When Contribution Looks Like Nothing
From a corporate lens, I’ve contributed nothing measurable to a ministry that I’m part of since 2016.
There’s no report with my name on it. No initiative I can take full credit for. No flashy outcomes to showcase. And yet, if I’m honest, this might be the most meaningful leadership decision I’ve made in the past decade. Not because of the results, but because of the becoming. Not because I built anything grand, but because I kept sowing—quietly, consistently, without applause.
We live in a world obsessed with systems—scalable frameworks, dashboards, quarterly targets. But ministry doesn’t move on those tracks. It flows like water through hidden roots. And over time, I’ve come to realize: ministry isn’t measured by what you build. It’s revealed by what you’re willing to become. Because systems may impress, but only seeds transform.
The Mentorship That Never Made Strategic Sense
The journey began not with a plan, but with a person—Dato Peter, the founder of UCSI and my mentor since 2016. There was no clear reason for him to invest in me. From a business standpoint, our paths didn’t align. I wasn’t a stakeholder in his company, and he had no direct incentive to pour into my life. But he did it anyway—month after month, year after year. He never once asked for a return. He owed me nothing. And still, he gave freely.
That season of receiving changed me. I brought others into the relationship—not to leverage his influence, but because I wanted them to taste what I was receiving. From one-on-one conversations, to team retreats, to corporate settings—I watched as his seed of discipleship quietly multiplied. Not through programming or branding, but through presence.
Eventually, I realized something uncomfortable: I had been receiving endlessly without giving back. There was no formal rebuke, no guilt trip. Just a quiet realization that this rhythm wasn’t sustainable. Not because he demanded something of me, but because the seed was already working its way outward. I was being invited to become more than a recipient. I was being invited to multiply.
That shift happened around August 2016, when he gently but clearly encouraged me to begin discipling others. No organizational agenda. No ministry title. Just one life at a time. That’s when I first understood what it meant to sow—even when it made no strategic sense.
When the System Paused, the Seed Didn’t
Years later, in 2021, he invited me to join the EXCO leader of the ministry he’s committed to. I said yes immediately. Not out of ambition, but out of honour. This was the same man who shaped much of what my life and Stellar would later become. How could I not stand with him?
But not long after I accepted, he began transitioning out of his leadership role and passed the baton to a new president. At first, I thought it was just an idea. I didn’t realize it was already in motion. The new leadership carried different convictions, and soon the vision began to shift. Priorities were restructured. The expansion plan to 123 nations, which had once lit fires in all of us, was paused for good reason. The new leader needed to assess readiness, rebuild the foundation, and realign the team.
Strategically, it made sense. Organizationally, it was the right call. But on the ground in Johor, the momentum didn’t stop. Relationships had already been formed. Seeds had already been sown. The soil was too fertile to wait for the system to catch up.
You Can Pause the Program—But Not the Planting
At that point, I had a choice. I could wait for official approval and structural alignment—which, in ministry, sometimes takes decades—or I could continue sowing faithfully, knowing that what we were doing wasn’t about a name, a logo, or a platform. It was about people. So I kept sowing.
What happened next wasn’t part of any plan. I had every intention to remain committed to the ministry I had journeyed with. But God had a different rhythm in mind. My path unexpectedly crossed with Every Nation, and what began as a coincidence soon felt like divine orchestration. Their values, relational DNA, and disciple-making culture mirrored what we had already been cultivating in Johor. It wasn’t about switching allegiance. It was about recognizing the soil God had already prepared. And with quiet blessing, I kept building—on new ground, but with the same seeds.
From the outside, it looked like a pivot. But really, it was just what seeds do: they grow, even when the label changes.
To this day, many of the people impacted by that original ministry movement are still journeying forward—not under a single brand, but under a shared spirit. And that’s the lesson I carry with me: you can pause a system, but you can’t pause a seed that’s already in soil.
A Ministry That’s Measured in Becoming
This experience flipped my view of leadership on its head. In the corporate world, we focus on performance: If you deliver, you stay. If you don’t, you go. The metrics are clean, the expectations clear. But ministry doesn’t work that way. You might walk with someone for ten years and see nothing “productive” happen. And still, you stay.
That’s the hard part. It feels irrational. It breaks every business rule.
But it’s also the sacred part.
Because ministry doesn’t demand efficiency. It demands presence.
And often, presence is the thing we want to skip over so we can get to results.
The Farmer’s Model: Seed, Soil, Season
Looking back, the clearest metaphor for what I’ve experienced is farming. Systems are predictable, automated, scalable. But seeds? They don’t care about deadlines. They demand patience, surrender, and faith. You prepare the soil. You plant. You water. And then… you wait.
The seed might sprout. Or not. The fruit might come. Or not. You keep showing up anyway.
If I were to distill everything I’ve learned into a simple framework for legacy-minded leaders, it would look like this:
- Seed → Identity What are you becoming—not just doing? The seed is not your project. The seed is your personhood.
- Soil → Environment What values are you rooted in? Are you surrounded by hype and hustle—or depth and discipline?
- Season → Obedience Are you willing to wait, even when there’s no outcome in sight? Faithfulness is always seasonal. There is no fruit without delay.
ROP Over ROI: A Better Metric for Legacy
We’re taught to chase ROI—Return on Investment. But for ministry, for family, and for legacy-driven leadership, ROI alone will always be incomplete. The better question is ROP: Return on Purpose.
My mentor never asked for results from me. No contracts. No KPIs. No headlines. And yet, his quiet obedience produced something far more lasting. Because today, the people I lead, the culture we’ve built, and the leadership we’re multiplying—all of it—traces back to seeds he sowed.
You don’t measure that monthly. You measure that generationally.
Where Work and Ministry Blur—and That’s Okay
People talk about work-life integration as if it’s a problem. As if boundaries are meant to keep everything neat. But I’ve come to see that when our work, faith, and family bleed into each other—it’s not confusion. It’s congruence.
My business has become ministry. My parenting has become discipleship. And my discipleship continues to shape how I lead my team. It’s all part of the same tree.
This isn’t about being busy. It’s about being rooted.
And while the logos may change, the fruit doesn’t.
The Reverse That Redefines It All
In a world that worships systems, we think leadership is about control.
But I’ve learned: the highest form of leadership doesn’t tighten grip. It loosens ego.
Real leaders don’t obsess over ownership. They care about fruitfulness.
I used to think I needed a title, a brand, a structure. But sometimes, all you need is a seed. And the willingness to let it die so others can live.
That’s the paradox: the more invisible the seed, the more powerful the fruit.
A Simple Day, A Sown Life
Sunday, 1 June 2025. It wasn’t a mountaintop day. But it was meaningful.
The kids rested. My wife, heavily pregnant, finally got to breathe. We surprised her with a new phone. The kids giggled through the process. We ended with a movie and a Zoom call I didn’t have to dress up for.
No headlines. But a harvest.
Because sometimes, ministry looks like laughter in the living room.
Sometimes, leadership looks like presence.
And sometimes, the most sacred moments are the ones that no one will ever see—except the people who matter most.
