An article by T. Wayne Dye has rocked my core theology of discipleship. (From my Perspectives Class)
Dye walks you through the life of Pete the missionary. A tribe that he is working with has just become Christians. There are some traits that Pete cannot stand in this tribe and that they need to be changed now that they have become Christians. He has taken it upon himself to let this tribe know what they are doing wrong (all under the pretense of trying to help them).
Dye is making the argument that we as disciple-ers are to allow the Holy Spirit to bring about transformation. And even harder to hear, that maybe the Holy Spirit will convict in a totally different sequence than he did with me.
“Anyone who has followed Christ for long has experienced the Holy Spirit convicting him or her of behavior that they had not realized was sinful. This is not a once-for-all experience. God repeatedly and progressively leads individuals through a process of transformation to become increasingly like Christ. In a similar way, God moves by His Spirit and speaks by His word to bring about gradual changes in a community of believers. We find that the Holy Spirit brings conviction for particular sins in different sequence from one people to another” (Dye).
It is not my right or responsibility to point out what “sins” people need to work on. By doing this I am making the gospel about a list of “to do’s” instead of about salvation by grace. What I am responsible for teaching is
a) God is sovereign
b) The Bible is the authority of Truth
c) To love one another
Through these core teachings, the Holy Spirit will be able to transform a society.
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