Update 24th February

I wrote in a blog entry about a year ago that “a yes is a thousand nos”. I think it was in response to my first shock at the realization that I can't actually do everything that I want to do. That was back when I wanted to read an five NYTimes articles daily, skype with three New Yorkers besides my family every week, run two miles a day, and get back on track with my life goal of learning Chopin's Ballade #1 in Gmin.
This week, I reiterated that same truth in resigned frustration, but for a different reason. I have too many ministries I want to try this year! I want to get my hand into every candy jar, and there are too many candy jars. I'm experiencing something my dear mentor Pastor Don told me a year and a half ago: “Sometimes it's not what you choose to do, but what you choose to leave out that defines your ministry.” I've been contemplating that statement a lot in various contexts. I've asked myself, “if I were to plant a church somewhere, how would I word my church's mission?” What words would I use and what would I leave out? What ministries would I consider important and what would I leave out? “If I were to take a job at a dysfunctional or waning church, how would I spend my time in my first couple of years?” What ministries would I devote myself to and what ministries would I temporarily leave out?
It's good that I've been using this opportunity to reflect on future ministry, but for now I am still trying to wisely and prayerfully work out how to spend my time this year. I've been experimenting with various kinds of calendars and timesheets. In all this, I've been trying to keep in mind two things:

1) If my mission is God's mission, then he will accomplish it with or without my help. And he'll do a perfect job at it too. God sovereignly rules over all of creation and is also executing to perfection his redemptive plans. He's already gotten the timing down for the most crucial part of his plan! In other words, if God can so flawlessly bring about the perfect execution of his plans, even to the point of having the right person born at exactly the right time and dying at exactly the right moment in exactly the right circumstances.... I get the feeling like he is in control! So then, if Christ died “at just the right time” (Rom 5.6), then can't I trust that everyone that I am serving and doing ministry to will receive grace and grow “at just the right time” as well?
2) If my work is God's work, he will give me enough time and resources to accomplish it. The times when I, granted that I've worked as hard as I could, worry and lament over things not getting done are the times I am not exercising trust in and dependence on him. I make myself to be more important than I really am and thus despair when I, in my human weakness, fail.

I guess, jumping ahead to prayer points, please pray that I can learn to trust in God and depend on him for my work to be accomplished. Pray that I will, in my ministry, make less of myself and more of him, seeking to give him praise and glory and thanks for all things.

News From GracePoint



This is a picture, taken yesterday, of my desk. If I had taken the picture a month ago, it would have looked like this:



The truth is, ever since we've been set for a move to a new building, I've been pretty complacent with working at my desk. People have always treated it as a garbage disposal/storage area, and I've gotten pretty tired of throwing out people's trash for them and occasionally taking something nice home (just kidding). I usually just get work done on someone else's desk or on a table in the library. Hopefully, when we move either in late March or early April, I can start afresh!

But before that, the next big move in our church is sending off our church plant team, who will be worshiping with us one last time this coming Sunday! It's been really exciting to hear from Simon, the church plant pastor, the different ways that they've been getting to know their community, from walking around and visiting random shops to striking conversations with random strangers. They have a real love for their new mission field and a real desire to share the good news of Jesus with their neighborhood!



In unrelated news, the English pastoral staff started their monthly training and mutual encouragement meetings. We kicked off our first one by discussing an article on spiritual disciplines taken from a book. Pictured above, from left to right: Euge, Owen, Tom, Ronnie, who is volunteering at church one day a week, and Pete Hughes. Not pictured: Simon Wong and Amy Leong.

Scripture Of The Week: 2 Timothy 3.14-17
But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

Something I've Been Learning: The Need For Reproducible Bible Teaching
Last week I shared some of my thoughts on growing in the people you disciple a love for God's Word based on a joy and awe in God's revelation to us. Another thing I've been thinking about is how to teach someone to read the Bible. The above passage tells us that the purpose of Scripture is to make us wise for our salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. That means that the end goal of reading Scripture should be to behold Jesus in his greatness, grow in understanding of him and his love, and respond in faith, repentance, and worship. The question is, "How do I teach this to someone not just so that they know, but also so that they may teach others to do the same?"

The object is a faithful Bible reading method simple enough to be replicated not just by your disciple, but also by your disciple's disciple (2 Tim 2.2). This means employing a number of different acronym-based methods. In GracePoint, all the community leaders were taught the COMA method (Context, Observation, Meaning, Application), which I hear is pretty popular in Sydney. Back in New York, I learned the similar OIA method (Observation, which also counts as context, Interpretation, Application). Something I worked out, that I've been teaching my disciples is to ask three simple questions:

What does it say?
What does it mean?
What does it mean for me?

Some people might say that it's a little too simple and can be misleading. But I believe teaching the questions clearly will prevent your disciple from reading inaccurately. There are many Christians for whom the word "context" is too difficult and abstract, let alone "interpretation".

Prayer Points
~Continue to pray for the Lidcombe church-planting team, who will be launching their service in March. I will post up pictures of our commissioning service next week.

~As mentioned above, pray for my time management and dependence on God.

~Pray for the music ministry training event that I will be running in late March.

~Pray for the people of Christchurch, NZ, who recently suffered a devastating earthquake that left their city in shambles.

Update 17 Feb 2011

I have officially been living in Sydney for one year and twenty days and I am now just over halfway through my two-year ministry apprenticeship program. My first year I was woefully irregular in my ministry updates and for that I apologize. I am convicted that, for the purposes of accountability and transparency, and also that you may share in my joy as I continue to grow in my love for the gospel and desire to serve the Lord, I will begin updating weekly, using a simple format. Each week, I'll share a little bit about what's been going on in GracePoint church, a Bible verse that I've been thinking through, something I've been learning, and some prayer points. I hope that those who are reading will be encouraged by the great things that God is doing in the Inner West of Sydney through this church, as he gathers a people for himself, saved and bought by his Son Jesus. I also hope that you will partner me and the saints here in prayer, lifting up our needs to the Father.

News From GracePoint
It's that time of the year again, when the GracePoint ministry engine roars to life! Many things are starting up this month, including community groups, Advance 1 + 2 emerging leader's course, and music teams (officially starting in March). Friday Community Groups (FCG) is kicking off this week, sending mixed feelings of excitement and dread through our University and TAFE students; excitement over the fact that we're meeting regularly to study God's Word together but dread over the start of classes!
In addition to our regular ministries starting up, we're also pretty excited about our relaunch and church plant! Some of you might know that two weeks ago, our Burwood evening church relaunched its Sunday meetings in a new location down the street, along with a vision for a renewed gospel ministry in our suburb. Praise God that we are settled in and thank him for our new meeting location, offered to us by the kind staff at the Coronation Club. In two weeks, we will also be commissioning a team of Christians from our own church to plant a new service in Lidcombe, which is a suburb about ten minutes away. That team is led by pastor Simon Wong (former MAP student) and we are all so excited for them!


Second-year emerging leaders class meeting over yummy cherries and the Word of God

Scripture Of The Week: 2 Timothy 1.13-14, 2.2, 3.14-15
What you heard from me, keep as the pattern of sound teaching, with faith and love in Christ Jesus. Guard the good deposit that was entrusted to you – guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit... And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to each others... But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ.

Something I've Been Learning: Love God's Word!
We at GracePoint are on about teaching the Bible. We believe that every Christian should love the Word of God and desire it. Now down here in Sydney, there are some pretty smart people. There are some really academic, scholarly Christians. Christians who know what the word “Christological” means. Ordinary, non-full-time ministry Christians who are not pastors who know what “Christological” means. Down here in Sydney, among Christian circles is a culture of conference attendance and biblical scholarship; many high school, university, or young worker-aged Christians attend yearly conferences that really hammer you with theology, teach you how to read and exegete Scripture, and give you tools of scholarship for deeper Bible reading. They LOVE it down here, and praise God for this culture of loving his Word.
But one question I've been asking myself recently is, “What do you do if someone doesn't like reading, or isn't a scholar or an intellectual?” How do you teach him to love God's Word? What do you do if someone isn't the best reader, never liked his studies, or is maybe even illiterate? What do you do if you have someone who is great at very many things, but one of those things is not the abstract, intellectual kind of thinking necessary to understand complex theology and string together doctrine? Is he then, unable to love God's Word? Does someone like that have access to the words of life?
I realize there are two ways to teach someone to love God's Word. You can send them off to the Katoomba mountains to learn exegesis and hermeneutics and to take crash courses in biblical and systematic theology. You can buy them a commentary or read Graeme Goldsworthy's Gospel And Kingdom with them. Or you can tell them that the Bible contains the words of life. You can tell them what the Bible is about; that it is about Jesus Christ, who is God, who died for us on the cross so that we may know and love and be received by the God that we rejected. You can tell them that the Bible is God's very own words to us! It is his message, inspired by his spirit, and purposed for saving us and bringing us into his kingdom, through the Son who purchased us with his own blood!
You can tell them that if they want to know their God better, reading the Bible is the way to go. You can give them simple, non-academic tools to read the Bible and to understand it on their own. You can tell them that Scripture is perspicuous, that it is clear and understandable for all people whose hearts are awakened by the Spirit. Next week, I will share some of what I've been learning about reproducible Bible teaching.

Prayer Points
~Thank God for his grace, given to us as the Burwood evening church moves out of our Belmore st. location and settles into our new gathering place right next door to the mall!

~Pray for the Lidcombe evening church plant. Pray that they continue to be excited about bringing God's mission into a new place, and that they would be excited about the gospel there. Pray for Simon and Steph Wong, who are leading the plant.

~Pray for Friday Community Groups (FCG), which is kicking off this week. We're expecting a lot of newcomers to our church and quite a few non-Christians, so pray that we can welcome them and be on about sharing Jesus with them.