The turnaround in the crisis

Just a few days ago, on the 27th, we had a Newcomers' Party at a condo to welcome those who had recently joined our church or attended our recent activities. It was really fun and interesting, although it started off with a few shocks. The first shock was that the function room that was booked for us was booked by someone else!! After some checking, it turned out that there had been some problem in the booking system, allowing for 2 people to book for the function room at the same time. So we switched to the rooftop instead. The second shock was that the number of newcomers coming for the party dwindled from 14 to just 5!! Haha quite a number of us were shocked, but it was quite ok in the end. To make things even better, one of the newcomers accepted Christ during the party! I was so happy to hear about it the next morning.

It was quite a different situation 1 year ago. It was the day of the May Prayer Meeting for 2005. At this point, I was coming to church only because some youth leaders had encouraged me 2 weeks before to stay in church. However, I knew that this encouragement would not sustain my staying in church for much longer. I knew that nobody could help me, and that it would take a miracle for me to continue remaining in church. These thoughts were still in my mind even as I went for the Prayer Meeting that night.

This Prayer Meeting turned out to be one which made me examine my faith very deeply, more deeply than I had ever done before. The Prayer Meeting started off with a devotion that asked several questions, especially on how much we trusted God. It made me realise that despite all I had gone through, I still didn't really trust God. Then we sang the song "You Alone". As I sang the song, thinking through the lyrics, I realised how much my faith and trust depended on friendships. This faith that I had grown to desire so much, all along was never really genuine. I knelt down and I broke down. I felt so disappointed and so upset that my faith was never really what I thought it to be. That very night, I asked God to give me a genuine faith and trust in Him alone.

I didn't know it then, but that Prayer Meeting was the beginning of a life-changing period and series of events. On Sunday, just 2 days ago, we sang "God Will Make a Way", and thinking back to what I went through, God did indeed make a way for me.

God will make a way
When there seems to be no way
He works in ways we cannot see
He will make a way for me
He will be my guide
Hold me closely to His side
With love and strength for each new day
He will make a way
He will make a way

Just a year ago...nearly left church...

As I enter into the second half of May for this year, I couldn't help thinking back to what I was going through last year during this period. While I'm now a baptised member of my church, around this time last year, on 15 May 2005, I had actually made up my mind to leave church, and was expecting that day to be my last day in church. During the big group teaching, I still remember one moment when I took a look around at all the other youths who were attending the lesson with me. Which of them had any idea that I had made up my mind on that very Sunday to leave church?

However, after the 2nd service that day, I felt like I was just giving up without doing anything to help myself. So I approached one of the youths leaders who had left church before and spoke to her for quite some time. Then another youth leader came and joined us, so I told him about my problems too. Both of them encouraged me to stay on in church, but neither of them knew then exactly why I wanted to leave church. I knew that if I stayed on, emotionally I couldn't hold on for more than a few weeks, but I decided to stay on anyway.

Thinking back, I nearly, VERY nearly left church that day. Couldn't have got any closer than that. But making the decision to stay on that day was the start of how things would eventually turn around.

An encouraging sign! :)

Yesterday was Sunday, and I went to church as per normal. Went through all the youth activities, then went for service. After service, I was just talking to some of the youths, when an unexpected appearance by one of my friends surprised me! At the same time, his appearance was an encouraging sign to me.

For several months, this friend, who was born into church, had not been going to church. Caught up with too many other things, I didn't start trying to reach out to him till a few months after he started disappearing. Some time after that, we met up with a group a few times, but as other things kept on coming in (actually I probably was trying to reach out to too many people), I kind of lapsed in keeping in contact for him for several weeks. Over the past 3-4 weeks, I made repeated persistent efforts to try and contact him, but largely to no avail, until last Thursday morning, when he replied the sms (and the missed call) I sent to him on Wednesday night. And next thing you know, he appeared back in church, after months of disappearance!!

Many times, when I try reaching out to people by contacting them, I often worry that I would end up irritating them. For example, if someone left church and I try to contact that person over and over again through sms and calls, it may end up irritating that person right? However, I slowly came to realise that it was better for me to try contacting others several times and stand the risk of irritating them, but at least show that I care for them and have not forgotten them, rather than not contacting them at all as it shows apathy. Sometimes, people who have left church won't respond when people from church try contacting them. However, through repeated attempts to contact them, showing them that I care, I've found it possible to regain contact with people who I've lost contact with for quite long.

For my friend, when he ignored my repeated attempts to contact him over the past few weeks, I knew it wasn't a good sign. He could be having problems and didn't want to talk to me, or he could have already decided not to come back to church. I knew time was running out (or I feared it had already run out) and risking irritating him, I smsed and called him repeatedly over these few weeks. I had no idea how much chance I had of bringing him back, and that didn't feel very good, but I continued to pray for his response. Hope was just a silver lining but I gave it my best and let God do the rest.

Seeing my friend in church yesterday, it really felt like all the hard working reaching out to him had finally paid off. Doing what I could do and leaving the rest to God really had encouraging rewards. Personally, I feel that this is an encouraging sign from God to do my best even in unlikely situations. For now, I will aim for my next goal, even though it really seems quite improbable. Yet at the same time, I will continue to invest time and effort for reaching out to my friend.

Lunch reflections

Today was a rather "interesting" day. After 2nd service, for some strange reason, ALMOST everyone split into batch + gender groups for lunch!! What a shock!! How come suddenly everyone did that at the same time? Well, in the end I didn't break the trend... It was quite a fruitful lunch though, reflecting a lot on what I've been doing for months.

The community in a church, not surprisingly, is often quite focused on social needs as well as spiritual needs. Especially for youths, the church community is a community that we learn with, have fun with and grow with. However, as we settle into groups that we are comfortable in, often these groups become the group that we spend most, if not all of our time with. Sunday after Sunday, we spend our free time in church with our own groups. For me, though, life in church has been quite different from most of the youths.

Unlike most of the youths who were born here, I came into the church over 2.5 years ago. Through experiencing numerous trials, facing the pain of loneliness time and again, and nearly leaving church 1 year ago (until God touched my life in a miraculous way), I learned a lot about caring for others, especially those whom no one talked to or mixed with, those who felt alone. I discovered my spiritual gifts of sheperding, mercy, encouragement, hospitality and intercession (some of which I had already been making use of) and deep down, I knew God wanted me to use my life to touch the lives of others.

This effort began with an attempt to reach out to those who had left church. Some didn't respond, but some responded positively, and with some intentional effort on my part, we strengthened this friendship once again.

Over time, I reached out to more people. Those who had left the Youth Ministry, the newcomers and others who had come to our church before. It took more and more effort reaching out to so many people, talking to them on a regular basis, smsing them to remind them that there are others who care for them, sometimes even listening to their problems. But I willingly put in this effort, cos I knew that for some of these people, if I didn't take the initiative to mix around with them regularly, almost no one else would. I cared for them, and didn't want them to face what I had gone through. If they wanted to find God's love and couldn't find it elsewhere, I thought, why not let them find it in me?

In handling much of this alone, the effort did get overwhelming at times. During these times, I would look at the other youths with the groups that they're so comfortable in, and sometimes I wondered whether the effort was worthwhile, sometimes just felt like giving up. But, for the love of these people, I never did, and the results have been extremely rewarding. Many of them come to me automatically, just to talk or sometimes to share problems. I know that I've won their trust and friendship, things which are priceless.

1 John 4:19 says "We love because He first loved us." God touched me with His love and saved me from the brink of leaving church, but He didn't do that to many others who ended up leaving church. Why? It's because He wants me to make a difference in the lives of others. It hasn't been easy to do, but it has been rewarding. My dear WAH team, my answered prayer from God, this is the goal I have for you. Reaching out to others on a personal level takes time and effort, and I've paid this price (doing it alone somemore!), but the rewards are incredible.

For my church youths who have read this, think about our Youth Ministry. Do we truly exhibit God's love? Do we care? My secret is out, the secret that I've kept for SOOO long, the secret that I nearly left church. Maybe someone around you is having problems in this community? Maybe, just maybe, someone around you is feeling alone and wants to leave church? I'll end off here with some 4-word questions for everyone to think about:

Do we really care?

Do we really love?

Where is God's love?