Thanksgiving Review
2008 will soon be over. At this
year-end, we truly have much to be thankful for to God. Let this writer now
review with you all aspects of development of the church¡¦s work during the past
year, so that together we can reflect, examine, admonish each other and offer
our thanks. The theme of the church this year was: ¡§Follow the example of
Christ united in spirit; discharge God¡¦s will bound together by love.¡¨ All the
messages from the pulpit and in my Shepherd¡¦s Voices exhort everyone to implement
the Truth that you have heard, follow the example of Christ, long for His
Coming, live with a holy and loving heart, and carry out the will of God.
Concerning worship
and thanksgiving: God chose us to be a royal priesthood in order for us to
worship and serve Him on earth. Thank the Lord! Each week, the church has Bread-breaking
and Worship services, so that we have the opportunity to remember Jesus Christ
and His great love on the Cross. Do you really treasure and enjoy these moments
of worship and thanksgiving every week? In March, the church celebrated its 13th
anniversary of establishment. On October 3, we had our first ¡§Worship Night¡¨,
when we contemplated and praised the Lord¡¦s grace of salvation through four
musical interludes.
Concerning
spiritual nurturing: God has greatly blessed our church, and speaks to us
through many of His servants. Some have come from afar especially to build us up through
the Truth. Besides delivering sermons each Sunday from the pulpit, the church
also held several spiritual nurturing assemblies. During one such gathering in
March, Brother David Ng took four sessions to admonish us to ¡§Imitate Christ¡¨.
At our Summer Conference, he used eight sessions under the theme ¡§The Lord died
for me; I live for the Lord¡¨ to encourage us to apply ourselves in service to
God. And in the nurturing sessions in November, he utilized the example of Noah,
the righteous man at the end of age, to remind us to wait reverentially for the
Lord. As well, in April we had Brother Wong Kwok Hin
here to share the message: ¡§The will of God is Jesus Christ¡¨; in October,
Brother Yip Tak Sang spoke on ¡§The man who came out
of the fish¡¦s belly¡¨; and in September, Sister Teng
Chang Tze Yin shared with us ¡§Confronting the crisis
of the New Age Movement¡¨ etc. I am sure we were all deeply and abundantly
enlightened. Over at the English Worship, God sent several servants who love
Him faithfully to instruct our youth, as well as two missionaries from the OMF,
Richard Schlitt and Garrett Jones, to share with us
their missionary testimonies.
Concerning witnessing the Gospel: Thank
God for using us who are frail vessels! As of the year to date, we had 326 new
visitors who attended our Sunday services. 25 of them converted to the Lord.
The church conducted three Sunday Gospel Services ¡V ¡§Where to find true
blessing¡¨ in February, ¡§An affair in life not to be missed¡¨ in May, and ¡§Manage
your life¡¨ in October. Eleven people came to Christ through them. Also, the Lord
provided opportunities for us to bear witness at the Gospel services held in
English in September and by the Elijah Fellowship in November. According to
numbers from the Outreach and Ministry Department, during twelve instances when
we went out to preach the Gospel, we contacted 1,165 persons, five of which
converted to the Lord. There were 270 occasions to talk at length about the
Truth, and 620 people accepted Gospel tracts. May God use the seeds of the
Gospel that we had sown so that they may some day produce harvests.
In order to encourage brothers and sisters to bring our non-believing family
members to Christ, the Outreach and Ministry Department invited Brother Pond
Chan to share his testimony with us in January, and also handed out the names
of non-believing family members during our Wednesday prayer meetings so that we
could intercede for them. God listened to our prayers, and consequently the
parents of a sister who were visiting from
Thank God! At the beginning of June,
14 members were baptized into the church. Externally, the church donated to
rescue operations after the storm in
Our merciful and loving Father in
Heaven! Thank you for your guidance, providence and protection this past year.
May you accept our heartfelt exaltation and gratitude! Amen.
By: Daniel To