A Vision from God
This is my 9th year in GMC. I do not want to let it go quietly without a testimony. I am afraid I may be too busy to write after I leave GMC as I will leave the church by the end of this year. I am moving on to another chapter of my life. Do pray for me that I will get a place at Sabah Theological Seminary for my Master of Theology in Bahasa Malaysia in 2011 and 2012. Board of Ministry of SCAC has also approved my study leave. God has given me a vision of producing more Bahasa Malaysia speaking pastors and missionaries. Do pray with me that I eventually will mobilize a team of pastors who have the burden to train more BM speaking pastors and missionaries.
I promise myself to write this article in this season of Chinese New Year (2010). Here I am.
My Incapabilities
I came to GMC in 2002 at the age of 35 and now I am about 43 years old. What make GMC a tough church for me to shepherd is not because they are full of professionals. It is because I am not capable. As I am not capable of leading the LCEC; not capable of preaching good sermons; not wise in my speech; not good in my English speaking ability; not strong in administration, etc. There were times when I felt I should leave the church and requested SCAC to post a more capable pastor to come. There was only one time when I could justify to leave GMC. It was at the end of 2007 when I felt I could be much more effective to be the director of Board of Evangelism. I expressed my wish to my District Superintendent and the President then. There was no change and I understood it as it was my own heart desire. God desired me to stay.
My Secret Is Jesus and Him Crucified.
As I look back the past 8 years plus, it was full of joy. This is my conclusion at the end of my 9th year of ministry in GMC though it is still not the end of 2010. I believe after all my encounter with God in the person of Jesus in GMC, I now have a deeper sense of joy which nobody will rob from me. You may be wondering what is my secret. I tell you my simple secret is everything to do with Jesus and Him crucified (1Corinthian 1:23). I write this down with all humility and Jesus knows this is what is going on in me. Now, what this joy is all about. Before I write all about it, I must tell all my fellow pastors, all children of God and disciples of Jesus out there and especially all those who are serving God whole-heartedly and making great disciples, you can have the similar joy that I experience. I truly experience what the joy of the Lord is my strength means.
The Joy of the Lord is my Strength
I discover that nobody except myself keep challenging myself to give up pastoring GMC. My incapabilities caused me to believe so. But, every time I turned to Jesus, the bible, the Holy Spirit, God always showed me He used the most incapable people like a fisherman to be His disciple; He used even immoral people to accomplish His purpose; He used Judas to accomplish His purpose; He used lowly educated people to translate the Bible, etc. But the most important reason is still for me, Jesus and Him crucified. Whenever, I felt incapable to be GMC pastor, I entered into a time of communion with Jesus and Him crucified, I felt like my incapabilities are no more important. He is more important than my incapabilities. His words and my obedience and faithfulness are far more important and valuable than my incapabilities. The picture of His crucifixion and His suffering far exceeds in its importance compared to everything else in my life. Do I choose my incapabilities or Jesus? I always choose Jesus and I always end up with joy and I gain strength to move on. I focus on Jesus and move on again and again.
There were times I received complains of all kinds. These complains challenged every aspect of my life. It includes my integrity; my character; my family life; my negligence; my failures; my weaknesses, my imperfect sermons, etc. I can never finish naming them. Every year I bound to get a few. Of course I was hurt, disappointed, felt not appreciated, discouraged, frustrated, humiliated, embarrassed, sinful, guilty, etc. How do I deal with them? Praise the Lord I discover that I am my own greatest enemy. I come to realize that I need to deal with my own sin like self-centredness, greed, anger, being judgemental, pride, careless, etc. I realize that I cannot be perfect. I need to deal with the self in me. I always look to the crucified Jesus on the cross and told Him all my hurts and all the bad feelings suffered (including those which I experienced in my family), He always show me why He need to suffer on the cross. On the one hand, He suffered for my sins and on the other hand, as His servant, He show how I should suffer like Him and never give up. How when God’s servant like apostle Paul chose to suffer, then, the movement of disciple making could spread far and extensive. Upon such realizations over and over again, I cannot help but rejoicing. I gain strength to move on again and again.
I also discover that it is very important not to let the complaints, demand of others, judgements of others, condemnations of others; misunderstanding of others, anger of others, sin of others, etc define your worth and identity. If there were times I was in big trouble and got very emotional, it was because I allowed my worth and identity to be defined by what other said and did about me. I find that when I allow myself to do so, I kill my own spirit and self-esteem. I always quickly went to Jesus and reminded myself how He saw me. I reminded myself how precious I was to Jesus; how important I was to Him; how He loved me and died for my sins, etc. I always ended up being uplifted. When I allow Jesus to define my worth and identity, I experienced the joy of Jesus as my strength.
When I received harsh words, hurting words, challenging situations, in my early days of ministry, I tend to react with anger and frustration; and I tried to justify myself. I hope to get away with it. But later, I realize I do have my weaknesses, my self-centredness, my pride, my imperfections, etc, I learn to look at people, situation and circumstance from the perspective that God wanted me to learn something. There must be a godly purpose which I need to discover. When I got personal with Jesus like that, I discovered that I had lots of room to improve, learn and grow to become a more matured disciple of Jesus. Upon discovering so much opportunity to grow, learn and become more matured disciple of Jesus, I was always overjoyed. Once again, I experience that knowing there are lots of room for improvement, I am motivated to move on and I gain strength from Jesus to be better and more like Him next time.
Nothing Better Than Becoming A Servant Of God
Each time I experience joy, I experience Jesus and I have a personal encounter with Him, I feel it is such a privilege to be Christ’s servant; a disciple of Him. I always feel nothing is better than being a servant to Jesus. I look forward to the day like what apostle Paul said, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race and I have kept the faith. And I am now awaiting for the crown of righteousness which Jesus the judge of the living and the dead, will give to those who desire His appearance.”
If serving Christ is such a toil to you and you experience no joy, most probably you have missed Jesus. You miss Jesus, you miss everything in life. I cannot afford to miss Jesus in my life. What about you? (you may like to respond to my article by writing to me: ourgrace@streamyx.com)
A faithful disciple of Jesus,
Pastor Law Hui Seng
(19th February, 2010)
Posted by Teresa Han
No comments:
Post a Comment