And one thing more: Prepare a guest room for me, because I hope to be restored to you in answer to your prayers.
--Philemon 22 (NIV)
I found myself stuck at this verse.
Chian Ming (my CG leader) had painstakingly typed out the entire letter to Philemon because she was unaware that there were online Bible resources. As I was reading through the epistle, this verse stopped me in my tracks.
I suppose it's because of Paul's confidence that he would be released from prison, what with the instructions to prepare for his visit. And I wondered if I ever had so much faith, or at least, faith enough to make plans in anticipation of God's favourable response.
There's this story I heard a long time ago, and you might have heard it too, of how a community that was in the midst of a terrible drought got together to pray for rain. And then they stood out in the open to wait for the rain. At some point someone spotted in the crowd a girl with an umbrella, and so he/she asked her why she was carrying an umbrella. She said she wanted to be prepared for the rain.
I realise that all too often, I pray and then wait for an answer, but I do nothing to prepare myself for it. Maybe, to put it in simplistic terms, I have been treating prayer like a competition in which I submit my entry and then just wait for the results, rather than an ongoing effort like fishing or farming or helping organise a trip/reunion.
Paul's words to Philemon are an apt reminder to pray with anticipation.
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Thursday, January 17, 2008
How the past returns!
(I wrote this post in fragments and snatches over the last twelve days.)
* * * * *
If you told me three years ago that I would one day lead worship on guitar, I wouldn't believe you.
If you told me my childhood fascination with invertebrates and Mum's agreeing to buy me that first BUGS! magazine some twelve years ago would lead me to this course (and perhaps my very future!), I wouldn't believe you.
If you told me my first toy camera about ten years ago would lead me eventually to the D50 (via the Ricoh, nearly countless rolls of film and the G400) and my ever-growing passion for photography, I would have thought it incredible.
* * * * *
Laura led the second worship session at the recent PKV Leaders' Training Retreat. One of the songs we sang was 'Won't You Lord'.
Won't You Lord
Take a look at our hands
Everything we have
Use it for your plan
Won't You Lord
Take a look at our hearts
Mould it, refine it
As you set us apart
Chorus:
We want to run to the altar
And catch the fire
To stand in the gap
Between the living and the dead
Give us a heart of compassion
For a world without vision
We will make a difference
Bringing hope to our land
Bridge:
We will answer the call
To build this church without walls
Let Your glory be shown
Bring salvation to the lost
To the lost
It virtually became the LTR theme song (at least to me) when Kim Cheng drew so many lessons from it, weaving it into her message and challenge to us.
Laura. From the days in the VI's CU to a near-chance encounter at UM's Festival Seni about a year ago, and now to this... how God has weaved our lives together. Two years ago I would have never imagined serving as her colleague in university!
* * * * *
Kim Cheng shared from Romans 12:1-2.
Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God--this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will.
And this is what being a church without walls is all about.
This is what the altar means to us.
Above all this is the heart of God's work of consecration and the definition of a 'set apart' leader.
I have always found this verse difficult, and maybe for that very reason I should keep it before me especially since it is the most troublesome and incising truths that have the greatest potential to change us.
* * * * *
Pastor Vincent opened the year with Acts 1:8.
"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."
I left church that day with this question in my head; "Is this God's call to go and His promise to change us by His power?"
GT's theme this year is "The Year of EmPOWERment" (yes, spelt verbatim), and I don't think they could've found a more misrepresented word.
Among Christians in general, some cling on religiously to the word, entertaining dreams of untold power and the ability to control their lives and the lives of others around them. Others, on the other hand, are sceptical about it; surely the Gospel is a message of laying down our arms and not one of domination.
And both have their reasons and there are perhaps many other stances on the word 'power' but this is not the point.
The point is that the promise of the Spirit is a promise of power. It is the promise of a power to do what only God can, and man cannot. In Zechariah 4:6, God declares: "Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit."
Looking ahead to the months before me, I am at once overwhelmed by the immensity of the task at hand and the many challenges of balancing ministry and the 'day job' and also the challenge to turning the 'day job' into ministry and ministry into the daily job, yet at the same time I am encouraged and strengthened knowing that I can--and I must, for no human can do this by the strength of man alone--draw on a power beyond me and beyond this universe.
* * * * *
God must have a sense of humour to recruit the people he does. Surely it is not because He has limited resources, for He can raise anyone, even a donkey in the classic account of Balaam!
But such is God's nature to use the most unlikely of servants.
And such is God's nature to 'resurrect' things buried in the past and redeem them in the present in ways we can never imagine. To see all these things I knew before, taking on a new significance now... it's just beyond my comprehension. How the mistakes of the past have been redeemed, how my weaknesses have been a backdrop for the display of God's grace and mercy, how the little insignificant decisions made many years ago have shaped the many years that followed.
I journey on.
* * * * *
If you told me three years ago that I would one day lead worship on guitar, I wouldn't believe you.
If you told me my childhood fascination with invertebrates and Mum's agreeing to buy me that first BUGS! magazine some twelve years ago would lead me to this course (and perhaps my very future!), I wouldn't believe you.
If you told me my first toy camera about ten years ago would lead me eventually to the D50 (via the Ricoh, nearly countless rolls of film and the G400) and my ever-growing passion for photography, I would have thought it incredible.
* * * * *
Laura led the second worship session at the recent PKV Leaders' Training Retreat. One of the songs we sang was 'Won't You Lord'.
Won't You Lord
Take a look at our hands
Everything we have
Use it for your plan
Won't You Lord
Take a look at our hearts
Mould it, refine it
As you set us apart
Chorus:
We want to run to the altar
And catch the fire
To stand in the gap
Between the living and the dead
Give us a heart of compassion
For a world without vision
We will make a difference
Bringing hope to our land
Bridge:
We will answer the call
To build this church without walls
Let Your glory be shown
Bring salvation to the lost
To the lost
It virtually became the LTR theme song (at least to me) when Kim Cheng drew so many lessons from it, weaving it into her message and challenge to us.
Laura. From the days in the VI's CU to a near-chance encounter at UM's Festival Seni about a year ago, and now to this... how God has weaved our lives together. Two years ago I would have never imagined serving as her colleague in university!
* * * * *
Kim Cheng shared from Romans 12:1-2.
Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God--this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will.
And this is what being a church without walls is all about.
This is what the altar means to us.
Above all this is the heart of God's work of consecration and the definition of a 'set apart' leader.
I have always found this verse difficult, and maybe for that very reason I should keep it before me especially since it is the most troublesome and incising truths that have the greatest potential to change us.
* * * * *
Pastor Vincent opened the year with Acts 1:8.
"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."
I left church that day with this question in my head; "Is this God's call to go and His promise to change us by His power?"
GT's theme this year is "The Year of EmPOWERment" (yes, spelt verbatim), and I don't think they could've found a more misrepresented word.
Among Christians in general, some cling on religiously to the word, entertaining dreams of untold power and the ability to control their lives and the lives of others around them. Others, on the other hand, are sceptical about it; surely the Gospel is a message of laying down our arms and not one of domination.
And both have their reasons and there are perhaps many other stances on the word 'power' but this is not the point.
The point is that the promise of the Spirit is a promise of power. It is the promise of a power to do what only God can, and man cannot. In Zechariah 4:6, God declares: "Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit."
Looking ahead to the months before me, I am at once overwhelmed by the immensity of the task at hand and the many challenges of balancing ministry and the 'day job' and also the challenge to turning the 'day job' into ministry and ministry into the daily job, yet at the same time I am encouraged and strengthened knowing that I can--and I must, for no human can do this by the strength of man alone--draw on a power beyond me and beyond this universe.
* * * * *
God must have a sense of humour to recruit the people he does. Surely it is not because He has limited resources, for He can raise anyone, even a donkey in the classic account of Balaam!
But such is God's nature to use the most unlikely of servants.
And such is God's nature to 'resurrect' things buried in the past and redeem them in the present in ways we can never imagine. To see all these things I knew before, taking on a new significance now... it's just beyond my comprehension. How the mistakes of the past have been redeemed, how my weaknesses have been a backdrop for the display of God's grace and mercy, how the little insignificant decisions made many years ago have shaped the many years that followed.
I journey on.
Thursday, January 03, 2008
How Deep, High, Long and Wide is the Love of Christ
As bread that is broken
Use our lives
As wine that is poured out
A willing sacrifice
Empower us Father
To share the love of Christ
As bread that is broken Lord
Use our lives
~Paul Baloche and Claire Cloninger
Use our lives
As wine that is poured out
A willing sacrifice
Empower us Father
To share the love of Christ
As bread that is broken Lord
Use our lives
~Paul Baloche and Claire Cloninger
I spent the last few months of 2007 preparing for HIGHER, my church's youth camp. The preparation, and the camp itself, is an experience that I still can't put words to. I have never had the privilege to be part of something so big, with 130 odd campers, and so humbling when we caught a glimpse of God's awesome love for us. I could congratulate myself for sticking to the job and giving my all for this (which I have never done before, being normally inconsistent), etc etc, but in my heart I know it's not the complete story. I know I only did a good job because there was a strong sense of God's intention for the camp, His Higher purpose, throughout the planning. Our leaders prayed over it and gave us their complete support; church administrators helped us with food; plans that fell through came together again in the nick of time.I was especially humbled by the way everyone in the committee gave their best for the Lord through this camp. With such a cloud of witnesses, there was no reason to run half-heartedly. And I believe God has used this camp to prepare us as a community for His service in this year.
This year I want to learn a little more what it means to serve as broken bread and poured out wine. I don't think it is possible to ever come to the end of learning this. Perhaps that's what all this excitement about Jabez and enlarging our territory means. God will continue to draw us to the very edge of ourselves, our abilities. If I think I cannot possibly be more broken than I was last year, or that I have not one more drop left to give, that's when I learn how God's strength is made perfect in my weakness. I need to realise just how empty I am so that I can be filled with God's strength and love, filled to overflowing, filled to the point that my heart is stretched and my spirit enlarged. And I will have learnt more the depth of Christ's love and forgiveness, participated more in his sufferings, and anticipated more of the glory to come. That's what I want out of this year: to enter the depths of Christ's love in serving to the point of brokenness. And to remember (as the melancholic me often forgets) that in the midst of that brokenness I can still rejoice in the knowledge that what is in store will be so much greater, and worth the effort, just as Christ, knowing the glory that was ahead of him, endured the cross.
This year I want to learn a little more what it means to serve as broken bread and poured out wine. I don't think it is possible to ever come to the end of learning this. Perhaps that's what all this excitement about Jabez and enlarging our territory means. God will continue to draw us to the very edge of ourselves, our abilities. If I think I cannot possibly be more broken than I was last year, or that I have not one more drop left to give, that's when I learn how God's strength is made perfect in my weakness. I need to realise just how empty I am so that I can be filled with God's strength and love, filled to overflowing, filled to the point that my heart is stretched and my spirit enlarged. And I will have learnt more the depth of Christ's love and forgiveness, participated more in his sufferings, and anticipated more of the glory to come. That's what I want out of this year: to enter the depths of Christ's love in serving to the point of brokenness. And to remember (as the melancholic me often forgets) that in the midst of that brokenness I can still rejoice in the knowledge that what is in store will be so much greater, and worth the effort, just as Christ, knowing the glory that was ahead of him, endured the cross.
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