Impact Equation
Introduction: The Essence of Transformation
Jesus graciously empowers us to become like Him. He also expects us to become like Him.
For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son. Romans 8:29
But what does that transformation look like? What is the definition of a disciple? How do you help a person become a disciple? There are many answers to this, and most of them lack a helpful degree of specificity. The most common explanation I hear is that a disciple is one who becomes more and more like Jesus. While I agree with this statement, it begs the question, “In what way?”
A lack of clarity on the outcomes of discipleship makes it very difficult to determine the strategies to help them accomplish them. Fortunately, the Bible provides clarity on what the outcomes of disciple-making are. If we focus on those outcomes, we will yield more enthusiastic and effective disciples.
The search for the outcomes begins with an understanding of God Himself. God is three persons. The Father ordains our salvation. The Son accomplishes our salvation. The Spirit is the one who applies our salvation. If the Spirit applies our salvation, it begs the question, “What does that application look like?”
First, the Spirit cultivates spiritual fruit in us. The spiritual fruit listed in the Bible are simply the character traits of Jesus. Second, the Spirit deposits spiritual gifts into us. The spiritual gifts are a key indicator of the calling Jesus has for our lives. Every command Jesus gives us falls into one of these transformation buckets.
Our focus, then, of disciple-making is to develop the character and calling of those who follow Jesus. The power of having specific outcomes in disciple-making is that we can create processes to help people accomplish these objectives. Those processes will be listed below.
The result of focusing on these two outcomes is impact. As disciples allow Jesus to cultivate His character in them, and as they allow Jesus to demonstrate His power through their calling, it will change the world around them for the good. This powerful mystery of transformation is summed up in Colossians.
Christ in you, the hope of glory.
Colossians 1:27
Most disciple-making environments focus on the content of a study. People considering joining a group will often ask, “What are you studying?” While content is a crucial element of any transformation process, it cannot be the focus. As an example of the role content plays, consider this statement of Jesus; “You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” Jesus is placing an exceptionally high value on the truth, but the truth is a means to an end… not the end itself. The end, or the purpose or truth is freedom.
As character and calling remain the focus of your disciple- making efforts, you will see more genuine transformation in people… not simply an accumulation of Christian knowledge.
Outcome #1 of Christ in You: Character
The Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Galatians 5:22-23
Jesus is the epitome of godly character, and this character is summed up in these verses. As we read in Romans 8:29, Jesus’ plan is for us to become more and more like Him.
I have a grandfather who was a Baptist country preacher. He read the Bible every night. He quoted the Bible to us often. He was also one of the meanest men I have ever met. He verbally bombarded his wife and family with critical words. He was not patient. He was not kind. He was not gentle.
Was Jesus in Him?
Many will answer this question based upon the declarations of faith my grandfather had made. If he had believed that Jesus rose from the dead” and “declared that Jesus is Lord,” then he must have been saved because Jesus is in Him.
I want to believe that, but there are a few things that challenge that view. The first challenge is how Jesus interacted with a fig tree as He entered Jerusalem. The tree had leaves, but it did not have fruit on it. The lack of fruit prompted Jesus to curse the tree. It withered and died in a day. The point? If you have leaves, you should have fruit. If you do not bear fruit, you are not really attached to Jesus’ vine and are at risk of being eliminated.
In 2 Peter 1, Peter discusses the gradual progression of love in a person’s life as they follow Jesus. The list looks much like the fruit of the Spirit. After listing this evidence of the Spirit’s presence, Peter writes, “For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his past sins.” 2 Peter 1: 8-9
My grandfather would have passed a bible knowledge test. He would have passed a preaching proficiency test in some circles. He would not have passed a fruit check. Jesus is looking for fruit. It is the evidence of His presence in our lives. Jesus came to change our character.
How does Jesus cultivate this fruit in our lives?
This fruit is born in us as we abide with Jesus through the ancient habits, or disciplines. A few of these disciples are prayer, bible reading, journaling, and mutual accountability/submission. Developing these habits helps
us abide with Jesus. It is important to remember that these habits are not the goal, or the end. They are simply the means to an end. The end is fellowship with and obedience through Jesus.
As we abide with Jesus, He will reveal things about us that can be more fruitful. He will also prompt us to take actions that we would not have taken on our own. These “obedience opportunities” are the actual experiences that render the fruit in our lives.
One example of this is a time I was in a heated conflict with my daughter. Our voices escalated during this conflict, and we went to sleep, still angry with one another. I woke up the next morning, and my bible reading included the “A gentle answer turns away wrath,” passage. Jesus clearly let me know that I was not gentle. I chose to ask for forgiveness, and He generously gave it to me. Jesus, however, was not done. He clearly challenged me to also ask for forgiveness from my daughter and to give her permission to remind me of this verse the next time I start to escalate. At this point
I had a choice: I could obey Him, which would be hard, or I could not obey Him, which would be easier in the short term but harder in the long term.
Truthfully, the only thing threatened by Jesus’ challenge was my ego. Not surprisingly, it is my ego that must die for Jesus’ character to emerge. I chose to take a nick out of my ego and obey Jesus. This experience, coupled with hinders of similar experiences with Jesus, has gradually born fruit in my life.
Jesus’ character is available to anyone who asks for it and focuses on cultivating it.
Outcome #2 of Christ in You: Calling
We are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Ephesians 2:10
Whereas character involves who we are becoming, our calling involves what we should focus on doing. In
Ephesians 2:10, we learn that Jesus has a purpose for us. We call that purpose our calling. Our calling is primarily expressed as we discover, develop, and deploy our Gifts in our area of Passion as we allow Jesus to write our Story.
If you put the first letters of those three words together, you see the familiar GPS term. GPS is a modern technology that shows you where you are on the planet by triangulating signals from multiple satellites. Our spiritual GPS triangulates the three signals that God emits from Himself.
Gifts
God has given each of you a gift from his great variety of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another.
1 Peter 4:10
There are many Spiritual gifts listed in the New Testament. While these gifts are a key indicator of the calling Jesus has for our lives, knowing what they are is not enough.
God has also given us natural abilities as well as the ability to develop additional skills through education and training.
Passions
These gifts and abilities tell us what activities God will use to most powerfully accomplish His purposes
through us, but they do not necessarily share where or how we will use them. To discover the answers to these questions, we need to discern which primary passions God has given to us.
God uses the experiences in our lives to give us purpose for our lives. Through these experiences, God develops within us passions for certain people and causes. What kind of people do you care most about? What causes could you give your energy to? The answers to these questions will help you know where to primarily use your gifts.
Another area of our passion is the agenda we bring to the table as we exercise our gifts in our area of passion. We call this our spiritual influencing style, which is our way of talking about the five-fold ministry found in Ephesians 4:11, most commonly known as APEST.
Story
The final question to ask when it comes to our calling is, “what is my next step in developing my calling?” The best way to know your next step is to look back and see your previous steps in the story of your life. How has God been developing your calling to date? That will best inform how to proceed.
You can take an online assessment to discover your personal GPS at gpsnow.church.
The Result: The Hope of Glory, or Impact
We have not been transformed for our benefit only. We have been transformed to share that transformation with others. As we grow in character and calling, Jesus impacts the world around us with His grace and power.
The relative impact of developing character and calling can be seen by doing simple math through our symbol, and that math is very telling.
If a person’s character is relatively low, perhaps a 3 on a scale from 1-10, and they have never even heard that Jesus has a calling on their life, perhaps a 1 on a scale from 1-10, then the relative impact they can expect to have is only 3 on a scale of 1-100. Here is the math…
3 (character) x 1 (calling) = 3 (Impact)
If this person starts to engage with a disciple-making experience that is focused on developing both character and calling, look what happens when their character goes up slightly but their calling takes a quick jump…
4 (character) x 3 (calling) = 12 (Impact)
As you can see, small steps can lead to significant impact. Impact, in turn, becomes the fuel that inspires more character and calling development. This person, for perhaps the first time in their life, is living on purpose.
They want to protect that experience, so they accelerate the pursuit of character development. In turn, God honors that purity with more power through their calling. This changes the math even more…
6 (character) x 5 (calling) = 30 (Impact)
The Impact has doubled, and so has the fuel for further development. Over time, character and calling increase and God’s impact in the world contributes to His coming glory. May character and calling become our language more and more!
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
Where have you seen God make an impact in this world through you the most? How much did that impact relate to the growth you took in character? In calling?
What next step do you need to take to develop your character? Your calling?
What next step do you need to take to ensure that every disciple-making experience you lead will focus on developing character and calling?
The Impact Equation is a picture, a mirror, and a window.
Picture to understand: what does the Impact Equation show you about being a disciple of Jesus?
Mirror to reflect: what does the Impact Equation show you about yourself?
Window to see: what should you do about what you see in and through the Impact Equation?
KEY SCRIPTURES FOR THE IMPACT EQUATION
The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
John 10:10
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.
Romans 8: 28-29
The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.
Galatians 5: 22-25
If you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his past sins.
2 Peter 1: 8-9
We are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Ephesians 2:10
Now about spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be ignorant. There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit.
There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. To one there is given through the Spirit the message of wisdom, to another the message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues. All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines.
From 1 Corinthians 12
Discovery Bible Studies for Impact Equation
Galatians 5:16-26
John 15:1-10
Romans 12:1-8
2 Corinthians 5:17-20
DBS Process (S.O.A.P.)
Scripture
• Read the passage
• Have someone put it in their own words
Observe
• What stands out to you?
• What does this text say about God?
• What does this text say about people?
Apply
• How can you specifically live out this passage in the next few days? (Everyone creates an ‘I WILL’ STATEMENT)
Person
• Who are you going to tell about what you discovered this week?