Let everything that has breath praise the Lord

A New Season

2010-10-17T08:45:00.000-07:00

The theme of Glad Tiding's Gateway 4th Anniversary was 'A New Season'.

A new season brings about changes.
A new season poses new challenges.
A new season raises champions.

Change is the only constant thing in life. There's so many changes happening at the same time. Firstly at work, I was expecting a change in department but after going through a 6 months review, the managment decided that the change is not possible. This was a change that I was expecting but it didn't happen. So the change was it didn't change.. And the only thing I could change is how I look at it. Trust God in everything he has prepared for me!!
Secondly my youth ministry. Come to think of it, I've been serving the ministry for almost 2 years. Well it's still short compared to the rest of my youth leaders who started the ministry many many years ago. And I probably have a long way to go here.. Now there were changes that I've to deal with too. After much consideration, the pastors decided to spilt up the youth ministry into 2 - Young Adults & Youths. For me, this has always been what we wanted and finally it has been put into place but what I didn't expect was the plan to shift 6 youth leaders to focus on the young adults ministry. On one end it is good as this group of people can focus on the ministry but on the other end, I've lesser leaders for the youth ministry. From next year onwards, the 2 groups will work independently on a weekly basis but will come together in terms of outreaches and church events. Because of this, the entire youth ministry has to go through a reorganisation in terms of structure and also our weekly meetings. Well I'm keen to explore new things and ideas. Just hope the idea gets through our pastor..

With all these changes in place, the challenges doesn't get lesser too. In terms of work, I was tasked to manage a project which requires me to oversee a product which I will need to think about business development, training development, maketing, reviewing of programme, etc. It's really a mounting task ahead of me!!
In the ministry, there are so many things to deal with. There are youth leaders to coach and develop, leaders/youths that have issues to settle, young adults or youth that have strayed away from God, lukewarm youths, weekly meetings, DFD, ensuring spiritual needs and emotional needs are met, planning for outreaches & events, etc. I do get physically, emotionally and spiritually drained at times. The challenges are never ending and we're also in the midst of planning for next year with the new committee. I'm excited with this new committee and looking forward to more changes coming up!!

Having to deal with changes and challenges does bring out the champion in you. No matter how tired I am, I just need to press on to finish the race!! There are 2 verses that I have been claiming. Isaiah 43:18-19 says "Do not remember the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold I will do a new thing, now it shall spring forth." I trust God will lead and guide us but its always our human nature to think about past experiences and use it instead of relaying on God which I must learn to. Sometimes I can't really think of anything as I have not experience it before and thus have no prior knowledge on how to go about doing it. The other verse is actually in today's bulletin. Isaiah 40:31 says But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint. This tells me to press on and wait on the Lord so I can be renewed and recharged!! and will not be weary in the ministry and always on fire for God!! Be a champion for Christ...

To God be the glory!!!

GEL Mission Trip (12-21 June 2010)

2010-06-25T00:02:00.000-07:00

This's year mission trip theme is One Choice, One Way, One God.

I thank God for everyone who helped make this trip possible. Firstly will be all your prayers before and during the trip. Secondly would be supporting our fund-raising. We started off with a few of us not able to go for the trip due to financial constraint. To me I believe that if your heart is willing to go, money shouldn’t be the concern. So I prayed and really ask God to provide for the youths and that is when we had our fund raising. And to my surprise, we had enough money to cover all our expenses there. Thank God for providing us with the money.

We had 10 youths with Pastor Rebecca for this trip. We had a tight schedule this year and were traveling from place to place. We went to 2 new places, Leyte and Camotes. We were involve in worship service lead by Shiyi, Charissa, Gladys, Joshua & Pearlyn. The children’s ministry was handled by Pearlyn, Sherryn, Gladys, Ian & Glendon. We attended a youth service in Lapu-Lapu, did house to house evangelism in both Leyte and Camotes. This was when we go house to house to share Step to Peace with God. We also prayed for the community.

There was this time where we prayed for this lady who had a stroke. She had difficulties moving her limbs and was seated down. When we went in the house, we shared with her the salvation message and eventually challenged her to receive Christ. She accepted Jesus into her life and we started praying for her. Slowly she could move her arms, we continued praying more fervently and then she was able to stand. We continued praying and praising God and well enough she was able to walk and lift up her hands to praise God. Sometimes we lack faith in God when we pray or do things, so this experience tells me to do my part and leave the rest to God.

Another happening incident was during our boat trip back from Leyte. We were all sound asleep in the middle of the night when suddenly I felt the boat was tipsy and I got shocked when I opened my eyes to see total darkness in the room. I went out to investigate and realised that the boat’s engine had died and thus the boat is stranded in the middle of the sea with no electricity. Wild thoughts started streaming into my mind: What if we drift to another island, Should I go wake them up? I wanted to wake Pastor Rebecca up and then I remembered about Jesus’s disciples waking him up in the middle of the storm and Jesus telling them “You of little faith.” So I prayed to God to take charge of the situation and help the crew to resolve whatever problem. I knew my work is not complete on earth yet and thus today I won’t be going to heaven. I headed into the room and saw that most of them were awake so I explained the situation and reassured them.

Overall it was a good experience to be with all my youths and thank God for 3 of them who were there for the first time. And hopefully more will want to be involved in mission work and see God work through them. Amen

My God is the God who provides

2010-04-23T16:30:00.000-07:00

Thank God for He always provides for us!!!

We know that Sophia resigned and joined another company recently. Her last day was actually in mid March and she started work on 1st April (April Fools Day-what a joke). Well she wanted a break before her new job and that was reasonable. By doing so she would get a pro-rated pay and probably her next pay would be in May since she started work in April. That got me a little worried as my pay had to sustain 2 months (Mar & Apr) which was very tough. We were like calculating the spending and seeing whether it could sustain us for that period.

Normally my bonus would come in April but looking at last year's economic I was wondering if we would still have one. Miraculously it did came!! And it came in Feb this year which is like out of the norm for the past 5 years and the amount was quite substantial that was enough to sustain us for another 2 months with extra. God is so good!!! I even bought Sophia a Nikon D90 and an Ipod which she wanted for such a long time. And her full pay came in April instead of May so we really got more than we expected!!

Sometimes simple things like this get taken for granted and so we should thank God for his grace and providence. It really gave me the confidence to do God's ministry in future.

Fear not for I am with you (Isaiah 41:10)

2010-01-28T17:31:00.000-08:00

I just completed my 4 star kayak training in Ramunia, Malaysia.

It was a tremendous experience, fun but challenging as well.

For so many yrs in OBS, kayak has never been my area of expertise and I always had the fear of capsizing and not able to roll up. I had been practising my rolls prior to this training. I know I can roll up but when placed in the sea I tend to panic. I realise it's a psychological barrier that I have to overcome.

This ramunia trip to me is not about some kayak training. I know God wants to teach me something in this trip so it's more of a spiritual trip rather than a skill training.

The people I went with were all familiar faces and people I know well. I'm glad that God put me there with all these good friends.

Then came the first day.. Goodness. The wave was like 2m high!!!! Overwhelming!!! But I still went out and trained. Capsized twice but I didn't roll up as I was afraid. I was still not comfortable at the end of day 1.

Before the start of Day 2, we were supposed to write out mistakes on a duct tape and paste it on our kayak. This serves as a reminder when we kayaking. So I just wrote 2 words on my kayak. "Have Faith". Fear represents a lack of trust in God and that is not what I want. So I put my trust in God and prayed. I thank God for His assurance as His words says in Isaiah 41:10 "Fear not for I am with you". I really thank God for his words as it brought assurance, comfort and confidence in me. I had never felt so vunerable before and this allowed me to really depend on God. Another verse that really spoke to me was in Deuteronomy 31:6 "Be strong and courageous... He will never leave you nor forsake you".

One funny incident happened. On day 2 when we were punching through the waves to get to the green. The waves were like crashing at us on the start and it was so tough to get out. Elton was the first one out and he got hit by the waves time after time.. But finally he got through. 3 girls also attempted to launch but couldn't as the waves were so strong. Eventually 3 of us managed to punch out. It was Elton, Evan and myself. When all 3 of us were out, we were like. Eh all christian.. Yeah!! And we were praising God there and then. It was a great feeling.

So needless to say I passed my 4 star award but with the grace of God upon me. Most importantly I learned a valuable lesson from God this week which I will hold dearly!!

Thank You JESUS!!!

My partner - Jasmine

Red Team - Yen Leng, Evan, Jasmine, Gek Fong & Elton

Coping with Stress

2010-01-08T01:20:00.000-08:00

1st week of 2010 at work wasn't easy.

The year started hectic and piles of work to be done in such a short time.

Well guess everyone feels this way at some point in time. It has been a long time since I felt this way.

I was feeling so stressed that I went to find out how do we cope with stress. So this verse spoke to me.

Matthew 11: 28-30

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

There's also 3 practical ways to deal with stress.

1) Pray

2) Praise

3) Meditate on God's words

Moving House - 29 Aug

2009-09-03T03:56:00.000-07:00

It's really exciting and challenging to move house. Imagine only the 2 of us and we have so much things. How about those shifting the whole house. That's madness. We chose Sat to move house as it's almost last day of the month and it was a Sat where both of us were free.

We didn't want to trouble anyone so decided to shift everything ourselves using only my car.

Everything was packed in my car and we made around 4 trips since it was so near.

Both our clothes!!!

Shoes filled the back..

Carrying it was tough job!!!

The most interesting of them all is how I shift my mattress!!!

One whole day of strenous activity but was worth everything. I'm so excited so have moved in and hoping to host you guys here in my house.

Marketplace ministers

2009-08-17T01:21:00.000-07:00

Everyone of us are called to be ministers to minister the word of God to others. A market place is somewhere we are in most of our time. Eg. school, work & home.

I had a wake up call from God today. I was working in the office and there was this cleaner doing his job, going around clearing trash and so on. I knew him by his name David. He seems to be a cheerful person everytime we say hi to him. As I was about to leave, he started talking to me. As usual, I'll also talk to him. All of a sudden, he ask me whether I'm a christian or not and I said yes. And after that we had a good conversation about Christ. He also shared about the things he did such as going from door to door to share the gospel, handling out pamphlets and even sharing the faith with our instructors!!

Now that really caught my attention! A cleaner spreading the word of God. How amazing this is. I'm not looking down at cleaners here but trying to draw the point that its not only the pastor's job to spread the word but everyone of us. From CEO to even cleaners on the street. This person is a marketplace minister. Glory be to God.

What struck me was that he single-handedly was trying to spread the word of God to our instructors. And we have so many christians as staff in our workplace. Why are we not sharing the good news with the rest? Are we complacent? Are we waiting for someone else to do the job? Think about this. If we all put our heart together, more souls will be save. *Not saying everyone just go to that individual and just pour out the gospel and make him/her believe instantly.

There's many ways to share our testimony and our faith to others. It is just a matter of how passionate we are for God. It is hard for a start but if you don't try, you'll never know. If your heart is willing, God will take care of the rest. I assure you that. So to all who are reading this, be inspired as I am by David, start slow and small. With friends it's easier to start a conversation. Don't force your ideas across. Enjoy evangelism!!

Thank God for this learning.

God's refining power

2009-08-04T20:58:00.000-07:00

God uses many ways to refine and mould us. I remembered my pastor mentioning it's like how gold is extracted out from its raw form. Gold in its raw form is useless and ugly. But when go through intense heat, pure gold is extracted out. Just like how each of us are until we are being refine by God and thus turn out to be useful servants of God. But it's always during the heat when people turn away from God as they don't see the end results.

Sophia and me had a quarrel on Sunday morning. I hate quarrels as it always spoils each of our mood. We were at church early to prepare the presentation slides for worship. So I was there helping her find the songs and inserting it. I wanted her to be the one doing so she can learn but she was sweeping the floor and preparing the communion. And I was hungry so it kind of made me irritated as she didn't set her priorities right by doing what she came here to do. Well they say a hungry man is an angry man. Everything was done on time and we started the service. I was reflecting on the words and the attitute I put things across to her. God was refining me in a way. We had a talk on that evening to sort things out.

Things that attribute to a misunderstanding
1) Each other's conception of priorities
2) Personal interest of other things(eg. breakfast)

Fun with Frisbee and Friends

2009-08-03T00:43:00.000-07:00

Our youth's monthly outing/activity. This month we went to Pasir Ris park to play frisbee. The weather was nice and sunny. I decided to bring along my guitar just to sing a few songs to praise God. So we started around 10.30am with a few worship songs and prayed. We warm up a bit and started practising our catch & throws. We soon formed into 2 groups and played for 15 mins. Good workout for everyone. We took a break and I started taking out the guitar and started singing. Soon the rest joined in and this carried on till like 12pm. Haha.. Instead of a frisbee session, we ended up singing praises and chit chatting among ourselves. I felt good about it and wanted to do a picnic outing next time. So do stay tune for the next outing. So we really ended up playing only 1 game and decided to go for lunch. We went to eHub to eat some set meal lunch with free flow of drink n ice-cream. Good and cheap!!

Met up with Weihong because his contractor was coming up to do some measurements. I'm really touched to have Weihong(contractor) and Chloe(interior designer) to help us in the renovation. Firstly they are not paid helping me, Secondly they have to take their own personal time to meet and discuss things with me, Thirdly they really take time and effort in helping us. So I really really thank them from the bottom of my heart and Sophia's too!! It's good to have these kind of friends. Thank God for them.

The day ended off with a wedding of my colleague, Clayton and Jackie. It was at Earshot Cafe, Arts house. It was a really free & easy kind of dinner compared to the 10 course dinner. Prefer this kind of wedding where we can sit/stand and mingle with the bride & groom. There were sharings made, songs sang. Nice and easy. Well more weddings to come!!

Festival of Praise 31 July

2009-08-02T23:50:00.000-07:00

The first 3 days at work was more of catching up with emails, help conduct a profiling workshop and also conduct a climbing session.

I attended a course titled "Working with youths with special needs" at NCSS on Thurs and Fri. Was a heartening course to see on-ground people working with these youths. Got to speak to a couple of them. REALLY great respect for these people! Shows how much love they have. It also reminded me to look at people's ABILITY rather than their disABILITY.

The course ended on Fri afternoon so manage to settle some of my housing matters. WE've got all the basic essentials already. We have a bedframe, wardrobe, dining table, coffee table, tv console and a sofa. Although it seems like only a few items, it has already cost us quite a lot. Will need time to get the rest.

FOP was the highlight of the day. Reached there around 6 and there was only 4 of us(ivor, ying huan, her sis and me). We went in around 6.30 booking seats for 14 people. It started aound 7.45pm with True Worshippers leading the worship. It was alright but I don't know most of their songs. Bob Fitts was next and he's the kind of musician for my parent's generation. Haha.. You know what I mean. But still he's great. Sermon by Mark Conner was wonderful. He talks about us breaking free from Worries. To have freedom from worries as stated in Matthew 6:25-34. He mentioned that majority of our worries are unnecessary(things we can control) and only 4% of our worries are real.

Stratgey to have freedom from worry(S.T.O.P)

1. Specify your worries(most of them are insignificant)

2. Take action on your worries(turn that worry into action, do something about it)

3. Offer a prayer to God(Philippians 4:6-7 Submit our thoughts to God)

4. Place trust in God(Proverbs 3:5-6 Lean on him more, put our trust in Him)

At the end of the sermon when he said "Who thinks this sermon is for you?" and to stand up if you think the word is speaking to you. I immediately stood up and thank God for the word. Cause I know I tend to worry too much, for wedding and now for house. I thank God for reminding me about this and to use the strategy which was taught. It was wonderul. I'm not a captive of my worries!!! Amen.

Heard that Planetshakers will be here for 2010. I'll be there!

FOP 2009

Hillsong United Rocks..

2009-07-27T11:20:00.000-07:00

The day started early with 5 of the youth leaders(me, Sophia, char, shiyi, ivor) attending a workshop about growing youth cells. It was attended by many other churches too. The workshop allowed us to see how other youth groups operate in Singapore and it got us thinking about how to reform our youth group. Many ideas came through my mind. But I’ll need to pray and spend more time with God to hear from him. We need to be in sync with God in order to move forward. I’m glad I could attend this workshop. Thanks be to God.

Straight after the workshop, I had to attend a church wedding. It was one of my poly rock climbing friend, Wee Li. It was held at Holy Grace Presbyterian Church along Upper East Coast Road. It was a beautiful church with a nice ambience. The ceremony was short and simple – Exchanging of vows and lighting of the unity candle. How significant! Before the matrimony started, I saw one of my girl scout, Eunice. And we started talking about life, work, etc. She talked about my wedding too and remembered how much I teared during the wedding. I was telling her how much I was touched by God and started sharing my testimony about my life story. Well she was already a Christian but sometimes by sharing we encourage each other to serve God more. So brothers and sisters in Christ, we are all part of the body and seek to uphold one another.

Saturday seems to be the busiest day of the week. From the wedding, I went to youth service and today we were going out to bless people on the street. We were doing the 100k blessing initiated by Love Singapore. I was paired up with a younger youth and it was challenging for him to just approach people and pray for them. I think it takes a lot of courage and thank God for all my youths on that day to have the boldness in them to approach people.

Now the day has not ended. After the outreach, we had to rush to expo to see Hillsong United!!! It was packed to the max but Sophia had friends to book seats for us although I long to be in front jumping. The atmosphere was fantastic. The presence of God can be felt. The band was great! Sang a lot of my favourite songs – Mighty to save, Desert Song, Inside out, etc.

Sermon was straight to the point and very relevant to youths in Singapore. It was from the passage Luke 7:11-17, Jesus raises a window’s son. The story was simple. Talks about a widow whose son died and in the middle of a funeral procession, came along this man, Jesus, that talks to this dead young man in the coffin and miraculously this young man sat up and began to speak.
How it relates to us then? Most of the time, we are carried away by the world. Alive on the outside but dead on the inside. Being carried out by the issues of the world(greed, sex, pornography, etc) and to be buried. Now comes along Jesus who gets you to Arise(wake up) from the dead so you can be saved.
How many of us are living a life of compromise? A double standard life? Many have. I was like that too. Till the day Jesus called me to WAKE UP and follow him. So arise and follow the truth.

Great sermon! More songs followed on. And both Sophia and me were jumping all around and enjoying ourselves. It all ended way too soon. We manage to buy 2 new CDs from Hillsong as they played a couple of their new songs. I thank God for having the opportunity to go for this concert as this was really God’s timing. Initially we didn’t have the tickets to go, but on Fri Matthew called us and say that his friend got 2 extra tickets as some pulled out last minute. Of course I took it. And even before going, I was quite down in spirit due to the many things in my mind. So I prayed for God to strengthen me. And well my prayer was answered. After the concert, my spirit was so lighted up and the fire burns strongly again! Amen.

Tickets for Hillsong United

Live from Expo

Household of Faith - 24 July

2009-07-26T19:01:00.000-07:00

Today is the day we are entering into the promise land.
This was the feeling I had when I woke up. After waiting so long, we’ll be getting our keys today. Really excited over it.
It was like the Israelites walking in the desert for 40 years and finally reaching the Promised Land by God.

The day started late as both of us were not working. Once again we went around shopping for furniture. Went to Sungei Kadut area and woah, there’s quite a number of furniture shops there. Huge ones! This time round we were hunting for dinning table, coffee table and tv console. Shop around 5 buildings, managed to saw a few that we like but not very like. You know what I mean. So didn’t get anything there.

Soon it was time to go HDB for the final bit of administrative work. It was short and sweet. By 1700hrs, we were owners of the new house. Amen.

But now comes the stress part – Renovation and furnishing!

Pictures of my new house..

Off Day 21 July

2009-07-20T19:50:00.000-07:00

It's refreshing to have an off day once in a while. Its not healthly to be working all the time. So to all that are working your butts off, do consider taking a break to rejuvenate yourself. One of the 7 habits of highly effective people is to sharpen the saw which means to rest physically, mentally or spiritually. This in turns will balance your work life and increase productivity.

So what am I doing on my off day? Well there's plenty of things to do.
1. Meeting my ID(interior designer) to firm up plans for my house
2. Shop for furniture
3. Bringing someone for an appointment

Sophia and I have been doing intensive furniture shopping for these few weeks. Tiring but fun going around looking at what we want for the house. We just bought a bedframe recently and saved ourselves $400. We're like furniture experts now. Haha..

New Blogger

2009-06-17T22:52:00.000-07:00

Hi all,

Thanks be to Sophia. For I'm taking over her blog. So for all the many many fans of this blog. Do conitue to give your support to me.. Haha..

Stay tune for more updates.

Kenny