{"id":455,"date":"2018-09-22T10:52:00","date_gmt":"2018-09-22T15:52:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/disciple-discipled-discipling\/"},"modified":"2019-02-18T10:15:19","modified_gmt":"2019-02-18T16:15:19","slug":"disciple-discipled-discipling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/?p=455","title":{"rendered":"Disciple, Discipled, Discipling"},"content":{"rendered":"
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My daughter completed writing another book that has been sent off to the publisher. I was grateful to be her technical writer, going through the manuscript with a \u201cfine tooth comb\u201d to review it for clarity, punctuation, grammar, and content. With the wisdom she learned from her own life experiences, she wrote as a disciple of Christ to help her readers avoid some of her pitfalls and gain the wisdom she learned. So, in essence, she, as a disciple of Christ is discipling others to become disciples of Christ, also. <\/p>\n

In my editing, I wrestled with her using discipled or discipling as an \u201caction verb\u201d because it isn\u2019t described in the dictionary as a verb. I know she used it as the \u201caction of making disciples\u201d and shortened it to \u201cdiscipling\u201d, but my \u201cGrammarly\u201d app that spellchecks the contents, kept rejecting it as an “unknown” word. <\/p>\n

Using \u201cdisciple\u201d as a verb indicates the action Jesus commanded when he told us to \u201cmake disciples\u201d of all nations. And when Staci used it as \u201cdiscipling\u201d people, she was describing how we obey Jesus by \u201cmaking disciples.\u201d Whew! I\u2019m sure you can understand the angst I had to not using it as a verb because even as I type this post, Grammarly has highlighted it as an “incorrect” word eight times. But, for the emphasis Staci desired to make her point, it was necessary. She won the debate by keeping the word as a noun and a verb.<\/p>\n

But there is a deeper question underlying the issue of grammar that created my angst. I was resolute against it but now, I find myself asking myself. \u201cDoes the way I\u2019m wanting to use the word \u201cdisciple\u201d indicate something about my heart? About my preferences? Do I prefer the noun of being a disciple or the verb of \u201cdiscipling\u201d aka making disciples?<\/p>\n

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Maybe I\u2019m more comfortable with \u201cdisciple\u201d as a noun because it puts the onus on me to be a \u201cdaily\u201d disciple of Christ. I just need to \u201cmeasure up\u201d in my devotion and love for Him in what I say, how I live my life day-to-day, being His good girl, keeping His good rules, maintaining my Christian status, speaking good, not evil of others, and being an example of a follower of Christ. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s a whole other thing for \u201cdisciple\u201d to become an action verb where there is the activity of discipleship directed toward others by obeying Jesus’ command in Matthew 28:19 to “go and make disciples of all nations.” It\u2019s obvious in my \u201cage bracket\u201d (35 and up \u2013 LOL!) that we engage our own discipleship well, but we are aloof to those younger than us who need encouragement. We are more comfortable with being a disciple than making disciples.<\/p>\n

I also contend that if we shift the use of \u201cdisciple\u201d from a noun to a verb, we may get more comfortable with the activity of \u201cmaking disciples\u201d than the state of \u201cbeing a disciple and literally following Jesus, being in intimate relationship with Him\u201d. We could spend our lives investing in our relationships with others, but neglect the most important relationship of all, the one with Jesus Himself. <\/p>\n

So back to my dilemma in using a word in a published book that isn\u2019t in the dictionary. I hear God saying to me what He said in my post yesterday. \u201cYou are worried about too many things that matter so little. Say, \u2018Oh well\u2019, and embrace \u201cdiscipled and discipling\u201d as verbs and \u201cdisciple\u201d as a noun. Just live out both senses of the word if you desire to do discipleship well. Take your personal discipleship with me seriously as well as the discipleship of others to help them connect to Me and the Body of Christ. You are my \u201cdisciple\u201d. Now go into all the world and \u201cdisciple\u201d others to follow me, too.\u201d Dear Lord, I sure do hope the next question I have for you DOESN\u2019T involve grammar! Amen.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My daughter completed writing another book that has been sent off to the publisher. I was grateful to be her technical writer, going through the manuscript with a \u201cfine tooth comb\u201d to review it for clarity, punctuation, grammar, and content. With the wisdom she learned from her own life experiences, she wrote as a disciple…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1481,346,1482,1483,1484,1485,1486,1393,1487,1488,1489,1490,1491,1492,1493],"class_list":["post-455","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-action-verb","tag-content","tag-disciple","tag-disciple-of-christ","tag-discipled","tag-discipling","tag-grammar","tag-grammarly","tag-making-disciples","tag-manuscript","tag-matthew-2819","tag-noun","tag-punctuation","tag-technicalwriter","tag-wisdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=455"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8608,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455\/revisions\/8608"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}