Perfect Discipleship – DISCIPLESHIP REQUIRES DISCIPLINE – 2 STORIES from Kampala, Uganda and Phoenix Arizona, USA

Perfect Discipleship - DISCIPLESHIP REQUIRES DISCIPLINE - 2 STORIES from Kampala, Uganda and Phoenix Arizona, USA

#transformationaldiscipleship #ordinarydiscipleship #everydaydiscipleship #discipleshiplifestyle #gomakedisciples #discipleship #discipline #culture #culturaltransformation

Sunday, 4th of June 2023

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Podcast link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/otakada/episodes/FIND–FOCUS-and-DEPLOY-on-Divine-PRODUCTIVITY-and-ENLARGEMENT–Perfect-Discipleship—DISCIPLESHIP-REQUIRES-DISCIPLINE—2-STORIES-from-Kampala–Uganda-and-Phoenix-Arizona–USA-e266l8m

Blog link: https://www.otakada.org/perfect-discipleship-discipleship-requires-discipline-2-stories-from-kampala-uganda-and-phoenix-arizona-usa/

YouTube link: https://youtu.be/cpM5UozEGPk

 

Perfect Discipleship - DISCIPLESHIP REQUIRES DISCIPLINE - 2 STORIES from Kampala, Uganda and Phoenix Arizona, USA

Theme – Perfect Discipleship – Cultural transformation – Romans 12:1-2

Title –

DISCIPLESHIP REQUIRES DISCIPLINE – 2 STORIES from Kampala, Uganda and Phoenix Arizona, USA.

Friends, welcome to the month of June 2023. In this series on perfect discipleship, we will be looking at true life stories of what is working around the world so that you and I can deploy the ideas in our local context. Enjoy the stories and by all means possible, share, adapt and apply where necessary.

You will find the work book for seed project for your community on our website via the blog link.

Thank You!

Story 1: Watoto church in an African community – Kampala Uganda

I want to tell you a story. In this story, is the story of a small group that multiplied four times in two years. Almost all of the new people in that small group were new believers. Story is from Africa… and here’s the story.

In the Church called the Watoto Church, a large church, they heard this message. Then they decided to form small groups. In those small groups, they gave them an assignment. The primary assignment was that everybody in that small group should go out during the week and find somebody in need who they could do something for, not necessarily solve that person’s problem but basically address the problem. That was their DNA. Yes, they did Bible study. They had fellowship which usually was popcorn and punch because it was a very poor community. It was basically a Muslim community.

This group was started by a couple of women from this particular church, one of the satellite Churches of this Watoto Church. They began meeting. Every week they had that one assignment, go out in the community and find somebody that has a need that you can address, not a need that you can solve but you can do something about. They went out.
Within a short period of time, that group of two women grew to about 15. It kept growing so they divided and they had two groups. In within two years, that group of 15 had divided four times and they were close to 50 new group members. Almost all of them had come to Christ because they had been met by a member of that group, who saw them in need and came to them and said, “Can I pray for you?” One night we were with that group and the pastor asked them, “Tell our visitors your story.” We went around the room about 12-15 people. I don’t remember exactly the number but I distinctly remember the stories. I want to tell you three of those stories.

First one is a young man, and he stood up and he said, “I’m a refugee from the Congo. I don’t know if my family is alive. I got in to university. I didn’t have much money but enough to enroll. But my money ran out. I had nothing for food, nothing for rent. And I was seriously contemplating taking my life. Can you see that woman over there? She saw me. I didn’t know her. She didn’t know me. But she came to me and she said, ‘I can see you’re troubled. Would you care to tell me your story?’ She was a complete stranger. Why in the world would I do that? Hey I’m going to commit suicide, why don’t I just…wait, I’ll tell her my story.” He told her his story.

“And she said, ‘Can I pray for you?’ And I… “Sure, why not?” I wasn’t a Christian, but I thought it’s not gonna hurt or anything. So she prayed for me. Then she said, ‘You know I belong to a small group that meets on Wednesday nights. Would you…we like to pray together as a group for people like you. Would you mind coming to our group and telling your story? And then allowing us to pray for you?’ So I came. I’m surprised myself, but I came. And you know, they had their popcorn and punch, and did a little study from the Bible. And then my friend that had invited me said, ‘Tell your story, and I did. And they gathered around me. They laid hands on me and they prayed for me. And that was nice. But then they did something that completely blew my mind.” I don’t know if that’s the expression to use but that’s what he was saying. He said, “They said, ‘How much money do we have?’. And they all emptied their wallets and their purses on a table in the middle of the room. And they looked at me and they said, ‘Would this help?’ I was shocked! These are complete strangers and they emptied their wallets, and they said, ‘Would this help you?’ Of course, it would help me. I’d never seen such love. Wow, I became a follower of Jesus. And do you know what I do during the week? I go around looking for people that might be troubled. And I go up to them and I say, ‘I know you don’t know me but I can tell something is troubling you. Would like to share what it is with me? And would you allow me to pray for you?’ And then I say, ‘You know what? I belong to a group that meets on Wednesday nights. Would you be willing to come? We’d like to… We’d love to pray for you.”

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Next person was a woman with a little five-year-old boy with her. She said, “See my boy?” “Yeah! of course.” “He was very sick. I took him to the local clinic. And they said, unless he gets medical treatment, he’s gonna be blind the rest of his life if he lives. I was really troubled. “See that lady over there? She’s my neighbour. When she heard about that, she came to my house and she said, ‘I heard about your boy. Can I pray for you? Can I pray for him?’ I said, ‘Sure,’ because I didn’t have the money to go to buy the medicine that my boy needed. She prayed. And then she said, ‘Tomorrow night, I belong to a small group and we meet. Would you
mind coming and sharing your story with my group and allow us to pray for you and your boy?’ So, I came. I didn’t know any of them except my neighbor. But I came. And I told my story. And after they prayed for me, they said, ‘I wonder what we could do to raise…?’ They asked me, ‘How much do you need?’ And I told them, ‘I wonder what we could do to help find those resources.’ And you know what they did? They all decided, every one of them, to go back to their house and the next day to talk to their neighbors about my boy, and the money that he needed and ask for contributions from all of their neighbors. Within 24 hours, I had enough money to take my boy to the clinic and get the medicine he needed. Look at him; he can see.” The next one, wearing a red dress, holding a Bible in her arm like an evangelist, and she said this is my story. “I was in bed ready to die from AIDS. I had gone to the bathroom in my bed clothes. My house smells terrible. And that lady over there heard about me. She came to my house. I just wanted to die. And she came inside, I said, ‘Please, please, don’t try to help me. Just go away! I want to die. She said, ‘Honey, I can’t do that. You’re still alive.’ And then she proceeded to fix a meal for me. And then she brought her friends the next day, this group. And I said, ‘Please, I want to die, just let me alone.’ And they said, ‘We can’t do that. You’re still alive.
And so, these friends, they cleaned my house, they took my soiled bed clothes, and washed them. They washed me. And then they divided up among themselves so that a different person would bring meal every day. The only food I’d had was leaf and grass soup. My daughter would go out and pick leaves and weeds, and bring them home and boil them. And that’s the only thing we had to eat. I was taking antiviral drugs but they don’t do any good because I had no nutrition. But with the food that these people brought to me, I began to get better. And look at me. I still have AIDS, but I’m well enough now to sell vegetables that I buy in the market do-to-door. And you know what I do, as I go door-to-door? When I see somebody troubled I say, ‘Would you like to share with me what your problem is so I can pray for you?’ And I’ll invite them to come here. And if they come, we listen; we pray. That group that started off with a couple of women in four years, in two years, grew four times almost all of them were new believers. Wow. They were good news. Does God have good news for the present? You bet he does! We are supposed to be the good news by the way we live, the way we address and we care for others.

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Assignment:

What I’d like you to do is to list two or three practical ideas that your church or you could implement, in any area of the physical needs, social needs, wisdom needs or spiritual needs in community, to be good news to the people with whom you interact.

Story two – Bob and Don with the unkempt front lawn

We first moved to Phoenix, I had a neighbor. His name is Don, it’s his real name, and Don was really dysfunctional. He was an alcoholic, he was unemployed, he was in trouble with the government for back taxes and he was very depressed and he lived in his house with his curtains drawn.
Once in a while, I’d see him and we’d talk and I found out very quickly he didn’t want to talk about God, so I didn’t. But there was something about Don that really bothered me, it shouldn’t have but it did, and that was the fact that his front lawn was really messy. And I’m one of these people who loves to spend time on Saturdays in my yard and I love flowers, I love trimming, I love cutting the grass. I’m the kind of guy that likes to see the lines of the lawn mower after I’ve finished, all in straight parallel lines, but I just love doing that.
On Saturdays, I tell Judy, “Honey, I’m going to be Adam today,” and so I go under the garden and I tend the garden and so one day I was out fixing my lawn, doing all the things that I love to do with flowers, trimming, cutting the grass, watering and I was complaining to God about Don’s yard which was full of trash: bottles, cans, high weeds. It was a mess and it was embarrassing to me. It wasn’t that I cared that much about Don, I just cared about the appearance of his yard next to mine and I felt this nagging voice of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit doesn’t nag but that’s how I took it, and the Holy Spirit said, “Well, Bob, if you don’t like it, you clean it up.’ Well, I didn’t want to hear that and I was about to go in and I heard the Spirit of God say, “Bob, you’re not done yet. Clean this yard.” Okay, I didn’t ask him, I just went. I spent several hours pulling out weeds and collecting trash and edging and I went in, sort of pouting. The next week I was out doing my yard and feeling pretty good about myself, you know, that I’d cleaned Don’s yard last week and I was about to go in and I felt the Spirit say to me, “You’re not finished.”
I said, “Yes, I am.” And the Spirit said, “No, you’re not. You haven’t done Don’s yard.”
I said, “I did it last week.” “No, you do it this week.”

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So, I went out and I did Don’s yard. Well, you know, once in a while and this kept on going. The Spirit didn’t let me off the hook and every once in a while, Don would come out. He’d been looking at what I was doing through his curtains and I knew that. But he came out and he’d talk about the weather and politics and things of that nature and hardly ever mentioned the lawn, you know. He’d say, “You thirsty? You want something to drink?” I’d say, “Sure.” So he’d bring out a coke or some water and we’d talk. Well this went on formore than a year and a half and I just stopped complaining. I just knew that this is what God wanted me to do. One night there was a knock on my door and it was Don and he said, “Can I
talk to you?” I said, “Sure, Don, come in.” He said, “Bob, I’ve been watching you for almost two years, why are you cleaning my yard?” I didn’t say, “I really didn’t want to Don,” but I said, “It was because God told me that I should do it.” He said, “What?” I said, “Yes, it was really God’s Spirit who impressed on my mind that I was to go clean your yard and Don, He wouldn’t let me alone. He kept asking me to the point that it just becamesomething that I do.” And Don said, “Could we talk?” And I said, “Sure.” And we began to meet on a weekly basis, we’d go out for coffee and he poured out his heart and I found out how broken he was and I found out that he’d really been wounded by religious people in the past and he was very angry with God and religious people and he came to Christ and he began to put his life back together. About a year ago, and this was quite some time ago, he invited Judy and I to come over with him and his wife and at the end of dinner, he said, “Bob, I want to tell you that your cutting my yard and cleaning my yard was the beginning of a change in my life.” He said, “I’m no longer an alcoholic. I’m employed. I’ve resolved with the issue with the IRS with the government and the taxes. I’m a leader in my church and it’s all because you were serving me.” He said, “Would you like to know what I do on weekends?” I said, “Yes, I would. What do you do?” He said, “I clean my neighbor’s yard.” You know, when we are obedient to what the Holy Spirit calls us to do in terms of serving others, this is what God does. He does far more than we can think or imagine and it’s because we reflect the glorious image of our great God.

Assignment
As we break, I want you to ask the question, “If you see serving as one of the spiritual disciplines where would you place it in terms of priority in other spiritual disciplines: Bible reading, prayer, tithing, etcetera. Where would you place that in terms of priority?

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Shalom!

Ambassador Monday Oreojo Ogwuojo Ogbe

Gods eagle ministries

Otakada.org

 

 

 

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