Bethany Home Ministry

A while ago I blogged about the "Reading Bus" a program to help rural children to read. This program was pioneered by Pastor Cheli and his wife Mei who have now relocated to Kuala Lumpur.

Beside this reading project, Pastor Cheli and his wife has also started a after school centre in Kuching. This was specially to help students who are poor in their studies. Understand that a nominal fee is collected.

Since the relocation of Pastor Cheli and his wife Mei the job has been taken over by Pastor Fong Che Chung who is the product of the after school centre.

"Fong Che Chung, 25, is one of those who benefited from Bethany Home. Fong, who is now an assistant pastor with Bethany Ministries, said he had failed every subject in the SPM mock examination at school in 2003 before his friends urged him to go to Bethany Home.

“It was about a month before SPM and I had totally lost hope. But I decided to come to Bethany Home as I had nothing to lose.

“During that month, I came every day and studied mainly with my friends, who taught and helped me to understand the various subjects. Questions that I did not know how to answer previously started to make sense,” he said."

Pastor Che Chung is now a full time pastor with Bethany Home Ministry, Kuching.

To read an article on this subject click on the title of this post.

Money Video

In interesting video about how we can be controlled by money.

Alpha Workplace - KTS Kuching

The Alpha Workplace course started on 22nd July 2011 and it ended last Friday 23rd September 2011. About 58 staffs of KTS Group Kuching attended this course. It was indeed an inspiring journey with so many members of their staff attending Alpha Workplace course in one place. This could be the largest Workplace Alpha ever conducted in the state of Sarawak.

Many people were touched by the Holy Spirit in this course. Some started as nominal Christians, and now they repented and are hungry for God. Praise God that the Holy Spirit had been working in their lives!

Hosts and Helpers from Trinity Methodist, Faith Methodist, Tabuan Anglican, and First Baptist Church were there to assist KTS from the start of the course on 22nd July 2011. It has also been an encouraging journey for many of the Hosts and Helpers to see so many people being moved by the Holy Spirit.

This workplace Alpha at KTS Group was the work of the Holy Spirit and it was not work on man. Glory to God!

A note of thanks to Bro.Tony Wee for helping in recording this video, Sis Doreen for volunteering to be recorded, and Bro.Lau for recording the video.

Watch a video testimony of Sis. Doreen Sim of the insurance division at KTS, Crown Tower Kuching.

Rob Bell Leaves Mars Hill Church

Rob Bell the pastor who wrote Love Wins which created controversy in the Christian world a few months ago is leaving the mega church he founded. He was accused of being a universalist that saying everyone will be saved eventually regardless of what they believe. This did not sit well with many theologians including Pastor John Piper who tweeted "Seriously, as before, may you fare well, Rob Bell. http://dsr.gd/otctwX" after the book came out. Now Piper's prediction has come true! Other famous pastors/authors have written books countering Bell, like Francis Chan who wrote Erasing Hell.

His book created confusion and many believe he got the wrong theology that is the reason for so many people opposing it.

To read an article on this subject click on the title of this post.



John MacArthur's response

Bribery and Corruption

On 10th Sept 2011, Bishop Rev Hwa Yung of Methodist Church Malaysia was here in Kuching to address the issue of bribery and corruption at Trinity Methodist Church (TMC). He has written a book of the same name. The book has generated a lot of interest in these subjects especially in present Malaysia. No doubt corruption is an issue in many countries, but as our country is going through a political transition it seems that corruption is on everyone's mind.

Rev Hwa Yung's book was a result of a paper on corruption he prepared for the Graduate Fellowship while he was studying for a PhD in the USA in 1992. He didn't want to make the presentation but was directed by God to take up the challenge as he did not know much about the subject prior to his presentation.

Rev Hwa Yung said basically we human have 3 struggles, a)money b)sex and c)power. Many people failed because of these issues including pastors.

How can we take truth of God and make it alive in the real world? Rev Hwa Yung suggested three models :

Separation Model - separate from the world which rebels against God.

Indentification Model - Christians are salt & light of the world (Matt 5:13-16), To live simultaneously under God's law.

Transformation Model - we live in two realms but as Christians we can change the structure/systems to be God-comforming.

He suggested an integrated model of the three models that is called Incarnational model.. This model assumes that we practise identification only to the extent we allow transformation.

What can we do ?

1. Never commit or condone active corruption practices.
2. Avoid as much as possible passive acceptance of corruption i.e paying for something that no doubt is legitimate.
3.Aim for transformation –for the greater good, for better quality of service, so that lives of others may improve.
4. God will speak to us individually and He expect differently from each of us.
5. Never lose sight of God’s call for us to be SALT and LIGHT.

In the nut shell do not participate in corruption, we must be committed to change and God will help us.

Beside Rev Hwa Yung lecture, five brothers shared how they handle corruption and bribery in their work. We had a doctor, an architect, two consulting engineers and a developer sharing their testimonies from the workplace.

Overall, a very interesting and informative seminar on corruption and how as Christians we should respond to this issue in our daily lives.

Bribery & Corruption - Free Slideshow Maker

Akha Christians

The Gospel is being spread among the Akha people. Pray for them.



A short video of Dr.Aje teaching at Haggai course, Kuching.

Akha People of Thailand

Dr. Chaiyot A-je Kukaewkasem(Dr.Aje) is an Akha from Thailand. I had the honor to meet him while attending the Haggai course here in Kuching recently.

The Akha people lives in five countries, China,Thailand,Loas,Cambodia and Myamar. All together there are about 2 million Akha in these five countries.

It has been an inspiring experience to meet Dr.Aje. He is not only a PhD holder in science, he is also a pastor to his people. He and his American wife is pastoring a church in northern Thailand and have various social programs to help his people. More and more of their people are turning to God. Hallelujah! (Click on the title of this post to read Operations World report)

As soon as Dr.Aje came into the class at Haggai I could feel his humble presence and felt connected to him as a Christian brother. Indeed, it was a joy learning from him. He made the subject of pluralism easy to understand. I believe all the participants enjoyed his teaching.

He showed Christ in what he is doing and in his treatment of other people, a person we all can emulate. Praise God for such a humble person and pastor.

Here is a video of Akha people. Not all Akha people are Christians, please pray for Dr.Aje and his ministry to the Akha people.

Top: picture of praying for Dr.Aje during our Haggai course. The colorful weaving on his coat is of Akha design.



Watch this video of a beautiful song.

Haggai Institute 3rd National Seminar

The 6-days Haggai Institute 3rd National Seminar held at 360 Hotel, Kuching has just concluded on 17th Sept (Sat).

This was the first time in the Haggai Malaysian history for two languages seminar to be held at the same time, that was Bahasa Malaysia (Malay) and English seminars running together. Thanks to the organizing committee in making this possible. There are 34 participants, 17 from Bahasa group and 17 from English speaking group. Participants came from various parts of Sarawak. For Bahasa speaking some came from Indonesia.

Three brothers from our church attended.

The faculty members were Pastor Aries Siew (Malaysia), Pastor Tay Wah Seng (Malaysia), Robert Leong (Malaysia), Dr.Aje Chaiyot (Thailand), Alex Tan (Malaysia), Rev Wong Kim Kong (Malaysia), Joseph Tan (Malaysia), Jeff Wei (Malaysia). All the speakers were world class as most of them also conduct international seminars all over the world.

Subjects covered, Biblical Mandate,discipline,effective communication,pluralism,effective witness,Biblical stewardship and setting goals.

All these subjects were relevant to evangelism. But personally I was touched by personal sharing of Dr.Aje who is from Akha tribe of northern Thailand. He said his people are in 5 countries, Thailand, China, Loas, Myamar,and Cambodia. He came from a very poor family who did not even have a pair of slippers when he was young. Yet he managed to complete his PhD. God called him to minister to his people. Now he is also a pastor, as well as evangelist to his people. He was very humble and despite his high education he was not arrogant.

The other faculty member whose teaching and personal sharing impacted me was Alex Tan from Penang. He is a high ranking manager in Intel Malaysia. His personal testimony was touching. He shared how his right eye was healed when he prayed and was faithful to God. How his financial problems were solved when he obeyed and tithe as commanded by God. His teaching was clear and effective. A fellow brother said that his subject of Biblical Stewardship conducted on the last day of the course was like a "cap" for the whole course.

I remembered Billy Graham said "If a person gets his attitude toward money straight, it will help straighten out almost every other area in his life". It is true from my observations.

All the participants have a God-encounter from the testimonies shared on the last day of this course. Most are fired up to go out to share the good news. Many are already doing some work in evangelism. This course help us to arm ourselves to do "the battles" out there.

Glory to God for this Haggai course.

Haggai Institute

Haggai Institute was founded by Dr. John Edmund Haggai and it specializes in evangelistic work. It has been around Malaysia for a while now, and they have been conducting courses on evangelism. Their main aim is to train leaders to train their local people to evangelize.

For the next one week, I will be attending their course here in Kuching. It is indeed a good opportunity for Christians here, otherwise we would have to go somewhere else to take this course.

After the course I will be able to comment more about it. Meantime stay tuned!

God bless all readers.

You can check out Haggai's website by clicking the title of this post.

Remembering 911

Today we remember 11th September,2001 when our world was changed forever by a terrorist attack on the twin-tower in New York. The pain of many still lingers for many around the world, but especially for those families whose love ones died a horrible death on that faithful day. We are all part of it, the pain and anguish may not be apparent but nevertheless inside us because we share a common objective for a peaceful world.

Malaysia remembers the seven Malaysians who died in this horrible attack, but only three could be traced. They are:

Ang Siew Nya, Khoo Sei Lai,and Vijayashanker Paramsothy. May they rest in peace.

To read a Malaysian on-line news report click on the title of this post.

In a Malaysia national newspaper, The Star reported recently on "Where were you on 11th Sept 2001?" a number of people responded. So where were you? I remembered that faithful day, my family and I were living in Kuala Lumpur. That evening, my sister-in-law called my wife to turn on the T.V that a plane had crashed into a building. We turned on the TV and true enough we watched a plane crashing into a building and it caught fire. I told my wife it could not be real, it must be a movie. Later the news came on shortly and reported about the attack in the US. We were shocked.

To read another article about these three Malaysians go to :
http://thestar.com.my/lifestyle/story.asp?file=/2011/9/11/lifefocus/9310547&sec=lifefocus

Christians in India

I was reading blogpastor (blogpastor.net) and he had a post about the Christians in India which is interesting. All we read about in the news are usually how Christians are persecuted, they being killed and son on. It is heart warming to read that there is a revival going on in India. Praise the Lord! Nothing is impossible for our God!

India has 70 million Christians according to Operation World. This number may seem alot but India's population is about 1.2 billion, so 70 million is about 6%. The number is growing, and among the Dalit (the untouchable of India )it appears that their numbers are growing faster than the general population. By grace of God the Dalit have a chance to be redeemed and counted as God's people.



To read blogpastor post about India click on the title of this post.

The Reading Bus

It is heart warming to read about godly people reaching out to the needy community. Here is the story of dedicated Christians like Pastor/teacher Cheli Tamilselvan and his wife Kong Lai Mei helping the communities in Kuching as well as in Kuala Lumpur. Pastor Cheli has close relation with our church when he and his wife were serving in Kuching, East Malaysia for 27 years until they moved back to Kuala Lumpur end of last year.

They started the Reading Bus to help poor rural children to learn to read. What they did was using four wheels drive vehicle (4WD)stacked with books in wooden shelves for easy transportation before driving to targeted communities on a periodical basis until the locals are trained, after which the books are left with them as their libraries. This project has been very successful. They started with one 4WD in Kuching,Sarawak now they have 6 in Sarawak, 1 in Sabah and 1 in peninsula (kuala Lumpur). They have also started one in Cambodia with resounding success.

Cheli and Kong used to be full time teachers here in Kuching and it was their passion to teach and help the disadvantage that they started the Reading Bus. Indeed, this project have helped so many poor students especially those in the rural communities in Sarawak. Praise God for these dedicated teachers!

Beside, this reading bus work, Cheli is also a pastor. While in Kuching he pastored Bethany House, a church mainly for the youth and young people like college students. He also started a tuition centre at Bethany House. This project is also to help the poor students from disadvantage communities in Kuching. Students attended session once a week to be guided and taught by volunteers.

Many thanks to Pastor Cheli and his wife Mdm Kong for their sacrifice for the poor. They are indeed servants of God and have given unselfishly to their neighbors the poor.

To read the full news article please click on the title of this post.

Churches "Friend" More Than Schools

There seem to be a debate about using Face Book between teachers and students in the US. Now it seems more churches "friend" than schools. Some states in the US banned schools from engaging on face book (fb) with their students.

A few months ago there was also a report that some churches were instructing their members to close their fb accounts because in some cases their usage led to infidelity among members. However now it appears that more churches are using the social media to evangelize, communicate, and educate their members as well as other visitors. Social media expert Chris Forbes said this is a very effective tool when used properly. Just imagine with fb a church can reach million of people. It not only influence its congregation but also people around the world. We have not seen anything like this before fb or other social medias. The expert said “If churches desire to connect with their congregation and community in meaningful ways, then they need to establish a strategy for actively engaging in the social media conversation.”

Not only in the US, many churches around the world are using social media to connect with their congregations. It is just the extend of connection. To the younger members social media is just natural for them, perhaps the older generations have to adapt to the "new" social media.

Like any good things ( all the positive benefits of social media) there are bound to be people who use such benefits for ill gains or to harm others.

As for us Christians what ever it is we must be accountable to God and use any tool with good intention and integrity.

"The man of integrity walks securely but he who take crooked paths will be found out". Proverb 10:9

To read a full article click on the title of this post.

Watch this informative video especially for churches using social media

Church Signs in the US

Church signs in US can be interesting, funny, serious and some with very thoughtful messages to attract people.

Only in US you get these kind of church signs. Let me know if there are any from other countries.

Here are some I found.

The Face Book style sign is my favourite.

Click on the title of this post to read an article on church signs.