Reflections

FGC Sunday (2nd August): My Father Preaches For the First Time

2009-08-05T01:50:00.001+08:00

It was bound to happen sooner or later. It happened last weekend and it was interesting. My father came back to sort out some family matters and is also on his way to Korea for more ministry. Arrived on Saturday morning and as we talked on the one-hour drive back to Selayang I asked if he or my mother would like to preach in my church. For a while my father and mother had a toss-a-coin situation on who would preach. But I guess my father cannot resist the offer.

It was mid-term break so many of the MMU students were back in their hometowns. The remnants were pleasantly surprised that we had a guest speaker. One of my leaders (Melisa Ann) was also visiting family in Penang that particular week, so I did not get the exact number of people in attendance. But I think that for the first time in over a month, our attendance dropped below 40. I believe there were about 35 members last Sunday.

Even though many were missing from church, we still had our usual quota of guests. Fonie's two sisters were in town visiting. I guess it was visit-your-family week at FGC. There were also other guests that week. I feel that the church is still not ready for new members, we are still in an "incubation" period. But as I pray and meditate, it is becoming clearer what I believe is God's will for the church. Keep praying with me that the leadership of the church will be able to be sensitive to God's voice. Soon we will have to come out of our comfortable incubation mode and begin to move forward.

My father spoke about Abraham and the altars he built from various passages in Genesis. Rev. Yee Tham Wan reminded all of us that we need to continue to push ourselves in our journey with God. No matter who we are we still had room to grow.

It was also communion week so it was also a first as I served Holy Communion to my parents. I am still kind of in a daze and disbelief as I thank God for his grace, that he would use me to pastor a church. I will have to continue to grow in boldness and confidence as I minister but still keep that sense of reverant fear and priviledge for being granted such a great responsibility. At the moment it is still a shoe too big for my feet, however I want to push myself more and more to make sure I grow, and consequently because of my growth the church will grow as well.

Shekinah Community Center Sunday (July 26th): Prophetic Conference, Ipoh

2009-07-31T10:06:00.004+08:00

So I went missing for the whole of last week. I was attending a prophetic conference in Shekinah Community Center (SCC), Ipoh, a.k.a. the mothership. SCC is my church's mother church.

I was initially quite reluctant to go, firstly, Ipoh was supposed to be a small town, what could Ipoh offer that I couldn't already get in KL? Then there was also my thing about the "prophetic". Many times I just substitute prophetic with pathetic, it really didn't help when I was trying to pay attention during the conference, everytime the speaker said "prophetic", my mind automatically switches it to "pathetic". It was really funny, to me, only. A real inside joke.

So I mentally prepared myself for a week of boredom. I was prepared to fast internet, stay indoors if there weren't any place to go, and bear a week of pathetic conference. I gave up on my "P" night on Monday and left before I could catch up with anyone, I only met Ke Xin when she came earlier to twist perm my hair, but you would have already had your share of that story by now. I left my wife, daughter, friends, and internet at home and headed due north for Ipoh.

Drive alone was nice, quite therapeutic and cleansing in a way. Music blasted from my aunty's new speakers as I drove her car. I arrived slightly late and had to find the church. For a brief moment I thought my GPS got me to the wrong place, but a brief call to Pas. Henry confirmed I was in the right area. The place was littered with pubs, cafes, cyber cafes, hawkers, and even discos (some dodgier than others). During the duration of my stay I have cristened that area where SCC was located as "Sodom and Gomorrah". I figured this shouldn't be as bad as I have initially prepared for. Worse come to worse I could camp it out in the cyber cafe.

Conference already started and the prophet-speaker already has begun the seminar. I see two familiar faces, Pas. Sam (from Baguio Philippines), and Pas. D'ton (from Bangkok, Thailand). I met them earlier in the week for a dinner on the day of their arrival, I also previously met them during my trip to Bangkok. We were going to be roomies throughout this conference.

The conference was great, for me I was reminded that I need to sharpen my spiritual gifts and not just rely on physical ministry. Many of the supernatural things can't be explained or understood so I just have to trust God when it comes to those things.

During the conference the speaker prayed for the manifestation of "golden glory" and true enough gold dust started appearing on people. Pas. Nagu, being Indian (dark skinned) was the most obvious of all, his face and hands was sparkly from the gold dust.

It is interesting why God would do something like this. I guess he's God and he's just showing off. It's just fantastic when God decides to show off a little... fantabulous!

There were also people who were healed, especially those with backaches due to uneven legs. We (the participants) would pray for the legs to be lengthened and true enough legs were lengthened. Then back problems just went away, it was a miracle. Of course there was also prophecies that were made.

The conferences were held during the night so days were free. So we had time to do some shopping. I spent most of the day with the foreign pastors. Being the local, I showed them around and basically played their host. If gained nothing else from this trip, the friendship built would be well worth the effort.

During one of the days, Pas. Henry brought us all up to Cameron Highlands for a cup of tea. The foreign pastors were also here for a meeting with the various national youth directors. Vietnam and Cambodia could not make it, but Philippines and Thailand was present, and guess who represented Malaysia?

Meeting lasted about 15 minutes, and time to travel to Cameron Highlands from Ipoh is just over 1 hour. Then the rest of the time we had tea and goofed off.

Other days I spent getting to know the people of SCC as well as getting to know the area around the church. Of course the eating was one of the highlights, for me it's the fellowship around the table.

I was supposed to head back straight after the final session late Saturday night, but I finally decided after much deliberation that I would attend the worship service in SCC. It was great getting to see how things are done in the main church. I was introduced to the church, and as expected, people were fascinated at me. I know I'm not the stereotype pastor, in fact, I'm quite the opposite. My newly permed hair got even more stares. But I am happy that people don't immediately recognize me as a "pastor". I'm just a normal guy that loves Jesus and want to serve him. I do the work of a pastor, but I don't want the "stigma" that comes with being a pastor. Christians and non-believers alike often act differently (and many times weird) when they realize you're a "pastor". Pastors are just people like you and me trying to make the most out of our lives. Anyway I was introduced to SCC.

After Sunday service I had the privilege of having lunch at Howard Leow's house. Howard studies Artificial Intelligence in KL and attends our church whenever he's around. He was going to hitch a ride from me back to KL so his mother invited me over to have lunch at their home. It was a great experience for me. They were real village folks and I had an authentic Hakka meal that is rare in KL, even though I myself am a Hakka. I had the chance to embaress myself with my horrible Hakka.

I left Ipoh with a very different perception of the place then when I first came. Ipoh is ready for harvest. So many young people so near the church there, SCC needs a youth worker badly. SCC is right at the heart of the hotspot, less than 100 meters away young people meet up to eat, play, and party. Someone just needs to invite them to come eat, play, and party in the church! God please send more workers, workers who can understand and meet the needs of these young people in Ipoh! I desperately want to go back to Ipoh, but next time I want to bring a small team along with me and try to make a difference there. It will also be good bonding time for me and my small team of ministers. For now I consider this more of a recon trip. People in Ipoh get ready, I'm coming back for you soon...

I arrived in KL at 4:30pm, just in time for futsal. Perfect way to cap off this fantastic week.

10,000

2009-07-29T12:33:00.006+08:00

I came to my blog this morning and this was what I saw...

10,051 visitors and counting!

Never thought it would get this far. I hope this site has been helpful to some of you. I know my church members read me to keep updated on what's going on in my life as well as in the church. Especially those who missed service, you know who you are. Hopefully I will be able to find more time to write. I've been told that I need to read and write more, so far I've been reading but not writing. So hopefully after a while I'll be able to write more significant stuff.

Remember it all began here.

Twist 'n Perm

2009-07-23T17:30:00.016+08:00

If you're a guy and have not tried a perm before, try this!

Since last monday when I posted a facebook status saying that I will be perming my hair, messages have been coming in left, right, and center for pictures. MSN, Skype, Facebook, Gmail, even on my phone. So I figured I'd milk this for all it's worth...

For those of you who are here for the first time: a big welcome to you!

According to my personal stylist Ke Xin a.k.a. Cassandra Lioe, this is the "twist perm". Sounds groovy doesn't it? Apart from me, Ke Xin is also the hair stylist and make up artist for many other celebrities like Sarimah Ibrahim, Hannah Tan, Amber Chia, etc. However I am her main endorsee, she thinks I am young, hip, and trendy enough, and am the best candidate to represent her work. She does all my hair for free and I am a walking testament to her genius. She does take some bookings but mostly concentrates on bigger projects like weddings, magazine shoots, TV commercials, etc. You would have to be someone special to be part of her elite clientele. Here I’d like to thank her for all her hard work, she always says to me that “if you don’t look good, I don’t look good”. And so I always look good for her sake.

Without further delay, here's what you have been waiting for:

Front profile

Side profile

*Flash... so you can see the texture

A mane to tame

Tied up for that "cleaner" look

So what do you think?

FGC Sunday (July 12th): Catching Waves

2009-07-13T19:31:00.009+08:00

Sunday's Stats:

This week there were no extra guests from other churches. However I encouraged the church to take a look around and see that our church is filling up. Albeit only after 10:20 (our service starts at 10am). But it is encouraging to see that we are already moving forward. The official count was 46 people in attendance. I told them that I count people because people count. That said, I believe that it is the people and NOT the numbers. I will always build lives and not numbers because lives gives give birth to lives and numbers just give birth to numbers. Numbers will only be used as an indication of our health. Lives are our passion, the more we get the happier we'll be.

Melissa Ng & the worship team

Sunday's Message:

Pas. Henry our senior pastor was around. Second week of the month is his week, he preaches. He spoke of prayer from Luke 18, from the parable of the persistent widow and the unfair judge. It was a timely reminder for us to keep praying for our church and me, the pastor. Even before I passed the mic to him, I encouraged the church to pray with me for the church. I told them that we don't want God to bless what we are doing, but I asked that they pray we may be sensitive to what God is doing, so that our church can join in God's work, not the other way around.

Pas. Henry doing his thing

So even as we are moving forward let's keep praying as a church that we will be able to see the spiritual waves that are coming our way and catch them.

No free lunch? Think again, every Sunday only at FGC

FGC Sunday (July 5th): High Score!

2009-07-07T00:59:00.023+08:00

I guess to help me keep this blog more updated I would do a weekly reflection of the Sunday I had. It would include a short section on the events that happened in church along with some numbers and more. There will also be a section on what I felt God was saying to the church that week. I guess if I was preaching I will provide the sermon points, otherwise I'll just share what I felt God was saying to me or to the church. So here's the first of many more to come.

Sunday Stats: MMU Week

Last week was a great week for FGC, we had an attendance of over 55. That would be our highest attendance since I began my ministry in this church. There were about 15 MMU students who turned up for service because they used our church premise the day before for their CF Committee Leadership training. They spent the whole day in the church and subsequently spent the night at the church as well. I had a chance to catch up with them after worship practice. I had dinner with them and got to know some of them. However my name-nesia issue still plagues me, hopefully when I meet them again I will remember their names.

Claustrophobic, let's grow out of this place!

It was good to see the church hall almost full, it was a good foretaste of what will come. Even without the 12-15 MMU CF committee members, we still had about 40 in attendance, which is still on the high side. We just got to keep doing what we are doing. As we are now stablizing, next up will be growth. We just have to wait for God's wave, and when he sends that wave let's make sure we're watching and ready to catch that wave and ride it for all its worth. Surf's up!

Holy Communion Sunday

Sunday's Sermon: Facing The Fire

Peer pressure is not just a youth's problem, anyone with peers can feel the heat. Here is a lesson how 3 friends faced the fire and did not get fried.

1. Surround myself with support (verse 16)
What support do you have?
What kind of support do you give?
Be a positive peer pressure.

2. Set my trust in God (verse 17)
God values trust and obedience above understanding and intelligence.
Teachers, parents, pastors fail, only God never fails.

3. Stick to what's right (verse 18)
Do you know what's right?
Do you have what it takes to stick to it?

Thanks Joshua for helping with the camera and LCD.

So what did God say to you last week? If God challenged you, and if you feel comfortable, share with me your thoughts here.

What Is Church?

2009-06-19T12:56:00.007+08:00

It's been sometime since my last update. I normally try to update at least once a week but I couldn't help it as ministry in church is starting to pick up. It's not so much "doing" now, but a lot of reflecting, how ironic.

One of those main things messing with my mind and contributing to some amount of insomnia is the question of "What is Church?" and "How do we express church?" Tried posting that question to facebook-ers but the answers were generic and nothing new. I'm not saying we need to give a new answer for the sake of giving a new answer, but how can we better do this thing we call "church"? This can't be all that the church could be. Frankly sometimes church bores me to bits. I want to do so much more, I want the church to be so much more.

I might be coming across as being disillusioned or angry at "church", but that is not true. At this point in my ministry I am considering what kind of identity I want my church to develop. Every church has a certain "identity". Mention some church names and you have a mental picture. It might be a picture of the pastor, or the picture of the building, or the picture of some of the people, or a picture of some of the ministries of the church. So what kind of image do I want to project to people when I say FGC (or Foursquare Gospel Church). I have posed the question to some of the church members as this is as much their church as it is my church. What is most important to God? What should the church value most? What should the "perfect" FGC member be like?

The answer would differ one person to another. I guess we are all throwing our answers into the pot, but as the pastor I cannot let the situation where too many chefs spoil the soup happen. What is there left to do but to turn to God in prayer and seek his will in this area. Pray with me church, that his will be done in our lives.

First Things First:

2009-06-08T23:22:00.000+08:00

... getting the first things right

As our church begins our journey together we need to have a common understanding. Some common values and principles. Last week I felt the time was right to share a message about some of the most important things to Christians.

I spoke on the most basic Christian disciplines. These were the "first things". Here are the first things:

First Hour of the Day: Spending time with God
Psalm 133 - Dwell/live in God's presence; recharge; drink of the living water.

First Day of the Week: Keeping your sabbath holy
Exodus 20:8-11 - The 4th commandment; rest and worship.
Hebrews 10:24-25 - Good habit; meet more (i.e. cell group)

First Fruits of your Labour: Paying your tithes
Malachi 3:9-12 - Keyword "paying"; don't rob God; privilege & responsibility.

First Love of your Life: Sharing your love with everyone
Matthew 28:16-20 - We God's authority and presence
Revelations 2:4 - God our first love; don't grow cold.

These four things are so important in a Christian's life, even non-believers know Christians as people who observe these practices. However we should not do it just because the preacher says so, above all we must do it because we love God and want to please him. God is looking at our heart. Don't patronise God, give him what he deserves.

Keep Learning to Keep Leading

2009-06-02T12:53:00.009+08:00

By Dr John C. Maxwell

Kurt, a salesman I had just met, and I were having breakfast at the Holiday Inn in Lancaster, Ohio. He leaned forward and asked me a question that would change the way I lived and led.

“John, what is your plan for personal growth?”

I was stumped. I didn’t have a plan for personal growth. At the time, I didn’t know that I needed one!
Not wanting to look bad, I began telling Kurt all about my work schedule. For fifteen minutes I tried to convince him (and myself) that working hard was helping me to grow and reach my potential. Isn’t that the way it’s supposed to happen? You work hard, you climb the ladder, and someday you “make it”?

My futile attempt to impress Kurt was like a plane circling an airport, waiting for clearance to land. Round and round it went until I finally ran out of gas.

“You don’t have a personal plan for growth, do you?”
“No,” I finally admitted. “I guess I don’t.”
The next thing he said was life changing.
“You know, John, people don’t grow automatically,” Kurt explained. “To grow, you have to be intentional.”

That conversation took place in 1973, though it’s as clear to me as if it happened last week. It spurred me to action. I immediately adopted a plan for growth in my life. And every year, since then, I have recommitted myself to strategic, intentional growth.

For decades at conferences I’ve talked to people about the issue of personal growth. Sometimes I’ve been criticized for it. I remember a person coming up to me on one occasion and saving,

"I don’t like your plan for personal growth.”
“That’s okay,” I replied. “What’s your plan?”
“I don’t have one,” he said.
“Well, I like mine better!”

I suspect he believed that the only reason I talked about my growth plan was to sell books. What he didn’t know was that I started talking about having a personal growth plan long before I ever had a book or tape to sell. I know that people don’t reach their potential on accident. The secret to success can be found in people’s daily agendas. If they do something intentional to grow every day, they move closer to reaching their potential. If they don’t, their potential slowly slips away over the course of their lifetime.

If you want to be a good leader, you’ve got to be a good learner. I wrote my book Today Matters to try to help people with this idea. In the chapter “Defining Moments Define Your Leadership,” I shared the “Daily Dozen” that I use for personal growth. It might serve you well as a personal growth track to run on. If not, find another one. The main thing is, if you don’t have a plan for personal growth, then don’t expect to grow!

How Will You Grow?

As you seek to learn and grow as a leader, let me give you some advice about how to approach the process. After more than three decades of dedicated, continual effort to learn and grow, I offer the following suggestions:

1. Invest in Yourself First
Most leaders want to grow their business or organization. What is the one thing—more than any other—that will determine the growth of that organization? The growth of the people in the organization. And what determines the people’s growth of the leader! As long as people are following you, they will be able to go only as far as you go. If you’re not growing, they won’t be growing—either that or they will leave and go somewhere else where they can grow.

As a young leader, I spent what felt like a lot of money on books and conferences. My wife, Margaret, and I found this very difficult because we were on a very limited income. We often delayed other important expenditures so that we could invest in ourselves. Though it was difficult, those early investments have compounded, and over the years they have given me a great return by improving my leadership.

Investing in yourself first may look selfish to some of the people around you. They may even criticize you for it. But if they do, they don’t really’ understand how growth works. When airline flight attendants explaining emergency procedures tell passengers to put their own oxygen mask on first before putting masks on their children, is that instruction selfish? Of course not! The children’s safety and well-being is dependent upon their parent being able to help them. As a leader, you are responsible for your people. They are depending on you! If you’re in no shape to lead well, where does that leave them?

If you look around, you can see a pattern at work in every area of life. Employees get better after their supervisor does. Kids get better after their parents do. Students get better after their teachers do. Customers get better after the salespeople do. Likewise, followers get better after their leaders do. It is a universal principle. President Harry Truman said, “You cannot lead others until you first lead yourself.” That is possible only if you invest in yourself first.

2. Be a Continual Learner
When a leader reaches a desired position or level of training, there is a temptation to slack off. That is a dangerous place to be. Rick Warren, author of The Purpose Driven Life, says, “The moment you stop learning is the moments you stop leading.” If you want to lead, you have to learn. If you want to continue to lead, you must continue to learn. This will guarantee that you will be hungry for ever greater accomplishments. And it will help you to maintain credibility with your followers.

One of the most influential people in the golf world for many years was Harvey Penick. The author of the best-selling Harvey Penick’s Little Red Book: Lessons and Teachings from a Lifetime of Golf taught pro players such as Ben Crenshaw, Tom Kite, Kathy Wentworth, Sandra Palmer, and Mickey Wright how to improve their games. When Crenshaw won the Masters in 1995, he broke down and cried afterward because Penick, his lifelong mentor, had recently passed away.

You may be surprised to learn that Penick was largely self-taught. For decades he carried around a little red book in which he jotted down notes and observations to help him improve their game. He was a continual learner. And every time he got better, so did the people he taught. Ironically, Penick never intended to publish his notes. He simply planned to hand the book down to his son. But people convinced him to publish all the lessons he had learned over the years. As a result, people are still learning from him and benefiting from his wisdom.

In my book Winning with People, I write about the Learning Principle, which says, “Every Person We Meet Has Potential to Teach Us Something.” Maintaining an attitude of teachability is essential for being a continual learner. Contrary to popular belief, the greatest obstacle to discovery isn’t ignorance or lack of intelligence. It’s the illusion of knowledge. One of the great dangers of life is believing that you have arrived. If that happens to you, you’re done growing.

Successful people don’t see learning or achievement as a fixed destination to head for, and, having arrived, to settle into—completed and finished. Not once have I heard someone who was a continual learner talk about looking forward to coming to the end of life’s challenges. They continue to exhibit an excitement, a curiosity, or a sense of wonder. One of their most engaging characteristics is their infectious desire to keep moving into the future, generating new challenges, and living with a sense that there is more to learn and accomplish. They understand that you can’t conquer the world by staying in a safe harbor.

What kind of attitude do you have when it comes to learning? I’ve observed that people fall into one of these categories. They live in one of three zones:

The Challenge Zone: “I attempt to do what I haven’t done before.”
The Comfort Zone: “I do what I already know I can do.”
The Coasting Zone: “I don’t even do what I’ve done before.”

Everyone starts out in the challenge zone. As small babies, we have to learn to eat, talk. and walk. Then we go to school and keep learning. But there comes a time in every person’s life when they no longer have to keep trying new things. This is a pivotal time. For some people it occurs pretty early in life. For others, it comes after they achieve some degree of success. That’s when they decide which zone they will live in: the challenge zone, where they will continue to try new things, explore—and some times fail; the comfort zone, where they no longer take risks; or the coasting zone, where they don’t even try anymore. It’s a sad day when a person chooses to leave the challenge zone and stop growing. As Philips Brooks, the minister who spoke at Abraham Lincoln’s funeral, asserted, “Sad is the day for any man when he becomes absolutely satisfied with the life he is living, the thoughts that he is thinking and the deeds that he is doing; when there ceases to be forever beating at the doors of his soul a desire to do something larger which he seeks and knows he was meant and intended to do.”

There is no substitute for continual learning. Over the years I hate developed a highly disciplined growth regimen:

I read daily to grow in my personal life.
I listen daily to broaden my perspective.
I think daily to apply what I learn.
I file daily to preserve what I learn.

I try to embrace the advice of German philosopher Goethe, who said, “Never let a day pass without looking at some perfect work of art, hearing some great piece of music and reading, in part, some great book.”

Adopting this kind of regimen required me to change my mind-set. During the first few years I was in leadership, I wanted to be “Mr. Answer Man”—the expert others could come to for answers. After my conversation with Kurt in 1973, I wanted to become “Mr. Open Man”— someone with a teachable attitude who desired to grow every day. My desire is to keep growing and learning until the day I die, not only for my own benefit, but for the benefit of others. I can never afford to forget what President John E Kennedy said: “Leadership and learning are indispensable of each other.”

3. Create a Growth Environment for the People You Lead
Soon after I dedicated myself to being a granting person, I came to the realization that most working environments are not conducive to growth. Many of my friends did not want to keep growing. In their minds, they had paid their dues by attending and graduating from college. As far as they were concerned, they knew enough. They were done. In many ways, they were like the little girl who thought that she had exhausted mathematics when she had learned the twelve times table. When her grandfather said with a twinkle in his eye, “What’s thirteen times thirteen?” she scoffed, ‘Don’t be silly, Grandpa, there’s no such thing.”

The average person will try to pull down anyone around him who it working to rise above average. The road to success is uphill all the way, and most people are not willing to pay the price. Many people would rather deal with old problems than find new solutions. To be a lifelong learner, I had to get out of a stagnant environment and distance myself from people who had no desire to grow. I sought out places where growth was valued and people were growing. It helped me to change and grow—especially in the beginning of my journey.

If you are investing in yourself and have adopted the attitude of a continual learner, you may think you’ve done all you need to do in the area of personal growth. But as a leader, you have one more responsibility. You need to create a positive growth environment for the people you lead. If you don’t, the people in your organization who want to grow will find it difficult to do so, and they will eventually seek out other opportunities.

What cities a growth environment look like? I believe it has ten characteristics. It is a place where the following things occur:

• Other’s are ahead of you.
• You are continually challenged.
• Your focus is forward.
• The atmosphere is affirming.
• You are often out of your comfort zone.
• You wake up excited.
• Failure is not your enemy.
• Others are growing.
• People desire change.
• Growth is modeled and expected.

If you can create a growth environment, not only will the people in your organization grow and improve, but people with great potential will knock down your doors to become part of your team! It will transform your organization.

The People Difference

Walt Disney remarked, “I am a part of all that I have met” Whether you are trying to cross over into the ranks of continual learners or you are trying to build an organization that possesses a growth environment, the secret to success can be found in the people who surround you. People’s attitudes and actions rub off on one another.

My father loves to tell the story of the man who tried to enter his mule in the Kentucky Derby He was immediately rejected and rebuked.

“Your mule has no chance of winning a race against thoroughbreds.” the race organizers chided.
“I know,” the man replied, “but I thought the associations would do him some good.”

Being around people who are better than we are has a tendency to make us stretch and improve ourselves. That is not always comfortable, but it is always profitable. It’s said that whenever the great poet Emerson saw the great essayist Thoreau, they would ask each other: “What has become clearer to you since last we met?” Each wanted to know what the other was learning. Great people desire to bring out the greatness in others. Small people will try to put the same limits on you that they have put on themselves.

I have Kurt to thank for helping me understand the value of growth so early in my career. Within a year of my conversation with him, I could tell that I was learning, growing, and changing. It’s said that the Tartar tribes of Central Asia used to have a curse that they would use on their enemies. They didn’t tell them to get lost or to drop dead. Instead they would say, “May you stay in one place forever.” What a horrible thought! Can you imagine? I can’t.

Application Exercises
1. Do you have destination disease? If you think you have arrived (or can someday arrive) by achieving a certain position, acquiring a particular degree or credential, or earning a certain level of income, then you are in danger of finding yourself in either the comfort or coasting zone. What are you doing to guard against that? Make sure that your long-term personal goals are growth oriented instead of destination oriented.

2. What is your plan? Let me be the Kurt in your life by asking the question. “What is your plan for personal growth?” Working hard and putting in long hours does not ensure growth. Neither does promotion. What will you do this week, this month, and this year to actively grow. I would recommend that you read a minimum of one growth-oriented book a month and listen to a minimum of one growth-oriented CD or tape a month. In addition, schedule yourself for an annual conference or growth-oriented retreat.

3. Are you creating a growth environment? If you possess any kind of leadership position, you are responsible for creating a growth environment for the people who work for you. Use the guidelines from the chapter to start creating one. Remember, a growth environment is one in which

Check list:

Others are ahead of them (this means you are growing).
They are continually challenged.
The focus is forward (on the future, not past mistakes).
The atmosphere is affirming.
They are often out of their comfort zone (but not their strength zone).
They wake up excited (they are excited about coming to work).
Failure is not their enemy (they are allowed to take risks).
Others are growing (you must place a high value on growth for everyone).
People desire change.
Growth is modeled and expected (by you and others).

The View From Behind The Mic Stand

2009-05-30T13:41:00.005+08:00

So my good friend Joash, who was one of those who insisted I start a blog, has recently been blogging much less actively. So something that happened almost a month ago is only showing up on his blog today. Mind you this was the person who once preferred to stay back and blog while I wanted to go out for a walk, or anything else for that matter, since we were in Baguio. I felt like anything is better than just staying inside. Anyway we finally got him out by baiting him with food!

I felt I should highlight his recent post here so that some of you guys can read his account of what happened in my church on Mothers' Day. Click on the picture or check out Joash Chan's link on my blog.

Joash and Ken, you guys did a great job. I'm sure my guitar had a part to play in that. We'll have you guys back again next time if you're up for it.

As for our worship team, we're off on our way and in the right direction. I predict that in about 3 months we will be seeing marked improvements in the worship team. But worship is not just about the worship team and the music, as a church we need to constantly learn to express ourselves better in our worship to God. Looking forward to better days as God brings us on this adventure of getting to know him better.

Paraders of the Lost Ark

2009-05-22T01:30:00.010+08:00

I preached in church last week, but because of the internet outage, my meeting with Tim Hughes on Tuesday night, Phinehas Mathius' visit from Taiping, and a few other things that happened I have not been able to update the blog.

Last week we were supposed to have a worship team meeting in the afternoon after lunch. It was also in line with our current theme of legacy. I spoke about worship in church. I used the incident from 1 Chronicles 13 to learn a few lessons on how our church should or should not worship.

The background to the incident in 1 Chronicles 13 can be found in 1 Samuel 4-7:

1 Samuel 4 - Ichabod Incident

1 Samuel 5 - The Lost Ark in Philistine

1 Samuel 6 - Lost Ark Found

1 Samuel 7 - The Ark in Kiriath Jearim

The message was basically split into two parts: what we should do in worship, what we should NOT do in worship. Lessons learnt were not only applicable to worship, but also applicable to our ministry and life. Here are the main points of the sermon:

1. Everybody's Way (1 Chronicles 13:1-4)

2. Other People's Way (1 Chronicles 13:7-8)

3. Frivolous Way (1 Chronicles 9-12)

4. God's Prescribed Way (1 Chronicles 15)

As we go about in life let's not do things "Everybody's Way" to please everybody. We should also avoid doing things "Other People's Way", just because other people are doing is not a reason for us to copy, especially in terms of music in the context of worship. The "Frivolous Way" also does not please God, we must also use our brains as we worship, worship must be thoughtful. Instead of these "ways", we must actively seek God and do his ministry his way.

As our worship team and church is now just taking off with a fresh start, let's make sure our foundation is strong. Let's really work on the fundamentals so that in the long run we will not limit our growth. The longer we go on the more obvious it is if our foundation is strong or weak. Let's get it right right from the start. It is an exciting time for many of us as we experience a fresh start. This is our chance to get it right again, this is the chance NOT to make the same mistakes again, this is what it means to have a fresh start!

Falling In Love With Jesus by Jonathan Butler

2009-05-21T15:36:00.004+08:00

Beautiful song. Check out other songs by Jonathan Butler, I previously made another post on his song "We Need You Lord", just use the "Search This Blog" widget on the right side.

Falling in love with Jesus
Falling in love with Jesus
Falling in love with Jesus
Falling in love with Jesus
Was the best thing I ever, ever done

In His arms I feel protected
In His arms never disconnected
In HIs arms I feel protected
There's no place I'd rather rather be

Amen.

Mikayla Asks For A Drink

2009-05-15T16:55:00.001+08:00

This is a video of Mikayla when she just turned one. We taught her some sign language and by that time she knew how to sign for milk. However, we did not teach her how to sign for water. Watch as she improvises.

When she finally gets what she wants she enjoys her well earned drink. Smart girl!

Mothers' Day

2009-05-12T23:12:00.012+08:00

Kinda late now I know, but I have always maintained that this blog lives for my life and not my life living for my blog. So if there is "living" to do, I'll do that first, my online life takes a backseat to my real life. In case you didn't know, I have a life.

As (almost) all other church, we had a good Mothers' Day celebration. I managed to put together a very nice gift package for the moms in FGC. I'm proud of it and won't mind getting something like that for fathers' day next month, the free movie passes take the cake (*hint hint*). Apart form that there was also a cosmetic voucher from MakeUup. My friend will be bringing some products to FGC one of these weeks and you can all check it out then. Otherwise, check out the site and make your order there. I also want to thank Jackie for her help in getting very nice freebies from Giant/Guardian. The moms were all buzzing about how nice the gifts were.

Pastor Nellie Chan spoke very motherly about mothers and children, and even as a father I felt that I had to apply what was preached to my life. I have to learn to enjoy Mikayla more now. Joash who came along initially as his mom’s driver for the day worship led. Ken Chung came along with him to play the keyboards. Both of them have been inactive in their own worship ministries but they too enjoyed ministering that morning. It was a good time of worship, Joash, Ken Chung and the rest of our worship team did a good job. I hope the atmosphere of worship in our church will continue to build up momentum. I’m looking forward to more vibrant worship sessions. Coming Sunday we will be having a worship team meeting to meet and just discuss briefly about the ministry.

After the service I spent some time jamming with Jay Sern and Jee Hor, and when they left I experienced my first time alone in the church. It felt weird being in my own church and feeling kinda off. Anyway I did some stuff, tidied up and left to spend some time with my mother in-law. I had my lunch at church so I missed the Vietnamese lunch with the family but I was there for cake at sister in-law's place.

When we got home the house phone rang, normally only a few people call our house phone: the bank (or sales people from the bank), various other sales people, my Aunty Kim Mooi’s family (who lives nearby), or my parents calling from Baguio. It was my parents.

This year I decided to do something for my mom even though she’s in Philippines. Previous years we occasionally bought her something, but this year I decided to call up my good friend Brian Lopez in Baguio and ask him to help me buy some flowers for my mom. That was what happened and I heard from my father that my mom was moved to tears because of the flowers. The grandmother (and grandfather) then spent close to an hour, maybe more than that on Skype talking to Mikayla, Melanie, me, and Elroi.

After the Skype session, since it was mothers’ day, I went to make dinner while Melanie went outside to play water with Mikayla. Mikayla really enjoys it. As I was preparing dinner the house phone rang again, this time it was Aunty Kim Mooi, she asked us over to her house for Bah Kut Teh. We packed some of our half cooked stuff and walked over to her house for their mothers’ day dinner. So that was mothers’ day all day.

Here are some sights and sounds of our mothers’ day…

Joash worship leading, I was playing lead guitar which is a first for FGC

Joash using my beautiful guitar, that's why he did such a good job

Worshipping through our giving as well

The kids wishing the moms

Guest speaker: Nellie Chan

Pas. Nellie spoke of how mothers build their children's lives

I heard what was spoken and decided that I too had to put to practice what was preached

The lunch I didn't have, but I'm glad to be able to spend time with the church members

Mikayla unwinding by reading a good book

Mikayla getting wet and dirty before her shower

Ready, aim, fire!

Here's the video of the kids' mothers' day greeting. Could not get camera turned on in time for Nicole and Jonas, but I did get Brighton. I'm waiting for the day when Mikayla I can see Mikayla doing something like this, she's so cute, she'll melt my heart. Yes, I'm biased, But Mikayla is the cutest!

Here is an interesting video I found on Youtube, I would like to dedicate this to my mother, Mikayla's mother, my mother in-law, my step mother in-law, and all the other "mothers" that God has placed in my life... God bless you all.

Faith Fighters Revisited

2009-05-09T02:34:00.002+08:00

Faith Fighter

Click here to play this game

This will knock your socks off, literally! I tried all the characters (a.k.a. gods). The secret boss character is so IMBA!

Big Heavy Balls & Creepy Communal Shoes

2009-05-05T09:52:00.027+08:00

So I found out that FGC (which is in USJ) is relatively near to Multimedia University in Cyberjaya. Explains why there were so many former and current MMU students in our church. I always thought Cyberjaya, Putra Heights, yes, even USJ were in a land far far away. Now that I have started to travel more to church and cell groups these places seem to be getting nearer. I guess a lot of it is psychological, the rest of it is just about having a good old fashion... GPS!

Since many of the students are away from home, they would need to find a church to belong to for the duration of the studies here. So to welcome them and show our love we decided to take them for some kind of outing. Being busy students they are only free when they come to church, and since our church provided lunch every week, and dinner was too far away from lunch, we thought of doing an activity together. We decided the best thing for us is to bowl it out.

Bowling day came and there was quite a buzz. It's good to see that the church program is actually relevant to them. The youth that normally meet on Sunday afternoon joined in on the fun. Service was great, then after lunch the MMU students had their usual jamming session. Some of them coming from bigger churches are glad that our church instruments were available to anyone who wanted to jam. I was able to join them last week and show that I can hang with them, in a musical sense. Lucky for me they played songs that I already practiced, otherwise they might discover my noobness, and thus reject me as a noob.

After our jamming session we all hopped on our wheels and rolled on over to The Summit down the road. We all gathered at the bowling alley, and got ourselves organized into four teams on four lanes. Then the trash talk started. It goes without saying that my team that was made up of Deric, Wei Hann, and Bryan ultimately won. I currently hold the highest score in a game when I scored 121 in my first game. However, as usual, I totally sucked at my second game, scoring under 100 points even, but let's not go there...

At the end of the first round, Deric who was my team mate and main contender for best bowler award, realized that there was a dark horse right over our shoulders. Charis, of all people, was right on our heels! Of all the big chunky guys there, throwing their 12, 13, 14 pound balls down the lane, it was Charis' taichi like style of just releasing her 9 (or 10, can't remember) pound ball that took the spoils of the day. After combining total scored of both games, Charis had the highest score. I think she finally beat me by a mere 10 points.

The second round was really unlucky for me, I just could not close my frames. Out of ten frames I scored 9 in SEVEN frames!!! Two other frames were marginally less than 9, and the final frame I finally scored a spare, but alas, the mojo came back too late. Lady Luck was really not on my side.

Here I must reiterate that bowling is, in fact, a team sport, ultimately our team won. That's all that counts really. Deric and I was busy coaching Wei Hann and Bryan that we lost our focus. In the end our strategy went exactly as we planned. By the second game, both Bryan and Wei Hann showed dramatic improvements and more than made up my low score. We were a tight team, we played for each other. Whenever we missed we felt as though we let our team down, that was the kind of camaraderie that we are talking about. That's when all the drama happened. We cheered each other on unlike the teams that were indifferent. We wore our hearts on our sleeves and played with all our livers. We were also the only team to have laid hands on our balls before we started our game, so we dedicate our win to God's glory... amen!

Everyone had a great time, especially since the whole thing was free! Everything is more fun when it is free. The church was very generous and paid for everyone's bowling. I think we should do this more in the future. We all had a chance to talk to each other, even though it was mostly trash talk, we all felt we knew got to know each other better through the trash talking. We should also do this so that we can prove that Charis just had a fluke day. It was really unfair as she was worship leading that week and God liked her worship leading so God was quite biased that day.

In the aftermath of throwing big heavy balls and smelly shoes worn by too many creepy feet (*shudders at the thought of creepy feet), I am filled with excitment, yes excitment, at the prospect of our church being able to do a work in reaching out to the college students. I hope that they will be able to grow in FGC and by the time they finish their studies in MMU (or whatever other college) we will send them home stronger in their faith than they have ever been. God help FGC make a difference.

To Boldly Go Where No Man Has Gone

2009-05-04T19:32:00.012+08:00

Yes that would be the line from Star Trek. I felt last Sunday's sermon was like my inauguration speech. The first time I preached in FGC it was Easter, and I had to preach an Easter sermon, but now two months into my ministry in FGC I felt comfortable and ready enough to share a very general idea of what I would like to see happen in FGC. It was very much a sermon cum vision casting session... “Change we can believe in”?

Our church is very much like the Starship Enterprise. If you remember Jean Luc Picard who is the captain of the ship will lead the whole ship with the help of his commanders and lieutenants. The rest of the ship, whether they are in the engine room, or on the bridge, or in the sick bay, or wherever on the ship you trekkies can think of, will work together so that they can reach a common goal. Being stuck on the same ship means that whether they like it or not they have to bear with one another as they will share the same fate and same destination. They need to be united and protect their ship, to keep the ship moving along, or they will be sucked into the vacuum of space. And like Starship Enterprise, FGC will have to boldly go where no man has gone before.

Need to get myself better pix that I can post here...

Being in transition I felt it was appropriate to share the Israelites' and Joshua's experience of their transition. The text is Joshua 1:6-9. At this point in Israelite history, they too were experiencing a transition, they too had a change of leadership. The book of Deuteronomy ends with the death of Moses the greatest ever prophet, the humblest man on the face of the earth, a great leader, and an all round great dude. Joshua also begins with God telling Joshua "Moses my servant is dead". This was an indication of the end of an era, and the commencement of another. In order for the Israelites to enter the promised land the Moses generation had to die. Now was it was the next generation, it was the Joshua Generation.

Now as Joshua took over he was not naïve, or blur, or power hungry, or anything like that. Joshua for one would have felt the great burden of the insurmountable task before him because he knew what the Israelites really were like. He has been Moses' assistant all these time and have seen the way the Israelites grumbled and murmured, he also seen how fickle they were, as well as how rebellious they were. We can safely say that Joshua would have been petrified at the prospect of leading this bunch of misfits.

In the same way, I too felt overwhelmed at the prospect of leading an entire church. People looking to me for advice on life decisions, families looking to me to lead them and show them the way. Blows my mind. All these while I was readying myself for youth ministry or something like that, but taking on an entire church was one of the last things on my mind, but I believe I heard God's calling and I had to obey. The verses from Joshua 1:6-9 is a real encouragement to me, and I felt that what God has spoken to my heart from this passage would also apply to FGC.
So now that Moses is gone Joshua had to step up. Moses’ generation had their share of miracles, crossing of the red sea, manna from the sky, the pillar of cloud/fire, etc. Now Joshua’s generation would have their own experiences, they would have to experience their own crossing (River Jordan in high season), the walls of Jericho and various other victorious battles, etc. That would be what we had before our church as we move forward from where we are now.

Here’s the breakdown of the sermon:
Title: To Boldly Go Where No Man Has Gone Before ...(cue Star Trek sound track)
Text: Joshua 1:6-9
Points:
Divine Task (verse 6)
Divine Word (verse 7-8)
Divine Presence (verse 9)

For the FGC members who did not make it to service last week, you guys missed what I felt was the best service in FGC so far. I felt strongly for the sermon preached but apart from that Charis and the worship team did a great job during the worship session. It was also Holy Communion week and being able to partake of the Lord’s Supper together as a church on such a week was so meaningful. After lunch, there was also an outing with the group of students from MMU. Some of the former MMU students and the high school students joined in on the fun, but that would be a whole other post.

I am excited. I am looking forward to moving forward. There would be times where FGC would have to first take a step backwards before moving forward, if that is the case then we will go at that with all our hearts. I am anticipating God’s new work in our church and lives. Let’s keep our fingers firmly on the pulse of God and expect something new. Today is a new day, let’s leave the past behind and begin to dream God’s dreams. Let’s pray for God to show us his vision for FGC. God wants growth for his church, and FGC is his church, let’s build his church his way. Pray with me church, pray that we will be able to fulfill his will for our church. Greater days are ahead.

Once Saved Always Saved?

2009-04-25T16:28:00.006+08:00

So I initially started this blog as a place to reflect on some theological issues for my studies in BCM. Check out my first blog post if you're interested to know more about how and why this blog is here. It has been some time now since I made any "theological" posts. But last Thursday during the Kepong cell (which is somehow located in Kota Damansara), Joel, who was leading the cell, brought up this question:

"Once saved always saved?"

So here's a chance for us (the cell members and you, the reader) to interact more on that question without being worried about the time constraint and needing to give one minute answers...

Among some verses mentioned during our cell discussion was 1 John 1:9 as well as Philippians 2:12. I'm sure there are so many other verses that can be brought up, so as we discuss you can go ahead and back it up with your choice of verses.

On this issue some people propagate that we have to constantly confess our sins, lest we die with unconfessed sins and thus cause us to go to hell. People who believe this are clearly against the "once saved always saved" doctrine.

On the flip side of the coin, there are others who claim that after we have accepted Jesus as our personal Lord and saviour it doesn't matter what we do anymore, our ticket to heaven is bought and pain in full, so we can live our lives in whatever way we please. People who hold to this view is for the doctrine of "once saved always saved".

I do not think there is a clear cut answer. Theologians to this very day still debate on this matter, only when we get to heaven will we really know for sure if this doctrine is right or wrong, or if it is a tension or certain mixture of this two opposing ideas. But I believe God gave us a brain, and I think God would like for us to use it (otherwise he would have created us without a brain). I do not appreciate Christians who want to reject theology as irrelevant to Christian life. What we believe (or don't believe) will determine how we live our lives. Even the smallest things make a big difference on a long run. So let's try to dig in here so that we can live a more "Christian" life, so to speak.

Feel free to express, as we interact I hope we will be able to better understand God and soteriology (meaning the doctrine of Salvation... have to throw in the theological term there), and thus cause us to grow in our faith.

I will also put up the very first poll on this blog, and it's not about whether I should cut my hair and how it should look. So check it out and leave your mark there as well.

Looking forward to growing with you.

PowerShot SX110 IS

2009-04-17T14:02:00.005+08:00

Some of you might have noticed an increase in pictures in my blog. This is because my parents gave me a superb digital camera for Christmas. The camera is too good for this site, if I really want to show of the quality of the shots I'll have to sign up for Flickr or Picasa of something else, but here this is all you get.

The camera is a cross between an actual SLR and a compact camera. But the camera has been set up so well that some pro photographers like Prakash, Kenneth Hiew, and Elroi (my brother), have been very impressed by it. They are particularly impressed by the macro shots, which is like a microscope I tell you! The camera has what I call a noob mode and also has manual mode where all there are enough settings for any pro to make a very decent shot. On top of that, it's all wrapped up in a reasonably small size (compared to DSLRs), it fits in the same pouch as Canon's compact models.

The zoom too is to boast about, 10X optical zoom. Not a fan of the image stabilizer though, it gets in my way more than it helps. The metering is also not helpful when I use the flash. That one will require a lot of guesswork and even more time with my camera to get familiarize and get that shot. But for now I still blame myself for being untrained with cameras, but I thank God (and my parents) for giving me this camera. It has allowed me to experiment and better understand what a camera is all about.

So if you all appreciate the new look of the blog (with way more pictures), you know where the pictures came from. For one, I know Melanie is enjoying taking pictures, and yes, even videos of Mikayla, and when Mikayla grows up, she will realize that she has lots of high quality shots to choose from for her wedding day slide show. I know, that's kind of far off, but parents are paranoid that way.

Vital Statistics

2009-04-15T15:12:00.000+08:00

Many people have been asking me about my new church. Many are asking where the church is so I guess the best thing is to put a map here on my blog. Along with it are more answers to many of the FAQs I've been getting. So check it out...

Church: Foursquare Gospel Church, USJ

Main Service: 10:00am (Sundays); free lunch, believe it!
Average attendance: about 40
Cell groups: 8:30pm USJ (Wednesday), Kepong (Thursday), Putra Heights (Friday)
Youth Service: 12:30pm (Sundays)
Address: 21-2, Jalan USJ 21/3, 47630 Subang Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia.

View My Saved Places in a larger map

Pastor: Lemuel Yee
Demography: Made up of mostly young working adults, fresh grads, college students; and 3 or 4 families.
Denomination: The Foursquare Church (Pentecostal)
Links:
The Foursquare Church - http://www.foursquare.org/
Foursquare Gospel Church of Malaysia - http://www.foursquaremalaysia.org/

Curious?: Drop by to find out more...

Scenes from Baguio

2009-04-13T14:06:00.010+08:00

Here's more on my recent trip to Baguio. Yes, I know you all prefer pictures to words so here's a lot of pictures accompanied by just enough words for you to know what the pictures are about.

"Isdaan", meaning fish (pronounced as is-da-an), is a floating restaurant. It's a real tourist place so if any of you are planning to visit my parents in Baguio I'm quite certain you'll be recommended and/or brought to this place. Prices are kind of "touristy" as well, although it is worth the one-time experience.

Flying to Clark Field via AirAsia we left our home in Selayang at 4:30am, hitched a ride from our aunty Kim Mooi to Sentral Station, took a bus to LCCT, then went through the whole flying thing, then another 1 hour van ride before arriving at this oasis-like restaurant at about 1:30pm. The restaurant is along the route to Baguio. Here's a good place to take a lunch break.

Food is good, do not miss out on the liempo here. Liempo is marinated pork, much like char siew but juicier, sweeter, tastier, and way fatter. The barbecue (inihaw) stuff there is good, so go with those, but also look out for "black rice", which is rice cooked in squid ink.

Not just a lunch break, but also a photo break. After a good meal everyone's more willing to show that teeth are not just for chewing. Filipinos (a.k.a. Pinoys) love taking pictures, so at places of interests there are always scenes set up for photos.

Mikayla followed her grandparents over to Baguio about 10 days earlier, this was the first time Melanie and I are away from Mikayla for an extended period of time. Melanie misses her sorely while I thoroughly enjoyed my break. It was very much needed for both of us. When we got to Baguio a full 4 hours later, we find Mikayla sleeping, she has grown more hair. She still remembers us of course, but was kind of confused. She had that look of what-are-you-doing-here on her face. Melanie quickly rebonded with Mikayla while I was still trying to extend our break from each other.

This trip was about my father's inauguration. So after a full day of travelling the second day was all about the graduation and inauguration ceremony. There was quite a Malaysian contingent there. I guess it's safe to say that AG Malaysia is standing behind my father and mother. Rev. Ong Seck Leang, the general superintendent of Malaysia was there; Rev Chris Pak and Rev. Chin Keng Leong were representing the AG Malaysia's World Missions Department; Rev. Lim Yeu Chuen was there as part of the APTS board of directors representing Malaysia.

Apart from Malaysians there were AG leaders from all over Asia Pacific gathered on that mountain. All were there showing approval and support for my father's appointment. The graduation ceremony was first to go. Dr. Wonsuk Ma was the speaker, he spoke a message that I felt was prophetic. Then the inauguration commenced. The ceremonies were very solemn and "proper", but count on my dad to break the ice. He cracked everyone up with his comment about Academic Deans being likened to a terrorist.

Of course he got down to business announcing to everyone present his plans to occupy APTS, to make full use of the APTS facilities. That much I can remember, he did mention few other things but that was the main gist of it.

The faculty, staff, alumni, and board or APTS pledged their help and support to their new president. The president then pledged to do his best with God's help.

Of course being pentecostal there was prayer with the laying on of hands. Rev. Ong Seck Leang was there to lead the prayer of dedication for the new president and his wife (a.k.a. my parents).

And of course being Asians there was the makan time (a.k.a. kain time, the pinoy version of the same thing). There was time to meet and catch up with some people that we have met there in our past visits, those who were still there at least.

The AG World Mission Department chairperson (Rev Chris Pak) and WMD committee member (Rev. Chin Keng Leong) flew in on the same flight we did but were due to leave the next morning. It was in and out for them.

Next day we had the best burgers for lunch - Hotshots. Those who have been there will know what I'm talking about. The pizzas there are good as well, but for me, the burgers take the cake. By the way there is also a nice cake place there as well, but still, the burgers take the cake.

Seriously, next time I'm going to try to tapau these babies. But nothing beats eating them while they are hot off the grill (not boiler, not hot plate, GRILL, you can taste it!). Great burgers eaten outside in the mild mountain weather with such a beautiful backdrop makes it a perfect lunch. I'll be dreaming of it till I'm there again.

Yes, if you follow me there, I'll make sure we get us to the Filling Station then you can taste the burgers yourself and find out what the hype is about.

Day 4 started with a luxuriour brunch at The Manor. The exclusive resort is relatively cheap, but nothing beats staying on APTS. The view in APTS is just as good but is less crowded and even more exclusive.

Like other tourist locations there were also many photo ops at The Manor. This is the view from The Manor's observation deck.

Melanie never ceases to amaze me the way she sacrifices for Mikayla, seriously, she's making me look bad...

Well we have been to Baguio enough times to have seen all the sights. So most of our time was really spent shopping and just hanging out in places like the Filling Station. We also made sure we went to the local wet market and bought us a great stash of very fresh seafood. Yes, fresh seafood up in the mountains at prices you won't believe! Baguio is an hour away from the sea and we had oysters, muscles, clams, and prawns so fresh and big they beat KL's Japanese restaurants! All that at the price that is really just loose change! We were initially worried that the seafood were not fresh or clean and did not go all out, but after this experience, next time we have to go a bit further with the seafood.

Firsts

2009-04-13T10:30:00.008+08:00

It's been a little over a month since I joined Foursquare Gospel Church (FGC). I've been here since 1st March. I have been tying up a lot of loose ends from my previous time in Canaan as well as some personal plans that I have made. I had travelled to Philippines to cheer my father on as he was inaugurated as the first asian president of APTS. Managed to catch up with my family. Elroi and Ian works crazy hours and office is really their home, and my office is my home (I work from home). There was also a trip to Thailand that Pas. Henry asked me to join him, and before that was the AG Ministers' Retreat. Now I can finally say that they are all behind me and I am ready to kick into gear and get focused on FGC.

Good Friday was celebrated with a "Tabernacle Worship Concert". We had an extended worship time, mixed in with a little prayer time for our church, followed by a flash presentation entitled "He Chose The Nails", then another first - I served Holy Communion to the church. It was interesting to note that FGC uses cornflakes for the bread. Everything went well, although I wished I paid more attention in BCM! We also had a great feast after the Good Friday service. There were many newcomers (a.k.a. noobs) that day, some of which will turn up on Easter Sunday as well. Ke Xin, Keith, Susie, and Chris finally turned up at my church, it was their first time at my church. I hope they will be able to find a church that is suitable for them. If you guys are reading this post... Hurry up and settled down with a church, there is so much more that God has in stored for your lives!

I also had to attend my cousin's farewell dinner on Saturday. Keisha and Serenity will be leaving to New Zealand to live with their father. I was considering on skipping this one as I was really not feeling well, but I had promised aunty Tham Ping that I will be there and I also wanted to say good bye to my cousins. I did not have enough energy to spend more time with them, also I did not want them to get sick as well. I left the dinner early and spent the rest of the evening under covers and perfecting my Easter sermon as much as I can.

Easter morning dawned on me and I was feeling much better, although I was still not completely recovered I was well enough. All night I was claiming God's promise that by his stripes I am healed. I was happy that I am not bed ridden. I worked hard on my sermon and I really wanted to share it with my congregation. Before the service started I whacked some flu medicine and some PCM. I was hoping the drug will keep me stoned long enough to get me through the sermon.

Initially it seemed as though there would be quite a few people attending service. I still don't know what the regular attendance is, I just assumed that there would be about 25 people on a regular Sunday. However as the worship went on people started to come in. By the time I took the mic the church was quite filled up. I think there was about 35 people there. My estimation might still be way off as there would be some getting used to before I can make more precise estimates. Announcements were made and then I started my first sermon to my church. Here are the main points of the sermon:

Text: Luke 24:36-49

Points:

Easter means Complete Peace (verse 36-38)
Easter means Unbelievable Joy (verse 39-43)
Easter means Eternal Hope (verse 44-45)
Easter means a Powerful Witness (verse 46-49)

I'm sure I will be experiencing many other "firsts" here in FGC. I am relishing the challenge before me. Next week 19th of April, on Sunday, I will be having my first meeting with the church deacons. Looking forward working with the deacons and with God to grow his church.

This post is so scattered. The drugs running through my system has got me all messed up. Just felt that I need to make a new post to update everyone on what's going on. Need to sign off here and do something that requires less brain activity (like DotA).

I Woke Up to...

2009-04-02T11:47:00.000+08:00

...this view. This is from the balcony at my parent's apartment in APTS. Stunning.

The pictures really don't do justice, you got to see it for yourself.

It just makes me think about God and his beauty.

I also woke up to this (but this happened later in the afternoon):

Today at about 1pm, my father was inaugurated as the 9th president of APTS. He was also the first president from an Asian country. It's really a season of change, I really sense a difference in the spiritual climate. I want to discern and follow where God wants me to go and where he wants me to change.

Everyone's excited, everyone's proud. Pastors Ong Seck Leang, Chris Pak, Chin Keng Leong, and Lim Yeu Chuen and others flew all the way from Malasyia flew over to show their support.

The president was commissioned then he gives his inauguration speech.

Then the APTS board members prayed for him. Pas. Ong Seck Leang led the prayer of dedication for my parents.

Later that day, after all the fanfare of the inauguration and graduation ceremony, we hit the city. Tonight it was mostly makan time. We were "asian" enough to be able to try out all the local street stuff.

Of course there had to be balut! Bobby and Sarah you all didn't make it here because your parents didn't allow... this is what you're missing out on!

Balut is the egg of a duck which is almost matured. There are a few "grades", 14 day old, 21 day old, etc. I tried it before, didn't like the texture, but Elroi and Ian seemed to really enjoy it, I should have a go at it again soon.

Jackie who travelled with us almost threw up. She was all red-eyed and teared up and couldn't bear the sight. Melanie and Anne has yet to taste the whole thing, they just took a few nibbles. At the end I had a taste of the leftovers, the egg white part, but that wasn't nice. Got to get me the duck itself.

That's just a short update, we're on our way out for some sight seeing and hopefully a lot of shopping.

We Miss You Mikayla

2009-03-31T03:04:00.014+08:00

Mikayla!

Mommy and daddy miss you very much. Your mommy is really feeling it, I guess it's a maternal thing. Daddy misses you too, but being the dude around the house requires some cool, so...

Mommy and daddy have been looking at all your pix and vids. Mommy mostly viewing, whereas daddy was mostly aranging and sorting all the pix out. Mommy and daddy are different in that way. I always like doing stuff, rather than sitting down. Our library is now really neat and chronologically in order. That awesome camera your gong gong and popo gave to us for Christmas takes fantastic pictures.

We will be coming over to Baguio tomorrow to attend your gong gong's installation/inauguration as the president of APTS. Also to bring you back to Malaysia. Compounded with our recent change of church, many people back here are missing you, asking us "Mikayla leh?". So for their sakes here are some pix of you.

At 1U. You love bikes. Whenever you see one you'll sign and make the sound *boo boo boo boo".

At ah kong's house. During Chinese New Year as you can see... You call the orange "ball ball".

At home. Soon you'll be back here...

... and I'll be back to babysitting duties.

It was nice to have a break and spend some quality time with your mommy.

I think now I understand what they mean by "quality time".

At the Curve. Your first time on a slide.

We were waiting to have dinner with your "kai ma" Ke Xin (and Keith).

...so cute >.<

At home. That would be my "other" baby, don't worry, you're still my favourite baby. But it seems like you like the guitar as well, which is good news for me.

Dinner time! You found out you could put the pasta on your finger, mommy, as usual, very fast to take pictures.

I bought this arm chair for you after one of the cell groups, now you can sit and watch your cartoons!

At Ministers' Retreat in JB. That's the toy gong gong bought for you, but you lost interest almost as soon as gong gong paid for it.

Playing "ball ball" with popo and mommy.

On the way back from Ministers' Retreat. You slept most of the time during the journey. We hope you'll have a good trip when we bring you back from Baguio.

This is a recent video of you talking on the remote control. I can understand why you would mistake the remote control for a phone, both have number pads, and they are even arranged in similar fashion. See you soon baby!

My Final Ministers' Retreat?

2009-03-28T14:14:00.002+08:00

Ministers' (and Pastor's Kids') Retreat
Date: 16th - 19th March 09 (Monday - Thursday)
Venue: Pulai Springs Resort, Johor
Theme: LeadChangeGrow
Website: http://www.ministersretreat09.blogspot.com/

Time has come again for Ministers' Retreat, yes, this time it would be way down at the southern most state of Malaysia. My parents flew back from the Philippines to attend this retreat. Although I have already begun my ministry in FGC, USJ, I had earlier registered and paid in full, so I guess I will take this as a good chance to just relax. Just make the most out of what would likely be my final Ministers' Retreat. After this I will be part of a different family, although the AG will always be a part of me. Who knows maybe one day, if God calls, I might be back in the AG. But till then...

It was roughly a 4 hour drive from our home to the venue. We decided that we would stop over at Melaka for our lunch. I was always going to have a shot at the durian cendol if we were to stop in Melaka. Durian cendol totally rocks! I'll have it anytime!

We arrived at Melaka at about 2:30pm, we decided to call Ian out for lunch. Ian who is working with The Star newspapers was there helping out with The Star's Brats English camp. He was available so we picked him up from the Straits Hotel. From there we headed straight for Jonker Street.

After lunch we had some time to do some shoppping, which is always good as well. Mikayla got a new toy from her grandfather, but almost as soon as it was paid for, she lost interest in it.

Here Mikayla is signing "scared", she's afraid of the statue. We dropped Ian back at the camp and headed off once again southward.

We arrived at Pulai Springs late, about 6pm, which was dinner time. We got lost trying to find Pulai Springs. The GPS made that same mistake again, you know, the one where the GPS tells us to "turn right here" when we were under a bridge, there was no junctions. We were supposed to get on that bridge over our heads. The auto reroute informed us that the next U-turn was about 5KMs away. When we got to the alleged U-turn, we found out that the road was renovated and there was no U-turn. We passed it and again the auto reroute brought us another 5KMs before we finally could U-turn. That was quite a detour.

We quickly checked in, freshen up, and headed out for dinner which started at 6PM. We wolfed down dinner and quickly headed to the first session. This year the food was not as good as previous years' food. Previously the food has been nothing short of fantastic, Pulai Springs' food is really quite mediocre. During the first session Rev. Ong Sek Leang, our General Superintendant of the Assemblies of God Malaysia, gave the keynote address to the whole fellowship. One of the things he mentioned was served to affirm my decision to move to FGC, USJ. He said "the age of denominationalism has passed". He did not say denominations are history, denominations still exists, I think there will always be different denominations to serve different needs, but the gap between the denominations is no longer as they were previously. Denominations are now coming together and working together to be more effective in reaching the world.

Ministers' Retreat (MR) was often the time to meet up and reconnect with colleagues. This time it was special for me as I have just completed my studies in BCM, and I have been missing some of my classmates. I realized that, like the last edition, BCM students were invited to be the worship band. So I got to catch up with them over mamak during the final night.

The Pastors' Kids' Retreat (PKR) also runs consecutively with the MR. I was looking forward to catching up with some pastor's kids (PKs) however many who were from my batch did not make it this time. I guess I'm growing too old for this now. YAM did a great thing by subsidizing all the PKs that attended the PK sessions. At the end of the camp, when they have attended all the sessions they would be given a RM100 refund. I did not qualify for this as I was married. I understand that they are trying to help make it more accessible to the PKs, but I insist that no matter what, I am still a "K" of a "P"... I'm still a PK, I maintain my identity! Thank you YAM for subsidizing for my fellow PKs.

Lunches were not provided and they were a good time to go out and catch up. My parents who severely missed Mikayla were glad to be able to bring their precious granddaughter out for some of the lunches. Melanie and I tagged along a few times. We had some catching up of our own to do.

The resort boasts two seperate swimming areas (just like my condominium), if you didn't know, we enjoy quite a lifestyle... two swimming areas (not two swimming pools, swimming area, each area consisting of a few pools). Grandfather and granddaughter enjoyed the sun and swim. Mikayla is always trying to have a taste of everything, always sticking her tongue out to taste anything and everything in her world.

There was the usual football sessions in the afternoon, however since dinner was at 6PM, we didn't have much time to really do anything meaningful. It was way too hot to really go at it and so I continue to find it hard to motivate myself to exercise and keep in shape. Perhaps I really need to seriously take up paintball as my exercise. Last MR Reuben was recovering from a ligament surgery, but this year he was playing and boy he's good. He had the physique, great balance, skill, composure. I guess that's what training does to someone. It was fun playing with, as well as against him.

We sat at the back as we did not want Mikayla to be too much of a distraction to the other people, she doesn't understand why we need to be quiet in a service yet. While at the back, Mikayla had the opportunity to make new friends. She had so much space to run around with her new friends. It is the first time that she was allowed to run about in such a big open space. She could only walk about, but she was trying to run to keep up with the other kids. Very soon she will be running about, then we'll have to keep up.

On the final day my father told me to be ready to take some pictures for him, he did not mention why and I did not ask. He had also earlier asked me to help him buy a nice shirt as he was going on the stage. Later I realized that the fellowship was going to pray for him, for the position that he is about to take out. Come April 2nd he will be steppign in as the president of Asia Pacific Theological Seminary's very first Asian president. Everyone was proud of him. So are his children and grandchild. They made the announcement and invited him to the stage. I sprang into action with the very good camera that I got from them for Christmas and got some good shots. I'm sure you'll be seeing them in his site as well. The executive bethren were also invited to the stage to pray and charge my parents.

It was a great retreat. Of course the preaching and sessions was good, but the best part for me has to be when I was able to meet old friends and catch up. The physical side of being being waited upon at the hotel was great as well.

After the MR, my parents returned to the Philippines on Saturday. Mikayla went with them. Melanie and I are now enjoying and suffering the first time away from Mikayla since she was born, which was 15 months ago. We (Melanie, Elroi, Anne, Ian, Jackie, and me) will be flying over to celebrate my father's installation on April 1st. We will be coming back that same week on April 5th. We will bring Mikayla back then.

I have so much on my plate at the moment. I just got back from Thailand, but that's a whole other post. I have barely been at my home these last few weeks. But I thank God that I am once again on the move and liking it very much.

Will try to post pictures and thoughts from my Thai trip soon. But for now I need to wrap things up and get ready for my Phil trip.

Next Step: Foursquare Gospel Church

2009-03-15T01:00:00.019+08:00

Yes, I'm moving on. As the last post have informed you of my exodus, this would be my genesis.
Again, some of you would have already heard from someone else. It is not a secret but I just wanted to personally inform some people before making it official here on Lemuel Yee's official site. I will be joining a new church.

There, it's official.

I will be joining Foursquare Gospel Church, USJ. This church is part of a bigger group of churches headed by Pas. Henry Liew under the Shekinah Community Center group of churches. There are about 10 churches across Malaysia, but I will be based in the USJ branch. Foursquare is another denomination, but is pretty much the AG's twin. It is a classical Pentecostal church. So far from my observations it looks and feels like AG about 10 years ago.

Many people have asked me if I had some problems with the Assemblies of God (AG), and why I was joining a church from another denomination. Let me make it clear for everyone here. I don't have any problems with the AG, it's just a really big opportunity for me here and I am moving on because the door has opened up for me, and I believe God wants me to walk through this door.

I received the offer and have been considering this option since Chinese New Year. Two weeks ago (1st March), after Sunday service with Pas. Tony Chua (the missionary to Japan), Pas. Henry called me to ask me for a meeting later that night. At the meeting he asked me if I have made my decision about his offer. I figured that since everything was seemed to be falling in place so nicely and the timing seemed to almost be perfect, I decided to give him a positive answer. No point delaying it anymore as I had previously planned.

Pas. Henry proceeded to inform me that I “started this morning” (1st March), even though I was at Canaan that morning for service.

I have already been joining their cell groups for almost a month now, and the church is a small church, so I already know a majority of the church members now. However I continue to suffer from namenesia (suckiness in remembering names). But so far I must say that everyone has been overwhelmingly accepting and welcoming of us.

Melanie is very supportive of my move, and Mikayla seems to be happy with it as well. She tried out the baby room and was very comfortable with it, as if her own house. They are both such a great support and asset to my ministry. You won't believe the spell a cute baby can cast on people. People are just totally open to you when they see you have a cute baby! My parents have told me to just go for it and follow where God leads me. Their advice to me is just to take it one step at a time, which is what many are saying to me. This represents a new phase and a chance to do things differently and grow, so I guess I can try letting some things run their course instead of forcing everything along.

This week there will be a Foursquare Conference in Hotel Malaya, but I will miss out on it since I will be at the AG's Ministers' Retreat which I have signed up and already paid in full. However I will be going with a few of them to Thailand the very next week for a Foursquare South East Asian Leaders' Conference there. I will also be in Philippines on the first week of April. So it’s a busy, blurry few weeks. I will be missing much of the action in FGC but soon enough I’ll be back in the thick of it.

We would appreciate your prayers and support as we embark on this new phase in our lives and ministry. Again, feel free to call me, or email me if you have any questions. I would appreciate the opportunity to personally share with you about our new phase in our lives and ministry, and even how we could possibly partner together in the future.

Just for fun, I am posting scenes from FGC without any people. These pictures were taken just this morning before anyone arrived at church. But watch this space, soon the church members will start to appear.

Paintball!!!

2009-03-10T10:18:00.031+08:00

Date: 9th March 09
Time: 12:00pm to about 3:00pm (Meet at Sri Gombak McDonalds at 10:30am)
Venue: Rimba Harmonis
Cost: RM74.00 per pax
Dresscode: clothes you don't mind getting dirty or maybe even ripping! Long sleeve and long pants preferred. Don't forget your shoes.
Paintballers:

Lemuel
Elroi
Bobby
Terry
William
Jason
Kok Leong
Joseph
Benjamin
Caleb
Joash
May
Rabeeka
Michel
Keith
Dennis

Yes, the day came and we finally were able to get together for another round of paintball!!!

A few of us recently tried out this extreme sport and really got hooked on it. Many have labelled paintball as the most addictive sport in the world.

We woke up and realized that the skies were really threatening to pour, by the time we arrived at our rendezvous point in the Sri Gombak McDonalds it started to pour and I mean cats and dogs. For once the weather forecast were dead on, why today?!

10:30am was the meet up time, by about 11:20am all arrived. We called the paintball grounds and we were advised to just chill out and have a drink first, just wait out the rain a bit. So we were all at McDonalds for about 2 hours. By 12:30pm it was still raining but not as heavy anymore, so we decided to head to the paintball field to get our pre-game briefing done first.

By the time we arrived at the Rimba Harmonis Paintball grounds, the rain completely stopped.

During the briefing Joseph could still squat, but later he totally ripped his pants in the groin region. He ripped it big time! You do NOT want him squatting like this then. Simple instructions on safety and how to handle the marker (a.k.a. gun) was given to everyone to ensure that, although it would be painful, nobody would lose an eye or something important. The girls were real jumpy every time the marker was shot during the briefing, but later when they had a go, they liked it... I guess the gun in hand makes them feel empowered.

Everyone had a go at the marker after the briefing session, don't worry we were not given a loaded marker. But even unloaded, we were all protected from the high pressure gas as the barrel was always covered with barrel socks. Even then the marker is scary, especially when Bobby is handling it, you'll never know what he's going to do.

Soon we split ourselves into two groups and it was go go go! There was two scenarios in the Rimba Harmonis ground. One was more of a woodsball scenario, the other was more of a speedball set up. I think we all preferred the woodsball field (above). This was my favourite bunker, between these two boxes is a gap and I was able get quite a number of "kills" from here.

It dried up pretty quick after the rain, but it was still muddy. I didn't mind getting dirty so got into some mud, Jason on the other hand, got dirty from getting shot too much. I think he's the most shot player of the day. He had this really pro-looking chest protection, but he got shot so much in the arms. Looking at the picture though I wonder why we didn't get shot more in the butt...

Kok Leong was also on my team, at the end of the day, I think he was the cleanest guy. He just got a tad bit of mud around the knee area. Sharing a bunker is never a good idea, makes it too easy for our opponents to keep track of us. Since I was on the ground and I was there first, I provided cover while Kok Leong made a run for it.

Again my teammates ran up to my bunker. This time it was Ben, and he even bunkered down, I didn't even know he was there! I guess he moved on real quick. I had a bead on Terry and Wiliam, just waiting for them to pop their heads out and it would be a head shot! Also got forced to my left hand again. On the left everything is more tricky, have to use my other hand to steady the gun, other hand to pull the trigger, other eye to aim. Otherwise you would be exposed and too big a target. However it did make one awesome paintball shot (both from the marker as well as from the camera)!

Other teammates were Bobby (in brown), Michel (hand signalling Bobby), and Rabeeka (squatting, checking out the other team's movements). Later, during breaks, we realized that our team was more organized. The chicks (Rabeeca and Michel) gave us good cover, meanwhile the the guys (Bobby, Jason, Kok Leong, Ben, Elroi, and me) were able to make up ground and flank the other team. We totally owned them... IMBA teams!

This was the opponent's sniper tower/base. Depending on the game, we can go back to the base to "recharge our live", then it's action again. That right there is Terry, with his hands raised, walking the walk of shame to recharge. The snipers on the tower can really get a good view of the entire field of play. Below there would be pods with some extra ammo for the team. Once Elroi spilled half of our stash! Cost us both money as well as a game we should have won!

No matter, we still managed to win the games that we did not draw. Victory! I was almost too tired to pose... ALMOST, but I still did. What's the point in winning if you didn't pose for the cameras?

The winning team at our base (L-R standing): Rabeeka, Bobby, Lemuel, Elroi, Kok Leong, and Michel. Squatting: Jason, and Ben.

Good team work guys!

Flag captured, victory! Raise our flag.

You can't see it here, but we were all really happy, thoroughly enjoyed it, even the losing team had some victories. We were all smiling behind our masks.

You can see that when we all removed our masks. Clockwise from left: Ben, Jo, Bobby, Sham (the owner of the paintball facility), William (Terry's friend), Kok Leong, Michel, Rabeeka, Elroi, and camwhoring smack in the middle is me.

Rambo of the day award: Jason "Tanker" Ong. There, now you have your paintball nick. He got shot up so much! When you get a chance take a look at his arm. The paint is orange, but that red patch on Jason's right leg... IS HIS BLOOD (not Jesus'), haven't asked him about how he got that yet. There were some minor injuries but all were superficial, and none were actually from getting shot. It was things like landing a knee on a stone, cut by a branch, etc.

At the shooting range, trying to use up the little ammo we have left. That's when the marshall on site realized we still had enough ammo for one last round!

Seven of us went gung ho on the last round. Teams were not even nor was it balanced. My team lost out from running out of ammo, but we did gun them down quite a bit. As this round had less players we were able to try some really cool stunts like shooting while running, diving and rolling from bunker to bunker, standing ON bunker like Rambo then getting shot, using the cameraman (Terry) as a giant moving bunker, even had chance to charge and get charged. Nice!

Get all tucked in or risk becoming a sitting duck. I think my elbows and knees are a bit more exposed than they need to be though. Note to self: keep elbows and knees in!

Bobby "snapshooting", which is so pro paintball language for coming out for a quick shot then ducking back into cover.

WOAH! My barrel is smoking. And there I am in another puddle of mud...

All in all it was a great holiday spent hurting good friends. Now to save up cash for the next game. Let me know if any of you would like to join us when we go again next time. Guys and girls can play this game. Till the next time, we'll now bear the pain of the muscle aches, and proudly wear the battle scars. What you see above is the most painful paintball hit to date, a neck shot! Even a forehead shot is not as bad. But missing all the long sleeves, long pants, face mask, and all the protection, it hits my bare naked neck! That, my friends, is a paintball hickey!

Check out all the day's pix on Jason Ong's Facebook album.

In Transition

2009-03-02T22:21:00.000+08:00

Perhaps most of you already know, but for the benefit of those who are still guessing or assuming, or for the rest of you who are totally still in the dark, this is the (not so) latest news.

Shortly after my graduation in December of last year, I gave up my role in Canaan. This was effective31st December 2008. I was previously "minister-in-training" here in Canaan Church during my time in BCM. To some of you this might still come as a surprise even two months after effect. I did not previously release any "official" news of this because I wanted to allow Canaan to be the first to make this official the "official way". There was no formal announcement and now almost two months later I feel the time is right to make this "official".

But I know how this works... most of you have already heard from someone. Well, it's no secret, since it's been "official" since last year!

Naturally one of the questions that I have been asked after breaking the news is "why?". Well, to be honest I was not left with much choice. I was all prepared to take up a role in Canaan, especially with regards to youth and young adults ministry. However that was not what I was offered. On top of that I believe God has given me big dreams, but the role offered to me was really way smaller than anything I have imagined. The role was only one factor, another factor is that I have found that some the elder people have not and will never be able to perceive me as their "pastor". I really don't blame them as I am not easily understood. I feel I have very often been misunderstood... the story of my life.

Although the situation was not in my favour I still gave it due consideration and prayer. I consulted with many people. I did not want to make a decision based on what I liked or disliked nor did I want to make an emotional decision. Almost everyone of you whom I spoke to simply told me to just go to another place where I can have room to grow and discover my potential. I thank you for all your kind and wise advice, however I delayed my departure as I considered which mistake I would rather make. Would I rather leave slightly too early? Or would I rather leave slightly too late?

I'd rather leave slightly late.

Some of you who are concerned ask me is "what's your plan?" Well, as the title says - I am in transition. I don't really know what is next. But I am currently exploring some options. I really don't want anything to be in the dark, I like being frank, I like being transparent, I like being myself. So if any of you are curious, or if any of you have heard anything. Come, we'll catch up over a cup of tea. I am willing to talk to anyone who is willing to have a conversation.

I am not in any hurry to take my next step. I thank God for a heck of a helpmate, my wife is currently supporting our family (as she has always been doing). But even if she were not, we are not concerned about finance or providence. I know this sounds careless and a total lack of prudence. But I know my God, he has never failed.

In a way I am glad that God has answered my prayers. I told God that if he wanted me to move out he will have to MOVE me out. It is a real roller coaster the past few months, on one hand I am glad I was left with no choice, otherwise I would very likely just stick to where I am comfortable. On the other hand I am close to tears thinking of that Sunday when I will attend my final service in Canaan before I move out from the church that I love. It would be close to 30 years that I have spent in this church. But now it is clear to me, God wants me to continue to grow and stretch me, Canaan is my comfort zone and I need to get out of it. Yesterday's service when Pas Tony, the Sabahan from Japan, gave a personal prophecy in front of the church I think it's confirmed. I think all of you from Canaan would have heard. I am not acting on that prophecy alone, but the prophecy is like the last straw that breaks the camel's back. It is a confirmation of what God wants for me and my family. Even within the last few months God has already begun to stretch me, it is a foretaste of what is ahead.

I am moving on to the next phase in my life, it is a HUGE step for Melanie, Mikayla, and me. So here I appeal to all of you to really pray for us. We will be praying very very hard and even fasting for God's guidance. It has NOTHING to do with the amount of money I will earn, it has NOTHING to do with the title I will get. It really just boils down to one very simple thing: GOD'S WILL.

As we move on we are not deleting Canaan from our memories, you all will forever be a part of our journey. But now the time is here and we need to move on to the next stop that God has in mind for us. We thank all of you for being a part of our lives in all the major events in our lives, at our various birthdays and Christmases, at our baptisms, at our wedding, at our daughter's birth, so many memories. You all have made our lives richer, and you all will always be a part of our lives. We will carry memories of you all to the next stop that God leads us to. I hope we have left a legacy here as we carry your legacy along with us.

We ask not only of your prayers but also your blessings, that as we leave, we leave with the favour of God smiling upon us. It's time to let us go, please allow us to move on, our time in Canaan is up. Now is the time for a new move, do not hold on to us, but allow room for God to do a new thing with the new people who might rise up. I know that as I leave I take my skills and talents along but I pray that Canaan Church and all her members will continue to grow and bear fruits. I am certain we will cross paths again in the future and I look forward to telling you of how great God has been as much as I look forward to hear you tell me the same.

Thank you all for everything!

Worship List 090222

2009-02-24T17:23:00.001+08:00

This session would very likely represent my last session worship leading. As many of you know I am preparing start my career as a minister. So I have to free myself up to focus a bit better, but that would be a whole other post. If you read this page you will one of the first to find out as soon as anything is confirmed.

I believe we are in a certain season now, many people are facing tough times. It is no different with people in Canaan. For some it is tough financial times, for some it's tough spiritual times, some others are facing physical sicknesses, for others still it could even be tough mental/emotional times. Whatever it is, I believe this is true for many people all around the world. In view of that, this week the worship list was all about needing God all the more in our time of need, knowing that he is faithful even during tough times.

Here's the list:

Forever (G)
By Your Side (G)
I Will Run To You (G)
Still (C)
The reason I Live Is To Worship You (C)
Draw Me Close (C) - chorus only

Guitar Tips

2009-02-18T00:52:00.003+08:00

Derrick Siow always distracts me with youtube videos. When I am working on my com he sometimes sends me a link and tells me I need to watch it... and so far he has been right!

Anyway he sent me this video and I found this very helpful. I'm sure some of you who are as noob as I am would find this helpful as well.

Basically in this video you will learn to "colour" the songs with different chords. Will definitely bring new life to old songs that have went dull.

My Visit to Foursquare Gospel Church, USJ

2009-02-16T13:03:00.013+08:00

I was invited by Pas. Henry Liew to preach in his church, Foursquare Gospel Church in USJ. Yesterday was the big day, as many of you would have known. I prepared hard to make a good impression as this would be my first time there. I was told the church consisted of mainly younger people (youths, young adults, new families, etc.). It was also a relatively smaller church compared to Canaan, there is normally about 30 in attendance.

The service starts at 10:00am, but we arrived at the church at 9:07am, to be exact. This was because I had to make sure I had time to get lost, but my handy Samsung Omnia made no mistake, linking up with global positioning satelites to make sure I didn't that I didn't even make one wrong turn. GPS ROCKS! Realizing that we were way too early, we did the Malaysian thing, we headed out in search of food. Kok Leong who insisted on joining us at the last minute, as we normally carpool to church, was in generous mood as he normally is, and picked out of the steamer a whole lot of dim sum. Mid way through dim sum I realized it is now a reasonable time to call Pas Henry Liew to make sure I was at the right place (and at the right time). He informed me that he was about a hundred yards from the church, I explained that I was at this dim sum place and he told me that he would come right over. It was a relieve to see him and finally know for sure that we are at the right place at the right time. We will finish our breakfast before we headed to the next street where the church was located.

By 9:30 I realized there was way too much food for me, so I decided to leave Melanie, Mikayla and Kok Leong and walked to the church as I had to make sure my powerpoint (with video) would work properly. The powerpoint ultimately did not work, until halfway through the message, they missed out on the video that I was going to show them. I promised them the video would be up on my blog if they searched and it will be at the bottom of this post for all your viewing pleasure.

Mikayla enjoying herself at a new church

The service started slightly late, I expected this, as smaller churches tend to wait up for each other before kicking off. There was fewer people than I expected, there were about 25 who turned up that day. It turns out that there was a missions trip at that time and about 5 of the church members were in Hanoi. The smaller and younger than expected crowd helped put me more at ease. Joel Liew a long time friend and resident PK led the worship with a guitar. Worship was simple, 4-piece band. Although I didn't recognize nearly half the songs, I enjoyed the worship. In Canaan I would be concerned about how the music sounded, if there was any techinical mess ups, etc. This was not my church, I was not responsible for anything, so I was able to be more focus. That was a nice.

I was introduced as the speaker, and that I will also be leading the cell groups over the next 2 weeks in their pastor's absence (Pas. Henry will be at APTS). I took the stage and in the wake of Valentine's Day, preached the sermon that I titled as "The Brokeback kind of Love". The message was about the love, but not the usual love that is propagated in movies and Valentine's Day advertising. It was about love between friends, it was the "bromance" kind of love, between brothers and sisters.

Here are the four main contrasts that I made from King Saul and Prince Jonathan and how they related to David:

The Brokeback kind of Love

Bible Text: 1 Samuel 18:1-9

1. Unchain your heart... Don't chain your friend. (verse 1-2)

Jonathan unchained his heart toward David.
Saul tried to chain David to himself.

2. Make a one-way covenant... not a two-way contract. (verse 3 & 5)

Jonathan made a one-way covenant with David.
Saul made a two-way contract with David.

3.Give a gift... don't expect one. (verse 4-5)

Jonathan freely gave what he had.
Saul expected David to make him look good.

4.Enjoy your friend's sucess... don't be jealous of it. (verse 6-9)

Jonathan enjoyed David’s victories.
Saul kept a jealous eye on David.

Here's the video that was supposed to be part of the sermon powerpoint:

Brokeback Mountain Christian Edition

Now you understand why I call it the brokeback kind of love? If not try this: I grieve for you, Jonathan my brother; you were very dear to me. Your love for me was wonderful, more wonderful than that of women. - 2 Samuel 2:26

After the service we had a special lunch as it was "Birthday Week". It was good to be able to get to meet some of the people. Our entourage was too stuffed with dim sum so we missed out on the food this time around. After that I was pleasantly surprised to have been asked to speak to the youths. Since I did not have anything prepared, Joel basically had an informal "interview session", asking me questions about youth ministry. There was a tight group of about 6 youths, but Joel who was heading the group was aggresive about growth. I spoke to them and basically offered some suggestions and consultation to them.

This was taken during the youth meeting... I need a better photographer!

All in, it was a good day. Came back, played some computer (since futsal was canceled), then later we went out for dinner at Ikea with Kok Leong, Sarah, Rachel and Irvin. Had a great time fooling around at Ikea riding shopping carts, messing around with the stuff on display, and even bringing some of it home! Good day. Thank you Jesus. Now I am looking forward to other upcoming stuff.

Facing The Fire

2009-02-10T18:50:00.000+08:00

Last Friday I was invited by Pas. Thaddeus Lee to preach in New Covenant Assembly's (Sri Petaling) home school chapel service. This would make it the second time that I have been there. Last year when I was there my wife was still pregnant and I showed the ultra sound scan of the now 1 year old Mikayla. Last year I spoke to them on disciplines in "First Things First". Chris was with me the last time and gave a short testimonial. This time round I decided to talk about peer pressure. Joash and Jason came along to support me and Jason even gave a testimonial on how he was influenced by negative peer pressure.

All in, it was a good day. Joash, Jason and I enjoyed the trip there, the compulsory mamak session with Pas. Thaddeus, and getting to know some new friends. Some of the students were supposed to add me on Garena but so far none of them have added me. But the main highlight of the day was of course my message to the students. I was worried I might do a lousy job as I not been getting any practice preaching recently. On top of that I was also to be preaching in Foursquare Gospel Church, USJ (FGC) the following Sunday (15th February). I worked very hard for this session and it turned out very well, good enough that Joash even asked me for the sermon notes and powerpoint so that he could use it in his own youth service the following day. This session certainly reminded me of my passion to share God's word with young people and also served to boost my confidence for the following Sunday's gig in FGC. Now I am looking forward to next Sunday's gig. God help me speak your words.

For thoes interested here are the points that I touched on during my peer pressure talk:

"Facing the Fire"
Bible text: Daniel 3:16-18

1. Surround myself with support (verse 16)

Ecc 4:12 - Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.

2. Set my trust in God (verse 17)

Proverbs 3:5 - Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.

3. Stick to what's right (verse 18)

Acts 5:28 - Peter and the other apostles replied: "We must obey God rather than men!

My Prayer:

2009-02-06T01:10:00.006+08:00

We Need You Lord...

but not just that, I need you Lord...

I know you hear us... Hear our cries oh Lord, hear MY cry oh Lord!

Amen.

Are You Listening?

2009-01-27T20:05:00.000+08:00

Hello? Did you hear what I just said? Do I have to shout at you before you listen? Why are you only listening to what you want to hear? What can I do to make you hear what I am saying?

Some recent dealings with some people have left me very dissappointed. They looked like they were listening, but as they responded I realized they were so checked out... Please, listen up (especially leaders). I find older people less likely to have a conversation with you, more likely they just want to give you instructions. Maybe it's just their nature, being old. But young or old, we all need to grow. Young or old, listening with an open mind and heart will teach you something. Time to get off your pedestal and sit with us (younger people, some of us are not that young anymore anyway), have a conversation with us. Then maybe you will understand why we are so "like this".

I wonder if I was (or am) like that, I decided that I was not going to be like that. Did some surfing and found this. Much to learn. Here you will learn why and how you can be a better leader just by listening better... by the John Maxwell, the leadership guru himself. So listen up.

The Best Leaders Are Listeners
By Dr John C. Maxwell

Steven Sample, in his book The Contrarian’s Guide to Leadership, writes, “The average person suffers from three delusions: (1) that he is a good driver, (2) that he has a good sense at humor, and (3) that he is a good listener.” I plead guilty on ill three counts!
I will never forget the time a lady I worked with confronted me about my poor listening skills. She said, “John, when people talk to you, often seem distracted and look around the room. We’re not sure that you are listening to us!”

I was surprised because, like most people, I really did think I was a good listener. The first thing I did was apologize. I trusted the opinion of the person who had confronted me, and I knew it had taken courage for her to tell me. (I was her boss.) The second thing I did was start trying to change. For several years I made it a regular practice to put an “L” in the corner of my legal pad anytime I was in a meeting to remind myself to listen. Sometimes I would write “LL” to remind myself to look at them while I listened. It made a big difference in my leadership.

Steven Sample says, “Many leaders are terrible listeners; they actually think talking is more important than listening. But contrarian leaders know it is better to listen first and talk later. And when they listen, they do so artfully.”

The positive benefits of being a good listener are much more valuable than we often recognize. Recently I read a humorous story that Jim Lange included in his book Bleedership.

A couple of rednecks are out in the woods hunting when one of them falls to the ground. He doesn’t seem to be breathing and his eyes are rolled back in his head.
The other guy whips out his cell phone and calls 911.
He frantically tells the operator. “Bubba is dead! What can I do?”
The operator, in a calm, soothing voice says, “Just take it easy. I can help. First, let’s make sure he’s dead.”
There is silence, and then a shot is heard.
The guy’s voice comes back on the line and says, “Okay, now what?”

As this story about rednecks illustrates—we can hear what is said without really listening to what is being communicated. The hunter above heard what the operator told him and technically did make sure that his hunting companion was dead. But had he really been listening. I don’t think he would have shot his partner.

The story may seem silly, but it contains an important truth. When we hear without really listening, our leadership is bound to suffer—and so will our followers.
I once read about a study that stated that we hear half of what is being said, listen to half of what we hear, understand half of it, believe half of that, and remember only half of that. If you translate those assumptions into an eight-hour work day, here is what it would mean:

• You spend half your day—about four hours—in listening activities.
• You hear about two hours’ worth of what is said.
• You actually listen to an hour of it.
• You understand only thirty minutes of that hour.
• You believe only fifteen minutes’ worth.
• And you remember less than eight minutes of all that is said.

That’s a pretty poor track record. And it shows that we all need to work much harder at actively listening!

Why Listeners Are More Effective Leaders

Because of my desire to be a more effective listener, I have actively observed leaders for years and paid close attention to how the effective ones listen to others. And I have come to come conclusions about the impact of good listening related to leadership.

1. Understanding People Precedes Leading Then.
Leadership finds its source in understanding. To be worthy of the responsibility of leadership, a person must have insight into the human heart. Sensitivity toward the hopes and dreams of people on your team is essential for connecting with than and motivating them. In my book The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, I write about the Law of Connection, which states, “Leaders touch a heart before they ask for a hand.” You cannot connect with someone if you don’t try to listen to and understand them. Not only is it not fair to ask for the help of someone with whom you haven’t connected, it is also ineffective. If you want to be more effective connecting with people, make it your goal to understand them.

2. Listening Is the Best Way to Learn
It is no accident that we have one mouth and two ears. When we fail to listen, we shut off much of our learning potential. You’ve probably heard the phrase “seeing is believing.” Well, so is listening. Talk show host Larry King said, “I remind myself every morning nothing I say this day will teach me anything. So, if I’m going to learn. I must do it by listening.”

In 1997 we moved to Atlanta, Georgia. Immediately I realized the influence of the African American community upon that city. I wanted to connect with people in that community and learn about their journey. I asked my friend Sam Chand to set up four lunches with some top African American leaders. For me, it was one of the greatest learning experiences of my life. Our time together was filled with our getting acquainted, my asking questions, and my listening to wonderful stories. I left each Lunch with new friends and great respect for the people I met and for their life experiences. Many individuals expressed their surprise to me that with my leadership experience, I did not try to teach them about leadership, but that I was the student and they were the teachers. If I had done that, I wouldn’t have learned anything. Today I am still listening to and learning from many of the leaders who became my friends at those lunches.

3. Listening Can Keep Problems from Escalating
A Cherokee proverb says, “Listen to the whispers and you won’t have to hear the screams.” Good leaders are attentive to small issues. They pay attention to their intuition. And they also pay close attention to what isn’t being said. That requires more than just good listening skills. It requires a good understanding of people, and it also means being secure enough to ask for honest communication from others and to not become defensive when receiving it. To be an effective leader, you need to let others tell you what you need to hear, not necessarily what you want to hear.

Gordon Bethune, former CEO of Continental Airlines, took this idea a step further when he advised, “Make sure you only hire people who will be willing to kick the door open if you lose direction and close it. You may be able to ignore somebody’s opinion if you don’t like it, but if the person has the data to back it up, your intellect should be able to overwhelm your vanity.”

A common fault that occurs in people as they gain more authority is impatience with those who work for them. Leaders like results. Unfortunately that action orientation sometimes causes them to stop listening. But a deaf ear is the first symptom of a closed mind, and having a closed mind is a surefire way to hurt your leadership.
The higher people go in leadership, the more authority they wield, and the less they are forced to listen to others. However, their need to listen becomes greater than ever! The farther leaders get from the front lines, the more they must depend on others for accurate information. If they haven’t formed the habit of listening – carefully and intelligently—they aren’t going to get the facts they need. And when a leader stays in the dark, whatever problem the organization is having will only get worse,

4. Listening Establishes Trust
Effective leaders are always good communicators, but that means much more than just being a good talker. David Burns. a medical doctor and professor of psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania, points out, “The biggest mistake you can make in trying to talk convincingly is to put your highest priority on expressing your ideas and feelings. What most people really want is to be listened to, respected, and understood. The moment people see that they are being understood, they become more motivated to understand your point of view.”

Author and speaker Brian Tracy says, “listening builds trust, the foundation of all lasting relationships.” When my employee confronted me about my poor listening skills, what she was really telling me was that I was not trustworthy. She didn’t know whether her ideas, opinions, and feelings were safe with me. By becoming a more attentive listener, I was able to earn her trust.

When leaders listen to followers and use what they hear to make improvements that benefit those who speak up and the organization, then followers put their trust in those leaders. When leaders do the opposite—when they fail to listen—it damages the leader-follower relationship. When followers no longer believe that their leaders are listening to them, they start looking for someone who will.

5. Listening Can Improve the Organization
The bottom line is that when the leader listens, the organization gets better. Former Chrysler chairman Lee Iacocca asserted, “Listening can make the difference between a mediocre company and a great one.” That means listening to people up and down the line at every level of the organization—to customers, workers, and other leaders.

Dallas-based Chili’s, one of the nation’s top restaurant chains, has prided itself in having leaders who listen. Norman Brinker, onetime owner and chairman of Chili’s, believes that responsive communication is the key to good relations with both employees and customers. He also has learned that such communication pays big dividends. Almost 80 percent of Chili’s menu has come from suggestions made by unit managers.

Listening always pays dividends. The more you know, the better off you are—as long as you maintain perspective and think like a leader. Niccolo Machiavelli, author of The Prince, wrote. “Minds are of three kinds. One is capable of thinking for itself; another is able to understand the thinking of others and a third can neither think for itself nor understand the thinking of others. The first is of the highest excellence, the second is excellent, and the third is worthless.” To be a good leader, you must be able to not only think for yourself but also understand and learn from the thinking of others.

Is it possible to be a leader without being a listener? The answer is yes. Talk to employees in companies all across the country and they will tell you that they work for people who do not listen to them. Is it possible to be a good leader without listening? The answer is no. No one can go to the highest level and take his or her organization there without being a good listener. It simply doesn’t happen, because you can never get the best out of people if you don’t know who they are, where they want to go. why they care, how they think, and what they have to contribute. You can learn those things only if you listen.

Author and speaker Jim Rohn says, “One of the greatest gifts you can give anyone is the gift of attention.” I believe that’s true. But listening to followers isn’t just a gift to them. It benefits the leader too. When leaders listen, they receive others’ insight, knowledge, wisdom, and respect. That puts all of an organization’s assets into play ready to be marshaled for the fulfillment of the vision and the attainment of its goals. What a wonderful gift.

Application Exercises

1. Give yourself a listening audit. The next few times you are in meetings, ask your assistant or a colleague to track how many minutes you spend speaking and how many minutes you spend listening. If you are not spending at least 80 percent of the time listening, you need to improve. Try writing “L” on your notes where you will see it.

2. Who doesn’t feel listened to? If people you work or live with feel that you do not listen to them, you will be able to see it in their faces. Think about the people who are most important to you in your life. The next time you have a conversation with them, stop everything you’re doing, give them your undivided attention, and look them in the eye as they speak. If you see surprise, avoidance, or hostility in their expression, it may be because they feel you have not really listened to them in the past. Start a dialogue on the subject. Ask if you’ve neglected to listen in the past, and then let them talk. Don’t defend yourself. Seek only clarification and apologize if necessary.

3. What people have you neglected to seek out? Effective leaders are active listeners. By that I mean that they do more than listen to people who approach them with something to say. They seek out the thoughts, opinions, and feelings of others—starting with the top leaders who work for and with them. If you haven’t heard from some of your key people recently, seek them out and give them your ear.

Worship List 090118

2009-01-21T02:12:00.005+08:00

New year, still unsure of what it holds. However I did expect some chaos in the worship team as the worship schedule was never confirmed. Some of the musicians are also feeling burnt out and I am no different. With all that in mind, I decided for a return to the basics. I picked simple and familiar songs that both musicians and congregation knew by heart. Songs were picked around the song Heart of Worship. This was my call for us to return once again to that first love and reconnect.

The blog has been silent for sometime now, I am keeping to the don't-say-anything-if-you-don't-have-anything-good-to-say policy some have. However I really wonder if that is beneficial for anybody. Would things be better if we just left them alone? Sometimes, but not all the time, so what about the other times? I normally make the mistake of taking action too fast, this time I'm going to try to make the other mistake instead. It goes against my instincts and my believes. But what the heck...

On the bright side, my guitar sounded awesome! The simplicity of the songs allowed my guitar to really ring through. Makes me melt... Anyway here's the worship list:

Lord I lift You Name On High (G)
We Wanna See (G)
Potter's Hand (G)
Heart Of Worship (G)
I Could Sing Of Your Love Forever [chorus only] (G)

I need to rediscover, reconnect, return, receive, revive... Do YOU need to?

Worship List 081221

2009-01-07T01:54:00.003+08:00

This would be the ultimate session of the year, the Christmas service. The service was going to be attended by many who are new to the church. So the pressure was on, and that's the ways I liked it. I was told that I would have and extended session. So I roped in David Yeoh to help me out with some songs to make sure we could make it through the whole session.

Here's the list:

We Wish You A Merry Christmas (G)
That’s What We Came Here For (A)
One Way (Bb)
Friend of God (D)
Beautiful Saviour (A)
One Thing Have I Desired (A)
How Great Is Our God (A) chorus and bridge
Feliz Navi Dat (A)

From what I saw from the stage the church's response was good, I guess the church was ready for it on Christmas. According to Donny, this session was the bomb, we had a pro sound man on scene to mix it up for us. Also the rented drum set was good, and Jeremy was steady and did as well as he did during practice (which is quite a rare). The backing vocals, although still rather raw, did provide me with good backing, allowing me to concentrate on leading the congregation rather than just sing the song.

All in, this was a fantastic end to 2008 for the worship team. At the start of the year I observed and around May I stepped in to help out with the worship department. Feedback from the team informed me that we are headed in the right direction. We now have a good set of work ethics, a good core team of musicians who are not only talented but are also passionate and really feel that this is the ministry that God has called them to. I pray that next year, as we have a good foundation in place now, that we will begin to develop and grow this ministry. The way I see it, 2008 was pretty much a year of providing stability and maintenance. Perhaps 2009 can be a year where we begin to grow into a great ministry. Not sure what or how, but let's keep our eyes open to see God's move.

Happy Birthday Mikayla!!!

2008-12-21T11:22:00.014+08:00

Mikayla Yee Rencai 余仁采:

Born, 21/12/2008, 11:22am

Daughter of proud parents Lemuel Yee and Melanie Lim

Yes, it has already been one year, one year since my trustee ol' XDA II died on me in the hospital (watch this space for more on my Pocket PC), one year since my wife was rushed to the emergency ward at 5am, one year since I my freedom was all but lost, one year since what I came to know as MY life was gone... and I have never been so proud and happy. I now live for someone else.

Yes, Mikayla turned a big 1 (one) on the 21st December 2008 (Sunday). It was quite low key as Canaan's Christmas Open House was on the very same day. So the church was busy with all things Christmas and open housey. Melanie was particularly upset about that. I guess it's a maternal thing, Melanie informed me that she was doing all the hard work while I just "enjoyed" the process. THAT, my (male) friends is like the ultimate female trump card, and our que to shaddup. Anyway, it was all out of our control, whining about it was not going to do anything. We spent the whole day at the open house, where Melanie won a coffee maker. Lunch was free for all and free for all. Many people came, including friends from other churches. But there was not dinner...

Yes, we went out dinner after that long day. But there was little fanfare. Uncle Elroi and aunty Anne (not to be mistaken with the pretzel making one); uncle Bob; aunties Sarah, Rachel, and uncle Irvin; and kai yeh Kok Leong were those in attendance. We ate at one of our favourite restaurants - D'Fortune in Menjalara. And called it a (birth)day.

Next year there will be a small "Mikayla" update section on this blog. The demand is just too great, already Mikayla's life is more interesting than mine! She lives and charmed life...

Daddy's Diva =)

Mikayla,

Mommy and daddy loves you so much. You are so cute, so beautiful. You are truly a "gift from God" to us and to our family. We pray that you will grow up to be God's gift to your church, and even to Malaysia and the rest of the world. Your kong kong has already mentioned (a.k.a. prophecied) that one of his grandchildren will be a pastor, would that be you? hmmm...

I am looking forward to the many many more experiences we will be having together.

I love you,
Daddy (mommy will have to get her own blog)
P/S: You're going to make daddy even more of a cry baby...

Tiramisu all for my baby... watch this space for the pix & vids of Mikayla vs. Tiramisu.

**some nostalgic moments:

January 2008: Gifts From God

September 2008: Mikayla's First Fever

First Days as our baby

First days in our now warmer and cozier home

Winter Break

2008-12-11T00:50:00.000+08:00

This did NOT happen

Dear readers,

This blog will be frozen for the holidays. I'll be back next year when this blog turns 1. There is just too much happening in too short a time for me to keep up. I will not be giving up on the real world to spend time in the cyber world. I'll be livin' it up!

For those of you near and dear to me you will not be needing to come here as I will be seeing you sometime during the festive season. For those of you who are trying to keep track even during this time, please spend less time online, and more time with your family and friends. This is the season to love, and to be loved.

This DID happen... for you

Remember in all the shopping, gifts, and makan... JESUS!

Merry Christmas and a Happy 2009!

Yours truly,
Lemuel Yee

P/S: He did not just die for you, he ALSO overcame death... for you too

All I Want For Christmas Is...

2008-12-09T13:11:00.011+08:00

How many times have you received a gift and had this thought:

"Why not just give me the cash instead?" or "What am I supposed to do with this?" or "What a waste of money?"

Don't get me wrong I am not ungrateful, just being honest here. Don't lie to me, I know we have all had that experience. Then some of us hold onto the gift for another year or two and then "re-gift" it to another poor soul (or someone else who would actually appreciate it).

So far my philosophy for Christmas gifts is this: "if I wouldn't like to receive it, I won't give it". Maybe this might help some of you.

For me, the best thing to do is to give a "group gift", which means getting a few mutual friends (a term I learnt in Facebook) together and give something more significant. It will cost you the same, but the gift's value (not just monetarily) will grow exponentially. Although this would require some extra planning and organizing.

With Christmas looming and the prospect of having unwanted "surprises", I have created this "wish list" for those of you who genuinely love me but face the challenge of expressing your love through your Christmas giving. Hopefully this will make your Christmas shopping (for me) less stressful and more enjoyable (for you). Prices for the items on my wish list range from as low as RM2 to more over USD2,000. So go ahead, get a few guys together and do some planning/organizing!

Note:

* This is just a wish list, you know what wish means? Anyway, these days I'm dreaming big and I am not going to apologize about it. Hopefully they are God's dreams as well...

** This is not an exhaustive list, but a guide. I'm sure some of you have some great gift ideas for me, can't wait for Christmas...

Samsung Omnia

The all-in-one

Last Christmas, when Mikayla was born, for some unknown reason my pocket PC of almost 5 years died on me in the hospital. Since then I have been jumping from phone to phone, just borrowing people's cheap backup phones. I am currently using Osbourne's old and reliable Nokia.

The Omnia is really an all-in-one gadget. It has the usual Phone and PDA functions (i.e. calendar, to-do list, making and receiving phone calls, SMS, etc.). On top of the usual stuff this baby also has a built in GPS and AGPS, not to mention the HSPDA (3.5G) connectivity, also useful as a PDA and also as a thumb drive/external hard disk.

My life has really been a blur since my trusty O2 XDA II konged out. I feel a need to get my life back on track as I begin to build my ministry next year.

Mic Stand Pick Holder

The standard mic stand pick holder

I have a tendency to drop my picks when I play guitar, especially on fast songs (I think I just can't keep up with the tempo). Anyway apart from my efforts in practice, this item will come in helpful during those embarrassing times.

Similar but different

Outdoor Crocs (Red/Black)
With my faithful green pair of crocs wearing out, it is getting hazardous for me when it gets wet. Maybe I should just slip, fall, then sue Crocs for a new pair of Crocs?

My current Beach Croc is in the size of Men's 8-9. So might as well try the outdoor crocs this time around.

Red/Black colour is the best of the lot

A Taylor Guitar (814 or 914 series)

Not just another guitar, a Taylor 814... *drools*

Hope agianst all hope, but I just heard a message from a CD in Sarah Tan's car. The speaker excouraged us not to limit God. God has no limits, only we limit God by putting him into a box. So I decided to put this up as well. This is definitely out of the box.

As all of you would know guitars is a real passion of mine. I can't play it as well as I wished I could, so I resort to just loving the whole concept and idea of a guitar. This guitar would be more than a music instrument, it would be more a piece of art. I am currently tracking several auctions on Ebay. It is MUCH cheaper in US, since these babies are made in US. Currently the most attractive is this Taylor 2006 814ce Fall Limited Edition with sitka spruce top and Madagascar rosewood sides and back. Check this baby out! That's what I call a sexy back... yea...

The Madagascar Rosewood back

Sexy back... yea

Paul Gilbert Guitar Picks

Any color will do.

So far, I have found these to be the best picks. The size is right, the shape is right, the texture is right, the tone is right, even the colours are right. These are the only guitar picks I use, I exclusively use Paul Gilbert picks. I stumbled upon these picks one day when David Yeoh lent one of his picks to someone during worship practice, since then there was no turning back.

Recently I went to get myself a few more of these picks. I seldom lose my picks nowadays, unless I borrowed them to someone else, then they lose it for me. However these picks are currently dried up in Malaysia, all stocks are sold out, that is how popular these picks are. Anyway those still in my possesion are getting worn out. They are getting blunt on the tip from strumming, and getting holes on the sides from scrapping the strings. Time for a bunch of new ones. Think you can find some?

Clip On Guitar Tuner

This is the Intelli IMT-500, available at The Guitar Store.

There are many types of tuners out there, but the ones I am interested in are the clip on time. The clip on type don't require a guitar jack plugged in to them to start tuning. These also do not need silence while tuning because they are not reliant on the mic to pick up the guitar's pitch. These clip on are based on vibration that the guitar emits to determine the pitch of the guitar. These clip on type tuners are also generally smaller, for me, that's a plus.

This is how it is used.

Mikayla Harness

That's NOT Mikayla

With Mikayla turning 1 this Christmas season, she should very soon be running about. So as parents our job is to spoil her fun by putting her on a leash... A baby harness should allow both Melanie and I, and Mikayla some freedom and room. A simple one would be great. Not some "cute" bulky one.

Definitely not a fan of lugging more weight around.

Facebook

2008-12-03T15:47:00.013+08:00

Yes, as some of you would already know, I have finally (this is like a keyword these recent months) fallen prey to the perils of Facebook. The last straw was when my father, of all people, not only invited me, but told me to get on Facebook. Like me he thought facebook was not "serious" enough, so I guess now we both just have to loosen up a bit. However as soon as we logged on we realized that many of the "serious" people were already actively participating in Facebook and the various groups. Anyway, I'm now in. Add me if you wish.

My father announces his Facebook presence on his site, as I am doing now.

I'm still a total Facebook noob. It'll take some time for me to settle into my Facebook. So far I have 175 "friends", I'm sure many are real "friends" however there are quite a number that I'm not sure if I have ever met them. Some seem to know who I am, while some others ask me the very same question that I want to ask them, but dare not lest I make a fool of my noob-Facebook-self... I end up with many "Who are you?" messages.

Facebook doesn't allow me to be married to a person who is NOT on Facebook. My wife had to register too.

Anyway, there I am in facebook, connecting with all my "friends" from all around the world. There already has been some old friends that I was able to reconnect with. Photos shared and "tagged" (whatever that means) in some others, while I joined some groups that seemed intersting to me (like a certain warehouse sales group). But at the end of the day, I think my blog will still be my main presence in cyber space.

Well... anyway, just so you know...

Worship List 081130

2008-12-01T11:55:00.000+08:00

Prakash was scheduled as the worship leader this week, however since he swapped with David last Sunday he would be worship leading back to back. This Sunday was also a special week, there was going to be a shoot for a promotional video for the church. So I wanted to make sure that 1) the worship team did a good job and 2) I got my face on camera. So I got myself involved by arranging myself as co-worship leader. The shoot was really elaborate. Elroi (my brother did it) and it was not a home video thing. It was the full monty corporate video. I figured that the shoot would affect the worship time. I didn't worry so much that the people would be distracted by it, but kind of realized that this week the people would be more "ready" for church. And so it was that last Sunday that the atmosphere was really much better.

By Wednesday Prakash and I have already communicated and it already seemed like we were on the same track. By Thursday we have confirmed some songs and by Friday it was almost all set. Our direction was to get desperate for God, to have more of him in our lives and church. Below is Sunday's list:

Cover The Earth (D)
Friend of God (D)
Breathe (A)
Draw Me Close (A)
Forever [by Hillsong, chorus only] (A)

That Sunday morning, some visitors walked into our church, they were with the speaker for the day. The speaker was Ronnie Tan. He is a Malaysian who is now pastoring in New Zealand, he brought along with him a group of young people. They were so full of energy and the worship team fed off their energy and enthusiasm. I believe many of our own church members too were infected by them. However we always knew it was going to be a great session that week. We had a time of prayer after the worship practice last week, we all put our instruments down and just gathered around for a short time of really worshipping God and prayer after that.

I informed the team that since we introduced the debriefing after our worship sessions our worship team has made giant strides, so we are now going to start a short "briefing session" after our practice time. We will use this briefing time to discuss about our dress code, the service, and any other nitty-gritty stuff that we have to settle before the worship session. We will start the briefing time with a short simple time of worshipping together as a team followed by a time of prayer. As it would happen, God really did hear the worship team's heart's cry. The service, from the worship to the preaching, was all great.

This week is definitely an up. Hope next week will be just as good, and even better.

My Commencement Ceremony

2008-11-29T01:19:00.015+08:00

As many of you would have heard, I will be graduating this Tuesday (2nd December). It would be BCM's 47th graduation exercise, that is some tradition. Here I would like to extend my invitation to all of you who might be interested to participate in the exercise. Here are the details:

Date: 2nd December 2008 (Tuesday)

Time: 7:30pm (light refreshments served at 6:15-7:00pm)

Venue: Bible College of Malaysia

Yup, that's me, more photo op on Tuesday night.

The theme "Finish Strong" is really meaningful to me. I don't believe it is a description of me currently, that I have already finished my theological studies in BCM, and that I am now finishing it strong. But it is a exhortation to the class of 2008 to continue to fight the good race so that we can truly finish well. Yes, it is the close of a chapter of my life, but as this chapter ends I am opened up to a whole new chapter, blank and ready for me to make history and make my life count. Some schools call it a commencement ceremony and it really is exactly that for me, the end of one thing and the beginning of another. I am dreaming big things but being very sensitive to God at this time to lead me to the next place that he wants to bring me to. I am raring to put my training into practice now.

I can't help it, I just feel thankful to all those who have poured into my life or stood by me all this while, so here I thank you all (again). If you are thinking of buying flowers for me, forget it. Don't waste your time and money... I prefer cash! Many of you realize I'm graduating and asked me why I didn't tell anyone. It's because I am not really interested in making it a big deal, more than anything it is just a sense of relieve. Even then many of you have told me that you will be adjusting your schedules and giving up your evening to be there for me, I appreciate that. Just come if you're interested, your presence alone more than what I expect. Again, please don't bother with the flowers.

If you guys want, we'll have dinner after the graduation, perhaps we can go for A&W, the one with the drive-in. That one has air-cond and is open 24 hours.

...Finally

2008-11-18T12:22:00.001+08:00

I seem to be getting a lot of email and messages with that word recently. So much so that I am compelled to make a response here. My dad even made a great big announcement on his website about this. "Why?" you may ask, what's all the fuss about?...

It is because of Melanie!

I am (finally) graduating from BCM after spending a good 5 years there doing my training for ministry. Many of you thought the Key Magazine Photo Session post was in fact the graduation itself, don't just look at the photos, at least read the title! Anyway what normally takes 3 years to finish went on for an extra 2 years, almost double the allocated time. So I guess it's only warranted that we all feel relieved, especially the lecturers and staff in BCM. My wife, who was one of those who were, understandably, extra relieved, sent out emails to everyone inviting them to my graduation ceremony (on December 2nd). I was also on her mailling list. So some of our close friends, and not so close friends as well, started replying the email. There was some congratulatory emails, but many were "sigh-of-relieve" emails. Melanie is just proud of me. I believe her pride is justified.

Anyway I don't blame you all for being relieved. It really is my fault.

Most of you know what happened during the last 5 years. But for some of you who might be wondering here's a very quick look back on the last 5 years of my (academic) life:

Year One: The Gung-Ho Year
My parents has just resigned as the pastor of Canaan Church and was due to be sent to the Philippines as missionaries. A new pastor took over my church. Church was different, with all the transitions taking place I was kind of dazed at it all.

I did great for my first couple of terms in BCM. However, being me I lost my focus and attention halfway through the year.

Everyone knows my passion for ministry, when I (finally) got myself into BCM I was mighty relieved myself. I was so crazy about ministry (but mostly I'm just "UN-crazy" about my studies) that I spent too much time "doing ministry" and totally forgot about my studies. Guess what... I flunked a whole lot during my first year, trust me when I say "a whole lot". This was the year that I took over the youth ministry and also organized the RE:tuned concert, which was a huge project for someone like me to be handling. I also got involved in organizing the CDFM's (Christian Dance Fellowship of Malaysia) week-long seminar. I got involved in a lot of things, outside of my studies.

Year Two: The oh-crap-what-have-I-got-myself-into year
Halfway through this year I began to realize that in this American system I cannot just pass my tests, course papers carried a whole lot of weight. By the time I start to realize that I will need to sync or swim, damage has already been done. RE:tuned was deemed a success, other churches were telling me to go at it again next year, I declined. I put many things aside and began to set my sights on my studies. Then came along another butterfly...

In February I proposed to my girlfriend of 6 years. I was irresistable, and she said "yes".

Year Three: When I Got Married
We planned to get married sometime during Valentine's Day this year, however, due to my horrid results I was placed under "academic probation", which meant that I was to stay in my school almost all the time except for "weekend ministry", which is the practical side of my theological training. Another record I broke, apart from being the first Alumni's child to be back in BCM was that I was the first student in the 40-plus years history of the school to actually fail the same subject twice. That subject was "Religion and Cults". Because of that, I was issued an ultimatum by the school: no more failling or my credits will all be forfeited, and I will have to start my studies from scratch.

Marriage plans although postponed still went on. Melanie and I got hitched on June 11th this year. We decided that since we got married I should take some time off from BCM to honeymoon a little. Took one term off before I eased myself back into BCM by doing part-time studies. As they say "a wedding lasts only a day, but a marriage lasts a lifetime". I don't think that spending this time building my marriage was time lost or wasted. I now enjoy my marriage and family with Melanie and Mikayla, who are the gems in my life. I love you both very much.

This was also the year that I got suspended from school for failling to do my "Christian Duty". Part of the practical side of the training, Christian Duty was to help develop our character and all that jazz, you know what I'm talking about. I was in charge of cleaning this classroom, normally Christian Duty should be done on Monday, which is kind of like our off-day, minus the Christian Duty. However since I was no longer staying in the BCM dorm as there was no more room in the couple's dorm for my wife and me, travelling all the way to BCM from Selayang just to perform my "Christian Duty" was really out of the way. I had classes on Tuesday, which was when I cleaned my classroom. However there was a night class in my class on Monday, so after a few dirty nights the lecturer made a complaint. I was called in for questioning. Situation was explained as it was but the committee mentioned that my mistake was not informing them that my Christian Duty would be done on Tuesday instead of the regular Monday. So BCM suspended me for a term. Later on, my church suspended me for another term as they said that they did not have a chance to "work on me".

Year Four: The Reluctant Part-Timer
The suspension killed any chance of me graduating this year. But by this time I had done most of my subjects. My studies were approximately 80% done. I am close to fulfilling all my credit hours, however I could not graduate this year because there were some compulsory subjects that I need to pass before I can graduate. I wanted to try to graduate this year, but sadly I was informed that some of my required subjects were not being offered this year. Since these were compulsory subjects, they were subjects that were important to the school, so they did not allow me to do these courses via correspondence. So I was "forced" to take my studies part-time as there were no other courses to take, can you believe that?

In a way I was also glad that I was "forced" to be a part-timer, since I cannot afford to fail ANY of my subjects or face a total meltdown in my life and studies.

Around the month of May I decided to opt for an internship with Faith Charismatic Center. I found that I have been in this church for too long, not only have I become complacent, but so also have the people around me. It was time for something new, something to jolt all of us (me and my church) out of our slumber. So I took up the offer from FCC for an internship. I committed the rest of the year to them. I really enjoyed my time in FCC. I was told to take charge of the worship ministry in that church and also had the very nice opportunity to partner with Joash in the youth ministry. I also had my first taste of preaching on a Sunday service. FCC offered to take me up on a more premanent basis. I brought the offer back to Canaan where they asked me not to take up the offer but return to Canaan where there will be "more opportunities" for me. Since my commitment was first to Canaan and being a man of my word, I rejected the very delicious offer and returned as instructed.

Year Five:
This would bring us to the current year and the reason for this post. This year, after completing my final 2 compulsory subjects in BCM. I will only graduate in December, but unofficially, my studies is done and dusted as of August this year. I was looking forward to getting a taste of full-time ministry. I was hoping that I would be given more to do as previously promised, however I am left feeling that I could do more, both as part of my training process as well as to fill up the time I have on my hands.
Now I am less than 1 month away from the day that I have been working towards for 5 years. It has not been a waste of time. My training had to be complete and thourough. Some of you would have personally heard from me of my struggles (in school, in ministry, and just basically in life as a whole), you would know that I have not taken the easy way out even though there were many chances to do so, and no one would have blamed me for it. But I stuck with it in the hope that it would make me a better minister, a better person. My family and close friends who have been rooting for me have got themselves way more than what they bargained for, standing by me for 5 years instead of the intended 3 years. I understand why you are all (finally) relieved. Here I want to take the opportunity to thank some of you who have stood by me through thick and thin.

Thank you... REALLY!
Words don't really do justice here, but from the bottom of my heart... Thank you!

Melanie and my parents are the ones who really felt the burden and carried it with me. Melanie worked while I studied, and they are just worried for me fulfilling my call. It's not a money thing, but it's a destiny thing.

My closest friends, namely, Ke Xin, Angela, Susie, and Joash (and few more I'm sure I missed). Who have lent me their strength in times when I was weakest. How they did it was merely by being there and being who they are.

Some of my Christian relatives that acknowledged God's call in my life and helped me to prove it to those who did not see it.

Even some of my non-Christian relatives like my in-laws who were so gracious and patient with me, I pray that one day you will come to know the amazing love and grace that we can all experience.

Some of you Canaan Church members and Christian friends who really did more than offer me moral support.

Of course not forgetting the lecturers and pastors who have shared their insights with me. And also my classmates who made it that much more interesting. As we step out in ministry, I know you are my network, you are my support, I pray that I can be the same for you. Big dreams, let them be God's dreams and let him bring them to fulfilment.

It is an understatement and cliche, but I really would not have made it. It's been a tough long journey and I am FINALLY done with it. Now I look forward to the ministry opportunities. I pray God will reignite that gung-ho spirit that I had when I first went to BCM, that I will leave BCM not just with a head full of knowledge but a heart full of FIRE!

Just An Update...

2008-11-13T02:18:00.002+08:00

Parents are back in town, but only for one week.

Dad is in Indonesia doing some accreditation for a school there. His new Toshiba Protege was left with me, there was some mix up when he bought it, there was supposed to be a 4gig RAM but there was only 2gigs. So he took my laptop and I was left with his. After testing out the Vista for almost a week I have decided to give Vista a great big two thumbs down. Always suspected it to be so, but finally using it I realized how slow the machine was even with 4gigs worth of RAM. Now I miss my laptop. The absence of my laptop is the reason for the silence in my blog. Don't have any of my stuff on this com.

That's dad. Mom however had the pleasure of staying back with Mikayla, thus freeing me up to catch up with some errands.

So top of the list was changing the brake pads for my Jaguh (should get some pix of my bike...). Riding a bike with barely any rear brakes was both a test of skill as well as (dumb) faith. With minimal rear brakes I managed to survive ferrying around Phinehas Mathius (a Pastors' Kid and fellow minister) when he visited KL last week. Also fetched Marcus back from church after he, very diligently, worked with Andrea Bong on a song that we will most likely sing this weekend - Cover The Earth. This is the first time that the brakes have really been working the way it should since I bought it about a year ago, so it was fun putting the brakes to work.

Also managed to do a fair bit of banking.

With Mikayla's grandparents watching her we were also able to have a nice dinner with some good friends in celebration of Ke Xin's birthday. Happy ??th Birthday Ke Xin!!! We were supposed to eat at this place in Solaris called "Garage" or something like that, however because it was Ke Xin's birthday the shop declared it as a holiday and they were not opened. Had to change plans, so we ate at the restaurant next door which were ignorant of what a big and important day it was. Ole Ole Bali's food was very nice, something different but with the large serving, we were all more than satisfied. Had a nice time catching up with each other since we are all getting caught up more and more with other stuff. What we used to have in common was church, but now some are in other churches and some others are caught up with work. I really hope and pray that I can do something to get them back to our very first common ground - church.

Next on the list is to tune the engine of my Juara (not to be mistaken with my Jaguh). The engine has been out of whack since some noob mechanic did the top overhaul. My timing belt gave way smack on the 120,000KM mark. I know timing belt is to be changed every 60,000KM, but I thought it coult wait a few hundred KMs more. Didn't know they engineered the belts with such precision. Can't bring it to just any mechanic as the Juara has a rather different engine and electronics. So have to bring it to the pros (and pay more). Rather get it done right once than to have to keep on bringing it back over and over again.

Apart from that I am also looking forward to catching a movie with Melanie sometime this week. We have not watched ANY movie since Kung Fu Panda, which, I believe, is almost 3 months ago.

Since my com is not around this will just be a simple update from me to break the silence in my blog.

For all of you out there who keeps up with my blog... I'm still alive.

Worship List 081102

2008-11-04T02:36:00.016+08:00

So I'm here at the end of another, if not busy, eventful week. I had a wedding dinner to attend, my good friend David Lim was in town for a song writing competition, and yes, I worship led again. When I'm well prepared and have a clear idea where I am leading the church in worship, I really look forward to it. However this time I felt I was less prepared than I would like to be. There was just one up side for me, my guitar is back from the shop and all ready to be plugged in and to go live! So my baby was going to get her first chance at "singing" in front of my church.

Anyway I decided on the theme of God's glory, I wanted to lead the church into God's presence and have his glory revealed to us. So here's the song list:

Glory by Hillsong United (E)
Cover The Earth by Lakewood (A)
Forever by Hillsong (D-A)
One Thing Have I Desired unknown (A)
Oh The Presence of Your Glory by Ron Kenolly (A-C)

At the end of everything I am thankful that God helped me do a reasonably good job. I think the worship was inspiring, but how it turned out just didn't satisfy me. I wanted more, I want excellence, I want to do my best, and nothing less, nothing less.

Everything went well, apart from one of our keyboard adaptors being out of commission, but minus one keyboard, the music was still quite good and tight, considering that we were doing a new song (Cover The Earth), and also a musically more technical song (Oh The Presence of Your Glory), the church still responded well to the songs. However I was just not satisfied, it feels like it just lacked a certain X factor. During our evaluation the team felt that the practice session was better than the actual worship time, we unanimously agreed.

It just keeps coming back to me... what was missing? There was just something missing and I cannot put my finger on it. I don't think the rest of the team is as bothered by it as I am. But I really want to identify it and make sure our worship team doesn't happen again. Maybe it's just me suffering from a heavy week.

Meet My Farida D52

2008-10-30T01:23:00.014+08:00

Have you met? This is my Farida... Farida, meet the world...

I'm sure some of you have already met my baby (not Mikayla, neither is she Melanie), she is my other baby, and her name is Farida.

I bought this beautiful piece of guitar about 2 years ago from Pas. Julian Low, she should be about 3 years old now. Pas. Julian in turn bought her from the Guitar Store. Born in China the Farida D52 comes with a sitka spruce top with abalone shell soundhole inlays; South American mahogany sides and back with beautiful wood binding; 2-piece mahogany neck with rosewood fretboard adorned with mother of pearl (snowflakes and diamonds) inlays; nut and bridge made of whale bone; and chromed machine heads; finished off with matte/natural finish.

I have found my Farida D52 to be the benchmark for all other dreadnaughts to emulate. It is loud and boomy yet defined. The tone is very (did I say very? Yes, very, VERY) warm. To date I have not heard a guitar that gives a warmer tone. At the age of 4, she is just beginning to open up... gosh! Can't imagine when she opens up... When strummed it will easily engulf your cell group host's home, smaller halls will also be completely saturated with her sweet tones; when finger plucked it is just intimate and simply romantic. Perfect for times when you want to sing a simple song, as the voice of the guitar will shine through, just get your voice out of the guitar's way.

Recently I was considering selling this baby off for an upgrade. I was, and still is, looking for a Taylor (7, 8, or 9 series with Cindy in lays) or McPherson. I quickly realized my folly in wanting to trade her in for a "better" guitar during my trip down to Singapore. I was there for a holiday and also to hunt for a new guitar. After trying all the guitars that a Malaysian in Singapore could get his hands on, I realized that all dreadnaughts actually want to sound like MY dreadnaught! I quickly repented and decided that I was never going to part with my baby.

Sounds too good to be true? Check out this 5-star review on the Farida D52. I quote their bottomline, "For: Beautiful sounds, slim neck, great quality woods; Against: Nothing at all!" Believe it!

Click here to download the full review from Total Guitar Magazine

Note that my piece was specially selected and hand-carried by Guitar Store's guitar techs from the factory in China. Three of their technicians went over to check out the factory and guitars before bringing back these guitars. My piece was one of only six that were specially chosen to be brought back as samples. When it got back to Malaysia, Pas Julian immediately tried it out and immediately took the guitar home on credit term without second thoughts, it was that good. When I tried it out in Pas. Julian's house I wanted to immediately take it home as well, but he did not want to sell it then. However a few months later he made me an offer for the guitar and I pounced on it!

So since this guitar was going to be my legacy to Mikayla, I decided that I have to (finally) put in some electronics so that I can use it sometimes. For a long time I was considering the AER AK 15 plus pickup system. For the longest time this was the best choice because of 1) the non-invasive system that would not harm any part of my guitar, as no holes needed to be made to install this pickup, and 2) there are two sources, a standard piezo (under saddle pickup) as well as a mic. These two sources could be blended to create a different sound. Once I decided to put in the electronics I decided to give my friend Jon Koo a call for some consultation before taking action. He quickly pointed me to another similar very new system by Fishman - the Fishman Ellipse Matrix Blend. This system was available in JS Music, and the guitar tech there was highly recommended.

So last Friday I went over to JS Music to try out the system in view of installing it on my Farida. When I was there the guitar tech that I was consulting (Ng) realized that this was one of the first pieces of Faridas in Malaysia he immediately exclaimed that he was one of the guys that hand-carried it back from China. Small world. He was the guitar tech that was recommended by Jon Koo and some other guitarists that I know, he no longer works for the Guitar Store he now works for JS Music. I decided that it was fate that brought us all together so very quickly I decided on the Fishman system and I even got a special price for it. It would come up to RM900.00 (inclusive of installation).

As I type this my baby is in being fitted with her electronics. I'm so excited to get it back this Friday. I hope it is ready by then. I will be woship leading again this weekend (don't ask), and I am really looking forward to breaking in my Farida in with her brand new Matrix Ellipse Blend pickup system.

Check out my baby on some other sites:

Farida's Official Site
D52 on Farida's UK Site
Farida's YouTube Channel
The Guitar Store

** Watch this space, more pix of my Farida with the brand new Matrix Ellipse Blend coming up.

The First Shall Be The Last... and... The Last Shall Be First.

2008-10-23T20:25:00.016+08:00

Just waiting here for my dinner that has been ordered from the restaurant in my condominium compound. Cantonese fried ala yin yang, and pineapple fried rice is on its way.

Melanie has a bad headache after coming back from what she calls "work", visiting bird park with her kindergarten. Elroi is also back from work and hungry, he's also waiting for dinner. Decided to surf a bit while waiting... you know... take my mind of the rumbly tumbly. So I stumbled into my parent's website and saw this...

Click on the screen shot to go to the site

I am the "last and final one"... *as if I needed to be reminded...

Anyway...

Maybe some of you readers might not know, but my parents are missionaries sent by the Assemblies of God of Malaysia. They are lecturing in Asia Pacific Theological Seminary in Baguio, Philippines. They have been in Philippines for almost 5 years now (I think).

Next year, I am proud to also announce in my own site now, that my father will be installed as the president of the seminary. I guess it's quite a big deal, but he's still my father. I'm starting to realize that he is going to be the president of the school that trains pastors and leaders for the entire region of Asia Pacific. I'm sure many back here in Malaysia (especially those from the Assemblies of God) are proud of him.

Melanie, Mikayla and I will try our best to be there around April/May to attend his installation as the president. I think my church might even try to plan a missions trip there that will coincide with his installation.

So if my dad becomes the president, my mom would be the first lady... so I guess that would make my family the "first family"

Does that make me "first young man" or "first son" or something like that?

First or Last?

Worship List 081018

2008-10-20T10:45:00.009+08:00

Yes I worship led in church... again. Don't get me wrong I really enjoy it and I really want to do it well. So I take a long time preparing for each time. I worship led just two weeks ago because I swapped with David, this week I swapped with Prakash. Prakash was really working towards this session, I saw him practicing with Marcus and Melissa couple weeks in advance. But in his line of work, last minute stuff just jumps at him. Anyway he will be moving on to a new jon very soon, he is hopeful that in his new work he will be able to spend more time with some ministries in church.

So Prakash informed me on Tuesday, I think, that I will have to replace him. It was going to be a long weekend for me, I was going to be preaching in Bethany Chapel's Y:Fusion (the youth ministry) on Saturday as well. I want very much to do well for both tasks, so I had to really work hard at it. Some of you might have noticed I've not been on Garena (a gaming client where I play DotA online). Well, now you know why I have been MIA.

Practice was kind of sloppy, but at the end while praying for the next morning's service there was just a peace that came over me.

Here's the worship list:

Hosanna (G)
Better Than Life (G)
Jesus Lover of My Soul (Chorus & bridge only) (G)
Beautiful Saviour (A)
One Thing Have I Desired (A)

The worship time was excellent. I have to find a way to quantify and publish it here along with my worship list. Will work on that and try to place a "score" on the worship time in the future. However for now, you will just have to take my word for it, the worship session was great. After the service some people approached me to ask me for the final song. Jason Ong, one of our stage hands/tech also just SMS-ed me asking for the song, but I think the song is so old that I can't find a single thing on the song. It's like the song doesn't exist. Now you're wondering where I got the song from, well, I learnt the song during my internship stint in FCC last year.

I have just received my USB audio interface from Ebay, so I guess I will make it my first project to make an attempt to record the beautiful song for some who are requesting for it. Don't expect it anytime soon though, I'm kind of a perfectionist and I have to learn how do a proper recording from nothing. Might need some help from my good friend Dr. David Lim here. I will post it up here when it's ready.

Key Magazine Photo Session

2008-10-16T22:30:00.006+08:00

Like I mentioned in an earlier post, I had a graduation photo shoot in BCM on the 22nd of September. I finally have the results of that shoot. Here are some of the pix from that day. Would have included more pix here but each pic is about 5mgbs, so uploading them was a real hassle.

Diploma in Theology

Class of 2008

Guess what... mortar board toss!

There are more pix but I'll probably have to resize them before uploading them. Anyway I will not publish them here now but leave some for the school magazine that will be published around the same time as the graduation. You can catch me in my gown on during BCM's Graduation Exercise on the 2nd of December.

I preached the second time in chapel last Wednesday (8th October), so now I am totally done and ready for my graduation. I preached on what I am going through during this point in my life... the main idea is to do things God's way, even when we don't understand the whole situation.

Yes... I am finally graduating... (that's my response to all of you who have been asking). Thank you for all your support (and patience) and THANK GOD!

Worship List 081206

2008-10-06T01:19:00.004+08:00

Before I come to the list, I want to make mention of the worship team here...

I was supposed to lead the worship next Sunday. However David Yeoh, who was next week's worship leader, told me that he could not make it to practice this Saturday. I had to swap with him.

I was immediately put in a dilemma. This week is Hari Raya week, so many of our musicians were away for a holiday. All week I was trying to find the right time when all the musicians could come together for a practice. It was a tough time trying to synchronize all our calendars and find the right time to practice. Bearing in mind that I also did not want to deprive them of their holiday as they have worked hard for the worship ministry and deserved a holiday. I spent much of my week worrying about the practice and the worship time. We finally decided to practice on Saturday morning at 10:00AM instead of the usual 1:30PM. Suddenly all the musicians were available, even David made it to the practice! I was very encouraged by the commitment of this group of musicians. They really went out of their way to serve God in this area. In the midst of the confusion I forgot to inform Donny, our lead guitarist, that we have moved the practice time again this week. I had previously spoken to him about the change of practice time. I thought I informed him but I was making so many calls to so many people that I left him out.

Bobby (bassist), Irvin (sound tech), Marcus (keyboardist), Timothy (rhythm guitarist), and I (worship leader) arrived at church at 10:00AM. We all came in my van. We setup while waiting for the rest to arrive. By 10:20AM we gave Donny a call asking him how late he was going to be. It was then that we realized that there was a communication break down. He explained to us that he was not informed of the practice. I apologized for leaving him in the dark and told him that it's alright if he cannot make it since the songs are very simple, as I was anticipating that there would be very few people in church this holiday weekend. But Donny told us that he will come immediately if we could wait. We started our practice without Donny, he arrived only when we were doing our 4th song. That was approximately 12 minutes... Kelisa quite fast!

Practice went on very well, at the end of the practice we spent some time praying for the team, the worship time, and the church members. We did not do the usual "thank you for this practice... amen". We took our time this time. We were implementing the decision that we made based on the worship evaluation form from the last time I worship led. Practice was good.

After the practice we all went for a CS session. It was a good reward for our efforts. We had a great time killing each other, laughing our hearts out as we did it. Nice!

Here is the worship list:

Beautiful One (D)
We Wanna See Jesus Lifted High (G)
It Is You (G)
Heart Of Worship (G)
I Love You Lord (G)

The worship time was very good. The musicians were really "into it", we could feel a different energy in the music. More importantly, the church was really "into it". It was a wonderful time of worship. At the end of the session during our briefing we asked each other what was the difference this week. I mentioned that it could probably be the break. The members might be more relaxed and responsive after having a holiday. However after reflecting the rest of the day on what we did different this week I came to a conclusion that although the holiday might have played a role, the bigger factor was more probably 1) the extended prayer time we had, and 2) the attitude and commitment of the musicians who went out of their way to make it to the practice this week. Not just Donny and David, but also Bobby, who just flew back in from Indonesia on Friday. Their commitment encourages me to continue to give my best to God in this ministry. Let us continue to encourage each other in this way. Thank you musicians, and bravo!

Religion and Cults: Chinese Deities & Ancestor Worship

2008-10-06T00:46:00.005+08:00

Here are the two files that I promised to share with the rest of the students in the Religion and Cults class in my church:

*Click on the link to download:

"Malaysian Chinese Beliefs" by Lemuel Yee

"Ancestral Worship and Christianity" by Victor Lee

The Religion and Cults class was quite refreshing. Instead of the usual lecturing method, the class was split into groups and designated to research certain religions/cults. Then we were supposed to present it in our class. Since I took this course in BCM my group volunteered to be the first to go. I wish we could have had more time to prepare a better presentation. My group was designated to research on the Chinese Religions, which includes the 3 major religions: Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism. Also included the various chinese deities, ancestral worship, religious practices, etc.

I made my presentation and informed the class that I am opened to questions, and that we would learn from each other. After my presentation a lively discussion ensued. Many of my classmates took part in the discussion, sharing their thoughts openly. In a flash one hour had already passed and time was up. I offered to make these two files available for those who are interested in studying the subject further. So here they are.

The first paper is my term paper for my Religion and Cults class in BCM. I chose to do this paper so that I could interact better with the Chinese people that I meet. Especially my relatives. So the paper is more focused on the local Chinese beliefs.

The second paper is from Victor Lee my classmate from BCM. His paper is on the topic of "Ancestral Worship and Christianity". Feel free to visit his blog as well, incidentally his blog is called "My Reflections". We had no idea our blogs had similar names until much later.

Feel free to comment on the papers or my group's presentation. There is much that we can learn from each other. We could continue with our discussion here.

1 Timothy 2:9-15

2008-10-05T00:28:00.000+08:00

Now this blog was named "Reflections" as I wanted to do some "reflecting" here. Lately my reflections have been more on the "casual" side, unlike the posts this blog started off with. It is no easy work trying to dig deep into God's word and situations around us. However once in a while someone or something comes along and pushes you to do it.

So my friend Angela Yap, who recently went over to Oxford, England to complete her studies, emailed me and asked me about a certain passage in the Bible that she was reading. Angela mentioned that she was reading 1 Timothy. I believe the exact reference is 1 Timothy 2:9-15. This is what it says:

9 I also want women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or expensive clothes, 10 but with good deeds, appropriate for women who profess to worship God.

11 A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. 12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. 13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve. 14 And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. 15 But women will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.

Read the rest of the passage here.

This view of a woman's role in the church is rather passive and male chauvinist. Is there such a thing as "equality of genders"? Can a woman teach or preach in church? Or is the role of women only to "make babies"? Or does the Bible view women as secondary to men? What is the Bible trying to teach us here? Does the church's practices reflect the principles taught in the Bible? Or are we conforming to worldly trends?

Before I go any further, let me hear your initial thoughts and responses to this question raised by Angela (who still doesn't have a blog yet). In the meantime I will be attempting to formulate a "proper" response. Hopefully we can have a meaningful discussion on this very interesting topic. Ultimately I hope that through this exercise we can provoke each other towards growth. As my newbie blogger uncle says in his blog: "iron sharpens iron".

Looking forward to hearing your comments.

EduCare & WidowCare Fundraiser

2008-09-30T17:08:00.031+08:00

As previously mentioned, here is the post on the Assemblies of God charity dinner.

I was contacted by the committee earlier in month to come give a testimony during the dinner about how EduCare has helped me. Rev. Jeremiah Kong who contacted me based on a list given to him did not realize that although I applied for the EduCare scholarship for my studies in BCM I did not get the scholarship. I informed Rev Jeremiah that I did not get the help, upon realizing that he apologized profusely. It really wasn't his fault but he felt so embarassed about it. I was already helping Shanti to find some PKs (pastors' kids) to give special numbers during the event, but I volunteered my help in any other way to Rev Jeremiah. He thanked me and apologized one last time before hanging up.

Few days later I got an email from Rev Jeremiah asking me to emcee the event. That was when I kinda regretted opening my big fat mouth. However I thought that if they felt I could contribute in this way I would give my time.

For those of you who are still blur let me inform you. Educare & WidowCare is a fund set up by the Assemblies of God of Malaysia to help our ministers. Many pastors who work in the outskirts do not "earn" enough from their job as a "minister" to support their families. So AG Malaysia wanted to help support some of our workers by helping them with their children's studies and also by taking care of some of the widows that are left behind. I understand that this might not add up for some of you. You might ask why God does not provide "properly" for these people who are working for him. I believe this would be one of the ways that God would use to provide for these servants. There is a general rule an there is always an exception to the rule. God works in different ways with different people.

Anyhow, I believe that Christians should be more sensitive. Keep your eyes opened, take good care of your shepherd so that they can minister effectively without external pressure or duress. Might discuss this more in another post.

Here are the event details:

Date: 22nd September 2008 (Monday)
Time: 7:30pm-10:00pm
Venue: Dewan Sivik, Petaling Jaya
Price: RM100.00 per seat
Estimated Attendance: 600 (60+ tables)
Guest of Honour: Yang Berhormat Teresa Kok

The event was to start at 7:30pm. I was asked to be there by 5:30pm. I met many who were part of the committee when I arrived. We were all there doing last minute preparations. I went over the script with Shanti my "co-host" and made some changes. Some of the people who were giving special presentations (including Juwita Suwito, also a PK) were also there setting up.

I soon realized that it will be an hour since the opening till diner will be served. Taking into account Malaysian's "flexi" time, it will be almost 9pm before anyone had anything to eat. That certainly worried me as I did not want to become the "hate figure" of the dinner. They will be seeing me coming up and making announcements but there will not be food. There would be many hungry (and angry people). I suggested to Shanti that it might be good to adjust the time so that there will be less hungry people. After some consultation, Shanti finally told me that the schedule will be adjusted as the guest of honour would also rather not give a speech to 600 hungry people.

Here's the itinerary for the dinner:

7:15 - Arrival of Guests
7:25 - Arrival of VIPs
7:30 - Opening Ceremony (Hip Hop Dance by Christian Dance Fellowship of Malaysia)
7:35 - Opening Address by hosts (Shanti & Lemuel)
7:40 - Opening Prayer by Rev Ronnie Chin
7:45 - Praise & Worship (Good Tidings, Shah Alam)
8:00 - Song Presentation: "I Surrender All" by Rev Sean Prasad
8:05 - Greetings by Rev Terrence Sinnadurai
8:10 - Speech by Rev Ong Sek Leang
8:15 - Speech by Guest of Honour (YB Teresa Kok)
8:20 - Dinner served
8:20 - Live Band Performance by X4JC
8:40 - Testimonies by
Rev Jeremiah Gan (his son recipient of EduCare fund)
Sis Sharon (recipient of EduCare fund)
Rev Ezra Muthu
9:00 - "My Love Gift" Pledge (Rev Terrence Sinnadurai)
9:10 - Table Lucky Draw
9:20 - Finale by Juwita Suwito

So that was the official plan. But when time came for YB Teresa Kok to give her speech she went on and on about her ISA detention. YB Teresa Kok who is the Member of the Selangor state Assembly for Kinrara, almost did not make it for the event due to her ISA detention. YB Edward Lee, Bukit Gasing State Assemblyman (who I just found out is my BCM classmate's father) was ready to stand in on her behalf. YB Teresa Kok, as we know was released and made it for the dinner. I do feel that it was not right for her to be held for such a long time for such menial issues. She spoke for about her ISA experience and how she felt God had helped her during her time in detention for about 25 minutes but only spoke about 3 minutes on the EduCare & WidowCare fund. The crowd sat and listened intently to her speech. In some ways she is like Malaysia's own Nelson Mandela, but of course Nelson Mandela is a whole other league. She did however pledge RM5,000 to the fund and applaud the efforts of the committee to take care of the pastors and their families.

So the schedule was screwed beyond recognition. Everything was pushed back, by the time we reached Juwita's part of the schedule there were few people left. Juwita was advised to do just one song, she decided to perform her song "Leading Change". Despite the 40-odd people left in the hall Juwita gave her best. It was like an intimate concert with her fans. Those who stayed behind had a chance to interact intimately with her while she sang. Those who stayed on screamed for more and Juwita duly obliged. By the end of it she sang 3 songs, everyone got into it. It was like a karaoke session with Juwita. I must say her attitude impresses me. She's such a pro, even with so few people she gave her 100% knowing that she was using her talents as God wanted her to.

So that was the EduCare and WidowCare Fundraiser. It is great that the Assemblies of God Malaysia is doing this for their credential members. We have to take care of our ministers. There were some Canaan Church people who were around, I caught a glimpse of Joshua taking some pix of the event. You can read his account of the event on his blog. The better pix here are from his flickr account, the sucky ones are from... "other people". I think I might have to get a camera of my own, can't trust anyone with their cameras. End up with no good pix, as you can see no picture of me hosting the dinner.

Anyway if you would like to contribute towards this fund, speak to your pastor. Or you could also visit the Assemblies of God Malaysia's website for more info.

For the more visually oriented:

Arrival of YB Teresa Kok

The VIP Table

Teresa Kok presenting gifts to some individuals and companies

Mikayla was not left out, she too will soon be a PK

Some PKs that were there. R-L: Shanti, Kenny, Reuben (I assume you know Melanie by now).

Juwita Suwito (center) with X4JC. Watch out for the release of X4JC's album at the end of the year

Mikayla and Shanti. Shanti was recently featured in a newpaper article.

My mother got in the action as well.

My mother wanted a picture with "someone famous"... I think she was talking about me.

Way better pictures from Joshua. Didn't find any of me though...

Congratulations!

2008-09-26T09:28:00.001+08:00

Breaking News!

You have to see this! This took place in Faith Charismatic Center on the 20th of September 2008. A day that will go down in history. I got an SMS from one of the TOUCH members, don't know who as I lost all my contacts. Sometime during the following week I got this video from Joseph Teng... Anyway, here's what happened:

Congratulations Joash and May (and all parties who waited so patiently for this day to come, especially Pastor Luke)! Well done Joash and May, you guys finally made it after so many years! I am happy for all of you.

I pray you two will continue to be faithful and to keep up your testimony as the two of you become one couple. This is a start of a journey, a long way to go, but it's going to be one heck of a ride.

Let me know if you guys need any help for the big day.

Faith Fighter

2008-09-25T02:29:00.006+08:00

This is so cool! If the previous post did not relieve you of any stress you should try this out:

Click here to have a go!

So funny... Jesus kicked everyone's butt!

When It Rains It Pours

2008-09-23T11:05:00.026+08:00

Yes that was the story last weekend. Throughout the week the weather was scorching hot when the weekend came it poured so heavily with such heavy winds that Elroi, Bobby and I, who were initially watching TV, opted instead to be entertained by the crazy winds that pushed the potted plants outside my house over. Yup, that was the weather over the weekend.

My schedule was no different, I'm usually very relaxed (TOO relaxed for my liking) however this week it was absolutely choked up!

Pastor Daniel told me to plan a "Cat & Dog Seminar". It was to last from 19th (Friday) to 21st (Saturday) September. Had to plan for everything from the speaker's meals, transport and accommodations to the participants' registrations and meal. That's basically the whole gig. The seminar had a great message: Christianity is really not about us, it's about Christ (hence the name).

I will make another post on this seminar but for those of you who are curious, check out UnvellinGlory's website.

Back to my weekend...

After that very exhausting weekend of services, I also had to look forward to Graduating student's photo shoot. Yes, BCM students who are about to graduate are very vain. It's for BCM's Key Magazine. This happened on Monday 1:00PM-4:00PM.

Immediately after strutting my stuff for the cameras in BCM, I had to rush home bathe, dress up real nice, put on some more make up, and head off to Dewan Sivik P.J. for the Assemblies of God's EduCare and WidowCare fundraiser. YB Teresa Kok (yes, the ISA lady) was the guest of honour. This item would definitely have not made it onto my calendar if not for me hosting the event. Someone very nicely recommended me to emcee the event. For reasons I am strongly suspicious of Pastor Gideon Yong or Shanti (my co-host). when I find out who it is he/she is going to have to pay for this. Anyway watch this space if you would like to see some of the pix taken during the dinner. It will be posted as soon as I receive them.

Busy week for me, busy week for my blog as well... stay tuned for more details on the weekend.

Anyway this whole weekend turned out to be a series of great opportunities. I had the opportunity to plan an entire weekend of services; a chance to catch up with good friends, fellow "candidates for graduation", and future colleagues; and also an opportunity to host a very big charity event and make a difference for PKs (pastors' kids) of Malaysia.

It's finally Tuesday, and boy, am I glad it's Tuesday. For pastors and ministers it normally is a case of "TGIM" (instead of Thank God It's Friday), as Monday is usually the day off. However this weekend it's TGIT. I let out a sigh of relieve as I woke up today, but it was all premature... My baby got sick for the second time and it had to be today...

When it rains... it (absolutely) pours!

I look to you God... you are my strength.

Anyone reading this feeling like they need to catch a breath as well? Read this: Psalm 73

Verse 26 says:
My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.

... amen.

*Feeling better already =)

Worship Evaluation Form

2008-09-19T09:36:00.001+08:00

In my attempt to grow the worship ministry in my church I decided to implement a short 5-minute debriefing session after each service. I wanted to minimize some of the mistakes that we were making (on a regular basis). I have had this idea for some time now (about 6 months ago) but have only recently implemented it (about 2 months ago). I have been weighing out the pros and cons and really thinking it through and how I should approach this.

So to facilitate the debriefing session I decided to come up with a simple "Worship Evaluation Form". It's so simple, it only takes 5 minutes to fill up. This was VERY important as I do not want to keep the worship team from their chance to catch up with other church members. My church's worship team has used the form and it has been so beneficial to us. It helps us as we prepare, it helps us as we play. It just makes us more conscious and more intentional in whatever we do. I would recommend worship teams do this. But please be careful to keep it short and sweet (KISS), and also to make sure your team is ready to take criticism. If you have taken these two steps you can gently introduce a debriefing session for your worship team.

Last Sunday I took it one step further. Apart from the debriefing session with the worship team. I also passed out another "Worship Evaluation Form" to certain members in the congregation and asked them for their honest feedback and comment. When we first introduced the debriefing we wanted to get feedback from people who were not part of the worship team as well. However I was careful to take it slow as musicians are often emotional people and I wanted to see if they were really ready to be criticized before getting random people to give us their thoughts. I also did not want to instill a critical spirit into the church members where they constantly judge and evaluate the team, nor did I want to distract the church members from worshipping to be judging or watching the team. I passed out the forms immediately after the worship session. However I am considering passing it out to them before the session next time so that they can be more detailed and accurate in their assessments.

It turned out very well, the members were honest and commended some efforts and criticized some others. I showed it to the team during the debriefing and they were all opened and receptive to what the members thought. We instantly made two decisions based on ALL the evaluations (even previous ones), that we 1) need to select more familliar songs and 2) more importantly, was that we needed to pray harder for the worship ministry.

The forms are available for download here (at the end of this post) if you would like to use them for your own church.

I'm sure some of you who read my blog are involved in the worship ministry as well. What do you think of this idea of a debriefing session or evaluating the team? Can the forms be improved?

Or perhaps you are also a member of Canaan Church and would like to give your opinion on the worship ministry, download the form, fill it up, and let me hear your thoughts.

My ultimate goal is growth.

Download the forms here:
Worship Evaluation Form (Team)

Worship Evaluation Form (Congregation)

Worship List 080914

2008-09-14T23:15:00.003+08:00

I felt that the church was going through a dry time. I personally spiritually dry. I think even my van felt that way this morning. My van overheated on my way to church and later the timing belt even broke! Double whammy. But I have my parents to thank, they managed to help get me to church by 8:50am (10 minutes before service starts).

Back to my point...

Sometimes there is just a season for these things, so at the moment my church is kind of dry. There are certain things in church that are dying and this is not necessarily a bad thing, somethings really should die. So in this season of dryness I took the theme for this week's worship session from Psalm 63:1-8. During the session I hoped to encourage my church members, especially those who are feeling dry, to come to the river of life and drink in his living water.

I pray for those who are, for any reasons, feeling dry. I pray that you will hang on to God during this time. After this there will be a season of growth and life. But God allows us to go through these different times to so that we can experience him in different dimensions and consequently grow. So hang on! He is faithful to carry us through.

Perhaps spiritually you are feeling the same way as I am at this moment. You may, or may not, be from Canaan Church, and I cannot be there to lead you in a "worship session". But you could still express yourself to God by singing some of these songs to him. I believe that as we earnestly seek him we will be satisfied. Here is the worship list:

Better Than Life (G)
Now That You're Near (G)
Shout Of The King (G)
God I Need You Now (E)
Unto You (E)
As The Deer (E)

I have included the setlist here for some of you who might be curious to know what the musicians and singers look at.

P/S: I got to use my new Shure Beta 58 wireless mic this morning as I led worship, it was the very first time for me. So happy! There was a better definition in the trebles on the Beta 58. There were some good comments after the service, which I was glad to hear :D

Introducing... My Worship Lists

2008-09-13T23:58:00.000+08:00

In my attempt to include more content in my blog I have decided to include all my worship lists in this blog. It will be like an archive of all my worship lists. Since I am more or less in charge of the worship team in Canaan Church I hope that as I write about some of the things that I do and some of the experiences that I post here will benefit other worship ministries. Maybe this site can become a very simple resource for some of the worship ministries out there.

Singapore and Back

2008-09-10T05:00:00.002+08:00

I recently made a trip down to Singapore from 17th August (Sunday) to 22nd August (Friday). Melanie and Mikayla were with me and so were some of our closest friends. Angela, Deborah, Ke Xin, and Keith makes the 7 of us. Keith was there to attend a seminar to upgrade himself, he is a hairstylist, Ke Xin invited us to accompany her. We also wanted to spend some time with Angela and Deborah before they headed off to England to continue their studies.

We were initially planning to stay in my aunty's condominium in Laguna Green but some last minute stuff came up and we ended up crashing in Leon Lim's apartment. Thank God for providing us with accommodations even at the very last minute. I also have Leon to thank for being so generous and hospitable to me and a the group of pretty strangers. I'm sure he enjoyed the company as well.

The trip was very relaxing. We had a very loose schedule. We just hung out together till we felt like going out then we would hit the shopping malls. We basically had no items on our itenerary:

Meet with Leon to check out accoustic guitars in view of purchasing in the future

Have a meal with David and Nechelle

Have a meal with former Canaan Church members (Nancy, Richard, Nico, etc.)

No we did not even bother with Sentosa Island as we found it too expensive and did not find anything worth paying for. Rather go shopping! Shopping is great therapy, just took our minds off whatever was happening back home.

We had so much fun, won't bother writing it all down. However to share my experience in Singapore, here are some pix of the trip.

* I realized that I'm not really a photo kinda guy, will try to get more pix to record the moments.
** I will also need to use some web album to get my pix organized.

On the wobbly Aeroline bus to Singapore. Mikayla (and Angela) makes funny faces whenever a camera is held up.

Mikayla and me in Takashimaya SC after our meal with David and Nechelle Lim.

On holiday everyone is happy... until the crappy food arrives! Malaysia's food is WAY better!

Daddy's cute princess

Yes, that's how Mikayla spent most of her time in Singapore. I feel like a kangaroo.

The (new) Yee Family at Suntec City

The rest of the group. Keith missed out on the shopping attending his course.

Mikayla watching Koi fish in Suntec City's Garden

The fairy bear mooning everyone >.<

Canaan members now residing in Singapore. It makes me so happy to know that they are STILL serving God where they are.

My New Toys

2008-09-05T11:43:00.012+08:00

My new toy is finally here!!! "It feels like Christmas" I told Steven Wong, our church sound man... really! Bobby was also waiting anxiously, but he was waiting for the other item that was arriving along with the Beta 58A.

I bought these on ebay few months back but the sellers would only ship to an American address. So San San, who was initially planning to come back for a holiday, said she would help me bring it back. So I bought the item and it was sitting pretty in her house till about 2 weeks ago. It arrived along with my "other new toy" - the Zoom 506 Bass multi effect pedal. The Zoom 506 Bass was purchased to encourage my church bassists to be more passionate about their instrument. I am basically buying this for Bobby to use. Timothy Raj and Derrick are also eager to try it out.

Anyway, here is a more (very) detailed description of the Beta 58A.

Shure Beta 58A

The Shure Beta 58A is a high-output supercardioid dynamic vocal microphone designed for professional sound reinforcement and project studio recording. It maintains a true supercardioid pattern throughout its frequency range. This insures high gain-before-feedback, maximum isolation from other sound sources, and minimum off-axis tone colouration. The Beta 58A has a shaped frequency response that is ideal for close-up vocals. The superb performance of this microphone is not affected by rough handling because of its rugged construction, proven shock mount system, and hardened steel mesh grille. Typical applications for the Beta 58A include lead vocals, backup vocals and speech.

• FeaturesSmooth, extended frequency response for outstanding sound for professional live vocal use
• Consistent supercardioid pattern provides the best gain-before-feedback among dynamic microphones
• Pneumatic shock mount reduces handling noise
• Frequency response: 50 to 16,000 Hz

This system includes:

Shure PGX4 receiver
Shure Beta 58A Microphone with PGX2 Transmitter
Power supply
User guide
Carrying case
Microphone clip

Technical Info:

Channel Frequencies:
Channel H6: 524.000 to 542.000 MHz
Channel J6: 572.250 to 589.875 MHz
Channel L5: 644.000 to 662.000 MHz

System Working Range: 100 m (300 ft.)Note: actual range depends on RF signal absorption, reflection, and interference

Audio Frequency Response (+/- 2 dB):
Minimum: 45 Hz
Maximum: 15 kHz(Overall system frequency depends on microphone element.)

Total Harmonic Distortion (Ref. +/- 33 kHz deviation, 1 kHz tone): 0.5 %, typical

Dynamic Range: >100 dB A-weighted

Operating Temperature Range:
18 deg. C (0 deg. F) to 50 deg. C (122 deg. F)
Note: battery characteristics may limit this range

Transmitter Audio Polarity:
Positive pressure on microphone diaphragm (or positive voltage applied to tip of WA302 phone plug) produces positive voltage on pin 2 (with respect to pin 3 of low impedance output) and the tip of the high impedance 1/4-inch output.

PGX4 Receiver:

Dimensions: 40 mm H x 181 mm W x 104 mm D (1.6 x 7.125 x 4.1 in.)

Weight: 327 g (11.5 oz.)

Housing: ABS

Audio Output Level (Ref. +/- 33 kHz deviation with 1 kHz tone):
XLR connector (into 600 & load): 19 dBV
1/4 inch connector (into 3000 & load): 5 dBV

Output Impedance:
XLR connector: 200 Ohms
1/4 inch connector: 1kOhm

XLR output:
Impedance balanced
Pin 1: Ground (cable shield)
Pin 2: AudioPin
3: No Audio

Sensitivity: 105 dBm for 12 dB SINAD, typical

Image Rejection: >70 dB, typical

Power Requirements: 12-18 Vdc at 150 mA, supplied by external power supply

PGX2 Handheld Transmitter:

Audio Input Level:
+2 dBV maximum at -10dB position
-8 dBV maximum at 0dB position

Gain Adjustment Range: 10dB

RF Transmitter Output: 30 mW maximum (dependent on applicable country regulations)

Dimensions: 254 mm x 51 mm dia. (10 x 2 in.) (including SM58 cartridge)

Weight: 290 grams (10.2 oz.) (without batteries)

Housing: Molded PC/ABS handle and battery cup

Power Requirements: 2 AA-size alkaline or rechargeable batteries

Battery Life: >8 hours (alkaline batteries)

...

What does all this mean? ...It means my mic ROCKS! Now to find my wireless guitar/clip-on mic pack. I'm already watching a few auctions on ebay now, hopefully I'll get as good a deal as my wireless handheld!

Mikayla's First Fever

2008-09-03T10:13:00.006+08:00

Susie our good friend and member of Canaan Church counted 8 months and 12 days. This is the first time Mikayla is getting sick. We were in Angela's car on our way to see Doc. Lim (not to be confused with our friend Doc. David Lim who is practicing in Johor Baru). All the "kai ma" are concerned and wants to be at the clinic, I think more busybody than concerned. She has a fever of 38.5 degrees Celsius and got her first dose of medicine - Paracetamol (a.k.a. Panadol, liquid form of course). Today is day two of Mikayla's fever watch. I'm home with her now. Normally she would be keeping my hands full. But...

Oh... she just O.M.M. (orh mm mm a.k.a. passed motion a.k.a. did her big business... get it yet?)... Time to clean up. Looks like she's still keeping my hands full...

Ok, done. Mikayla is all cleaned up. Yes, normally she would be making noise and I would not be able to take my eyes off her or she might roll off or crawl off the sofa that she spends most of her day on. But due to her fever she is weak and prefers to spend the day just lying still. She just went to sleep. Pray with Melanie and me, we know a fever is a small thing but being first time parents and this is her very first time falling sick, we're both naturally anxious.

God has kept Mikayla in good health so far. My parents told me that by this time my brothers and I would have been sick several times already. Doc. Lim shared the same sentiment. But Melanie has been breastfeeding her so far so it helped keep Mikayla healthy, however we now have no more choice and are transiting her to formula. Job well done to Melanie for keeping it up for over 8 months. Breast milk helps very much to keep babies healthy. Formulas have been said to be "heaty", so maybe this is why Mikayla is not well now.

Pray with us. I doubt anything major will happen, however I have some items on my schedule which I would have to let go if she does not get better. Melanie and I will also be able to sleep better at night. I believe now I can relate with and understand some of the parents out there.

Have A Break... Watch This.

2008-08-29T00:58:00.004+08:00

Some comic relief for you. For more of them search for Flight of the Conchords on You Tube.

I wished I could do something like that.

BCM Term Paper (Galatians 5:16-18)

2008-08-15T14:25:00.002+08:00

Finally I am at the end of my time in BCM. Here is the final assignment that I have to pass up. Hopefully now I will be able to keep my blog a bit more updated.

I promised the students in my Bible study class that they will be able to have a look at what a BCM assignment is done so I am uploading it here for them. Some of you might be curious of what is expected in BCM. So here is a taste of BCM...

http://www.mediafire.com/?2z1fx5o8w2j