Disciple-Making Lab

We want every person to meet Jesus.

We believe that every disciple of Jesus can be equipped to make disciples in the everyday stuff of life.

Many pastors are busy. They want to see disciples making disciples, but find it difficult to develop a clear plan for multiplication in everyday life.

We want to help.

GET READY

The Disciple-Making Lab is a ten-month journey to equip you and your church leadership team to create a holistic, disciple-making pathway for your church.

You will build an intentional plan to help disciples mature and multiply in your context with the aim to raise up disciples who know Jesus, are being changed by Jesus, and join Jesus in what He is doing in the world.

JOIN US FOR THE JOURNEY

Your team will:

  • Clarify and unify around your shared definition of a disciple.
  • Cultivate a church-wide culture for disciple-making.
  • Design, build, and implement a disciple-making pathway for your church.
  • Create tools, strategies, and processes to equip everyday disciples in your church.
  • Align around Jesus’ invitation, common language, and practices.

For over 12 years, our leadership has come alongside leaders of various churches, denominations, and organizations, equipping them to create unique, disciple-making pathways for their contexts.

The Disciple-Making Lab leads to proven, multi-faceted outcomes—for both your leaders and your church as a whole. 

Why is the Disciple-Making Lab an Investment Worth Considering?

A 2025 study from Exponential showed that 62% of churches in the United States and Canada are declining or plateauing. Out of 1,001 pastors surveyed, only 7% said their churches were reproducing new churches.

Jesus loves the world, and the commission He left with us is to make disciples who make disciples. We want to see a move of God in our day, in our cities, in our churches! If we want to shift the trend away from decline and plateau, we are going to need to make some changes.

Often, leaders are clear about their vision and mission. And they can talk about their programs and ministries. But if you ask, “How would you define what a disciple is and the plan you have for helping them grow from spiritual infancy to maturity?” their strategy is not so clear.

The journey laid out in the Disciple-Making Lab was created to address these gaps. Our goal is not to give you one more curriculum to run, or a plug-and-play program to bolt onto your existing ministry. Our aim is to help you and your team return everything to Jesus and His mission, and build a way of life together, unique to your context, that consistently forms people into mature disciple-makers.

Programs don’t make disciples. Disciples make disciples.

We want to help you become a disciple-making leader of a disciple-making church. This is where the Disciple-Making Lab comes in.

DML Proven Process

What Does the Disciple-Making Lab Look Like?


The Disciple-Making Lab is a ten-month journey. It opens with a two-day, in-person workshop, followed by four monthly, three-hour online sessions. A second two-day, in-person workshop comes at the midpoint, followed by four more monthly online sessions. Every session is packed full of teaching, guided reflection, exercises, team breakouts, coaching, and more.

New cohorts will be kicking off with these two-day in-person workshops:

  • September 15-16, 2026 in Charleston, SC
  • October 7-8, 2026 in Seattle, WA

Click on “Schedule a Call” and fill out the form to let us know if you’re interested or have any questions. Our team would love to talk with you.

SCHEDULE A CALL

Two-Day In-Person Workshop to Start the Journey

Then, Four Monthly Online Sessions

Two-Day In-Person Workshop Half-Way Through

Last, Four Monthly Online Sessions

Want to Learn More?

SCHEDULE A CALL
DOWNLOAD PROSPECTUS
FROM PAST PARTICIPANTs:
  • “What I loved about the Disciple-Making Lab was that it was not a ‘copy and paste’ or ‘plug and play’ program. I have tried enough of those to know that it just does not work. Too many disciple-making programs out there are content-driven. The DML is practice-based; they give you the coaching, training, and equipping for your church to discover, build, and implement a disciple-making culture that is uniquely your own. As a pastor, I now have a vision, plan, pathway and process that I can lead our church to fulfill the Great Commission in our Acts 1:8 context.”
    BRYON BUKOVESKY
  • “Partnering with Saturate has been an incredibly encouraging and impactful experience for our church leadership. The conversations and tools have brought our team closer together and helped clarify our vision for the future. The in-person lab and personal coaching were especially powerful, deepening my leadership and relationship with Jesus. This lab provides a unique opportunity to connect with other churches, gain really helpful insights, and focus our team on gospel mission. If your church is looking for a way to align your team and take intentional steps toward truly making disciples, I’d highly recommend the Disciple-Making Lab!”
    DANIEL TYLER
  • “When I heard about the Disciple-Making Lab, I immediately signed up. As a long-time church-planter and pastor in Japan, I knew that this was exactly what I needed, and I had a lot of hope. The good thing about the DML is that it shifts you to the most important work and coaches you to do the work in your cultural context. We participated as a team and were able to have discussions together on the most important things that we need to face. Three churches in Tokyo participated, and it was also very good for us to learn together with the other churches. As a result, we have become more unified as churches within Tokyo. Many Japanese pastors are now interested in attending the DML. I believe the DML will be one of the most important works in Japan, because it will help churches become more unified around discipleship and in the end, we will see gospel saturation in Tokyo and beyond Japan.”
    YOSHI NOGUCH
  • “We are half-way through our process and I am amazed at how God has used this Disciple-Making Lab to unify our staff and elders around the central theme of disciple-making. The work of defining what a disciple is and how we make disciples has been our main objective and this cohort has been instrumental in actually helping us accomplish the mission Jesus called us to, make disciples who make disciples! I am already seeing our church family begin to grasp that they are missionaries and am seeing people grow in their maturity as a disciple and a disciple-maker. I can’t wait to see the end product as we begin to implement all that we are learning and developing!”
    MIKE GARNER
  • “The Disciple-Making Lab with Jeff Vanderstelt has been helpful for our church family. Our staff has a common language and ideas for future discipleship pathways because of the intentional time and training from Jeff over this past year.  It is hard to carve out time in a busy ministry schedule, but the impact of this training is well worth the time invested.”
    MARTY M.

Who Will Be Leading the Journey?

JEFF VANDERSTELT

Jeff serves as the Executive Director of Saturate. He is also the Founder of Soma, a global family of churches committed to seeing every woman, man and child meet Jesus through His body on mission everyday. He regularly works with teams toward gospel saturation in greater Seattle, Charleston, and Tokyo. Jeff has authored Saturate, Gospel Fluency, and Making Space.

He lives in Seattle, WA with his wife Jayne and their three children.

Brett Donald

Brett Donald (MCS, Regent College) has been in church leadership as a pastor, church planter, and occasional coach and professor for over 20 years.

Ever since accidentally becoming a pastor at 18, he has been focused on learning how to intentionally make disciples. Brett is passionate about helping ordinary people join Jesus in His mission, seeing a growing convergence of Word and Spirit, and strategic disciple-making.

Brett is a founding pastor of CityLights Church in Vancouver, B.C., and is currently church planting again. He loves the ocean, good coffee, and time with his wife Natalie and two children.

Todd Engstrom

Todd Engstrom

Todd serves in various capacities for Saturate and served on the Advisory Board in the early years of the ministry. He ministered for 20 years at The Austin Stone in Austin, TX, equipping missional communities to live on mission, building and leading congregational teams, and most recently, stewarding local mission, global mission, counseling, and theological training. Todd now regularly trains and coaches leaders on ministry, discipleship, and organizational health. He also serves as the Executive Director for the Greater Austin Mission Society, with a continued burden from the Lord to reach all of Austin. For fun, he dabbles in some entrepreneurship and cheers a little too passionately for Notre Dame and Austin FC.

He is married to his wife, Olivia, raising five kids, and has called Austin home for over 20 years.

BEN CONNELLY

Ben Connelly is a pastor, author, equipper, and occasional professor. He is honored to serve everyday disciples, ministry leaders, and church planters across the world through The Equipping Group, and to help lead Salt+Light Community and Plant Fort Worth in Fort Worth, TX. Ben has written/contributed to several books, workbooks, articles, and publications, has overseen church planting efforts for multiple organizations, and has also taught university and seminary classes. He and Jess have three children (Charlotte, Maggie, and Travis) and at times, host short-term foster kids too. You can find Ben at @connellyben on various social media platforms.

Ben Connelly

Ready to Take a Next Step?

If you and your team are ready to sign up for the Disciple-Making Lab, or if you have questions and want to talk with someone, fill out the form below.

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