It starts with one.
What happens when one person tells one person about Jesus and teaches them to do the same?
Here's the whole idea.
Tell one person about Jesus.
Walk with them until they can do the same.
Then both of you do it again.
Generation 0
1
person following Jesus
Drag to turn the world
Each light on the globe stands for about 1.2 million people. The first light is roughly where you are.
Now picture a preacher who leads 1,000 people to Jesus every single day.
Then picture you, reaching just one person a year, with each of them doing the same.
33 years, two ways
People reached
- One a year, multiplied
- Adding 1,000 a day
Year 10. The preacher has reached 3,650,000 people. You and everyone in your chain number 1,024.
Year 24. For 23 years, the preacher is far ahead. In year 24, the lines cross.
Year 33. The preacher has reached 12 million people, which is an extraordinary life. The multipliers have reached more than 8.5 billion.
View as table
| Year | Preacher (1,000/day) | Multipliers (one a year) |
|---|
The difference isn't how many people you reach.
It's whether the people you reach go on to reach people.
The honest part
Real life is messier than math.
Some will say no. Some will stop. But multiplication still outruns addition in the end, and none of it happens unless someone starts.
Everyone alive is reached in
57
generations (years, at one a year)
Adding 1,000 a day takes
22,740
years
It was always the plan
Four generations in one sentence.
“And what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also.”
2 Timothy 2:2 · Paul, writing to Timothy
- Paul
- Timothy
- Faithful men
- Others
Paul wasn't just making converts. He was making disciples who make disciples.
Ephesus · about AD 53
It's happened before.
Paul taught daily in one lecture hall in Ephesus.
Within two years, “all the residents of Asia heard the word of the Lord” (Acts 19:10).
Map: cities of the Roman province of Asia where the New Testament mentions believers.
The Great Theatre, Ephesus
It's happening now.
Around the world, disciple-making movements report chains of new believers and new churches that go many generations deep. They are carried by ordinary people meeting in living rooms, under trees, and around kitchen tables.
You don't have to be Peter.
Andrew found his brother and told him, “We have found the Messiah” (John 1:41).
His brother was Peter. When Peter preached at Pentecost, about 3,000 people were baptized in a single day (Acts 2:41).
0baptized in a single day
You just have to be Andrew.
Duccio di Buoninsegna, The Calling of the Apostles Peter and Andrew, 1308–1311. Andrew in red, Peter in blue.
Somebody told you.
A parent.
A friend.
A pastor.
A stranger.
It might have been a parent, a friend, a pastor, or a stranger. You know Jesus because someone didn't stay quiet.
You
Follow the chain back far enough and you reach an empty tomb, and a woman running to tell the others, “I have seen the Lord” (John 20:18).
The chain reached you.
Don't let it stop with you.
Rembrandt van Rijn, Christ and St Mary Magdalen at the Tomb, 1638.
Revelation 5:9
This is where it's all going.
“…by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation.”
Every tribe and language and people and nation. Hover a name to see the language.
Somewhere in that crowd is someone who's there because of a conversation you haven't had yet.
Jan van Eyck, Adoration of the Mystic Lamb (Ghent Altarpiece), 1432.
You'll probably never meet generation 33.
But generation 33 is waiting on generation 1.
And generation 1 starts with you.
Who is your one?
Think of one person who doesn't know Jesus. It could be a neighbor, a coworker, a sibling, or a friend.
Before you do anything else
Pray.
Jesus told his disciples to ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers (Matthew 9:38). In the very next scene, he sent the same people who had prayed.
Pray this slowly. Out loud, if you can.
Jesus,
thank you that someone told me about you.
Thank you for the cross, for the empty tomb, and for the life you've given me.
Forgive me for the times I've stayed silent.
Right now I lift up the person you've put on my heart.
Open their heart. Prepare the moment.
Give me the courage to speak and the words to say.
Lord of the harvest, send out laborers into your harvest, and start with me.
Let one conversation become a chain that reaches every tribe, language, people, and nation.
In your name,
amen.
Tap when you've prayed.
Not sure you know Jesus yourself? That's where your chain begins. Talk to him honestly right now: turn from your sin, trust him, then tell someone who follows him.
Now go.
“Go home to your friends and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you.”
Mark 5:19
Nervous? So was he.
In 1855, a Sunday school teacher named Edward Kimball walked right past a Boston shoe store, second-guessing himself. Then he turned around, went in, and told a young clerk about Jesus.
That clerk was D.L. Moody, who went on to preach the gospel to millions.
Not sure what to say? Tell them three things.
- 1
What your life was like before Jesus.
- 2
How you met him.
- 3
What he's done since.
Or say it simply
“God loves you. Our sin separates us from him, but Jesus died in our place and rose again. Anyone who turns from their sin and trusts him is forgiven and made new.”
Start with one question
“Can I tell you why Jesus matters so much to me?”
Don't wait until you feel ready.
Text them. Call them. Knock on their door. Today.
Generation 1 starts now.
Close this page. Go find your one.