"Going" from 2008, "Coming" to 2009

Looking out of the window at the First World Hotel at Genting on the early morning of Boxing Day (26 Dec), this thought floated through my mind:

“I lift up my eyes to the hills,
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord,
the Maker of heaven and earth.”

It was a hectic trip with a lot of driving. It was a time to get away, a time to look back in order to move forward - to look back at 2008 and see how to move forward in 2009. Entering the Cactus Valley,

Is 2008 like the beautiful flowers that blossom for only a while, …

or like a cactus, robust and strong standing in the midst of adversity?

2008 has taught me a lot of things. It is a year with a lot of personal reflection and solitude. It is a year of learning to be still with God. It is a year of personal discipline and self study. Yes, there are storm and tension moments, but my help come from the LORD.

Many questions arose in my thoughts. Have I written and reveal too much? (Like the BoH Tea valley spread all over?)

(Or the Beautiful Garden behind the IPOH Cave nourishing others with my thoughts?)

Why aren’t the people in Bethany more forthcoming? Why the lukewarm? Is it the lacking of the knowledge of God’s Word? Or is it lacking in love and zeal for the Lord? Or are we just tourists, moving quickly from one place, look and see and then move on to another, leaving the church as the same as it is after one year? The answers lie with all of us. Still, there is no comment…

See you in 2009!!! Have a blessed new year.

“The Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore”

Why I started my blog

Blogging started 3000 years ago. It may be longer than that.

The most readable blog at that time would be about a shepherd boy. Although a shepherd himself, he was able to see himself as a sheep with His God as his shepherd. As he grew older, he made more enemies. Most times he was pursued by them. Yet he looked to God and write:

In you, O LORD, I have taken refuge;

let me never be put to shame;

deliver me in your righteousness.

Many years later, he became king. I guess that was when he decided to make his blog known. And so I have the privilege of reading his blog. So do you. Perhaps reading this shepherd turn-into king’s blog is the first place to start before one starts to write his own blog. Want to know where to read his blog? Do let me know and I will provide the information.

I too have my own encounters. I started to keep a diary a year later after I became a Christian in 1976. There seemed to be a lot of things happening after receiving Christ as Saviour and Lord. Life seems so different. At first it was about just reading the Bible. Then it was about trying to do what the Bible said. Then people became the most important things in life. It was not about success, being first in class, or the best runner in school anymore. It is not about getting. It is about giving. Giving my time to help others in their studies. Giving my energy to encourage those who just became Christians. Giving my pocket money to support the Christian servants. Life gradually started to be different. And when I gave, God gave me more in order that I could continue to give. He gave me “more time”. I didn’t need to study a lot to do well in exam. He gave me more energy. I could still be among the first few in a race even though I seldom trained due to lack of time. He gave me more money so that I could give to those in need. I seemed to be HIS channel of giving without loosing what I liked to do – studies and running. I needed to write them down. And so I started to keep a diary. But with my poor command of English, it was just my diary, my God and me. Writing helped me to listen to my heart and to God. It also helped me in sharing my life with church friends. Sometimes, I revealed too much about what God was doing in my life, people got frightened. One young Christian lady once said to me after hearing my struggle: “you are so transparent that it frightens me.” Since then, I try to be careful in my sharing. My writings got lesser and lesser. … Then the writing stopped. Those pages-old diaries are still in the shelf somewhere. Eh, don’t know where.

Then I came to Bethany. I find that people just don’t open up, except a few. Perhaps being transparent is frightening. Or perhaps we have not learn to listen ... to God or how he is working in our lives. Not sure about this.

This year, I want to be like David the shepherd boy. He doesn’t need to wear a mask. He sinned greatly and we know how he felt when we read his blog. And that is why I write mine even though I have yet to read any others blog, except David Ben Jesse’s. He cared to write. Or was it God who inspired him to write?

Blogging help to be transparent and share my heart. One day, every secret will be made known.

Share our blogs, share our hearts and remove all masks.

"Be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known. What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight, and what you have whispered in the ear in the inner rooms will be proclaimed from the roofs. (Lk 12:1-3)

Agape
Mark

The Universal Christian Language

Christians speak a kind of universal language. When they do, you kind of feel it and know it.

Rightfully, Christians should always use this language in all their conversations. Should always, but seldom. It is a language that Jesus taught His disciples. – Agape

I have just finished reading this book, God’s Smuggler by Brother Andrew. It is a very old book. I first read it about 22 years ago. Thought I would like to go through some old books that challenge me to exercise faith in God, while the sermons on the Book of Hebrews are still fresh on my mind. It is more or less an autobiography and how his works in the communist countries led to the beginning of Open Doors, a Christian para-church organization. There are 2 lessons I learn from this book – Agape and Faith.

How do we speak Agape, I wonder? This thought came to me as Brother Andrew told a clerk of a hotel in communist country Rumania that he was looking for a church. Though he didn’t know Rumanian, he could communicate with the Christians through a universal language – Agape.

Thoughts drift back to more than a decade ago, somewhere in the north …

This universal language is most powerful when we cross border and into unfamiliar ground. I experience this when I was in London. You could know who the Christians were without them telling you they were Christians when Agape was spoken. Our universal language spoke loud and clear. Being alone there and always looking out for friendship, I always spoke in that language – Agape. When I was in London, around the campus and in the dormitory, I made it a point to smile when my eyes came into contact with another. This was the beginning of my Agape language. Very few reciprocated. Probably I was an oriental and more inferior. Those who did smile back would always be greeted with nod, my second Agape language.

One day, an Indian lady came to the centralized kitchen while I was preparing lunch.

“We had a volleyball game this Saturday morning and would you care to join us?”

She caught me by surprise but gave me a hope. After more than 1 week, I had already concluded that people around the campus and in the dormitory were not that friendly. My first instinct when talking to her was that these people who went around inviting students were Christians doing evangelistic outreach. After all, I am no novice in this kind of strategies, having involved in Campus ministry for many years. Anyway, it was an opportunity to meet Christians and to get to know people. So, why not?

After the game, they invited me to their fellowship and it turned out that they were the Church of Christ, a somewhat “off-skewed group” who believed that only "those who are baptized and always doing evangelism are saved". We then had a 2-hours (till pass mid-night) debate in my room using Scriptures. That was the time I felt all my effort in Scripture Memory was really put to good use. Unable to convince me and all their quotations were put to contextual challenge, they never came to talk to me again. So much about Christian love – Agape?

Real Agape came when I happened to talk to a French classmate - Luke. By instinct, I knew he was different; it was a kind of telepathy feeling or spirit-met-spirit experience. He invited me to a Campus fellowship and I got to know more Christians and the international fellowship where most of them are Singaporean, a few Malaysian, and one Ethiopian. All of them were very young in faith but very eager to learn.

It’s time to use the Universal Christian language again.

"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. (John 13:34)

Agape
Mark Lim

Be an Agent of God’s Blessing

Some of us are familiar with what Hudson Taylor used to say: “God’s work done in God’s ways never lack God’s Supply”

Ever wonder how God really provide for those in need?

I learnt this from my previous church. We worshipped in a very old wooden hut rented from an old couple along Balestier Road. We were poor and few in number, about 20 odd of us. Before I came to this church in 1976, there were some problems and many left. According to the pastor, someone came and “steal the sheep”.

In 1982, I was in my first year in the university (as a sophomore, Polytechnic students were exempted from first year engineering) and by God’s grace had received a scholarship. I knew in my heart (a very strong feeling) that God sent the money ahead for HIS future use. How did I know? When I received the scholarship, I needed to sign a bond. The two guarantors a\were my eldest brother, who is the church treasurer and Brother Tan, a businessman and a very godly brother whom everyone respected. He has since gone to be a pastor of another church. When you are dealing with money and with godly people (who gave everything they had to God) around you, you instantly know that the money belong to God. That was how the feeling came to me but I wasn’t quite sure what God was doing then.

In 1983, the church roof leaked quite seriously after many days of continuous raining. The church was in need of money for the roof repair. I then contributed whatever was leftover from the scholarship. No one knew where the money came except Brother Tan and my brother.

The following year, my pastor was on a mission trip to Canada and required a substantial sum of money (slightly more than $2700). The pastor pleaded relentlessly through his sermon. He asked for a collection. Very few responded. I knew that God again wanted to take back what HE had entrusted to me. One non-Christian visitor announced publicly that he would give an interest free loan to the pastor. The whole congregation felt very embarrassed. After the worship service, I told my brother to use the scholarship and whatever saving I had in his bank for pastor’s mission trip. After this second incident, I knew quite clearly that I was to be God’s agent of blessing to this poor church.

In 1985, one church brother enrolled in the Philippines theological seminary. This was my last year in the university and after offering my financial support for his dedication to serve God, I actually graduated from university studies with nothing in my bank account but learning everything about God’s riches.

Shortly, thereafter, I went to USA for job training and on returning from the States left the church in 1986 due to personal reasons.

People use to think that becoming a Christian is just to gain a passport to heaven. For me, becoming a Christian is to be God’s Agent of blessing.

And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus (Phil 4:19 NIV)

Mark Lim

How to get Money for church work?

Most people go to church to worship God and make friends.

Whether the church building is beautiful or full of facilities like cafeteria, internet or game rooms actually does not matter much to most of us. We go there only once or at most twice a week and only for a few hours.

Perhaps if you work in the church, 8 hours a day for 5 days a week, then that is a different thing altogether. Bigger offices, better copier, broadband internet are all useful for those working there. But then, where do you get the money to beautify or build facilities in a non-profit organization like the church?

That is one of the topic is our every BPCES committee meeting. We had a meeting last Sunday and well, it is still about money. Money is needed for upgrading and renovation for year 2009. I believe it is even more discussed in the Elders and Deacons court. Money, Money, money and where to get money? In such a meeting, we need lawyer, accountant, financial controller and businessman. What has a blur engineer like me who play with machine and silicon (soil and mud) got to do with such a discussion? Just like someone in the congregation once told me direct in my face, “there are better people in the BPCES who can do a better job than those in the committee now” (A hint for me to step down actually, as committee discussions are always on money)

Hence, we need deacon who likes to talk about money. If not, the deacon attending such meetings will be stressed up. Deacon Casey, after attending many of such meetings has already told me that he is being stressed by all these sub-committee and has relinquished his BSG leadership. As for me, with hindsight and wisdom, I rejected the job of deacon in Bethany.

How then should a church deal with money?

Biblically speaking, tithing is not a command in the New Testament. Let’s turn to 2Cor 9:7

Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

Giving should always be done without compulsion. There is no such thing as each members should contribute $XXX a month. Each of us has to decided in his heart how much to give.
So if, we can’t get enough money, the simplest way is - don’t renovate or upgrade. It is just a building that we come once or twice a week. Of course, not many would think like me. I don’t think you do. This is where godly wisdom and faith is needed. The church leadership has to make a decision (going to the bank, going to the congregation, or going to God) to get money.

Going to the bank to get money need no faith and everybody can do that without much wisdom needed. The end result would always be more painful as we need to pay interest and still repay the money borrowed. How our church leaders make that decision is clearly seen in the past and the repercussion continue till this day.

Going to the congregation to get money, the leaders need faith in the people. People who support your vision for the church will be moved by that vision and are more willing to give.

Going to God for money, the leaders need faith in God. Do you believe God can provide money for the church needs? Yes, I have seen how God works. I will share with you in my next blog.

If we truly believe that God want us to upgrade HIS church facilities, church renovation, have more rooms for church workers, then ask God for the money! Let’s not harp at why some people are not giving enough. That is lacking in faith. And people don’t respect pastors and church leaders who lack in faith. Not sure about you. I don’t respect pastor who has no faith that God will provide for his work.

Learn from Hudson Taylor and George Mueller

Mark Lim