By Lee Jen Wei
One of our outgoing apprentices, Jen Wei, reflects on his apprenticeship journey and shares how we as a church family can be praying for him and his wife Hui Shi as he finishes up apprenticeship and continues serving the Lord:
Dear church family, I’m thankful for this opportunity to share how the Lord has grown me over the past year of apprenticeship and indeed to share how many of your prayers have been answered! Thank you for supporting Hui Shi and I, whether it be financially, through prayer or just through checking in with us.
Similar to what E and N shared last week, apprenticeship this year has involved lots of learning how to read and teach the Bible in different capacities – through Bible handling sessions in Galatians and Revelation, in house training sessions as well as teaching it in 121/AG Bible studies and preaching at youth meetings and small scale evangelistic meetings. But what’s listed on the calendar is only part of it – so much learning has come through chance conversations with other saints, whether it be a conversation that helped to crystallise a lesson learnt, or a wise rebuke from someone else!
A few lessons from the year:
It is the Lord who does the work: Being equipped for ministry has often been so exciting – sometimes it feels like discovering a tool that could unlock the next level of spiritual growth in an individual or a group. So intoxicating, and yet I’ve been reminded that “Unless the Lord builds a house, its builders labor over it in vain” (Psalm 127.1a)[1]. Human effort can only go so far; but the Lord will do what He wants, and what a privilege it is to play some small role in His work. Please pray that no matter where I go and what I do, I would remember that I am just a jar of clay, showing the world that the glory belongs to God and not to us (2 Cor 4.7).
Ministry is all about people: I had often joked throughout the year that my job was mostly being holed up in my room tapping away on my computer. It sometimes felt like that! But apprenticeship taught me that the work of the saints is about speaking the truth in love to each other (Eph 4.15), not just getting the passage right (though that’s important too!). It’s about people, and especially the people closest to us – I learnt how easy it is to neglect the people closest to us in pursuit of a loftier dream. Please pray that in the next phase of life, I would remember that ministry is about loving people, especially our nearest and dearest.
Finally, all of life is worship: Revelation reminded us that all of life is a cosmic war of worship between God and the devil, and how easy it is to be sucked into the devil’s deception. Please pray that I would grow in my love and worship for God, and that my life would be all about bringing others to worship Him too.
I will be returning to my work as a medical doctor but given everything we have learnt this year, do pray for Hui Shi and myself as we figure out what ministry will look like moving forward! We trust that the lessons learnt will stand us in good stead as we continue to serve in our AG and beyond.
[1] I think I’ve heard devotions on this passage 3 times in the past year amongst the staff team, thank God for how He drills truths into our heads!