Contagious Disciple Making: Leading Others on a Journey of Discovery by David Watson & Paul Watson

Author:David Watson & Paul Watson
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Christian
ISBN: 9780529112200
Published: 2014-12-23T00:00:00+00:00

USING BUSINESS TO ENGAGE COMMUNITIES

The disciple-maker walked up the path to the village. In all of his years of living and making disciples in the area, he never saw a walled village. Yet a huge wall surrounded his destination. Two guards stopped him at the gate.

“Can I come into the village?”

“No, strangers are not welcome in this village. We’ve had lots of problems with bandits. So we built this wall, and only people who live in this village can enter.”

The disciple-maker realized he wasn’t going to get into this village. So he moved on. A few days later, at a village about three walking hours away, he noticed a woman he had seen going into the walled village.

“Don’t you live in that walled village?”

“Yes.”

“What are you doing here?”

“This village has the largest market in the area. I come here to get things I cannot get in my own village.”

The disciple-maker had an idea. “How often do you come to this village? What kind of things do you buy when you are here?”

The woman went on to tell him that she made the trip about once a week. In fact, most of the women in the village made the trip pretty regularly. She gave the disciple-maker a list of the things she bought on a typical visit. They chatted for a while and then parted ways.

The disciple-maker bought a bicycle and a cart. He purchased many of the products the woman in the market said she purchased regularly. After getting everything together, he rode his bicycle and cart to the walled village. “Is it okay if I set up my cart here outside the village?” he asked.

The guards looked at each other. After talking for a while, they came back to the disciple-maker and gave him permission to sell his goods on the road just outside the village gate.

As women left the village to make the long trip to the area market, they noticed the disciple-maker and his cart. When they discovered they could purchase everything they needed, the women were ecstatic. The enterprising disciple-maker and his cart saved them a six-hour journey.

The disciple-maker sold everything on his cart. He also made a fair profit, which the village women were glad to pay. He replenished his cart and made the trip to the walled village several times a week. He was well-known and liked by everyone in the village.

After a while, the disciple-maker started taking special orders. One day, an older woman ordered fifty kilos of rice for an upcoming wedding. The disciple-maker made a special trip to the area market and delivered the rice a couple of days later.

The older woman looked at the rice and then at the guards. “I cannot carry all this rice into the village. Can he just bring it in for me?”

The guards looked at each other. They liked the disciple-maker. Several times a week for several months, they saw him, talked with him, and watched him treat everyone fairly. “Sure.”

The disciple-maker delivered the rice. From that day on, the disciple-maker delivered special orders inside the village.

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