Centre for Transformation and Development

We live a busy and hectic lifestyle. As we grow up, our responsibilities increase. Our work gets busier. Our service in church gets heavier too. We just keep adding things to our lives, hoping to keep up with our way of life. No one knows how much more we could take.
We live in a trapped situation that make us think the more the better. If our children go for more courses, they would be more competent. If we work harder, we could provide better for our family and go for more holidays. If we have more activities in the church, then we would have more fellowship and church would grow faster. The list goes on. We just keep adding and keep telling ourselves that we have no choice.
Indeed, we would have no choice if we want to keep our mindset. Unless we are willing to substract some things in our lives, we would only get busier. But taking things out of our lives would require wisdom. Without wisdom, we might actually remove the wrong things. For some, they would cut their devotion time with God or going to Sunday service. That would be detrimental to our spiritual life. What we need to do is actually to consider ways to simplify our lives with the wisdom of God. I know that it is not easy to bring down our standard of living when it has been raised. But only in simplifying our lives, then we could see how luxurious our lives have been. We could have a feel of living without whatapps or smartphone games, cutting down on TV serials or music, skipping our holiday trips or additional courses, take the public transport instead of driving around, etc. There are always things we could cut down so that we could free up our time. We could then use this time to meditate on the Word of God and pray to the Lord. We could reflect on our lives and plan for our lives. We could spend quality time with our family members. We could just relax and do nothing. There is no need to always go for more.
The church has a role to play as well. Many a times, instead of helping believers to find rest in God, the church join in the rat race too. It is as though that they are trying to compete for more time from the believers and then make them even busier. Do not get me wrong, I am not against serving God. What I am saying is that the church could not just be getting believers to do things for God without letting God do things for them. There need to be proper feeding and contemplation to build the spiritual life. If we have so much output, we would be too tired to receive spiritual input from God. The church should not tired out the already worn-out generation, she needs to refresh and restore them.
Frankly speaking, this has to start from the leaders. Many leaders think that they have so much to do. They think that God has called them to do a lot of things. They even quoted from the Bible to say that Jesus lived a very busy and hectic life, so should we. Well, we could surely get very busy in ministry, as much as we want it to be. We might even feel good to be the most important person around. It is as though we are indispensable. Sometimes, there is even guilt when we take a rest or spend time with our family. But I am worried that many today are living a life busier and more hectic than Jesus. They might be more important than what Jesus meant for them to be. They have so many meetings to chair and so many assignments to complete. They might also be more tired than Jesus. Instead of helping believers to slow down their pace in the society, they ended up speeding up the believers’ pace of life because they could not even slow down theirs. Well, there are some who use the Second Coming of Christ as the reason to push the congregation. But ironically, by serving God so hard, some ended up becoming like those virgins without sufficient oil for the lamps. They would be dried up when the Bridegroom comes! It is time the church take a step back and review our existence. It is not just our lives that need simplication, the church must lead the world in this simplication process. Perhaps we are having too many structures or committees. Or we might be having too many programs or trainings. It is time to simplify so that we could be more effective and spend more time building meaningful relationship. We must be careful not to be too carried away by our goals. We should not put programs before people since the programs are meant for the people. We could not drive people to evangelise. Neither could we compel people to stay in our church. But we could build a conducive environment for people to relate and enjoy being around. We could love and encourage people to fulfill the purposes of God. All these could only take place, if we were to simplify certain things in church. Or else, we would just end up with having more blue houseflies in church-busy running around and making a lot of noises without making real impact in the kingdom of God.
Let us stop complicating our lives and our church, simplify them today.

现在很多教会都很积极的想要建立更大的教会。虽说是为了要让更多人决志信主，但也有时候是为了数字，要自己的教会得到荣耀。教会可能以神的名誉，建立自己的国度，导致教会非常注重外表，而忽略了内心的改变。教会也会因太着重服事，而忽视了个人的灵命与成长。到头来，教会可能只是个空壳子。我们看到西方教会的衰退就是很好的例子，往年的风采去了何处，真是可悲。
今天教会可能有很大的数字，但并不代表信徒会有素质。决志与素质必须取得平衡。我们不需要为了得到数字而放弃素质。教会建立得慢，好过建没有根基的教会。而且，教会大了，分开管理也并不是件坏事，可能还可以训练出更多的领袖。让教会回到十架的根本，不要太看重数字，而要求主赐下有素质的决志。神的救赎才是最重要的。必然，人只能撒种，唯有神能使他们成长，我们又何必扮神呢？

要信徒自动自发的在主里成长并不是一件容易的事。通常领袖都需要以不同的方式鼓励信徒。鼓励的方式虽不一，但最糟糕的却是以愧疚推动人。这些人通常滥用神的全柄审判人，还使人背了一身的重担，不但无力服事主，也没有勇气亲近主。生命也就失去了喜乐。这种推动方式以我们的缺乏为主，而不是从神而来的富足。这种方式只让我们看到自己为何没有尽力，没有做得更好和做得更多，但却没有看到那全能，全知，全在和全权的主。这样的方式违反了圣经的教导，因为耶稣来，是要以祂的爱来激发我们，除去我们的重担。祂不再以律法来逼迫我们，而是把律法写在我们的心里，好让我们活在主的恩典，自动自发。
愧疚的推动方式出于一种审判的态度，所以带来严重的伤害。其实若别人不说我们，我们心里都已经不好受了，别人的论断，只加添我们的愧疚。我们即不愿他人用这样的方式对待我们，我们也必须改掉这种坏习惯，学习以爱来激发他人。神的爱能以不同的方式激发人。不单是写在我们心中的律法，也包括神的应许，使命和异像。所以我们也可以用耶稣的模式去鼓励激发别人。但切记，这并不代表我们就盲目地去掩饰我们的过错，而是以鼓励的方式，改掉过错，下次做得更好。
让我们不再以愧疚的方式推动人了，那是很累人的一件事。让我们活出主的丰盛，脱去愧疚的捆绑。让我们尝试以爱来激发他人，下一次他可能给你一个而外的惊喜，因为他不再需要你去推动他了。他将有一股从神而来，发自内心的动力，让他自动自发。这就是爱的力量。

When we go to a rally or a revival meeting these days, we would realize that the content of a message is rather different. There are more and more sweet talk coaxing people to receive Jesus. Some even hardly talk about Christ, but are just mere motivational or inspirational talks. Sometimes to the extent of forsaking the call to repent. I had ever faced this temptation as well. I was tempted to preach a message focusing on the goodness of God so that people would find it easier to receive Christ. I knew that if my call for repentance was too strong, my rally would surely be a failure. Sure enough, whenever I preached for the people to repent before our loving God, the response was few. But I knew that was what God wanted me to do. He was not looking for numbers to boost my ego or made me accountable to my church, He was looking for genuine disciples. That is why there was such a thing as the full Gospel I supposed. We must shift from a soothing Gospel to a complete and wholesome Gospel. The Lord has been reminding me of four things we should repeat in our Christian walk.
The first is Redemption. This is our inner motivation. Without Christ, we are condemned and hopeless. The grace and mercy of God reached out to us while we are still sinners. It is in this loving redemptive work of Jesus Christ that we have eternal life and hope. As such, this redemption should always be our inner motivation that cause us to live a holy life and to serve Him.
Secondly, it is about Repentance. Repentance is actually our response to Christ’s redemption. If we really understand the love, grace and mercy of God that He saves us while we are still sinners, then we should respond by repentance. We should be living a new life for God so that we would bring glory to His name.
Thirdly, there is the Relationship. Relationship is our sustenance. If we are to sustain our walk with God, we would need to build a healthy and close relationship with Jesus. If we do not maintain and grow this relationship, our walk with Jesus would become a chore. Serving God would become joyless. It would simply be reduced to a task.
Last but not least, we need Renewal. Renewal is the way to transformation. If our minds are not renewed, we would then only experience behavioral change and this change is only temporal. As a child of God, we should transform into His likeness and restore the image of God in us. We need a change in our worldview or mindset so that we may understand the things of God and His will correctly.
These four aspects are very much needed today and should be reminded again and again. By no means that they are sequential, but more often than not,happen concurrently. Let us not just go for watered down messages to tickle our ears, but be ready to take in solid food from God, then we will experience growth beyond what we can expect.

In the midst of all church programs and activities. Christians must never forget going back to the basics. I have seen many people too busy serving God that they neglect their spiritual lives. It is as though God demands our service more than the relationship. This is never true. God treasures our relationship more than what we can do for Him. It is silly to sacrifice our spiritual life for the service. In fact, our service can become meaningless and futile if it is not done out of a relationship with God. Sometimes, even the pastors are not aware that their members are not doing well spiritually. They are just happy that people are involved in service. We have valued church service more than spiritual life in most cases. In the rush to push for our goals, we forsake our relationship with God. Spiritual service must always be an outflow of our spiritual relationship with God.
There are those who also sacrifice their family because of serving God. Well, God must always come first but that does not mean that we put our family last. The children are already deprived of their time with their parents when we are working, should they get the balance portion of our time and commitment? It is as though training our kids are not serving God. No, children are precious gifts from God and we need to serve God by taking good care of our family. How can the maids have a closer relationship with our children? How can our children stick closer to a smartphone or a ipad than us? We need to spend quality time with them. Play with them and don’t just get them to study.
Of course, there is another extreme where people are spending too much time with their family. We get our children to learn so many things that we do not have time for church. We need a balance. But a fact remains, only spiritual parents can produce spiritual children. In the midst of our service and work, and trying to provide and take care of our children, we cannot neglect our spiritual lives. We do not want to just give our children our frustrations, our anger or our worries, we want to give them a spiritual inheritance. This would have to begin with us.
If we really want to serve God, take care and grow our spiritual lives. If we really care for our family, do give them quality time and have a quality spiritual life so that we can give our children a spiritual inheritance.

The Word of God is a timeless truth. It is still relevant and applicable to all of us today. Even though the setting and the story are different from what we encounter today, it has lessons that guides our everyday life. These are precious lessons that help us to know God and understand ourselves better. But many times, we fail to see the relevance because we just focus on knowing the story. Like one of my lecturers put it so well, he said that we ended up knowing the Bible of God rather than knowing the God of the Bible. That is why there are people who know the Bible very well, but still live a carnal life to glorify self. The Bible is reduced to some cerebral exercises that tickle our mind and not transform our lives. We can end up being so caught up with the interpretation that we missed what the Bible is trying to say.
Of course, nowadays there is another extreme. Preaching and teaching can become a kind of entertainment. Rather than using the pulpit to teach, we use it to entertain. Sad to say, many listeners like it because they find the Word of God soothing. They feel relaxed and refreshed after laughing the whole session. Speakers with a special kind of charisma is so captivating and intriguing. But if the Word of God does not captivate us or intrigue us to the extent of moving us to repentance, then we may be just playing God. Many people today do not care whether the sermon or teaching are taught correctly, they just hope that it is not boring. Nowadays, we still add in sounds, lights and media to our worship service. Yes, technology has advanced and people’s attention span has shortened over the years. But the Word of God should never be compromised. Though it is good to use technology, we must not forget that it is a luxury. Though we need techniques to help in our preaching and teaching, techniques is not everything. We must remember the basic that we do not go church to worship technology or techniques, preacher or teacher, music or management strategies but God. The timeless truth of God must take the centre stage, not any other things.
In our preaching and teaching today, it is also common to have the whats, the whys and the hows. This of course is a neat way to present a topic. For example, we can talk about what is prayer, why we need to pray, and how to pray. But what is sometimes lacking is to teach  the principles and values from God’s perspective. From the initial days of my conversion, I know that prayer is communicating with God and if I have any needs, I can tell them to God and He would answer me. This is the assurance of answered prayer. That’s true but not complete. More important than presenting our needs to God, I later know that prayer is a way of discerning His will and yielding to Him through communing with Him. God is actually more important than my needs. I just wonder why this was not taught to me first. It is actually very important for me to change my wrong value of putting myself first in prayers and to know that praying to know God is more important than having Him meet my needs. I could have mistaken God for a Santa Claus if I have built the theology wrongly. If principles and values are centred on us, we are sure to get selfish Christians. Perhaps, that is why we see less Christians who are like the early church believers anymore. We only see more and more nominal Christians who are demanding and self-seeking. Incomplete theology can lead to impaired believers.
Like it or not, we often compromise the Word of God. Even when we share the Gospel, we do not share the full Gospel but we mellowed it down. When we go for rally or revival meetings, we hear of all the nice things from God. We have the grace of God, prophecies and promises, but where is the call for repentance? Well, we may just finished it in a few lines for fear that it would affect the response later. How many of us dare to preach like John Sung today? To be frank, we actually care for the results more than the souls. We are hard up for our church to grow. As such, we hope to ‘lure’ them into the kingdom of God first and then ‘convert’ them slowly. But subtly, we are actually building them on a theology that centred on human beings. We ended up trying to solve their never-ending problems in church and start blaming them for not growing. It maybe us who have taken a wrong footstep in the first place.
Why not come back to the basics? Do not just tell Bible stories or build our church that centred around human beings and techniques, build our church on God-centred principles and values. Be bold to show why and how God’s principles and values are superior than ours, and move to a call for genuine repentance. Build true disciples for Jesus. Do not be threatened by the fact that the church is growing slowly. It is still better than not growing or growing very fast but without a genuine faith in God.

路不怕走得慢
只怕走不完
可能我们走得比较慢
但却好过不走完

路不怕走得慢
只怕走错向
可能路途坎坷与孤独
但却好过走错路

路不怕走得慢
只怕迷了向
可能他人要你走别路
但唯自己走得出

路不怕走得慢
只怕违主向
可能自己已有道路行
但唯上主知去向

副：
每人都有自己的路要走
无论前途光明或迷茫
慢长的路我们要走完
幸好有耶稣来作你伴

One of the greatest challenges we faced in transformation is to change our eclectic mindset. It is basically the art of choosing what we accustomed to, what we already believe and what we are already doing. I called it an art because we do this so subtly and so unknowingly that we ourselves can go unnoticed. Like it or not, we see what we want to see, hear what we want to hear and do what we believe only. As such, even when we read the Bible, we may not ‘see’ all of the text. When we listen to God, we may not hear everything that God wants to say. When we obey God, we may also be selective to just follow what is comfortable for us.
Our minds are always in a constant process of choosing. We tend to choose those images, words or pictures that our minds are familiar with first. This is the same for our beliefs. We tend to choose those that match our current beliefs. We choose those that are easy to accept and do first. Leaving those ‘new’ and difficult things to the last. As such, we may actually select those commandments that are easy for us to follow first, while putting the rest aside. We can possibly fool ourselves and even try to fool God by just doing those things we are good at while neglecting the rest.
As Christians, however, our obedience is not selective. God expects us to love Him with our heart, with our mind, with our souls, and with our strength. He calls for a total allegiance. Therefore, even those beliefs that match ours must be checked. We must understand that we are not finding concepts in the Bible to conform to our thinking but rather to make our thoughts submit to the Word of God. Every thoughts should be tested with the Scriptures. There is always some differences between our thoughts and God thoughts, between our ways and God ways. Our Christian beliefs is never a buffet to go and pick only those that we like. It comes as a whole, not a piecemeal. If so, it would be easy for many of us for we would be able to continue to live our old lives without the need to change.
Many of us are not aware that we have this eclectic worldview. As such, we continue to find what fit us rather than being shaped by God. We continue to find what is easy to accept and easy for us to do. We still live in our own framework. But to live for Christ, we have to deny ourselves, carry our cross and follow Him. We need to dethrone ourselves, even those of which are familiar to us. We no longer adopt a eclectic mindset to ‘buffet’ the Word of God, but to accept the Word as it is in a neutral state and let it speak to us as God wills it to be.
Let us seek to transform this eclectic mindset. Let us not left any thoughts untested just as we do not leave any stones unturned. We need to constantly take captive of our thoughts and make them submit to Christ. We are to dethrone our own thoughts and ways so as to receive Christ as the sole Master of our lives.

This is a busy society. We have so much things to do that we often feel awkward when we are free. Some of us would even feel guilty when we take a rest. We would tend to find something to be occupied with. Even when we are free, many of us would read a magazine, listen to the music, or now our favourite –play with our smartphones. There is just so much we can do.
With all these ‘noises’ of this world, we are driven to act. Very seldom, we would spend time in solitude and reflect on God. Actually there are many things we can reflect. We can think about the Word of God and what God is saying to us. We can also reflect about what God is saying to us through the things that are happening around us. Rather than rushing into action, we can also reflect on what God is doing. Our experiences are also good to reflect, so that our experiences would not go futile. While reflection without action can lead to passivity. Action without reflection can lead to foolishness and impulsiveness. We may end up doing a lot of things without learning. God may also allow us to go through the same experience again and again in order to chasten us and discipline us.
Therefore, it is vital that action be coupled with reflection. Then there will be meaningful actions and wise lessons learnt. Let us think before we do and reflect after we act.

How do we feel when we read the same old passage again and again? Sometimes we get bored and switch off our thinking mode assuming we already know the passage. While it is true that we may know the story, but we may not have been renewed in our minds. We need to learn to extract biblical principles and values from the passage and use them to renew our mind. It is these principles and values that are timeless. But many failed to do so.
Instead of spending time to unravel these precious principles and values, some turn to other sources to look for ‘new’ teachings. When people talks about numerology in the bible, symbolism in the bible, allegories in the bible, they become very excited. We must be careful not to read too much into the bible. These kinds of knowledge just puffs us up without substance and content. We can end up becoming Christians who are hyped up on the outside but hollow inside. For these kinds of knowledge can never build up our spiritual lives. It is more worthwhile to go back to the ancient paths of God. There are more than enough for us to digest. It is a matter whether we want to dig into this gold mine or not. Do not always wait for people to spoon feed us. While receiving teaching, make sure we learn the biblical principles and values for our lives rather than just going for the knowledge. Let us be people who not only know the story but also living the word of God.