Connect • Build Intentional Relationships with Nonbelievers, Part 1

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Do you know the Bible well but have difficulty interacting with the nonbelievers around you? Do you depend on the church staff to not only reach the community but to also teach each person who comes through the door? Now is the time for you to become a Christ-follower not only in your personal walk of faith but also in disciplemaking. Jesus commissioned His followers to make disciples for Him. He demonstrated how to do this while He was on earth. It was part of His lifestyle, and He wants it to be part of our lifestyle, too. In this series of articles, I will share with you what it means to be a disciplemaker and give you helpful tools so that you can live intentionally as a disciplemaker in your daily life. This is part 1 of post #2 in our “Lifestyle Disciplemaking” blog series, adapted from our book, Leap into Lifestyle Disciplemaking. In this article, we will look at why we should intentionally connect with nonbelievers.

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Disciplemaking is a lifestyle, not a program

Disciplemaking is a ministry lifestyle. It is not a program. It is mirroring what Jesus did with His own followers as He taught them how to connect with those who are not Christians, share the gospel with them, establish new believers in their faith in Christ, and show them how to become disciplemakers, too.

Disciplemaking is going beyond personal discipleship. We use the word “discipleship” to refer to the normal process for Christians to get established and grow in their faith (Sunday sermons, Bible studies, classes, and small groups). Disciplemaking is the full process of seeing people come to faith in Christ, grow in Him (discipleship), and then being equipped to help others through the same process (disciplemaking).

Christian women who are following Jesus can live intentionally to connect with nonbelievers, personally establish believers (new and growing) both inside and outside the church, and equip them to engage other nonbelievers and establish new believers. That is making disciples who make disciples who make disciples. 

Who can do this? Every woman can become a disciplemaker–teens and college students, senior adults, singles, married, widowed, moms, empty nesters. Take what you have learned already (discipleship) and take someone else through that process (disciplemaking). Not everyone will become a leader, but every believer can become a disciplemaker and choose a lifestyle of disciplemaking. Jesus showed us how to do this.

Jesus built intentional relationships

Disciplemaking starts with getting to know those around you who are nonbelievers. A nonbeliever is someone who does not know Christ yet! She may want to know Him but does not know how. She may not know enough about Him to want to know Him. But we know God desires her to know Him. So, if we look at those around us as women who want to know Jesus but do not know how, we can have compassion and courage for helping at least one to know Him. This will require us to be strategic in how we help her as Jesus was strategic.

Jesus intentionally went to those who needed to know Him.

Throughout His three and a half years of ministry, Jesus intentionally went to places where the people were who needed to know Him. He did not let people keep Him in one community to benefit from His presence.

At sunset, the people brought to Jesus all who had various kinds of sickness, and laying his hands on each one, he healed them. Moreover, demons came out of many people, shouting, “You are the Son of God!” But he rebuked them and would not allow them to speak, because they knew he was the Messiah. At daybreak, Jesus went out to a solitary place. The people were looking for him and when they came to where he was, they tried to keep him from leaving them. But he said, “I must proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent.” And he kept on preaching in the synagogues of Judea. (Luke 4:40-44)

The situation just referenced occurred in Capernaum after Jesus healed Peter’s mother-in-law. Notice what the townspeople wanted to do—keep Him from leaving them. They wanted to have their own community healer. Where is the concern for those in other communities who needed His healing power? Jesus, however, knew that His mission was to go to other towns and “proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God.” He knew His purpose.

As I mentioned in “The Call to Lifestyle Disciplemaking,” we can get very cozy and comfortable hanging out with Christians all the time. That is like keeping Jesus to ourselves. We need to resist that temptation and understand that our purpose is the same as His—go to others outside of our community and proclaim the good news of the Gospel.

Jesus built relationships with anyone interested in Him.

Jesus built relationships with those who were interested, and He was known as a friend of sinners.

After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector by the name of Levi sitting at his tax booth. “Follow me,” Jesus said to him, and Levi got up, left everything and followed him. Then Levi held a great banquet for Jesus at his house, and a large crowd of tax collectors and others were eating with them. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” (Luke 5:27-32)

Jesus recognized that Levi (aka Matthew) was interested in following Him. Jesus invited Levi. Levi said “Yes!” Then, Levi held a party and invited all his tax collector friends. His life had been changed, and he wanted his friends to meet the reason. What a great excuse to throw a party!

Apparently, he had a house full of coworkers! I always want to ask the question, “What made them want to come?” Tax collectors were known to be greedy and charged the Jewish people far more than what was owed. They were in cahoots with the Romans. All of that made them despised. But no one is beyond the power of the Gospel.

From Luke’s gospel, we know that tax collectors had already shown an interest in wanting a new life by going out to hear John the Baptist and get baptized by him (Luke 3:12-13). They were spiritual seekers. What did they have to lose? Nothing! They were already shunned by the “religious” community because of their lifestyle. Maybe not all the tax collectors who came to Levi’s house decided to follow Jesus, but enough were interested in listening to Him. If someone was not talking about God’s true way of approaching life, how would they otherwise know?

This is what is said about those who responded:

All the people, even the tax collectors, when they heard Jesus’ words, acknowledged that God’s way was right, because they had been baptized by John. (Luke 7:29)

Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. (Luke 15:1)

To those who wanted to know more about Him, Jesus gave them more teaching. He even used tax collectors in His parables representing those who knew they needed God and were seeking Him though the “religious” people avoided them. Besides Levi, Zacchaeus was also a tax collector who turned his life around when Jesus entered his life. He was hungry for a different kind of life. Jesus met him there in his need (Luke 19:2-8).

For more help with this, read my article, “Live a Question-Stimulating Life in View of Your Neighbors.”

Jesus invited people to join Him on His mission.

Jesus invited people to join Him in His mission. For some, that meant they were to travel with Him. For others, they were to go back home and share about Him with their family and neighbors.

In a non-Jewish region on the eastern side of the Sea of Galilee, Jesus healed a severely demonized man. How do you think the healed man responded? The same as you and I would.

As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon-possessed begged to go with him. Jesus did not let him, but said, “Go home to your own people and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you.” So the man went away and began to tell in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him. And all the people were amazed. (Mark 5:18-20)

Of course, the grateful man wanted to stay close to Jesus and hang out with the other disciples. But Jesus gave him a mission. “Go to those who have not met Me and tell your story so they can know Me, too.” The healed man obeyed Jesus and told his story not just to one person but to many. “And all the people were amazed.”

The evidences of human distress are everywhere around us. Women are in bondage to guilt, fear, destructive behavior, and fatigue due to the burden of responsibilities. Erroneous views of God leave them feeling empty, confused, and without meaning and purpose. Failure in relationships produces a sense of rejection, worthlessness, and extreme loneliness. Jesus Christ’s plan to meet that need for every woman is Himself. And He invited you to join Him on that mission.

Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” (Matthew 9:35-38)

Do you desire to be a laborer for the harvest? I hope your answer is “Yes!” You and I need to join Jesus in the mission to build intentional relationships with those who do not know Christ or do not know Him well. As I mentioned in “The Call to Disciplemaking,” Jesus’ example in the gospels reveals to us that lifestyle disciplemaking is an intentional, relational process flowing from a love for God and love from God for people. We will start getting ready for lifestyle disciplemaking with something simple—learning how to love people.

Read all our articles in the lifestyle disciplemaking series. You can read part 2 of this article and find out how to intentionally connect with nonbelievers.

Let Jesus lead you into lifestyle disciplemaking. Jesus followers become disciplemakers.

AI was not used to generate this post.