The Discipleship Training Model That Goes Four Generations Deep
If you've ever finished a group and wondered, "Now what?" — this is for you. If your church is running Bible studies but not making disciples, this is for you. If you want to lead but nobody has ever shown you how to think past the first semester — keep reading.
I made a phone call to Alex Rossie right after we finished recording a session with Josh Howard from Discipleship.org. Good session. Good conversation. The microphones went off, and I felt this weight I couldn't shake. So I called Alex and asked him point-blank: "Why did God call me to do this? Why am I leading this?"
I felt like the most unequipped person in the room. I'm not a scholar. I'm not a strategist. Alex hit me with the obvious. He said, "Jeremy, it's called Ordinary Movement. He called you for a reason."
Maybe being the wrong guy actually makes you the right person. I've held onto that. I want to stay ordinary — not ignorant, not shallow, but grounded. Common-sense faith. Eyes-open obedience. That's what we built this around.
And that's what I want to talk about here. Not discipleship theory. The specific thing we keep getting wrong as leaders — the habit of finishing a group and walking away.
Mentorship Is Discipleship Training in Action
I used to separate the two in my mind. Mentorship over here. Discipleship over there. David Watson changed that for me. In Contagious Disciple Making (2014), Watson documents how this same principle fueled church multiplication movements in some of the most difficult regions in the world — including some of the fastest-growing disciple-making networks in closed countries. His definition is simple: mentoring is an intentional relationship that causes everyone involved to grow — not just the person being poured into, but the one doing the pouring.
That's how we use the word at Ordinary Movement. When someone finishes leading a discipleship group and starts walking alongside their former participants as they go lead others — that's mentorship. That's the phase where knowledge stops being information and starts becoming wisdom. It's conversion through application.
The vision isn't complicated. You pour into people. They go lead. You stay in their lives. Eventually, you have so many people out in the field that you can't take on another new group. Your whole job becomes supporting the ones who are already moving. That's what we mean by "leader of leaders."
Most people never get there. Not because they lack the desire — because nobody ever challenged them to think that way.
The Four-Generation Discipleship Process
When we started Ordinary Movement in 2018, I hadn't broken down the theology of four generations. It felt like common sense to me. Then I started really sitting with 2 Timothy 2:2, and the blueprint became impossible to miss:
"And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others."
Read that carefully. Four generations in one sentence.
Paul — the one who started it
Timothy — the one Paul poured into
Reliable people — who Timothy entrusted with it
Others — who those reliable people would go teach
Paul wasn't thinking about Timothy. He was thinking three steps beyond Timothy. That's the mindset shift most leaders have never been asked to make.
Discipleship researchers call this "fourth-generation thinking" — and it's widely regarded as the marker that separates information transfer from genuine movement. In their 2023 research synthesis, the Discipleship.org team found that most church discipleship programs produce second-generation growth at best. Third and fourth generation replication is rare — not because people don't want it, but because nobody ever teaches leaders to expect it.
I talked to a leader not long ago who was fired up. He'd just finished investing in a group of men and couldn't wait to start the next one. That hunger is exactly what you want. But I asked him: "What's your plan for the men you just finished with? How are you helping them launch their own groups? How are you staying in their lives as they step into leading?"
He stopped.
He thought his job was done when the semester ended. And he's not alone — that assumption is everywhere. We built it, and we have to dismantle it.
The Business Owner Doesn't Walk Away
Think about how any business actually runs. A good owner doesn't hire someone, train them for three months, and then disappear. They change roles. They lead team meetings. They stay close enough to see where things are breaking down and help fix it. They build something designed to outlast their own direct involvement.
That's long-term thinking. It's how organizations grow.
The problem in too many ministries is what I'd call an information mindset. Give people the content. Check the box. Move on. We equip people to receive, not to reproduce.
As leaders — as people who actually believe this matters — we have to think past the information. What happens after? How does that person walk it out? Who stays in the room with them when they hit a wall?
If we want something that grows into generations, we have to stay in the game longer than one semester.
The Doing Is Where You Actually Grow
There's an old saying that cuts right to it:
"I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand."
Understanding is the top of the ladder. Not knowledge. Not observation. Doing.
Some of the most significant growth in my own walk didn't happen in a classroom or a teaching. It happened when I was mentoring someone else. When I was the one walking alongside another person through hard seasons and real questions. The doing is what produces maturity.
At Ordinary Movement, we're not anti-information. We're Scripture-saturated. We want deep roots. But at some point, you have to leave the locker room and actually run. David Watson goes as far as to say that mature believers who stop pouring their lives into others actually stop growing. They stall because they've taken themselves out of the game.
If you're a church leader or groups pastor wrestling with how to get your people to move from receiving to reproducing — this is the core problem. Not a lack of curriculum. A lack of expectation. Nobody's told them the group isn't the finish line.
We Built a Culture That Drops People Off
Here's where I have to be honest — and honest about what we've created.
In a lot of churches and ministry environments, the unspoken system works like this: a leader runs a group, the group ends, and then the leader essentially drops those people off at the church door and says, "I did my part. Pastor, your turn."
We've accidentally built that expectation. And it's the wrong one.
Our model — Pastor-Championed, Ordinary-Led — doesn't mean the pastor takes over when the group ends. It means ordinary people are equipped to keep going. My job as someone who started this isn't to do the discipleship work for you. It's to be here when you hit a wall. To equip you. To walk it out with you. That's the difference.
Shifting into a discipleship lifestyle is a high-challenge, high-grace invitation. It means staying in the lives of the people you poured into. It means helping them launch their own groups. It means accepting that sometimes you'll be rejected or ignored. It means giving more than a semester of your time.
It's a different level of sacrifice. But it's what actually produces a movement — not just a group.
The Discipleship Curriculum Behind the Ordinary Movement Process
We founded Ordinary Movement in 2018 around a simple conviction from Acts 4:13:
"When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus."
You don't need a degree. You don't need a title. You need to have been with Jesus — and you need to be willing to bring people along.
Since 2018 to 2025, we've walked more than 1,600 people through this process across 245+ groups in 35+ states. The process works because it's built for ordinary people — not ministry professionals. Our small group discipleship process takes people through 4 modules and 27 sessions:
Module 1 (Sessions 1–5): Foundation. Getting the bedrock right.
Module 2 (Sessions 6–12): Core Values. Intimacy with Jesus, Intentional Relationships, and Multiplication.
Module 3 (Sessions 13–16): Holy Spirit. Learning to walk in His power.
Module 4 (Sessions 17–26): 7 Principles of Discipleship. The how-to of the whole thing.
The 7 Principles are the marks of a multiplying follower of Christ: Accept Him. Know Him. Obey Him. Make Sacrifices. Share Him. Love Others. Make Disciples.
We close with The Urgency and The Send — because discipleship isn't a hobby. It's a rescue mission. We offer separate tracks for men's discipleship and women's discipleship, built for ordinary people who want to lead — not just attend.
If you've been leading a group, here's the question: Who are you helping become a disciple-maker?
Not who are you planning to pour into next. Who are you currently walking alongside as they step out and lead?
Don't just give people information. Give them your life. That's where the growth happens. That's where the movement starts.
