Recently, I was reflecting on the real meaning of being a disciple of Jesus and was reminded of the childhood game Follow the Leader. You probably remember it—the leader sets the pace and everyone else mimics their actions. If they step over a rock, you step over the rock; if they wave their arms, you wave your arms. The objective is simple: follow the leader as precisely as possible.

Confession: I have been serving as a missionary leader in South Asia for more than 19 years, and I still have seasons when evangelism feels hard. 

Malcolm Gladwell's seminal work, The Tipping Point, offers profound insights into how small changes can lead to significant shifts, a concept that aligns seamlessly with our core missionary objective. This article will discuss how the principles outlined in the book can be directly applied to our core missionary task, emphasizing the importance of context, stickiness, and the roles of connectors, mavens, and salespeople in achieving our goals.

Simply put, the Metric Black Hole is the idea that there are many things that we do for which we do not have an accurate measurement of how they contribute to the bottom line.

We’d been on the road in South Asia for three weeks. We’d covered thousands of kilometers and met hundreds of people. The purpose was to hear their stories and experience the life of a movement of God.

In the early days of my disciple-making journey, I went door-to-door on a weekly basis with others in Austin, TX. We prayed and shared the Gospel with those who would open their doors. Candidly, I didn’t like it.

We see in this passage that Jesus saw what the disciples completely missed. They missed the opportunity to reach the Samaritan village.

One balmy summer evening, I was prayer walking with my friend through a predominantly Muslim area in my city. It wasn’t the smell of street food and masala chai or the horns of the gridlocked vehicles that overwhelmed me the most; it was the sheer amount of people bustling through the tight streets who I knew had never - and likely would never - hear the good news about Jesus that hit me the hardest at that moment.

Without prayer, there simply is no movement of God among any person or any place. Prayer is the greater catalytic work in movements just as blood is the fluid of life in the human body. It flows through every part of the miracle of reproducing disciples and churches.

Today, there is more qualitative and quantitative research on the core missionary task than ever. Those not involved in research or directly receiving the information often do not fully understand the purpose, benefit, or process of good missiological research.