TREASURY OF SERMONS
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Pattern For Accelerated Church Growth
By Rev (Dr) Timothy Tow
(Preached at Life BPC, 10.30 am service, 8 July 2001)
Text: Matthew 10:1-15
In last week’s message we heard our Lord sigh,
"The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few; Pray ye
therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers
into his harvest." In conjunction with this command, we find in Luke
10 the Lord sending seventy, two by two, other than the 12
disciples, to the harvest field. Who are these seventy? They are the
members in the pews, ordinary people saved by grace, able to
witness.
And so there has arisen a denomination called
The Brethren who teaches all are brothers and sisters and from these
are elected Responsible Brethren or Elders to lead the Church. These
need no training but are taught of the Holy Spirit. They take the
place of pastors who not only preach and teach but run the affairs
of the Church.
For the text we’ve taken, Matt 10:1-15 we see
that in order to establish His Church our Lord has chosen Twelve
Disciples whom He called Apostles (v.2), whom He commissioned to
preach and to heal, to raise the dead and cast out devils. These
were further fortified with the miracles performed by the Master.
Firstly, they were indoctrinated in the Doctrines of God and His
Work of Saving Mankind. They underwent the building of good
character and how to behave as good Christian leaders before men.
They had a full three-year course and graduated with seeing the
Risen and Ascended Christ and the Coming at Pentecost of the Holy
Spirit. They graduated from JESUS Bible College. The power to do
miracles was reconfirmed on them (Acts 5:12) and with these powers
the Church was established and grew from strength to strength.
Every Apostle (except Judas Iscariot whose part
was taken over by Paul) went evangelising, each to one country or
region according to tradition and died a martyr’s death. But we will
mention what is clearly stated in Scripture, the spread of the
Gospel throughout the Roman Empire through Peter the Apostle to the
Jews and Paul, the Apostle to the Gentiles.
From Peter we learn in the Acts of the Apostles
how he evangelised Samaria with John in the steps of Philip and how
he branched out to Lydda and Joppa. From Peter’s Epistles we know he
preached in Asia Minor, to Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and
Bithynia. From Corinthians we hear from Paul that Peter also came
there for the Gospel’s sake. Peter mentioned "the Church of Babylon"
and tradition strongly tells us how Peter, like Paul, had gone to
Rome and there he died a martyrs death.
Now the Apostle Paul. He spent his whole life
after conversion in three missionary journeys that took him through
the Roman Empire in Europe arriving in Rome in what could be called
his fourth missionary journey.
What do these exploits of the two chiefest of
Apostles tell us? They set the Church Pattern that the twelve
Apostles whom the Lord has called, chosen, and trained has
accelerated Church Growth above others. JESUS Bible College is the
formula.
And this formula is handed by the Apostle to
Timothy for the continuation of the propagation of the Gospel and
the faster church growth in II Tim 2:2, "And the things that thou
hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to
faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also."
Paul here is speaking from his own personal
experience the mighty results of what he did in Ephesus. He opened a
Bible College that lasted two full years in Ephesus to train them
for the Gospel, "so that all they which dwelt in Asia heard the word
of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks." (Acts 19:10). How did all
who dwelt in Asia hear the Word of the Lord Jesus? Not through one
person in Paul, but undoubtedly through the many students taught by
Paul who went out with the Word. As a result five new churches were
added to form the Seven Churches of Revelation. These are Smyrna,
Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, and Philadelphia. Ephesus which heads
the list and the last Laodicea are two old churches. The pattern for
accelerated Church Growth is demonstrated by none other than St.
Paul.
We have seen how our Lord founded JESUS Bible
College with the best calibre of men, the Twelve Apostles. We have
seen the results in the two chiefest of Apostles, Peter and Paul. We
have seen how Paul has called Timothy to choose faithful men and
train them as in a Bible College that they may continue the process
whereby the church might multiply from strength to strength.
With this pattern in mind, by way of testimony,
the Lord helped me to found the Far Eastern Bible College in 1962.
Foreseeing that unless such a College was founded, Life Church would
remain as Life Church, like many other churches. From the beginning
we launched out as a full-fledged College in order to train men and
women to higher academic excellence. We required students to stay in
school, so that by communal interactions we might nurture their
spiritual life and mould their characters. Four years leading to the
Bachelor of Theology is deemed not enough. Further study leading to
the master’s degree (another 2 years) is encouraged that they might
mature to be effective leaders. When they graduate in their
repective degrees, insofar as the men are concerned, they are
eventually ordained as pastors or ministers of the Gospel. Calvin
says these are they who step into the position left by the Apostles.
A new tide has arisen in Neo-evangelical circles
to start ordaining eminent pastors as Apostles. Lawrence Kong, as I
understand, has now been ordained an Apostle. But Apostles are not
for Bible-Presbyterians. We believe there are only Twelve according
to Acts of the Apostles who were endued with special powers to work
miracles so as to establish the Church. Apostles were specially
appointed to write the Scriptures.
Nevertheless, for the full-orbed training they
have received from FEBC, we have ordained 65 to the pastoral
ministry. These have become Church leaders principally in the 60 and
20 BP congregations in Singapore and Malaysia, with a goodly number
over BP Churches founded across the world. Without the Bible
College, Life Church would have remained one to this day. Without
church growth there is even the danger that the church will close
shop. How many churches I can count on my fingers that have, after a
few years, vanished. This is borne out by what my good friend, Dr.
Paul Contento has said, "Without the Bible College, the Church would
die."
Today, by God’s grace, He is raising more and
more tertiary-educated young men and young women from our midst to
study at FEBC. These are they who will be leaders of churches, who
will further go on to establish branches.
The Far Eastern Bible College today has a full
faculty of thirteen. It has graduated a total of 376 in the last 39
years. Next year will be the 40th Anniversary. Its present enrolment
has over 100 students from 17 countries. FEBC is the centre of a
Bible College movement to help fraternal Bible Colleges raise their
standards. We have helped the Far Eastern Fundamental School of
Theology of Burma, and now we have launched out to Africa to help
the Bible College of East Africa. To raise the standard of Sunday
School Teachers among BP Churches, we are receiving an increasing
number of evening school students—all this for accelerated church
growth.
Pray for FEBC that we may be enabled to
accomplish what has been mandated to us through Paul’s charge to
Timothy, "And the things that thou hast heard of me among many
witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able
to teach others also" (II Tim 2:2). Pray that the Lord of the
Harvest will send us men of the calibre of the Twelve Apostles who
will enhance the work of the Church during these last days in
accelerated missions before He returns.
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