Friendship Association sees discipleship go grassroots

Friendship Association sees discipleship go grassroots

Ernie Carroll says what’s happening with discipleship in Friendship Baptist Association right now is associationalism at its finest.

“It’s about multiplying, and it levels the playing field between small churches and large churches,” said Carroll, the association’s director of missions. “It’s a way to unleash the church in the community.”

It’s simple, he said, but Friendship Association is definitely not the first to do it. It’s a biblical model that he saw working amazingly well when he went to visit his son, who is doing missions work in another country.

“I told him, ‘I’ve been in associational missions for three decades, and you’re teaching me how to do associational missions now,’” Carroll said.

Simple concept

The concept is simple, he said. First he goes into churches in his association and walks them through “The Disciple Maker’s Handbook” by Bobby Harrington and Josh Patrick, a book that offers seven elements of a discipleship lifestyle.

“We talk about things like the big story of the Bible and how to read the Bible with someone else and walk them through it,” Carroll said.

Scott Gross, pastor of Philadelphia Baptist Church, Oneonta, said he’s already seeing it take hold at his church.

“It was very encouraging. There’s been fruit from it,” Gross said.

His congregation is older, but one of the women heard Carroll’s admonition to use technology to reach others, and she started a Bible study through a Facebook Messenger group.

Carroll said that’s exactly the kind of thing he’s hoping for — for people to find ways to get out in their neighborhoods and communities and live life as disciples.

“This is a chain reaction where individuals in the churches go out and do a Bible study with an individual in their family, a co-worker, a classmate — somebody like that,” he said. “It’s not addition, adding people to the church, even though it could and can do that. It’s about multiplying — spreading the gospel.” (Grace Thornton)