Skip to content Session 3 - Cultivate a Discipleship Culture Mar 21 · 56 min ...more
316K followers
Rev. Paul Jeyachandran leads the Intentional Disciple Making Church (IDMC) Movement, which is all about calling churches back to its disciplemaking roots. Visit us at idmcmovement.com
316K followers
0:00 In my last session with you, I talked about knowing God and how the sons of Eli, the Bible mentions they were worthless men0:12 and they did not know the Lord. I have a question for you this morning as we begin this session. What does it mean to know God? What does it mean to fully know0:24 God? Is it just know Him intellectually or just know Him intimately? But what does a person look like if they know God? What does a young people look like if they0:35 truly know God? I want to take you to a passage of scripture in first Samuel chapter 14 and verses 6. I want to give you the background.0:47 Jonathan and his armor bearer are having a chat. And the word of God says, Jonathan said to the young man who carried his armor, come let us go to the garrison of0:59 these uncircumcised. It may be that the Lord will work for us for nothing can hinder the Lord from saving by many or by few. I want you to underline1:11 that text. Nothing can hinder the Lord from saving by many or by few. Hallelujah. Father bless the reading1:23 of this word. Explain it to us in Jesus name. Amen. Church, Jonathan and his armor bearer are facing an impossible situation here.1:35 Now, is the impossible situation? The Bible says in chapter 13, first Samuel chapter 13 and verse 2, that Saul chose 3000 men in Israel.1:46 2000 was with Saul and thousand was with Jonathan. And they were coming against the Philistines. The Philistines were encamping around them and so they wanted to fight the1:58 Philistines. Now, how many did the Philistines have? The Bible says in verse 5 of first Samuel chapter 13, and the Philistines mustered to fight with Israel 30000
2:10 chariots, 6000 horsemen and troops like the sand on the seashore in multitude. They came up and encamped in Mishmash to the east of Bethaban.
2:22 I want you to listen to me carefully. Saul could only get 3000 men, whereas the Philistines had 30000 chariots. What are
2:34 the odds here? 6000 horsemen. And then the Bible says innumerable number of men as troops, because it
2:46 was surmountable problem. I want you to listen to me carefully. This is the magnitude of the situation that Jonathan and Saul was facing. The Bible says in verse 6, when
2:57 the men of Israel saw that they were in trouble for the people were hard pressed, The people hid themselves in caves and in holes and in rocks and in tombs and in cisterns. And some
3:09 Hebrews crossed the fords of Jordan to the land of Gad and Gilead. Saul was still at Gilgal and all the people followed him trembling. Listen to this. They saw the chariots, they saw the
3:21 horsemen, they saw the number of troops. And the Bible says they were hard pressed, they were trembling. And if you are already defeated psychologically, there is no strength,
3:33 there's no courage, there's no willpower to truly fight the fight. So the Bible says in verse 2 of chapter 14, first Samuel chapter 14 and verse 2, the
3:45 Bible says Saul was staying in the outskirts of Gibeah. The people who are with him were about 600 men, 3000 men he started with. Now, after seeing the
3:56 enemy's capacity, they dwindle now to 600. Now, when you were 3000, and they were already 30000, you cannot win.
4:09 600 with 30000 chariots, 6000 horsemen, and an innumerable troops. How could you actually fight this battle? I want you
4:20 to listen to me. This is the context in which Jonathan says to his armor bearer in verse 6, it may be that the Lord will work for us for nothing
4:32 can hinder the Lord from saving by many or by few. What Jonathan has captured here is a theological anchor that I want you to capture in this conference.
4:44 The stuff that God calls us to do world evangelization, making disciples of all nation is a great task. It's a task that is
4:55 impossible for 1 church for 1 city for 1 nation to be able to do it the whole world the whole body of Christ working together. We need to do it. But the Bible says that you
5:07 don't get overwhelmed by what you see. Instead there's a theological anchor here the theological anchor here is for nothing can hinder the Lord from saving by many or by few.
5:19 In other words the numbers doesn't matter. It is not about the numbers. It is not about how many, but it's always about what kind.
5:31 I want you to listen to me carefully. Jonathan, the Bible says, turned to his armor bearer and said, Come, let us go to the garrison of these uncircumcised. His trust was not in
5:43 the numbers, they are outnumbered. The odds are against them. But his trust was in the call of God, in the promise of God, in the covenant of God that God has given to
5:55 the nation of Israel. As a result, the Bible says in verse 7, the armor bearer said to him, do all that is in your heart, do as you wish, behold, I'm with you heart
6:07 and soul. I love it. How many senior pastors would love if their staff members, if their board members, if their leadership team would come
6:18 around them and say, do what God has placed in your heart, I'm with you heart and soul. What a joy. Again, this armor bearer's trust is not again in
6:29 Jonathan's strategic wisdom, or his ability to fight the battle. I believe his trust was in the Lord as well. So together, they run into the
6:41 enemy's camp. And this is what Jonathan says, you know, if we go to the enemy's camp, and if 1 of them say to us, come. Look at this in verse 10. But if they say, come up to us, then we will go
6:53 up for the Lord has given them into a hand. And this will be a sign for us. So both of them verse 11 showed themselves to the garrison of the Philistines and the Philistines said look the Hebrews are coming out of the
7:04 holes where they have hidden themselves. And verse 12 and the men of the garrison hailed Jonathan and his armor bearer and said come up to us and we will show you a thing. And Jonathan said to his armor
7:16 bearer come up after me for the Lord has given them into the hand of Israel. Can you hear this faith in his voice? Can you see how he is captivated not by the circumstances but by
7:28 the grace of God the magnificence of God the faithfulness of a faithful God because he's a covenant keeping God. His eyes is upon the Lord and he says let's go if the Lord will be working for us
7:41 nothing can hinder him from saving us by many or by few. In other words all it takes is if I know God I would take decisive action. I would take the action. I will step out in faith. I'll start
7:52 doing it. I will not be overwhelmed by the task because I know greater is He that is in me than he that is in the world. Hallelujah. The Bible says in verse 13, they climbed up on his hands and feet.
8:05 They they fell before Jonathan and his armor bearer killed them after him. Now verse 14 says, they killed only about 20 men. They killed only about 20 men, 2 of them. They're going
8:17 into the camp and they said, let's come. Let's surround them. There are 30000 chariots. There are 6000 horsemen, innumerable number of troops. And they said, let's go gather around them and let's surround
8:28 them. You know what the Lord did? Look at verse 15. There was a panic in the camp, in the field among all the people, the Garrison and even the raiders trembled, the earthquake and it became
8:40 a very great panic. I want you to capture this church. The Lord intervened and the Lord stepped in and gave him a mighty victory. I want to
8:52 highlight a couple of things as we go into today's session. 1, the battle belongs to the Lord. And the Lord can do His saving work through many or by
9:03 few. Because it is the Lord who ultimately builds the ministry. It is the Lord who ultimately gives you the victory. Hallelujah. So it is not never it is
9:15 never about how many, but it's always about whether you have faith in God. What kind of faith do you believe in God? I'm reminded of the
9:27 verse in Daniel chapter 11 and verse 32. Knowing God means this, The people who know their God, the Bible says, shall stand
9:38 firm and take action. Hallelujah. They are decisive and they are decisive action takers. They take action, they take deliberate action.
9:51 They step out of their comfort zone, they step into the enemy territory, they go out in the name of Jesus, they do what God has called them to do, because the promise of Jesus Christ is
10:02 behold, I'm with you always. And I'm the 1 who has authority in heaven and on earth. And I'm the 1 sending you Jesus says. People who
10:14 know God are people who take action. And my prayer is that God will give you an incredible courage, that God will give you a leadership team, people
10:26 who are heart and soul with you in building what God has called you to build. And God has called us to build a disciple making church, a disciple making
10:38 vision. This is a mandate from Jesus. Therefore, Jesus stands behind it and he gives us grace to do it. Hallelujah. I want to just pray a quick prayer for you. Even as you're
10:49 gathered here, I'm not sure if I'm speaking to a pastor or a leader in a church. Don't know how, what kind of situation you're facing currently. But I want to encourage you with this. The call of God that is upon
11:01 you is not a call given by man. It is a call given by the Almighty God. They could be mighty. There could be my there could be so many things that's going not going
11:13 right. Or there could be so many things that are hindering the work of God in your life. And you can be overwhelmed or discouraged looking at these things. But I want to encourage you look to Him, the 1 who called
11:25 you is faithful. The 1 who laid hold of your hand is faithful. The 1 who promises that he is with you, he will help you, he will strengthen you, he will uphold you with his righteous right hand is faithful, and he
11:37 will do the work. Hallelujah. Let's pray. Father, I pray for every person under the sound of my voice. Lord, no matter what the situation they are in, there is greater is He that is in us
11:48 than they they that are in the world. Father give them eyes to see what you have already prepared. Give them the grace to know that you're with them, that you are a faithful God. Help them to experience the
12:00 faithfulness of the faithful father. The goodness of a gracious God. I pray in the name of Jesus that you fill them today with your supernatural wisdom and strength. And I pray for
12:12 team unity and team to work together in heart and soul in this great task that you've called us to do. And knowing that Jesus Christ is the 1 who gives us the authority, the calling and the grace and the
12:24 ability and he stands with us until the work is finished. So Father, we thank you in Jesus name. And the people of God said, Amen and Amen. Hallelujah. Shall we take a moment to give the
12:36 Lord a clap offering? Come on. Hallelujah. This morning, we're going to start with session 3. In session 1, we talked about the 7 marks of a radical
12:48 disciple. It all begins with a transformed life. You can't multiply and you can't experience the exponential factor unless it begins with the
12:59 transformation of life. There must be a change of heart. Matthew chapter 5 to 7 is what we studied, and we looked at the 7 marks of radical
13:11 disciple. The second session, we talked about the discipleship environment and discipleship community. How we need to develop a discipleship training environment, and how we need to develop a discipleship
13:23 community. Because change happens within a relational relational environment, where there is a relational accountability, and how we need to be so intentional in our training.
13:35 The third session today, we're going to be touching about cultivating a discipleship culture. Now, you and I, we need to understand how do we cultivate a culture. See you can
13:47 have culture by design or by default. If you walk into my house there is a defined culture. I don't have to explain it to you but you will be able to see it
13:58 what the culture is. You walk into an organization, you can see the culture, what is the culture, the culture is how things are done here, the way we do things. So in the church, there
14:10 is a culture. But we need to focus on how can we build a discipleship culture within the church. It begins by asking the right questions.
14:23 You know, in my leadership mentoring, I usually ask people to read this book, my personal, the personal MBA by Josh Kaufman. The book
14:35 begins with this introduction, that Josh Kaufman says it is not how or how question that matters. It is about why and what that matters. In other words, how do you
14:47 move forward in your life and in your leadership? How do you lead well? How do you live well? You got to develop a certain kind of thinking. And the thinking is
14:58 about asking, learning to ask the right questions. He calls it the mental models. We need to develop the right mental models and it begins with asking the right questions.
15:11 I was in an international city once and the pastor met me from the airport and he took me to my hotel. And along the way that we had a wonderful conversation and it turned out to be a divine
15:23 appointment. And in that divine appointment, he recognized that I was staying in that city only for 1 or 2 days. And he wanted his leadership team to come around and to glean from
15:36 a mentoring session with me. So this is what he did. He called all his leaders together. And then he said, here's a this is the pastor I want you to glean from ask him any questions. Now, they don't know me from a bar of
15:48 soap. So there was no questions that came from from the congregation from the leadership team. So I started the mentoring by asking them to think about the 4
15:59 questions every leader should ask. These are the 4 questions. I want to give it to you. I want you to take it down. Number 1, what for? What kind? What's possible? And
16:11 what's next? What for? What kind? What's possible? What's next? What for is a purpose question. You've got to begin with a purpose. What kind is a product
16:22 question? What are you trying to produce? Number 3, what's possible? In other words, what God has promised? What is it that we are believing? It's not something that comes out of our imagination, but it comes out of
16:33 hearing God clearly in prayer. And God has spoken and he has promised through his word. Number 4, what's next? In other words, every leader should eyeball what's coming up next
16:45 because that's a process question. What's the next step for our life? What's the next step for our family? What's the next step for our ministry? Praise God. And today, that's not the topic that I want to
16:57 talk about. But I want you to capture what it means to develop a disciple making culture. To develop a disciple making culture we need to think about the right questions to ask. Because
17:09 when you want to move the church towards multiplication, when you want to move the church towards spiritual multiplication, you've got to help the people understand the culture that you
17:21 want them to create and part of creating that culture is to be able to help them to think about things so that we can move together. Hallelujah. So I want you to listen to me, there are 5 defining questions
17:33 that we're going to talk about in this first session in this session. What are the 5 defining questions? Now, I was accompanying Pastor Edmund, Pastor Edmund Chan, my spiritual father and mentor
17:45 to NIACC in New York, where he was teaching in the Alliance Theological Seminary for his doctrinal students. And in this 3 day, I think it was a week,
17:57 a week class, he was giving them a 5 defining questions to not only think about things, but to memorize it so that they can articulate what, they can
18:08 meaningfully articulate and meaningfully think about certain things. These are the 5 defining questions. And I want to give it to you first so that we can think about it together. Why is
18:20 Dash so important? The Dash could be anything. The Dash could be spiritual warfare. The dash could be living a generous life, or the dash could be even listening to your wife.
18:32 Whatever the dash is, whenever you're asked to think about things as leaders, I want you to think about this 5 defining questions. Number 1, why is dash so important? Number 2, if DASH is so
18:44 important, why is it so neglected? Number 3, what is DASH all about? Number 4, what makes DASH so difficult? Number 5, how can Dash be
18:56 best accomplished? Think about it. You know, if I'm if I'm counseling a married man, and I'm telling him go, the most important thing in a marriage is that you listen to your wife.
19:08 And if you want to think about how listening to your wife, why we need to do that. There are 5 defining questions. Number 1, why is listening to your wife so important? Number 2, if listening to your wife
19:20 is so important, why is it so neglected? What is listening to your wife all about? What makes listening to your wife so difficult? And number 5, how can listening to your wife be best
19:31 accomplished? You can think about anything and and you can actually come up with a good research paper. Now, we're going to think about how do we develop a
19:43 discipleship culture. And I want to ask ourselves these 5 defining questions this morning. Number 1, why is radical discipleship so important? If I want to move the church towards
19:55 multiplication, if I want to move the church towards intentional disciple making ministry, then this question needs to be addressed. And this is a critical thing for you and I to understand. See many times people
20:06 resist change because they don't know why we are changing. They don't know that so that's why 1 of the leadership role is to help people see the critical need. So why is
20:18 radical discipleship so important? The reason is because the church is in trouble. You know, you would have heard this say
20:29 saying the world is in trouble. And the church is in need the world is in trouble. Coronavirus pandemic crisis, economies down
20:40 nations shut down all these things. The world is in trouble. The church is in need. We need more resources. We need more manpower. We need more leaders. We need more volunteers.
20:52 Can I humbly say this? The opposite is also true. The world is in need, but the church is in trouble. Why? Because if you
21:04 truly examine the state of the church all over the world, you will find this. There are 4 things that concerns me that I want to talk to you. Number 1 the first thing is there is a dilution of truth.
21:16 In this day and age people are not willing to listen to sound doctrine. That is biblical illiteracy that plagues the church. People who are popular preachers are preaching the things
21:28 that people want to hear. It is all about how can I be happy? How can I be healthy? How can I be wealthy? I want you to listen to me there is a dilution of truth as a result there is no
21:39 true discipleship. The second thing is when you keep hearing a weak diet from the pulpit week after week there is a declension in the soul because the soul is not convicted it's not challenged.
21:51 It's not inspired to rise up and live for Jesus. There's a declension of the soul. Thirdly, as a result of personal life being in a mess, there is a disintegration of families.
22:04 Families are breaking down. It's not only divorces not only rampant in the world, it's rampant even among clergymen. Why? Because the families are not
22:16 centered on the Word of God. Number 4, there's a disengagement of next generation. In other words, the next generation is walking away from the church. Yesterday, recommended that you read a
22:28 book by David Kinnaman, Banner Research Group released this, You lost me that's the title of the book where they talk about how people in the next generation are exiling out
22:40 of the church in mass numbers listen to me carefully this is what you and I are seeing the church is actually losing ground In 1 of my conferences I already shared with you that the church is losing
22:51 moral ground biblical ground and a spiritual ground moral ground because there's impurity within the church there's carnality there's sin there's defilement of sin within the church. Biblical
23:03 ground we are losing biblical ground because superstition is ruling the people. People are not grounded. There's biblical illiteracy. Number 3, there's people are losing spiritual ground. In other words,
23:15 rather than being people who walk with a Christian worldview, a biblical worldview with a kingdom value system, nothing has changed. Listen, this is the reason why we need radical
23:27 discipleship to be restored. The word radical means this roots. It comes from the word roots. In other words we need to go back to the roots. We need young
23:39 people. We need the next generation to be grounded in the scriptures. They we needed to bring them under the Lordship of Jesus Christ empowered by the Holy Spirit so that they can live for the glory
23:51 of God and they can fulfill the will of the Father. Listen to me carefully But the problem around the world is we have people who say they want this but yet
24:03 they don't do this. Let me explain. You have pastors and preachers who get up there and say evangelism is a priority discipleship is a priority but ask the fundamental
24:14 question how many people did you evangelize this past year? How many people did you personally disciple in this past 6 months? Because there's
24:26 a disconnect between what we say we want and what we do as a church. This is why developing a culture is important.
24:38 See many times leaders want to get things perfect. See when I do church consultations, pastors usually are working out a strategy and they're working and they're thinking they're thinking they put a committee together
24:49 and they're thinking about things and they think about things and they think about things and they never implement anything. Why? Because they're trying to get it right. Listen to me carefully. Many times it's like this.
25:01 You're trying to shoot a rifle and you're saying ready, aim, aim, aim some more, aim some more accurately, aim, aim, they never fire. What I recommend
25:13 pastors to do is ready, fire and then aim because now you know whether you hit or miss then you can make changes and cause correction. Listen to me carefully you and I we need to come back to
25:24 realizing that world evangelization is the mandate. Discipling the nations is the mandate and to do that we need to start with a disciple making culture within our household, within
25:36 our church, so that it can continue to multiply. See many times pastors and leaders are praying for revival. They say we want revival Lord send us revival. And
25:48 many times God does graciously send revival. And then they say, oh, we have experienced the revival of God. And then that's it. Revival is not the end of people. Revival is only the means. What
26:00 is the end? The end of any revival the revival should bring consecration and evangelism as a focus. The revival is it's it's it's not it's not the
26:12 end of end of the line it's the beginning in other words there should be repentance that comes in through the word of God to the preaching of the word there's a repentance as a result there's a
26:23 consecration of our heart before God consecration of our love our affection before God consecration of our resources our time our talent our treasures to say God I abandoned this world I want to
26:35 pursue you wholeheartedly I want to have this 1 love in my 1 heart 1 allegiance to my 1 King and I want to live for you. Now that is radical
26:46 discipleship. Now that is what we need to model for the next generation. Discipleship is nothing more than falling in love with Jesus. Let me give you 5 things
26:58 discipleship is. Number 1, it is knowing Jesus. It is loving Jesus. It is serving Jesus. It is abiding in Jesus. And it's becoming more and more like
27:10 Jesus. If you know Him and you love Him and you serve Him and you abide in Him and you're becoming more and more like Him your heart will be on fire for God. Hallelujah. This look this
27:21 world along with all its desires will lose its grip on you and you'll be saying Lord use my 1 life for your glory. That's why we need to build intentionally a
27:33 disciple making culture within the church by bringing back this radical discipleship by going back to the roots. See discipleship is so important for all kinds of
27:45 churches. There are 3 kinds of church in my consultation I've come across 1 there are struggling churches and for the struggling churches discipleship brings an impetus for
27:56 growth. There are growing churches for growing churches discipleship brings sustainability for growth. And then there is the mega church for the mega
28:08 church. They have already grown in numbers, but what they lack is depth. Discipleship will bring depth in the congregation. Now, let's move on to the second
28:20 1. If it is so important, then why is it so neglected? If radical discipleship is so important, why is radical discipleship so neglected?
28:32 I want us to consider 4 reasons. Number 1, these are reasons that I've discovered by walking with church leaders, church pastors who try it for a while, and then they say,
28:44 ah, it doesn't work. So the first thing is it doesn't work. In other words, discipleship doesn't work. Let me end that statement. It doesn't work in the short term. For
28:55 example, imagine if you're a missionary in a foreign country, and you need to send a monthly report or a yearly report back to the sending church. If you're doing discipleship
29:07 in your year 1 and all you can reach is only 2 people and you have been discipling these 2 people It doesn't look good to the report back there. When people are reading oh we have been sponsoring
29:19 this person and this person has only reached 2 people second year 4 people third year 8 people. It doesn't look good on paper But can I humbly say this? This is
29:31 where many times we we don't have a long term thinking. We have a short term view. And we we truncate the work of discipleship. We say, oh, it takes time. Yes, it
29:43 takes time. But you know what, if you do it right, it will have spiritual exponential factor. It will have a multiplication factor. Because you and I, we need to understand that it
29:54 takes a lot of time to build an IDMC, an intentional disciple making church. Tell pastors usually it takes about 7 years. Now in
30:06 Japan, they make the samurai sword. Samurai sword is very special because it is very sharp. And this samurai sword is it's tempered.
30:18 It's a tempered steel. And it's usually put into the fire so many times until it becomes ready. I want you listen to me it takes time.
30:30 If you want to build a godly ministry, a disciple making ministry, it takes time. Secondly, it is hard to measure. In other words, how do you measure life change?
30:42 Discipleship is about change in a life change but how do you measure change? It is easy to measure if people attend a class. See there's a big difference between programmatic discipleship and radical
30:53 discipleship. Programmatic I can I can I can easily measure it? This many people attend the class 1 class 2 class 3 and they submitted their reports and the assignments are done. But
31:05 can I humbly say this how do you measure life change how do you measure that this person has become a better husband or better father or he is becoming a better leader he's a better discipler
31:17 how do you measure life change It's harder? That's why sometimes we neglect it. Thirdly, discipleship is messy. See many times we we when we are walking with people, we realize that
31:29 it's messy. Why? Because Christian life is messy. People listen to me, there are fault lines underneath. You know, I was recently reading a book, Tending Your
31:41 Body, Soul, Spirit by Todd Wilson. In that he talks about pastors who have duality within within them. In other words, they could be prayer warriors and yet control
31:53 freaks. They could be they could be biblical biblically sound, and yet they could have personal struggle, struggling with addiction to porn or even food or other
32:04 things. They could be they could be fully whole in God and yet psychologically broken. Want you to listen to me. In other words, discipleship when you're journeying with
32:16 people, they open their life, they share their vulnerability. It's messy. When I when my wife and I, we walk with people, we take time to deal
32:28 with marriage issues. We take time to deal with domestic life issues. And many times these are things that are always swept under the carpet and never dealt with.
32:40 It's important. See, IDMC to me is 3 things. IDT. What does IDT stand for? I die trying. No, no, no. IDT stands for this. Inner life,
32:52 devotional disciplines and transformation. In other words, we have to deal with the inner life of a person. That is why we do IDMC. IDMC is not a program, it's not a model
33:04 of church, it's a way of life where we deal with the inner life issues when the fault lines appear we deal with it head on what is devotional disciplines person has to read the bible
33:16 pray fast go before the Lord and hence have that posture of surrender and brokenness these come these are cultivated through devotional disciplines and that needs to be checked and
33:27 cultivated intentionally and transformation of life. See when a man comes and tells me pastor I'm changed by the Word of God. I've been so blessed by your ministry and changed by the Word of God. Can I humbly say this, I
33:39 don't buy that? I will wait for the wife to come and tell me 1 day, my husband is truly changed. When the children say my father is truly changed. That's real change people.
33:51 So it's messy. That's why we neglected. Number 4, the fourth reason why we neglected is because we are not discipled ourselves. We were not discipled. I'm not sure if you have a show of hands to the
34:03 people that you're watching with how many people were truly discipled when you were growing up in your spiritual formation? Not many and that is the reason why sometimes we don't know what to do. Can I humbly say this in
34:14 this season of your life it's never too late ask someone to mentor you ask someone to disciple you disciple you in the scriptures disciple you in prayer ah start now I believe when the
34:26 student is ready the teacher will appear So ask and deal with it? Number 3, what is radical discipleship all about? When you want to really build a culture we got to
34:38 start thinking about what is radical discipleship. I mentioned to you already radical discipleship is all about people to be grounded in the scriptures rooted and grounded in the scriptures under the Lordship
34:49 of Jesus Christ empowered by the Holy Spirit to live for the glory of God and to fulfill the will of the Father this is radical discipleship Can I bring it down to 2 things? It
35:01 is allegiance to Jesus and surrender to Jesus. It is about pledging your allegiance to Jesus and giving your all to Jesus to surrender. See surrender is not giving
35:13 up surrender is about giving in to God surrender is about allowing him to step into your life and to say Lord take over my life I'm giving into your love to your promises in the
35:25 scripture I'm giving into your plan. Hallelujah. That is surrender church. Galatians chapter 2 and verse 20. Apostle Paul said it like this, it is no longer I who live,
35:37 but Christ who lives in me. The life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. 2 things I see in that passage of Scripture. It is no longer
35:49 I who live but Christ who lives. In other words it is radical discipleship is about moving people from committed life to crucified life. It is moving them to
36:01 a place where they say it's no longer I. It's no longer Paul Jay Chandra that lives but Christ has taken over. He lives my life. He rules and reigns in my heart. My
36:13 allegiance is pledged to my 1 king, king Jesus. Hallelujah. His love becomes my love. His aspirations becomes my aspirations. His affections becomes my affections and what he asked me to
36:25 do I do willingly. Hallelujah. Secondly it is not just focusing on what I can do for God but moving from what God has done for me through Christ.
36:37 What God has done for me look at how the verse ends. The verse ends by saying who loved me and gave himself for me Hallelujah. He loved me gave himself for me. In other words, he
36:48 gave completely for me. He loved me wholeheartedly. He gave himself completely. Therefore, I in turn love him completely. And I give myself wholeheartedly to him.
37:00 Hallelujah. That is radical discipleship church. You know, I've been in this church for nearly 21 years at the time of this recording.
37:12 And in this church, I have been a senior pastor for the last 10 years. 21 years in the same church and 10 years ago when the church was given to me for my wife and I to
37:24 lead in the next season. I was a reluctant leader. The reason is because I saw so much dysfunction. I saw so much demoralization. I saw
37:35 division and defilement of sin. And I saw discouraged people. I want you to listen to me carefully. But in the last 10 years, because of our focus is on intentional
37:47 disciple making church, the Lord had taken a demoralized church to become a disciple making church, and not only become a church that is disciple making, but also spearhead a
37:59 discipleship movement in our nation. I believe with all my heart, this is the work of God. It is the work of God through and through. But the work didn't begin in the church, the work
38:10 began in my heart. It began with a transformation of my own life, where God had to take a man that was broken, wounded, shattered to pieces,
38:22 and God had to rebuild his own life. And God needed to bring him back to that place of authenticity before God and brokenness before God and to put courage within him to rise up to say
38:34 disciple making is the vision for not only my life, my family, but for this ministry. Listen carefully. Many times when you start to deal with things, you
38:45 recognize that are that are hurts in the hearts of people that needs to be healed. There are primal wounds of the heart. There are cynicism of the mind. There
38:57 doubt, there's fears, there's insecurities. There's there's paralysis of the will. In other words, they can't they have failed in the past. So they don't want to step out again. They don't want to be embarrassed and
39:07 shamed again. And there is overcrowding of the soul that clutters the soul because pastors are too busy doing too many things. But they're not focusing on the 1 thing, the major thing thatShow more
Comments No comments yet. Start the conversation.
Paul Jeyachandran
Comments
Keep it kind. Comments are public.