Posted on 1 Dec 2017 by CERC
As CERC wraps up its 9th year of ministry in the Klang Valley, we have much to thank God for. The church congregation has multiplied to a crowd of over 300 weekly; with significant growth coming from the Central campus.
With God’s providence, CERC has also seen its Growth Groups (GGs) expanding to various other locations in the Klang Valley over the last nine years. Now, the church has 13 adult Growth Groups and 7 tertiary groups that meet weekly to accommodate the growing need for discipleship.
The expansion of GGs has also been made possible because God has raised up many Growth Group Leaders in Training (GGLT) over the last nine years.
Currently, the number of CERC’s leaders in training have grown to more than 40 people, consisting of working professionals across various industries, CERC apprentices and tertiary students with a 1:1 ratio of working adults to tertiary students.
On Tuesday evenings, the group of 40 GGLT-ers meet together with Elder Robin to discuss ministry matters, prepare studies for GGs and pray for the church. What continues to drive them each week to sacrifice their time and rest is their desire to see their GG members transformed by the Word of God and conform to God’s authority in their lives.
This year, as part of our 500th Reformation celebrations as a church, we kicked off the year with a sermon series on the 10 Commandments, having various GGLT-ers take the pulpit.
We spoke to the preachers of the 10 Commandments series, with some key highlights flashed out below.
Sam Ye Han, Bangsar GG Leader & Head of MC Department
Hi Sam, which commandment did you preach on?
I preached on the 8th commandment, Thou Shall Not Steal, which I have preached before as a youth talk, so I was quite familiar with the text.
What have you learnt about preaching from that experience?
I learnt that preparing for a sermon is no easy task as it requires a lot of discipline and hard work, and that good preaching shouldn’t be taken for granted. This helped me appreciate the work of full-time paid ministers who work tirelessly at delivering faithful sermons each week. I am particularly grateful for our elder, Robin Gan who works wholeheartedly week in and week out to preach good sermons in CERC.
I’ve also come to realise that formal theological training is very necessary for those pursuing full-time preaching in church, as I became aware that my lack of understanding in many areas was a challenge in preparing a better sermon.
As a layperson and a member of the church, my experience with my sermon preparation encouraged me to be more supportive of those who wish to pursue full-time paid ministry and to really appreciate the love that goes into sermon preparations.
David Kuok, Wangsa Maju GG Leader
David, you preached on the 6th commandment: Do not murder. Any particular reason you chose this commandment?
I’d always thought that the 6th commandment was the simplest among the other commandments, and I knew that there must have been something lacking in my understanding of it for me to think that way. So, that was why I took on the challenge to find out what the commandment is really about.
Which did you find more difficult: preparing or delivering the sermon?
Everything about it was difficult! (laughs) I’ve preached a few times before and every time the most difficult part for me is just having the perseverance to finish preparing it. Preparing a sermon is not an easy feat and it really takes a toll on you physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually. You’re constantly stressed and anxious about it because there’s just so much to work on and improve, you’re constantly thinking about it and often you work on it with little rest.
That means it requires a great deal of perseverance and loving commitment in preparing and preaching the sermon.
That sounds like a lot to take on. So, what did you take away from this entire process?
When you prepare a sermon, you don’t just work on the technical aspects like exegeting the text, reading commentaries and outlining the sermon — in fact, preparing a sermon trains you tremendously in your character.
It trains you a lot to love God and His church, because in the end you learn that it’s not about you, but about glorifying God by feeding His sheep the Word, and that is what really motivates you throughout the sermon preparation.
I’ve also had to learn humility: the more I read and prepared for the sermon, the more I realised that I actually know extremely little, not to mention the number of sermon drafts that I had to discard because it was just terrible. It’s really a lot of hard work to preach the text well.
After this experience, I really have a newfound respect for church pastors. To go through this whole process again and again and again every week, and sometimes having to prepare more than one sermon a week, that’s just… wow!
CERC is thankful for God’s good work in His church these past 9 years; in growing more Growth Groups, in training and equipping leaders, and in convicting His people with His word.
