Be Still for the Presence of the Lord

This is the song that I most remember from the Day of Prayer.

Be still for the presence of the Lord

The holy one is here

Come bow before him now

With reverence and fear

In him no sin is found

We stand on holy ground

Be still for the presence of the Lord

The holy one is here

Be still for the glory of the Lord

Is shining all around

He burns with holy fire

With splendour he is crowned

How awesome is the sight

Our radiant king of light

Be still for the glory of the Lord

Is shining all around

Be still for the power of the Lord

Is moving in this place

He comes to cleanse and heal

To minister his grace

No work to hard for him

In faith receive from him

Be still for the power of the Lord

Is moving in this place

TTC Day of Prayer 2011

Good things are meant to be shared.

This time I would like to share with you the sermon by one of the professors in TTC for our annual Day of Prayer.
I'm glad to find out in that they post the sermon on TTC Website. I would encourage ALL of you to take time to read it. It is truly a sermon not to be missed! I do hope it will contribute to growth in your prayer life, just as it has done to me. You can find the sermon here.

Another thing is I really like the poster. It is simple. And the strength is its simplicity. And it's also brilliant. It is TTC logo and the "ren" (Chinese word for "person"/"people") consists of The Lord's Prayer in Greek, Latin, Vietnamese, Korean, Chinese, English, and Bahasa. I personally request the designer to provide me soft copy. Here it is.

Ok, now let the picture not distract you from the sermon. Click the link to the sermon NOW! :D

Compliment & Criticism

Compliment & criticism...

Both are dangerous. 

Compliment can make us steal God's glory. ("Yes, I am good!")

Criticism can discourage us to the point that we went down to bitterness or make us quit. ("I can't stand it!")

So... Be aware of both! 

But both can also be good.

Compliment can give you opportunity to testify of God's goodness. ("It is not me, but God" - must say it with both  our mouth and our heart, beware of hypocrisy!)

Criticism, if they are constructive ones, can actually lead to awareness of our weaknesses, motivate us to improve and make us be more depending of God.

So... Embrace both! :)

Why am I suddenly thinking about compliments? Because lately I have been showered with lots of compliments. A good subject rep, a good testimony, good teen ministry, good this, good that. Sometimes I feel so tired. Why? Because everytime people compliment me, I need to take time to check myself whether I'm giving the glory back to God or not. 

Of course I can't blame others for giving me compliments. I believe they have good intention, which is to encourage me to keep doing good work. But how I process compliments and how they affected me also get me to think that I should also be careful in receiving compliments and in giving compliments to others because compliments can destroy a person instead of building them.

And why am I suddenly thinking about criticism? Because lately me and my friends have been giving a lot of criticism to others, especially pastors and lecturers. This pastor can't preach well. That pastor is very weak in pastoral care. This lecturer don't know what he is talking about. 

And it hit me. I realise one day I will stand on the pulpit preaching and many people will comment on my sermon. Or maybe one day I will stand in front of the class teaching and my students will talk about how they are disappointed with how I teach or my incapabilities to teach. 

Am I afraid? I don't think I should. I know it will be tough, but hopefully, by God's grace, I can ignore "bad" criticism and embrace "good" one. I've seen people doing that. Nothing is impossible with God.

Will I keep criticising others? Yes. But with caution. I will try to give "good" criticism (feedback). And I will   find balance between criticising (giving feedback to others) and criticising myself.

God, help me.

More Thanksgiving

First...

I received the above software a few days ago. It is a testimony of how God provides for me. I did not spend any single cents to purchase it. Since early this semester I was thinking that I would need to buy it because it is such a great investment. Throughout the semester God provides for me through some friends who gave me love gifts.

Second...
I received my education report. I was surprised because my grade for the 2nd semester is above what I targeted.
Old Testament II              A-
New Testament II            A-
Church History Survey II  A
World Religion (Isl.)         A-
Theology II                      A-

Third...
I can continue my scholarship because my average grade fulfilled what is required by my sponsor :)
I'm thankful to God for providing me scholarship! The cost of studying in Singapore is quite high. I am reminded of it as I received a copy of bill from the school a few days ago.

Thank you, Lord!

Testimony/Thanksgiving-Based Evening Vesper

Today I have the privilege to lead TTC evening vesper/prayer for the second time. The first time I did it was on March and it was my favourite "sytle", meditative (based on Lectio Divina). Today is my second favourite style, the testimony-thanksgiving based style. The Scripture Reading assigned to me was Matthew 6:1-4. 


What did I do?
1. Read Matthew 6:1-4.
2. Pray and ponder.
3. Take one point of message.
4. Contextualise it for TTC students and testimony/thanksgiving-based "style" of evening vesper.
5. Write my testimony/thanksgiving
6. Ask the chaplain for feedback
7. Edit, edit, and edit
8. Practice reading it
9. Pray, pray, pray


The testimony is not intended to be a sermon, and I did not open any other book/commentaries/software except my NRSV Bible. And here is my testimony/thanksgiving:

"It is natural for humans to demand signs. We are created with senses: to see, to hear, to smell, to savor, and to touch. We also naturally feel excited with something extraordinary.

I am no exception. During my one year plus studying in TTC, I always yearn for inspiring moments. I feel so excited and grateful when the lecturer says something that is relevant to my life or when they share their wonderful life experiences. I am grateful when the speakers in the chapel share something that touches my heart. I thank God for moments when I read textbook and feel that God really speaks to me personally through what I read. I am touched when my friend takes time to come to me and ask me how I am doing. I am happy when TTC won the trophy of Intercollege Games Day and I got treated at Subway (meaning that I have a valid reason to skip dining hall meal).

Those moments are special. Those moments makes me feel good. Those moments make me shout in my heart, “Wow, thank you, Lord. You are awesome! I know that you are with me!”

But, the reality is, I don’t always have that inspiring moments. Most of my days in TTC are routine and mundane: weekly reading assignments & Bible quizzes, eating dining hall food, doing my cluster cleaning, classes, chapels, evening vespers, class groups and family group.

But today’s Bible reading reminds that God does not work through extraordinary things only. It means he works and speaks to me through ordinary and mundane stuffs in my life. It is my incapability to grasp it. I am just not sensitive enough to see His presence in those mundane stuffs.

When I ponder about it, God shed some light to me on how he works through ordinary things. And just as I thank God for the extraordinary thing, I also want to thank God for the ordinary thing. I took time to come up with a list of thanksgiving for ordinary activities and for people who do "mundane" things. I will read to you my thanksgiving list:

Lord, thank you for the ordinary mundane things that you give me to do (reading, going to chapel, attending family group) because these things are forming me spiritually, although I might not appreciate how important these things are now.

Lord, I thank you for administration and finance staffs in TTC. They have been working so hard in arranging the classes, issuing my transcripts, liaising directly with my sponsor so I don’t have to be worried about paying the tuition fee, organizing allowance for my international friends. I believe there are many other things they do that I do not know, so I thank you for them.

I thank you, Lord, for cooking staffs in dining hall and cafeteria. Every morning they wake up as early as 5am to cook for me so I can eat on time and be physically prepared for every activity that I have each day. Because of them I do not need to spend time planning what to eat or spend time to go out to eat.

Lord, thank you for the cleaners. They keep TTC toilet clean.

Lord, I also thank you for the housekeeping staff, who makes sure the aircons are working, fix our toilet pipe, fix our doors, change our light bulbs, provide cleaning tools, and do many other things for us.

Thank you, Lord, for those people who are doing mundane stuff that we sometimes don’t even realize. I know that you also work in our life through them."

The evening vesper was only 15 minutes long. After the evening vesper ended, a senior came to me, shook my hands, thank me, and told me, "I was just complaint about mundane stuffs yesterday, and what you share is a great reminder to me." 

I was stunned. A coincidence? Looks like, but of course it's not! I believe it is God speaking to my senior through me, an ordinary person. 

Some last points:

1. Thanking God for routine and mundane stuffs is not a one-time thing. It is a very difficult habit to cultivate. It is a lifetime learning. This week is just another point of time where I was reminded again by God about it.

2. I think I'm addicted to leading evening vesper :) I still have two other "style" to try, liturgical and contemporary. But I don't think I will be given a chance to lead evening vespers again. Guess it's time to pass the baton to the juniors.

3. Everyone can give testimony and be used by God to be a blessing! All we need to do is read the Scripture silently and prayerfully.

The Second Half of 2011

I'm so miss my blog :)

TTC Life
New semester has started for 2 weeks. This semester I take 5 module: Interpretation to Biblical Introduction (IBI), The Book of Job, Greek, Pastoral Care, and Hebrew.
1. IBI for me is very important. Why? Because it's been the regulation of my home church that if someone is to preach a sermon in the fellowship or worship service/chapel, he/she must have taken Hermeneutics (interpretation) and Homiletics (preaching). One thing I like most from IBI is the power point presentation shown by the lecturer. It is the most systematically and wonderfully crafted ppt presentation I have ever seen in my whole life. Honestly, I'm amazed. I'm a visual person. A good power point presentation definitely helps me in learning faster :) Beside that I really like it when he starts every session with a thoughtful, reflective, and relevant sharing of the Word of God :)
2. The Book of Job module is special. It's an intensive course held 3 times a week from 11 July to 11 August and it is taught by Prof. S., a visiting professor from Princeton Theological Seminary, USA. An inspiring man who is greatly passionate about Old Testament and its literature. In class he is teaching in English, but he would hold a Hebrew Bible with him all the time. I never see him with his English Bible :p Prof. S is a nice person. There was once I was in the faculty office compound and was talking to a lady who takes the same module, Prof. S came to us, chat with us while doing some photocopy works, and suddenly looked at his watch and said, "Well, I think it's time for coffee. Shall we go to the cafeteria?". He treated us coffee and we were having a get-to-know-each-other session. He told me that it is love at the first sight with Old Testament. He was in the "Introduction to the Old Testament" class. The professor that taught him was awesome and since first day he just loved it and very excited about OT.
3. Greek. Finally! A Biblical language! I've been waiting for it and very excited about the idea of studying the Bible in its original language. For me, if I can read the Bible in its original language, it is like understanding God's Word in a much wider and deeper perspective. I'm just too excited! :) It's been two weeks now. Honestly I think it's difficult. Hehe... But I will definitely press on!
4. Pastoral Care. I took it because it is a core module. That's all. Nothing very excited about it. I don't dislike it, but I also definitely not excited about it. Our lecturer is a Christian mental health professional who happened to take Theology in his college time. Hmm...
5. Hebrew. Another Biblical language! :D But we haven't started yet because Hebrew will start after The Book of Job module ends. I'm so so so excited! I was told that the language will be very foreign to us. And Prof S also always encourages us in Job class to take Hebrew. Hebrew is, as I quoted him, "a very beautiful language". I'm becoming more excited to study Hebrew because of Job class. The Book of Job is a Hebrew poetry. Studying Job without a knowledge of Hebrew is like studying an English poetry without knowing English. Many times when I sat in Job class I would say to myself, "I wish I knew Hebrew". What a pain!

IEC Singapore
- Thankful to God for R, a deacon from Bandung whom God sent to study in SBC now. A great musician and youth worker. Now hopefully I can concentrate in Teen Ministry :)
- Thankful to God for Teen Ministry. The passion to serve and the longing to bring new friends are there. It's a good sign. God sent more and more teens for us to serve and pastor. My senior pastor, elders, fellow teen-workers, and friends have been very supportive all the way. Even the youths have been very supportive. Like what happened today.
     Today, J, a youth (girl) from Bandung, is coming to Singapore for holiday. J is quite known in our church community as she usually does a duo performance with K, another youth who is our church member. They would upload their video on Youtube. That's how we know them. J&K planned to perform in the Main Service only. But... they (and 3 other friends) surprised us by also performing at the Teen Service.Our Main Service is held at the same time with our teen service. I was, of course, thinking that they had to choose whether to perform in Main Service or Teen Service, and if they planned to perform in Teen Service, they would have let me know first. Since they didn't say anything, I took it that they would only perform in the Main Service. But... they took time to perform in Teen Service! I was surprised. After their performance in Teen Service they literally had to rush to the Main Service which was held upstairs. The song they sang and the determination of 5 very talented young people to proclaim God with their God-given talent that really touched me. I can see that the teens were so inspired! :) Anyway, I recorded their performance and has been playing the song again and again on my way back in TTC. I was almost in tears... :)
This is the song they sang, but today's performance has more people and better improvisation :)

TTC Retreat 2011 Day 2

Where you go, I'll go
Where you stay, I'll stay
When you move, I'll move
I will follow...

All your ways are good
All your ways are sure
I will trust in you alone
Higher than my side
High above my life
I will trust in you alone

Where you go, I'll go
Where you stay, I'll stay
When you move, I'll move
I will follow you
Who you love, I'll love
How you serve I'll serve
If this life I lose, I will follow you
I will follow you

Light unto the world
Light unto my life
I will live for you alone
You're the one I seek
Knowing I will find
All I need in you alone, in you alone

In you there's life everlasting
In you there's freedom for my soul
In you there joy, unending joy
and I will follow