The Christian Life Program (CLP)

What is the CLP of CFC Singles for Christ?

What is the Christian Life Program (CLP)?

The CLP is an integrated course intended to lead the program participants into a
renewed understanding of God's call to them as Christians. It runs for a total of 13
separate sessions, usually held once a week. Most sessions consist of three basic
ingredients: a teaching, a group discussion, and a time for fellowship. Each session
would normally last for about 2 1/2 hours.

What are the goals of the CLP?

The CLP has two basic purposes: evangelism and spiritual renewal.

To evangelize is to take the basic message of Christianity and to proclaim it anew so

that those who hear it can make a renewed commitment to the Lord in a way which will
allow them to receive a fuller experience of the work of the Holy Spirit in their lives.

Spiritual renewal works in three ways:

1. For the individual, it brings a person into a stronger relationship with God by
discovering and living more fully the power and gifts he or she received through the
Holy Spirit.

2. For the family, it brings singles to a renewed commitment to Christian family Life.

3. For the Church, it brings young men and women within a particular parish to a fuller
experience of life in the Spirit. Consequently it strengthens and revitalizes
community life in the parish.

What is the content of the CLP?

The CLP runs for a total of 13 consecutive sessions usually held weekly, divided into an
orientation session and then 3 modules of 4 sessions each. The topics of the 12
sessions are:

Module No. 1: THE BASIC TRUTHS ABOUT CHRISTIANITY

1. God's Love
2. Who is Jesus Christ?
3. What it means to be a Christian
4. Repentance and Faith

Module No. 2: THE AUTHENTIC CHRISTIAN LIFE

5. The Christian Ideal: Loving God

6. Loving Your Neighbor
 7. The Christian Family
8. Life in the Holy Spirit

Module No. 3: LIVING A SPIRIT-FILLED CHRISTIAN LIFE

9. Receiving the Power of the Holy Spirit

10. Growing in the Spirit
11. The Life and Mission of the Couples of Christ
12. Transformation in Christ

What is the content of each of the above teachings?

“GOD'S LOVE” speaks about God's wanting to bring us out of the confusion and
disorder that is being experienced in the modern world, and to bring us all back to
Himself, to restore our fellowship and intimacy with Him. There is something seriously
wrong with the situation of the world today, and behind most of the disorder and evil is
Satan. Only God can bring us out of this, and He has done it by sending His own Son,
Jesus Christ, into the world to suffer and die for us. Salvation has come to us in Jesus.

Realizing the absolute importance of this person Jesus Christ in our salvation from sin
and Satan and our return to God, we naturally would want to know more about Him.
And so we ask the question, "WHO IS JESUS CHRIST?". Being Christians, we just
naturally take for granted our conviction that Jesus is the Son of God. But is he really
worth paying attention to? Shouldn't he be on the same level as Buddha, Confucius,
Mohammed, Socrates, or other wise men or moral teachers? Jesus was unique and has
had a greater impact on the course of human events more than any other person. But
what really set him apart was his claim to be God, which none of the other founders of
great world religions ever claimed. With this claim, we can only look upon him as either
a liar, a lunatic or in fact the Lord.

If we come away with the conviction that Jesus is indeed Lord, then we are confronted
with his life and his words which demand a response from us. If we as Christians are to
carry his name, then we need to live in a way that acknowledges his lordship over us.
And so we want to learn “WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A CHRISTIAN”. This talk first
dispels misconceptions or wrong notions about Christianity. It points out what it is not.
Then it shows that the essence of Christianity is union with God, made possible through
the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. What makes us Christian is our loving,
personal relationship with God, and our whole life becomes an expression of this
relationship.

God has loved us. God sent His Son to die for us. He has gathered us unto Himself as
His people. Christianity is something that God has initiated, unilaterally and
unreservedly. In the light of all these, our proper response is “REPENTANCE AND
FAITH”. And this is a double-action response. Repentance and faith go together.
Repentance involves a turning away from sin, wrongdoing and running our own lives,
and a turning to a life of obedience to God. Faith, in turn, is belief in Jesus as our
personal Savior.

The above four talks form the first module of the CLP, and has presented the absolute
basics of Christian life. It is basically Christian theology. The next module, consisting of
another four sessions, presents the kind of life that God calls us to. It spells out the
personal response involved in receiving Jesus as Lord and Savior and helps couples to
make a reorientation of their lives around Jesus.

The second module starts out with a talk on “THE CHRISTIAN IDEAL: LOVING GOD”.
It is an explanation of the first and greatest commandment. It explains in detail what it
really means to love God above all with all our heart, with all our mind and with all our
strength.

The next talk deals with “LOVING YOUR NEIGHBOR”, which, together with loving God,
forms the core of the Christian life. The talk contrasts God's love with the world's idea of
love. Love is not only having positive feelings, not always saying "yes", not being
defensive, not self-seeking or manipulative. Rather, Christian love is connected with
keeping God's commandments and means a self-sacrificial love, best exemplified by
Jesus himself. On the practical level, Christian love means service love. It is committed
service to our fellow men.

Being a family-oriented ministry, we then have a talk on “THE CHRISTIAN FAMILY”.

Here the importance of the family in God's plan is stressed. The family is intended by
God to be the basic unit of society, and as such, it is to be a place for teaching and
training children and also the place for training leaders. But God's plan for our families is
not happening, because God has lost His central place in the family, because the family
itself is losing its importance, because of the fast life, and finally because the family is
under attack by evil forces. The talk ends with practical advice on what can be done to
build up a strong Christian family.

Finally, after learning what this new life that we are called to really means--love of God,
love of neighbor, building a Christian family--we look at the one ingredient that makes it
all possible. And that is the power from above which enables us to live a “LIFE IN THE
HOLY SPIRIT”. True Christian living is not just a matter of human will power but a new
heart, a new life from God. The Holy Spirit enables us to experience God, a living
relationship with Him and His action in our lives. With the Holy Spirit, men again
experience union with God and gain a new nature, spiritual power and power to serve.

The third and final module helps the couples to commit their lives in a serious way to
Jesus Christ. And first of all this involves “RECEIVING THE POWER OF THE HOLY
SPIRIT”. This first session of the third module is essentially a prayer session where the
participants are prayed with for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in their lives. Some
would term it the baptism in the Holy Spirit.

Then, recognizing that the baptism in the Holy Spirit is only a beginning, there is a
need to learn more about how to grow in the life of the Spirit. Thus the participants are
taught the basic means for “GROWING IN THE SPIRIT”. And the four basic tools for
growth are prayer, study, service and fellowship.

Fellowship refers to almost everything that Christians do together as a body. It is the

concretization of the spiritual reality that we belong to the same family. We do not
become complete Christians by ourselves. And here we come to the need for coming
together with other committed Christians and their families for mutual support and
encouragement. Here is presented “THE LIFE AND MISSION OF THE CFC SINGLES
FOR CHRIST”. It gives the history of CFC Singles for Christ (SFC), its statements of
Mission and Philosophy, and a description of how support for Christian life is carried out.
An invitation to consider and pray about joining SFC is issued.

Finally, the last session wraps up the whole Christian Life Program which has started the
process of “TRANSFORMATION IN CHRIST”. The participants are encouraged to
persevere and live out actively the new life in the power of the Holy Spirit. And though
the CLP has come to an end, the new life is just beginning. In order to grow, much more
is needed. There is a need to learn more about the Christian life. There is a need for
the strength and support of others. There is a need for a situation in which single men
and women can learn how to serve the Lord. Thus the singles are invited to join CFC
SINGLES FOR CHRIST. For those who have decided to do so, they make their
commitment to SFC and are welcomed into the body.