
There are a few essential bits of training that a core team must have before they are deployed. Over the months that you will be training your core team, you need to emphasize the following resources, scriptures, and key concepts.
- The Book of Titus
- Acts 1 & 2
- The Gospel-Centered Life
- Jump School Film
REMEMBER THE TITUS
Titus is one of my biblical heroes. He was the stud apostolic trainee of Paul. This is evidenced by the challenging nature of the missions that Paul handed down to him in contrast with Timothy who had to be told to “do the work of an evangelist”. Titus was frontline all the way. His Mission Impossible manila folder contains the letter of Titus with a photograph of the isle of Crete. In that briefing he was told that his mission, should he choose to accept it, was to church plant in every major city. How was he to do that? By establishing leadership in every city (Titus 1:4)
The method: discipleship “teach men who themselves can teach others”
In effect, that’s what you’re doing with a core team. You’re training them to be a crack commando unity like the Dirty Dozen. In the same way that Jesus took a small group and poured his all into it, you’re pouring into the core team with the hope that they will, in turn, pay it forward when you’re taken out of the picture. Eventually, you’ll be sending them out as innocent as sheep, but as wise as serpents which can be translated as a dangerous combination to the kingdom of darkness.
Discipleship is at the heart of the book of Titus. If Acts is the narrative church planting book of the New Testament, then Titus is the church planting epistle! It’s not by accident that Paul writes to a serial church planter with discipleship directives. The key to the book is in 1:9 teach, exhort, and
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