That You Might Believe
John 20:31 (NKJV), John 2:1-22 (NKJV)
On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. Now both Jesus and His disciples were invited to the wedding. And when they ran out of wine, the mother of Jesus said to Him, "They have no wine."
Jesus said to her, "Woman, what does your concern have to do with Me? My hour has not yet come."
His mother said to the servants, "Whatever He says to you, do it."
Now there were set there six waterpots of stone, according to the manner of purification of the Jews, containing twenty or thirty gallons apiece. Jesus said to them, "Fill the waterpots with water." And they filled them up to the brim. And He said to them, "Draw some out now, and take it to the master of the feast." And they took it. When the master of the feast had tasted the water that was made wine, and did not know where it came from (but the servants who had drawn the water knew), the master of the feast called the bridegroom. And he said to him, "Every man at the beginning sets out the good wine, and when the guests have well drunk, then the inferior. You have kept the good wine until now!"
This beginning of signs Jesus did in Cana of Galilee, and manifested His glory; and His disciples believed in Him.
John 2:1-22 (NKJV)
What an embarrassing debacle! Running out of wine at a Jewish wedding was a shame to irresponsible hosts. Once their disgraceful miscalculation became apparent, the bride and groom could only wait and dread the moment when their thirsty drunken guests would start whining (no pun intended) about their dry goblets and itching tongues.
For all their bungles and blunders, however, the discombobulated newlyweds had unwittingly done something very wise…they had invited Jesus to their wedding. Jesus saved the day! I’m sure the bride and groom would have been thrilled for Jesus to supply any wine…even average wine. After all, it was the end of the wedding and usually the cheaper wine was served when the guests were inebriated and had become indifferent. But Jesus' wine wasn't just "good enough"…it was the best! It was the finest! It was more than enough!!
This is a wonderful parable of grace – no matter what mistakes you have made along the way, if you’ll invite Jesus into your life, he will turn your mess into a miracle and your tragedy into a triumph!
The turning of the water into wine was the first of Jesus' miracles and it had a profound effect on those that knew him. John 2:11 says that it was because of this miracle that his disciples, "believed on him." To most it would have been seen as a demonstration of power and a revelation of Christ's Messianic identity, but those disciples would later see a much more profound prophetic meaning to the miracle after Christ had ascended to Heaven.
Taken from Christ for all Nations news
Water Into Wine - Part 1 of 3 - That You Might Believe
By: Daniel Kolenda, Evangelist
Monday, April 11, 2011
Friday, April 8, 2011
Theme: “The Flesh and the Spirit (Romans 8: 6-11)
Lent 5 (10 April 2011)
Other Readings: Ezekiel 37:1-14 & John 11:1-45
This section of the Bible is a reflection or a meditation of Paul. Paul is reflecting on the difference Christ makes between “flesh,” and “spirit”. By “flesh” Paul means living life on one’s own powers, by one’s own lights, on one’s own terms, without God. It is to live a life, whereby God is not at the centre of our lives. A person may claim to be a Christian, but if God is not at the centre of his life, it is living without God.
According to Paul, if we continue on living such life, it will result in death. Now, the “death,” that Paul refers to here is not physical death. Paul is talking about an absence of life or deprivation of life. It is life empty of meaning, purpose, point, and it is certainly absence of God. It is a life lived according to the principles of “flesh,” which will not only lead to death, but is “death,” itself. They are things we do that are meaningless, and contribute nothing to anything really worthwhile, no matter how good they look, or how much they are valued, on the outside.
These “principles,” of the flesh are things we do: they are the operating ABC’s of a society and the individuals in that society. The Jews and many religious people all have their operating principles, and these are rules, or basic assumptions and prescriptions about life. These laws or rules are often inspired by God or connected to God. Though the laws are good and reveal what God wants out of us, but they do not help us to become good people because we simply do not have the power to keep them. Thus, a Jew has all the rules to help him how to live. However, he does not have the power to exercise what he knows, because he cannot overcome the flesh.
So we need some other force or power to help us - an extra ingredient if we are to become what we can become. Paul identifies that “ingredient,” as spirit. This is not the human spirit: this is the divine Spirit, the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ, and the Indwelling Holy Spirit, who enables Christ to live in us and among the Christian community. Though we are still in the world or still in the flesh, we are no longer a prisoner of the flesh because the Spirit helps us.
This Spirit also helps us by bringing us into the presence of God, right up to the last day, the day of general resurrection, the “end of the world.” This Spirit affects our attitude, which changes our behavior and connects the two, the internal (attitude), and the external, (behavior). This is what we called life in Jesus Christ; it is a life which transcends the laws, principles, customs, presuppositions, prescriptions, death, and sin.
In verses six and seven, Paul says that the mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace. The verse explains the results of the sinful nature as well as the result of the life controlled by the Spirit. He says that the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. Again this verse explains the result of the sinful nature and the result of no relationship with the Spirit.
Verse eight tells us that those who are in the flesh cannot please God: To be “in the flesh” is to be operating on one’s own – meaning to doing what we want or like, and that, by definition, is opposed to God. The two cannot mix, cannot be reconciled, because they are opposites. Living “in the flesh,” has for its purpose and goal pleasing the self. “Flesh” and “obedient to God” are contradictory terms.
In verse nine, Christians are people whose lives are directed from a source outside themselves, here characterized as “living in the Spirit”. There can be no relationship with Christ apart from this Spirit. There can be no such thing as a Christian Pharisee; that is, by being someone who tries to please God by living a good life through his own power. And Paul stresses that whoever does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to Christ. If you have no Holy Spirit, you are not a Christian. Note also that Paul uses “Spirit of God,” and “Spirit of Christ,” interchangeably.
Paul does not deny that all humans have something which can be described as “spirit.” This is often referred to as zeal, enthusiasm or motivation. But it is only when that human “spirit,” is enlivened by “Spirit of God,” that life starts to have special meaning. In our Old Testament reading in Ezekiel 37: 1-14, the resurrection from the dead took place in two steps. First, the “body,” rose. It looked like any normal human body, but was lifeless. Only when the “spirit,” was breathed into it did it come to life.
Likewise, we have bodies that live, but if we really look at ourselves and at one another, we shall realize that many of us are not really living as we should. We are just on surviving mode. We come to church, we say our prayers, give some money and that is it. The church itself no longer has meaning. Some of us treat our job just as source of earning income: the work itself no longer has meaning. We can be just doing things without zeal, enthusiasm or motivation: it is just dead.
That is why we need God’s Spirit to help us. When we are only guided by the human spirits we shall only exercise human enthusiasm. Yes, we shall do good and noble things, but up to a certain points. Time will come when that enthusiasm will cease, when we become less motivated, or when we lose interest altogether. But when we allow God’s Spirit to work within us, we shall not only do good things just for the sake of looking good or making names for ourselves. (These are what the people of the world are doing: they want to be seen and acknowledged, praised and honoured, and remembered for the good things they have done). When we work simply under the strength of our human spirits we can also get bored and lose interests after we have been doing them for a long time; or we may want give up when we are challenged by difficulties and problems. But when we are under God’s grace we have God’s Spirit to help and empower us, to do what God’s want us to do. That is why when we have done something good for the church or society, we should not be taking the credit. The glory should be given to God because he is the one who enables us to do what is good and right. If there is anybody who says, “I quit because nobody notices or appreciates what I am doing,” that person is not serving with the grace of God: he or she is serving out of her own effort!
Again I don’t want to be misquoted here. I am not implying that if a Christian has lost his zeal, interest or becomes lukewarm, he has no Holy Spirit. No. I am not saying that. I believe that every Christian has the Holy Spirit in him or her. The problem is the person does not allow the Holy Spirit to work; perhaps because he does not trust the Holy Spirit, or because he does not know he has the Holy Spirit.
Let us look at verse 11: And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who lives in you. Note that the Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead is the same Spirit who lives in us. If you use this verse to apply Christ’s resurrection to the resurrection of all Christians, it can come to mean that that our resurrection is not only at the end of time. In fact, our first resurrection takes place when the Spirit enters our lives at our baptism. Paul in Colossians 2: 12 says, “…having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through your faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.”
Last few Sundays we heard about the conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus; and in that encounter Jesus explained to Nicodemus what it meant to being born again by the Spirit. From Jesus’ explanation we understand that when we receive the Spirit of Christ or the Holy Spirit, we are reborn because our mortal bodies are given new lives. So our lives now have new meaning. And not only that: our meaningless activities are also transformed into life-enhancing and enduring quality. The good things we do in this world under the power of the Spirit will not be good only to this world: they take on eternal value and meaning. For example, how we treat one another does not only affect our relationship with each other: it affects our relationship with God. Jesus spells it out plainly: he says that if we forgive others, we will be forgiven. Likewise, we shouldn't judge, lest we be judged and we shouldn't condemn lest we be condemned as well.
This is not always good news to the church because when some people in church allow themselves to be transformed and used by the Holy Spirit, it can create uneasiness or even tension between them and those people who have not opened themselves to the working of the Holy Spirit. People who are not transformed and inspired by the Holy Spirit tend to use human reasons, experiences and emotions when they do things. For example, when Jesus told the people to remove the stone covering the tomb of Lazarus, Martha said, “But, Lord, by this time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days.” Martha was speaking out of her human experience that a body that had been buried for 4 days would produce a bad smell.
On the other hand, those under the guidance of the Holy Spirit listen to the God’s word and prompting. Sometimes what they say or do does not make sense at all: they go beyond the confine of human logic or experience. Therefore, people not under guidance of the Holy Spirit very often, will accuse them of being extremists or even heretics.
What is my point in bringing out this matter? First, we need to understand that the church is composed of various kinds of people at various levels of spirituality. Some are very worldly-minded and they only do things based on reasons and experiences. Some are more matured and have learned how to submit themselves to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. A few have advanced deeper so much so that God have given them special gifts that others have never experienced. These are people who are blessed with visions, blessed with gifts of prophecy, and abilities to perform miracles.
Wherever or whatever level we are at, Christians have no basis or cause to reject something or boast about something, except in the Lord. If we are to do that, we are allowing ourselves to slid back into the conceit, into thinking that we can do God’s work without the help of God’s Spirit; and into thinking that we can do something good on our own power alone. It is not the deed itself, but the “Spirit,” in which and by which the deed is done that matters to God.
Second, Christians are supposed to grow in faith. Those of us who hold important position in Church must grow spiritually; otherwise we become obstacles to the growth of the Church. It has taken a long time for the Anglican Church in this Diocese to grow because many lay leaders and some members of the clergy are not spiritually-enlightened or transformed. They do things under the pretexts of keeping the traditions. They reject anything that comes from the Spirit of God, and instead prefer to use their own logics and reasons to do the work of God. Rather than allowing the Holy Spirit to lead them into new experiences, they prefer to walk the familiar roads, play safe, and stay in their comfort zones. They say, “This was how things were done in the past, and this is how they are going to be run”. They are just like the men in Ezekiel’s vision: they have bodies but they are spiritually dead.
Therefore, if we want the Church to grow, that growth must begin in each one of us first. We need to abandon our old thinking and allow our minds to be transformed and opened to the guidance and the prompting of the Holy Spirit. To have God’s Spirit dwelling inside us means that we must accept Christ, replacing our own will with His will. And these are not easy things to accomplish because we are naturally protective of our biases, interests and things that we are comfortable with. That is why we need the grace of God to help us out. We are like the dead men in the valley of dry bones: we need the breath of God. We are also like Lazarus who came out of the tomb, covered in shroud: we too need to be released of our bondage.
Other Readings: Ezekiel 37:1-14 & John 11:1-45
This section of the Bible is a reflection or a meditation of Paul. Paul is reflecting on the difference Christ makes between “flesh,” and “spirit”. By “flesh” Paul means living life on one’s own powers, by one’s own lights, on one’s own terms, without God. It is to live a life, whereby God is not at the centre of our lives. A person may claim to be a Christian, but if God is not at the centre of his life, it is living without God.
According to Paul, if we continue on living such life, it will result in death. Now, the “death,” that Paul refers to here is not physical death. Paul is talking about an absence of life or deprivation of life. It is life empty of meaning, purpose, point, and it is certainly absence of God. It is a life lived according to the principles of “flesh,” which will not only lead to death, but is “death,” itself. They are things we do that are meaningless, and contribute nothing to anything really worthwhile, no matter how good they look, or how much they are valued, on the outside.
These “principles,” of the flesh are things we do: they are the operating ABC’s of a society and the individuals in that society. The Jews and many religious people all have their operating principles, and these are rules, or basic assumptions and prescriptions about life. These laws or rules are often inspired by God or connected to God. Though the laws are good and reveal what God wants out of us, but they do not help us to become good people because we simply do not have the power to keep them. Thus, a Jew has all the rules to help him how to live. However, he does not have the power to exercise what he knows, because he cannot overcome the flesh.
So we need some other force or power to help us - an extra ingredient if we are to become what we can become. Paul identifies that “ingredient,” as spirit. This is not the human spirit: this is the divine Spirit, the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ, and the Indwelling Holy Spirit, who enables Christ to live in us and among the Christian community. Though we are still in the world or still in the flesh, we are no longer a prisoner of the flesh because the Spirit helps us.
This Spirit also helps us by bringing us into the presence of God, right up to the last day, the day of general resurrection, the “end of the world.” This Spirit affects our attitude, which changes our behavior and connects the two, the internal (attitude), and the external, (behavior). This is what we called life in Jesus Christ; it is a life which transcends the laws, principles, customs, presuppositions, prescriptions, death, and sin.
In verses six and seven, Paul says that the mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace. The verse explains the results of the sinful nature as well as the result of the life controlled by the Spirit. He says that the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. Again this verse explains the result of the sinful nature and the result of no relationship with the Spirit.
Verse eight tells us that those who are in the flesh cannot please God: To be “in the flesh” is to be operating on one’s own – meaning to doing what we want or like, and that, by definition, is opposed to God. The two cannot mix, cannot be reconciled, because they are opposites. Living “in the flesh,” has for its purpose and goal pleasing the self. “Flesh” and “obedient to God” are contradictory terms.
In verse nine, Christians are people whose lives are directed from a source outside themselves, here characterized as “living in the Spirit”. There can be no relationship with Christ apart from this Spirit. There can be no such thing as a Christian Pharisee; that is, by being someone who tries to please God by living a good life through his own power. And Paul stresses that whoever does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to Christ. If you have no Holy Spirit, you are not a Christian. Note also that Paul uses “Spirit of God,” and “Spirit of Christ,” interchangeably.
Paul does not deny that all humans have something which can be described as “spirit.” This is often referred to as zeal, enthusiasm or motivation. But it is only when that human “spirit,” is enlivened by “Spirit of God,” that life starts to have special meaning. In our Old Testament reading in Ezekiel 37: 1-14, the resurrection from the dead took place in two steps. First, the “body,” rose. It looked like any normal human body, but was lifeless. Only when the “spirit,” was breathed into it did it come to life.
Likewise, we have bodies that live, but if we really look at ourselves and at one another, we shall realize that many of us are not really living as we should. We are just on surviving mode. We come to church, we say our prayers, give some money and that is it. The church itself no longer has meaning. Some of us treat our job just as source of earning income: the work itself no longer has meaning. We can be just doing things without zeal, enthusiasm or motivation: it is just dead.
That is why we need God’s Spirit to help us. When we are only guided by the human spirits we shall only exercise human enthusiasm. Yes, we shall do good and noble things, but up to a certain points. Time will come when that enthusiasm will cease, when we become less motivated, or when we lose interest altogether. But when we allow God’s Spirit to work within us, we shall not only do good things just for the sake of looking good or making names for ourselves. (These are what the people of the world are doing: they want to be seen and acknowledged, praised and honoured, and remembered for the good things they have done). When we work simply under the strength of our human spirits we can also get bored and lose interests after we have been doing them for a long time; or we may want give up when we are challenged by difficulties and problems. But when we are under God’s grace we have God’s Spirit to help and empower us, to do what God’s want us to do. That is why when we have done something good for the church or society, we should not be taking the credit. The glory should be given to God because he is the one who enables us to do what is good and right. If there is anybody who says, “I quit because nobody notices or appreciates what I am doing,” that person is not serving with the grace of God: he or she is serving out of her own effort!
Again I don’t want to be misquoted here. I am not implying that if a Christian has lost his zeal, interest or becomes lukewarm, he has no Holy Spirit. No. I am not saying that. I believe that every Christian has the Holy Spirit in him or her. The problem is the person does not allow the Holy Spirit to work; perhaps because he does not trust the Holy Spirit, or because he does not know he has the Holy Spirit.
Let us look at verse 11: And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who lives in you. Note that the Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead is the same Spirit who lives in us. If you use this verse to apply Christ’s resurrection to the resurrection of all Christians, it can come to mean that that our resurrection is not only at the end of time. In fact, our first resurrection takes place when the Spirit enters our lives at our baptism. Paul in Colossians 2: 12 says, “…having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through your faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.”
Last few Sundays we heard about the conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus; and in that encounter Jesus explained to Nicodemus what it meant to being born again by the Spirit. From Jesus’ explanation we understand that when we receive the Spirit of Christ or the Holy Spirit, we are reborn because our mortal bodies are given new lives. So our lives now have new meaning. And not only that: our meaningless activities are also transformed into life-enhancing and enduring quality. The good things we do in this world under the power of the Spirit will not be good only to this world: they take on eternal value and meaning. For example, how we treat one another does not only affect our relationship with each other: it affects our relationship with God. Jesus spells it out plainly: he says that if we forgive others, we will be forgiven. Likewise, we shouldn't judge, lest we be judged and we shouldn't condemn lest we be condemned as well.
This is not always good news to the church because when some people in church allow themselves to be transformed and used by the Holy Spirit, it can create uneasiness or even tension between them and those people who have not opened themselves to the working of the Holy Spirit. People who are not transformed and inspired by the Holy Spirit tend to use human reasons, experiences and emotions when they do things. For example, when Jesus told the people to remove the stone covering the tomb of Lazarus, Martha said, “But, Lord, by this time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days.” Martha was speaking out of her human experience that a body that had been buried for 4 days would produce a bad smell.
On the other hand, those under the guidance of the Holy Spirit listen to the God’s word and prompting. Sometimes what they say or do does not make sense at all: they go beyond the confine of human logic or experience. Therefore, people not under guidance of the Holy Spirit very often, will accuse them of being extremists or even heretics.
What is my point in bringing out this matter? First, we need to understand that the church is composed of various kinds of people at various levels of spirituality. Some are very worldly-minded and they only do things based on reasons and experiences. Some are more matured and have learned how to submit themselves to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. A few have advanced deeper so much so that God have given them special gifts that others have never experienced. These are people who are blessed with visions, blessed with gifts of prophecy, and abilities to perform miracles.
Wherever or whatever level we are at, Christians have no basis or cause to reject something or boast about something, except in the Lord. If we are to do that, we are allowing ourselves to slid back into the conceit, into thinking that we can do God’s work without the help of God’s Spirit; and into thinking that we can do something good on our own power alone. It is not the deed itself, but the “Spirit,” in which and by which the deed is done that matters to God.
Second, Christians are supposed to grow in faith. Those of us who hold important position in Church must grow spiritually; otherwise we become obstacles to the growth of the Church. It has taken a long time for the Anglican Church in this Diocese to grow because many lay leaders and some members of the clergy are not spiritually-enlightened or transformed. They do things under the pretexts of keeping the traditions. They reject anything that comes from the Spirit of God, and instead prefer to use their own logics and reasons to do the work of God. Rather than allowing the Holy Spirit to lead them into new experiences, they prefer to walk the familiar roads, play safe, and stay in their comfort zones. They say, “This was how things were done in the past, and this is how they are going to be run”. They are just like the men in Ezekiel’s vision: they have bodies but they are spiritually dead.
Therefore, if we want the Church to grow, that growth must begin in each one of us first. We need to abandon our old thinking and allow our minds to be transformed and opened to the guidance and the prompting of the Holy Spirit. To have God’s Spirit dwelling inside us means that we must accept Christ, replacing our own will with His will. And these are not easy things to accomplish because we are naturally protective of our biases, interests and things that we are comfortable with. That is why we need the grace of God to help us out. We are like the dead men in the valley of dry bones: we need the breath of God. We are also like Lazarus who came out of the tomb, covered in shroud: we too need to be released of our bondage.
Friday, April 1, 2011
Pontianak Mission Trip 2011
Praise the Lord for my safe voyage to Pontianak and also for my safe passage return back to Brunei Darussalam. The Lord Jesus had sheltered me and secluded me from any harm that might transpire along the way of the mission trip. Even though a day before my embarkation to Pontianak, the evil one had tried to prevent me from going there by giving me some treacherous obstacle. But the Lord Jesus had kept me out of danger.
I give thanks to the Lord, for giving me the opportunity to be called for the missionary work in Pontianak and also for the spiritual experiences that I gained during those passed days serving at “ruko” with Ps. Martin, Sister Noridah, Aunty Janet, Aunty Betty and Aunty Grace.
My first impression of Pontianak was: “It is a cultural wakeup call” for the reason that I found out a lot of Dayak heritage is still firmly exist in all places throughout the city. I was a bit surprised that it resembles a lot more like the Iban culture in Sarawak in terms of the tribal art, the traditional attire and so forth. It is really startling to see all of that, and I finally discovered that the Iban heritage was originated from Kalimantan. So the history was there and surely it will be a good sharing for the G.Y.M.
From the first night at Pontianak, I met up with all the young adults at ruko, from my point of view they are very extraordinary and gifted young people. There is nothing that they can’t do in Christ alone. Ucok, Ana and Elisabeth are among the youth leaders and the Sunday school teachers that had attend the ADYC Leader’s retreat in Kuching 2010. As we comfortably seated at ruko, Ucok gave us the warm welcoming speech on behalf of Pak Ben who was not there due to his training somewhere in Bandung. Nevertheless, the praise and worship at ruko is simply excellent in terms of spirituality even though they only utilize a keyboard but the heart of worship was present, the music are all preset in the keyboard synthesizer consequently that it will produce a good quality sounding effect. The worship was pretty much alive when everybody stood up and giving their best to the Lord. Overall ruko can be a very good potential youth church since most of the members are youth & young adult. The young adults are the ones that are the most active on the reaching out part in comparison to the adult member.
In terms of church growth it needs to be improved for the elderly members. I witnessed only three or four members are adults but the majorities are youth & young adult. Definitely ruko need to have some pastoral effort to be conducted. Well one of the member name Pak Herman is one remarkable person. He had endured hardship in his life, the Lord had blessed him. His skull was badly broken when he tried to prevent an armed robbery in progress during his duties as a security. He testified that the Lord had saved his life. He is one of the dedicated members who haven’t consecrated himself to join the Anglican member at ruko because he is from another church called ‘Isa Al-Masih’. He is very faithful to the Lord and served Him with all his heart. He has an open view to join ruko. He also composed worship songs, play musical instrument and lead worship. I think that he will make a good lay-reader or worship leader for ruko.
During our visitation to Siantan (slump area) at a place for Sunday school called “The holy house of life”, there is a feeling of sadness reached out to my heart where I saw poverty empowers the land. A different side of life that I never encountered before seems to grab my nature sensitivity. What made this part so heartrending is that the unleveled stilt house, roof full of holes that I can imagined when the rain pouring down the water will be dripping all over the place and makes it a hell on earth to live in; the fact that the owner of the house is just a little girl surviving on her own. The empathy for the little girl was really depressing that made me call upon the Lord in prayer and from that moment I had learned a valuable lesson not to take everything in life for granted. I believe that the Lord always watched over her as she watched over the few dozen children there which they use her home as a class for Sunday school. In nature they are too young to have felt the hardship in life, yet they manage to wipe their sadness with a warm smile. The most remarkable things that I’ve seen in life that the effort that they made to minister to others in harsh conditions. The benevolent dictates the heart that serves the Lord with truth, hope and love.
As we continue our days in Pontianak, it came to one Sunday morning where we walked approximately 15 minutes away from our hotel to a nearby stilt house which is also utilize as a Sunday school class room. Aunty Janet and Aunty Betty had become a blessing to those children. Those children were so anxious to answer their questions because in return they will be receiving prizes. Once they were asked to pray, I was once again amazed of the heart that showed how intimately those children with Christ in their prayer. One small boy captured my attention, he was closing his eyes so tightly; holding his both hands so firmly and prayed with his immense heart to the Lord. It is a heartwarming situation for me, as I never encountered any children below the age of 6 would pray like an angel. It is truly a blessing to have experienced all of that. I know that there is a reason why the Lord called upon me for this mission and that is to serve and gain more faith; there is a purpose to be served here. Aunty Betty was so brilliant ministering to the children with the help of Aunty Janet, they were match made in heaven to be the children’s greatest blessing.
We had a long journey of endless prayers, we visited the members that had not been attending regular Sunday service at ruko and gave them encouragement and counseling. We prayed for the blessing of the Lord to be upon them.
Well some journey will come to an end somehow. During our last day in Pontianak we gathered in fellowship with the ruko members. We ate together in joyfulness as if that is the last time we ever see each other again. That night me and the three girls from ruko perform a musical collaboration involving guitar and tambourine in a sense of creative art. Sister Noridah had thought them how to play the tambourine while I on the spot accompany those three girls on the guitar part. Another new experienced for me playing another type of musical genre. It was overwhelming to worship the Lord using musical instrument, one of the very talents that the Lord bestowed in me.
I’ve learned so much during this mission trip. I’ve learned about life walking with Jesus, serving his people according to His will. The Lord had made a path for me long before I was born. He had planned something wonderful for me. I just need to listen to what He is telling me and He shall direct my path to righteousness for His glory.
Guard their hearts, Lord, keep them close to you. Lord, help me to show them what is right. I pray, Lord that they would grow strong in you. Thank you Lord for trusting me, guide me and teach me all your ways; and I will not fail to give You all of the glory and praise. In the name of Jesus, Amen
This prayer will always be the remnant of blessing from the Lord for the members of ruko at Pontianak.
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