I am notorious for downsizing. I downsize my closet continually. I downsize my children’s toys when they aren’t watching and I downsize my husband’s belongings whenever I can get away with it. So, it came as no surprise the day I found my two-year-old standing stark naked in his crib with his bedding, his clothing, and even his diaper piled up in one tidy corner. “What are you doing?” I asked. “Just making a little pile for the Goodwill,” was his earnest reply as I burst out laughing.
A decade later, I keenly remember this incident as I consider my calling to be a disciple-maker (Matt 28:19). God has blessed me with children and those children are my disciples. Thus, when my children see me practicing the spiritual discipline of prayer, they learn to pray. When they see the Word of God being studied and honored, they learn to treasure it. When they experience the love of Christ alive in me, they learn to be selfless. If the fruit of the Spirit is evident in me, a disciple-maker, then I can expect it to be evident in my disciples.
Likewise, when I fail to demonstrate Christ-like love to my husband, it comes as no surprise when my son and daughter follow suit. When I speak harshly to my husband, I should not be surprised to hear my daughter speak unkindly to her brother. When I overreact to my husband’s imperfections, I can expect to see that same pattern of impatience in my son. After all, I am making disciples.
It is a daunting task, this disciple-making, requiring my utmost. I, on my own, am ill-equipped. It is in seeking first the kingdom of God that the tools necessary for disciple-making will be added unto me (Matt 6:33). Disciple-making requires my utmost and I can only give my utmost when I make Christ my true treasure. Thank God for grace! Thank God that I am being made new day by day. Thank God that I am not left alone in this calling to disciple my children for Christ is with me “to the very end of the age” (Matt 28:20b).
I am a sinner raising sinners, but this is not the whole story. Jesus has taken my filthy rags and given me His clothes of perfect righteousness. Therefore, “I delight greatly in the LORD; my soul rejoices in my God. For He has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of His righteousness” (Isa 61:10). He is renewing me by His Holy Spirit (Titus 3:5); and what’s more, He is doing the same in my children. After all, they are ultimately His disciples and He is the true Disciple-Maker.