Phil's Evangelism Testimony

aha, i post on behalf of my dear beloved brother Phil, who went out valiantly last friday and returned with quite a testimony on his experience with evangelism. i'll keep my words short, and there you go Phil. do the talking. yes kenneth also asked me to post on the past - one year back, and you can find the link here, to take a whiff at the past and how it all began. but enough of that. on to phil (:

I don’t believe that I have been called into the ministry of evangelism; I’m pretty sure that it’s one of those spiritual gifts that I haven’t been blessed with (probably because opening my mouth to talk to strangers is something I’d naturally shy away from).

It should then come as no surprise that my blood nearly turned cold when seeing my name come up first upon the drawing of lots (out of the group of seven). Urim and Thummim it was not (nice pray over the paper and toss into the air, really), but I had to trust that it was indeed God’s will for me to go out and learn something from it. It didn’t quite help that I didn’t have any past evangelism experience to speak of – praying for students having their exams is one thing; having to share the gospel with a complete stranger is another.

And so it was with more than a slight bit of uncertainty that I went out, thankfully with a partner (Christabel) who was willing and able to initiate our conversations.

I must also admit that I did indeed learn much from that short half an hour – both how to handle the initial stage, when the subject still gives you an ^o) and peers at you goggle-eyed in suspicion, and also how to take the conversation from there. Once the hardest part is over, things did seem to proceed a little more smoothly.

And then, I was also reminded that there exist people who acknowledge both their own sinfulness and God’s holiness and still refuse to come to Christ; that there are people who have been to church for years and yet remain unsaved; that there are people who have been in ACS for years and have undoubtedly heard the gospel message being preached and presented many times over, and yet still remain blinded (or worse still, hardened) to their own need for salvation; that indeed, the most sobering reality in the world today is that people are dying and going to hell today. That is the terrifying but sad truth about the situation, both in ACS and in everywhere else around the world.

But it is also a truth which should at the very least shake us into living a life which shows that we truly believe what we claim to believe. And it is a powerful and timely reminder of the work we have been called to here in ACS.

in His service,
Phil

God's love

He first loved us...
while we were yet sinners(Romans 5:8)
-
Jesus said: "I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd" (John 10:16)
-
Even when go astray, He still wants us to come back to Him
-
...I will not forget you,
See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands....
(Isaiah 49:15-16)
-
the parable of the prodigal son , the Father does not forget us(Luke 15)
-
We love because He first loved us.(1 John 4:19)
-
Yet there are so many out there who haven't experienced His love... are we going to share God's gift of love to them?
-
a parable(taken from church today)
-
picture this... a terrible famine broke out in part of Africa, an entire village starving.
then the UN sends food to the village and entrusts it to the village chief . However to the horror of the starving people, the chief stockpiles the food in a warehouse and refuses to give the food to the people unless they paid...leaving them to die one by one, while the chief and his family live in luxury. Finally, after a few months, the entire village except the chief and his family has died of starvation. The UN goes over to check to find a warehouse of rotting food and the chief still living in luxury. And the chief gets charged in court...
-
are we like the chief , keeping God's gift of Love to ourselves and not sharing it with others, until all we left is a rotting self? Freely we have received so freely we should give(Matthew 10:8).
How are we going to answer to God for not telling other people about Christ?
-
or picture the escalator analogy , imagine your friends crying out to you asking you why you never told them about Christ?
-
just something to think about.
-

In His Love,
Emil

underground operation

(before this starts to sound like some jihad terrorist organization rally message, let us clarify that it is not)

as Christians we live in an upside down kingdom, ruled by the greatest and only King of the universe, but nevertheless it is a kingdom ruled in love, and ruled by morals unheard of to the world: while one takes revenge in the world, another turns the other cheek in the upside down kingdom; while one strives to store up riches, the other forsakes all for the call;

i besiege all belonging to this upside down kingdom today - to remember your citizenship!

start to hold the fort. we're in an underground operation here. persecuted but not completely struck down; hard-pressed on all sides but not giving in; perhaps some of us have not realized the extent of the battle - that ongoing war between the principalities of light and darkness, the fighting going on on the spiritual battlefield - but it is happening, even as we walk to school, partake of the fellowship during recess - it is happening.

and get this. it appears at times, that we are fighting a losing battle. in the light of the happenings of this world, it seems that us, underground operations, will never see the light of day. Yet there is one, one comforting word, that we must all remember. the great commander, whilst He was here beside us said those few words:

"But take heart, for I have already overcome the world!"

and here we are, just occupying the land for this little moment, trying at best to bring others to follow us on the cause, to convince others of the truth of the message, to build up the Lord's army. Have we forgotten the sacrifice He made for us - that life which he gave for us to guarantee us the victory? that moment, when he passed on, and when He returned with the promise, was the moment that we knew, that the battle was already won (:

still. this is not a reason to rest on our laurels. we must continue to be filled with passion for the cause, and be creative in the methods of defence, offence; infiltration of enemy ground - for all those he has taken hostage, we need to steal them back from under His nose.

first. be convicted of the cause.
second. direct the conviction in creative means
third. pray. and rely on the strength of our Grand Commander.

yes pray. because in our base. there are a group of prayer warriors, who fight not physically but call upon the name of our Grand Commander, to cry out to Him for grace and mercy to aid us in the cause. and the best part - He is always listening, always ready to help - and His angels guard us, His army stands before us. and we have Nothing To Fear. absolutely.

so why wait. let's go out. and do this for His glory.

that the Lord may receive the reward for His grand sacrifice on the cross!!

Flame On!

in love and humility
God be glorified
tim

what are we waiting for?

In church today, the pastor asked the question,

"Do you know Jesus?"

He said, all those who know Jesus please stand up.
As expected, almost the entire church stood up. There was no doubt, no denial. It was clear - everyone of us knew Jesus and placed Him as the King of our lives. Then the pastor asked,

"If you know Jesus, why aren't you doing anything about it?"

This question left me pondering and reflecting about myself as I realized I did not have enough urgency in my heart to share the word of Christ with the world. God gave us 24 hours a day, yet sometimes we just let the days slip past. Jesus commanded us "Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation". Jesus is our saviour and He exists in our lives...is that a good news to us? Everyday as we pray, we get to meet the most awesome wonderful amazingggggggg God...is that a good news to us?

Let's say one day, you suddenly meet hmmmm.. TOM CRUISE. or JOHNNY DEPP! (i guess this applies more to girls ^_^ ) Not only that, guess what?! You talked to him for a loooong time. WOW. I think I would be calling all my friends and sharing with them my excitement. "Oh my gosh, I talked to TOM CRUISE today!" You get the picture.

Well then, compared to this, what a great joy and excitement do we have in having Jesus as our Lord! Jesus, the King of the entire universe. King of you and me and Tom Cruise and everyone else in the planet. Shouldn't we be sharing with the world our joy of knowing Him personally?



In FireAC, we always ask God to give us a revival, that He would set as on fire for Him.
But the thing is, this fire starts from..... *drum roll*...... YOU. It starts from ME. from each one of us. This revival doesn't just happen one day when we keep waiting, doing nothing about it, and not answering His call to each one of us.

Are we placing God as the most important part of our lives right now? If not, what are we waiting for? Why not start devoting more time with Him and letting Him be the number one in our lives?

Are we sharing the word of Christ to others? If not, what are we waiting for? Why not start now?


Time is running out.
What are we waiting for?
Why not start now?
Right now.
Let us all let God move in us.
Right now.

Faith and trust!

Please check out this link if you have 10 mins to spare:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuXpEz34TY8

Why are we still sleeping? GOSH ALL OF YOU GET YOUR BUTTS OUT OF BED, THE SUN IS SHINING ON YOUR BEHINDS! This particular video starts off by saying how "The church of Jesus is largely sleeping, like a great bedroom and you have all the Christians in bed and they're all sleeping... and they're saying "Please, don't wake me up! I want to sleep on!" And of course when God starts to operate a revival people cannot sleep, you can't sleep in church when the spirit of God awakes the people." This clip to me was essentially a powerful one. Try watching it and ask yourself why are we still sleeping? Why aren't we alive and kicking on God, and remember the chairs message? Why are we still sitting on the comfortable grey chair, God hates lukewarm Christians and will PUKE you out. SO ITS TIME TO GET SITTED ON THE RED CHAIR AND BE ON FIRE FOR JESUS, THE ONE WE CLAIM WE LOVE SO DEARLY!

Okay anyway back to my main experience today, yea as you all know i'm in Boy's Brigade, and there's this even called BB cares, it's a event where by the BB people go to the less fortunate people like orphanages and old folks home to bless the people there, and yeap i was given this great task of planning on how to implant this heart of service into the boys. I was told by an officer i actually have an official one hour with the boys on the 7th of July but i thought i heard it was on the 14th of July, and i OVERSLEPT on the 7th. By the time i came to hear of it, i realised how deep trouble i was in. The short 14 days i had had become even shorter with lesser time to impact the juniors! I was so worried... So worried that i couldn't pray.

Then today's message came, it was about faith. Matthes 6:25-34 if i'm not wrong. It was about living each day not worrying about food or clothings as if our Father in Heaven would feed the animals daily then what say us? He loved us so much to give His one and only Son, how then can He not give us our daily bread? Suddenly i stopped worrying any longer, I just stopped and pray and entrusted the entire BB cares into the hands of the Lord knowing that He will guide me through this! What are you waiting for? Trust the Lord! He's there ALWAYS :) I LOVE GOD, HE ROCKS MY SOCKS! FLAME ON FIREAC! RAWRRRR LIKE NEVER BEFORE!

In the Lord's service,
ah lua

heart, mind and soul

when one is led only by the mind - distracted by endless planning, worrying over trivialities, organization and getting structures into place - one finds that there will always be a scarce amount of energy, and our passion, or the construct of it, is easily depleted and difficult to replenish. perhaps for too long our focus has been on the themes, the frameworks, the spiritual technology, that we may have lost sight of the initial purpose of us being here in FireAC. why, a true timely reminder, that it is high time we searched and prayed to rediscover our hearts.

and in all of us, there is a heart - much like the carebears i am tempted to mention, ahhh to much (unhealthy? no rather..strange) influences - but there is a heart, and one that we need to pray that God will help us to discover and unleash. many a time, it is only when we are fully convicted, and not merely convinced of the cause, that God can really start to move through each and every one of us. on a personal note, tim has had a rather fluctuating passion, ups and downs of the sine curve of emotion, and has struggled to keep the flame alive. tim wonders, if there is indeed that true conviction in his heart, but he prays for it, tries to, though sometimes he might not feel like it.

and we need to seek enlightenment; of our purpose in this school. was FireAC merely the product of a group of people who decided to band together and be (for lack of better word) funny? or was it truly, and sincerely, a group that was called by God to glorify Him through evangelism, through love, through service to the school? Do we really feel empowered by the Holy spirit to do His work? or do we live day by day discouraged and feeling defeated, our efforts and seed-planting all in vain? high time we ask ourselves.

and we need to pray like never before. that God will instill that passion in our hearts. beyond the work, beyond the distractions, we need to look at God and say - that we want Him to be glorified! and definitely, through this, there will be infinite joy, and men will certainly be satisfied in God (:

so seek the fire. seek the heart. seek the conviction once again.

send revival. start with me. (yes that's every one of us)

in God's love,
in His strength
tim