God works in our lives in various and manifold ways. Discipleship is not some formula. There are many and diverse ways both for us to be trained, and likewise for us to train others in the teaching of Christ. But I would like to begin with my own testimony about my experience of discipleship. In this testimony I would like to answer the following few questions:
- How did I come to believe in God?
- Who are the people who influenced me to follow Christ?
- Who are those who helped me grow in my Christian faith?
- Who are those who helped me discover my gifts and get involved in service in the local church?
Notice that this is not merely a testimony about how I came to believe in God and how I grew in ministry, but a sharing about the people who had an influence in my life, in my spiritual formation, and in my following of Christ. If you take the trouble to answer these same questions, perhaps a message similar to the one I am giving you will take shape. I believe that as I speak, what I share will inspire you too to recall how God has worked in your own life and which channels He used for your growth in the faith. And my aim, in the end, is that everything said about these people would motivate us to follow their example, so that we too, like them, may pass the baton of the gospel to the next generation of followers of Christ.
AN ENCOUNTER WITH THE REALITY OF THE SPIRITUAL WORLD
My first contact with the spiritual world and the beyond was literally supernatural. I saw an angel. This happened in 1975. I was about six years old, and until then I had neither heard about nor given a thought to God or the afterlife, nor had it ever crossed my mind that a spiritual world existed. The house we lived in consisted of a spacious corridor from which you entered three rooms: one was shared – a living room and kitchen; the other two were my mother’s and my aunt’s rooms. Since my aunt was married and lived separately with her family, and my mother was divorced, she and I lived in that house with her parents. My grandmother, whom I called “Mother Olga,” and my grandfather, whom I called “Father Vanyo,” slept in the kitchen, while my mother and I slept in her room on two corner beds.
One evening Mother Olga came, as usual, to tell us good night and “to turn off our lamp.” But the moment she switched off the light and closed the door, another light flooded the room. Never before or since have I seen such a light. It was so dense that you could almost touch it. The room faced southwest and had two windows, each with three panes. My mother’s bed was pushed against the western wall of the room, and mine against the northern wall. Then suddenly the southern window – which was directly across from my bed – seemed to vanish, and in its place stood an angel. I cannot describe it exactly, but the whole of it was clothed in white and, according to my ideas at the time, it looked like a child of about eight to twelve years old.
The encounter with the light and with this heavenly being frightened me to death. I pulled the covers over my head and began to push my mother on the next bed and cry out to her, “Do you see it? Do you see it?” But she saw nothing.
The angel said nothing to me. It simply appeared to me. As though to reveal to me that there is another world – invisible, spiritual, heavenly. From then on I have known that besides this one – the visible one in which we live – there is also another, a spiritual world, which is “parallel” to ours. In fact, in those times of atheism and the rejection of everything supernatural, this was precisely the message I needed – that not everything is material, that a spiritual world also exists.
Someone may take this experience of mine to be a hallucination, but they should know that never before or after have I experienced anything like it. Moreover, my faith in God is not founded on this experience, but on my faith in God’s Word. Yet I tell it because it was precisely this experience that became the occasion for my turning to God. In different ways God simply makes His existence known to each one of those whom He has chosen for salvation.
But even if everyone has the right to question my personal experiences, no one ought to question God’s Word, and in it there is talk of guardian angels and of their special care for little children. In Hebrews 1:14, speaking of God’s Son and His superiority over the angels, the author of this letter asks the following rhetorical question concerning them:
14 Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation? (Hebrews 1:14)
From this question we understand that angels definitely exist. They are spiritual beings, sent by God to serve those who have believed in Christ.
And concerning the connection between angels and children, in the Gospel of Matthew 18:10 we hear the Lord Jesus Himself say:
10 See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven. (Matthew 18:10)
For me these words of Christ are confirmation of the truth and the divine reality of my experience with my guardian angel, whom God allowed me to see.
A SPIRITUAL MOTHER
In the New Testament we see that seeing an angel is not enough to be saved from sin. Cornelius saw an angel, but the angel did not tell him the gospel; instead it told him to call for Simon Peter, who would tell him words by which he and his whole household would be saved (Acts 11:14). So too this experience of mine did not save me, but it brought me to the discovery of a side of my grandmother – Mother Olga – that had been unknown to me until then: that she believed in God.
The next morning, after I saw the angel, my mother and my grandmother asked me what I had seen. When I told them, they realized that God had a plan for me. I say “realized” because later I understood that until that moment, out of a mother’s love and concern, and probably also because of her own cooling toward God, my mother Kornelia had forbidden my grandmother Olga to speak to me about God, so that I would not be raised in the Christian faith and would not have trouble in that totalitarian and atheistic society. But after this experience of mine, things changed. My mother, who by that time had grown cold toward God and had drifted from the faith, began once again to go to church and to take me along.
With regard to discipleship, I would say that my Mother Olga was my first mentor and guide, even though at the time I was not at all aware of it. Mother Olga is an example of the fact that a person does not need to be placed in some important position in order to be a guide, a leader, and a person of influence. Her wealth was her relationship with God, and the inheritance she left us is faith in Him. She abided in the Vine, and the life-giving sap of eternal life passed through her to those around her who were open to drink of the wine of the Holy Spirit.
In those days, every evening before we went to bed, she would tell me stories from the Bible – about the various biblical heroes – Noah, Abraham, David, Daniel, and, of course, about the Lord Jesus Christ. Afterward she would kneel down and pray. Every morning when I woke up, she was already at prayer. Sometimes she prayed for hours. This made me treasure prayer and understand its importance for the Christian’s relationship with God.
Her Bible was never put back on the shelf. It was always beside her head, and she read it constantly. This created in me an interest in this Book of Books – an interest that continues to be alive and to grow even today.
Every Sunday my grandmother and I would put on our finest clothes and go to church. This showed me how important the church is for the spiritual life of the believer.
Another thing Mother Olga did was to visit elderly women who were sick. She kept house for them and brought them food. She took me to home groups, and from time to time she would invite Christians to our house as well. She helped the pastors of the church and their families by inviting them over to pick cherries, raspberries, and figs. This stirred me, even as a young man, to do the same and to treasure Christian service.
Watching my grandmother’s life, I had the privilege of understanding firsthand what it means to live a life with God and for God.
Beyond everything else, Mother Olga was exceptionally faithful in giving the tithe. From her I learned that everything we have comes from God. It is not ours but God’s, and therefore we should thank God for everything He gives us and honor Him not only with our words but also with our money.
Later, when the holidays ended and I returned to Burgas to my mother, Mother Olga kept up her spiritual bond with us through an extraordinary correspondence. She wrote us letters almost every week. In them she always urged us to live a godly life, to make no compromises with the world, to keep ourselves from sin, to go to church, and to live a holy life. Almost every letter ended with the words: “Have the fear of the Lord!” This was her motto. She constantly repeated that “God is love, but He is also a consuming fire,” and, like Job, she was especially afraid that she or her children might sin before God and provoke His wrath.
All of this helped to build in me basic disciple’s habits and to form me as a disciple of Christ. In this way I came to understand that one of the ways God builds us up as disciples is through members of our own family. And likewise, we must know that we ourselves have a responsibility to live in such a way as to exert a beneficial influence for the gospel upon our children and grandchildren. In fact, they are our first and chief disciples. Only in this way can the faith we have be passed on to the coming generations. We find proof of this in 2 Timothy 1:5, where the Apostle Paul mentions the sincere faith that the young servant of God, Timothy, inherited from his grandmother:
5 I am reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and, I am persuaded, now lives in you also. (2 Timothy 1:5)
THE GOOD MENTOR
The second person who had a serious influence on my discipleship was my first pastor – Pastor Iliya Apostolov Iliev. When I was in Kazanlak during the holidays and vacations, I often visited their home and played with their children. Apostol and Kristiyana were my friends, so to me their father was simply “Uncle Iliycho.” Despite the entirely informal relationship we had, I believe that he had a great influence on me through his example and his pastoral care for me – perhaps even without giving it a second thought, simply because of the gift that rested upon him. While I visited their home, I sensed the atmosphere of grace, peace, and love that reigned in their house. To me he was an example of a pastor and a man of God. He showed a special love, tenderness, wisdom, and understanding toward me. I never heard him scold or snap at anyone. Despite the persecutions and the pressure he was subjected to by the totalitarian regime of that time, he accepted everything with an endurance and strength that came from his incredible prayer life. He would often begin his Sunday sermon with the words: “This morning I had prepared a different sermon, but just before I stepped up to the pulpit God told me to preach on such and such…” His voice still rings in my ears to this day.
In telling of Pastor Iliya Apostolov Iliev, I want to draw your attention to the role of our pastor and the other spiritual ministers in our spiritual growth. In Hebrews 13:7 it says:
7 Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith. (Hebrews 13:7)
HOSPITALITY AND SPIRITUAL CONVERSATIONS
The third person who influenced my discipleship was my mother, Kornelia (Neli), even though she herself was not a preacher. During my teenage years, she often took me to visit churches in other towns – especially in Shumen. The pastor of the church there was named Simeon Popov – an exceptionally wise and intelligent man – and his wife Elza was German. He lived in the pastor’s residence, which was right next to the church, and he always invited us to his home. There he would serve us tea and sweets, and we would begin long conversations on spiritual subjects. Even more gracious to us were some Armenians – Garo (Garabet) and Mariam Altunyan, the parents of the husband of my mother’s friend Maya. After the changes of 1989, their son Bedros Altunyan became superintendent of the Evangelical Methodist Episcopal Church. My stay with the Altunyan family was very impressive to me. Without in any way forcing their faith upon us, these people were my spiritual guides and counselors. Evening after evening, after dinner, we talked late into the night about spiritual matters – something we called “communion.” Brother Garo Altunyan had a notebook in which he had written down illustrations, and he loved to tell them to us and to explain the lesson in them. I could freely ask him questions and receive answers grounded in his knowledge of God’s Word. These spiritual conversations and times of communion shaped my Christian worldview and built me up as a disciple of Christ. This strengthened my faith, because I could see the real fruit of the Christian faith in the lives of God’s people and taste firsthand their goodness, love, and nobility. That is precisely why I can say that I know from experience what the Apostle Paul means when he says in 2 Timothy 3:14:
14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, (2 Timothy 3:14)
In this way I learned that one of the channels for building disciples is our Christian hospitality. Do we live what we believe? Are we good people? Do we open our homes and our hearts to those newly come to faith in Christ? Do we share with them our experiences with God? These questions are important, because their answers could change many destinies.
THE LAYING ON OF HANDS
God forms us not only through prolonged relationships with someone, but also through events. From April 7 to 9, 1989, there was the historic conference with Pastor Johny Noer in Varna. At that conference he prophesied that after seven months the government of Todor Zhivkov would fall, which indeed happened exactly seven months later – on November 9, 1989, the Berlin Wall fell, and on November 10, 1989, the communist regime fell. At the April conference Brother Johny Noer preached on the book of Exodus, and in particular on the words of Moses before Pharaoh: “Let my people go!” Just as Moses gathered the men of Israel, so too Pastor Johny Noer invited the men forward and laid hands on each one. Then I too came forward, with the desire to become one of the channels of God’s fire of revival for Bulgaria, for it was precisely for this that God had called us through His servant. After this conference, my prayer life, my study of God’s Word, and my desire for ministry deepened considerably.
The laying on of hands is also one of the “means of grace” that God uses for our spiritual building. Of course, when this is an ordination into a particular spiritual office it is somewhat different, but in either case, through the laying on of hands by anointed servants of God, we receive gifts and power for ministry (2 Timothy 1:6).
6 For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. (2 Timothy 1:6)
PERSONAL STUDY OF GOD’S WORD
The next period in my growth as a disciple of Christ was the time of my personal study of God’s Word. Although I had grown up in church and had read the Bible, my serious study of the Bible began as a student – when I was a first-year student at the Higher Institute of Chemical Technology “Prof. Dr. Asen Zlatarov” in the city of Burgas. I read the Bible, underlined it, studied it, and compared passages, and all the while I was astonished and simply marveled at God’s wisdom, the harmony, and the unity of God’s Word. In this period I experienced what it means to receive illumination from the Holy Spirit, and I came to understand God’s way of dealing with the guilt of sin – the receiving of God’s righteousness through faith in Jesus Christ (Romans 1:16-17).
16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile. 17 For in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed—a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: “The righteous will live by faith.” (Romans 1:16-17)
In 2 Timothy 3:15-17 the Apostle Paul reminds his spiritual son Timothy of the importance of the Holy Scriptures for his spiritual formation as a man of God.
15 and how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17 so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. (2 Timothy 3:15-17)
Later, already as a church leader and at an academic level, God enriched this study of the Word of mine by using the materials of the International Correspondence Institute, ICI. In this study I had to read books and follow guides that were written in a format in which the instructor speaks to the student from within the textbook itself. It was then that I understood why the Apostle Paul calls the preacher Timothy a “worker” – because quality service with God’s Word requires hours of thorough preparation and spiritual labor (2 Timothy 2:15).
15 Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth. (2 Timothy 2:15)
AN EXAMPLE WORTHY OF IMITATION
One of the people I wanted to imitate as a young man was Pastor Zhivko Tonchev. In fact, at that time – in the early eighties – he was not yet a pastor, but a youth leader. What impressed me about him was his simultaneous modesty and humility and, at the same time, his incredible boldness and confidence in preaching. His father, Brother Toncho, one of the deacons of the Pentecostal church, was also an amazing man – always smiling and responsive.
Pastor Zhivko was the person from whom I learned how to preach. From him I received my first sermon outlines, some of which I still preach to this day.
He was also the one who kindled in me a love for English. Watching how he translated and established contacts with brothers and sisters in the faith from other countries motivated me to leap over the barrier and learn at least one foreign language. He and his wife Neli were my first English teachers.
I mention the foreign language because I believe it is important, since it shows two things – first, that the church is something worldwide – it is not something that is present only in one country or culture – it is international, “universal”; and second, that learning a second language reminds us of the need for persistence, discipline, and perseverance in discipleship. As a young man, I once shared with an elderly brother from the church – his name was Todor Sabev – how hard it was for me to memorize the new words of a foreign language. I complained to him that languages simply did not come to me. But I will never forget how he smiled at me and said: “Don’t worry, you will learn the language.” I asked him how he could be so sure, and he confidently told me: “I know that you will succeed, because you are a Christian, and Christians are people with a definite method of life. They are constant in their efforts, regular in the fulfillment of their obligations, and this is precisely what is required for learning a foreign language – motivation and discipline.”
From Pastor Zhivko I also learned to share the gospel – both personally and publicly. I noticed how he not only stood boldly on the street and preached to the passersby, but also always carried brochures with him and handed them out to everyone he met. It is certainly no accident that he named the church he founded “The Gospel” – the church in which I had the privilege of serving as a youth leader from 1990 to 1992.
All of this reveals the importance of a spiritual friend who becomes your spiritual mentor and an example for you to follow in your faith in Christ. As the Apostle Paul says to Timothy in 2 Timothy 3:10:
10 You, however, know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose, faith, patience, love, endurance, (2 Timothy 3:10)
For me these were the teaching, the conduct, the purpose, the faith, the patience, the love, and the steadfastness of Zhivko Tonchev.
A MEN’S PRAYER GROUP
In 1991 I began to invite some young men from the church to pray at my home. Our aim was to pray for at least an hour, with each one taking part in the prayer. We prayed for the church, for the gospel, and for the advance of God’s kingdom. I think that from then on Ephesians 6:18-19 became my prayer motto:
18 And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people. 19 Pray also for me, that whenever I speak, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, (Ephesians 6:18-19)
In those days I experienced how prayer binds you to the One to whom you pray, to the one for whom you pray, and to the one with whom you pray. Three of the participants in that prayer group later became serious ministers in the body of Christ, and my friendship with them continues to this day.
And indeed, both then and later, again and again I became convinced that if God is going to do something on the earth, He always begins by finding people who love to pray and to worship Him.
A PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD
Speaking of the influence of people, I cannot leave out perhaps the most important influence in my life – that of the Holy Spirit. In 1981 I went through the spiritual experience of the baptism with the Holy Spirit. This happened, again, in Kazanlak. We were at prayer in a house. There were so many people that there was no free space. Then we experienced what is described in Acts 4:31. The house in which we were gathered literally shook. We all went outside, thinking there was an earthquake, until some realized that what was happening was in fact a miracle from God (Acts 4:31).
31 After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly. (Acts 4:31)
I was only twelve years old, but even so I had an awareness of the sin that is in me. I prayed for God to forgive my sins until God’s joy filled my heart and I began to pray in unknown tongues. Although at first these were only a few little words, I have never felt a stronger love than the love that filled my heart in that moment. The feeling was indescribable. I was ready to embrace the whole world. In that moment I experienced the words of the Lord Jesus from John 7:37-39:
37 On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. 38 Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” 39 By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified. (John 7:37-39)
Later I read books and listened to teachings about the role of the Holy Spirit in our lives. I am convinced that the Holy Spirit is within me and that He desires to speak to me and to guide me in my life and ministry. I believe that I have heard His voice concerning the decisive questions of my life – those about the founding of my family and about my work and ministry. I try to include Him in all the decision-making processes of my life. I have found that there is no greater comfort than to be certain that what you are doing, and the place where you are, is according to God’s will (Romans 8:14).
14 For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. (Romans 8:14)
THE ORDER OF THE TOWEL
After I finished ICI in 1999, in the autumn of 2002 God opened a door for me to continue in a master’s program at TCM. TCM is a unique center for training followers of Christ to become spiritual leaders in their own countries in Eastern Europe. The training there is at an academic level, but the emphasis placed there is not so much on technique and scholarship as on spirituality and the practical application of what is learned for the expansion of God’s Kingdom in that part of the world. The first book I had to read for my first course at TCM was “The Master Plan of Evangelism” by Robert E. Coleman. I will not forget how God spoke to me through it while I was traveling by train to Sofia. At these courses, which were held in holiday lodges at the foot of Vitosha, I had the feeling that I was like one of Christ’s disciples, whom He had called aside privately in order to explain His teaching to them more fully.
But my real shock came when, in 2003, I went for the first time to their campus near Vienna, which is called “Haus Edelweiss.” What I saw there I had never seen anywhere else. For one thing, during the first week I could not even tell who was the boss and who was the worker there. I decided to dig around on the internet and find out who ran this place. I found his photo on their website. His name is Tony Twist. But what a surprise it was for me when, the next day after breakfast, I saw Brother Tony washing dishes in the kitchen. Before long I discovered that our professors were right there alongside him. Not to mention that the brothers and sisters from America waited on us the whole time – they served, cleared the tables, cooked, kept house, and washed not only the dishes but also the bathrooms and toilets of that place. And most of them had already given a good deal of money for our training. Nowhere else have I seen so clearly expressed and emphasized the model of the servant-leader that Jesus demonstrates in John chapter 13 (John 13:12-17).
12 When he had finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place. “Do you understand what I have done for you?” he asked them. 13 “You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and rightly so, for that is what I am. 14 Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. 15 I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. 16 Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. 17 Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them. (John 13:12-17)
So at TCM I learned many things, but the most important lesson I learned was not in the classroom, but while I watched the work of that extraordinary mission in which the washing of dishes is part of the curriculum (Luke 22:24-27).
A CONSTELLATION OF INFLUENCES
As you have perhaps already noticed from this account of mine about the positive influences in my life, they are not one or two. They are many. The model in which we have one teacher and one disciple is too ideal to exist in practice. Most of us are influenced not by one or two people, but by many. Each of our spiritual mentors has contributed a little so that we might become what we are. And as you have perhaps also noticed, many of those who influenced me for good were not pastors but ordinary believers. And this is my challenge to you – to have a healthy relationship with God and a full-fledged Christian life, with which you can influence others. So that what the Apostle Paul says in 2 Timothy 2:2 may be fulfilled:
2 And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others. (2 Timothy 2:2)
I hope that one day, when we all go to heaven, we will meet there people who will thank God for having used us as His instruments to influence their lives. For there is something better than going to heaven, and that is, when you get there, not to be alone, but to bring others with you!
And finally, I would once again like to emphasize that I say none of these things in order to exalt or highlight myself. Rather, I say them in order to glorify God and to show you the ways in which He acts and exerts influence in our lives.
Therefore, first, with the psalmist I say (Psalm 115:1):
1 Not to us, Lord, not to us but to your name be the glory, because of your love and faithfulness. (Psalm 115:1)
And then I join with the Apostle Paul, who says (Philippians 3:12):
12 Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. (Philippians 3:12)