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Here at YCCO, we start the year off with Vision Sunday, a time where we receive our direction as a church for the year ahead. This Vision Sunday, Reverend Daniel unpacks what it means to be with Jesus and challenges us to choose the path of discipleship.

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Today is a Vision Sunday, and I'll be sharing more about how I sense God leading us as a church this year. So it's not something that we are able to I'm able to do alone, but it's something that we will sense with the Lord together and see how He brings us together as a parish. Let us pray. Father, we thank you that you are the one that leads your church into a deeper purpose, even where you have placed us in issue. And Lord, thank you for calling us as individuals to grow in Christ-likeness towards spiritual maturity. So draw us near, draw us deeper into you and help us to make sense of all that you are doing in our lives through your word, through one another, and through what you are doing in the world. We pray and ask all this in Jesus' name. Amen. The vision that I shared for us as a church in YCCA is that we are actually an intergenerational family church. We are not just a youth church or a church full of seniors or church only for young parents or middle-aged people who are in the middle of their career. No, we are an intergenerational family church, meaning that this is a church for all generations, right? And it's something that we hope to do, we hope to grow, to embrace uh the generations more and more in our midst. So we are an intergenerational family church growing in Christ-likeness towards spiritual maturity. And that's the goal. That is the telos, that is what we are working towards formation and growth. To be more Christ-like in our lives. And as we do that, it's scary because all of us know that when we say we want to be more Christ-like, then we see all our ugliness start to sprout out in our lives, our impatience, uh maybe our anger, our frustrations, our all kinds of things comes up. And it's normal and it's okay because that is the beginning of a journey towards uh greater conformity to Christ. So I believe it's not the only way, but I believe that God wants us to grow towards Christ-likeness and towards spiritual maturity by the following ways. Right? The need to embrace personal brokenness and an openness to God for spiritual change. We all uh have a certain sense of brokenness in our lives, whether through uh illness or through a certain uh uh work situation or family situation or even our own uh secret sin that we struggle with that we don't dare to tell anyone. So this is the brokenness that we bear in our lives, and as we embrace it and accept it, we open our hearts to God for change because God is at work in our lives to change us, to transform us to be more like Christ. So each time we come to the Lord with our brokenness, we also come with Him, to Him with open hands, so that He's able to change and transform our brokenness for a greater good. And secondly, creating a space for God's truth to be understood and applied in community. What is central to our faith is uh scripture and God's word, and how can we allow God's words to simmer in our hearts and lives, how can we apply it within our community? So, this is a very central thing that uh churches do, which is to focus on the preaching and teaching of God's word, so that God's truth will get into our hearts and minds and spur us in our actions. Thirdly, to invest time and effort in deep formational relationships with one another. And this is what we hope to grow in uh uh in terms of our relational connectedness with one another. Not just superficial, but hopefully, as I share further today the discipleship initiative, we will grow truly relationally connected when we allow ourselves to be vulnerable, when we hear and listen to the brokenness of one another, when we journey together, when we allow God's word to shape our hearts and lives, transformation happens. And lastly, to live out the gospel of God's grace through acts of service and compassion. I think it's quite self-explanatory. What God feeds into our lives has to flow out uh in terms of how we look at the laws around us in issue and also around the world. So I also shared along with this um something called our discipleship transformational framework to complement our vision, which is this it is when we apply God's truth to our life, challenges and circumstances in our inevitable experience of personal brokenness, God's truth applied to our circumstances with the support of deep formational relationships, that we actually grow in discipleship and spiritual maturity. And this is something that I hope we can keep at the back of our minds. This is how God truly grows us. You know, as we allow God's truth to shape our human brokenness in the context of community, we'll see growth happen to us and to corporately to us, corporately, uh all of us together as a community of God. So, along with the vision, which will be a mainstay for us, or at least as as long as I'm uh the vicar here, uh, for YCCA, I felt it good that we developed uh what I call a key trust for this year and perhaps for next year and the years ahead, which is deepening discipleship with Jesus. So the theme of this year is deepening discipleship with Jesus. Rowan Williams, uh the former Archbishop of Canterbury, writes uh that discipleship in a nutshell is a state of being. It's a state of being with someone. In ancient times, to be a learner or disciple of a teacher was to commit oneself to be with the teacher, to learn from him. This means living together in close quarters, eating the same food and breathing the same air. And there was nothing, according to Rowan Williams, there was nothing intermittent about discipleship. Intermittent meaning that there's not so much of a start-stop, you know, uh you follow someone and then you leave the relationship to do your own thing and then you come back to your teacher or master. That there was it's not something intermittent, but it's something continuous and ever connected. So discipleship is a state of being in which one looks and listens to the teacher without interruption. And this is what happens in the text before us that was read from John 1, 35 to 39. John was standing, John the Baptist, with two of his disciples, and when he saw Jesus, he said, Behold the Lamb of God. When the two disciples of John heard him say this, they began to follow Jesus. And Jesus turned to them and said, What are you seeking? And their response actually kind of initiated the relationship between Jesus and the disciples to learn from Jesus to be his disciple. They said to him, Rabbi, which means teacher, where are you staying? He said to them, Come and you will see. So they came and saw where he was staying and they stayed with him that day, for it was about the 10th hour. So by asking Jesus where he was staying, the two disciples of John indicated they wanted a student-teacher relationship with Jesus. They wanted to be initiated to call Jesus as rabbi to follow him, to learn from him. This is where we experience a disconnect today in our lives because very often discipleship in churches is often understood as attending a discipleship course for a period of time. You know, whether it is uh Master Life or even the Alpha Course, you know, we see it as a time frame where we embark on this program, and after that, when the period of the course ends, so does our discipleship journey. However, discipleship in the truer sense of the word is a constant being with Jesus, and it's a constant watching and looking out with expectancy for something that Jesus may be saying or imparting to us. So it's good for us all to have our regular quiet time where we seek to focus on God, give Him the first few moments of the day or last few moments of the night. But sometimes by having such a fixed time, it sometimes we think that after the quiet time, the rest of the time belongs to me. Right? So it's how I arrange my life and how I begin to do certain things. But our quiet time with Jesus is supposed to be throughout the day, it's uh non-intermittent. So we should connect with Jesus as we work, as we engage with uh matters in the work, in the office, as we interact with people. You know, Jesus wants to be with us. So discipleship is the way of being, it's more than just a course or the quiet time that we do, it is non-intermittent. So I'd like to share with us three ways in which we can apply this to our lives today. How can we adopt a posture of being with Jesus in our lives? So, firstly, I we need to be attentive to how God reveals himself in scripture, particularly in the gospels. So as we listen to God as he reveals himself in scripture, we hear his heartbeat and begin to respond to his leading. So Matthew 11, 28, 30, I mean, just using it as an example of how we can be attentive to God as He speaks to us. So Matthew 11, 28 to 30 reads, Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. So as you focus on the words of Jesus, uh some of the more direct invitations of Jesus, one of it is Matthew 11, 28 to 30, forms a way that we can orientate ourselves each day to come to Jesus, to take his yoke upon ourselves, to learn from him and to find rest for our souls. Dallas Willard once said, the secret of Jesus' easy yoke involves living as Jesus lived in the entirety of his life, adopting his overall lifestyle. When I first read this, I said easier said than done. I mean, if you are really able to live as Jesus lived in the entirety of his life, adopting his overall lifestyle, then we'll be it's so it sounds so easy, right? It's something which uh it's a journey, right? And it's not something that is easily adopted. However, I believe that the journey of our transformation to be more Christ-like can start with first steps that we develop into a habit, a routine, and a lifestyle of being with Jesus. As I shared with us uh previously, uh Matthew 11, 28 to 30, since the church camp last year becomes the go-to scripture each day for me as I begin the day. I begin the day by orientating myself to scripture and to what God is saying to me. So let's look at the immediate context of Matthew 11, 28 to 30 to better understand what is this invitation that God that Jesus calls us to. So the immediate context of Matthew 11, 28 to 30 is his critique of the generation of his time. Jesus said that they were like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to their playmates, we played the flute for you and you did not dance. We sang a dirk and you did not mourn. His generation were either the aloof children who sought or the active children who expected all to dance to their tune. Then Jesus turned to denounce the cities where most of his mighty works were done, because they did not repent or turn to him. So Matthew 11, 21 to 24, Jesus began to denounce the cities. He says, Woe to you, Jorasin, woe to you, Poseida, for if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you. And you, Kapanon, will you be exalted to heaven? You'll be brought down to Hades. For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom, it would remain until this day. But I tell you, it will be more terrible on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom than for you. So these were terrible judgments, woe to the Galilean cities, who saw Jesus' mighty works, yet resisted him. Jesus then compared the Galilean cities of Ty, Sidon, and Sodom, compared the cities to Ty, Sidon, and Sodom in the Old Testament. So Ty and Sidon were wealthy Phoenician port cities, condemned by the prophets of the Old Testament, such as Isaiah and Ezekiel, for their pride and idolatry. So they were worshipping foreign gods, and when God kind of served judgment upon them, it was his divine judgment. And Sodom was infamous for her extreme wickedness, particularly in her sexual immorality, leading to its total destruction by God in Genesis 19. So she Sodom became an example of sin and divine wrath against unrepentant evil. So here Jesus is saying that even the most evil and wicked cities in the Old Testament would receive a less severe judgment compared to the Galilean cities who rejected Jesus and the mighty works done. So everything was at stake because these Galilean cities were not turning to Jesus. They rejected his mighty works. So they only faced divine judgment. Then Jesus began to turn his attention to the little children, thanking the Father that it is not the wise and understanding, but to little children that is revealed these things. So what are these things that have been revealed to little children? I believe Jesus is speaking about the receptiveness of little children to come to him. In Matthew 19, verse 14, Jesus said, Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven. So it's precisely the attitude of receptivity, of attentiveness to Jesus that is so valuable, that is hidden from those who are wise and understanding in their own eyes. So as the little children come to Jesus, it is our coming to Him each day that will bring us rest and that will orientate our lives for the day. Isaiah 30 verse 15 reminds us, for thus said the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, in returning and rest you shall be safe. In quietness and in trust shall be your strength. But you were not willing. So we need to come to Jesus each day and allow him to live in and through us and all that we do. So the invitation of Jesus in Matthew 11, 28 to 30, come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me. For I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. So I'm reminded each time I come before the Lord and use Matthew 11, 28 to 30 to frame my time with him. Each day is the same verse, but each day the Lord gives me new strength. So I will bring before him the day, the shape of the day, the people I will meet, the things I need to do, and I invite him to come to teach me. I choose to take his yoke upon myself and learn how he does things. So it's so different when we see our quiet time as just something we need to do, like a religious duty, read a short passage, and then we are done. Our quiet time actually is a place where we open ourselves, we open up spaces for God to act in us throughout the day. So Matthew 11, 28, 30 forms a very good framework that we can frame our lives each day to learn from Jesus. Each day there are new lessons to learn, there are new things that he will open our eyes to if we only take time to listen and to learn to take his yoke upon ourselves. And the reason why Jesus uses the two verbs here, take my yoke upon you and learn from me. So these two words, verbs take and learn, they are actually in the imperative, meaning it's a command. Something that Jesus is saying, along with the word the verb come, take my yoke upon you, learn from me. And then Jesus gives us the reason why. Why should we take the yoke of Jesus and learn from him? Because he tells us that for I'm gentle and lowly in heart, and that's the reason why we are invited. Each time to come to Jesus. Because he is gentle. And the word gentle comes with it the meaning of one that is not overly impressed by his or her sense of self-importance. To be gentle means you are not you're self-forgetting, you are not focused so much about your own self-importance. Right? That's the meaning of the word gentle and lowly. Lowly has the idea of being unpretentious, humble. So this is how one of the few passages in the gospel where Jesus reveals who he is. Right? We know he's the creator of the world. He you know he did many acts of compassion and mercy, but he is also gentle and lowly in heart. He is unpretentious, he's humble, he is someone that has not an inflated ego, a sense of self-importance. So this is the savior we worship. And when we do that, when we learn to take the yoke of Jesus upon our lives, when we learn to invite Him into our lives and learn from Him, then we will find rest for our souls. God will rest our souls. So the first thing that we need to do as we think about how we can be more attentive to God is to look at how He reveals Himself in Scripture and through the Gospels. So I invite you, uh if not Matthew 11, 28 to 30, but just pick any gospel passages, especially the direct words of Jesus, and begin to uh read it in the context and begin to allow the Lord to speak to you through that passage. And it's okay to take the passage through a few months, right? So we are going deep, we are not just trying to fulfill a criteria. Right? The second thing we we can do is by being attentive to how God reveals Himself in our communal life together. So God desires that we grow together in our communal life in Him. Somehow, growth as a Christian cannot be isolated. We only grow when we grow together in community. So Rowan Williams writes this quote, and I like it. If you can maybe uh take a picture of it if it helps you remember, because it kind of reorientates the way you look at one another as Christians, as fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. This is what he writes, and I quote, Jesus has brought us together precisely so that we look at one another with a degree of expectancy as if God will speak through our fellow brother or sister to us. It doesn't mean we will agree with everything they say, but it does mean that we come with an open posture to hear God speak through one another. How many of us have actually considered, you know, that there's something that we can learn just by hearing the story of another brother and sister and we see how they go through a particular challenge in their lives. We see God at work, you know, or when a brother or sister share his or her brokenness in their lives, that's where we begin to identify uh with them through mercy and compassion. We begin to come into their lives and try to provide some help and support. So this is what it means that God actually reveals Himself to us in our communal life together. In other words, there's something special and divine that God is doing in our fellow brother and sister's life if we only take time and have a heart to listen and hear God through their stories of faith and the challenges they go through. Perhaps the question to us is what is God giving me here and now through this fellow brother or sister speaking to me right now? And I believe God does speak to us in community through one another. So that's where I like to kind of anchor or share a bit more about the discipleship initiative that uh we'll be launching this year. And the whole purpose of this discipleship initiative is really to help us as a church to grow in our communal life together. Right? It's not a program that we adopt and just try to finish, maybe uh cut short the program or try to fast-track the course. It's not about even the book, but it's about our life together, in community, around scripture, around one another, around authentic open sharing, around prayer, support, and encouragement. So, as mentioned previously, this year we'll be opening up the possibility for us to grow deeper in discipleship intentionally. The resource that will aid our growth is uh Greg Odin's discipleship essentials. Uh as I said, the main focus of this is for us to really grow deeper in discipleship together. So there are three elements in his book which will help us grow as disciples together. First, the unchanging truth of God's word. Right? God's word is the center of the time we have together. There's a memory verse, there's an orientating passage that we'll go through. There's some inductive Bible study that we'll go through. So God's truth and God's word is like a plum line that will anchor our time together. And then transparent relationships, right? Um in groups of trees and forests and gender-specific, it enables us to share in a deeper way over time and it enables us to go deeper when we share about our own personal brokenness. We allow our relationships, our community to shape us around God's word. And thirdly, there's a life change accountability around a mutual covenant. So there's a mutual covenant that we make to one another, not so much to hold it like a law or a legalistic way to rein in on one another, but the whole idea is that we covenant together. That's why discipleship cannot be forced, right? So in our in the discipleship initiative, uh we it is an opt-in thing, right? We will not launch it and having every connect group to run this because it will not work right this way, top down. It has to be a willingness to come together to see the value of community. It has to be a desire to grow deeper in sharing our lives with one another, and it has to be a desire to allow God's word to shape our lives more. So transformation occurs when we grapple with the truth of God's word in the context of transparent relationships. Our mutual accountability to one another takes the relational context of discipleship to another level. This means giving one another in a group, right, uh permission to keep us accountable. Uh so the mutual covenant involves the commitment to meet together, whether it's uh every week, whether it's twice a month, which I think that would that is more doable in the context of our time. Um so committing to meet together, to share transparently and honestly for mutual edification, to be diligent in completing assignments prior to our meeting together, and to offer ourselves fully to God to allow Him to effect transformation as we embark on our discipleship journey. So from next Sunday onwards, the 18th January, and for a couple of weeks, we'll be sharing with you how you can sign up for this discipleship initiative. So we will need time uh after the closing date to kind of look through the names and to see how we can fit you into groups such that uh it's doable. Right? So uh it's a journey, uh, and it's a journey of growing together in community. Think about how much we can learn when we gather and hear each other's stories uh centered around God's word. And I believe we are able to go deeper and grow uh in closer fellowship, at least to those who commit to journeying together. So thirdly and lastly, we can grow to be more attentive to who Jesus seeks and keep company with. Right? Being with Jesus implies that we follow him wherever he goes and to whomever he leads us to. So part and parcel of what it means to follow Jesus is that we will have to be led by him rather than uh to allow ourselves to shape our own agenda. So when Jesus goes in the company to be in the company of the excluded and the unclean, the outcast, the poor and needy, the sick and weary, that's where we are going to find ourselves as we follow him. Right? So by being with Jesus, we need to be attentive to who Jesus seeks and keeps company with. And how we know that? As we read the gospels, we see how uh the focus of Jesus' ministry. So we see that in Jesus' ministry, the people he sat and ate with and to whom he opened the kingdom of God are of all kinds and shapes and sizes. He intentionally broke social barriers, showing mercy and compassion to the last, the least, and the lost. Jesus called the despised tax collectors of the day. He healed and cleansed unclean lepers who were just left in their own colony, isolated and destitute. He forgave the sinful woman caught in the act of adultery and who received mercy from God, from Jesus. And a sinful woman was drawn to him who received forgiveness. To be where Jesus is today means that we cannot be contented just serving the needs of our community and engaging in our own holy hardware. It requires us to live out the gospel of God's grace where he has placed us through acts of service and compassion. So we had rolled out a local uh outreach survey sometime in October last year. So we have actually uh compiled the results. We're just waiting for the right time to share with us together, and we will do so in one of the services. So there'll be an opportunity this year for us to explore some possible uh form of outreach where all of us can be involved. So watch out for more details to come. So let me summarize. The theme, the focus of the sermon today is being with Jesus. And being with Jesus is in line with the overall theme of this year, which is to deepen our discipleship with Jesus. So we be we are we have to be with Jesus. Sorry, we are we can be with Jesus by being attentive to how God reveals Himself in Scripture. As I shared through Matthew 11, 28 to 30, and perhaps you can take other passages in the Gospels. We need to be attentive to God's word in scripture and allow his word to shape our lives. Being with Jesus also involves uh looking at how he reveals himself in our communal life together, and that's where the discipleship initiative comes in. We cannot have do discipleship alone. No, we do it in community. And finally, being with Jesus involves being where Jesus chooses to seek and keep company with. I'd like to close the sharing today by bringing us back to our discipleship transformation framework and urge us to consider deepening our discipleship with Jesus. So the discipleship transformation framework is really a means where God can use this to transform our lives. 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.

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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 Eastern Christian Church, please visit our website at yccanglican.com. Have a blessed day.