A Framework for Making Disciples | Tirza Hartono

We are storied creatures, and I’d argue that is probably why the Bible is 70% narrative flow and not just principles. Therefore, our understanding of the Story that formed us is so crucial. There are hundreds or thousands of stories that are presented to us daily. One night I was finishing my small group discussion, and my housemates wanted to watch a movie together. The movie was great. It was about this excellent lawyer who’s doing a very noble thing to defend those that are wrongly condemned, he was fighting injustice. At the end, many were liberated through his heroic act. Although this story is astonishing, it emphasises his human effort in what he believes. I am not looking at it from a Christian who wants all the story to be Biblical basis, but with this example my point is that it’s a difficult task if we want to immerse ourselves with God's Story, because there are a ton of other alternatives out there. This movie taught us that we can do great things, but it can be done in such a determinative and prideful way rather than as a life surrendered to Him. This is one of the examples of how easy it is for us to listen to so many different stories that can stray us away from God’s Story.

God’s Story is telling us a different set of beliefs. His unfailing grace is a very real thing that we can experience in our lives, no matter how good or bad we are at performing with our choices. We, as humans, will fail because of our limitations. We can achieve great things, but we can also disappoint others. If we immerse ourselves with the story of the world, we will miss the whole point of living our life with God. In a world full of egocentric values, it is easy to get lost in our motions rather than letting God's Story direct us.

“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.”

This quote from ‘you are what you love’ from Jamie Smith is something that stood out for me whenever I am thinking about us as storied creatures. Stories can raise our hope, or it can break our hearts. Stories will guide us in our lives. It is true that Christian spirituality lives from the end of the story, thinks from the end of the story, prays from the end of the story; which is our eternal hope in Christ.

After reading and reflecting on some of the content suggested below, explain in what ways does understanding God as Trinity—three persons and yet one God—make a difference for a Christian view of the world and the foundational relational reality that holds all things together?

I often worry about explaining the Trinity, as our human concept of ‘God’ has been reduced to the number or quantity of one. To put it plainly, the theology behind the truth of the Trinity is a lifetime of learning as a human being, which makes it a mystery. Mystery meaning that it is high for reverence but low for accuracy. As Michael Reeves wrote in 'Delighting in the Trinity’, this triune God has revealed Himself to us and because of it we can understand the Trinity.

It's a question that we will wrestle with as we have a stronger worldview of 'The One'. The best one out of the school, the first one that went to the moon, and so on. Life has tricked us into a competition field rather than shaping us to be a selfless loving person. Whoever accomplished more, or who achieved it first, then that's the winner. But the God that we know isn't like that and in no way is our God is in competition with any other gods. He created us out of love, from a place of relationship. He didn't create us because He needs us, or out of dissatisfaction. This truth of the Trinity is that which makes sense in the Bible, it brings clarity to the principles we draw out from it, and it shows His character throughout what He did in history. Personally, more importantly in my own life experiences with Him is that this Trinity God is the One who has taught me how to love because of knowing His love.

What struck me the most about the Trinity has always been that God is loving. He can't be just oneself from the beginning, because if there’s no other before us, God needed to learn how to love, rather than that He is love and He is perfect in unity. Therefore, if God the Trinity is love, we need to experience that love. We can't fully know the Trinity if we only know the Trinity merely from our knowledge. We need to embrace the Trinity to experience Him. We can know of a God who forgives, but we won't know it fully until we experience His forgiveness. Knowing the love of God is the very thing that makes us loving.

As humans try to live a life with God, we can encounter a lot of shame because of the fallen world we are living in as broken humans. From Curt Thompson's book, he wrote that "It is tempting to hope that we can eliminate shame from our relational diet, it is futile to wish for this.” The ‘relational diet’ is an important point to focus on. There are so many responses and reactions from people that can make us fall into the pit of shame, again and again, even though we’re doing the right things. We live in a broken world and interacting with broken people, and we are experiencing brokenness in a lot of relationships. As a relational being that longs for connections, this is a big thing that can break ourselves and our relationships.

Learning about shame has allowed me to realise more of shame and the role of it in my life, that it can take a grip of me so easily in so many areas. It can cripple me from the things in my life that God has given me the courage and freedom in. I have been wrestling in how I am responding to shame, not just in the right way of responding to it, but in a way that truth should be planted so deeply in my heart. It is a discipleship process. Many of us can shield and hide ourself with our own fig leaves. It can be our drive to perform well, to do things well and never fail or disappoint, but that is not how life goes usually. We are limited and broken, and our giftings aren’t there to just cover things up. We need to accept our limitations and working through our brokenness because we’re not superhumans, and this is part of our glory. Julie Canlis said that “The limitations that are part of us being ’not-God’ were intended to keep us close and in relationship with God… Limitation was written into their (Adam and Eve) perfection, because limitation put them in a proper relationship with the Creator.”

Our original vocation is to be God's image-bearers with the limitations that He put in our lives. We need to know our limit and our brokenness, as much as we know about our giftings. We need to know ourself in the fullness of it, with God’s unending grace in our lives which can guide us to be who He really made us to be. This is where the discipleship process takes place. To know ourself fully, we need to make intentional actions to be vulnerable. To be known is to be fully loved. It all goes back to the story of Adam and Eve, that they were both naked and they felt no shame (Genesis 2:25). As Curt Thompson said, "The vulnerability of nakedness is the antithesis of shame."

While we always put a strong emphasis on Jesus’ death and resurrection, that is not the whole point of the Gospel. In fact, it is true that the justification act Jesus did is not what the Gospel writers wanted the books to be all about. It is all about God becoming King, and His resurrection from the dead was the confirming piece that He really is the King for a Kingdom that will never end! If we tracked back to the history of Israel, it was a very significant moment when Jesus came to earth as a promised King, the Messiah that Israel has been longing for! They have longed for the Messiah to come, and His birth was an answer of many prayers. I can't imagine Mary wondering all along while Jesus grew up, knowing that the angel appeared to her and told her that her son “will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.” The Bible said in Luke 2:51 that Mary treasured all these things in her heart. 

I will suspect that all those years where it is not written in the Bible is the growing years of Him knowing His identity and deepening His intimacy with the Father. It goes back again to that story from Luke 2:41-52, the only story of Jesus before He entered into His ministry years. Based on His answer in verse 49, we can see Jesus’ intimate relationship with the Father. Jesus’ life before his ministry years isn’t written as much, and if the point of our redemption is only through His atonement, then why does He need to go through life? This unrevealed part of His life shows me so much of His humanity that is, I assumed, just ordinary. As Julie Canlis said "God enters into creation and engages with us there on creation's terms.” To know and understand His daily life that was ordinary is to understand humanity. He didn't just come to save the world,” but Julie Canlis argues that His mission was "... to grab hold of us from within, heal us, re-create us, and reorient us back to the Father." 

I grew up with a lot of understanding about Jesus’ divinity, but to learn about Jesus’ humanity is something fairly new to me. His life is to show us the way of life. He showed us how to live a life with the Father. Throughout His life, Jesus was so dependant on God. John 6:38 was written with the reason why Jesus came down to earth: "For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me.” In our process of becoming Christ’s disciples, our will is to do His will too. 

But that doesn't come as easy. "And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man.” In this verse, the Greek verb here is about Him beating His way forward by blows. Jesus needed to learn how to obey, as stated in Hebrew 5:8. This means that "All of life was important to Jesus because all of life is important to God," as Trent put it in Jesus Journey. The same way goes for us, as we imitate His life. To be His disciple is to learn obedience to His ways and His will. It takes practice and time to do it over and over again. 

But Jesus doesn't want us to just copy Him. NT Wright wrote that "Jesus was more like someone who had just invented an entirely new musical instrument, had written some stunning music for it, and was now “teaching” people to play the new music on the new instrument. Jesus was announcing that a whole new world was being born and he was “teaching” people how to live within that whole new world." To be like Him is to have a personal relationship with the Trinity! But we can't do it if we only see the story of Jesus as a set of teaching only. We need to see it as a guide for life to live in the presence of God. In Dwell, Barry Jones said "The life we were created for and will one day experience in its fullness - is life lived in the presence of God.” How much do I actually pay attention to God in my ordinary life?

To learn about the Kingship of Jesus, we need to learn more about the history of Israel. At that time, Jesus wasn't the only one claiming to be the Messiah. He would have learned that His birth was a miracle, from the stories He heard from His family and neighbours around. As a Jewish man, He would have needed to learn about this God of Israel and His promises throughout the prophets, that a Messiah is coming.

One interesting story of how Jesus claimed Himself to be the Messiah was in Mark 8:27-33. Jesus asked the disciples about who people say He is. They said that people said that He is one of the prophets. Jesus then asked what they think about Him, and Peter spoke up and said that Jesus is the Messiah, and they were warned to not tell anyone about Him. Jesus then taught them that He will be killed and then raised after three days. Peter took Him aside and scolded Him, but Jesus rebuked him, saying that "You're thinking human thoughts, not God thoughts." This story explained so much about the disciples' view of Jesus - they didn't fully get it, at all. The picture of a king, especially the Messiah, was supposed to be conquering and definitely not picturing him to be killed. The doubt continues after Jesus' death, just as NT Wright wrote in 'How God Became King' from Luke 24, "Even Jesus’s closest followers, however, cannot begin to see in the strange events of his arrest, trial, and death any kind of fulfilment. They had been living in the currently prevailing version of the Jewish story, and it certainly wasn’t supposed to end with the violent death of God’s anointed. “We were hoping,” say the two on the road to Emmaus, “that he was going to redeem Israel!” (24:21)."

We may have the wrong idea of what a King should be like, or what a Kingdom should look like. But Jesus wasn’t wavered by disbelief or misconception. He knew who He was because His self-identification comes from the Father, years before His ministry started. It was so puzzling for the disciples about Jesus’ death, but when Jesus conquered death, they knew that He is King, forever. No more doubts, He is the promise to fulfil and to rescue the world. He is the One that Isaiah prophesied about, and as NT Wright said that He is the climax of Israel's story.

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After reading and reflecting on some of the content suggested below, unpack 2 new perspectives that have deepened your understanding of the death, atonement, and resurrection of Jesus and their implications in discipleship.

I’ve had many instances in evangelism times to reflect about my heart’s motives. While we celebrate so much when we see people committing their lives to Jesus, we don’t acknowledge it as much when we have a great conversation with people about God. Sadly, this pattern has shaped me that our goal in evangelism is to see Salvation happen. It might have come from our view that if people got saved, they will go to heaven and that's what we all want. I've seen this approach in many evangelism campaigns. But I'd argue that this is not the intended work of the Cross through Christ. My understanding began to grow as I am learning about what Jesus did at the cross, and I began to realise that His work is to renew us. It is about letting God reshape us into a new creation. In an interview with Dallas Willard, Gary Moon summed it up nicely that “…we can get saved without this necessarily meaning that an active agent of change is in our lives - without daily participating in a transforming friendship with the Trinity. We can become “Christians” without becoming disciples / apprentices.” Our Salvation isn’t just about eternal life with God in heaven, but it is about living with God here and now on earth! 

Another understanding that I recently realised was that the death and resurrection of Jesus do not impose a necessity, but rather they open a possibility. He has given us a purpose. And our purpose isn’t just about getting to the moral standard that God has for us. NT Wright stated this in his brilliant talk that "What many people hear about the Gospel is that, God is standing over with His big stick, here’s the moral challenge... Then somebody else stands in our place and takes the wrath, and it happens to be God’s own son... This is a pagan picture of a bullying God.” He then continues, "What does it mean that the Messiah died on the cross for our sins according to the scriptures? We have to see it in this great arch of the Bible. Israel was called to be God’s great people to rescue the world but who themselves in need of rescue. God called humans to be His means of making this world fruitful and flourishing. Adam and Eve were not called in order to have a moral test to see whether they could leave Eden and then go to heaven instead. God said: get on with the job in the garden, be fruitful and multiply, look after my world… It’s about bearing the image of God.” If our goal to be followers of Christ is to just to get to heaven, what a shallow life we would live in! We must view our salvation as the beginning of a life with God. The cross and His resurrection is not only about setting our morals right, but it has made a way for us to live with the Trinity right now.  

Heaven is our future, and how we think about heaven will determine our approach to how we live out our lives. Sky Jethani argues that “What we think about tomorrow matters because our vision of the future is what determines how we understand the present. In a real sense, today is defined by tomorrow. How we interpret our present suffering, our work, our purpose, even our relationships are defined by how we think about what lies ahead.” How do we view eschatology (the final destiny) will affect the way we do missions. One eschatology view that is embedded in my life is the evacuation theory, which is huge in all of our Christian beliefs. It views heaven as an escape path rather than a hopeful future. If we all will leave the earth one day to go to heaven, then why do we need to work so hard on earth? His calling for us to cultivate order, beauty and abundance, then, would not make sense. Tim Mackie made a statement that the key themes of the story of the Bible is the view that heaven and earth are completely overlapping in reality, that in Revelation 21 it says that heaven is coming here - God is coming here! Our understanding of how the story ends has a huge implication on how we live and how we think about what Jesus wants us to do today as His followers.

There are a few eschatology postures that Beth Felker Jones presented. While we need to be aware of God’s already-present kingdom as the reality of God’s transforming grace, the over-realised eschatology is one that forfeits future hope, it claims that the present is all that God has in store for us, in all of its pain. It can drain life of meaning and hope. Looking into this one mindset of over-realised eschatology, the implications of this belief are huge. We can be in a posture of just believing that whatever happens, it happens and nothing can change this world. But Paul, "knowing that the fullness of hope is yet to come, thus practices an eschatological reservation, acting in the knowledge that something is always reserved for the not-yet. The eschatological reservation trains us a posture of present humility. It is a life full of good work and good rest, in both humility and confidence."

With the view that ‘we are not there yet’, that there is still so much more to be done but also putting our hope in the future, this is where our role as His image-bearers comes into the story. As the image-bearers, we are ‘doing things’ not just for ourselves, but for God’s-given-world. That is where we need to put ourselves to be His disciples because we have not arrived yet, and we need to tell the world about His good news.

As humans, we have a gap between what we desire and what we’re actually doing. What we spend our time the most on is what we love. Let’s say it is Jesus, which we all would agree if we are His followers. But does that mean that we all need to live in monastaries? I’d argue that is not what God wants. But how can we spend our time with Jesus, in our over-busy life schedule that demands us to be attentive with other things than to be with Jesus? It is more than just an hour of quiet time in the morning or our Sunday services. Ultimately, we need to recalibrate our hearts. John Mark Comer said that “Attention is the beginning of devotion.” And that “what you give your attention to is the person you become." We can’t not worship, God has made us to be worshippers. The question is what do you worship? 

But to train our attentiveness, we need a set of habits because there is no formation without repetition. Your love is recruited by practices and rhythm and rituals that you give yourself over to. It can't be just about adding to our knowledge about God. We are not just a thinking being. As scriptures has said, we need to guard our heart above all else because everything we do flows from it (Proverbs 4:23). But to recalibrate our heart, it requires more than just a new idea or knowledge. It's about our mind and body and how to engage with the Creator of the universe with our whole being. If formation requires repetition, then I'd argue that one of the best ways to discipline ourselves is to create new habits. 

Over the course of learning about different practices, I have also learned that as I was doing Spiritual Practices, my hunger for God and His presence grew. The more I immersed myself within His presence, the more I wanted to know Him. James Smith said that "Discipleship, we might say, is a way to curate your heart, to be attentive to and intentional about what you love. So discipleship is more a matter of hungering and thirsting than of knowing and believing." 

As I explored different spiritual practices, there are a few practices that are transformative for me. One of them is the ancient practice of taking a Sabbath. It has been a journey for me to finally take a Sabbath every week, or trying to understand how to rest. In this age of constant busyness and a demand to be available for others almost at all times, taking a day to rest can shift our priority back to our relationship with God. In my experience, I can say that sometimes we glorify our ability to stay busy. Often times when I have nothing to do, I can become restless. Productivity had become an idol in my life without me noticing it. Putting this day of rest in my week is like having a reset button. It has helped me to recognise that I am a finite creature and my body has a limit and that it is okay to not work for a day. The world is doing just fine with me pausing and it’s a reminder that He is God, not me. As I’m practicing the Sabbath, it has helped to show me where my heart is at and what I desire to be viewed as a person. As John Mark Comer said “The Jesus tradition would offer this: human desire is infinite because we were made to live with God forever in His world and nothing less will ever satisfy us, so our only hope is to put desire back in its proper place on God. And to put all our other desires in their proper place below God. Not to detach from all desire…” Through this practice, we are putting our desires into its proper place. 

Another practice that I found helpful was a personal practice that Justin Earley introduced in ‘The Common Rule’ book, called the 'kneeling prayer'. What I find helpful from this practice is the interruption throughout my day to refocus in God’s presence. In the book, Justin suggested for a kneeling prayer 3 times a day, which is in the morning as soon as you get up, in the afternoon, and then in the evening before bedtime. Setting aside time to pray in the afternoon is something new for me. I can go through my day focused on what needs to get done, but the afternoon prayer has helped me to stop and recognise that God is working with me; I am not just on my own. It helps me to recenter and to not forget why I am doing what I do. "Regular, carefully placed prayer is one of the keystone habits of spiritual formation, and is the beginning of building the trellis of habit," written by Justin. These two practices are to form our habit to rest in God in a world that is full of self-gratification towards our own self. 

Practices are a means to create habits with our mind and body. As Christians, we have sets of Spiritual Disciplines that people have practised from long ago. These practices are commitments that people will do in order to realign themselves with God and others. The goal of practices isn't for us to be doing them perfectly, but to do it repetitively so that it form ourselves to be present with God and others. It is not for us to tick the boxes as we humans often see tasks, but to reorient us to God's ways. Liam explained that "The purpose of the practices is not to be great doing spiritual practices. They are to make space to encounter God in a fresh way, in faithful ways. In a way that will help us to remember who we are and the story that we are in, and the God that we are invited to be in a relationship with." 

The range of the practices are varied, and most of them are to train our attentiveness towards God, others, and eventually towards ourselves too. To be aware is the beginning of the journey to relearn how to live and love. Justin said in his book that "… while the house of my life was decorated with Christian content, the architecture of my habits was just like everyone else’s.” Our habits formed us more than we form them; they form our hearts. We do them over and over without even thinking about them and it shapes our world effortlessly. The spiritual practices offer us an interruption over our seemingly effortless habits. In order to align ourself with God in a world full of competing messages, we need to take the time to be aware of God’s presence through these practices. 

Practices aren't just easy things to do, instead it requires us to be intentional in our pursuit of life. John Mark said that "Your life is the by-product of your lifestyle. By life I mean your experience for the human condition, and by lifestyle I mean the rhythms and routines that make up your day-to-day existence." Our habits are so significant in directing us to the life God has for us. 

After reading and reflecting on some of the content suggested below, What about a Rule Of Life is helpful when approaching disciple-making? What might the pitfalls be of this approach?

Rule of Life is an ancient practice that has been around from the monastic movement. The purpose of this is to help us to have schedule and rhythm to give space for God and others in our busy world, and the goal is to love God and to love others. We can be so easily distracted with many things in our lives and as believers, most of them are not bad things. Through Rule of Life, we can set our priorities to be aligned with our values. It will also help us to form a set of habits in our lives. Many people said that Rule of Life is like a trellis. John Mark Comer said that "If a vine doesn't have a trellis, it will die. And if your life with Jesus doesn't have some kind of structure to facilitate health and growth, it will wither away." We need a trellis to abide; it is there to create a space for us to grow and bear fruit. This set of schedule and rhythm is helpful for us to recognise the growth that God wants to bring into our lives. 

There is no right or wrong in making this set of rule. It is very flexible and you need to design it on your own, for however it will fit you. The danger could be that we just stick to it too much that we can become legalistic about it. As John Mark Comer said, "And like all habits, they are a means to an end. This is where well-meaning religious people (like myself) go wrong. When the spiritual disciplines (Bible reading, prayer, Sabbath, and so on) become an end in and of themselves, you've arrived at legalism. Therein lies death, not life." In different seasons it will look different, and adjustments are encouraged to help you grow in that season. While creating a rule of life, we can easily compare it with others and that is dangerous. For each of us, God created us uniquely in our capacity. The point is for each of us to make our own boundaries, in an order that allows us to connect more with God and others. 

Another danger, from what I find from myself, is that I can be overachieving in my approach to this Rule of Life. As a perfectionist, I tend to go with putting too much on, so I can be perfect sooner, which is just silly. In some ways, I see the fruit more important than the practices to be in God’s presence. While it takes time to bear fruit and a lot of practices, I’ve realised that practices alone won’t transform us. The Rule of Life can help us to grow, but ultimately it is God's presence that needs to meet us and transform us. This set of rules is our commitment to make space for Him to meet us.

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After reading and reflecting on some of the content suggested below, what are three realities that are external to a person that you would encourage them to take into account as they discern calling?

One of the dangers I occasionally find myself in is how I view my work. As a full-time missionary, of course, I am doing an important job. The danger is when I think my work is more important than the people who are not in my field. This can reflect in many areas, but one thing I noticed is whenever I am in need of a financial provision, as we are called to be volunteers. I can approach people with this mindset that they have to give towards these noble projects! But in all reality, they don’t have to do that. It reflects the way I communicate. Often times I am asking if this is honouring God and giving the right perspective of what He wants to do. Because, as we look at our worldview, we are exalting those that work for others’ welfare. I want others to give towards God’s work because they feel lead to do so. Ultimately, I am depending on God and not others. 

Culturally, I grew up knowing that my life is not just about myself. It’s not just about being comfortable with myself, but that I have the unspoken expectation to take care of my family as well. It also could mean taking care of my extended family as well. As I look at this, I need to be careful to not be burdened too much. God’s call for me still needs to be the highest one above this cultural assumption. This is another external reality I need to be aware of when I discern about my calling. 

Many of us grew up in a society that expects us to be someone successful. While I find that it is good to have a good expectation of ourselves, one thing that is more definitive for me over the years is how I define success. As I commit my life to Christ and His leading, I find that my success should be defined by my walk with God and obedience towards His. It’s not about how much money I get, what I’ve accomplished so far, how many countries I travelled to in a year, what is my position in my workplace, and the list goes on. When I think of Jesus, if we measured His life with our ’normal standard’ of success, He is not quite there - being killed and hated by many is definitely not our normal definition for success. But if we believe in a God that is full of love, and knowing that Jesus’ purpose is to redeem us, then we will say that His life was very successful. Liam said that "In Jesus, you see someone whose vocation is so deep inside of Him. His calling is in no way in competition with his identity.” We need to know deeply about who we are and who God is because the world always tells us another story of what success should look like.

Barry Jones quoted, "My temperament, my personality, my abilities, and my interests and passions all say something about who I was called to be, not simply who I am. If I really believe that I was created by God and invited to find my place in his kingdom, I have to take seriously what God had already revealed about who I am.” There are a few aspects of our own self that we need to take as a consideration as we are looking at our vocational calling. One big thing we want to consider is our capacity, which involves our personality and just the way God created us to be. I have been thinking about our capacity as people, we are just so different in our ways of handling things. We can look at people in leadership and think, “ wow, they are so great with what they do and still are okay with all the pressures.” What we often don’t realise is that growth takes time. Our growth doesn’t come in an instant. It doesn’t come just when we passed this test or did that well. We can grow in our capacity but we can’t rush the process. And we need to remind ourselves that no one can do everything so perfectly. Could it be that our comparison is making us believe in the lies of  perfection? We need to find our true self that is grounded in our fellowship with the Father.

Our interest can lead us into the things that we are passionate about. We might be aware of what it is, and this is another gifting God has given us. We enjoy our time doing it or talking about it. We might have the talent to do it well, or we don't mind to work hard to learn the skills. It is always so unique, but at the same time giving you a collective of people that you feel belong and can commune with. God has given us the passion, and I’d suggest that He might want us to use it in our lives with God for the sake of the world.

All of these aspects of our self need to be aligned with our relationship with God. It can be a great hindrance if we hold on to it too tightly. As we discover our inner self, we need to always put it at the foot of the cross, that Jesus has the final say. He has created us to be who we are, but we also want to realise that there is so much growth we can experience, into the greater things that He has for us. And that growth can't be just doing it with our self, we need to be with God and others around us.

In looking at Jesus’ life, He knew Himself very well. Our calling often times can be a place where we put our identity in. Our drives in life often are related to our purpose or who we want to become. Our calling is more than just what we’re doing or what we’ve accomplished. Jesus knew Himself very well, but it’s not just from what He had done. He has a very intimate relationship with the Father and that it is unnegotiable to not have a day without the Father. It is unnegotiable for Him to do things without the Father speaking to Him (John 5:19). Therefore, by looking at the three Puritan callings, it can put a nice framework for us to discern our vocation.

First of all, we all have the same highest calling which is our fellowship with the Father. This is the place where we draw our identity from. He knows what His highest calling is, which is to be with the Father and having fellowship with Him because that is where His identity is from. As Liam said that “First and foremost, we are called to Someone.” As we live with one another, we also have our common calling. This common calling has grounded us to be in a place to honour and love each other. Lastly, we all have our specific calling. Often times, this can steal the highest calling in our lives. We can be obsessive over what we do and what title we have, because often times, this is the one that the world praises. I've encountered many people, mostly young ones, who have stressed so much about their specific calling rather than their fellowship with God. If we look out to the world that doesn't have a relationship with God, I'd say they put so much of their identity in their position.

Just imagine if Jesus puts His specific calling above His highest calling to be with the Father, that wouldn’t go well. As a person who works in a creative industry, I can see that I can put so much of my identity in the things I produce, and when people don't like it or give their feedback it can be so crushing. We need to put our identity in the right place. "Identity is never simply a creation. It is always a discovery. True identity is always a gift of God,” through this quote from David Benner, we need to discover our identity, and to discover it, we need to have fellowship with the Creator. Therefore, in our discipleship process, we want to give serious attention to the highest calling and the common calling. 'How's my relationship with God' should be the most important question. As we do that, we will live out our specific calling effortlessly.

He is the Creator, and I am not. After following God for some time, one thing I've come to realise is that that my calling is very much embedded with whom God has created me to be. To discover my calling, I need to discover myself, and that is one big key point. God created me uniquely from anybody else, and with the different elements of who I am, He has given me a particular calling. I discovered my calling through His faithful leading and my continuous 'yes' to Him, even in such random moments. All of those pieces of little 'yes' can become a big puzzle that is actually interconnecting. Living with God isn't just a one time 'yes', but it's a continuous surrender towards His will, to become the person we are meant to be. In discipleship process, I love how Maureen said that "the younger you are, you need to be engaging with people in activities that are forming who you are is more important than what you're doing. Get them to pay attention to set themselves in a position to what is truly forming me. God is more interested to form your character, value systems, foundations. And as you continue to mature and grow and take on more authority, your assignment gets a bit more specific." With His faithful leading, we can unpack the passion we have known before or some unknown ones. I believe that God wants us to enjoy our lives, as well as for us to give our best self in the vocations He has given us. 

When it comes to finding your own vocational calling, obviously after you feel God is speaking to you about a particular one, then it is good to ask yourself a lot of hard questions. In seasons of life, you might have assignments to do different things. And the nature of assignments is seasonal. Sometimes, it doesn’t really fit with you who are and you might feel really stretched. But it can be a growing season that teaches you a whole lot of lessons. Those elements are very important as well. But, when we think about our calling, it will be something that you do for a very long period of time. It’s bigger than just considering what your next step will be. It requires a bigger commitment from us, and you don't want to just take it lightly. In answering to our vocation, it also means that there are hundreds of 'no's that we need to give as well. Therefore, such a decision will take time to brew and to mature. You will face different obstacles that will be hard and trials that aren't easy, and those seasons will grow us in our dependency on God. All of life is for us to discover who He has made us to be. It is for God's glory rather than ours.