Pastoral Epistles is my last required module for my Master of Ministerial Studies program. This is one reason this module has a special place in my heart. I also enjoy this course because of the learning I received through it. Allow me to share five of the learning points through this blog entry.
Firstly, I made a discovery that structural diagramming is doable. I was so glad that I had another opportunity to learn and practice structural diagramming through the course. I have grown to appreciate the value of diagramming even though I still find it a little too technical at times. It seems that practice is the only way we can become more proficient in the skill of diagramming. This is why it truly helps that I could practice the skill twice this year, during the Corinthians course and during the Pastoral Epistles course. But after this, it would be up to my own initiative if I will continue practicing to retain and sharpen the skill Brother Casey and Sister Davina have been painstakingly trying to impart to us.
Secondly, I was reminded about the importance of discipleship. This reminder came to me as I reflected about individuals who had influenced me spiritually. Though there were many individuals who had influenced me spiritually I reflected upon three individuals.
The first person was my ex-mentor who mentored me when I was a University student in Melbourne. He imparted to me the lesson of living a simple life but to give my very best to those under my care. The second person was a highly intelligent and effective Christian leader. He set for me a wonderful example of humility and servanthood. The third person was none other than my own father. He modelled for me what it meant to be totally devoted to God and His work.
What is interesting is that these individuals didn’t know that they impacted my life significantly. I did tell my ex-mentor many years later but I am not sure if he truly realised the kind of impact he had on my life. This is perhaps the deal of discipleship. There are times we would intentionally try to disciple people. But there are times we simply live a godly life consistently and our lives would somehow impact others without we even knowing it.
Thirdly, I was reminded that we should not expect an easy life in ministry. This came about as I was looking at the context of Titus, looking for comparable particulars in Singapore to Titus’ context.
I made a discovery that just as people in Crete went through different challenges in their different life stages, people in Singapore would also go through different challenges in their different life stages. Indeed, as long as we are still living in an imperfect world we will still face challenges in any life stage we are in.
This has implications for church leaders today. Firstly, we need to strive to be a good model as we go through various life stages so that we would have credibility when we minister to people. Secondly, we should not expect an easy life in ministry. We need to be prepared to deal with issues at different life stages. I remember Frank Damazio sharing with a group of church leaders in Singapore that ministry in the 21st century world in complex. It was complex in Titus’ time and it is likely to be even more complex today even as we are living during the last of the last days. This is not to adopt a mindset of defeat. This is to inject realism as we do the work of ministry. We must expect God’s power and victories in our ministry but we must also be prepared to work hard to deal with difficult issues various groups of people are facing in their respective life stages.
Fourthly, I made a discovery on the strategies to combat false teaching. As I was reading and pondering on Titus 2:1-10 including their context it came to me that Paul was giving Titus some strategies to combat false teachers. The two key strategies found in the passage are to teach and model. Titus needs to teach what is sound and to model that sound teaching.
It is disheartening at times to see a teaching which is imbalance or false gaining so much popularity. It is disheartening at times to see Christians making compromises and try to justify their choices by exalting certain teachers or teachings.
Thankfully, Paul has taught us the strategies to turn the situation around. We simply need to teach and model what we teach. We need to teach what is sound and model that sound teaching. The strategies sound simple but they are not easy to live out. There is no guarantee that the strategies would work for the mass but it would surely work for some individuals.
Fifthly, I just found hospitality to be a fascinating topic. This is as I am a big believer in the importance of being hospitable to people. I believe that hospitality is a huge evidence of our Christian love towards people. This applies to people we know and people we do not know.
I found the four practices of New Testament hospitality to be practical and helpful. They are the warm reception of guests, the washing of the guests’ feet, the provision of food and shelter and the sending on of guests.
It is interesting exercise to try to contextualise these practices into our modern context. For example, the warm reception of our guests may include welcoming our guests in the airport in our modern context.
The washing of guests’ feet is particularly fascinating to me. Washing people feet is an ancient practice. What would be the equivalent practices in our modern context? I believe that big idea is to adopt the attitude of a servant to serve others well. In our modern context this may include of doing a laundry for our guests, shopping for items that would please our guests and perhaps giving them a good shoulder message.
The provision of food and shelter in our modern context may include opening up our house for people to stay. Many modern people are not comfortable with this practice as they would need to sacrifice their privacy. The sending on of guests in our modern context may include sending our guests off at the airport even if their flights are midnight flights.
I want to conclude my blog reflection by sincerely thanking Brother Casey and Sister Davina for being wonderful role models in many ways. Thank you for believing in us and for giving your all to prepare and equip us for the work of ministry. I pray that God will continue to strengthen and anoint both of you to raise many more workers for the harvest field. Amen!
Friday 24 August 2012
Monday 16 April 2012
My Reflection on Corinthians
I found the Corinthians course to be a very interesting course. I wish I had more time to digest what I was receiving. I did not have that luxury of time due to the arrival of my baby and new flat. However, there many learning points I have received from the course. I will be sharing six of them through this blog entry.
Firstly, God spoke to me about relinquishing my personal rights. As I was reading 1 Corinthians early this year God spoke to me from 1 Corinthians 6:7, “Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated?” As I pondered about it, it came to me that the unity and the testimony of the church were more important than my personal justice.
This was really a timely word for me. This was as I was going through a rather difficult time in my life. The destabilisation of my personal life coupled with new stresses from ministry caused me to demand for my personal rights a little bit more. This timely word was part of the restoration process that God was doing in my life.
Secondly, I found the concept of 3 kinds of man to be very interesting. The 3 kinds of man are the natural man, a man without the Spirit of God (1 Corinthians 2:14), the spiritual man (1 Cor 2:15-16) and the worldly man (1 Corinthians 3:1-4).
When I did my life history for one assignment of the course I discovered that my life history can be roughly divided into three major periods which were 0-16 years old, 17-33 years old and 34-35 years old.
The first period (0-16 years old) was where I lived as a natural man. The second period (17-33 years old) was where I generally lived as a spiritual man. The third period (34-35 years old) was a difficult period of time in my life due to the destabilisation of my personal life coupled with new stresses from ministry. During this period of time I was reacting to my situations as a worldly man in an increasing measure.
I am so thankful things are turning around. I believe that since a few months ago I was beginning to enter into the fourth period of my life. I am beginning to live my life as a spiritual man in increasing measure once again. I pray that God will always remind me and empower me to live as a spiritual man. This is the kind of life where I would have nothing to hide, nothing to lose and nothing to prove. This is the kind of life where I am living my life truly for the audience of one.
Thirdly, I found the similarities between Corinth and Singapore to be fascinating. Through the lectures and the group assignment work I appreciated in a deeper measure how similar the two cities were. I believe that it is important to ponder about the implications of these similarities as it would affect the way we do ministry today.
A possible theme for the Epistle of 1 Corinthians is to be a godly church in an ungodly city. The city of Corinth was clearly influenced by the ungodly values of their world. This is also clearly the struggles that the churches in Singapore are facing right now. This makes 1 Corinthians to be a highly relevant and practical epistle to study and apply for our ministries today.
A practical step I intend to do after the completion of the course is to review the material once again not as an academic requirement but as a necessary step for the ministries God is entrusting unto me. I need to learn from the successes and failures of the Corinthian church. I need to learn from Paul, how he ministered to a problematic church that every church in Singapore can easily evolve into owing to the great similarities of their contexts.
Fourthly, one motivation of generous giving is to glorify God. This is one of sermon points for our group assignment project. This is a refreshing idea to me. We often talk about how we will never be able to shortchange God. If we are generous in our giving God will be even more generous towards us. While this is a biblical idea it seems that this idea is a little overused.
However, the idea that our generous giving would cause people to glorify God is a fresh idea. When we are generous with our giving we are creating an environment for believers to glorify God through their thanksgiving unto God for meeting their needs. When we are generous with our giving we are also creating an environment where non-believers can glorify God through their acceptance of God’s love or even the Gospel.
This idea is a fresh motivation for me to be a generous giver. I pray that God will help me and lead me to give generously to both believers and non-believers and that it would result in both believers and non-believers glorifying God in a big way.
Fifthly, my friendship with some classmates went a little deeper through this course. I remember Brother Casey sharing with us in one lecture that if we would get a good grade for the course but fail to make a new friend through the course then the course would not be a success to us. That was one reason why he insisted for the class to do a group project.
That was a good idea. However, I honestly did not expect for God to use my group project to deepen my friendship with my group-mates. These two semesters, I am having some difficulties finding time for my studies due to the arrival of my baby and new flat. Some of my group members were also facing their own personal challenges. This caused some of us not to be so punctual in doing our parts for our group project. To cut a long story short, this led to some heart-to-heart talk among the group project-mates midway through the group project. It was a quality talk that helped me to appreciate and cherish my group-mates more. I am thankful for the grace they rendered to me. I feel that our friendship goes a little deeper through the incident. At least, this is what I personally felt.
I want to conclude my blog reflection with an insight I gleaned from the commentary on the book of 1 Corinthians written by Gordon D. Fee. Fee argues on page 616 when commenting on 1 Corinthians 12:12-14, “Paul’s concern is for diversity, on the one hand, and for mutual concern in the body, on the other.” It came to me that it takes a mature church to be able to genuinely appreciate diversity and show true appreciation of the different members of the church. The Church in Corinth could not do it then. I am not sure if they could do it following Paul’s exhortation. But I sincerely pray that the churches in Singapore in the 21st century can do it with the grace of our God.
Firstly, God spoke to me about relinquishing my personal rights. As I was reading 1 Corinthians early this year God spoke to me from 1 Corinthians 6:7, “Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated?” As I pondered about it, it came to me that the unity and the testimony of the church were more important than my personal justice.
This was really a timely word for me. This was as I was going through a rather difficult time in my life. The destabilisation of my personal life coupled with new stresses from ministry caused me to demand for my personal rights a little bit more. This timely word was part of the restoration process that God was doing in my life.
Secondly, I found the concept of 3 kinds of man to be very interesting. The 3 kinds of man are the natural man, a man without the Spirit of God (1 Corinthians 2:14), the spiritual man (1 Cor 2:15-16) and the worldly man (1 Corinthians 3:1-4).
When I did my life history for one assignment of the course I discovered that my life history can be roughly divided into three major periods which were 0-16 years old, 17-33 years old and 34-35 years old.
The first period (0-16 years old) was where I lived as a natural man. The second period (17-33 years old) was where I generally lived as a spiritual man. The third period (34-35 years old) was a difficult period of time in my life due to the destabilisation of my personal life coupled with new stresses from ministry. During this period of time I was reacting to my situations as a worldly man in an increasing measure.
I am so thankful things are turning around. I believe that since a few months ago I was beginning to enter into the fourth period of my life. I am beginning to live my life as a spiritual man in increasing measure once again. I pray that God will always remind me and empower me to live as a spiritual man. This is the kind of life where I would have nothing to hide, nothing to lose and nothing to prove. This is the kind of life where I am living my life truly for the audience of one.
Thirdly, I found the similarities between Corinth and Singapore to be fascinating. Through the lectures and the group assignment work I appreciated in a deeper measure how similar the two cities were. I believe that it is important to ponder about the implications of these similarities as it would affect the way we do ministry today.
A possible theme for the Epistle of 1 Corinthians is to be a godly church in an ungodly city. The city of Corinth was clearly influenced by the ungodly values of their world. This is also clearly the struggles that the churches in Singapore are facing right now. This makes 1 Corinthians to be a highly relevant and practical epistle to study and apply for our ministries today.
A practical step I intend to do after the completion of the course is to review the material once again not as an academic requirement but as a necessary step for the ministries God is entrusting unto me. I need to learn from the successes and failures of the Corinthian church. I need to learn from Paul, how he ministered to a problematic church that every church in Singapore can easily evolve into owing to the great similarities of their contexts.
Fourthly, one motivation of generous giving is to glorify God. This is one of sermon points for our group assignment project. This is a refreshing idea to me. We often talk about how we will never be able to shortchange God. If we are generous in our giving God will be even more generous towards us. While this is a biblical idea it seems that this idea is a little overused.
However, the idea that our generous giving would cause people to glorify God is a fresh idea. When we are generous with our giving we are creating an environment for believers to glorify God through their thanksgiving unto God for meeting their needs. When we are generous with our giving we are also creating an environment where non-believers can glorify God through their acceptance of God’s love or even the Gospel.
This idea is a fresh motivation for me to be a generous giver. I pray that God will help me and lead me to give generously to both believers and non-believers and that it would result in both believers and non-believers glorifying God in a big way.
Fifthly, my friendship with some classmates went a little deeper through this course. I remember Brother Casey sharing with us in one lecture that if we would get a good grade for the course but fail to make a new friend through the course then the course would not be a success to us. That was one reason why he insisted for the class to do a group project.
That was a good idea. However, I honestly did not expect for God to use my group project to deepen my friendship with my group-mates. These two semesters, I am having some difficulties finding time for my studies due to the arrival of my baby and new flat. Some of my group members were also facing their own personal challenges. This caused some of us not to be so punctual in doing our parts for our group project. To cut a long story short, this led to some heart-to-heart talk among the group project-mates midway through the group project. It was a quality talk that helped me to appreciate and cherish my group-mates more. I am thankful for the grace they rendered to me. I feel that our friendship goes a little deeper through the incident. At least, this is what I personally felt.
I want to conclude my blog reflection with an insight I gleaned from the commentary on the book of 1 Corinthians written by Gordon D. Fee. Fee argues on page 616 when commenting on 1 Corinthians 12:12-14, “Paul’s concern is for diversity, on the one hand, and for mutual concern in the body, on the other.” It came to me that it takes a mature church to be able to genuinely appreciate diversity and show true appreciation of the different members of the church. The Church in Corinth could not do it then. I am not sure if they could do it following Paul’s exhortation. But I sincerely pray that the churches in Singapore in the 21st century can do it with the grace of our God.
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