Youth Camp 2010!

Here's the trailer for Youth Camp 2010 - Victorious Faith! Do share it with your friends and invite them to the camp :) Remember to keep them in prayer to have receptive hearts and minds as well as for ourselves to seek God earnestly in the camp.

Here's the link if you wanna paste it on their facebook walls!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYeT6u-bgqk

We'll also be giving out the flyers soon if you're passing to your friends via hard copy. So don't worry!

God bless,
daryl 's u n d a e' heng

Standing up for the LORD

I recall the moments of Daniel’s 3 friends, Shandrach / Meshach / Abednego, they did not bow although the whole nation bowed. They were threatened to be burned to death if they will not bow down to the Idol King Nebuchadnezzar had set up. They had so much confidence that the God they are worshipping is the true God, they could even say to the King, in Daniel 3 : 16 – 18.

Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego replied to him, “King Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us[c] from Your Majesty’s hand. But even if he does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”

What a bold thing to say, to be frank, I am not sure if I am able to utter such words in my whole entire life, not only is what they have said depict their faith in God, but it also poses a very great challenge to us as Christians, can we truly say, in regards of making a stand for God, that even if God does not save us, we will still worship Him? Before we read on, lets think about this for 5 minutes.

Well, we have always talked about making a stand for the LORD. All these years at least I have, although the many times we said we as Christians should make a stand, we make a big Hoo Ha concerning making a stand but many times the chances come and we don’t make that stand. Worse still, we pretend as if God is not calling us. I remember once during my College Orientation, when they were introducing the clubs of the College, they called out - Christian Fellowship. The facilitator then asked which of you here is Christians, I looked left and right, and I did not put up my hand. I was afraid, but afraid of what? Afraid of being - the lone one. Because of this incident, sometimes I feel very ashamed of myself and this is definitely something I would not repeat in the future.

Howsoever, today I would like to share this message of standing up for the LORD with regards to a recent incident.

Recently my grandmother passed away. As children it is good for us to pay respect to our grandparents, my parents have told us as they have returned earlier, that this funeral will be held in a Taoist manner. Seeing that the road back to Penang is long, the 3 of us KHORs drove back and we spent some quality time together listening to songs and talk. Alas at 6 pm, we arrived at Penang. Upon our arrival, we were greeted by our dad, whom brief us the dos and do not of the funeral, we changed into the mourning clothes which is white and black and we sat down while the funeral service begin. As a Taoist funeral involve holding of joss sticks, we held white roses in place of that.

What we thought was a service soon became a ritual, when the undertakers starting arranging tables and chairs in such a manner and making a bridge for the partakers to crossover. We had to walk around the coffin countless of times. There were also kneeling and bowing down to the idols they have erected. After figuring out that a ritual is undergoing, we decided not to participate. This act began to bring about questioning and frowning glances by our relatives, as they asked, why aren’t they in it? After 6 hours of rituals, it came to a hold and we retreat for the night.

The next day, the ritual continues, so we go on and on, until this part in which the coffin is being taken out, it involves us as grandchildren to kneel 3 times before it. At that point of time, the pressure was greatly there as yesterday the whole congregation was involved in kneeling, but today, individuals have to kneel one by one. When the undertakers mentioned the names of the grandchildren, I knew this time had to come in which our testimony as Christians will be tested. As I told my mum, we will not kneel because that will be deemed as idol worship. We told the undertakers, we are Christians and we should not kneel to any idols because such an act is deemed as worship. Instead, we gently took a bow, even though eyes were looking at us, some were frowning, some were neutral, some were perplexed, our family knew we were doing the right thing.

As we left, I had 3 thoughts on my mind,
1) It is such a privilege being God’s Children, we do not need to experience the hassle of securing our way in Heaven, simply because God has assured our salvation in Jesus Christ.
2) Although we looked awkward in the eyes of man, but what is man’s view when compared to the eternal God that we worship?
3) Being a good testimony does not always involve compromising and it might have looked like good testimony if our family kneeled, after all they will look at it as a sign of filial. But what about the part of being the salt and light to the world, what bout making a stand for God when the opportunity arises?

As I end this passage, I would like to share with you all a song we all sing when we were kids,

I have decided to follow Jesus,
I have decided to follow Jesus,
I have decided to follow Jesus, no turning back, no turning back,
Though none go with me, still I will follow
Though none go with me, still I will follow
Though none go with me, still I will follow, no turning back, no turning back.

- John Khor

*Note: Images used in this blog post is meant purely for illustrative purposes only. There are no relation to the actual events of the photos displayed.

Images taken from:
http://timelytidbits.wordpress.com/2008/05/12/standing-up-for-yourself/
http://triathlons.thefuntimesguide.com/index.php?page=4
http://ronnieyap.net/tag/funeral/
http://kingdavid.wordpress.com/2009/02/05/it-all-begin-with-a-vision/

Focus!

I find it very hard to focus on something. I start off telling myself, okay FOCUS, but after awhile I tend to lose it. I get distracted very easily which is why I find it so difficult to sit down and study properly. But more importantly, this affects my walk with the Lord.

Sometimes we live each day not quite in focus. And sometimes, we tend to focus on the wrong things. We can also be so short-sighted that we completely miss what is going on around us. But focus is very important because we tend to head towards whatever we are focusing on.

What are you focusing on?

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.

Hebrews 12:1-2a

A story in Matthew 14 22-33 talks about focusing on the Lord.
Jesus’ disciples were in a boat quite far away from land at night. Jesus walked on water to them. They thought He was a ghost and were scared but He told them not to be afraid. Then Peter said, “Lord if it’s You, tell me to come to You on the water”. So Jesus said, “Come”. Peter got out and was doing fine until He took his focus off Jesus and focused on the stormy sea. He then began to sink and cried to Jesus to save Him. Jesus caught Him and said “You of little faith, why did you doubt?”

We need to keep our eyes on the Lord. If we take our eyes off the Lord even for a moment, we will start to sink, just like Peter. When Peter’s focus changed, he began to sink. In life, we face so many problems and distractions. The devil will always be there to try to take away our focus from the Lord. However, always remember that God will always be there to guide and to catch us if we start to sink. So don’t focus on the storm: focus on Him.

Where are YOU fixing your eyes?

- Phoebe Lim

Taking a Break?

The Christian walk is definitely not one of ease and comfort. Its if full of trials and temptations and also a lot of self-denying. It is a walk of focus and determination.

But what happens when we lose our focus, which is Christ? You find that denying yourself becomes extra difficult. You find yourself getting tired and weary to continue on the race. All sense of joy is lost. When doing anything for God, motivation and enthusiasm lacks. Emotions tend to become stronger than knowledge and facts. `What you feel’ now plays a big role in the decisions you make. You keep pressing on, of course. Not dealing with the issue of lack of focus. Until finally one day, you ask yourself when is my break? When do I get off?

I don’t know about you guys. But I have been there before. You see the fact is, in this walk, there are no breaks. That's why its a walk. It is continual. A long obedience in the same direction in fact. Not a hop or jump, but a continual, long lasting walk. This issue of taking a break only comes when you lose that love for God. Just imagine a relationship of two new lovers. As long as they are in love, they will do all kinds of things for each other. But when that love ends, all kinds of problems surface. Likewise, as Christians, we should always take a step back to reflect on how God has impacted our lives. Remind ourselves of the reason why we are running this race.

Well, the break will come eventually. When our time to do His work is up, that will be our break. For Paul stressed so much on the perseverance of believers to run the race because he knew its importance.

“For to live is Christ, to die gain” – Phillipians 1:21

- Alex 'c o p h y' Tan

Images taken from:

http://www.joshuapack.com/2009/07/07/taking-a-break
http://www.flickriver.com/photos/tags/taking/interesting/

True Colours

Taking my usual route back from work, I will have to go through at least several highways before reaching home. I will normally be extremely annoyed by a few drivers cutting the queue to the high way by squeezing into the end of the queue and then entering to the high way. The best part - the drivers who are queuing up and have been waiting patiently, have to wait even longer.

But I was wondering, besides the fact that it’s obviously inconsiderate and somewhat uncivilized, why could they do it?

I mean, would they blatantly cut a queue in the wide open of a fast food restaurant where everyone can see that person’s face? Maybe they would, but compared to a car cutting a queue to the highway, which is more seen frequently?

The contrast is obvious.

And then it hit me, maybe it’s because they know they're hiding behind their wheels and no one could really see their face. Even if the neighbour lane and the car infront of him could, they probably couldn’t recognize him or even remember because their eyes have to be on the road, not staring at a person’s face.

Even if they tried to stare, that person probably zoomed off far, far, far away and he doesn’t have to go through some “guilt” trip so to speak.

Why am I bringing this up? Because that’s true colour.

True colours of a person is not shown when a person is in the best mood and neither if the person knows that someone knows him and is looking at him. It is best shown the opposite - When he is going through a tough time and no one is looking.

Just like how an employee or an employer would secretly take short cigarette breaks or lie their way out when they're late. But works diligently and committed with “passion” when the superior is looking.

Just like how a college mate may steal your entire work just to finish his own work and then treats you extremely nice when you’re in front of him.

Just like how 2 players argue, quarrel and then curse foul letters at each other’s family members over an online game (like DOTA and HoN) and ironically not knowing they are actually friends in real life.

As Christians?

Well likewise! We are goody two shoes in front of everyone in church but when we’re out there in the world..well your identity, your true colours are shown.

We claim that we’re God’s child and that’s our identity, we got to make sure that’s who we are.

Romans 8 : 16
“ The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.”

And no, I’m not going about legalistic approach to this entire identity thing. We should know by now, our Father in Heaven is just as real as your father you have in your family. The things that you do or not do are not based by a book he (your blood father) has given you and you must follow it but rather it all depends on how much you love him - A real relationship.

I’m not writing this either to crucify any of my family members in this world as though I have no mistakes and wrong doings to our Father in heaven. But in hope to serve as a reminder, because too often than not, we do things forgetting that God is watching and His always there. And we’ll purposely try harder to forget that He is when we’re about to commit a sin!

If we are God’s children, then let us be the most loving, obedient and grateful children we can ever be to Him as our Lord, Saviour and our Beloved Father.

Matthew 22:37

“ Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.”

Do all things including your speech, your dressing and the totality of your being as a testimony of God’s love in your life, at all times. It’s okay to make mistakes along the way and loving God with all that you can give but it’s not okay if you’re doing whatever you’re doing because of conscience’s sake.

If you ever see a car cutting the queue to the highway, I hope it will remind you of this post!

God bless.

- Gary Heng

Images taken from:

http://www.2space.net/news/article/313150-1287906603/
http://my.opera.com/born2bv/blog/
http://www.elca.org/Who-We-Are/Our-Three-Expressions/Churchwide-Organization/Mission-Investment-Fund-of-the-ELCA/Stories-of-Inspiration/We-Are-All-Gods-Children.aspx

Office Politics

Lately I experience a new wave of politics at work. OK, what is office politics all about? Some office politics that I face are as such: colleagues say very demeaning words, treat you as if you’re invisible, purposely do not want to do their part of the work in order to delay your work etc. Many things they also do in order to get rid of you or make your life difficult because you are just not on their “side” or “gang” which can be caused simply you’re different from them.

Guess what? One of the people who tried to make me a victim of office politics is a brother in Christ. How sad to realize that my brother-in-Christ is a hypocrite! My fellow brothers and sisters, let not become one of them when you start working, for the Scripture says in Psalm 37: 27 -

Depart from evil, and do good; and dwell forevermore.

Yes, for these 6 years plus that I have been working, I am upset and depressed over many situations and I cried out “Lord, how long will the wicked, how long will the wicked triumph?” (Psalm 94:3, NKJV) and gnashing my teeth when I see those “bad” people triumph. But, I find that God is always faithful to me and answers the cries from my heart. Not only that, I find strength in the time of trouble (Psalm 37:39b) and comfort knowing that God says:

Do not fret because of evildoers,
Nor be envious of the workers of iniquity.
For they shall soon be cut down like the grass,
And wither as the green herb.

Trust in the LORD, and do good;
Dwell in the land, and feed on His faithfulness.
Delight yourself also in the LORD,
And He shall give you the desires of your heart.

Commit your way to the LORD,
Trust also in Him,
And He shall bring it to pass.
He shall bring forth your righteousness as the light,
And your justice as the noonday.

Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for Him;
Do not fret because of him who prospers in his way,
Because of the man who brings wicked schemes to pass.
Cease from anger, and forsake wrath;
Do not fret—it only causes harm.

For evildoers shall be cut off;
But those who wait on the LORD,
They shall inherit the earth. (Psalm 37: 1-9)

It is my desire to be like a tree, planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth its fruit in its season, whose leaf also shall not wither; and whatever he does shall prosper (Psalm 1:3).

May it be your desire too! As you journey with the Lord :)

- Yit Mun

Images taken from:

http://www.codecraftersinc.com/humor_contents.htm
http://www.iowabiz.com/2008/01/
http://lifesgoldenrule.com/

Duet with God

I once searched for days for a particular music score for a song I heard and fell in love with. When I found it, I was ecstatic. I printed out all ten pages of it and rushed to the piano excitedly. However, it sounded different when I played it. It was hollow, empty and incomplete.

Herein lies the problem- the song was a duet.

If you have ever played one part of a duet, you would know that it doesn’t work that way. You can’t have one part without the other. Both duettists have to come together once in a while to practise playing the song as a whole. Only then, with loads of practice, would the song be beautiful.

To me, I find our relationship with God like a duet composed for two people. We can’t leave God out of the song, or else the song would be incomplete. Likewise, God must be an element in all parts of our lives. Any part done without Him would result in an incomplete duet.

Furthermore, we have to constantly spend time working on our song with God to strengthen our relationship. This can be done through quiet time, prayer, and fasting.

Let this be an encouragement to all of us to perfect our song with God. Let the harmonies of the duet crescendo to an amazing, polished melody.

- Jo-Yi

Images taken from:

http://www.khabele.org/main/support-khabele/auction-and-sponsors
http://wordincarnate.wordpress.com/2008/05/

The Living Word of God

I'm sure somewhat in your Christian faith, you've heard countless times how important it is to do your quiet time - I couldn't agree better! For some, they call it devotion, for others, daily bread. But it all basically means the same. If you don't receive the daily nourishment from God to your spiritual life, how do expect to mature and constantly fix your aim to the hope of the cross?

Hebrews 4:12-

For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

Do you find yourself dreading or "rolling your eyes" when Bible passages or verses being read aloud during the sharing of others or youth sessions? Well if that's the case, perhaps you might want to have a talk with God our Father!

Don't get this wrong! This is not a "spot-check" or pointing fingers at one another session - It's a self reflection session. At one point of time in my walk with God, it did occur that the Word of God wasn't the most attractive piece of work I want to have my eyes reading on but everything else under the sky seem to be better.

Perhaps, I was afraid to compare of where I stand to where Jesus is. Perhaps I was feeling that life was worth the risk exploring without the guidance of God. Perhaps, I'm not really such a "baddie" so, what's the problem not listening closely to what God has to tell me?

All that was mentioned would had been the case if we're not aiming to impact others and tell them that "Jesus loves you". It would be about during the "bad times" we pray for solutions and every other comfortable time, we just tell God to sit back and relax and probably tell Him - "Why so serious lah?"

Wherever you are, whoever you are, whatever age you're in, God stays true to His Word. Don't seek a "comfortable life", seek an "eternal life"!

Deuteronomy 4:29-

If you seek me with all your heart, you will find me.

The power of the Cross did not give us strength to go for shopping, play computer games or hit on a hot chick at your classroom! It gives us this:

Hebrews 10:32-36-

Remember those earlier days after you had received the light, when you stood your ground in a great contest in the face of suffering. Sometimes you were publicly exposed to insult and persecution; at other times you stood side by side with those who were so treated. You sympathized with those in prison and joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property, because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions.

So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded. You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.

Do you feel your mind, heart and soul penetrated yet?

God bless,
daryl 's u n d a e' heng

Images taken from:

http://jonathanblankenship.com/page/2/
http://www.timbarcz.com/blog/CategoryView,category,Software.aspx
http://www.cheerfulhearts.org/faith.html