Fulfilling the Great Commission as Ordinary Christians

When we think of the Great Commission we usually have in mind career missionaries going overseas or cross-culturally. Definitely that's an important part of the Great Commission. But not all will become full-time missionaries. Some will be stuck in the home taking care of their children or to some their aging parents. Some will be managing family business. A few might even do both. Still some will probably stay in their local churches serving for the rest of their lives. Does that mean that they can't fulfill the Great Commission?

Let's look at it this way. Yes, the Great Commission takes place cross-culturally and in faraway places as missionaries are sent out to preach the gospel, make disciples of Christ, and start a church. However, ordinarily it happens in our homes, our workplaces, in the church, at school, even in some unexpected places.

The Great Commission begins at home where Christian parents are patiently teaching and disciplining their children in the ways of the Lord, including doing cheerfully simple house chores. Disciple-making takes place at home where husbands and fathers lead their families in reading the Bible, in teaching their families the precious doctrines of the Christian faith, and in leading their wives and children in prayer. Remember that as believers our children also belong to the Lord. We consider them disciples also. They also need to be taught of the teachings of Christ until they, too, would profess faith in him.

Proper understanding of the Great Commission would also lead Christian single men and single women to seriously consider marriage with a fellow believer in the Lord in order to build a home where Christ is honored as Lord, where his Word is taught and obeyed, and where children are nurtured to believe and serve God.

The Great Commission also happens in the workplace where Christian professionals and employees bear witness to the grace of God in their words (evangelism) and their good deeds to their fellow workers. They are the light of Christ in the workplace bearing good works as testimonies to the power and presence of God in their lives.

The Great Commission is also being fulfilled in Christian schools where children are taught in every subject the truth about God not only as the great Creator and Lord of the universe but also as the Redeemer and Savior in the person and work of His Son Jesus Christ. So Christian teachers are also fulfilling the Great Commission in the workplace.

And of course, in the church, where everyone is being taught of the gospel and its implications in personal lives and in the life of the whole community of faith, the Great Commission also takes place. Our Reformed churches must always proclaim the gospel in the pulpit, in Sunday school classrooms, in catechism classes, and in the nursery. Every member of the church must be captured and saturated by the same good news of salvation so that each one and the whole body naturally bear the gospel-fruit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, goodness, and self-control. We need the gospel not only to fulfill the Great Commission but also to live daily the Christian life bearing witness for Christ.

Leaving a Godly Legacy

For more than a year now I have been enjoying the privilege of teaching the Bible on air at Mango Radio Philippines, then at 97.1 FM in Davao City, now at http://mangoradio.asia/. I am thankful to the Lord for the opportunity to proclaim and teach the Holy Scripture over the radio. I also enjoy answering many practical, doctrinal and ethical issues asked by our listeners through text and Facebook messages.

As a Reformed Christian, and a minister at that, it is my joy to teach the Scripture and relate it in the daily life and personal relationships of ordinary believers. My way of interpreting the truths of the Scripture is not unique. The interpretation I express is not new but I always seek to be consistent with how faithful Christian interpreters in the past have explained the Bible and applied it in the lives of the believers.

I always remind myself that I (or anyone in this generation) am not the first who studied the Scripture and discovered the truths it bears and applied them to life’s daily struggles. Our forefathers in the faith had the same struggles that we have and they turned to the written Word of God to find answers to the issues they were facing.

Wisdom calls for us to learn from faithful and godly authors from the previous generations. They can teach us a lot of things from the Scripture about problems we face today. We can build our own new discoveries and conclusions on the solid foundations that they have laid. Of course we can also learn from their mistakes.

But I’m afraid we are losing the rich Christian legacy that our forefathers in the faith had discovered and written about and passed on to us. We will impoverish ourselves if we ignore the truths they have learned to love and preserved for us and the succeeding generations.

In trying to understand the teachings of the Scripture many of them devoted their time to extended study of it. I, for example, am greatly helped by the printed and online commentaries, treatises and sermons of faithful men of previous generations like Athanasius, Ambrose, Augustine, John Chrysostom, Anselm, Bernard of Clairvaux, Martin Luther, John Calvin, Charles Spurgeon, J. C. Ryle, and many more.

Many of their precious insights and teachings are now available and accessible not only in libraries of old institutions of learning but also in the worldwide web or internet. We can easily read them there and try to understand them for our own benefit. We can especially pass on their teachings to our children and young men and women in our churches.

I am writing this essay because I want to share my thoughts on why it is important to leave a godly legacy. I wish to share my insights with you, dear readers, in order to somehow help stir within you the need to take seriously our responsibility to study the Christian faith in order to live it out and leave behind a godly legacy to the next generation.

I do believe that a good legacy one could pass on to his descendants, as I remember one radio listener has shared, is love for God and everything that pertains to Him. What I wanted to share with you here is similar to that idea. The one that I desire for my children and the next generation of believers to learn from me is the faith that I received also from faithful believers of our Lord Jesus Christ, which ultimately comes from God.

Does it sound like the one the Apostle Paul is talking about in 2 Timothy? Actually that’s the kind of heritage I desire to leave my children. Remember how Paul told Timothy in 2 Timothy 1:5 about the faith which he received from his mother Eunice and first lived in his Grandmother Lois? Although that faith that Paul is talking about pertains to the gift that God promises to give his people which the Holy Spirit creates through the hearing of the gospel of Christ that faith does not come without the knowledge of the gospel of Christ and the assurance and conviction from the written Word of God.

The faith I’m talking about is the body of Biblical doctrines handed down by the Old Testament prophets, preached by the New Testament apostles and their companions, faithfully proclaimed, guarded and defended by the Church Fathers, preserved through the Middle Ages by a few faithful monks and preachers, and fearlessly preached by the 16th century European Protestant Reformers. This body of doctrines were taught and lived by many English and Scottish Puritans as well as by a good number of French, German and Dutch Reformed Christians and their posterity.

That faith has been carried and preached by the 18th and 19th century missionaries (like William Carey, John Paton, Adoniram Judson and many others) to many parts of the world until it reached us here in the Philippines by the providence of God. This body of doctrines summarized in the Apostles’ and Nicene Creed and in many 16th and 17th century Confessions (like the Belgic Confession, Westminster Confession, Second Helvetic Confession, Heidelberg Catechism, Westminster Shorter and Larger Catechism, The Thirty-Nine Articles, etc.) is now unknown to many Christians. But this is one legacy worth leaving the next generations of Christians.

Love for God rooted in the living faith of the Apostles results in true godliness. So sound biblical teaching and diligent exposition of the apostolic faith is imperative in producing wise and God-fearing Christians. There is no fear of God without the proper knowledge of God. Godly legacy is being passed on from one generation to another as a result of faithful and godly teaching being lived out by preachers and teachers in the church and by parents at home.

Faith that glorifies God does not come in a vacuum. The Holy Spirit brings it into our hearts by using preachers and teachers as well as godly parents who are soaked in and renewed by the Word of God. As the Holy Spirit uses their words and deeds and as He enables us to understand the holiness of God, the severity of His wrath against sin, the graciousness of His love and goodness and the super-abundance of His mercy in Jesus Christ to undeserving sinners, like us, we are empowered to believe.

These kinds of teaching and practices are becoming extinct in many churches and homes today. Teaching the Christian faith by pastors and parents used to be practiced in previous generations. If we read historical accounts we will discover that basic doctrines of the faith were being taught first by parents to their children at home. Conscientious Christian parents used to pass on their faith to their children in an ordinary house setting as well as in their more formal daily family devotions or family worship.[1]

Of course the church has a responsibility to nurture the believers and their children to mature in the faith. But this does not excuse parents from their responsibility to train and teach their children in the ways of the Lord. Believing parents are the main discipler of their children. They ought to teach their children the teachings of the Holy Scripture.

This is not the case in many Christian homes anymore. If we are going to ask a typical young people in our churches why he is a Christian, or why he or she goes to church, or what does it mean to be saved, you will usually get blank stares. Ask him about the basic doctrines of the Christian faith (such as the person and work of Christ, or the gospel, or faith and repentance, or justification and sanctification) and challenge him to defend these doctrines from the Holy Scripture and you might get frustrated.

But ask him to sing the latest composition of Hillsong or Integrity Music or Contemporary Christian Music and he will do it with gusto. Not that all contemporary praise songs are really bad (some of them are theologically sound and their melodies are quite singable, even a few of them might be sung in our church fellowships) but most of these songs are theologically erroneous.

One Vineyard song that I used to like is the song “Beloved.” Its chorus goes,

I’m Your beloved, Your creation, and You love me as I am;
You have called me ‘chosen’ for your kingdom,
Unshamed to call me, ‘Your own,’ I’m Your beloved.

To a typical evangelical Christian that song may not present any theological problem. But the thing is, when it comes to the love of God, God does not love me “as I am,” but He loves me “in Christ” and “through Christ.” He does not consider me His child apart from His Son, who is the Beloved. If God is going to deal with me “as I am” I will perish. “As I am,” in my natural state, I am a child, an object, of God’s wrath (Eph. 2:1-2) deserving judgment. But “in Christ,” I am God’s beloved.

That’s the problem of this contemporary song. God does not love me “as I am” but He does love me “in Christ” and “for Christ’s sake” by grace through faith in His Beloved.

I could cite another example but I think you get what I mean. Some contemporary songs that many Christians sing in church may sound nice and orthodox at first hearing but to a theologically-trained mind they are erroneous or unscriptural.

How sad it is to see many shallow and immature young people in our churches uninformed of the basic doctrines of the Christian faith! But there are elementary teachings of Scripture that we can’t live without as Christians (see, for example, Hebrews 6:1-2). Unless we grow in these basic doctrines we can’t go on to maturity in the faith.

How come many professing believers don’t know much about these fundamental doctrines anymore? I could safely say that many in our Evangelical churches today are Biblically and theologically illiterate. I was such an illiterate Christian once! If not for the gracious providence of God I could have remained immature in the faith oblivious of the precious and glorious doctrines of God’s amazing grace in Christ Jesus.

In His own time, God sent me faithful believers who diligently taught me the Biblical faith. He also gave me the opportunity to deepen my understanding of these Christian truths from faithful ministers of Christ in a Reformed church and at Mid-America Reformed Seminary.

By the grace of God, I’m still learning a lot from the Holy Scripture about the Christian faith. My learning of and training in the holy faith does not end when I took a three-year formal seminary education. As a pastor I continue to study and learn the faith ‘once delivered to the saints’ (Jude 3).

If church pastors and teachers won’t go back to the basic Biblical teachings taught by the Apostles and by our forefathers in the faith sooner or later the church would lose its power and the world around us won’t see our holiness (which literally means “set apartness” or “separateness”) and godliness as the people of God called to be salt of the earth and light of the world for our Lord Jesus Christ. How I wish that pastors and teachers, together with parents, would diligently teach their youth the whole counsel of God and the most holy faith, not man-centered and ear-tickling teachings!

By the grace of God and by the power of the Holy Spirit, I desire to leave these Biblical doctrines that I’ve learned and am still learning from others to my children, and Lord willing, to the young men and women and the next generation in the church.

There seems to be a prevailing myth among many pastors today that teaching solid Biblical doctrines bears no relevance in our lives since the 21st century has brought a lot of technological advances that renders the Christian faith irrelevant, if not obsolete. It’s kind of boring to them and besides, they would reason out, no one seems to like that kind of stuff nowadays. They are ‘nose-bleed’ for them. People in the pew, they would argue, have felt needs to be met that doctrinal or solid Biblical preaching would not be able to address.

That claim might be true if the teaching of these Biblical doctrines is devoid of practical applications. I’ve seen it done that way. But I have also seen faithful preachers and Bible teachers proclaim and teach these doctrines with relevant, day-to-day and down-to-earth applications. This kind of teaching does not only fatten the mind and gladden the heart but it also strengthens the feet and hands ready to go and do the will of God in the daily grind of life and every relationship.

So I agree that there’s a way to teach theology that can give knowledge but could not transform the thinking and lifestyle. But I disagree that theology is hard and irrelevant, unable to address the needs of ordinary people. People in the pew may have many felt needs. However even if these felt needs are somehow met or addressed by ‘practical preaching’ devoid of the gospel of Christ, yet if their basic human need is not met, that is, to be reconciled with God through our Lord Jesus Christ through the preaching of the holy gospel, these people will remain discontented and lost.

So many preachers today don’t preach anymore the doctrines of God’s sovereignty in creation and redemption, the fall of man, redemption in Christ in His substitutionary death at the cross, justification and union with Christ by faith alone, suffering for the sake of the kingdom of God, sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit and other basic Christian tenets.

Our forefathers in the faith were so moved by these doctrines that they can’t help praising God, serving Him with all their heart, soul and strength, living a life of gratitude, and pleasing Him in everything they say and do. Just the glorious thought and true knowledge of God moved them to endure fire, sword, persecution and many other forms of trials and sufferings to keep the faith and to stand for it. The book Foxe’s Book of Martyrs testifies to this.

Today we often hear many preachers talk about “Five Steps to Financial Recovery,” or “Ten Steps to Financial Success,” or “Five Steps to a Happy Marriage,” and other similar teachings without laying the Biblical foundations of these teachings or disconnecting them from the gospel – the redeeming and transforming work of God in Christ.

Worse yet, they tend to emphasize success and prosperity in life as if by his own wisdom and power man could achieve it by doing certain things that would oblige God to bow down to his selfish desires and demands.

Of course we need practical teaching but not at the expense of Biblical and doctrinal truths. If church members are being taught that financial success or career advancement is up to them – it’s their choice – apart from the sovereign will of God and from the finished work of Jesus Christ at the cross of Calvary, the church of Jesus Christ will produce many selfish, greedy, immature, and worldly people, ready to leave the church at the first sign of failure or disappointment.

Professing Christians who are unaware of the essential truths of Christianity on which practical issues, such as marriage, parenting, giving, prayer, stewardship, etc., stand will not grow deeper and stronger nor will persevere in the faith when the going gets rough and tough. Faithful and persevering Christians are enamored by the glory of God in Christ in the gospel. And this kind of believers would be willing to ‘give what they cannot keep to gain what they cannot not lose’ as missionary martyr Jim Elliot once said.

As long as the Lord gives me the strength and the voice to speak for Him it is my aim to proclaim the whole counsel of God and the Good News of salvation which is in and through Christ Jesus our Lord. I pray that the Lord would preserve me in this faith and will not let me go astray from it for the sake of His name.

I also wish that our faithful Christian listeners at Mango Radio Philippines would be vigilant in guarding the faith which we proclaim over the radio. I pray that they would be discerning, scrutinizing the kind of teaching that we promote and teach and let us know when we say things that are not consistent with the Word of God.

Paul said in 2 Timothy 3 and 4 that there will come a time, in the last days, when people become lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God – having a form of godliness but denying its power… they will not put up with sound doctrine but, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. The only way for us to endure and counter such a terrible time is to do what Paul charged Timothy to do, that is, to “Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage – with great patience and careful instruction” (2 Tim. 4:2).

It is my desire that the Biblical faith is being handed down by this generation of believers to the next. That I believe is one legacy worth leaving behind. While the church through its pulpit is the primary place to preach the Word of God, yet the homes, and even radio stations, like Mango Radio Philippines play a vital role in the propagation and the preservation of the true faith once for all entrusted to the saints.

I pray and work hard for this godly legacy to be passed on to the next generation for God’s greater glory and praise!

[1] Dr. Francis Nigel Lee’s 1987 Doctoral Dissertation, Daily Family Worship: Household Devotions Each Morning and Evening as a Chief Means of Church Revival, available at http://www.ebooklibrary.org/details.aspx?bookid=690203

Leaving All to Follow Christ - Part 2

(Part 2 of a sermon based on Luke 18:18-30)

Entering the Kingdom of God (vv. 24-27)

So from Jesus’ demand to trust God and to rely on Him for salvation, Luke now focuses on Christ’s sad comment about the man. Jesus said, “It is hard for the rich to enter the kingdom of God.” As we can see the expression ‘to enter the kingdom of God’ is closely related to the idea of obtaining eternal life and salvation.

To enter the kingdom of God is to inherit eternal life, and ultimately to be saved. But why is it that Christ said, ‘How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God’? Does it mean there are no rich people who can be saved? That could not be. We know Abraham and Job were rich people. Zacchaeus was also rich, and probably Barnabas.

One scholar has rightly said, “The inability to trust God and be humble can come with [self-preoccupation] and greed that money can bring” (see further Luke 6:24; 12:15, 21). While in some occasions wealth is a sign of divine blessing, those who pursue wealth and hold on to them can be distracted from pursuing God.

So what Jesus meant was that "those who persist in letting their riches come between themselves and their allegiance to God can never be saved." Anything that enslaves a person, whether money or other things, also keeps him from entering God’s kingdom. For God’s kingdom is for those who humbly submit to His kingship.

You cannot be a citizen of the God’s kingdom unless you confess with your mouth and believe in your heart that Jesus is your Lord and God is your one and only King. That’s the essence of entering the kingdom of God. The most important thing for you to do as citizen of the kingdom is to seek and to obey God and His will first above all else.

Earlier Jesus told his disciples that the kingdom of God belongs to the children (18:16, 17). The attitude being emphasized there is that children easily accept Christ’s calling and teaching. They simply trust God and obey what He says. So their trust and obedience to the Lord stand in stark contrast to the rich young ruler’s cold response and disregard of Jesus’ demand.

Again the point is that, those who trust on something other than God for their salvation will not obtain it. Those who want to enter the kingdom of God on their on terms will be surprised to know that they are excluded from it.

In the first place, it is God who has the prerogative who is in and who is out of His kingdom. He grants the privilege to anyone He is pleased to give to be in the kingdom. In Jesus’ word, “What is impossible with men is possible with God.”

So who has the power to grant eternal life? Who holds the key to the kingdom of God? No one except God alone. That’s what we have to remember always. If we belong to God’s kingdom, that’s only because God accepts us and loves us in His Son. He is pleased to give us to His Son Jesus Christ. By faith, we are united with Him and granted everything we need in order to live in this world as His subjects. Also in the life to come, He promises to clothe us with the righteousness of His Son so we can stand in His presence and see Him face to face.

However, those who want be in His kingdom, God asks one thing. In our text, we can see that the disciples fulfilled, again only by the grace of God, what is being asked: to be able to leave everything in order to follow Christ (v. 28).

Leaving All to Follow Christ - Part 1

(Part 1 of a sermon based on Luke 18:18-30)

In the three-year ministry of our Lord Jesus Christ on earth He was asked by different people with different kind of questions. Some asked Him in order to test or to trap Him. Others, however, asked Him sincerely.

In our passage today, we can see a very sincere person asking our Lord Jesus what to do in order to obtain eternal life. Unlike the lawyer who put our Lord to the test by asking Him the same question (Luke 10:25), here Luke does not tell us that the man had such a motive to trap our Lord.

The question, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” is a very important question. The person who asks such a question is concerned not only of life in this world but also in the world to come. For the question itself pertains to our eternal comfort and salvation wherein God’s promise of abundant life in His presence is at stake.

In our passage, we are going to see that eternal life is for those who leave everything for the sake Jesus Christ and His kingdom.

What must you do to inherit eternal life? That’s the question I want to address as we look at our text. First, we will try to understand what it means by obtaining eternal life. Second, we will explore on the related theme of entering the kingdom of God. Third, we will wind up in discussing the encompassing theme of following Jesus Christ, the Lord and King in the kingdom of God.

Receiving Eternal Life (vv. 18-23)

What does it mean to inherit or to receive eternal life? What really is the essence of this man’s question? Maybe it is necessary to point out that the one asking our Lord is no ordinary person. Luke tells us that he is a ruler. Most probably the man was a respected leader in Jewish society, not necessarily a synagogue or religious leader because in Matthew’s account he was still young (Mt. 19:20). As noted earlier, his question is similar to the lawyer in Luke 10.

In essence, the ruler wants to be assured of his salvation in the final resurrection. Eternal life for him, in other words, is the essential covenant blessing that God promises in His Word, not only for this life but especially for the life to come.

So he is asking if there’s still something he needs to do in order to enjoy God’s blessings both in this life and the future life. So the question pertains to the kind of life God promises to all His covenant people, to all His children.

The answer this man got from Jesus does not immediately address his question. For the Lord made him realize something about what he said. He calls Jesus a “Good” Teacher. Before Jesus answered his question, he told the man that no one is good except God.

Why did Jesus point out to this man that no one is good except God alone? One possibility is that, before the ruler understands what he is asking, “Jesus wants [him] to focus on God and his will [first] so that he will be genuinely responsive to God.” The mention of the commandments supports this interpretation. Jesus wants the man to first realize who God is and what He demands from man.

Jesus is therefore asserting God’s absolute goodness and His righteous requirements in the face of his question on how to earn eternal life. In other words, the ruler must realize, first of all, that God is good and that He is holy. If he desires to obtain an inheritance from God, he has to remember that God is full of goodness and at the same time He desires perfect obedience to His law.

Friends, do you see the cost to inherit eternal life? First you have to acknowledge that it is God alone who is good and the source of all good things, including eternal life. Not us. Not our good works.

When Jesus mentioned about the commandments to love one’s neighbor, the ruler confidently said that he has kept all of these since his youth (v.21), which is equivalent to early teen years in our time. So this man is not only a respected leader, he is also a very pious person. He keeps the law of God.

However, when Jesus further tells him what else is lacking, something within him was exposed that disqualifies him from obtaining what he asks. Jesus commands him to sell everything he has and to give them to the poor. In doing this Jesus promises him of treasure in heaven. This treasure of course includes eternal life and other blessings both in this life and the life to come. Then Jesus wants him to follow Him.

What can we see from the Lord’s demand from this man? Why he has to sell everything he owns and give the proceeds to the poor? Does Jesus prescribe a new way to be saved? What does Jesus ask of the man when he told him to sell everything and give to the poor? Someone says, “The selling of all is intended to force the ruler to trust God and humbly rely on him.” In context, this is the fundamental issue that Luke wants to point out. Humble acceptance of one’s inability to earn God’s favor and confident trust in God alone to provide one’s need, both in this life and the life to come, is at the heart of what Jesus asked of the ruler.

Not everyone who wants to be saved and to follow Jesus was told to sell what he has. But everyone who wants to become a disciple of Christ is compelled to obey Christ and to trust God for his salvation. This may mean different things to different people. For a fraud tax collector like Zacchaeus, it shows in giving half of his possession to the poor and to return four times the things he earned from corruption. For an adulterer like the woman in John 8, it means to stop his adulterous relationship and to start obeying God. Salvation is from God. One has to trust Him in order to obtain eternal life.

At this point, Luke tells us that the man became very sad upon hearing our Lord’s demand. Reason? He was very rich. He was not ready to let go of his possessions and help the poor. In other words, he is not ready to come to God and to follow Christ. He wants to earn eternal life. But he does not want to do the first step to obtain it. He does not want to listen to the One who gives eternal life. For Jesus alone has the power to grant eternal life to those who ask for it. But what is eternal life? Jesus said in John 17:3 that it is to know the one true God and the one He sent to save the world, who is Jesus Christ.

The man seems to be admiring Christ of His perfect character yet He is not willing to listen to what Christ tells him to do. He cannot give up his earthly treasures for a heavenly one.
Bottom line: this man is still in the grip of his greed, not of God’s grace. His wealth still holds him. They bind him so tight he cannot take hold of God. He may have obeyed the other commandments. But he stumbled on one. James said it counts to nothing (2:10).

If he really wants to obtain eternal life by means of obeying the law, he has to obey everything perfectly. Otherwise, the law condemns him. Or he can simply humble himself before Christ and trust God for His salvation. No one can obtain eternal life apart from the grace of God through His Son Jesus Christ. In other words, no one can enter the kingdom of God apart from God’s saving grace.

My Journey in the Christian Faith

My goal in sharing with you this story is to thank God and His providence in leading me in my journey as a follower of His Son, Jesus Christ, and to thank as well those whom God has used in helping me grow in the faith. In my other article, “The Testimony of God’s Grace in My Life,” I shared with you how I came to a saving knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Here I would like to relate my growth in the Christian faith highlighting some people who helped me and those ones that I want to help me along the way.

People Who Helped Me Grow in the Faith

God has sovereignly and uniquely strengthened me in the faith using people who are devoted first to Him. My brother, Melchor, first modeled to me the Christian life. His example of faithfulness to God challenged me to stay strong in the faith. He was one of the few people who was concerned for my spiritual growth early in my Christian life back in 1987.

When I was still new in the Christian faith, he would always bring me to a Pentecostal church every Sunday and let me join in every lecture and seminar the church was offering. Though he never taught in any of those lectures I still consider him as my 'teacher'. After the class he would talk to me and try to explain further what the teacher had said. He would also compare notes with me and ask me if I have more questions. He also became my first discipler because he modeled to me how to study the Bible and pray privately and publicly. In the first year of my Christian life he served as my personal discipler.

I was also a college freshman when my brother took care of me as a new Christian. The following year I started involving in a Christian fellowship inside the campus. There I have experienced continuous spiritual growth as I attended Brother Elmo Velasco’s Bible study group. Three times a week he would lead a small group Bible study. There were five of us who would regularly attend his group and he became a discipler to us. He taught us the basics of prayer, fasting, Bible meditation, church involvement and other Christian disciplines.

One time he led us in giving out Bible tracts to other students inside the campus. On another occasion he asked me to enter a room with students waiting for their class. Then he let me share my personal testimony of how I came to know the Lord Jesus Christ. That was my first experience in sharing my faith with other people. It was through his coaching that I became an active witness for Christ in the campus.

I also realized that my skill in leading group Bible studies was first learned from him. He also became a spiritual guide to me. His warm and pastor-like personality served as an example to me on what it means to be a servant-leader of Christ. He also brought me to many trainings and seminars. I felt as if he wanted me to learn many things.

Through the early mentoring of these two people I have gained enough knowledge and understanding on how to live the Christian life. I have learned basic skills in witnessing and leading Bible study out of my relationship with them. On my last year in college, I got involved with Inter Varsity Christian Fellowship (IVCF).

While with IVCF I experienced a tremendous spiritual growth when I joined its month-long leadership training camp known as Kawayan Camp (KC). It was like a mini-Bible school. There I was enabled to strengthen my knowledge of the Holy Scripture and enhance my skill in studying it and in leading Bible studies. It also helped me grasp the basic Christian doctrines and disciplines as we studied the theology and practice of the Christian life, listened to Bible expositions from Genesis 1-3 and lectures on the kingdom of God and other topics relevant to life and ministry as a Christian student.

The camp also helped me come to terms with my struggles in my personhood and relationship with my family. The different lectures by and my personal interactions with the IVCF staff and speakers, as well as my conversations with fellow campers helped me settle some personal issues haunting me in the past. In that camp it was not all lecture and study but also a real and healthy interaction in a community of fellow believers who share the same struggles in life as followers of Jesus Christ.

I brought these knowledge, experiences and skills with me when I joined an evangelical church. Pastor Elvin Mijares, the resident pastor of Caloocan Bible Church, has helped me grow more as a believer. He encouraged me to join a local team of young people who ministers to the high schoolers in a nearby campus. He served as a counselor to me in joining this team. Being my local church pastor I learned from him deep spiritual insights through his expository sermons every Sunday. It was through him that I first learned the rudiments of preaching textual expository sermons. His study habits and discipline in preparing for these sermons provided a model for me on how to do the same.

One of the greatest impacts he had on me as a leader was his love for books and the discipline of reading interactively. He would always lend me his books and I saw how he interacted with the author. He wrote his comments and questions on the margin and highlighted those ideas that he deemed to be important. Because of that I started buying Christian literature for myself and did the same. Also this led me to start reading my Bible in the same manner.

Another influence he had on me is in the area of humility and simplicity. He never projected himself as a super Christian or a perfect pastor or pretending to be somebody who knows a lot. He simply did his best to live out his faith. He did not hide his fears, his angers, his failures and his weaknesses. He cried and poured out his anguish and frustrations in life and ministry in his sermons, as well as during Wednesday prayer meetings. He could manage to laugh also. In fact he laughed a lot and oftentimes aloud. He is so down-to-earth and a light-hearted person.

Although there was no formal commitment for him to mentor me, yet I consider our relationship as that of a mentor-protégé. Oftentimes he allowed me to stay with his family, eat with them and spend time with them. He let me see who he was as a husband and a father. I became a family friend to them as a result. In the process I learned a lot about building a Christian family out of that relationship I had with him and his family.

Pastor Elvin also served as a mentor to me when I joined Inter Varsity Christian Fellowship staff team. With his years of experience with IVCF he provided me the right perspective in this ministry. My interactions with him became an informal way of learning the ups and downs of campus ministry. His perceptions and precautions were seeds of wisdom as I tried to figure out my way through the student ministry.

Several people mentored me while I was with IVCF. Jun Singson is one worth mentioning. He became a Kuya (big brother) to me. He imparted principles and strategies on how to start and sustain group Bible studies among high school students. I remember how he brought me to different high school campuses and introduced me to several key teachers and students whom he was working with. I learned through that experience that having a good relationship with people is an important element in doing the ministry.

Peer counseling was another type of mentoring that I had experienced while with IVCF. Gary Celis, a fellow field staffworker became an accountable partner to me. In times of loneliness and confusion Gary acted as a concerned friend and co-worker. He gave me timely words of encouragement and affirmation. Gary possesses traits of a good counselor. He was willing to listen and accept people in spite of their weaknesses. I can be transparent with him with no fear of rejection. He corrected my misbehaviors without passing any judgment. The relationship I had with him provided the venue for me to grow in my listening and people-skills, which are important in ministry among students.

I would like to mention Kuya Darrell Mortalla as well. He was my IVCF co-worker in Davao City and pastor at Grace Evangelical Free Church. I served the Lord with him in IVCF and Grace EFC and it was a pleasure working with him. His wisdom and wit are both inspiring and contagious. His devotion to the Lord and dedication for His kingdom are genuine. His ability to expound the Scripture and apply it to daily lives is just awesome. He has a kind pastoral heart, too, for the Lord's flock. I was privileged to minister side-by-side with him and to have learned significant lessons in the Christian life and ministry under his mentorship.

Authors Who Influenced and Shaped My Early Christian Life and Ministry

Early in my Christian life several authors helped me get established in the faith. John R. W. Stott, through his acclaimed book Basic Christianity, left an imprint to my soul as I tried to understand the new life I have in Christ. Stott systematically explained man’s universal sinfulness as well his violation of God's law as summarized in the Ten Commandments. Through the simple explanation of the Ten Commandments Stott is able to prove that man is guilty in violating all those commandments and in desperate need of a Savior.

In Christ, Stott argued, God displayed both His justice and love. Man deserves to die because God’s justice requires death as a penalty for his sin and disobedience to the moral law of God. But Christ died in man's stead paying for the penalty of his sin and disobedience.

In Christ’s death God’s wrath was propitiated. Thus man’s sin was atoned for at the cross of Calvary. This is where God showed His holy justice and gracious love – at the cross of Jesus where He died on behalf of sinners like me.

Stott also explained that in Christ’s perfect and obedient life God’s righteous requirement was satisfied. Thus anyone who believes in the finished atoning work of our Lord Jesus Christ will be saved and clothed with the righteousness of Christ.

This is the way God provided for man to be saved and forgiven. Therefore man, by God’s enabling grace, must repent from his sin, ask God’s pardon and believe in the death of His Son as the only means to be reconciled with Him. It was through Stott’s clear presentation of the gospel that the Holy Spirit enabled me to understand my fallenness and God’s unearned favor in Christ.

As I slowly grow in the faith Charles Swindoll, Neil Anderson, and Max Lucado helped me along the way. Swindoll’s Strengthening Your Grip and Growing Strong in the Seasons of Life, Anderson’s Victory Over the Darkness, and Lucado's In the Grip of Grace helped me in my understanding of the Christian life. Though I didn’t fully agree with their teachings, God, in His sovereignty, used these authors in my personal knowledge of Him and the abundance of His grace in Christ at that point in my Christian journey.

Additionally, when I decided to join IVCF I thought I was ready to face the student ministry’s demands and challenges. Life as a student worker is no joke. It is not easy. It is not only taxing physically, it is sometimes draining spiritually and emotionally. I think this is a typical experience for men and women in people-helping ministry.

Two prominent Christian authors mentored me as I struggled in my personal life and ministry among students. The first was Paul Borthwick. His books Feeding Your Forgotten Soul and Leading The Way ministered to me. The former helped me understand what I was going through. It also provided me valuable insights on how to stay spiritually and morally healthy as a student worker. The latter gave me the courage to take the challenge of leadership especially in critical times when faithful and morally responsible leaders are hard to find.

The other author was Bill Hybels. His books Too Busy Not To Pray, Who You Are When No One’s Looking, and Honest to God? challenged me to live the Christian life with the knowledge that God is all knowing, ever present and ever pure. His wisdom deepened my knowledge of the Christian life. His simplicity and very practical approach to life provided me the model to practice the different Christian disciplines more consistently at that point in my Christian journey.

People Who Helped Sharpen My Perspective in Life

My five-year stint with IVCF increased my appetite to read. Shortly after I left campus ministry, four outstanding Christian authors continued to impact my life and understanding of the grace of God as I read their books. The first was R.C. Sproul whose books The Holiness of God, The Soul’s Quest for God, Chosen by God, and Grace Unknown are still very valuable. Sproul is more of a popular theologian and his writings are easy to understand. It is as if he is just talking to me face to face. His passion and skill to communicate Biblical truths is contagious. God has spoken to me through His Word as I read Sproul. To some degree, Sproul has marked me theologically.

Another Christian author whom I delight reading is Jerry Bridges. His expositions on holiness, godliness, grace, and sovereignty of God are superb. I have been greatly blessed by God’s wonderful grace in reading Bridges. His books The Pursuit of Holiness, The Practice of Godliness, Transforming Grace, Trusting God, and The Disciplines of Grace are my frequent companions when I want to read and study God’s Word. His impact is in the area of holiness and personal obedience to God. His wisdom empowers me to take holiness seriously. By the power of the Holy Spirit, Bridges’s warnings against legalism and antinomianism save me from trying to earn God’s favor by performance, on the one hand, and from abusing His grace by living licentiously and irresponsibly, on the other hand.

John MacArthur is also a favorite writer. He faithfully expounds the Word of God and communicates clearly to his reader. I especially like his books Ashamed of the Gospel, The Gospel According To Jesus, and Our Sufficiency In Christ which deepened my knowledge of God and understanding of the message and the implications of Christ’s gospel. To a certain degree, these books motivated me and made me more confident in sharing the gospel. Also his book Ultimate Priority led me to a deeper understanding of why and how should we worship God.

J. I. Packer is also very influential to me. When I first read his book Knowing God, it was as if God was talking to me saying, “I gave you my Son for your life and salvation, now live a life of faithful service by my Spirit.” I can't thank God enough for the blessing of His grace to me through Packer's careful and faithful exposition of the Biblical truths he wrote in the pages of that book. It is still one of my favorites and I promise myself to read that book, or at least part of that book, every year.

I am grateful to God for the lives and ministries of these authors. Surely God has used them and is using them still to impact my life with their gospel-centered books. But the other person who really has a great impact in my life as a Christian, especially as a Reformed Christian, is Pastor Nollie Malabuyo. He is the one who introduced me and taught me and my family the Reformed faith back in 1999. He is also responsible in encouraging me to study in a Reformed seminary. The Reformed denomination which I am now a part of was organized partly due to his faithful teaching of the Reformed faith and mentoring.

I also would like to thank the Lord for my seminary professors and mentors at Mid-America Reformed Seminary who taught me how to think Biblically and minister pastorally. My thanks to Dr. Cornel Venema, Dr. Nelson Kloosterman, Dr. J. Mark Beach, Rev. Mark Vander Hart, Rev. Alan Strange, Dr. Peter Wallace, Prof. Blaine Conklin, Rev. Ron Scheuers, Dr. John Sittema, Rev. Paul Ipema, and Rev. Jason Tuinstra. They've been gracious in giving their time and energy to train and mentor young and aspiring pastors like me.

My Personal Commitment

While I have been learning from different people with diverse backgrounds, in various ways and in different degrees, still, Lord willing, I desire to grow more in the knowledge of God and His grace. Lord willing, I would like to take the time to learn some more from the early church Fathers such as Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch, Polycarp of Smyrna, Athanasius, the Cappadocian Fathers, John Chrysostom, Cyprian, Augustine, and others. I also want to be acquainted with the great medieval theologians and their writings particularly Anselm, Thomas Aquinas, and Bernard of Clairvaux.

Definitely I want to be influenced by the Protestant Reformers – Luther, Calvin, Bucer, Bullinger, Ursinus, and others who followed their faith like the English Puritans and the Dutch Reformed theologians. Their knowledge of God, prayer life and passion for godliness are exemplary. Their influence in the past and even in the present is noteworthy. I can see God’s grace and mercy flowing out of their beliefs and behavior. I am not only impressed. I am inspired and challenged by their pursuit to serve and follow Christ. God is blessing me by their words and works.

I also would like to be adequately informed by the writings and theologies of some great Puritans like John Owen, William Perkins, Thomas Watson, Thomas Boston, Richard Sibbes, Jonathan Edwards, and those preachers and theologians in the Reformed tradition like Francis Turretin, Wilhelmus a Brakel, Abraham Kuyper, and Herman Bavinck. I am also interested to explore and study the theologies of the Hodges (Charles and A.A.), B. B. Warfield, Louis Berkhof, Geerhardus Vos, J. Gresham Machen, John Murray, etc.. Then I would surely enjoy the writings of contemporary writers such as my seminary professor Dr. Cornelis Venema, Drs. Sinclair Ferguson, Gregory Beale, Richard Gaffin, Vern Poythress, and Michael Horton, and other Reformed and Evangelical authors.

Ultimately my desire is to read, study, meditate and live out the Bible in order to glorify God. I am also desiring to faithfully study the Christian faith as it is the summarized or expressed in the ecumenical creeds of the Christian Church and the Reformed confessions in order to grow in my knowledge of the Christian doctrines and to be able to live consistently with these Scriptural doctrines serving the Church, body of Christ, and the kingdom of God.

As I grow in my understanding of the Word of God I also desire to be more obedient and devoted to the Lord, living a holy life out of gratitude to His undeserved grace to me in His beloved Son, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I implore the enabling grace of the Holy Spirit as I embark on this lifetime pursuit of knowing God, glorifying and enjoying Him forever. Soli Deo Gloria!

Beware of Greed!

(a meditation on Luke 12:13-21)

Setting the Context

The Christian life is like a journey. There are road signs we need to observe and follow. Otherwise we will be in danger of accident or arrest. As followers of Jesus Christ, there are certain danger signs we need to be particularly aware of. Once ignored these danger signs can bring fatal destruction in our lives as believers.

One of these danger signs is greed or covetousness. The modern term is closely related to materialism. Sometimes we think that only rich people struggle with this problem. But greed is universal. It comes from the heart of every man (cf. Mk 7:20-23), young or old, rich or poor. It enslaves everyone whose ultimate purpose in life is to accumulate things of this world.

Once we measure success or blessed life by the number of material things we possess, by the income we receive, by the clothes we wear, by the cars we drive or by the size of our houses, greed has crept into our hearts.

The good news is, Christ has defeated the power of greed at the cross. He nailed it there. Being united with Christ by faith, we also had been set free from the power of greed. But as a power, as a master who wants to control our heart, we still struggle against it.

Many people today use the name of Christ in order to get rich. There are some people we know who are able to build big houses, even kingdom, using the name of Christ. They look very religious. They are well known. However their lives do not reflect Christ in His self-sacrificing love, compassion, kindness, humility and real concern for others.

Oftentimes these religious men use and manipulate people to achieve their personal agenda. Such selfish people are not worthy to be called Christ’s disciples. They may profess to be His followers but their lives betray their profession. Beware of such people!

In Luke 12, Christ is instructing His disciples to watch out for few things. First, He calls His disciples’ attention to the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. He compared their hypocrisy to that of the yeast. Why yeast? Yeast is a baking material. A small amount of it can cause a small dough of flour to rise up to several times its original size.

In Scripture yeast is almost always a symbol of evil (cf. 1 Cor 5:6-7). This is why Jesus told His disciples to be on their guard against the ‘hypocrisy’ of the Pharisees. They appear to be godly but deep within they are burning with pride and envy. They seem to follow Christ but their intention was to kill Him and to persecute His followers.

Christ is a threat to their cause and religion. This explains why Saul of Tarsus, a Pharisee, was so zealous in persecuting the church. This is something scary! So Jesus warns them. But He also said not to be afraid for God the Holy Spirit will take care of them. Trusting Him is all they need to do.

There is real danger in following Christ wholeheartedly. This makes Christianity a radical religion. If you follow Christ consider yourself to be dead. If you want to stand for God's truth and live for the sake of the gospel you will be persecuted. It can cost your life. Remember John Huss? Remember Guido de Bres and many others who stood for Christ and the Christian faith? They professed and lived out their faith in Christ in the hands of their enemies.

Remember our Lord Jesus Himself. He suffered the greatest injustice ever committed by man for the truth of the gospel. He, the sinless Son of God, was unjustly condemned as a worse criminal. Are you willing to suffer the same for the sake of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and for His gospel?