by Edmund Chan

A widely influential Singaporean pastor and author, in 1995 Edmund launched the Intentional Disciple-Making Church (IDMC) Conference. Started as a seminar with 320 participants, it has become a sold-out conference teaching disciple-making to 2,500 participants from 20 countries.

2.  From Single-Level Discipling to Multi-Level Discipling

Surely there is a difference (at least in time commitment if nothing else) between discipling a college student who is single and discipling a mother of three young children. As such, to cater to the varying needs in the life of the church, there is a movement from single-level discipling to multi-level discipling.

In the past, discipling was done primarily outside the church, through the para-church organisations, and it was more or less homogeneous in nature. Today, there is an emergence of church-based discipling, which is broader in scope and commitment levels. Unlike homogeneous units, disciples now come in all shapes and sizes, from different walks of life, with different levels of commitment, and different depths of spiritual maturity.

In such a context, many are also discovering the cell group as a great discipling vehicle. It builds a discipleship community.  It is also an effective platform for grooming emerging leaders. A cell group is thus an excellent vehicle for the multi-level discipling as it builds not on individuals but on community. We must build discipleship cell-groups!

3. From Program-Oriented Discipling to Person-Oriented Discipling

The focus must shift from valuing successful programs to valuing spiritual maturity. Effective discipling in the twenty-first century starts with the question “who are you” rather than “what is to be covered”.

The discipleship syllabus is dependent on the disciple’s needs – both felt and real needs. There is a growing appreciation that each person is different. Thus, the discipling process is not to be merely centred upon a particular program. This calls us to major on the major. It is not enough to disciple someone by just completing some pre-set materials. There is a need to know and apply basic life principles in all arenas of life!

The shift from program-based discipling to person-based discipling is congruent with the quest of identity in the urban world. As a guide for such person-centred discipling, the younger the disciple is, the more structured the discipling program. Conversely, the more mature the disciple is, the less structured the discipling program. In any case, the focus is on the needs of the person, not the dictates of the program!

4. From Classroom-Discipling to Real-World Discipling

People tend to compartmentalise their lives because of the “privatisation” of religion. So what is taught in the classroom remains in the classroom. What is taught in the church remains in the church. Unless there is a deliberate attempt to integrate what is learnt into the real world, nothing significant happens in the discipleship journey!

Things are not just to be taught in a classroom setting. They must be integrated into all arenas of life. One example of real-world discipling is to train the disciple to learn how to master life’s transitions. It develops the disciple to be holistically effective in the school or workplace, in the home and in Christian ministry. There is a critical need for holistic discipling that is relevant to the “real world”.

The “With Him” principle, popularised by the Navigators, is helpful. It moves discipling from the classroom into the real world. Real-world discipling resonates with the emergence of integration in the contemporary world. Knowledge is not isolated from life but integrated to it. The focus must thus shift from making disciples in the church to making disciples in the church, family and workplace. This is where the rubber meets the road!

by Edmund Chan

A widely influential Singaporean pastor and author, in 1995 Edmund launched the Intentional Disciple-Making Church (IDMC) Conference. Started as a seminar with 320 participants, it has become a sold-out conference teaching disciple-making to 2,500 participants from 20 countries.

The church is losing ground.  Sure, in some quarters, she is gaining ground.  But in radical discipleship and in spiritual depth, she is losing massive grounds. It is almost proverbial that the church in many places is “a mile wide but an inch deep.” Worse still, many so-called Christians are no different from the world in their core values and moral choices!

Unless we reverse the tide, we lose our sense of identity and destiny. Unless we come back to the fundamentals of a radical New Testament discipleship to Jesus (cf. Luke 9:23; Luke 14:25-33) we lose sight of the authentic key to true revival and world evangelization!

The problem lies not in the Great Commission. Church history indicates that it is a commission destined to flourish, not one doomed to fail! The problem lies not in the massive needs of the mission field. The fundamental need of humanity is spiritual; and this has not changed one bit! The problem lies not in the ability of God to empower his Church to fulfil His commission. The power of God is the same yesterday, today and forever!

So wherein lies the problem? Why is intentional disciplemaking so difficult in the contemporary world?

In any generation, the fundamental principles of disciplemaking remain unchanged. The focus of the Church must radically shift from merely making converts to that of making disciples! Disciplemaking is the process of bringing people into right relationship with God; and developing them to full maturity in Christ through intentional growth strategies, that they might multiply the entire process in others also.

Nonetheless, the post-modern world presents a new set of challenges to the call of making disciples today. To be effective, each generation must understand its own mind-set, meaningfully exegete its own culture, and masterfully adjust our approach to be relevant and effective in disciplemaking.

There are at least seven major paradigm shifts we must make for effective discipling in the twenty-first century. The term “paradigm shift” was first used by Thomas Kuhn in his influential book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962). It has since come to denote a radical change in the basic assumptions or belief systems, replacing former ways of thinking with a radically different way of thinking. Here then are the radical shifts in thinking we must make on discipling the next generation.

1.  From Spiritual Exhortation to Spiritual Direction

Discipling without spiritual direction is a contradiction of terms. Yet the missing link in discipling today is spiritual direction. In his book Working The Angles, Eugene Peterson calls the ministry of the Word, prayer and spiritual direction the “trigonometry of pastoral ministry”. These fundamentals apply to discipling as well. What is true of pastoring is true of disciplemaking.

The art of spiritual direction is the ability to point a disciple of Christ towards God; and in Him, towards the right direction of life. Spiritual direction thus presents discipleship, not as a program, but as a way of life.

A lot of mentoring today is centred merely upon spiritual exhortation and not on spiritual direction. Pious exhortations like, “you must do your Quite Time” or “you must have (more) faith” abounds. But few are instructed on how to do it, nor inspired to do so!

People know what they ought to do. The regimental do-lists abound. But the problem is getting it done; and getting it done in a manner which pleases God.

Two generations ago, when people came to be discipled, they were ready for the “serious stuff”. The modern generation is not. They come with too much baggage. Wise spiritual direction is much needed in contemporary discipleship!

by Tom Adleta

Rev. Tom Adleta, BBA MA, is the  founder and executive director of Global Christian Network, Inc., also now Minister-at-Large with Mission to Unreached Peoples, and recently has joined the staff of SVM2. From a diverse foundation of military experience and entrepreneurial business enterprises, Tom and his wife ministered in their local churches and eventually 30 years in missions from Central America, across Asia, now through Africa, Europe and Latin America, as he and his wife homeschooled their 8 children. 

I was drawn toward God even from my earliest childhood but didn’t come to know Jesus personally until I was in my late 30’s. A persistent real estate agent finally dragged me to lunch and managed to share the Four Spiritual Laws with me afterwards. God moved in my heart and I yielded to Him. I can still remember the feeling of warm oil flowing over my head down into my body as He came into my life.

My addictions to alcohol and gambling fell away without effort under His control, though other areas of my life required greater seeking of God and His power over time to set me free. Yet, as I discovered the joy of yielding my life to Him, I longed to grow closer and to know Him more and more. He provided opportunity to pray for greater filling of His Spirit and yet again I experienced an even greater overflow of His presence and power in my life as I asked for this gift.

I discovered that the more I yielded and asked of Him, the greater His outpouring and empowerment would become. Early on, my efforts seemed a great struggle of my own will; later, His Spirit seemed to enable me to soar forward, almost effortlessly as I yielded and learned to obey. Gradually, He’s been teaching me how to be set ablaze by God, how to run the race His way. Let me share more….

God often employs the ignorant and unlearned to confound the wise. “Now as they observed the confidence of Peter and John and understood that they were uneducated and untrained men, they were amazed, and began to recognize them as having been with Jesus.” (Acts 4:13) And, again in Acts 5: 38-39, it was not the ignorance of Peter and John that convinced the Sanhedrin. It was done in spite of their ignorance. It was their boldness and their honest conviction of truth.

Besides, though not learned in the schools of the Jews, they had been under a far more important training – under the personal direction of Christ himself – for three years. Now they were directly endowed by the Holy Spirit with the power of speaking the truth and the truth will set the captives free.

We can also see Paul’s reliance upon the Spirit in 1 Corinthians 2: 1-5 “And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.”

God is able to use you and me, not because of our skills or great wisdom, but simply to show forth His glory and power through frail human vessels.

by Edmund Chan

A widely influential Singaporean pastor and author, in 1995 Edmund launched the Intentional Disciple-Making Church (IDMC) Conference. Started as a seminar with 320 participants, it has become a sold-out conference teaching disciple-making to 2,500 participants from 20 countries.

2.  From Single-Level Discipling to Multi-Level Discipling

Surely there is a difference (at least in time commitment if nothing else) between discipling a college student who is single and discipling a mother of three young children. As such, to cater to the varying needs in the life of the church, there is a movement from single-level discipling to multi-level discipling.

In the past, discipling was done primarily outside the church, through the para-church organisations, and it was more or less homogeneous in nature. Today, there is an emergence of church-based discipling, which is broader in scope and commitment levels. Unlike homogeneous units, disciples now come in all shapes and sizes, from different walks of life, with different levels of commitment, and different depths of spiritual maturity.

In such a context, many are also discovering the cell group as a great discipling vehicle. It builds a discipleship community.  It is also an effective platform for grooming emerging leaders. A cell group is thus an excellent vehicle for the multi-level discipling as it builds not on individuals but on community. We must build discipleship cell-groups!

3. From Program-Oriented Discipling to Person-Oriented Discipling

The focus must shift from valuing successful programs to valuing spiritual maturity. Effective discipling in the twenty-first century starts with the question “who are you” rather than “what is to be covered”.

The discipleship syllabus is dependent on the disciple’s needs – both felt and real needs. There is a growing appreciation that each person is different. Thus, the discipling process is not to be merely centred upon a particular program. This calls us to major on the major. It is not enough to disciple someone by just completing some pre-set materials. There is a need to know and apply basic life principles in all arenas of life!

The shift from program-based discipling to person-based discipling is congruent with the quest of identity in the urban world. As a guide for such person-centred discipling, the younger the disciple is, the more structured the discipling program. Conversely, the more mature the disciple is, the less structured the discipling program. In any case, the focus is on the needs of the person, not the dictates of the program!

4. From Classroom-Discipling to Real-World Discipling

People tend to compartmentalise their lives because of the “privatisation” of religion. So what is taught in the classroom remains in the classroom. What is taught in the church remains in the church. Unless there is a deliberate attempt to integrate what is learnt into the real world, nothing significant happens in the discipleship journey!

Things are not just to be taught in a classroom setting. They must be integrated into all arenas of life. One example of real-world discipling is to train the disciple to learn how to master life’s transitions. It develops the disciple to be holistically effective in the school or workplace, in the home and in Christian ministry. There is a critical need for holistic discipling that is relevant to the “real world”.

The “With Him” principle, popularised by the Navigators, is helpful. It moves discipling from the classroom into the real world. Real-world discipling resonates with the emergence of integration in the contemporary world. Knowledge is not isolated from life but integrated to it. The focus must thus shift from making disciples in the church to making disciples in the church, family and workplace. This is where the rubber meets the road!

by Edmund Chan

A widely influential Singaporean pastor and author, in 1995 Edmund launched the Intentional Disciple-Making Church (IDMC) Conference. Started as a seminar with 320 participants, it has become a sold-out conference teaching disciple-making to 2,500 participants from 20 countries.

The church is losing ground.  Sure, in some quarters, she is gaining ground.  But in radical discipleship and in spiritual depth, she is losing massive grounds. It is almost proverbial that the church in many places is “a mile wide but an inch deep.” Worse still, many so-called Christians are no different from the world in their core values and moral choices!

Unless we reverse the tide, we lose our sense of identity and destiny. Unless we come back to the fundamentals of a radical New Testament discipleship to Jesus (cf. Luke 9:23; Luke 14:25-33) we lose sight of the authentic key to true revival and world evangelization!

The problem lies not in the Great Commission. Church history indicates that it is a commission destined to flourish, not one doomed to fail! The problem lies not in the massive needs of the mission field. The fundamental need of humanity is spiritual; and this has not changed one bit! The problem lies not in the ability of God to empower his Church to fulfil His commission. The power of God is the same yesterday, today and forever!

So wherein lies the problem? Why is intentional disciplemaking so difficult in the contemporary world?

In any generation, the fundamental principles of disciplemaking remain unchanged. The focus of the Church must radically shift from merely making converts to that of making disciples! Disciplemaking is the process of bringing people into right relationship with God; and developing them to full maturity in Christ through intentional growth strategies, that they might multiply the entire process in others also.

Nonetheless, the post-modern world presents a new set of challenges to the call of making disciples today. To be effective, each generation must understand its own mind-set, meaningfully exegete its own culture, and masterfully adjust our approach to be relevant and effective in disciplemaking.

There are at least seven major paradigm shifts we must make for effective discipling in the twenty-first century. The term “paradigm shift” was first used by Thomas Kuhn in his influential book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962). It has since come to denote a radical change in the basic assumptions or belief systems, replacing former ways of thinking with a radically different way of thinking. Here then are the radical shifts in thinking we must make on discipling the next generation.

1.  From Spiritual Exhortation to Spiritual Direction

Discipling without spiritual direction is a contradiction of terms. Yet the missing link in discipling today is spiritual direction. In his book Working The Angles, Eugene Peterson calls the ministry of the Word, prayer and spiritual direction the “trigonometry of pastoral ministry”. These fundamentals apply to discipling as well. What is true of pastoring is true of disciplemaking.

The art of spiritual direction is the ability to point a disciple of Christ towards God; and in Him, towards the right direction of life. Spiritual direction thus presents discipleship, not as a program, but as a way of life.

A lot of mentoring today is centred merely upon spiritual exhortation and not on spiritual direction. Pious exhortations like, “you must do your Quite Time” or “you must have (more) faith” abounds. But few are instructed on how to do it, nor inspired to do so!

People know what they ought to do. The regimental do-lists abound. But the problem is getting it done; and getting it done in a manner which pleases God.

Two generations ago, when people came to be discipled, they were ready for the “serious stuff”. The modern generation is not. They come with too much baggage. Wise spiritual direction is much needed in contemporary discipleship!

by Edmund Chan

A widely influential Singaporean pastor and author, in 1995 Edmund launched the Intentional Disciple-Making Church (IDMC) Conference. Started as a seminar with 320 participants, it has become a sold-out conference teaching disciple-making to 2,500 participants from 20 countries.

Understanding “Light of the World”

The second discipleship-metaphor Jesus employed is equally profound: “You are the light of the world” (5:14-16). This metaphor itself is accompanied by the stirring call of our Lord: “Let your light shine.”

It applies to all arenas of life. When things around us are confusing and difficult, “let your light shine.” When you face problems and difficulties, “let your light shine.” When someone needs the Gospel, “let your light shine.” That’s the radical calling of the church.

Let your light shine! A hidden light is a useless light.

Thus Jesus tells us in verse 15, “a city on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do men light a lamp and put it under the peg measure.” A peg measure is a small bowl, a measuring for grain. Put it under a peg measure means to cover it with this bowl. It’s not the right thing to do. The purpose of the lamp is to give light. And to light up a lamp and put it under a bowl to hide doesn’t make sense. It’s incongruous.  It misses the whole point.

Not under the bowl but on a lampstand! That’s our destiny. To glorify God. To bear witness to His grace and greatness. And Jesus Himself gave us the reason for shining: “Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.” (v.16)

Living with a Sense of Destiny

Without a sense of destiny, and a desire to glorify God through it, we would tend to hide our light.  But the opposite is also true. When we live with a sense of destiny, and a burning desire to glorify God, we will rise up and let our light shine.

Now, when Jesus said “you are the light of the world”, there are at least three things I find rather surprising. It grabs our attention.

Notice who this message is being addressed to. Notice what is actually being said. And notice how it is being addressed.

The first surprising thing is that this glorious declaration was addressed to an inconspicuous, insignificant ragtag band of disciples. They were not among the world’s elite. To this inconspicuous and insignificant bunch, Jesus said: “you are the salt of the earth, you are the light of the world.”  This is a biblical principle. The Almighty God uses ordinary people to live extraordinary lives for His extraordinary purpose!

The second surprise is that the term “light of the world” is used of Jesus Himself. In John 8:9, Jesus said of Himself, “I am the light of the world” (reiterated in John 8:12; 9:5). Now, we ask ourselves, who exactly is light? Christ or us?

As far as Jesus is concerned, He had two tasks. One is totally exclusive to Himself – to give His life as the perfect sacrifice on the Cross as a manifestation of God’s light, life and love. He is the light that, coming into the world, brings light to all men.

But there is a second task. In fact, originally this task was given to Israel. They were given a task to be a witness, to be a light. But they failed miserably in their task. So, God gathered His Church, the spiritual Israel, and said to her “Look, you are the light of the world. You are the witnesses of God.” What a privilege!

The third surprise is the scope of the task. God gave it to an ordinary group of people and said “you are the light of the world.”

To a small group of ordinary people, God gave a world vision! He did not say, you are the light of the home; or you are the light of your region. He says you are the light of the world. You are to be the light unto the nations. For a small band of Jewish disciples, that’s staggering!

God not only has a mission for the church, He has a master plan for the church. His strategy is in four simple words, “let your light shine.” That’s His strategy. Wherever God has placed you, let your light shine. If you do not shine where you are, how could you shine elsewhere?

Let your light shine wherever God has placed you. That is His strategy! Whenever it gets dark around you, you can either curse the darkness or light a lamp. Let your light shine. Wherever He places you, you shine as a light everywhere you go. People will be attracted to your light.

A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. It attracts people.

If we allow God to work in our life, to shine where He places us, we will shine – not because we are good – but because Christ will shine through us. We may have the same problems, the same difficulties, but the joy of the Lord, the strength of the Lord, will shine through us.

The lamp shines best when the darkness is darkest. Let your light shine!

That’s discipleship of “a certain kind”!

by Edmund Chan

A widely influential Singaporean pastor and author, in 1995 Edmund launched the Intentional Disciple-Making Church (IDMC) Conference. Started as a seminar with 320 participants, it has become a sold-out conference teaching disciple-making to 2,500 participants from 20 countries.

Living With a Sense of Distinctiveness

Losing the saltiness of salt is quite difficult. Chemically, salt (sodium chloride) is a very stable compound. You keep it for years in a jar and it is still salty. So how can salt lose its saltiness? That’s the clue to our understanding of this metaphor.

Salt loses its saltiness by contamination.

In Jesus’ day, people in Palestine took their salt mainly from two sources. The rich could have their salt from the Mediterranean Sea area but others have their salt from the Dead Sea. Salt taken from the Dead Sea can sometimes be contaminated by different minerals; especially gypsum, which looks like salt and can easily be mistaken for salt. It contaminates salt so that the salt not only loses its saltiness, it loses its usefulness as well. It’s contaminated. It is good for nothing.

The warning that Jesus gives us here is a very significant one for the Church. Beware of being contaminated. A compromised Church is a contaminated Church.

Oswald Chambers said, “We need more Christians who are distinctively Christian; he is the one who points out to the Church the very fact that it is so easy for us to become contaminated by the world.”

Don’t miss this. It is critically important. This then is the particular thing Jesus had in mind when He said “you are the salt of the earth.” The essential uniqueness of salt is what this metaphor is all about.

Not merely the usefulness of salt but primarily the uniqueness of salt.

It is so distinct that if you taste salt, there is nothing else to describe saltiness but salt. This is essentially tied with this idea of distinctiveness. He is talking about the distinctiveness of Christian disciples – of being so distinctively distinct – that there is nothing else like it!

Jesus is thus talking about the essential nature of the Church. If the church is not unique, it is useless (v.13). It is good for nothing. The idea of usefulness is only seen in the context of distinctiveness.

Get this discipleship principle: The usefulness of the Church of Jesus Christ is directly linked to the distinctiveness of the Church of Jesus Christ. That’s discipleship of “a certain kind.” Another way of stating this principle is this: The Church has a distinct calling of God because it has a distinct character in God.

That’s what discipleship is all about. Character. So what Jesus was saying is that the Church is designed by God for God; but if it is not distinct in God, it is good for nothing else!

The Church is radical in calling because the Church is radical in nature.

We are to be disciples of “a certain kind”! This is expressed in the preceding context in the Beatitudes. Blessed are those who mourn, blessed are the gentle, blessed are the poor in spirit – these are the qualities that makes for the saltiness of the Church!

That’s why the “you” is an emphatic pronoun. It means “you and you alone” (there is nothing else!) – “you are the salt of the earth.” There is no substitute for the Church. There is nothing like the Church. It is as unique as one of the most unique things on planet earth. Salt.

by Edmund Chan

A widely influential Singaporean pastor and author, in 1995 Edmund launched the Intentional Disciple-Making Church (IDMC) Conference. Started as a seminar with 320 participants, it has become a sold-out conference teaching disciple-making to 2,500 participants from 20 countries.

Salt of the Earth and Light of the World

Salt and light. These are two unforgettable metaphors.

Stunningly profound. Brilliantly provocative.

The Sermon of the Mount (Matthew 5-7) is Jesus’ manifesto of Kingdom discipleship. Everything else that Jesus taught in this grand manifesto is entirely anchored upon our understanding of these two metaphors. Jesus masterfully employed these two striking metaphors to convey something fundamental about radical discipleship.

These two discipleship metaphors are referring to two distinctly different things. The first emphasizes what God calls us to be and the second, what God calls us to do.

The first metaphor, salt of the earth, has to do with discipleship with a sense of distinctiveness. It relates to one’s identity in the world.

The second metaphor, light of the world, has to do with discipleship with a sense of destiny. It relates to one’s influence of the world.

Understanding “Salt Of the Earth”

“You are the salt of the earth”, Jesus said. In our contemporary world, this metaphor seems rather uninspiring. The sentiment today is to eat less sugar, less fat and less salt.

So, who wants to be the MSG of the world? It doesn’t sound very flattering.

Why then didn’t Jesus simply say, “I’ve got news for you, you are the gold of the world”?

That would be more inspiring than salt, wouldn’t it?

The answer is quite obvious. If He said “you are the gold of the world”, it would have referred metaphorically to being precious or worthy. But that’s not what Jesus had in mind. There is something else, something far more important, that He wanted to intentionally convey.

How then are we to understand this metaphor?

The common approach is to study the uses of salt; and thereafter to declare by inference its meaning for the Christian disciple.

Alison and Davis listed down eleven different ways that salt was used in ancient times and showed their implications what Jesus meant when He said that “you are the salt of the earth.”

Let me highlight for you just four common uses of salt and how these are prescribed to us as an understanding of the metaphor.

1. Salt is used as a seasoning. Thus as disciples we are to season the world; such as by “seasoning your speech with salt.”
2. Another use of salt in ancient times was as a healing antiseptic. So, by inference, it means “as the antiseptic of the world, you bring about healing”. Indeed, the modern therapeutic revolution – of inner healing, physical healing, emotional healing – would certainly welcome this.
3. Salt was also used as a wage in ancient times. That is why we have the modern saying “a man worth his salt”. It is taken from the days of the Roman Empire where they paid their Roman soldiers in salt as a wage. So, the inferred understanding is that the disciple is somewhat valuable.
4. The fourth use of salt was as a preservative. In ancient times, meat was often preserved with salt to prevent it from turning bad. By inference, disciples are to the preserving agents of the world. In a society that is spiritually corrupted and morally decaying, the Church as “salt of the earth” serves to preserve moral and spiritual purity.

This is a good and profitable consideration. But as to it being the interpretation of what Jesus really meant, I humbly beg to differ.

The context tells us something totally different. Jesus himself defined what He meant in the context. The Lord Jesus followed His metaphor with an important rhetorical question. It indicates to us what He was thinking about. He asked, “if the salt has become tasteless, how can it be salted again?” (v.13)

PHOTO by Ian Britton

By Ryan Shaw

Ryan is the international lead facilitator for SVM2.

There is a cry arising in the hearts of multitudes of young believers around the world today. It is cry for a relevant walk with Jesus Christ. The human heart was created by God to experience the highest levels of love relationship with Him.

Often, what we hear from Sunday to Sunday does not enable us to lay hold of the kind of love lifestyle available to us through faith in Jesus. Without rightly internalizing how to walk in increasing depths with Jesus Christ, the human heart fills that cry with other, ultimately unsatisfying, alternatives. This leaves many believers frustrated and ends up breeding skepticism in a person’s heart, saying such a life in God is not really possible.

Abandoned Unto Him

The Lord has an answer for this. Yet it requires our all and a turning completely to Him. This is what we call pursuing “Abandoned Devotion” for Jesus. It is a posturing of our whole hearts and lives before the Lord in order to allow Him to work into us an ever increasing blaze of love for God over a lifetime.

Paul had this passion burning in his heart when he wrote in Philippians 3:12,

“But I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ has also laid hold of me.”

This “laying hold” for Paul was multifaceted. First, it referred to his bent on attaining to the highest levels of love possible for God, His church and the lost. Second, Paul referred to attaining the full implications of the personal destiny God had ordained to accomplish through himself as he surrendered all to Christ. Both pieces of Paul’s passion to “lay hold” are critically important for every believer to continually emphasize before the Lord throughout their lifetimes. In this article we will focus on the first.

God First Loved Us

As we seek to become believers who are bent on living a lifestyle of abandoned devotion for Jesus, there are important theological truths that must come alive to us in our hearts and spirits. The first is 1 John 4:19,

“We love Him because He first loved us!”

Every believer who has ever believed in Christ’s work through the cross and resurrection has done so only because of God’s tireless love manifested in incredible mercy toward them. The only way a person can hope to respond with abandoned devotion for God is if the revelation of God’s intense pleasure and enjoyment of us has penetrated our hearts.

This is different than merely buying into the fact of God’s love for us at an intellectual level. Believers throughout history have believed in the doctrine of God’s love for them at an intellectual level and been saved. Yet millions of these did not do so at a heart level. Usually this results in a believer only attaining a casual walk with Christ.

Instead we want our hearts deeply aware that even when we stumble the pleasure of God is upon us. God is not mostly mad at us but mostly filled with enjoyment by us and over us (Psalms 16:11). Yes, when we willfully rebel against Him, His heart is hurt, but even then He is seeking to motivate us to come back to Him and recommit ourselves unto Him.

He is not like a human being who keeps records of wrongs. He is not sitting up in heaven saying, “You’ve blown it one too many times, son or daughter.” He knows our weakness and accepts us in that place, moving us onward step by step and from glory to glory.

Abandoned Devotion begins with receiving God’s intense love for us and telling Him how wonderful that love is to us even though we don’t deserve any of it. Experiencing His kindness and mercy in our hearts motivates a response that says, “No matter what it takes I will love this God who loves me so greatly!” This is the bedrock of abandoned devotion.

Abiding in Christ

The second foundational verse is 1 John 2:6 where the apostle writes,

“He who says He abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked.”

This is a massive statement with many significant implications. First, if we are true believers we will embrace the abiding lifestyle.

We will purposefully spend increasing amounts of time simply being with Jesus and sitting at His feet as Mary did in Luke 10:42. Knowing Him and gazing at His beauty will become our top priorities (Phil. 3:10; Psalms 27:4). This happens, however, in small steps and not all in one moment. We make a choice of the will that we want to know Him more.

We don’t necessarily feel like we want to know Him more, yet we pursue it anyway. The next day we affirm that choice and give ourselves to activity which promotes such a lifestyle. The next week, month and year we do the same thing. Over time our hearts are saturated and transformed and we feel something missing when we don’t get to spend adequate time in His presence in prayer, worship or Bible study.

Walking like Christ

A second main point in this verse is the call to walk just as Jesus walked. This is a jam-packed reality that I don’t have space to adequately go into now. In some measure we are tempted to ask John if he really meant what he wrote or if it was a mistake. Yet, the call is plain that one of the ways we walk as Jesus walked is to love the Father in the same way Jesus showed us by example.

Jesus taught us what this means in Matthew 22:37-38; “Jesus said to Him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment.” Mark adds in Mark 12:30 “with your strength” to the list.

We know that Jesus loved the Father in all four of these distinct categories. And equally as important, the Father loves Jesus, and every human being, in this same way.

We respond to the fact that God loves us with all His heart, soul, mind and strength with a wholehearted desire to return the favor of a life poured out with the same manner of focused love. As we posture our lives to grow in intentionally loving Him in each of these four distinct categories we are moving toward walking just as Jesus walked. This is pursuing abandoned devotion for God.

This article was originally posted in The Abandoned Times on January 25th, 2010.

By Ryan Shaw

Ryan is the international lead facilitator for Student Volunteer Movement 2 (SVM2) and currently lives among the unreached.

The Parable of the Virgins

There is a direct correlation with the Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins found in Matthew 25:1-13. All ten are meant to be seen as believers who were waiting for their Bridegroom. They all expected Him, but the primary teaching of the parable is that not all had “burning hearts.” Five had oil in their lamps and five had run out. The five who ran out ask the five who had some left to give them some of their oil. This request is denied. What was going on here?

Throughout the Old and New Testaments, oil is almost always seen as a representation of the Holy Spirit. The oil in the lamps refers to an alive, experiential, Holy Spirit inspired, radiant love and discipleship among believers. The oil testifies of a vibrant, fervent and intimate devotional life where the Spirit teaches, trains, provides revelation, correction and guidance on an ongoing basis. This isn’t necessarily true 100% of the time but the bent of the heart is in pursuit of this.

The lack of oil refers to believers who started well yet have tapered off in their devotional life. They have become nominal. Spiritual gifts go uncultivated and unused and spiritual fruit is minimal. Love for the lost is cold and commitment to obey Jesus’ commands weak.

They have a form of Christianity and participate in the rituals, but the abundant life is absent. Their prayer lives appear dutiful and dull with sensitivity to sin numbed. Obtaining oil in the lamps has to be done through God’s scripturally prescribed manner. We cannot ask another to give us some of their “burning heart.” It doesn’t work that way.

Cultivating Oil

Obtaining oil has to be cultivated personally as we give ourselves to becoming a believer clothed with the Word of God and invite the Holy Spirit to have His way in us, working His processes into our experience with Christ.

This is not an overnight process. Obtaining oil in our lamps simply means we get back to allowing the Holy Spirit His rightful place of teaching and training and in so doing develop a “burning heart” on the inside.

This parable is a warning parable of the need to keep our hearts growing with fresh love for Jesus through the Holy Spirit. The call to “watch” is just this….to watch our own hearts in order to guard them from buying into the spiritual malaise of cultural Christianity all around us and in so doing, lose the “burning heart” of vital intimate fellowship with Christ, becoming nominal.

Ready for His Return

Thankfully, this parable speaks directly to the time of Jesus’ return and the individual believers’ responsibility to have a bright and shining lamp in anticipation. The five foolish virgins tried, at that late date, to get spiritual “reality” in their lives and they paid a steep price for it.

However, part of the message of the parable is that today we can change our situation. For those who do not presently have oil, we can get it. There is hope in our day. We can proactively give ourselves to “buying” oil by giving ourselves to intentional study and meditation of the Word, growing in revelation of Jesus and His ways, and inviting the Spirit to teach us and in so doing cultivate a “burning heart.” It is imperative that we do so now, in order to not be caught without oil on that day when no further opportunities present themselves.