Rasool Berry on How Discipleship Shaped His Life and His Work at Our Daily Bread Ministries

In the Great Commission, Jesus instructs His followers to “go and make disciples of all nations” (Matthew 28:19), but what does this actually mean?

For Our Daily Bread Ministries podcast host and pastor Rasool Berry, he believes that discipleship looks different from what we might assume.

“When I worked in campus ministry, I used to think that discipleship meant you meet with somebody one-on-one for a week at a time. You go through a book of the Bible and ask them accountability questions,” he said. “Because no one had ever done that for me, I thought I had never been discipled.”

But over time, he reflected on his past impactful relationships.

“My first job after college was teaching, and I didn’t have an education degree, so there was a lot I needed to learn,” Rasool said. “But at the end of the day, I learned it all through being an apprentice to this incredible certified teacher. She modeled for me how to teach and instructed me to watch her. Then, when it was my turn to teach a lesson, she watched me too and gave me feedback and taught me that discipleship is more hands-on.”

This led him to acknowledge the spiritual impact his friends in the Christian rap group called The Cross Movement had on him.

“They’d ask me, ‘Hey, do you want to come to this concert with us?’ and as I was traveling with them, I’d hear them open up the Scripture in a way that helped me understand the Bible more. Over time, they began to ask me more questions and challenged me,” he said. “And I realized later that they had actually discipled me. It had happened so organically I didn’t even realize it.”

These experiences caused Rasool to believe that discipleship is “caught, not taught”—to quote a catchy pastoral phrase. But above all, Rasool shared that it’s “done in proximity and anchored in the truth of the Word.”

“Think of Paul discipling Timothy. And then think of them discipling churches. Paul wrote to the Thessalonians, ‘Because we loved you so much, we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well’” (1 Thessalonians 2:8).

We also see this example of closeness to each other and Scripture in Jesus and His own disciples. For example, when Christ sends out the twelve to “heal the sick, raise the dead . . . [and] drive out demons” (Matthew 10:8), He did not give them specific instructions on how to do so. They were simply able to rely on the time they’d spent living with, watching, and listening to Jesus.

Rasool brings this practical wisdom into his work with Our Daily Bread Ministries.

“Through my experience hosting In Pursuit of Jesus, I learned that listening is a key component of discipleship,” he said. “In our Where Ya From? podcast, we want to model how to listen to others’ stories. That walking 45 minutes in someone else’s shoes can help us understand them better and Jesus better.” 

Rasool pointed out Ephesians 4:15–16 as what happens when we watch, learn from, and listen to each other: “Speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.”

“How enriching is it when we’re able to be in such proximity to folks that we learn multiple ways of how to be formed in Christ?” Rasool asks. “Because Jesus is not just the Lord of the East or Lord of the West. He’s Lord of all.”