Kids having fun at Elim Playroom
Tips Parent-Child Reading
1. Anytime, anywhere is suitable
2. Have handy books with you all the time
3. Let kids choose the books
4. Read out the name of the book and the author’s name
5. Let kids flip the pages
6. Let kids guess “ What comes next “
7. Ask open-ended questions
8. Don’t criticize your kids’ answers
9. Read aloud to your kids while they are playing
10. Reading time is for fun, not for teaching
China Mission Work
Carol and Pastor Leung shared how they felt after their China mission team a few weeks ago. Here are the touching stories !
” This is the first time I eat with more than 70 brothers and sisters in a little cottage in China. We ate together and we worshipped together. More than 40 of them had travelled a long way in order to come here. And among them, 20 are new comers. And yet, all these 70 people are leaders in churches in the mainland. They are either responsible for a cell group or a district of cell groups. “
” The most special thing about this missionary trip was, we were able to watch a video of a very special event. It was a banquet celebrating 32 couples re-submitting their marriages to God. They committed that they would follow Biblical teachings in their marriage, i.e. one man and one woman, one heart and one mind, one husband and one wife, and for all of their lives. Some of them were even divorced and were brought together again by the power of God. And some of them were even grandparents. “
” From the conversations with the local believers, I learnt that the Gospel had changed their lives and they were totally renewed and living totally new lives! I was very thankful that Elim church is a church that put much emphasis on mission work. “
” All of these started in a tiny cottage 15 years ago. Now, it has already developed to more than 105 churches there. It is hard to believe if I have not seen this myself. “
(12 ) End of my story – Seize the Day
Ha ha ! Thank you for reading until the end of this story! What do you think? Taking an average of a person’s life, I have just gone through half of my life, and I still have another half to go.
In fact, my initial plan was to wait until all my problems are solved before I give this testimony. However, my Pastor always encourages me to do so and she said there is no need to wait. After knowing my story,I think you will share my worry and understand why I found it so difficult to talk about it. Not only that the story is very long, it will also be very difficult for me to say this in front of so many people.
An Ending without an Ending
Now that the church website is up and I thought, “If I post my testimony on the church website, I can have plenty of the time to organize my story and it is not a must to disclose who I am. There will not be as much pressure as if I have to stand in front of so many people to tell my story. ” Therefore, I think, this is the time and this is God’s arrangement that I can give the testimony now.
Let’s talk about the problem that is troubling me all the time. In fact, there is no single one therapy that can deal with my problems! May be I should say, as for me today, who is now living happily in the Lord, it is not as important as before that my problems must be solved!
Why do I have to give this testimony then? I hope you will understand, no matter how difficult your life may be, that you may feel that you have been trapped in a situation where no solution will be there for you, we have to remember, “We are not alone. ” Jesus is there for us.
A Friend who Doesn’t Look Like a Friend
So, who is my “friend”? In fact, it is the negative thoughts that are hidden deep inside my heart for a long time and something that I considered as “must be “, or ” ought to be “.
Everybody will have such thoughts. These thoughts had been buried under our hearts. They are affecting, with or without our knowledge, the every aspect of our lives. Such as our views towards ourselves, to other people or even to God.
For some people, these negative thoughts may be “I am no good! “, “I can’t accomplish anything!” “Everything I do is just a mess! “, or even “I shouldn’t be born in this world at all!” These thoughts will come to visit us from time to time, especially when we are depressed.
How comes these thoughts? Well, they are formed by “accumulation”. No matter how good your life may be, there must be times of difficulties, uncertainties, or even sometimes unfortunate situations.
When the negative emotions activated by these adversities were not dealt with properly, these emotions, which supposed to be temporary, started to accumulate inside our hearts.
Until one day, we cannot bear anymore, our bodies started to give us some signals. These signals may not be very strong and only temporary from the beginning, that is why it is very easy for us to neglect them. However, finally an “explosion” comes, and we have no idea why it is, and therefore, has become much more difficult to deal with.
Well, these are troubles, aren’t they? But why do I keep calling it “my friend”? Yes, we do have friends who will come to visit us from time to time. Sometimes they may come very frequently, and sometimes they may not come to us for a long time. This “friend of mine “, just like my other friends, helped me to know myself better and to face my problems. And this ” friend of mine ” also brought me to Jesus.
As said in the previous chapters, I had decided to believe in Jesus when I was in primary school. I had said to myself , ” I will believe in Jesus someday ! “. And this friend of mine had brought me back to Jesus. I was so stubborn that I left Him even after I was delivered from the evil spirits by Him. If it was not my friend, may be I am still wandering!
The Question after Questions
Okay! So who is the friend inside my heart? It is “death “. I am not afraid of death. However, “death “ itself is a topic which I can never be able to comprehend. After one question has been answered, another question will come. There will be never-ending questions about this topic. Very often, this made me depressed.
The thoughts inside my mind is this, death seems to make life meaningless. No matter how hard you tried to live a good life, or even if you have made significant contribution to the mankind, the ending is the same for everyone.
I know that I will go back to the Lord after I died. There will be no more tears and no more sufferings as said in the Bible. However, I cannot explain why my mind just keeps thinking of these questions. How will life be there? What will I do by then? Will it be praise and worship all the days? Will I have thoughts and my own thinking ? Will everybody be doing the same thing? As there will be so many Christians there, how can we possibly be together with the Lord at the same time, given that there is only one God?
I also understand that the heaven that we are going to, as said in the Bible, is beyond our expectations.
What do you think? Stupid?
In fact, I don’t want to think about these. But these questions rush into my mind automatically and I cannot stop them. Many of my friends had said to me, “There is no need to think about what we cannot think of. There is no need to think about something that we can do nothing about. “
Yes, I agree with them, I totally agree with them. I can fully understand this with my reasoning power. However, the problem is, I cannot stop these thoughts rushing into my mind. What can I do?
The Therapy after Therapies
Back to now, many people do not understand how I can survive until this moment. I can only say that this is the plan of the Lord. If it was not God, I should have been dead for many times. I have tried to take my own life. I was possessed by the demons which tried to kill me. I was almost suffocated when I was badly hit by panic attack. During the most difficult moments, I have said to the Lord, “Oh Lord, please take me home ! “ Of course, He didn’t answer my prayers. Otherwise, I will not be able to share this with you today.
I sincerely wish that you can understand, no matter how bad your situations might be, there will be a way. If my testimony can help anyone of you, may be just one, this is the plan of God. If you feel that you are the one, I wish that you will treasure this because this is God’s thoughtfulness and kind arrangement for you. He wants to save your heart.
As for myself, in writing this testimony, this has helped me a lot. This is an opportunity for me to really face the whole story, and to lay it down. May be this is the special therapy that the Lord has planned for me!
Finally, I sincerely bless you and wish you will treasure everyone in your life and try your best not to leave any regret for yourself. No matter how difficult your situations may be now, although you will still need to face them and deal with them, put them into the hands of Jesus Christ and let Him take care of you!
Prayers
If you are not a Christian yet, since you have spent so much time reading this story up to now, why not spend a few more minutes and try to pray this short prayer? After you have finished the prayer, just close your eyes and relax. Spend one minute and try to listen if Jesus will speak to you. I hope you will experience God and enter another stage of your life. If you have any question about Christianity, you can contact Pastor Leung of Elim Church.
“ Jesus Christ, the author of this story had experienced your help in his life. Please help me in my situations. Please let me experience and know that You are my God. Please let me be able to know and to feel your presence, in Jesus’s name I prayed, Amen. “
If you are already a Christian, I sincerely wish you can feel and obey the moving of the Holy Spirit in your heart for every moment of your life. I sincerely invite you to pray the following prayer. After you have finished the prayer, just close your eyes and relax. Let God speak to you heart and let Him tell you what He wants you to do for Him.
“ Jesus, You are my God and my Saviour. Please lead me and guide me so that I can fulfill what You call me to do in my life. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen. “
Acknowledgements
In alphabetical order : Alison, Cora, Dr. Chan, Pastor Leung, Siu Siam, and the brother who always pray with me, and to all those who had helped me… There are too many of them that I cannot list all. Otherwise, you may be able to find out who I am.
So, to all my dear friends, “Seize the Day ! “
Mr. Ice cream
Elim Youth Space Pancake Class
Elim Youth Space Pancake Class
Date : 19th March 2011
Time : 7:00pm
Fee : $25
Enquiry & application : Steven 26980070
MPF managed by my God
It was about 20 years ago, I came back to Hong Kong from the UK and worked as a nurse in a government hospital. I felt that God called me to full time ministry. However, since I had to pay for my flat for 9 more years, I said to God, ” Father, let me work for 9 more years, and I will serve you full time by then. “
At that time, my uncle wanted to buy a flat which was for civil servants only. Since our relationship is very close, I would like to see my uncle and his family happy. I decided to use my name to buy the flat for my uncle. Of course, the money was from my uncle.
However, since I felt that God called me to full time ministry, I knew that I would leave the hospital someday. I said to my uncle, ” Uncle, as you know, I felt that God had called me to full time ministry. I will worked for 9 more years. Afterwards, you will need to find someone else, may be your children, to replace me as the owner of the flat. “
Later, my cousin was empolyed by a government school as a teacher. I was very glad to learn about this. I thought God was helping us all the way and I could therefore smoothly transfer the ownership of the flat to my cousin when the 9 years were up.
9 years passed after much waiting. It came to the time when I was about to resign. However, we found that the owner of the flat needed to be 25 years old. My cousin was only 23 by then ! I was so upset because my plan was upset ! I love my uncle and his family and I didn’t want them having to leave this flat, which all of them liked very much. And, it was impossible for my uncle to buy another flat at this price. So, I had no choice but to stay 2 more years in my position.
The hardest part was, I started to question myself. Am I really called by God to full time ministry or did I just made this up by myself ? If God had called me, why didn’t it work out ? I was actually disappointed and frasturated. But I have to accept the reality and lay everything into God’s hands. Prayed, waited and waited.
It was at the same time when the management of government hosptials would be transferred to the Hospital Authority ( HA ). All the staff of government hospitals therefore need to choose if their retirement plan would stay with that government or transfer to the HA. The difference was, there would be no pension in HA but in order to make the plans more attractive, the HA raised the % of their input to 16.5% monthly, which was really quite attractive.
I had no idea as how to choose. Whereas my colleague said to me, ” Since you will work here for only 2 more years, why don’t you just transfer the plan so that you will get a lump sum when you resign ? “ So, I just transfer without much consideration.
Two year passed and I really resigned. After I completed my theology studies, I really started full time ministry.
I was very surprised to discover something ! I realized that God is supernatural ! He knows everything. Nothing is impossible with Him. Let me share with you what happened.
Firstly, the 2 more years which I thought I was ” forced ” to stay was actually a big blessing to me. Within these 2 years, the lump sum I could receive by the time of resignation was increased by $100k ！
Secondly, not only could I get the lump sum, I could have pension at the same time! Why ? How could this be ? In fact, for staff transferred from government to HA and who has worked for more than 10 years, their pension would continue! This is totally out of our knowledge! If I had insisted to resign after the 9 years, I would not be able to receive this pension !
Year after year passed. Each year, the MPF authority mailed a statement to me. It was of course with some figures I would never be able to fully understand. So, I didn’t pay much attention to it.
This year , I am 55 years old and have reached the age of retirement. The MFP authority therefore asked me to go there and sign some documents that allow me to receive the money. The money is really in my hands now. Can you imagine how excited I am ?
God is amazing. His thoughts are different from our thoughts. And his plans are greater than the best plan human beings can ever think of. Why? Because He knows everything, and we just know a part of it, our knowlege is so limited when compare to His.
As Christians we may come across doubts and frasturations in our lives. At these moments, what we should do is to trust Him and lay everything in His hands and let Him take care of us and let Him take the lead ! Bless you !
Mary