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A Year of Pruning and Fruitfulness: Reflecting on 2024

6 January 2025 blogpastor Leave a comment

This has been a satisfying and exciting year for me. If you had asked me earlier in the year, I would not have said so. Upon reflection, I see patterns that give meaning and joy to my journey.

I read my journal leisurely, covering a quarter each time. After reading, I took notes of repetitions, prayers, desires, laments, and anything that stayed on my mind. I noted my reactions, feelings, gratitude, and pain points. After collating these notes, I prayerfully reflected and saw two main themes of what God did in my life in 2024: pruning and fruitfulness. “…every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit” (John 15:2 ESV).

Trials and triumphs

This year has been personally trying for both my wife and me. My wife was in the hospital for 51 days due to a bacterial infection that affected her spine. It required several months of antibiotics and a spine operation for her to be completely well and able to resume her active life. God’s grace was upon us, and the verse that comforted me during my wife’s illness was fulfilled. “When you pass through the waters I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you. When you walk through fire you shall not be burned and the flame shall not consume you” (Isaiah 43:2 ESV). It meant that my wife would go through this difficult trial but would not be harmed and would come out fine. Praise the Lord, that was exactly what happened.

In the third quarter, I experienced several weeks of pain in my right back shoulder and arms. It was so bad in the first few days that I found it difficult to sleep. An X-ray indicated some narrowing of C3, and C4 causing nerve pains. I was given muscle relaxants, plasters, and referrals to a physiotherapist and spine specialist. The stages of my healing went from intense pain to annoying pain to irritation pain to finally vanished pain.

Besides the medicine, there was a spiritual aspect to the healing. “This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles” (Psalm 34:6). This poor man also asked many pastor friends and church friends to pray for him. The Lord also gave me a verse that brought me to my knees in contrition. “Before I was afflicted, I went astray, but now I keep your word” (Psalm 119:67). It was a time when the Lord opened my eyes to my sinfulness and poverty. I experienced a mini-revival: “The instructions of the Lord are perfect, reviving the soul” (Psalm 19:7). By the time of my physiotherapy appointment, I was completely pain-free and decided to skip the specialist appointment.

The pruning yielded more fruit. The Lord God is the gardener, and he prunes the branch that bears fruit so that it bears more fruit. My soul was stretched, stitched, healed, and revived. Even amid painful trials, God was present, and I saw his providence, provision, interventions, empowerment, and many answers to prayers.

Fruitful year

I noticed a few answered prayers about the book I was writing. God gave me the grace to edit and sometimes rewrite my draft, professional help to design the book cover, and publishing guidance and assistance from a Tung Ling classmate. My pastor friends read the draft and gave me their comments and endorsements of the book. I was elated at the sudden spurt of progress and saw God’s hand upon it.

I also saw more fruit and expansion in itinerant preaching and spiritual direction. God kept opening doors and giving me opportunities in both of these ministries.

It was a joy to have my adult children and grandchildren return from overseas to spend considerable time with my wife and me. It was a deeply meaningful year for me.

One of my classmates in the formation program shared an apt image that pictures what I experienced in 2024: “IN A YEAR, YOU HAVE GROWN, OVERCOME, AND BEEN SHAPED BY HIS GRACE”

Spiritual Direction: What’s Been Happening

23 September 2024 blogpastor Leave a comment

What is spiritual direction

It is not giving direction as in advising people and giving them biblical solutions to what they are seeking. You can get that from pastors, specialized ministers, and counsellors who use guiding questions to help you form your own solutions. It is “spiritual” in that it has to do with your relationship with God, of knowing God and what he is doing and communicating with you through your life experiences. It is “direction” in that the director directs you towards God, to seek and dialogue with God himself for what you are seeking.

I like the descriptions given by Life Direction Singapore (LDS) in its tiny brochure explaining its identity and the meaning of spiritual direction. It describes its identity this way: “Life Direction is an ecumenical community of trained spiritual directors (SD) offering spiritual support and accompaniment to all persons in their faith journey. The SD helps the pilgrim to pay attention to God’s presence in ordinary life experiences and reflections in prayer.”

The brochure then describes spiritual direction: “Spiritual direction is meeting with a trained director to reflect on how God is present and active in your life, and how God might be calling you into a deeper relationship in your everyday experiences. The content of the direction session is simply your life journey: whatever aspect, story or experience you feel moved to bring to prayer and reflection. You the seeker, the spiritual director and the Holy Spirit meet in holy conversation so “you may have life and have it more abundantly.” (John 10:10) The purpose must be a desire to deepen your journey with God as he journeys with you.”

What has happened since the formation program ended

It has been almost a year since I completed my formation program in spiritual direction and went on to accompany others. Thus far, I have found the journey fulfilling. I have learned much from the spiritual direction that I gave to individuals regularly and the supervision I received. In addition, I have learned from providing spiritual direction in a different context – the few short retreats I have been involved in.

SJSM Anglican cell leaders

I led a preached retreat in March 2024 for cell leaders in a zone with St John’s -St Margaret’s Anglican Church. It was a preached retreat and I introduced them to meditative prayer using a few passages with the theme, “Let God Love You”. It was an overnight retreat at Orchid Country Club near the Lower Seletar Reservoir. I could only give each person one session of thirty minutes each. Not the most ideal, but it is what it is. The priest, Rev Vincent Hoon, is a friend of mine who is also trained and experienced and could have conducted it but I suppose it would be wholesome and enriching to have a retreat leader from outside his church. It was a privilege to listen and converse with the committed leaders of the zone he pastors.

Trinity Theological College retreats

In September 2023, soon after we completed the same SD formation course, Seng Chor and I provided support in spiritual direction, as Dr Jimmy Tan led the retreat with Trinity Theological College students who had attended his course. I had written about the retreat HERE. This year, we helped out in a similar retreat with a new batch of seminary students and I was delighted to see one of the church members, Jean Lim (see above) . I found it a privilege and joy to have this opportunity to be fully present to listen and discern what God has been doing in the retreatant’s lives.

The two Dianas – key leaders of the SD formation program

Praying at the threshold Day of Prayer

The Life Direction Singapore continued to form us after the SD formation program. They went the second mile to ensure all the SDs had opportunities to accompany others. They organized days of prayer every few months, creating opportunities for us to accompany the participants who signed up. Each of us could offer ourselves to serve in two of these Days of Prayer.

Recently, I was involved in one. The theme was “Praying At The Threshold”. The purpose was to guide people to pray and ponder during times of transition. These are the in-between times of uncertainty, impatience and anxiety. It was a long day but I enjoyed the whole day of prayer particularly the spiritual direction with the participants assigned to me. It was always my desire to accompany pastors and both men assigned to me were pastors. It was satisfying to hear the takeaways of most of the retreatants. The next Day of Prayer is on the 26th of October. The prayer theme is “Gift Immeasurable”. Lord, bless those who signed up with your loving embrace and surprises.

I now desire to experience accompanying retreatants in silent retreats for a week as I believe it would be an even deeper and more meaningful accompaniment.

A New Beginning in Spiritual Direction

16 September 2023 blogpastor 4 Comments

Even though I have completed the one year nine months formation program for spiritual directors led by the Life Direction Singapore team of spiritual directors, I wondered about how my burden of journeying with younger pastors would be fulfilled.

Most evangelical pastors and ministry staff have little idea of the need for spiritual direction. They also tend towards productivity in their work and would be too busy with schedules that look like expanded suitcases. They would rather prefer a mentor who would help them be more productive and fruitful and effective in leadership and ministry. The doors seem shut. I have to look to God to open doors.

In the last decade, I have detected a glimmer of hope. A new generation of evangelical pastors and ministers have been trained in our institutions that have a knowledge of spiritual formation and the spiritual disciplines. The major evangelical seminaries and colleges have already established courses on the above subjects that would help students deepen their friendship with God, and their awareness of self. They even arrange for students to experience a silent retreat and/or spiritual direction as part of their training.

Such was the case for Trinity Theological College, whose lecturer Dr Jimmy Tan, from the time I knew him as a seminary student, had a passion for such knowledge. His years of study, practice, research, and reflection has resulted in a book he wrote titled, “How Then Shall We Guide?”, which is a comparative study of Ignatius of Loyola and John Calvin as spiritual guides. He has even run courses that included an experiential component so that students get to experience personal encounters with God in the context of a prayer retreat and reflection on the word.

A week ago Dr Jimmy Tan (third from left) led a retreat for Trinity Theological College students attending his course on Pastoral Theology and Praxis. He invited Koh Seng Chor(second from left) and myself to help out in providing spiritual direction to the students during the retreat. A few other regulars were also invited to help out: Sue Kim Lee(fifth from left), an Elder of a Presbyterian church and from the Life Direction Singapore; and Tina Khoo (fourth from left) and Kayyona Lim (extreme right), both ministry staff from Wesley Methodist Church. Together each of us met with three students each for spiritual direction sessions. It was a joy to serve in this inter-denominational context.

I felt privileged and blessed to experience this “open door” and to provide a safe space for the students to share about their walk with God, and their reflections on what God is doing or how he is leading them in their current life context. It is merely two sessions for a brief retreat. However, it was a good beginning.

All the time that I have gone on retreats, I have been sitting in the seat of the directee. It was a humbling and meaningful experience to sit on the other chair. Not that it is superior, for both persons are in seats of poverty. It is more a seat of co-discernment and sacred entrustment. I believe that this ministry is very much needed for people in pastoral ministry and I believe the Lord will manage my availability to those who need it.