Him. God gives us more time because He knows we only have a short time to do all He’s called us to do and to reach all He’s called us to reach.

To follow Jesus more closely, we have to pursue His people more quickly. We can’t just take our time. We have to increase our pace.

Although the church is larger in size and is a greater proportion of world population than ever before, we are still failing to keep up with the rate of population growth. This means there are more lost people alive today than ever before. This status quo is not acceptable.

This is one reason that making disciples who multiply is so important. The percentage of disciples who actually multiply on a regular basis is extremely important.

To illustrate, let’s look at an example of a ten-year period. Let’s say that you start with one disciple who reproduces a new disciple once every 18 months. The new disciples do the same. In ten years, you would have 64 disciples. If instead, that one disciple and the new disciples reproduce every 4 months, then in ten years you would have over a billion disciples.

In other words, over a period of ten years, changing the average reproduction rate from 18 months to 4 months does not mean the result is four-and-a-half times faster. It is over 15 million times faster.

This is possible because of the fact that the first thing a new disciple should do is share with others what he or she is learning. That means they can lead someone else to Christ as soon as they come to faith.

This pattern can continue all through the maturation process if the disciples continue in patterns of dual accountability for obeying and sharing what they learn.