When it comes to discipleship, you’d be hard-pressed to find a serious-minded Christ-follower who doesn’t believe in The Great Commission, to “Go, and make disciples of all the nations….” What if local churches around the globe got this right? What if our churches began to establish cultures of mentoring, where protégés (young and old) would be empowered and equipped to rise up to the challenges that face the Church now and in the future? We need to be reinvigorated by the compelling vision of discipleship that Jesus casts.

Protégé was designed as a six week guide to move discipleship forward—to help churches cultivate the values, processes, and conversations that are necessary to build a culture of disciple-making, and to establish a culture of intentional mentorship. We must begin by learning to embody the spirit of a protégé, adopting the values and characteristics of a protégé, and then learning how to cultivate a culture that empowers mentors and protégés to establish stronger, more intentional relationships that transform people’s lives at the deepest level.

Together, our task as a tribe of Jesus-followers is to figure out how to live out this reality in and through our churches. Just imagine the day when local churches around the globe become known for how well they invest in protégés, how well they facilitate authentic life-change, and how well they intentionally and lovingly mentor people? This is one of the great gifts the Church has to offer the world around them. So dive into this resource on your own, with a friend or mentor, as a ministry team, or with your community group, praying that God will use it to shape you personally, as well as others in your church to become more effective disciple-makers.

If you’ve used any of Missio’s Primers, you might be wondering what the difference is between a Primer and a Playbook. It’s simple; the Playbooks are not just designed to be used in a community context, but individually, with a team, in any discipleship group, or with a community. We’ve replaced the community day (5) with a synergy day to provide the most flexibility to fit your context. We’ve also designed these to be digitally delivered and formatted to work as an eBook. Hope you enjoy Protégé, which is our first Playbook in the series.