Praise and Pray
... Oops it's already 12plus so can't say it's tonite's Praise and Pray was excellent. The focus was the Youth Sunday.

Thankful I was able to finish up my work for yesterday. Rush to church from work... though I was tired, I still wanted to go down to be recharged and refreshed.

Decided to go to Greenridge to have a quick dinner. Saw the rest of the lighthse and livingstone CG so joined in to their table. Grabbed my economical rice and ate.

Left briefly so that I could prepare my heart to worship the Lord in the sanctuary... Pastor Fabian led in the worship, my heart was kinda of not right to worship the Lord. Thankfully, Pastor KK started a
session of prayer to prepare our hearts to worship the Lord. Prayed together with Ben. My spirit was better after that prayer session.

After which Pastor KK asked the congregation to pray for the youths in the sanctuary. We left for a briefing before departing to do prayer walk. Barnabas, Ruihao and Huiqi shared of their burden for the people out there... Praise God for their hearts. Although their sharing were different but common thing was they want people to come to know the Lord.

Looiyi gave us a short briefing and requested us to pair up in groups of four. Two brothers and two sisters. Wise choice. In this way, we can talk to anyone... if there are guys, as brothers we can help to advertise the Catch, if gals, the sisters can take over. Zhen yang, Shuping and another sister who I didn't bother to find out her name were in the same group as I was.

Along the way, there were people who rejected us flatly. There were those we were quite okie about it. Yes, there were discouragements... it just made my heart aches to see them rejected to have a chance to get to know God a step closer... They were not rejecting us but they were rejecting God instead. We prayed for them... that God will bring other people to come into their lives in the future to minister to them.

I remembered I did not come to know the Lord straight away... but it's those faithful ones who ministered to me one way or another that I am who I am now.

When we were about to return to church , we met an elderly lady in her 80s. She was having difficulties getting down from the escalator. Zhen Yang helped her down while I helped her with her groceries... she began to relate her life to us. Interestingly, the rest of the group wasn't able to speak well hokkien... so I was left to interact with her more... Shuping was there to communicate to her to make her more at ease.

She kept saying it's her good fortunate that she bumped into us. We knew it's we divine appointment from God. Shuping and I was trying to relate that it was God's blessing bestow upon her. Tried inviting her to our Hokkien service. Was kinda of difficult b'coz she was hard of hearing... hence we repeated a few times... Nevertheless, the message was brought across. Hopeful and prayerful she would come to the service. Accompanied back to her doorstep. Her son wasn't very pleasant to see strangers like us accompanied his mum back.

Yet, he continued to thank us... and closed the door behind us. I was troubled by the son's reaction... will I do that when my parents are old and slow.... I questioned myself. I prayed that I will not be like that when my parents grew old and slow.

Zhen Yang led a short prayer for this granny as we walked. I echoed his prayer. We headed back to church. The rest of the groups had already gathered back. Looiyi was asking for any testimony to be shared. Zhen Yang took the initiative to share about our group's encounter with the elderly lady. I believed it as a blessing to the rest of my brothers and sisters. Looiyi shared that the harvest was not only for the youth... although our focus was the youth last nite. I could agree more... the Father's heart is burden of all His creation... young, old, healthy, sick, rich or poor they are all precious in my Father's eyes.

Ended the night with Zhen Yang, Royston, Alvin and Looiyi saying the concluding prayer...

Youth Sunday... I'm excited, so are those people who had been praying hard for it.

Catch the soul, the vision and the fire. Come join us... and be blessed

Day Two of Retreat - Part 1
Did Quiet Time on Romans 8:1-17. I was rather an interesting passage... but did dwell very much into the passage. My mind was half here, half somewhere else.

Breakfast was great. Had a packet of fried mee hoon and another packet of fried mee. I'm a pig. Ate the entire two packet by myself. Lol.

Roy came timely for his message on F.A.I.T.H. Roy was my spiritual mentor when I was in Singapore Polytechnic. He is a insightful, wisdom and humble man of God. The few Man to man sessions helped me through some of my difficult issues in my life.

F - aithful
A - vailable
I - nitiative
T - eachable
H - umble

That was the break out of his message. He started off with the last alphabet.

Humbility
Humbility is seeing ourselves as who we are... not more, not less.
Humbility needs to be cultivated and protected.
God loves the humble

Teachable
A continous eagerness to learn and to be taught
We stopped being teachable when we think that we had known everything.
We need to constantly desire to learn to keep in step with the Father.
We can learn from everyone, young or old.

Initiative
Jesus took the initiative in many of the passage in Matthew, Mark, Luke & John. Eg. Feeding the thousands, calming the storm, washing his disciples feet etc...
We don't take the initiative b'coz it is unimportant.
Thus, we need to be initiative.... to complete the Lord's task

Availablility
We can be available for the wrong reasons.
Sometimes, be are available to ministry b'coz we want to run away fromour home.
Sometimes been available means to stay in the ministry too.
Be available even it is boring, mundance etc.

Faithfulness
Do things well, not for the things that can be seen but not seen.

"Our goal in life is to please HIM whether visuable or invisuable."

Lastly, Faithfulness & Humbility are the two pillars while Availability, Initiative and Teachablity are the application of Faithfulness & Humbility.

To be continued...

... back from the retreat yesterday. It was both enriching and tiring experience. Little sleep, lots of talking and seeking after the Lord. The four days, three nights went past with a blink of an eye.

Day One of Retreat
Before the whole retreat had started, I had already experience the Lord's blessing. I was having doubts on whether I would be able to make it since my leave was pending on the actual day. I was praying madly for the Lord to create a miracle to allow me be there without having to worry about my work.

Praise God! My leave was signed in the morning and thus I was able be on leave after 12pm.

My heart skipped a beat for that. I tried to clear as much work as I could.

Packed my stuff and cleared my table. Print out some notes for the recreation. Went over to Marine Burger King, had this new burger which was launched. Grabbed a quick bite before sped down to Navigators building.

Quite a no. of teens and labourers had arrived. Greeting them before settled down and changed to my sports wear. Shortly, they were getting ready to clean up the place while Hungkiat and I retreated to one corner to go through our recreation. Checking the procedure and the logistics need for each games that we played.

After Kia Yuan finished his briefing, we started our indoor recreation. Had quite abit of hard time trying to get these people to settle down. I wasn't in the mood to try to catch their attention. My engine was still running cold... I guessed I was still trying to put off the hectic week at work. Nevertheless, thanked God they were able to settle down after much prompting.

Started out first game, 'Scissors, paper, talcum powder'. The game was played in a such a way when the loser would get a stroke of talcum powder drawn on his/her face. The game were played for 3rounds, 10mins each.

Everyone was having lotsa of fun in this game. Many of their faces were painted white. Carried on with some other more games... Ended the last game with everyone trying to have the most cloth packs on his/her body. I was impressed by Jas that she could put so many of them on her face and not feel any pain. I was the last to played... couldn't put much on my arms... I should have tried put the on my tummy, I could have a better chance of winning.

After washed up, when everyone was thinking that the speaker, Tah Chong would start with the topic of Vision of Disciple-Making. Kingmum told the teens that they would having TMS(Topical Memory System) Quiz. Everyone was booing.. that don't play this kind of practical joke. It was scheduled in the program sheet.

Hee, it was part of our planning to include TMS Quiz anytime of the retreat. Most of them were taking aback but they did their best for it.

How I wish, I could participate in the TMS. It was my motivation every time, I go to camp... it's was a highlight for me in the camp. However, over the years there wasn't chance for me to challenge with anyone over 60verses... most of the time, the quiz only stopped till 30verses. In order to encourage the younger ones to participate. Now, I'm a labourer, there wasn't much chances to compete with anyone anymore.

15mins after the unprompted TMS Quiz, TC began his message.

What is vision of disciple-making?

"A clear mental image of a preferable future imprinted by God to His servants and is based upon an accurate understanding of God, self and circumstance."

It's investing your life in the life of another, with the aim of helping him/her to grow and mature as a fruitful life.

Matthew 4:19 - "Come, follow me," Jesus said, "and I will make you fishers of men."

However, there are cataracts in disciple-making if we don't deal with them properly.

1) Shallow conversion
2) Faulty discipleship
3) Making poor transitions of new phases of life
4) Overcome by the cares of this world
5) Lacking God's wisdom

The ending note... "Start Investing Your Life today..."

Had a 15mins short prayer for the various aspects of the camp.

The last program for the night was conducted by Chris Lian, Serendipity. An interesting time of making the various group(F.A.I.T.H) to promote their team to apply for a job from the Navigators. It was a wonderful time.. The night were on a higher note when Kenneth make a presentation on behalf of the labourers. I almost fell from the chair with him making such presentation... eg. our combined prayer hours was something x 10 to the power of 53 hrs. We fed 1000 people blah blah. All these chaps. It was a hilarious.Only he could have such an ability to make the whole session a laughter-filled time.

Finally, it was time for wash up... Day one of the retreat was over...

To be continued...