Even though we have designed a model called "The Growth Cycle" in our Church; we need to realize that things are never quite as neat as any model would indicate.
The complexity is that spiritual growth does not always happen in a logical fashion. The principle here is that something that is logical or simple does not necessarily mean better.
For example, I have found experientially that many believers mess up their lives before they hit the bottom and turn around. People often go on detours before they get to their destination.
This can sometimes be intentional in that in order to get from North to South, we often have to go North-East before we can get to the South.
Another analogy was when I tried to climb Mount Gunong Tahan several years ago; I had to go up and down several smaller mountains before I could reach the peak. But because I knew where I was heading, I did not mind the up's and down's.
Nothing is outside the reach of God's redemptive work even when we do not see any redemptive value in what we are going through right now. Once we have this perspective; we can view every circumstance as an opportunity to form Christ in us.
So take heart, my friends...
Galatians 4: 19 - "My dear children, for whom I am again in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you..."
Have a great week!
Friday, September 7, 2007
Friday, August 31, 2007
INTERVIEW WITH INTERN
REFLECTIONS ON MINISTRY
I was approached by Cherie Goh to do an interview with her for her course in Harvest West. When I saw the questions that she was planning for us to interact over, I thought it might be a nice way to get my blog started so here goes...
Cherie: "What led to your call into ministry and how did you know for sure?"
When I started tertiary studies, I was asked by my local church to start a campus ministry. That was my first experience in leading a full-on Christian ministry that incorporates leading, preaching, pastoring; the whole works and I fell in love with it!
At the end of my studies, I told myself that I would not be happy doing any other thing except serving the Lord so I decided to seek the Lord about whether or not He would want me in the full-time Christian ministry. Just a couple of months before graduation, I was approached by World Vision to take up a role in their Communications Department.
I still remember taking a day off to seek the Lord about answering the call to ministry and the Lord spoke to me through 2Timothy 2: 2. This verse has since become my life-verse.
My initial positive experience in ministry, the desire on my heart, the open door from World Vision and the confirmation of the Word all came together to help me affirm and confirm my sense of call.
Cherie: "What principles, values and priorities do you consider crucial in order to be a successful Christian pastor in today's society?"
This is a very big question and calls for a thoughtful answer which I do not think we will have time for. So let me summarize my response this way:
In terms of PRINCIPLES:
We need 4 Key Elements:
1. CLEAR VISION - Where are we heading?
2. CONCRETE STRATEGY - How are we getting there?
3. CORRECT STRUCTURE - Is our structure facilitating the vision & strategy?
4. COMMITTED LEADERSHIP - Do we have a committed team to see this through?
Without vision; the people perish but without the people; vision will also perish.
In terms of VALUES:
In our church, we use the phrase from Matthew 25: 21
7 KEY CORE-VALUES
1. “WELL” - EXCELLENT BY CHOICE
Anything that is worth doing is worth doing well. This is a spirit of excellence that make us go a step further, stay a little later, do a little more, shoot a little higher and aim a little further. Excellence is not perfection but it is defined as when we are using all that God has deposited in us to the maximum capacity for God’s glory and man’s good. And when true excellence happens, it glorifies God and edifies man.
2. “DONE” - A “CAN DO” ATTITUDE
This is a positive "whatever-it-takes" attitude that helps us to see possibilities before problems, miracles before mess and stars before scars. This is the “can do” spirit that causes us to ask: “Why not?” before “How Can?” Before we come up with 3 reasons why something cannot be done, we start with 30 reasons why it is so good to do this or that. It is not been blind to facts but it is a culture where we start with the positive rather than the negative. And we would all agree that it is so much more fun to work with positive rather than negative people.
3. “THOU” - FOCUS ON PEOPLE
People come before projects. Relationship is more critical that results. We want a culture where we value people as individuals; created to be unique and destined to be special. As a Church, there will be many projects that we need to engage in and work hard on. But in the midst of working, we want to grow the people we work with. At the end of any project, we will not just celebrate the results but we will rejoice in our relationships. So we will choose to honor people and value the unique gifts and talents that God has deposited in them. We recognize that square pegs must be placed in square holes for maximum effectiveness.
4. “GOOD” - CHARACTER FIRST
The Scriptures says that no one is good except God. In other words; goodness is godliness. So we place great value in godliness. We believe that character comes before capability, attitude comes before abilities. In everything that we do as a team, we never forget that we are representatives of Christ and others will judge Christ through our character.
5. “AND” - BALANCE IT ALL
Our corporate culture upholds both the need to balance people and performance; relationship and results. This little article “and” reminds us that we need to take an integrative approach where we maintain the tension of cultivating relationships and achieving results, loving people and getting things done. And godly wisdom is what we need to balance the demands of both.
6. “FAITHFUL” - FAITH & FAITHFULNESS
Everything that is not of faith & faithfulness does not please God so we want to build a culture where we speak faith, walk faith, act faith and do faith. We do not make decisions based on reason alone but we give room for revelation. We do not walk by sight alone but we walk by faith. Faith can bring us to places beyond ourselves. Faith can bring God’s will on earth as it is in heaven. Faith can take us higher, further and deeper than we have ever been before. And faithfulness will ensure that we see things through. - Faith & Faithfulness!
7. “SERVANT” - HUMILITY BEFORE HONOUR
This is our public persona – servants of God. We are quick to serve and ready to respond. We are resolved to put others before self. We are not here to impress but we are here to impart. So we operate in humble-boldness. We minister behind the Cross so that man will see Christ magnified more than man deified. In our action and attitude, we adopt humility as our posture and an apron as our uniform. We are servants of the Living God!
In terms of PRIORITIES:
The 3 Key Priorities for a Pastor are:
1. CHARTING (Leading & Vision-Casting)
2. COMMUNICATING (Teaching & Preaching)
3. CARING (Shepherding & Counseling).
And the order of these priorities can change according to growth path of the Church.
Cherie: "Do you believe that conflicts arise in church life? Why?"
I believe that conflicts arise wherever we have people. They do because people have different worldviews, desires and expectations. And whenever these crash, conflicts will arise.
Theologically speaking, conflicts started as far back as the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve violated God's command.
Since then as Isaiah 53: 6 declares – “We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us have turned to his own way…” From here, we can see that when man fell into sin, not only have we gone astray from God; we also separated from one another.
And conflict will only end when our Prince of Peace will return in Revelation to put an end to sin and to restore His rule and reign.
Cherie: "What steps have you taken to handle and even avoid conflicts in ministry?"
To reduce the "conflict-proneness" in the Church, we have defined 7 Non-Negotiables:
1. We Do Not Practice Lobbying
2. We Do Not Build a Demand Culture
3. We Do Not Spread Vicarious Anger
4. We Do Not Presume on Our Christian Relationship
5. We Do Not Resolve Problems through Emails
6. We Do Not Solicit Business
7. We Do Not Backbite Our Leaders
Besides these preventive measures, we also agreed to adopt the practice of nipping conflict in the bud by addressing issues quickly and learning to speak the truth in love before any conflict has a chance to incubate and grow into something unmanageable. Handling conflicts in the early stages of the conflict cycle always help to reduce the severity of the outcome.
Cherie: "What gives you the greatest pleasure as a pastor?"
Of course, as Pastor my greatest delight is to see the people grow in the Lord. There are
3 Specific Areas that I hope to see them grow in:
1. DEVOTIONAL
It gives me great pleasure to see our people grow in their personal walk with God and to see them nurture and cultivate an inner life that is a garden and not a desert.
2. DOMESTIC
Strong families make strong churches so it is always a delight for me to see healthy families in the church where marriages are strong and relationships between parents and chldren are healthy.
3. DEVELOPMENTAL
As a pastor, teacher and mentor by calling, my greatest pleasure is to see our people hungry to develop themselves personally and desiring to pass on the legacy to the next generation through mentoring and discipling.
Cherie: "What do you do to overcome stress and/or frustration in your ministry?"
2 THINGS:
1. MARGINS
I resolve to create enough margin in my life to de-stress and center down regularly. Without margin, all of us can become so tight and wound-up that we can snap innerly. So I have intentionally maintained a margin of one hour a day, four hours a week and two days a year where I withdraw to contemplate, evaluate and re-calibrate my inner compass and realign my life and recapture my sense of perspective.
2. MENTORS
I also seek to maintain regular relationships with mentors who can speak into my life and offer wise counsel. They also serve at times as a place for me to vent my frustratons; knowing that they will understand and not judge me for doing so. Priceless people!
Cherie: "How do you avoid burnout?"
Apart from the two preventative measures of margin and mentors outlined earlier; I also learnt from a mentor the need to differentiate between cutting down versus centering down. What are the differences?
Cherie: "What are the major problems that emerge in your family life and how do you avoid them?"
In the early years of ministry, I made the crucial mistake of putting the ministry before my family. I thought that if I take care of God's work, He will take care of my family. But I have found that this is not God's design.
My first and primary role is to be a prophet, priest and king in my own home. When God made this clear to me; I resolved to turn my priorities around. This has resulted in a stronger marriage and a closer relationship with my children. And this is probably one of the keys to the sustanance my personal ministry.
To maintain this, I have adopted the following strategies:
1. Keep a Monday Date with my wife consistently.
2. Keep a Family Dinner Date on Monday evening regularly.
3. Go on family holidays at least twice annually.
4. Pray with my children on the way to school.
5. Talk about God and life at the Dinner Table daily.
Cherie: "What steps do you take to continue growing in your ministry?"
The few things I am committed to are:
1. REGULAR READING ROUTINE
Maintain a reading routine of 4 books a month consisting of the following genres:
a. Inner Life Issue
b. Spiritual Growth
c. Leadership Skill
d. Contemporary Issue
2. LIFE-LONG LEARNING
Make use of audio-visual resources from cutting-edge leadership ministries like Willow Creek Association, Injoy, Catalyst and Pastors.com.
3. SYSTEMATIC STUDY OF SCRIPTURES
Work on studying expositorily at least one Old Testament and one New Testament book annually.
4. MONTHLY MENTORING
Keep monthly mentoring relationships with key mentors in my life and ministry.
5. THINK TIME
Intentionally maintain the minimal margin of one hour a day, four hours a week and 2 days a yaer for contemnplation, reflection and thinking.
Cherie: "How do you handle church finances/budgets to avoid shortfalls and possible accusations of 'mismanagement'?"
Thanks to my predeccesor, Pastor Cheng Lai, who has passed on a legacy of good governance in this area of finance, our church has a highly accountable system of financial management where the checks and control are very well established. For example: All checks are counter-signed and all expenses above a certain amount must be approved before they can be expended.
We also provide for a system where monthly financal reports are given to the Executive Leadership Team and quarterly financial reports are given to the congregation at large. Our accounts are also audited professionally and they are readily available for any member who desire to view them when called for.
With such careful accounting system in place, it effectively protects the leadership from any "accusations of mismanagement".
I was approached by Cherie Goh to do an interview with her for her course in Harvest West. When I saw the questions that she was planning for us to interact over, I thought it might be a nice way to get my blog started so here goes...
Cherie: "What led to your call into ministry and how did you know for sure?"
When I started tertiary studies, I was asked by my local church to start a campus ministry. That was my first experience in leading a full-on Christian ministry that incorporates leading, preaching, pastoring; the whole works and I fell in love with it!
At the end of my studies, I told myself that I would not be happy doing any other thing except serving the Lord so I decided to seek the Lord about whether or not He would want me in the full-time Christian ministry. Just a couple of months before graduation, I was approached by World Vision to take up a role in their Communications Department.
I still remember taking a day off to seek the Lord about answering the call to ministry and the Lord spoke to me through 2Timothy 2: 2. This verse has since become my life-verse.
My initial positive experience in ministry, the desire on my heart, the open door from World Vision and the confirmation of the Word all came together to help me affirm and confirm my sense of call.
Cherie: "What principles, values and priorities do you consider crucial in order to be a successful Christian pastor in today's society?"
This is a very big question and calls for a thoughtful answer which I do not think we will have time for. So let me summarize my response this way:
In terms of PRINCIPLES:
We need 4 Key Elements:
1. CLEAR VISION - Where are we heading?
2. CONCRETE STRATEGY - How are we getting there?
3. CORRECT STRUCTURE - Is our structure facilitating the vision & strategy?
4. COMMITTED LEADERSHIP - Do we have a committed team to see this through?
Without vision; the people perish but without the people; vision will also perish.
In terms of VALUES:
In our church, we use the phrase from Matthew 25: 21
7 KEY CORE-VALUES
1. “WELL” - EXCELLENT BY CHOICE
Anything that is worth doing is worth doing well. This is a spirit of excellence that make us go a step further, stay a little later, do a little more, shoot a little higher and aim a little further. Excellence is not perfection but it is defined as when we are using all that God has deposited in us to the maximum capacity for God’s glory and man’s good. And when true excellence happens, it glorifies God and edifies man.
2. “DONE” - A “CAN DO” ATTITUDE
This is a positive "whatever-it-takes" attitude that helps us to see possibilities before problems, miracles before mess and stars before scars. This is the “can do” spirit that causes us to ask: “Why not?” before “How Can?” Before we come up with 3 reasons why something cannot be done, we start with 30 reasons why it is so good to do this or that. It is not been blind to facts but it is a culture where we start with the positive rather than the negative. And we would all agree that it is so much more fun to work with positive rather than negative people.
3. “THOU” - FOCUS ON PEOPLE
People come before projects. Relationship is more critical that results. We want a culture where we value people as individuals; created to be unique and destined to be special. As a Church, there will be many projects that we need to engage in and work hard on. But in the midst of working, we want to grow the people we work with. At the end of any project, we will not just celebrate the results but we will rejoice in our relationships. So we will choose to honor people and value the unique gifts and talents that God has deposited in them. We recognize that square pegs must be placed in square holes for maximum effectiveness.
4. “GOOD” - CHARACTER FIRST
The Scriptures says that no one is good except God. In other words; goodness is godliness. So we place great value in godliness. We believe that character comes before capability, attitude comes before abilities. In everything that we do as a team, we never forget that we are representatives of Christ and others will judge Christ through our character.
5. “AND” - BALANCE IT ALL
Our corporate culture upholds both the need to balance people and performance; relationship and results. This little article “and” reminds us that we need to take an integrative approach where we maintain the tension of cultivating relationships and achieving results, loving people and getting things done. And godly wisdom is what we need to balance the demands of both.
6. “FAITHFUL” - FAITH & FAITHFULNESS
Everything that is not of faith & faithfulness does not please God so we want to build a culture where we speak faith, walk faith, act faith and do faith. We do not make decisions based on reason alone but we give room for revelation. We do not walk by sight alone but we walk by faith. Faith can bring us to places beyond ourselves. Faith can bring God’s will on earth as it is in heaven. Faith can take us higher, further and deeper than we have ever been before. And faithfulness will ensure that we see things through. - Faith & Faithfulness!
7. “SERVANT” - HUMILITY BEFORE HONOUR
This is our public persona – servants of God. We are quick to serve and ready to respond. We are resolved to put others before self. We are not here to impress but we are here to impart. So we operate in humble-boldness. We minister behind the Cross so that man will see Christ magnified more than man deified. In our action and attitude, we adopt humility as our posture and an apron as our uniform. We are servants of the Living God!
In terms of PRIORITIES:
The 3 Key Priorities for a Pastor are:
1. CHARTING (Leading & Vision-Casting)
2. COMMUNICATING (Teaching & Preaching)
3. CARING (Shepherding & Counseling).
And the order of these priorities can change according to growth path of the Church.
Cherie: "Do you believe that conflicts arise in church life? Why?"
I believe that conflicts arise wherever we have people. They do because people have different worldviews, desires and expectations. And whenever these crash, conflicts will arise.
Theologically speaking, conflicts started as far back as the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve violated God's command.
Since then as Isaiah 53: 6 declares – “We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us have turned to his own way…” From here, we can see that when man fell into sin, not only have we gone astray from God; we also separated from one another.
And conflict will only end when our Prince of Peace will return in Revelation to put an end to sin and to restore His rule and reign.
Cherie: "What steps have you taken to handle and even avoid conflicts in ministry?"
To reduce the "conflict-proneness" in the Church, we have defined 7 Non-Negotiables:
1. We Do Not Practice Lobbying
2. We Do Not Build a Demand Culture
3. We Do Not Spread Vicarious Anger
4. We Do Not Presume on Our Christian Relationship
5. We Do Not Resolve Problems through Emails
6. We Do Not Solicit Business
7. We Do Not Backbite Our Leaders
Besides these preventive measures, we also agreed to adopt the practice of nipping conflict in the bud by addressing issues quickly and learning to speak the truth in love before any conflict has a chance to incubate and grow into something unmanageable. Handling conflicts in the early stages of the conflict cycle always help to reduce the severity of the outcome.
Cherie: "What gives you the greatest pleasure as a pastor?"
Of course, as Pastor my greatest delight is to see the people grow in the Lord. There are
3 Specific Areas that I hope to see them grow in:
1. DEVOTIONAL
It gives me great pleasure to see our people grow in their personal walk with God and to see them nurture and cultivate an inner life that is a garden and not a desert.
2. DOMESTIC
Strong families make strong churches so it is always a delight for me to see healthy families in the church where marriages are strong and relationships between parents and chldren are healthy.
3. DEVELOPMENTAL
As a pastor, teacher and mentor by calling, my greatest pleasure is to see our people hungry to develop themselves personally and desiring to pass on the legacy to the next generation through mentoring and discipling.
Cherie: "What do you do to overcome stress and/or frustration in your ministry?"
2 THINGS:
1. MARGINS
I resolve to create enough margin in my life to de-stress and center down regularly. Without margin, all of us can become so tight and wound-up that we can snap innerly. So I have intentionally maintained a margin of one hour a day, four hours a week and two days a year where I withdraw to contemplate, evaluate and re-calibrate my inner compass and realign my life and recapture my sense of perspective.
2. MENTORS
I also seek to maintain regular relationships with mentors who can speak into my life and offer wise counsel. They also serve at times as a place for me to vent my frustratons; knowing that they will understand and not judge me for doing so. Priceless people!
Cherie: "How do you avoid burnout?"
Apart from the two preventative measures of margin and mentors outlined earlier; I also learnt from a mentor the need to differentiate between cutting down versus centering down. What are the differences?
Cherie: "What are the major problems that emerge in your family life and how do you avoid them?"
In the early years of ministry, I made the crucial mistake of putting the ministry before my family. I thought that if I take care of God's work, He will take care of my family. But I have found that this is not God's design.
My first and primary role is to be a prophet, priest and king in my own home. When God made this clear to me; I resolved to turn my priorities around. This has resulted in a stronger marriage and a closer relationship with my children. And this is probably one of the keys to the sustanance my personal ministry.
To maintain this, I have adopted the following strategies:
1. Keep a Monday Date with my wife consistently.
2. Keep a Family Dinner Date on Monday evening regularly.
3. Go on family holidays at least twice annually.
4. Pray with my children on the way to school.
5. Talk about God and life at the Dinner Table daily.
Cherie: "What steps do you take to continue growing in your ministry?"
The few things I am committed to are:
1. REGULAR READING ROUTINE
Maintain a reading routine of 4 books a month consisting of the following genres:
a. Inner Life Issue
b. Spiritual Growth
c. Leadership Skill
d. Contemporary Issue
2. LIFE-LONG LEARNING
Make use of audio-visual resources from cutting-edge leadership ministries like Willow Creek Association, Injoy, Catalyst and Pastors.com.
3. SYSTEMATIC STUDY OF SCRIPTURES
Work on studying expositorily at least one Old Testament and one New Testament book annually.
4. MONTHLY MENTORING
Keep monthly mentoring relationships with key mentors in my life and ministry.
5. THINK TIME
Intentionally maintain the minimal margin of one hour a day, four hours a week and 2 days a yaer for contemnplation, reflection and thinking.
Cherie: "How do you handle church finances/budgets to avoid shortfalls and possible accusations of 'mismanagement'?"
Thanks to my predeccesor, Pastor Cheng Lai, who has passed on a legacy of good governance in this area of finance, our church has a highly accountable system of financial management where the checks and control are very well established. For example: All checks are counter-signed and all expenses above a certain amount must be approved before they can be expended.
We also provide for a system where monthly financal reports are given to the Executive Leadership Team and quarterly financial reports are given to the congregation at large. Our accounts are also audited professionally and they are readily available for any member who desire to view them when called for.
With such careful accounting system in place, it effectively protects the leadership from any "accusations of mismanagement".
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