Effectively tracking your church discipleship is a common conversation among churches and has been since Jesus walked the earth. Today, just as it was then, discipleship should be a lifestyle – not a periodic or occasional choice. In simplest definitions, discipleship is the conscious, intentional decision to live more like Him every day.
However, as a church leader, how do you know when someone is being discipled? Furthermore. how do you track that growth over time?
It’s a tough question. And while there may be different answers depending on how your church defines discipleship, there are tools you can use to better understand how every individual is moving through your church’s journey of discipleship as you see it. Churches who use the church management solution (ChMS) Realm, along with Realm Pathways, can track every step of their discipleship process as their congregation progresses through their spiritual journey. Let’s take a look at how you can do that too.
Discipleship doesn’t come with overnight success; every person goes through their unique spiritual journey. Using Realm Pathways, churches can track and document this journey for every individual. Not only can they track the journey, but they can also define it based on their church’s needs.
For example, your church is undoubtedly interested in more people volunteering, being baptized, and becoming members of your church. Your church can define the individual steps in a discipleship journey and how long you expect each step to take before it reaches completion. Suppose any step leader drops the ball and isn’t able to shepherd someone on their individual step. In that case, your Pathway leader — the person who oversees the discipleship journey — will be notified so they can take action and help everyone through the process.
As an individual progresses through the process, leaders can document that journey so your church can have a record of it. As they complete that discipleship journey, the individual can be moved into a new discipleship track to continue their spiritual journey with your church.
At a macro level, your church leaders can see all the Pathways your church has. There’s no limit on the number of Pathways you have; add as many as you need to track your congregation’s journey. They’ll also get a Pathways dashboard that illustrates how many people your church has discipled, who’s actively in a Pathway, who needs immediate follow-up, and more.
For pastors and pastoral teams on the go, they use the free Realm Shepherd mobile app to access information on their congregation’s Pathways. By simply logging in to the Realm Shepherd app and searching for an individual, they gain access to anyone’s active Pathways as well as any they’ve completed. They’ll also be able to document any pastoral notes needed as they meet with individuals who are growing spiritually with your church.
But Realm Pathways can be used for more than discipleship. Many churches also use them to track internal operational processes, such as the steps needed to hire a staff member, the individual touchpoints needed to plan a wedding, and so much more. If you have staff members who oversee any of those internal processes, you can easily make them a Pathway or step leader for even greater oversight.
Click here to learn more about how Realm Pathways can reinvigorate your church’s discipleship process.
David is an Associate Product Marketing Manager and has been an ACS Technologies team member since 2011.
