What is a Disciple? – Making Disciples
What is a Disciple?
Together Church | Pastor Brandon Werner
August 16, 2026 | Series: Making Disciples
INTRODUCTION
As promised at the BASH, this morning, we’ll pick up steam in this new series on making disciples of Jesus.
Last week, we heard the mandate from King Jesus:
Go and make disciples
That’s the assignment.
This week, we’ll define it.
To fulfill the mandate of Jesus, we must know, “What is a disciple?”
Definitions matter.
A lot.
Try this…
Right now, let’s all think about a dog. Picture one dog in your mind.
Now look at this picture. Which dog is closest to the one you imagined? There may not even be an option up here that is even remotely close to what you were thinking.
Let’s try again…
Everybody think about a Golden Retriever.
Now, if you’ve ever learned what a Golden Retriever is, you are thinking of a very specific looking dog.
Most of us are probably thinking about something like this.
In my experience, what just happened with this exercise happens all the time in churches.
You know what is not uncommon?
Finding a church with a website that says they want to make disciples or a mission statement about making disciples.
I’m grateful for that. Based on Jesus’ example and His Great Commission that should be an easy thing for Bible believing Christians to agree on.
Do you know what is uncommon?
Finding a church that shares a common definition of what a disciple of Jesus is and how to make one.
That’s rare.
Most churches are like the first example… you say “go make disciples” and what people imagine is pretty different.
If we are going to be an effective team of disciples that make more disciples of Jesus together, we must share a common definition.
Otherwise, we’ll all be saying the same words but meaning something very different.
So, where do we start?
We will start with Jesus.
Why?
The objective is to make more disciples OF HIM.
Not disciples of Brandon.
Not disciples of Stephen.
Not disciples of Jerry, or Chad, or Seth.
Not disciples of Rachael, or Evelyn, or Dennah.
Disciples of Jesus.
And that’s great news, because Jesus is the greatest disciple-maker of all time.
His work with twelve disciples started a movement that sent the gospel blazing and turned the whole world upside down.
When we make disciples, we want to make disciples…
- Of Him
- Like Him
- For Him
So, when we ask, “What is a disciple,” we will look to Jesus for the answer. He is our teacher and our chief example.
If you have your Bible, and I hope you do, open with me to Matthew 4:18-22
Last week, we looked at the last words Jesus spoke to His disciples in Matthew’s gospel account. This week, we will look at the origin story in Matthew’s gospel of when Jesus first called His disciples to follow Him.
Let’s get into the text.
This story happens at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry…
Matthew 4:18-22
18 While walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon (who is called Peter) and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. 19 And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” 20 Immediately they left their nets and followed him. 21 And going on from there he saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets, and he called them. 22 Immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him.
That’s the story, now let’s focus on what Jesus said…
Matthew 4:19
And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
The invitation is the definition.
From the first moment Jesus called His disciples, He was already telling them what it means to be His disciple.
Jesus said,
Follow me
And I will make you
Fishers of men
There are three parts to this statement.
BODY
- Follow Me
Do you want to be a disciple of Jesus?
Do you want to make disciples of Him?
It begins with a head choice and a conscience decision… Will you follow Jesus?
Not your feelings. Not your personal moral compass. Not another influencer or thinker. Not your family or your friends. Not the money or the fame.
Will you follow JESUS?
In the text, when Jesus said, “Follow,” it is literally translated, “Come! After me.” It was a literal invitation to come to Him and with Him, to get behind Him, and to let Him lead.
Following Jesus means being with Him.
Following Jesus means He’s in the front leading, and you’re in the back imitating Him.
Following is simple – it means someone else leads.
Now watch this…
In this passage, the first thing “following” involved was a call to BE WITH JESUS… it was a call to close proximity with Him.
We become most like the people we spend the most time with.
Before this call, Peter and Andrew spent most their time with fish and other fishermen. It was the life they knew.
From this moment on, Peter and Andrew’s life would never be the same. They dropped their nets and followed Jesus. They started spending their days with Him, learning more about Him, and doing what He said and what He showed them to do.
The first step to becoming Jesus’ disciple was leaving their own way of living behind to be with Jesus and live His way.
And if you want to be a disciple of Jesus or make any disciples of Jesus, that’s your first step, too.
Later in Matthew, Jesus said this…
Matthew 10:24-25
24 “A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master. 25 It is enough for the disciple to be like his teacher, and the servant like his master.
The goal of discipleship is not to become a better version of me.
The goal of discipleship is for me to become more like Jesus.
He is the Teacher, I am His disciple.
He is the Master, I am His servant.
It is enough for me to be like Him.
That’s follow.
For some of you, this feels really personal because of what you’re wrestling with. For example…
- What are you tolerating in your life that needs to go?
- What are you withholding from Jesus that He wants you to give?
- What is Jesus asking you to do that you haven’t done yet?
- What voices are you listening to that contradict His?
How are you allowing your own emotions, preferences, opinions, or desires to lead you instead of being led by Jesus?
When Jesus called Peter and Andrew and James and John to follow Him, they immediately dropped their nets and followed Him.
That is significant.
Those nets represented everything about their lives before this encounter with Jesus.
They left behind their comfort zone.
They left behind their livelihood.
They left behind what they knew.
Once Jesus called, those nets no longer had any claim on them. Their lives became about one thing – following Jesus.
You cannot follow Jesus while insisting that you get to choose the direction.
At some point, every disciple discovers that Jesus is leading somewhere they wouldn’t have chosen on their own.
That’s when following gets real.
And when that happens, when we drop the nets and go, that’s what it really means to FOLLOW.
A disciple of Jesus is someone who is FOLLOWING Jesus.
Being His disciple means you are following Him.
Jesus said, “Follow me…”
- And I will make you.
A disciple of Jesus is being changed by Jesus… He is making us into something new.
From His first call, Jesus promised His disciples that discipleship with Him would change their lives.
Every time we baptize someone at Together Church, we make this declaration…
“Buried with Christ in baptism and raised to walk in newness of life!”
That “buried with Christ in baptism” is dropping the nets, it’s leaving our old lives behind. It’s a declaration: my old life – with its sin and shame – is buried with Him and gone.
And “raised to walk in newness of life” is a declaration of faith! We are saying, “Jesus HAS CHANGED and will CONTINUE TO CHANGE my life!”
If you’re a disciple of Jesus…
Jesus HAS ALREADY changed you!
The moment you were saved, God performed a miracle. Through faith in Jesus, you were born again of the spirit of God!
Through spiritual rebirth…
- My old, dead spirit dies with Christ
- My old life and all my sin and shame are buried with Him
- And I am raised with Him as a new creation in Christ!
- Born again of the Spirit of God
This change is immediate. It is a change of nature so that – as the Apostle Peter put it – you become a partaker of God’s divine nature. This change happens in your spirit the moment you are saved.
How amazing is that? Disciples of Jesus have been changed by Jesus!
But that’s not all.
Not only has Jesus ALREADY changed you through spiritual rebirth, but Jesus CONTINUES to change His disciples by changing the way we think and live.
The Bible calls this change SANCTIFICATION.
It is the process of a disciple of Jesus becoming more and more like Jesus in the way they think and live.
Sanctification is an ongoing work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer. The process of helping others grow in sanctification is what we call DISCIPLESHIP.
We can see that process unfold in the ministry of Jesus and in the way He made disciples.
When Jesus first called these disciples to follow Him, they were…
- Insecure and uncertain
- Unsure about who Jesus was
- Easily influenced by their emotions
- Constantly battling confusion
- Made a lot of mistakes
- Had a lot to learn about ministering to others
- Were very self-centered
But as they spent time with Jesus, their mindset and lifestyle really changed.
In fact, there’s this moment in Acts that takes place right after Jesus ascended into heaven and sent His Holy Spirit to fill His disciples.
Two familiar characters reappear in this story… Peter and John!
Two of the fishermen Jesus called in today’s text.
Peter and John were not the same men anymore… and others knew why.
In Acts 3, they were walking into the temple when they encountered a man who had been unable to walk since birth.
Peter healed the man in the name of Jesus Christ.
A crowd gathered, and Peter immediately started preaching the gospel.
That got the attention of the religious leaders.
They arrested Peter and John, put them in jail overnight, and the next day brought them before the most powerful religious leaders in Jerusalem.
These were some of the same men who had condemned Jesus to death.
And now Peter and John stood in front of them and boldly proclaimed that Jesus Christ had risen from the dead and that salvation is found in Him.
The religious leaders listened to them and then took counsel among themselves.
Listen to how they responded…
Acts 4:13
13 Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been with Jesus.
That’s the evidence of discipleship.
They had been with Jesus.
And being with Jesus had changed them.
The fishermen Jesus called in Matthew 4 had been changed by Jesus because they had followed Him and been with Him.
Discipleship is a process. There is a change Jesus brings instantly when we hear the gospel and believe. But there is also a change that happens through a process.
When we spend more time with Jesus and His disciples with a heart to learn, that process moves quickly.
When we let other things take priority in our lives, that process happens slowly – we can even get stuck in our spiritual development or even slide backwards.
This hits personally for some of you right now…
- What have you allowed in your life that has taken away the priority of spending time with Jesus and with other disciples of Him?
When we follow Jesus, He changes us… but that change comes through being close to Jesus and following Him.
But there is a specific way Jesus said He would change His disciples in Matthew 4:19…
Jesus said, “Follow Me, and I will make you…”
- Fishers of men.
A disciple of Jesus is someone living committed to the mission of Jesus.
We have a saying around here:
Clarity is kind.
When Jesus gave this first call in Matthew’s gospel, He left no room for questions about what kind of specific change He would bring about in the life of His disciples.
As they followed Him, Jesus would change them into fishers of men – He would make them become disciples who could go and make more disciples of Him.
From the time He called them until the Great Commission – and every moment in between – Jesus was leading this disciples to become disciple makers.
This is ALWAYS the objective of disciple-making.
Can and will discipleship help you mature personally? Absolutely!
Will being discipled help you learn more about Jesus and what He commands? You bet.
When you mature as a disciple, will it inevitably improve your inner relational skills and help you grow in love for the people around you? No question.
Does wisdom increase through discipleship, and can that wisdom lead to more success in your life? Definitely.
But are any of these things Jesus’ ultimate goal for disciple-making? Absolutely not.
The goal of Jesus is The Great Commission, and it is what Jesus said explicitly in His call and definition of being His disciple…
I WILL MAKE YOU FISHERS OF MEN.
The goal of discipleship is to help someone grow in spiritual maturity to the point where they can go effectively make more disciples.
Before this moment on the beach, Peter and Andrew’s daily mission was fishing for fish. They were fishermen by trade who woke up every morning with a purpose to go and catch some more fish.
When Jesus called them, He gave them an illustration that met them right where they were…
He was saying, “If you follow me, I’m going to take you through a process where you become men who go fish for the souls of men. Making disciples will be your new life purpose.”
I said it last week and I’ll say it again…
When you ask someone to disciple you, or when you are released to go disciple others, this is the goal.
Discipleship will change many things in your life.
But the job’s not done until the disciple becomes a disciple-maker… a fisher of men.
We have another saying: making disciples like this is better caught than taught. I can preach about this all day… but Jesus lived life on life with these disciples. How do you experience that now? We will get into that as this series progresses.
Disciples of Jesus are fishers of men. The Church is Jesus’ team – working together to make more disciples of Him.
CONCLUSION
In Matthew 4:19, Jesus provides a simple definition that tells us what it means to be His disciple. He said…
“Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
A disciple of Jesus is someone who…
- Follows Jesus
- Is being changed by Jesus
- Lives committed to the mission of Jesus
This definition isn’t everything there is to know about being a disciple or making disciples of Jesus. Every account in the gospels, every insight from the Apostles, all of it helps us grow in our understanding of what it means to be a disciple of Jesus.
But this simple definition serves as a framework.
When we start where Jesus began, we can all think “Golden Retriever.” Jesus’ definition helps us share a common definition so we can move together in Jesus’ mission.
Now that we have it, let me ask…
How are you doing?
How has deciding to be a disciple of Jesus changed your life?
What is different about your life because you chose to follow Him?
Your answer to that question reveals a lot about what you believe it means to be His disciple.
If you have the right definition, following Jesus inevitably changes everything.
The definition is the invitation!
INVITATION
Now that you have a better understanding of the definition, will you accept the invitation?
How’s it going when it comes to following Jesus?
- Is He in the front?
- Is He the leader, or are you allowing yourself to be led by other voices or by your own emotions?
Is there someone here who is calling themselves a disciple of Jesus, but you know for sure you are willfully disregarding one of His commands?
This is your moment to return to the Lord.
He is graciously prompting you, calling you, to come after Him. Will you follow?
How’s it going when it comes to being changed by Jesus?
- Like Peter and John, is it obvious to others that you’ve been with Jesus?
- Are you spending time with Him in His Word?
- Are you sharing life with other disciples of Jesus and learning to imitate His example in the way they live?
I’m talking to someone specific now…
You’ve let other priorities creep up in your life. If you were honest, your spiritual growth is slow or has stopped… and it’s because you’re not being with Jesus and with His disciples.
The definition is the invitation.
Will you change your priorities right now? Make time with Jesus and time with His Church the top priority on your list.
How’s it going when it comes to being a fisher of men?
- Is the goal of your discipleship to become a mature disciple of Jesus who can make more disciples of Him?
- Are you willing to drop your nets? Will you trade your own life ambitions and live on mission with Jesus?
CALL TO PRAYER
We want to close this morning with a time of prayer.
The definition is the invitation.
Look at the screen. Let me review these first. If one applies to you, I’ll invite you to stand for prayer.
- Follow Jesus
Is there something in your life that you know you need to drop to follow Jesus?
- Be changed by Jesus
Do you know you need to put your time with Jesus and His Church ahead of the other things you have let take its place?
- Commit to the mission of Jesus
What is your ultimate purpose in life? Is it something other than making disciples of Jesus? Are you ready to accept Jesus’ mission as your ultimate purpose?
If any of these three apply to you, would you please stand?