Clive and his team have been letting a young man, C, stay in one of their outbuildings while he works through drug addiction. C is doing well. There are still setbacks now and then, a day or two here and there, but he's moving toward real freedom, and he loves Jesus. Clive's team have also been teaching him how to lead Discovery Bible Studies.

This particular story, though, is about C's dad.

C's dad is Deaf and doesn't communicate through spoken words. He'd been watching the change in his son and could see something was different. Last week, while he was out fishing, he looked up into the trees and was convinced he saw a figure of Jesus, wearing a crown of thorns.

The next day C started telling his dad about Jesus. As he listened, his dad broke down in tears. He couldn't put it into words, but the tears said everything. Clive asked C the next morning, "Has your dad received Christ yet?" C said, "I think so."

His dad kept sending him messages about Jesus after that, so C asked him directly: "Have you received Jesus yet?"

"No," his dad replied. "How do I do that?"

They arranged to meet, and C took his dad through a Discovery Bible Study. By the end of it, they'd led him to Jesus. Now C's dad, his mum, their nan and the nan's friend, none of whom communicate through spoken words, are planning to meet together and start their own Discovery Bible Study group. C will be leading it, because he knows sign language.

A Discovery Bible Study is four questions, asked about a passage of Scripture. What does this teach us about God? What does this teach us about people? What will you do with what you've learned? And who can you share this story with?

That's it. No commentary, no notes, no leader who's studied the passage in advance and already knows the "right" answer. Just four questions and a group willing to talk about them. C didn't need years of training to take his dad through that process, he just needed to have done it himself first.

Bible teaching has its place, but that's what makes this reproducible in a way most Bible teaching isn't. You can show it to someone the week after they've come to faith, and they can show it to the next person the week after that.

Notice it's the very last of those four questions which is the one that's already produced a new group.

"Who can you share this story with" isn't a redundant question. It's the question that turns one person's discovery into a whole family's!

I spent a long time thinking I needed to know more before I could disciple anyone.

C had been walking with Jesus for a matter of months before he led his own dad to faith.

This means most of what's holding us back isn't a lack of knowledge, it's a lack of nerve. But remember how 'unready' you were when you first said yes to Jesus, and how little of that mattered.

Let's go make disciples.

Simon