The Pursuit of Knowledge for the Sake of Fulfilling the Great Commission

The call to proclaim God is the call to know God. The command for disciples to develop more disciples implies a knowledge of God. The task of raising disciples can hardly be accomplished without a working knowledge of what, or in this case, who, they are to be disciples of. Though this may be a simple premise agreed upon by people, we frequently challenge this premise when we attempt to make disciples of others without being disciples ourselves. Or, to use the words of Scott Pace and Shane Pruitt, "Many of us are telling others about the God we don't know very well"(1).

One has to wonder if their assessment is accurate. More than questioning the validity of their assessment, though, what's more important is perhaps asking, "Are we convicted by their assessment?" It's easy for us to ask if their assessment is valid, but in doing so, we shift the burden to others and start to question whether or not they are engaging others about God without knowing God. However, the more important question for each of us is to bring this back to ourselves and ask if we are guilty of this practice. To lay open my own conviction before you, I can say that reading those words is piercing, not only because I think they are accurate of professing Christians in general, but because I know they speak the truth about me. In fact, the more I engage in discipleship, the more I am convicted by that reality. How much am I trying to get others to know the God I don't know very well myself?

Knowing that Scott Pace and Shane Pruitt are describing me leads me to believe that they are accurately describing many others as well. In keeping with the call to walk worthy of our calling as believers, then, it's worth challenging ourselves with a thorough self-examination on this point (see Ephesians 4:1-6). Specifically, as disciple-makers, we challenge ourselves about our own personal pursuit of a knowledge of God, willingly asking, "Do I know God sufficiently enough to make disciples of others, and how am I continuing in my pursuit of knowledge?”

A catalyst for the pursuit of knowledge of God is the conviction that knowledge matters and keeps us from going astray. Yet, I think another factor is far more motivating: (theoretically and practically) greater knowledge of God leads to greater trust in God. The more we know God, the more we see His character is true, faithful, and good, and our response to that is a more significant trust and reliance upon the Lord, and an outcome of that is the ability to lead others in their pursuit of God. Not only does this mean you are more equipped to lead others in their pursuit of knowledge of God, but more importantly, God uses you as an example of what it means to faithfully rely upon Him.  

This pursuit of knowledge, though, is a dual pursuit. Knowledge in the Christian life is often delineated between knowing about something and knowing through a relationship. We need both. Discipleship requires that we know about God, that we have made a study of Him . . . in other words, that we study theology. By knowing about God, there is confidence in our relationship and position with God (see Paul’s encouragement to the Thessalonians in 1 Thessalonians 1:4). Knowing about God leads to knowing about God’s plan for the lives of His people and being able to trust Him in that plan because of knowledge about what He has done throughout history (cf. Philippians1:19; 1 John 2:29). Yet, this knowledge about God is no substitute for knowing god through relationship. It’s this type of knowledge that defines our salvation and leads to our sanctification (cf. John 17:3; Philippians 3:10). The combination of both types of knowledge enables one then to live out the call to make disciple, but I think the relationship between the two is more important. We can have knowledge about God without actually ‘knowing’ God, but our knowledge of God should enable us to ‘know’ God.

If this pursuit of knowledge is so important in enabling us to make disciples, that leads to a natural question: How do we pursue this type of knowledge? The obvious answer is one must be in the Word and in constant prayer. To know the Lord is to spend time with Him, speak to Him in prayer, and allow Him to speak through His Word. Without these fundamental habits of grace, a person will lack the information necessary to know about God and the relationship necessary to know Him personally. However, there's more we can do in this pursuit. We see in the Great Commission the call to make disciples of all nations, which implies that the disciple-makers are disciples themselves.

Therefore, it's reasonable to say that while being in the Word and prayer is part of the pursuit of knowing God, we should also submit to being disciples ourselves. It was Howard Hendricks who said, “If you stop growing today, you stop teaching tomorrow,” conveying the idea that in order to make more disciples, we should be in a process of growth ourselves (2). An additional but perhaps unexpected step in this pursuit is service, specifically serving according to the gifting He has placed upon you (Romans 12:1-8; 1 Corinthians12:1-11). Part of God's perfect design is the individual gifts given to each member of the body because, by it, the body of Christ functions as a complete body and is built up (Ephesians 4:11-16). What that means is that God works through the service of His people, and so, one’s service for the Lord becomes an opportunity to see God at work, to enjoy what He is doing and being part of it, and thus knowing God through a relationship with Him and the work He is doing.

My expectation is that none of these steps is surprising. However, when placed into the context of making disciples, I hope their importance is elevated and becomes a motivating factor in pursuing God. After all, the call to proclaim God is a call to know God.

(1) Scott Pace and Shane Pruitt, Calling Out the Called;Discipling Those Called to Ministry Leadership (Nashville, TN: Broadman& Holman Publishers, 2022), 41.

(2) It should be noted that Hendricks was speaking more broadly of a teaching context, specifically from his experience as a seminary professor, but it can certainly be applied to the discipleship relationship also. Howard Hendricks, Teaching to Change Lives: Seven Proven Ways to Make Your Teaching Come Alive (Colorado Springs, CO: Multnomah Books,1987), 17.

‍