cross, we assure our own ultimate defeat, for we cut the nerve of obedience and kill the life-style of the Great Commission. No one will take seriously the command to make disciples who has not taken up the cross. Strangely, today we hear little about self-denial and suffering in all the talk about church growth. Is this because most of what has been said to date has come out of the Western world, where affluence abounds and church affiliation is a mark of social acceptance, if not good politics?