Bye 2011, Hello 2012

It has come to the time of the year again when I need to take stock of the outgoing year and think about the incoming year. What has happened over the past one year? Let's take a look at it:

January
January was quite happening for me, thinking back what happened in church. I was halfway involved in planning for the YG Mission Camp, and of course, my first time in Chiang Mai attending the Passion Global Conference where I got to hear the testimony and the sharing of Ps Bill Wilson who is an incredible man of God. During the time in Chiang Mai, I got really challenged in thinking what my real passion should be and this of course sets off a year long search and questioning in my future path as a disciple of Christ.

The YG Mission Camp took place at Stansfield residence immediately after the week I was in Chiang Mai. Entering into that phase was quite stressful, but rewarding. It was the first camp (and perhaps the last) that I took charge in the overall planning and the first camp in Uni-YA history (and the last) to focus entirely on experiential learning for missions, with a focus on missions. There were a couple of spiritual attacks here and there during the journey but through the protection of God, we were able to pull through the camp, thus garnering responses from the YG and the graduating students to do missions. And I was heartened that the camp had made genuine impact in the lives of the participants and in my own life as well. I was even more honored to have worked with a group of committed people to plan a camp focusing on mission.

February
February was a relatively quiet month compared to January. However, it marked the first month that I stepped down from ushering and floor managing. It was a tough call but a necessary one. I never wanted to step away from ushering but without me doing so, it would have been difficult for others to rise up (since by default you can only have that many floor managers and team leaders). Also for the sake of my LG, I would need to step away so that my other ministry on stage would not take up so much time away from my LG. I missed ushering, and I will always do.

March
Again another distinctively quiet month, other than the fact that I began to read a lot more on apologetics and start spamming on theology which slowed down eventually. It was a month of good news for me at work, since I was told that I got a better performance grading than I expected, which I really thank God for that. And therefore, that resulted in a whole tonnes of money being poured into my account as part of my performance bonus, and I finally got my Macbook Pro, which I am using now to type out this reflection. Kickstarting the whole city whole world series in church, I guess this also marked the time when I began to seriously think about obtaining the Masters of Christian Apologetics from Biola, though this thought has been harbouring for quite some time already.

April
Building of the new AXIS auditorium (it wasn't named Axis that time yet) required us to start thinking about raising funds for the new place. But that particular campaign reminded me of the very chair that I received Christ on. And it fully convinced me that it was the right thing to do, because someone sponsored the chair that I sat on 6 years ago. It was also a traumatic month politically given the result of the GE2011. I guess God used that event to seriously challenge me on my own involvement in YP and if it is really worth continuing that kind of service to them. I have yet made my decision as of now, but I know it's sooner or later that I will want to step away from grassroot work. By the way, that also marked the beginning of a three to four months hiatus from Facebook, as an attempt to clear my mind off the clutters of negative comments. April we also made our second trip to Batam to gather information in the land regarding the spiritual condition there. All in all, it was a good trip as we managed, by God's grace, to meet people who are able to communicate and share with us and are willing to help us.

May
May was the time when I was expecting the new transfers from the Uni group to YG but it wasn't to be. However, I guess I took the chance post GE to send an email to PM and posted that letter on my blog criticising for the first time the way that YP was run. Months later, there may have been an improvement but I guess there's still a long way to go. I wanted to sign up for the Go Forth Conference, but it clashed with the Sundown Marathon (which surprisingly despite all the hiccups was the best Sundown I ran). Got played out by Ellson who decided to sign up for the conference even when he decided to run the Sundown together with me. Oh, by the way, I got my first iPhone 4 by then, and it was to be a dramatic transformation on how I used my handphone from then on, realising the power of 3G...

June
June... I attended a uni friend's wedding. It was at Botanic garden. However, I think, as I blogged earlier on, the events leading up to the wedding, I was challenged by God to face a series of past hurts and bad histories. It was also then that prompted me to think seriously more about the issue of BGR, as I prepared to disciple the transferees. Again, God spoke to me a lot in that area, though I think I still have a long way to go.

July
July was a traumatic month I supposed. The highlight was the WCWW conference at indoor stadium with the new people in my LG. It was the month that the transfers finally came over to YG and we the LGLs had to make a pitch to them on why they should join our LGs. At a single moment, it instantly saw my LG grow from 9 to 14. There were questions among my coreteam whether we can contain the new transferees but looking back from now, I guess our fears were well answered - we can and we are able.

WCWM conference was a good reminder to me why my life mission should be mission for God. The first day I was quite impressed by the testimonies of the panel speakers but it became clear to me that as they were praying for the different pillars of society, it was not to be for me as I began to clearly sense my calling to go out to the mission field.

The low side of this month was when I had to contend with different emotions, all those during the conference and after the conference. But it was also the time when I realised that this was exactly what I wrote in my PnF guide to my unit, that there is a cost in His cause, and one of the costs in pursuing His cause is the price of having to contend with the emotional struggles of people around me and minister to them.

August
And thus ended my hiatus from Facebook. I was struck by Denise Phua's comment that as Christians, we need to reclaim the space in the new media. Therefore, I decided to pull myself back to Facebook. Also it was to be a channel of communication with my LG, now that the LG has grown so much. We also started the SHAPE series in the unit, exploring our spiritual gifts, passions, ability etc in an attempt to find out shape. I guess it also allowed me to dig deeper into different theological thinking about spiritual gifts. It was indeed a good experience and a good experiment using NCD's spiritual gift assessment on the people in the unit.

September
Batam, it was the second time back there this year. This time, I was glad that Weikai, Wileen, Ming Xi and Ivy went along with us. It was their first time and I was encouraged by their heart. It was also very funny as we began to talk about some nonsense here and there. It was also the time that the reality of leading a large LG began to caught on to me. Yet, it was also the time when I realised that the large LG was not exactly a bad idea, especially when the people are together in one heart and well connected. I was encouraged to realise that there were great synergy in this group of people, which led me to rethink about the notion of restructuring.

October
October saw the launch of iPhone 4S and the demise of Mr Steve Jobs just a day after the launch. But more importantly I admit that I had to go against the general grain of thought towards restructuring. I was just glad that I was able to gain agreement with Joyce Peh. It was also during this period that I decided to go Japan to help out with the mission work as well as the period that I was supposed to help out with Robert's wedding. It was the time when the preparation was going full steam and I was trying to gather the team for Japan, supposedly. Thank God for Sharon, Xinying and Pang Shen for forming the team, and bringing the whole process to Japan in full motion during the end of the month.

November
November was interesting. The highlight of the month is of course the trip to Japan. It was my first mission trip to do community related work and I was glad that it was to be in Japan. The process and the journey was documented in the previous blog. It was also during this period that I confirmed my calling for mission, since I so enjoyed the work that I was doing during my time in Japan. Of course, there was also Robert's wedding. It was a long awaited wedding for a lot of people and we were glad that we were able to play some part.

December
This is the last month of the year. As we enter Christmas, I must admit that this is one period that work became busier, but it was also supposed to be the last month I serve in the guitaring ministry. This was not to be though. There was also Stanchart Marathon which I prefer not to mention here.

So after so much, let's also review my resolutions for last year:
Firstly, it is to do the things that I am currently doing in a better way. Lead the CG better, disciple my sheep better, relate with people better, play the guitar better. Basically, I will still be doing the same things as I have done last year, but there is always room for improvement. So need to do them better.
Secondly, as I have shared, it's to be more sound minded in my decision making. This is nothing new as well, since I have shared this in a previous post.

Lastly, it's Spirit-leadership. Again, nothing new. But let me just share a few things regarding this. Over at Chiang Mai, I believe that God is speaking to me and confirming to me about this aspect of my life. It is quite fascinating to see that God confirms all these during the teaching sessions by the pastors. The only question is how can I measure my life accordingly? Fruits of the Spirit perhaps? Certainly.
Firstly to do things better, have I achieved so? I think I certainly still have a lot to go for all the things I have been involved but there were certainly improvement. At least I know my guitaring had improved by leaps and bounds. Secondly, I also felt that there's still some way to go in terms of sound decision making, but I do see progress. At least, now I am able to see things objectively while making big decisions, but it was the small decisions that require more work.

Spirit leadership wise, it is one aspect where there's a lot to be thought about, since it is difficult to measure, but am I leading by the Spirit more and more? Again, there's still a lot to be worked upon. I continue to feel that I have a long way to go in terms of moving in the Spirit as well as my own relationship with God, even when other people say otherwise. Yet, this is one area which we will need ot continually grow in and there's never a way to measure the success of such resolutions.

I think following from last year, I will hold off from listing my resolutions for 2012 till I return from Chiang Mai and certainly before my birthday.

Till then, happy new year, my readers.



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