Evelyn Tan
22ND JULY 2013
http://www.gbaships.org/
Hello Church!
Sorry for not emailing within the last two weeks. I've been extra busy in this port with events. So, how am I doing?
Physically: I've been eating so much food! Being on the ship has made me realise how wonderful our Malaysian food is. Things that I took for granted like the local kopitiam or Chinese restaurants, just seem so fantastic now. Our food is so full of flavour! I've been eating so much! Anyway, I recently recovered from a two day fever. This was probably due to how much I had been pushing my body with all the activities and lack of sleep. Also, there is a cough, flu thing going around the ship. Please pray for healing over ship's company because it really isn't very fun to be sick while on board.
Happenings: Although public/street evangelism is not allowed, we have had many on board events for youths. One of them was a Bahasa Youth event for minority ethnic youths. The whole event was done in bahasa so all the bahasa speakers were encouraged to get involved. I was in the worship team and it was one of the best worship sessions I've played for and it was completely in BM! The youths that came were struggling with their identity and worth in Christ. Although they were Christians, there were many single mothers and many of them were sexually active. This event was held to encourage the youths and show them that God cares and that they can find their true identity in Christ. During worship, the youths were encouraged to come forward and write their struggles or new commitments on a piece of paper and place it at the cross. I was moved to see many youths get up from their seats and do that. The event was called Jangan Bergoyah, implying that these youths should be firm in their belief and not be moved by what others perceive of them, despite the fact that they are a minority group. Also, playing in this worship band, I realized how powerful these BM songs are. The words are so simple yet so powerful. I can't wait to share them with you!
Other than that, I went to a local church on Sunday just to attend the service, not to run a program. It was called HOPE church. The church was a branch off from the main church in Singapore. It was about quite a big church i would say. Maybe 300+people? They have 3 different services - English, Chinese and BM. Before the service started, the emcee would ask everyone to pray for each other. There was just a lot of prayer before anything started. I found that really good. The message was on Missions, strangely enough. The speaker based his message on Acts 10 (Cornelius and Peter). It was amazing to see how active this church was in their ministry. They've been church planting in so many places! Different countries and even locally. It was really encouraging to have the pastor encourage the congregation, young and old, to venture into missions because the harvest is plenty but the workers are few.
Spiritually: I am recovering from a small wave of struggle. Over the last couple weeks, I had been so busy with whatever was going on on the ship, I was sliding. My body was tired and I began to lose focus of why I was doing what I was doing. It seemed like my heart wasn't in it anymore. I started getting frustrated because it was getting so difficult to stay close to God.
I thought, 'How is possible that even though I know how faithful God has been to me and I know His goodness, I still find it extremely tough to keep holding on to Him?'
But on Saturday night, before playing for an event, my friends and I prayed together and I laid it all out to God. I was refreshed and rejuvenated and my focus was put back in the right place. I've realized how important sleep is and how important discipline is. It's so easy to get caught up with everything here. So easy to put God aside.
I have begun being wise in the opportunities i choose to take and to just take what I can handle. I'm still recovering but I know I'm on the right track again. Praise God!
I hope all of you are doing well. I'm pretty excited to be coming home! (although i kind of am already home, heh) GODBLESSYOUUUUU!
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