Your Personalized Disciple Making Makeover
Doug Burrier
You already have a strong foundation with a whole-Bible reading plan and an active desire to invest in specific people. If you clarify a simple disciple definition and make personal application the normal outcome of each meeting—while intentionally relying on the Holy Spirit—you’ll likely see your confidence rise and your process become far easier to reproduce.
Quick Snapshot
You’re actively investing in specific people, anchored by a cover-to-cover Bible reading plan, but right now your approach feels less confident because your disciple definition is fuzzy and application is only occasional. With a few near-term clarifications, you can make your current effort more personal, transferable, and easier for others to reproduce.
What's Working Well
You already have several foundation pieces in place: you’re actively discipling, you have people in mind, and Scripture is central through a consistent Bible reading plan moving through the whole Bible.
- A consistent cover-to-cover Bible reading plan is a strong fuel source for long-term formation.
- You’re not waiting for a program to do the work—you’re personally engaging specific people.
- You’re paying attention to real outcomes (“their lives change”), even if you haven’t defined clear indicators yet.
What May Be Challenging
Based on what you shared, the biggest constraints are that the discussion is mostly general, application is only occasional, disciple making outside meetings is limited mostly to Sundays due to busyness, and intentional reliance on the Holy Spirit isn’t really part of the process right now. Also, because your definition of a disciple feels fuzzy and you don’t yet have a clear plan, it’s hard to aim at the same outcome consistently—or to help others reproduce what you’re doing.
- General discussion can preserve insight but miss personal next steps.
- Limited “along-the-way” follow-up makes it harder for application to stick.
- A fuzzy definition makes replication harder (which matches your “not yet” on disciples discipling others).
Why It Matters
When disciple making becomes clear, personal, and Spirit-reliant, it becomes easier for people to apply Scripture in everyday decisions—and eventually to help someone else do the same. Given your low confidence right now, tightening the definition and building in consistent application and Spirit-dependence will help you see more durable change without requiring a bigger schedule.
— SEVEN SUCCESS STRATEGIES —
WHAT DOES SUCCESS LOOKS LIKE?
Contrary to popular belief, the best measure of success is not multiplication because if you multiply immature disciples no one wins. The best measure of success is life change (transformation)—which oddly enough always results in healthy, big multiplication.
Making disciples is a “get to” not a “have to” or “should do.” It’s a natural result of being a mature believer. It’s the BE comes before DO principle. Healthy people do healthy things. Here’s your best measure of disciple-making success,
The disciple does the right things for the right reasons, navigates the unknowns of life, and makes disciples long after your influence fades.
The quickest pathway to success is to stop making makers and focus on making individual healthy followers. Jesus did not come to make makers, he helped individuals follow and then called them to make. And the most efficient way to do that is to implement the Seven Success Strategies!
You + The Seven
Every successful disciple making effort leverages three or more of seven success strategies. Highly successful disciple making systems leverage five to seven of the strategies. The more you implement, the greater your success—which means the disciples succeed! Your top success factors are The Fuel is God’s Word and Making Disciples is Done Intentionally. Based on our conversation, you can see (in red) your depth of implementation alongside each of the seven strategies.
The Fuel is God's Word
Disciples read the entire Bible, cover-to-cover being exposed to all scripture which is useful to guide, correct, direct and prepare them for good works.
The Definition is Simple
Disciple makers know exactly what it means to make a disciple, what the end product should be, and how to know when they have succeeded in making a well-made disciple.
The Process Relies on the Holy Spirit
Disciple makers embrace the truth that it is the Holy Spirit that sanctifies, renews, and transforms making space and helping disciples hear from Him.
The Focus is on Individuals
The process is focused on leading disciples individually even in groups helping them find and apply immediately useful, relevant truths that transform their lives.
The Goal is Application
Disciples makers embrace Jesus’ call to help disciples obey (apply) God’s truths to their decisions focusing on transformation not education.
The Process is Done Along the Way
Disciple makers model following Christ and make disciples inside and outside weekly meetings over the course of several years giving disciples time to fully mature.
Making Disciples is Done Intentionally
Disciple makers embrace disciple making as the primary work to reconcile the world, have a plan to make disciples, and set specific, measurable disciple making goals.
— ONE BITE AT A TIME —
HOW DOES STRATEGY BECOME SUCCESS?
Strategies are big objectives, big concepts, and the key to implementing them is to align what you “do” with the seven strategies. Your “dos” are your methods.
If you’re just getting started or are ready to try something new, you can implement all seven strategies right from the start. Just build your disciple making plan to incorporate them or adopt some proven methods that achieve the seven strategies.
But when you are already making disciples, implementing all seven strategies can feel overwhelming. In a church setting, moving too quickly can feel a bit too disruptive. Your leadership might not even be open to a total overhaul! So what do you do?
You figure out which two strategies could use the most makeover and focus your work on them.
As those two strategies become consistently present in your disciple making, then you pick another strategy to work on. Before you know it, you’ll see even more success than ever before!
You’ll find your top two makeover strategies (with some practical steps and “how tos”) below.
And we’ll help you pick your next next
strategies in the last section.
Your First Makeover Strategies
You’re already actively discipling with Scripture at the center, but your low confidence makes sense because the process currently leans toward general discussion, occasional application, and limited follow-up beyond Sundays. The two highest-leverage moves are to clarify a simple definition of a disciple (so you know what you’re aiming for and can pass it on) and to shift your discussions toward consistent personal application (so people actually live out what they’re reading). Together, these two changes make the process clearer, more personal, and far more reproducible.
Make the Definition Simple and Repeatable
Based on what you shared, you’re actively investing in people but your definition of a disciple feels fuzzy, which makes it hard to aim at a clear “end product” and almost always slows replication.
- Write a one-sentence disciple definition you can say out loud (simple enough that your group could repeat it).
- Add 3–5 plain indicators that show progress (for example: Scripture engagement, prayer, relationships, witness, character), and keep them observable.
- Decide what “win” looks like for your current season with the specific people you have in mind.
- Use the same definition every time you meet so it becomes normal language, not a special lesson.
- When someone asks what you’re doing, practice explaining it in 30 seconds using that definition.
Make Application the Normal Outcome of Every Meeting
Based on what you shared, you have strong Scripture fuel, but because the discussion is mostly general and application is only occasional, the most important truths may not turn into clear next steps that reshape everyday life.
- End every meeting with one personal application step per person (small, specific, doable).
- Ask, “What will you do differently before we meet again because of this passage?” and wait for a concrete answer.
- Keep application tied directly to the Bible reading plan passage rather than general themes.
- Make space for brief prayer that asks the Holy Spirit for help to apply what was read (not just to understand it).
- In your next conversation (even on Sunday), ask one follow-up question about the previous application step.
What Success Looks Like
- You can clearly define “disciple” in a single sentence, and the people you’re investing in can say it back.
- People regularly leave with a personal, specific application step connected to the current Scripture reading.
- Your disciple making starts to extend beyond Sunday in simple, realistic ways (brief follow-up and real-life conversations).
- At least one person begins taking early steps toward discipling someone else because the process feels clear and doable.
Early Measurable Wins
- Create and use a one-sentence disciple definition in every gathering.
- Each person identifies one specific application step from the current passage before leaving.
- You initiate at least one intentional follow-up conversation outside the formal meeting (short and focused).
- You add a simple, explicit moment of relying on the Holy Spirit (asking for His guidance and help to apply Scripture) each time you meet.
— THE BIG FIVE —
HOW WILL YOU
MEASURE SUCCESS?
Most of the methods we research have one of five focuses and naturally measure success based on that focus. We call them the Big Five.
- Education (Success = Participation and Knowledge)
- Assimilation (Success = They Stay and Look Like Us)
- Behavior Modification (Success = They Fix Their Problems)
- Multiplication (Success = They Get Others Involved)
- Leadership Development (Success = They Lead Something)
The Church has been doing the Big Five for, well, forever. We do them because that is what we know. We do them because they are easy and easy to measure. Done well, they will result in some spiritual growth but normally the Big Five just produces “dos.”
The problem is the Big Five only work for 20% of all believers because all five are actually the outcomes of transformation, not the cause.
Whether you adopt or design an overall plan, your best bet is to pick a method focused on discovering and applying all of the truths in God’s Word that measures effectiveness by transformation. Something like,
The disciple does the right things for the right reasons, navigates the unknowns of life, and makes disciples long after your influence fades.
Don’t settle for anything less because when they get transformed, they will be smart, be a part of the body, fix their stuff, make disciples, and lead! Remember, healthy followers do healthy things—naturally.
The team at Sustainable Discipleship uses the
highly Predictable PathwayTM to measure success.
You can learn more below
Ideas + Resources for You
The ideas and resources on this page have been curated based on your Makeover answers and, like your previous “how to” ideas, are based on the Sustainable Discipleship Method—a model that’s fueling a global disciple-making movement.
Our single-minded goal is to share what God has shared with us. But let’s be clear—there are many ways to make disciples. Whether you are evaluating methods or designing your own, we hope these customized ideas help. But definitely check out the Makeover Meetups!
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Future Strategies to Consider
Once you get your first two makeover strategies going, you’re ready to work strengthen the rest. Based on your makeover answers, here a few next steps that will increase each disciple’s transformation.
- Strengthen “along-the-way” disciple making with small, repeatable touchpoints beyond Sundays.
- Add clearer indicators for progress so “life change” becomes easier to recognize and encourage.
- Increase individual focus by ensuring every person is personally helped, not just invited into group discussion.
Seven Success Strategies ➞ How To Methods
The Fuel is God’s Word
The Goal is Application
God designed us from creation to understand the Bible. Brain Powered Bible reveals a reading method that will have folks engaged cover-to-cover, getting immediate value working with God’s learning design rather than against it. It’s like Bill Nye the Science guy meets the Bible!
The Definition is Simple
Making Disciples is Done Intentionally
Even if you are designing your own disciple making model, the proven “how tos” in this book may give you ideas that will supercharge your disciple making. The principles and methods have fueled thousands of disciple making efforts for individuals and churches.
Disciple Making Focuses on Individuals
Making Disciples is Done Along the Way
This free ebook introduces the Predictable Pathway. It’s fourteen, highly predictable steps that every believer takes as they mature. The beauty of the pathway is that you can know exactly where someone is and know exactly what to give them to get to the next step. It’s the simplest way to measure success and boost transformation.
Makeover Midday Meetups
Want to talk about your makeover plan? Join us (and others!) for a one-hour Makeover Meetup the first Tuesday of each month at noon.
- Want to go over your makeover report with a team member?
- Want to be greater at the one thing God called you to do?
- Are you an independent maker who needs a tribe?
- Just want to talk disciple making?
- Looking to get tips and tricks before you change things?
- Trying to get leadership buy in for something new?
- Need to avoid disrupting what's already working?
Makeover Meetups are for you! One of our experienced team members will be there to help you with whatever you’re working on—not to pitch you! See you there!
