In His life on Earth, Jesus made it abundantly clear how much He loved children, how much He valued children. Perhaps His strongest message about children came in Matthew 18:2-6: He called a little child to him and placed the child among them. And He said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me. If anyone causes one of these little ones – those who believe in me – to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.”

It does not get any clearer than that.

We have the ability to shape the next generation in all things but especially in teaching them about Jesus and how to follow Him. But we can’t assume that it will just happen by surrounding them with healthy relationships or taking them to church every Sunday. We must get actively involved. 

So, what does that look like when you’re not Jesus? One way is for us to do as Jesus did: take our message to the people where they gather. In our case, Tony took our message to the classroom to talk to our future leaders directly.

I’ve always had a special place in my heart for children.  They can be our future heroes or our future villains, and this will be determined by what is poured into them throughout their youth.

I made some bad decisions early on in my youth, and it seemed like it began a series of one bad decision after another. I’ve always said that kids are just one choice away from destroying their lives.

As strongly as I feel about discipleship being crucial to a Christian’s life, it is even more crucial not to begin that discipleship while they are young, so they do not make “that one bad choice” that can destroy their lives.

Whenever I get the opportunity to speak to young people, I pour into them all the things I wish I would have had poured into me.

I try to speak into their lives; words of encouragement, words of advice, warnings, anything God puts on my heart to pour into them.  To equip them to become strong men and women of faith, integrity, honor, strength, and love. GODLY men and women!

Here’s the other part that so many Christians miss: if we expect our youth to become the leaders we want them to be, we had better start preparing them BEFORE they graduate high school and not after. And we provide leadership opportunities within our churches during this time, whether that’s as youth leaders for kids’ ministries, singing on our worship teams during services, or in missionary-based activities at the local level in addition to national or international locations. THIS is how we create our legacy.

This month Tony got to speak at two different Christian schools:  Christian Academy in Louisville, KY (CAL), and Pungo Christian Academy in Belhaven, NC. One he spoke on legacy and the other he spoke on love.  

Tony shared with them his testimony and how God brought him out of darkness and into light, and is using him to multiply His Kingdom by making disciples that make disciples.  Tony tried to encourage the students that “making disciples that make disciples” is a legacy that we all should want to leave.  

He taught them, as Tony shares with everyone, that love is the key ingredient that will transform them into men and women of great stature.  Men and women that God can use to change the world, and to leave a legacy built on love that will last for eternity.  

We were excited when the feedback we got from students, parents, teachers and school staff about Tony’s talk was greatly received.  The kids seemed super attentive and the teachers said they had not seen them that way in a long time. Let’s pray that the roots grow deep from the seeds that were planted.

WHAT’S YOUR LEGACY?

Tony taught the children the kind of legacy they want to leave is one that serves the Kingdom of God, and that this kind of legacy will live for eternity. He encouraged them to encourage others by stirring up a passion in them to be committed to being obedient to the great commission. Matthew 28:18-20.

Tony shared with the students that Jesus turned the world upside down starting with twelve men, and the early church carried on the ministry of reconciliation that Christ passed on to them. He explained how the early church modeled Christ by leading others to God and discipled them to disciple others. When the group they were discipling were ready to lead, they would then put them into leadership roles to begin a new church and then when they were ready, they moved on to start the process again. 

In the mission world today, this is known as a DMM… a Disciple Multiplication Movement. The DMM is only modeling what the early church did and what Christ called us all to do.

Parents and grandparents often think about the legacy they are going to leave for their children and grandchildren. These legacies often revolve around what the state of our world will be, any financial/materials means we bequeath to them, or how they remember us as human beings. Too rarely do parents and grandparents stop to consider what kind of spiritual legacy they are leaving behind and are they concerned they may not have done enough.

Our challenge to you is to look at your children and grandchildren and consider if you died today what would be the spiritual legacy you left them. Are you confident in their being adequately equipped as leaders, to share the love of Christ with others, and to go to Heaven when they died? It’s a sobering question, to be sure, but one that has an Eternal answer. Having said that, we’re not going to ask you to do something of which we won’t supply you with a helpful tool.

Tony and I are part of a movement that started here in Louisville nearly five years ago by using DMM tools known as the 3Thirds Discipleship Study. This movement started with two men here in Louisville and today, as of the date of this article, there are 74 groups around the city and 47 groups in other countries that men from this movement went to other countries to teach others these discipleship tools and started groups in those countries. These 3Thirds Groups are designed to multiply.

Here’s how we help accomplish that and something that you can utilize to build your spiritual legacy and raise up those around you – whether they are your biological family or your Christ family.

When a person is put in a leadership role (model) of one of these groups, he/she will soon step aside and disciple (assist) someone else on how to lead. Eventually, there will be another change in the leadership position and the previous leader will disciple the new leader. 

The first person that leads the group will now step into the role of watching over the one that is discipling (assisting) the new leader making sure he/she is keeping the DNA pure to the simple 3Thirds Format. That is why it is the number one tool in the world multiplying God’s Kingdom because it is simple and reproducible, and each person plays a role to ensure that the process is not changed. 

When the person watching over the group is confident that both leaders (modelers and assisters) are now equipped to carry this on, keeping it pure to the 3Thirds Format by not adding anything to it or taking anything away, the person watching will then leave and start another group. 

This is called the MAWL process. Model. Assist. Watch. Leave. 

This is exactly what the early church did. 

• they modeled Christ, 
• they discipled others, 
• they put reliable leaders in position of a new church, and 
• they moved on and did it again. 

These discipleship multiplication movements are all over the world. Start your legacy by becoming part of the movement today. We can help you get started.

Below is what Tony shared with the students at Pungo Christian Academy in Belhaven, NC. Feel free to share these words – where appropriate – with the children in your house, in your church, and in your community as you assist them in being more Christlike.

How Jesus LOVED Us While He Was Here

When teaching about love, Tony always starts off with a time in his life when he didn’t know what love was. His mother once told a woman that Tony dated who was having difficulty dealing with him, that “Tony just doesn’t know how to love.” In the heat of an argument one day, this woman said to Tony, “Your mother’s right. You don’t know how to love!” Tony never gave it much thought because he thought love was a joke. He didn’t understand what love was or the importance of it.

Years later, after turning to Christ, God revealed to Tony the importance of love.

One day while lying in solitary confinement, I began meditating on God’s Word and God revealed to me the profound, crucial importance of love. In this revelation, God brought to my mind that love was the number one commandment, love is the greatest gift, love fulfills all the laws and that God IS LOVE.

God then convicted my heart and brought to my memory my mother’s statement that I did not know how to love, and I pleaded with the Lord to teach me to love and He took me to Ephesians 5:22-33. In this part of Ephesians, Paul uses a marriage between a man and a woman as an example of our relationship with Christ.

I began focusing on how Jesus loved the church and realized that I am to model this love in everything I do. I realized that Christ loved “us” – the church – so much that He gave His life for us.

But I wanted to know HOW He loved us as He walked the Earth with us. So, I began to focus on how that looked, and I realized that as Christ walked this Earth everything He thought, said, and did, was for our greater good.

And THAT just blew my mind when I realized that everything that I think, say, and do is supposed to be for my wife’s greater good, and for others.

And He started to show me what a good man truly was, and that love would teach me how to be merciful, patient, kind, gentle, forgiving, selfless, sacrificial, and so much more. Then He led me to 1 Corinthians chapter 13.

Between Ephesians 5 and 1 Corinthians 13, God began teaching me how to be a good man, a godly man, a man of honor, a man of integrity, a man of faith, a man my family and others could depend on, a man that puts God and others first.

And He teaches me, daily, that until He returns, we will always need to increase our love so we can grow day-by-day to be more like Him.

God is love and therefore love should govern our lives. Love will shape and mold us into the kind of men and women God has called us to be. Everything evolves around love, and “if we have not love we have nothing.” 1 Corinthians 13

If you would like Tony and Kim to speak to your school, group, or organization, please contact us here.