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Our message today concerns the most important topic, discipleship. Join Reverend Daniel as he identifies the differences between a superficial state of discipleship and a true state of discipleship. Let's prepare our hearts and commit to continued growth in our faith walk.

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Church, we are on the CVs on discipleship. As I mentioned, uh the last month, the beginning of last month, every Family Sunday, we will focus on the theme of discipleship. So today's uh sharing is on the discipleship malaise. In the previous month, on the first week of our combined family Sunday, I shared on the discipleship gap. And I shared that the impetus for this sharing on the gap is because there's a shallow and superficial discipleship in our lives today, in the life of Christians today, that because of the culture and how it influences us, our discipleship to Jesus rarely goes skin deep. I shared that unless we see the gap between our current reality and our desired destination, we won't be able to assess what it will take to get us there. So if discipleship is our desired destination, what are some gaps between what we are now, our current reality, and what we could be as disciples of Jesus? I then shared on the five marks of discipleship that addresses the gap in our discipleship. So just to review again, because we live in a world where information is, we are bombarded by so much information, and I don't think any of us, many of us can recall what I mentioned last month. But just to jerk your memory again, the five marks of discipleship are firstly every member ministry. God has designed the church such that he desires more and more of us to serve God, to worship him, to take our place in the worship and service of God. Secondly, the disciplined life. Do we discipline ourselves to deepen our relationship with Jesus? And I shared through the example of athletes that go through strenuous and disciplined exercise regimes just to position themselves to be fit and to be well trained. Similarly, to walk out our life of discipleship without discipline, without effort, then we won't grow. Thirdly, embracing Jesus and his Lordship in our hearts, homes, and workplaces, in our attitudes, thoughts, and desires, our relationships and our decisions. And I ask the question: is Jesus Lord over all our lives? Fourthly, knowing what God wills and desires through knowing scripture. Are we shaped and formed by scripture as our plumb line of truth? And lastly, sharing our faith actively. Are we bubbling over with the words of Jesus? So each point uh there are food for thought, and just want to encourage us, if you have time, to just revisit the sermon. Uh, we have it recorded uh if you need to. Today we'll be looking at some of the root causes that have created the superficial state of discipleship and how we can deal with it here in YCCA by focusing on personal discipling through mentoring. Let us pray. Father, we want to thank you for your word today. Thank you for reminding us that you are calling us to first principles, to put discipleship at the center of our lives as a way of following Jesus. And Lord, we know we live in a culture that squeezes us into Ismo and helps us to not conform, not to be conformed to the world and what it desires, but to be shaped by your word, to be shaped by relationships that you will bring to our lives. So we pray and ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. In Jesus' last words of commission to his disciples in Matthew 28, verse 18 to 20, he said to them, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you. And the promise of Jesus is, Behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. So this is an undisputed claim that this is what Jesus desires of us to go and make disciples of all nations. He has given us his authority, he has promised us his presence. So he calls us to be going, to be making disciples, to be baptizing them, teaching them, to observe all that Jesus had commanded them. So if the main thing of the church should be discipleship, how do we fare as a church? Do you, do I consider it part of our responsibility as a Christian to make disciples? C.S. Lewis has stated the main thing in the most powerful way. He says this, and I quote, the church exists for nothing else but to draw men into Christ, to make them in inverted commerce little Christ. If they are not doing that, all the cathedrals, all the clergy, all the missions, and all the sermons are simply a waste of time. According to Greg Odin, there are eight distractions that often sideline us from producing disciples of Jesus. Because of time, I won't dive into detail in any of that, but because I want to move to the main thing on how, as a church, together we can engage in personal discipleship. I'll just uh briefly mention six of the distractions or the root causes of uh lack of discipleship in our life. So, firstly, a diversion from our primary calling. This refers more to pastors. And uh Ogden says this the primary calling of pastors is to equip God's people to fulfill their ministries rather than to do all the ministries themselves. So the pattern that we have adopted is a lot of times that pastors are focused on doing all the ministries, on running ministries and to keep things going, that they become too busy running ministries, then prioritizing relational connection with members. And there's always a struggle as a pastor, and I can attest to that, um, between uh getting on with work that needs to be done to keep so-called the church running, the machinery going, and there's always time devoted to that. But it shouldn't be at the expense of relational connection with members. So I make it a point in my weekly rhythm to have a slot where I focus on people that the Lord may be leading me to to reach out or to spend more time, perhaps to meet them up, to meet up with them for coffee, for chat. So I deliberately set a time each week to focus on relationships. Because if I don't do that, I'll be swung by many other things. Secondly, discipling through programs. The attempt to make disciples through programs kind of replaces the person-centered growth as a means to make disciples. And I'm sure all of us have experienced various kinds of discipleship programs. I remember growing up here, I went through, I went through Master Life. Uh is it by Avery Willis? I can't remember who is the author, but Master Life. There are different levels, different series, and there are many tools that are useful for discipleship. But they are just tools. They are not the end goal itself. But a lot of times, a lot of effort has been uh placed in developing good programs such that without the programs, then we the church is uh handicapped. We can't do discipleship because we don't have material. But the good news is, I'd like to share with us today is that not all discipleship, not all discipling requires a material. There's discipleship involved that does not involve material. Right? So um so we see back to the way of Jesus, the way he does ministry, uh, the pattern of his ministry is that he will take the disciples in to be with him so that he may send them out. In Mark 3, 14, this is clear. He called the 12 so that they may be with him, and so that he may send that out. So this is the pattern of discipleship. It's a relational ministry. It may involve uh programs, it may involve material, but essentially it's a call to relationship. Jesus called the 12 disciples to be with him so that he might send them out. Thirdly, reducing the Christian life. A reductionist approach to Christianity reduces the good news of the gospel to what benefits, eternal benefits we get from Jesus. Not sure whether you have heard of the transactional gospel, but this is what it uh proposes. Sin is an eternal debit, and Jesus' death and resurrection as a credit to our account, which cancels our debt. So uh so I have my ticket to heaven, I have my debt canceled, so praise the Lord, and that's all I need to do. So that opposes what Jesus intended for us. He intended discipleship to Jesus as a way of life. We are called not just to reap eternal benefits and and and have at the end, have that as the end, but to live as his disciples. So if we follow a reductionist approach to Christianity, the focus each time we come to church is what we can get from Jesus. More benefits, more blessings, uh, more fulfillment, rather than to live out the call to be his disciples. And there are many uh churches today um that play by the culture of the day, which is designed, the services are designed to make you feel good, to make you feel that you have received a blessing before you leave. But that is not a true measure of what the Christian life is about because God calls us to live as his disciples and not just to reap blessings for as an end to itself. Fourthly, a two-tiered understanding of discipleship. If I ask the question, how many of us can say that we are true disciples of Jesus? Perhaps not many of us will raise our hands, but how many of us can say that we are true Christians? If I ask the question, perhaps there'll be more hands being raised. Because subconsciously, uh many of us, I suspect, think that discipleship is for super Christians and not for ordinary Christians. I'm happy to just be a Christian. I'm happy to just have my name recorded, religion, Christianity, uh, rather than to live as a disciple of Jesus. The elephant in the room in many churches, this is what uh Ogden is saying, is the unstated assumption that a person can be a Christian without being a disciple. On the contrary, if we read the gospel, just reading through the gospels, we realize Jesus, the words of Jesus are very pointed. Uh is very pointed, sorry. In Luke 9, 23, he says, if anyone would come after me, meaning if you want to follow me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. So if we claim to follow Jesus, if we claim to worship him, then we need to take the call to discipleship seriously. Discipleship is for all Christians. The fifth point that's in a lot of in a number of churches, there's no clear pathway to maturity. Ogden writes, if making disciples is the primary mission of the church, wouldn't we expect that most churches will have some public pathway to maturity in Christ? What if a new person comes to church and was eager to grow in his or her faith? If he or she asks, how do I become a fully devoted follower of Christ, here would we have an answer? The sixth point, a lack of personal discipling. Most Christians have never been personally discipled. Ogden laments that a major reason for the eight flaws in the life of the Christian church is that people have not been personally discipled. He defines broadly discipling as a process that takes place within accountable relationships over a period of time for the purpose of bringing believers to spiritual maturity in Christ. I'd like to suggest to us that for us here in YCCA, our approach to discipleship links the pathway to maturity with the need for discipling relationships. Early last year, or the year before last year, in 2023, I introduced the discipleship transformational framework, which is a pathway to maturity to complement our vision to grow in Christ-likeness towards spiritual maturity. The discipleship transformation framework shows us the means. If anyone comes, uh, if you are a visitor, you come to YCCA. My hope is over time you you realize that there's certain dynamics involved in your growth in Christ. So the discipleship transformation framework shows us the means in which God often uses to transform us, to grow in Christ-likeness towards spiritual maturity. Simply stated, it is when we apply God's truth to our life, challenges and circumstances in our inevitable experience of personal brokenness, with the support of deep formational relationships, that we grow in discipleship and spiritual maturity. The means in which God uses to transform us, firstly, is his word, God's truth, and also our experience, the experiences that we go through in life, and sometimes it involves personal brokenness. And God also uses our relationships with one another as a means of maturing us, of transforming us. So the three areas have to interface with each other: God's truth, scripture, our personal experiences, and sometimes involves brokenness, and our relationships with one another. For example, knowing the truth that God desires us to trust him. We know that in scripture that God calls us, commands us to trust him. It's most fully applied to our lives when we go through times of personal brokenness, be it a work challenge, a family crisis, and so on. When we experience a loss, can we trust that God can bring good out of the situation? This is where God's truth is often put to the test. Yet God's truth is not applied in a vacuum, but in the context of a connected community. I believe that through deep formational relationships with one another, we can walk through crises stronger and grow in our faith and in our application of God's truth. This morning I'd like to just focus on the aspect of the need for deep formational relationships in discipleship. And as we think about discipling relationships, we need to consider the concept or the idea of mentoring. Explains, he paints a picture. But how Clinton and Stanley paints the picture is it describes a situation. And I think all of us, when we hear this, we can all identify with it. And he begins this way: it says that mentoring begins. It starts with someone with need. So all of us here have needs in our life, right? We come here to worship God. We may have something that we need help in. We may have a concern in our life. Uh we come with needs before God and also before one another. And this someone with need meets someone further along in experience who has something to contribute to that need. So a relationship over time is then established. And the more experienced person who is able to provide for that need then shares what he or she has been through or learned, meeting the need of the person with the need. So with the acceptance of what was shared, the person who was in need then is empowered and strengthened. So there's a transference or empowerment that empowering that happens in relationships that will take place as someone with need is being empowered by another who has an answer to their need. So this process of empowerment is actually at the heart of mentoring. And I like to uh just share with us, I thought this definition by Stanley and Clinton is a good definition that as a church we can approach when we think about mentoring. Mentoring is a relational experience in which one person empowers another by sharing God-given resources. All of us, as we sang the song earlier, you know, we are God's masterpiece. We all have something that God has placed in our lives. So no one is here uh without God's gift or talents. We are here because God has shaped us in a particular way. And our experience of being shaped by God in a particular way can be a blessing, perhaps, to someone who has going through the same situation that has a need. So by coming alongside that person, you are actually empowering that person. And in a way, you are entering into a relational experience that can be called mentoring. Right? So mentoring is really a relational experience in which one person empowers another by sharing God's given resources. I like to paint a picture about how mentoring looks like. In actual practice, by sharing a story, a journey of someone who received this mentoring. And I hope as I share his story, it starts to jerk your mind to think about how the Lord may be using you even right now or in time to come to be a mentor to someone in YCCA or even outside the church in your workplace and your families. So this is a story sharing with us. He struggled with some fairly normal issues for a young husband, father, and pastor. At 32, Jim had moved along well. He met Christ in college through a student outreach ministry and co-labored with that group as a student. And later for three years as a full-time staff. After four years of seminary and an associate pastor role, Jim was two years into his first pastorate, a small growing church. He was motivated, gifted, and off to a good start. So the author shared, as I became acquainted with Jim, I sensed that he was working hard and had high expectations for this new ministry opportunity. But I also suspected that he was under a lot of pressure from his internal drive and external demands, both perceived and real. Coupled this with two young toddlers and an eager spouse who has high expectations for their family development. And then we have a pastor with needs. So the author writes, having known similar situations and understanding the pressure he was under, I arranged to meet him for breakfast. During the meal, he related his testimony and how God had led him into the local church ministry and to his current responsibilities. As I listened, the Holy Spirit confirmed some of my earlier concerns. I asked specific questions and commented on the importance of having a ministry philosophy to provide the basis for decisions and priority in ministry. Jim responded with some questions that revealed a responsive cord had been touched. I like Jim and we seemed to feel comfortable with one another. We spent a good two hours talking. Just before leaving, he shared two prayer needs and asked if we could meet again. I agreed and continued to pray for Jim. At the second meeting, we jumped right into his schedule and potential conflicts with church members who seemed to resist some changes he wanted to see happen. My part was to simply listen and ask helpful questions. Then he shared some personal frustrations he experienced as a dad in the midst of competing time demands. That opened up time for me to encourage him, let him know he wasn't alone, and tell him about some of the same difficulties I had experienced. I related what I had learned as a young father and husband. I gave a few practical suggestions. Because of his response to what I shared, I proposed that he would think through what we discussed and develop a realistic plan for his appropriate involvement with his children and the time he spent praying and sharing with his wife. We set a time for a third meeting to review what effect his plan had. Jim's commitment and attitude to learn were obvious, but I needed to test his willingness to be held accountable by an older brother before I would commit myself to be his mentor. In subsequent meetings, our conversations became more personal and focused, and I sensed they were important to him. I asked him how he would describe our growing relationship and the most meaningful benefit. His response did not surprise me. He said, I see you as an older brother with experience in the areas I'm growing in: leadership, being a dad and husband, and bring about change in older people. Your questions and counsel have been so helpful and have kept me from a few needless conflicts as well. Then he asked me how I saw our relationship. So I replied, you are a very gifted, energetic young leader who can make a great contribution to the purposes of God. But there's much to learn, and the way is not easy. I like to walk with you for part of the way. I want to be a brother to you, challenge your thinking and faith, caution you where appropriate, and share what I've learned if it can help. Most of all, I want to pray specifically for you and with you. So we had a good time talking about some realistic expectations for our relationship. They centered around the subjects he wanted to grow in, how often we would meet, transparency and accountability. It's great having an older brother like you who is outside my immediate world and with whom I can discuss anything, and who can push me in some areas and keep me from shooting my foot in others. So the author writes, I'm also grateful for this relationship, for Jim will help me keep in touch with the issues and concerns young leaders face. He will challenge my thinking. It's a rare privilege to invest in a young leader in a way that will help him become godly and effective. I must pray much and keep in tune to the Holy Spirit's leading in all of this. Besides, I like Jim and his wife, and I sense a meaningful friendship developing. As shown, as shared in this uh story, this illustration, stepping into a mentoring relationship can be natural. And I'm talking about organic mentoring that can happen as we become aware of needs, even among uh our community here, as we fellowship at iZone. You may be aware of needs of certain uh concerns that someone may have faced. And through a process of interacting, perhaps a few meetings with the person, uh, the relationship will develop organically, and the role is very different. You're coming in as a guide and to offer advice and help. So just being aware of the growth needs and challenges of someone at any stage can place you in a position to listen, ask helpful questions, counsel, and encourage. You don't need to know all the answers or assume a teaching role to be a blessing to someone you mentor. Listening, affirming, suggesting, sharing experiences, and praying together are invaluable contributions that gives the person or the mentee confidence, perspective, and practical help. We also see a certain dynamic happening in this story. There is an openness and growing attraction and responsiveness to each other and a commitment eventually to be accountable by setting certain expectations and goals to guide their relationship. So all of us here today have something that we can contribute to help someone along the way. And in time to come, in fact, this year, we will one of the things that I hope to do is uh we will have a workshop together with Grace Works to talk about intergenerational mentoring. That is where we want to level the ground. We are not saying that mentoring is always someone with the upper hand, like someone who is uh much older in age. Only when you reach 60, then you can be an appropriate mentor because you have more life experience. That is true to some extent, but not totally true. Because there are always things that we may not know that we can learn from someone younger. Um perhaps it will not be such a direct way of mentoring where we will hold, for example, if you're an older person, uh, that a younger person will hold you accountable because it doesn't work that way, but there's something that the younger generation can mentor the older generation in. Uh, some benefit uh that can be given over. I mean, certain use of technology is one natural example or many other ways. So we I hope to level the field to say that it's really when we are connected relationally. It's only when we start to see discipleship beyond just what material we use and whether we are able to do it to sharing our experience, you know, to come to the place where we are able to empower someone with the experience we have, then I think we are able to grow as a church in spiritual maturity. So it is when we apply God's truth to our life, challenges and circumstances. And we and because of that, I've emphasized, you know, memory verses, and the whole reason is so that we have an opportunity to imbibe on God's word, to allow his word to seep into our hearts. Because the world today has lost its bearing. Even Christians today uh has lost the anchor, the plumb line of God's truth in their life. But what often feeds into the plumb line in their lives is uh other things other than God's word. So we really have to uh establish scripture, God's truth in our lives. But that alone, you know, won't transform us. Just knowing what God says won't transform us because we need that word, that truth needs to be applied in our lives. In our life, challenges our life circumstances. We only prove uh God to be true through our experiences. As we go through our life, we reflect on our life experiences. We say God is good because of certain challenges we face and how we have seen God leading us to overcome. But I'd like to add today that we cannot do that without the support of one another. We need deep, we need to grow in deep formational relationships. We need to go beyond just the usual group that we are um comfortable with, to interact with, to just to expand our horizon and to ask the Lord is He leading us to someone whom He may be calling us to be a mentor with. And it all starts with a willingness to connect, right? And no one would demand that straight away you be a mentor, you know, but it requires a whole process of willingness to connect with someone, willingness to listen, willingness to share our experience, and as the experience grows, um, the connection grows, then accountability can come in. Something more formal can come in. So mentoring is a relational experience in which one person empowers another by sharing God-given resources. And all of us have something that God has placed in us a resource, a gift, a talent. And God desires us, as the song reminds us earlier, God's masterpiece, to use that uh talent to bless someone, to share our experience so that someone in the congregation will be blessed. Mentoring can take place organically as we ask God to open our eyes to someone with a need in which you can empower with God given resources which He has provided you. And all of us will shape this differently, because all of us have different gifts and uh talents that God has placed us. So no one of us will mentor someone in the exact same way, and but nevertheless, God calls us to a relational connection to grow. And it's all the more poignant because if you recall uh a few years back, we're just we have just come out of COVID about a number of years already, and I sense that there's a sense of of complacency that set in. Life has gone, has gone back to what is usual. I mean, there's people are starting to travel more, and um perhaps COVID-19 has taught us one thing, and that is the need to come back to first principles, which is discipleship. What's discipleship about? And we cannot run away from the relational connection that discipleship offers us. And now that we have we can all come back fully as persons, then the call of God is for us to grow, to be more connected to one another, to share resources. And one very practical example is that God may be laying on the heart some of us who are older, who are grandparents, you know, we have quite a number of uh families with young children. Maybe the Lord is saying, why don't you you start to befriend those with young children? I'm sure you have a wealth of uh experience to share. And I'm sure the young parents can also be a blessing to you in some way, because they have resources in their hands that they can also share with you to help you. So we need one another, and I pray that we will grow stronger, connected to each other, to one another more as we go along. So sometime in the middle of the year, we will have a workshop on uh intergenerational mentoring and do await that time for more details. But I hope today to just give us a sense that all of us can be a mentor because all of us have something that God has gifted us. And the question is, what are we doing about it? Are we using it to bless someone? Or are we content to just keep it for our own use?

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We pray that you've been ministered to by the Word of God today. If you'd like to know more about each researcher, please visit our website at yccanglican.com. Have a blessed day.