Disciplemaking Materials In An Animistic Context

Oct 2013, Ministry In An Animistic Context: Disciplemaking

1.         INTRODUCTION

In order to help the converts to grow wholistically in the truth of God, there are three parts we will look into in designing the materials for disciple making in an animistic context. First we look at the biblical way of how Jesus and Paul built their disciples; second, we look at the normal growth path of a new convert in becoming a disciple of Christ, and lastly, the areas that we shall focus on when we design the materials.

2.         JESUS’ & PAUL’S MODEL OF DISCIPLESHIP

God has given us a very comprehensive way of disciple-making through the life of His Son Jesus Christ. Jesus was indeed a cross-cultural gospel planter. He came with a heavenly culture and message, and He intended to make an everlasting impact in the midst of an earthly context. We could see how he functioned as a cultural breaker to close the gap and to not just win people for the Kingdom, but to train them to be disciples who spread the Gospel after His earthly departure.

Paul was a cross-cultural church planter too and he was more than a church planter, but a disciple-maker for Christ. In all the churches which he had planted directly or indirectly, we could see a trend of his intentional efforts to build the local community through producing local leaders or elders.

Learning how they set up the disciple making model do help us to design the materials in accordance to the needs of the locals.

2.1       They Lived Among Them: Show Them the Way of Truth

Discipleship making is more than a classroom intellectual or knowledge impartation. It involves life and personal relationship in a daily interactive level. Both Jesus and Paul demonstrated their Christ-like living manner in those communities they reached out to.

Life example is a very important portion in the disciple-making process. People have to see how you live in order for them to grasp the meaning of sacrificial love and commitment that are the essence of the teaching of the Christianity life or community living. The very first material or content of discipleship that we could ever create and produce for the disciples is the message embodied in our personal daily life. As Paul said, “Imitate me, just as I also imitate Christ’. Role model is established when we live among them.

Especially in an animistic context where the teaching of the Bible is a total foreign message to them, a living image of Christ would be a very great help in the process of assisting the people to understand Christ and His Word.

2.2       They Taught the Word of God: Convey Them the Way of Truth

Jesus and Paul made every effort to make known the truth to the believers, in order for them to grow in the knowledge of Christ. The faith must be built in solid foundation, and Bible is the very basis and content of our faith. Thus it is the responsibility of every discipler to teach their followers in Christ faithfully about the content of the Word.

Another way of teaching the Word is by demonstrating the power of God through the spreading of the Gospel. Jesus and Paul performed great signs and wonders through the empowerment of the Holy Spirit when they preached the Word.

2.3       They Delegated Their Authorities: Train Them in the Way of Truth

Both Jesus and Paul selected certain qualified disciples to take over their ministries. Jesus chose the twelve and sent their two by two to preach the Gospel and to heal the sick. Paul chose and ordained elders to look after the local churches he had pioneered or overseen.

Delegation of authority is a way of releasing disciples into the fields and to continue the work we have started. Unless they are successors built up for Christ, our efforts and works started will not be able to carry on and reproduced in the following generations.

2.4       They Withdrew from Mission Fields: Pass Them the Baton of Truth

Jesus left behind His workloads to be taken up by those disciples He trained after He blessed them with the gifts and power of the Holy Spirit. Paul left his mission fields and move on to his new grounds for another circle of plowing and planting. There need to be a cut-off point when the locals are left to function with their trained capacity under a constant supervision and review.

3.         GROWTH PATH OF A DISCIPLE

A normal disciple (a new convert in an animistic context) will always go through a circle demonstrated as below (author unknown):

3.1       Infancy Stage

The new convert has just started his new journey of faith discovery. He came to accept Christ because of some power encounter, all he knows is about experience and all his interests might be encountering more of those miraculous experiences he went through before. Christianity is still a foreign faith to him. He is basically ignorant in all the experiences as well as the truth of Christ. All he knows is that certain supernatural being has healed him.

New converts at this stage are mostly very self-centred, especially they have been practicing all kinds of animistic beliefs and their purposes are to keep themselves safe and healthy physically or rich and prosperous financially. They have all sorts of queries that need to be answered with the biblical truth.

The discipler sets in to build a personal relationship with the converts, filling as a bridge to share life and testimonies together, encouraging the new converts with his own life and knowledge of God. There needs to have a personal touch either one to one or one to a community. Therefore the incarnated missionary is needed, for the discipler to live among the people groups to help the individuals or the communities to learn more about the truth behind the experiences he or they encountered before or after accepting Jesus.

3.2       Childhood Stage

This stage is where the new converts will pick up their new habits through our leading. And it is the pivot where we shall redirect their focuses on the things of Christ rather than their own pursues and interests. They need to discover the new meaning in a new faith and a larger community that they will be relating to.

The discipler comes in as a connection between the converts and the biblical truth, teaching them the Word of God, building their habits to attend church services and small groups etc, training them to have personal bible study and spend their personal times worshipping God and praying to God. It is a process to help them to connect with God and know God personally, as well as to connect with others and to know them personally in order to live healthily in a faith community. The disciple will first play the role as a director in leading the believers to grow in the faith of God, and to ultimately to channel them to communicate to God and meet God personally.

3.3       Adulthood Stage

This is the stage that the believers continue to grow in maturity of Christ. Since they know God personally, they might have received personal visions and missions in God through the truth imparted to them. And since they have overcome sense of self-centredness and to be trained to be more Christ-like and Christ-centred, they will automatically want to be participated in the work of God. They indeed could be used by God to minister to their own people as they do not have language and cultural barriers.

The discipler has to equip the believers further by teaching them and giving them on-job training. More leadership skills are required at this stage as the discipler will delegate some of his responsibilities to be shared by his disciples. The discipler need to identify the gifts of his followers and train them accordingly, creating new ministries for them individually or as a team and providing them assistances whenever they are in need.

3.4       Parental Stage

This is the stage of reproducing when the believers are independent to handle their ministries or the local church. The trained up leaders are capable of forming their own indigenous leadership team and play their roles as local trainers and spiritual parents over their faith community. They will run and build their church in their own styles and eventually creating their own strategies to branch out to pioneer new grounds. This is how the church planting movement works.

It is thus the time for the discipler to withdraw gradually and back up to become the supporters, allowing the local leaders to function independently. Constant leadership enhancement and consultants might have to be provided to further strengthen the existing local leaders but there will be a time a complete withdrawal and breaking away will be needed for the discipler. 

4.         DISCIPLESHIP PROGRAMS & MATERIALS

Having understood the biblical approaches of Jesus’ and Paul’s disciple-making process, and the stages that will be undergone by the common believers, the design of the programs and materials in discipleship should take into consideration of the below areas:

4.1       Transformation of Personal Belief/Daily Conduct

There are basically three parts in transforming a person’s belief system, by converting their fears into faith in Christ, changing them from believers of polytheism to monotheism, and to help them to overcome the cultural barrier or to be comfortable in their own cultural way of worship.   

a)         From Fear to Faith

One of the greatest enemies of faith is fear. In an animistic context where people believe strongly in the spiritual world and live under the fear of offending the spirits and being attacked or punished by them, it is a real tough process for the discipler to constantly clear up all the hidden fears caused by wrong concepts and beliefs.

Thus the disciple-making process is more than proving them the power of God, but to help them to build a solid faith in Christ as they root themselves in the Word of God. Faith is an essential element for spiritual growth and faith build upon hearing the Word of God.

b)         From Polytheism to Monotheism

For animistic followers, everything seems to connect with spiritual world and the spirits are gods to them who could determine their fate and destination. It is a hard process too to teach them the truth and to help them realize that there is only one true God in the entire universe.

Many followers of Christ in animistic context practice syncretism and they will continue their old ways of consulting mediums and contacting spirits or gods, and still come to worship God in the Sundays. Therefore it is the work of the discipler to make the distinctions clear so that the locals will have a complete break away from their old beliefs and practices. Jesus is not just one of their gods but their One and Only God

c)         From Idolism to Worshipper of Christ  

One of the phenomena of animistic problem is the spirit of idolism. The people under the animistic context might need something for them to see or to touch in order to believe in God. Sometimes the mediums or witches are the very persons they place their hope and trust in. As they come to believe in Christ, they might see pastors or leaders who look after them as ‘spiritual intermediaries” between them and the High God.

Though initially the discipler needs to play the role of “intermediary” to bridge the uncrossable gap in a new believing world, yet he has to ultimately direct the focus of the believers towards Christ and train them to seek God and to relate with God personally. He has to identify the cultural vacancies too and help them to find ways to worship and serve God in their own cultural styles and settings.

4.2       Character Building

True disciples demonstrate the character of Christ and reflect the Kingdom value through their leadership and living. Therefore the content of discipleship should consider the big block of materials training them to live a holy life with a God-fearing character. They need to be transformed with the agenda of Christ and willingly give their lives to serve others and seeking for the welfares of others.

4.3       Leadership Skills

The skills of how we desire them to possess once we are not in the scene of operation need to be considered and a design of imparting leadership skills is thus important. It involves teaching, on-job training, supervision and corrections.

The whole perspective of five-fold ministry has to be in mind when designing the program of leadership training. Though the gifts are given by Jesus to build the Church, it is still the discipler’s role and responsibility in bridging the gap and coaching his disciples to understand and to master the gifts effectively.

            A disciple needs to learn the very basis skills of evangelism, sharing his faith to others, and to share and teach the Bible to individual as well as in a group setting. He needs to possess the skill of a pastor, extending and showing his love and care for people under him. He needs to lead the people with the skills empowered by God and by practical training. He needs to know to exercise his gifts or mobilize the church to exercise their gifts in order to build up the Kingdom of God as a body of Christ.

The disciples need to be trained to make strategies in outreaches and follow up. They need to be prepared for future expansion and development, and it is the discipler’s work to point to the local leaders a larger context and boundary found in the Word of God than their existing churches and locations. Give them the Great Commandment and the Great Commission.

5.         CONCLUSION

Discipleship is a life-long process but with different approaches and levels of involvement a discipler needs to master and devote in the life of individuals or congregations. It is more than leadership training, but it involves life participation and sharing between a discipler and his disciples, a change of value and worldview system in the life of the disciples, a transformed life with holiness and love for God, and a final delegation of authority where the disciple could function in accordance to God’s calling in his life. Therefore the content of discipleship should take in consideration of all the above expected fruits and results.

People's Stories

Oct 2013, LAMENTATIONS 1:1-11 Creative Project: People's Stories

I.          INTRODUCTION

Lamentations 1:1-11 is a portion of poem that laments over the fall of the city of Jerusalem, over the destructed temple buildings and the cessation of its associated spiritual activities, the disintegrated national and social systems with the loss of the Judaic king, and the disrupted daily living because families are broken and separated. It is also a poem laments over the pains, sufferings and humiliation of the remnants in Jerusalem over the defeat, the loss and the exile of the royal family, the priesthood as well as the common people.

I have penned these pictures into four short and simple narrative stories in prose, captivating and demonstrating the imagined physical destructions and those individuals who had suffered under the great distresses and troubles caused by the invasion of the Babylonians, as well as the negative feelings stirred by their enemies who delight and rejoice over their misfortunes. The stories begin with the overall contrasted scenes of the city before and after the invasion of Babylonians, followed by the lament of a widow, the journey of deportation encountered by a young man as well as the king of Judah, and the repentance of a priest.

In my own perception and understanding, story is the most effective way to tell about what have actually happened, leaving the readers an impression of the real conditions with more detailed descriptions of individuals and their related environments presented through the story lines. These stories are like the movie scenes, displaying to the readers the multifaceted emotions and experiences encountered by the people after the ruins of Jerusalem.

If we read Lamentations with some imaginations, having the figures of the book personified in the real life situations, and see them as individuals rather than mere wordings and emotional expressions, the reading will be more interesting and impactful. And this is the very reason I have come up with this creative project by telling stories.

II.        THE PEOPLE’S STORIES IN LAMENTATIONS

1.         A TALE OF THE TWO CITIES

A man is holding the book of Lamentations, reading during the summer heat in his study room. It seems like many things have happened in this city called Jerusalem. As his eyes scroll down the lines, he discovers that he has actually entered into a cinema. Yes! A cinema and a free show giving away to all the comers on today.  With a sense of excitement and curiosity he enters and settles himself on a seat.

There the movie starts. But to his surprises, there are two screens instead of one he usually has come across. The screens are displaying two backgrounds with two story lines. He is busy switching his eyes between the two screens trying his very best to capture the contents and meanings.

The screen on the left is about a city crowded with people. The market is bustled with people buying and selling, and is flooded with street cries. Then comes a caravan, passing through the city gate and riding on the street, heading towards the direction of a big, glamorous, sumptuous and splendour building that looks like a palace.

The caravan carries with it many jewelleries, gold, silvers and produces. The people who are bargaining stop their conversations, and they line up automatically at both sides of the street, and their eyes are tailing after the movement of the caravan. From their whispers, he learns that these are vassals who come from afar to pay their tributes to the great king of Judah. He can literally tell that the people are proud about this occurrence as their facial expression discloses their hearts.

The screen on his right is depicting a desolated and dirty city. The city walls are crumbled, with some grasses sprouting here and there on top of the rubbles. A woman is dressed with her plain clothes, torn, sitting there quietly. Her face is pale and her eyes are filled with loneliness and void. Her eyes search aimlessly as if she is waiting for someone or something to arrive or appear. He can tell that she symbolizes a widow.

A caravan passes her by with tons and tons of local produces and goods deposited in it. Foreign armed soldiers are dragging along some locals who look like prisoners of the war. The later are chained and they walk dispiritedly without even lifting their heads. The widow observes these emotionlessly. Similar scenes are posted repeatedly and it seems that these are the daily encounters frequented by the locals. The evening sun is going down and the city is deadly quiet, resembles to the transfixed widow who sits still under the setting sun.

The man is puzzled at first, and wonders what has happened and how the two cities are related. But eventually he finds some clues. He spots some similarities between these two cities. These are actually not two discrepant cities but a city under two scenarios. He sees the same street, the same city gate, and the same face of the widow. Yet the appearances in these two screens are strikingly contrasted, with one being flourished and prospered and the other deserted and depressed. It is as though the city has blossomed through the spring and withered away in the autumn. With awe and bewilderment, the man gives his sorrowful cry “alas!”    

The laments of this city start with a widow sitting quietly near the city gate, narrating the destruction of a once glorious city of God. When the eyes of the Lord depart His favoured ones, the city is dumped like a widow, grieving over the demise of her beloved husband. It is a reflection for us when we encounter a broken relationship with God. Joy flees and sorrow creeps in as if we are spiritually widowed.

2.         THE TEARS OF A WIDOW

The widow sits still. Day by day she has been wailing near the city gate, until she is exhausted physically and mentally and cries no more. Usually there are some passers-by who   will stop and gaze at her for a while, but she pays them no attention as her heart is troubled deeply. At night, she will be there also. In the silence of the nights, her solitary soul is awakened by those painful memories, as she recalls the moment of the departures of her beloved husband and son.

Vividly she still can remember how her husband was killed and collapsed with blood sprinkled around and how her son was forcefully taken away by the Babylonian soldiers. The moaning and groaning of her dying husband and the screaming of her child, coupled by her yelling are sombrely piercing through the thick darkness and the sky.

Her house has been burnt down in a fire set by the Babylonians. She is uncertain who could have been the culprit since the number of people rushing into her house is overwhelming. But she captures the look in the eyes of the soldier who has pierced her husband with a spear. His eyes are so cruel and violent, as if there are some unresolved deep hatred existed between him and her husband. She huddles with her son hiding in a corner, and she covers his mouth to prevent him from shouting aloud seeing the death of his father. But they are discovered somehow, and the son is taken alive before her very eyes.

She chases after her son and the soldier who has taken him away. A cavalry stops her, grasping hold of her clothes and tore apart violently. She is astonished and she faints. When she wakes up, it is as though the city is swept over by a hurricane and is emptied. Rubbish is everywhere and the street is full with leaves flying around in the air. What an isolation she feels she is in! Her legs are swollen and she tries her best to stand up, bearing the great pains in her body. When she looks to the place where her house is located, she is shocked to find that it is turned into ashes! Dust! Ashes! And a half-naked widow starts wailing on the street!

She has lost her husband, and has no idea where her son could have been taken to. She tries to look for friends in the neighbourhood. But they refuse to take her in. They see her as someone unwanted, deserted, dirtied and an extra burden in their difficult moments. She is rejected again and again, by those she considers as good friends to share life with.

Since then, with her dishevelled hair and clothes she resides herself near the city gate, sitting alone on top of the rubbles. She is without hope. Her house is burnt, her family is disintegrated, and she finds nowhere even to get her basic food. She wonders in her heart. How long! How long can she survive? How long she will be willing to live on as such?

Judah is the troubled widow, who is humiliated by her enemies, and further rejected by her alliances. She has lost her providence, and is deprived of all her happiness and social rights. She is alone, without help, without pity, without hope and without destiny.

3.         THE DISPERSED SONS OF JUDAH

  

It is such a tragedy for him, to see before his very eyes the fall of his father.

Before he departs from the city of Jerusalem, he manages to have a last glance on his homeland. He witnesses the burning flame consuming his own house. When he is roused by the fact that his mother could have remained in the house, he turns instinctively trying to run back to his house. But his movement is constrained by the chain put on him, and he hurts himself while he tries to break away from the chain. A soldier approaches him, lashes on his back giving him a warning, and he is almost blackout because of the severe pains imposed by the lashes. So he staggers, with blood exuding over his hands, feet and body, towards a place unknown.

The cavalcade stops near a countryside. The soldiers eat their food and he is given a loaf of bread to feed his emptied stomach. They throw the bread to him, and it falls on the ground. He takes it up and eats the dirtied bread, as though it is the best food in the world. While he is eating, he hears someone groaning. He looks around and sees a blinded man. His eyes are still bleeding. Like a trapped and wounded animal, the man is roaring in pains.

Yet there is something special about this man. He is different from others, not because of his blindness, but because of the royal robe he wears. The soldiers are there giggling, and he can literally hear them calling the man in Aramaic language, the King of Judah! He opens his eyes widely, amazed. This man is none other than Hezekiah, my king! Now he discovers that he is deported alongside with King Hezekiah. No, he is no more the King. He is now a prisoner, a captive as poor and as lowly as any of his common people of Judah.

He cannot recount how many days they have travelled, until a huge and magnificent building appears in his sight. This is the city of Babylon! The huge entrance with fortified gates has attracted his whole attention. He has never seen such a monumental scale of buildings in Judah. Never in his lifetime in Judah has he ever been exposed to such architectural design though he is always proud of the temple and the palace in Jerusalem! How sad it is for Hezekiah! For he cannot see with his own eyes the majestic and grandeur of the Babylonian city!

Upon arriving at the city of Babylon, Hezekiah is taken away from their midst. Since then he never sees his Judahite king. He goes through a few rounds of interrogations and they allocate him with a group of people from Judah. Some he knows by face but most he does not recognize. He is a well-educated young man and is thus retained in the city of Babylon while some of the people are taken to other places for hard labour.

For the first night officially settles himself in the foreign land of Babylon, he is insomnia. He paces back and forth under the starry sky missing his homeland. It is like a nightmare, which he wakes up to discover himself uprooted and displaced. Like a dandelion, he cannot help but is directed by a wind of disaster. Babylon would never be his homeland but he guesses this will be the place where he is going to spend his entire life.  

Right there, under the starry sky, as though going into a trance, he hears the laments of the people of Jerusalem and the exiles in Babylon, swarming from all sides singing and mourning over the fall of their nation.   

4.         THE SHOFAR BLOWN IN ZION

            He stands before the destroyed temple with tears welling up in his eyes.

There have been about more than four months since the city is overtaken and the destructions have happened. During these four months, he climbs up to Mount Moriah as frequent as he used to be when he was carrying out his priesthood duty. He will then stare down half way to the peak, and overwhelmed by a sense of loss and despair seeing the ruins of the palace.

Both the temple and the palace are burnt after the siege, with Babylonian soldiers running mad and cheering to put all the big buildings in the city on fire. One cannot but keep on bewailing to see the wreckages of the palace, the debris of the city and the spoiled temple. There is always an unbearable smell of dead floating in the air.

The scene goes back to the day the city is conquered. He is in the midst of performing his priesthood duty and in a rush and fear he runs out of the temple upon hearing the outburst of great cries over the entire city. When he hurries down the staircases, he sees pillars of fire everywhere in the site of the king’s palace. The fire has consumed their pride as a nation and as a priesthood of God.

This morning, he gets up early to buy his breakfast. He has to queue up for long hours before he can get some buns for the family. The price is extremely high and every time he pays for the food, it is as though the wounds in his mind and heart are worsened. After buying the buns, he walks near to the city gate, and there he stuffs a bun into the dirty hand of the widow. She looks at him with a plain and emotionless facial expression. He wonders if she is in her right mind, just as he is questioning his own soundness. She is there day and night sitting near the city gate, while he is a regular visitor of a ruined temple.

In an unexplained manner, he is drawn compassionately towards the widow. He used to be so indifferent towards his surroundings, and would not even spend time greeting people on his way to his duty. But the city is almost vacant after the ruins and meeting someone now mean a big business to him.

After the destruction of the temple, he is literally jobless. Without wearing the priesthood robe, he has lost his sense of identity. Many are tending the vineyards for the Babylonian government, but he just cannot flow naturally with the current trend. He is embarrassed to know that he cannot even hold a hoe properly, not to mention to help out the harvest of the fruits. He is also without any business knowledge and experience for him to enter a trade. How will be his livelihood going to be supported for long term is a good question for him and the family to ponder, yet he knows no appropriate answer.

He knows that today is the Trumpet Day, a day which used to be one of the busiest in his working schedule. He used to murmur with the heavy workloads given to him. But now he is too slack to be alive. His wife has been nagging him. She suffers from disorder after the traumatic experience of the war, and has been pestering him days and nights, fearing without proper and solid reasons. Therefore he will prefer to be alone here, facing the ruins, and recalling all the past good memories in his priesthood days.

The weather on the mountain has somehow become cooler and the mountains are still resting soundly in the mist. He takes out his shofar, and with all his strength he blows a long blast, airing towards the Mount Zion. The sound seems to hit those cliffs, and he hears voices resounding and echoing in his ears, like those fears, angers, disappointments, sorrow, sadness, pains and suffering roars of the people bursting out in the city of Jerusalem.

Then all is silent. He falls on his knees and weeps uncontrollably and bitterly. For the very first time, he comes to realize that, though he has been a priest standing before the altar day and night, he has never ever been so mournful and so sorrowful lamenting over his own sins and the sins of his forefather and his nation.      

III.       THE END

The man closes the book. The end is nothing but sadness and pains. There is no solution offered for the city as a whole, as well as the widow, the exiled young man, the king and the priest. They are facing their tomorrow without a proper answer, without a rightful hope, and without a sure destination. With his depressed spirit, he exclaims another “alas!” and leaves his study room with the book laid quietly there under the summer heat.