I think this song is quite commonly heard nowadays. But it really speaks to me so much.. and the bridge especially i hold it as a prayer for myself and many others! It's really nice! hear it!

 

 

Bridge:

Heal my heart and make it clean

Open up my eyes to the things unseen

Show me how to love like You, have loved me

Break my heart for what breaks Yours

Everything I am for Your Kingdom's cause

As I walk from earth, into eternity

I can count a million times
People asking me how I
Can praise You with all that
I've gone through
The question just amazes me
Can circumstances possibly
Change who I forever am in You

Maybe since my life was changed
Long before these rainy days
It's never really ever crossed my mind
To turn my back on you, oh Lord
My only shelter from the storm
But instead I draw closer through these times
So I pray

Bring me joy, bring me peace
Bring the chance to be free
Bring me anything that brings
You glory And I know there'll
be days When this life brings me pain
But if that's what it takes to
praise You Jesus, bring the rain

I am yours regardless of the clouds that may
loom above because you are much greater than
my pain you who made a way for me suffering
your destiny so tell me whats a little rain

[1st Chorus]

Holy, holy, holy
Holy, holy, holy
is the lord God almighty
is the lord God almighty
I'm forever singing

[2nd Chorus 2x]

everybody singing
Holy holy holy
you are holy
you are holy 

Hope that this song can encourage each and everyone of us who consider urselves part of God's salvation plan, army.

1 John 3:2a

"Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known..."

Naturally, the human instincts in us tend to be always calculating (subconsciously we do!) that uncertainty is a horrible horrible thing! We think that we have to reach some end, BUT that is not the nature of a spiritual life! (WOO!)

Nature of spiritual life is that we are certain in our uncertainty, and thus we do not make our permanent home anywhere!!

Certainty is the mark of a common sense life whilst graciousness is the mark of the spiritual life. To be certain of God means that we are uncertain in all our ways, we do not know what a day may bring forth. Usually we'll say this with a sigh of sadness, but let's say it with an anticipating, expecting breath of excitment!

We are uncertain of the next step, but we are certain of God!

Immediately we abandon ourselves and submit to GOD, and do the duty that we have to do. GOD packs our life with surprises all the time. Don't believe your belief about God. Believe IN GOD! Jesus asked us to become like little children. Spiritual life is like the life of a child. We are NOT uncertain of God, but we are uncertain of what He is going to do next! If we are only certain in our beliefs, we get all dignified and strict and have this idea of finality about our views; but what we are rightly related with God, life is FULL of spontaneous, joyful uncertainty and expectancy.

Entrust your life to God, obey His Word. It is gloriously uncertain how God will come in and intervene in certain circumstances, but He will come. Remain loyal to Him! Woots!

Adapted from Oswald Chambers in his article "The Graciousness of Uncertainty"

How on earth can you answer this question? It is the 21st century after all; surely God doesn't hate you enough to make you say something so ridiculous and old-fashioned that you will lose all your friends! In the gospels, Jesus was asked many difficult questions and he frequently responded with a question before answering more fully. He did this so often that I think we are probably meant to notice it and learn something.

What is wrong with sex before marriage? How about: 'What is wrong with anything?' In other words, where do you get the moral code by which you live your life? There may be a whole number of different responses: 'I do what I feel is right' - my morals are entirely personal and arbitrary. Or 'society decides what is right and wrong' - laws are made and as long as I stick within them everything is OK. Or anything in between those two responses.

For us as Christians, right and wrong are not purely up to the individual; after all, what you feel is good for you may hurt me. It is not only up to society either; lots of societies have allowed things to be 'legal' that you or I might take issue with. Right and wrong for the Christian come from a higher standard than any individual or group of humans - they come from God. The creator is also the moral lawgiver. So when I say that I believe that sex is designed to be expressed within marriage, I am not setting myself up as judge and jury and deciding to make life difficult for single people - I am trying to follow the maker's instructions.

It may sound strange, but this question about sex is actually a vitally important question for many in the search for God. In fact, sometimes sexual and moral issues provide the main foundation for a person not believing in God. The atheist and writer Aldous Huxley wrote quite openly about his motivation for believing that life had no meaning and that there is no God:

I had motives for not wanting the world to have a meaning; consequently I assumed that it had none and was able without any difficulty to find satisfying reasons for this assumption.... For myself as, no doubt, for most of my contemporaries, the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument of liberation ... liberation from a certain system of morality. We objected to the morality because it interfered with our sexual freedom.... There was one admirably simple method in our political and erotic revolt: We could deny that the world had any meaning whatsoever. [1]

This is not to say that ethical objections to becoming a Christian are not sincere or heartfelt. I have met many students close to becoming a Christian who have asked, 'If I become a Christian, do I have to stop sleeping with my boyfriend?' This is a real question which cuts to the heart of meaning and happiness.

Sometimes sexual and moral issues provide the main foundation for a person not believing in God

It could be re-phrased: 'If I become a Christian, do I have to give up the one thing in my life which brings me happiness?' If this is the real question then our answer needs to deal with the question of happiness. Jesus talked about this a lot in the gospels - in fact his most famous teaching in the Sermon on the Mount promised blessing or happiness to those who followed in His way. We need to be careful here - we are not talking about a prosperity gospel: 'Come to Jesus and everything in your life will be fantastic!' We are talking about a real dynamic relationship with God which offers us satisfaction at the very deepest level - it does not shrink from suffering or difficulty, but gives us the promise of God's nearness and blessing even when life is tough.

Sex is good

However, this question may be asked from a completely different perspective. It could be that our friend is genuinely sceptical about Christ because of the out-of-date ideas about sex that Christians have. How can sex be wrong? It may come as a surprise that the biblical view of sex is extremely positive. God thought of sex - he gave us this wonderful expression of love for another. There is a whole book of the Old Testament devoted to extolling the beauty of sex and showing God's delight in what he has made pleasurable and good.

The very beginning of the bible lays a foundation for a Judaeo-Christian approach to sex. The early chapters of Genesis tell us that God created the first man and woman and, seeing what He had made, declared that it was 'very good'. Genesis provides the original context for sexual intercourse and shows that God has designed this wonderful thing to be expressed within a lifelong marital relationship between one man and one woman. Jesus grounds his teaching on sexuality on those words.

The divine image is expressed as both male and female, and so the man and woman are equally human despite their physical, anatomical and procreative differences. As they are joined together as husband and wife their unity and diversity is expressed. 'So a man will leave his father and his mother and be united with his wife, and they will become one flesh' (Genesis 2.24). Here we have a blueprint for human sexual love - through the sexual act the man and woman have a new, incredible kind of intimacy. This is called being 'one flesh' - designed to be exclusive and faithful. Both Jesus and Paul pick up on this in the New Testament - emphasising the beauty of monogamous marriage.

In this way, the question of how sex outside marriage could be wrong can be approached by looking at the beauty, intimacy and preciousness of sex. God designed that this happen in a safe and committed context of love and devotion. According to the maker, this is where sex is at its best.

¹ Aldous Huxley, Ends and Means (London: Chatto and Windus, 1946), pp 270-273.

Letter to my friend

My friend, I stand in judgement now

And feel that you're to be blamed somehow

on earthI walked with u day by day

And never did you point the way

You know the Lord in truth and glory

But never did you tell the story

My knowledge then was very dim

You could have led me saved through him

Though we lived together on the earth

you never told me of the second birth

And now i stand this day condemned

because you failed to mention his name to me

you taught me many things that's true

i called you friend and trusted you

but i learn now that's too late

you could have saved me from this fate

we walked by day and talked by night

and yet u showed me not the light

you let me live and love and die

you knew i'd never live on high

yes, i called you friend in life

and trusted you through joy and strife

and yet on coming to this end

---

What does trust mean ? Trust means having believe in things dat cant be seen (faith). Sometimes we tend to trust ourselves more than we trust God. BUT i have learnt dat we really need to rely fully on GOD in order to perform to our full potential. Cos rmb we are created in GOD's image and dat when God created us, HE already had a plan for us. Like one famous individual said, Life is like a stage and we are the actors. Let God control and use us so that we may do things dat are pleasing unto him. Thus for all of us taking our results or who have taken our results rmb dat it is God's plan dat puts us where we are or will be. In ending i would like to say this, the doors dat God opens no man can close and the doors that God closes no man can open.  

HELLO EVERYONE!

LUF! Is here! The community service you and your friends will have fun doing together! It's open to everyone so do get your pals to come with u!

 

4th April
9am - 6pm
YWCA Lodge (Behind Park Mall)

Get down and have fun with children from YWCA! Fill up the form passed out, and pass it back to Abraham or Cherlyn by 15 Mar! No form? Get it from us! Don't hesitate to approach us to ask questions yeah! :)

 

 

Hi all

I have been waiting for this movie for soooo long......FIREPROOF is from the makers of 'Facing the Giants'. It comes with the same action pack stuff like 'Facing the Giants' but addresses more serious issues like marriage, internet pornography and how seemingly good people frustrate their partners.

If you are married or about to get married, I encourage you to watch this movie with your partner. Then spend some time talking about what each person needs to do to make your marriage work.

If you are in a relationship, the movie is also a great starting point for discussing the different needs of men and women. Men needs to be respected. Women to be loved. Sounds easy in theory , wait till you try it in practise.

"Nevertheless, each individual among you also is to love his own wife even as himself, and the wife must see to it that she respects her husband." Ephesians 5:33 (NASB)

For me , the greatest take-home was "A woman is like a rose, take care of it properly and it will bloom, otherwise it will wither."

Enjoy the trailer!

Alvin Fu

 

 

Hi folks,

Just wanna say THANKs to the pple behind JAM! Great to see the collective effort of the photography team and editorial team.

I'm still reading it half way.... I love all the pictures cos' it captures the spirit of the event. Helps me put a face to the names too...

The interviews with Geng Zhi and Vanessa are encouraging. I like it cos' their testimonies capture the spirit of ordinary people being called and used by God. I hope every youth in our ministry would have similar experiences.

It is never about how good or how talented we are. If we are willing to let God use us and be a humble vessel, God will do great and mighty things through our lives.

Mary did, David did, Paul did, Peter did, so did many of our missionaries in BC, they gave Jesus their all.

What about you?

With every blessing,

Alvin Fu

 

Proverbs 4:20-27
" My son, pay attention to what I say; listen closely to my words. Do not let them out of your sight, keep them within your heart; for they are life to those who find them and health to a man's whole body. Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life. Put away perversity from your mouth; keep corrupt talk far from your lips. Let your eyes look straight ahead, fix your gaze directly before you. Make level paths for your feet and take only ways that are firm. Do not swerve to the right or the left; keep your foot from evil."

 

"Do not swerve to the right or the left; keep your foot from evil."

Yesterday during Combined Service, one of the things the speaker urged us to do was to guard our hearts and fill our lives with life-giving things instead of filling ourselves with what the world offers via media and fleshly temptations..

We are human, and when we keep exposing ourselves to these 'worldly stuff', it gets easy to start thinking that 'it ain't so bad what', and so often once we do that little bit, it leads us deeper and deeper into sin. Many times it's not that we want to be exposed to it, but the world offers it to us right in front of our faces!! That is why we need to constantly feed the spirit, and make ourselves exposed to the spirit, via reading God's Word, applying it in our lives, praying for others and doing His Work!

Feeding fleshly desires can be something very normal, i'm hungry, so i eat. But when it comes to choosing a seemingly harmless choice of feeding the flesh at the expense of compromising something that may glorify God's Name, then it's good to reconsider if we should do it in the first place. An example i thought of was this missionary who was serving in a muslim dominated land. He had every right to eat pork since he was not a muslim, but he wanted to show his sincerity of his desire to befriend the people group and he knew that this act of love and humility would be glorifying to God.

I just hope I can be more aware of my actions and motives, and evaluate each decision I make. As long as it can glorify God even that bit more, I hope that I would be willing to make any sacrifices!!

So this Chinese New Year, let's really go out and amaze our friends with the love of Jesus shone through us!!!

By the way, HUAT AH! Happy chinese new year!! May goodness, love and joy follow each of you in this new year :)