Consumer-Driven Church

In has been sometime that we observed the rise of so called "consumer-driven" church where the church is organized like entertainment center with a lot of multi-media presentation, catchy worship music, and rock style performances. One can see many of this type of churches in the US. Closer to home, there are several mega churches in Singapore following such formula. Nothing wrong about attracting the younger worshipers with modern music and performances. The problem comes when people believed that activities equate spirituality. In fact, Willow Creek in the US in their 2007 survey found that this was the strategy they employed, they planned to make changes. Believers in such churches seem to be attending church because they are attracted to the entertainment elements of worship, rather than really worshiping God with all their hearts. The trap is that these churches accede to the "demand" of those who attend in order to keep them in church. When the church is too entrance in such activities, they will lose sight of the main objective of church - making disciples of the nations. "Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit," Matt 28:18-20. These verses in the Bible did not say the church is to entertain their members. The important thing is that such church may not be helping the believers to be real Christians as defined in the Bible. To worship God with all our heart,mind and soul.

The lesson here is that as Christian we have to be discerning, and be aware that we attend church to worship God, not to go after activities or the entertainment elements, lest we make idols of these elements.

Human Car

I read about a car powered by human in our local newspaper, so I checked out Youtube and found the exact same vehicle. No petrol needed, fantastic! Reminded me of Fred Flintstone the carton character who goes around a car powered by human muscle. God has given this engineer the power of the mind to create such as wonderful machine. Watch the video.

Sunday Service 26th Sept

Pre-service Prayer

Praise God! that more and more members are turning up to pray each Sunday before our English service start. Hallelujah! Glory to God! Pray is powerful and it is the life blood of our faith, we cannot do without. We pray more will "catch" this ethos in our Church.

Bro. Chung Chek shared about prayer. How he hesitated to go to prayer meeting because he felt he was not up to mark. Later he realized he was in the process of learning to pray. Even the disciples said in Luke 11:1 "Lord teach us to pray...". From then one he found he has no problem going to any prayer meeting. Praise God!

Brother Nee Wen shared that he and Brother Teck Hua were at the Latter Rain Church in Semantan on Saturday where they participated in fervent worship and praise. It was spontaneous and the Holy Spirit filled the air. It was an encouragement to us.

Brother Michael's sermon on Mark Chapter 5 entitled "Cost of Salvation". In this chapter there are 3 main points a)Jesus' authority over demonic power
b) His authority over diseases c) His authority over death

Jesus came to serve and not be served Mark 1:15. He came and died for our sins.

Bro Micheal shared a little about forgiveness. He said once he was hurt by a Bro. and he could not forgive him. Later on he realized that this Bro. has grown spiritually and has moved on, whereas he was still at the point where he was hurt by this Bro. He realized that he has to forgive, like Jesus forgave us and move on. Now he is reconciled as he has forgiven this Bro.

Watch what Stormie said about prayer

Alpha Course Week 7

On Friday evening our Church had our session 7 of Alpha course topic was "How can I resist evil?". The session was very useful to many of us even those who have been Christians for sometime. It refreshed our memories and understanding of how we can resist the devil. I think it was most useful for new believers. They can be equiped with the Words to resist the dark forces.

Beside this we had some good foods.

The Holy Spirit in Us

The Holy Spirit brings us Christian maturity. As our guests participate in the Alpha course session now, we pray that they will receive the Holy Spirit. Many refer to the Holy Spirit as "it" ,but in fact it is Him in the trinity.

There are 7 ways God's Spirit works in a Christian's life :

Spirit of Life. "For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death...And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness", Rom 8:2, 10 NKJV.

Spirit of Truth. "When He, the Spirit of truth has come, He will guide you into all truth" John 16:13

Spirit of Adoption. "For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out "Abba Father". Rom 8:15

Spirit of Holiness. "Concerning His son Jesus Christ our Lord, who was....declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead" Rom 1:3-4

Spirit of Grace. "of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who has..insulted the Spirit of grace?" Heb 10:29

Spirit of Supplication. "And I will pour in the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication" Zech 12:10

Spirit of Glory. "If you are reproached for the name of Christ, blessed are you, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you". 1 Pet 4:14

A Man Fell in a Hole

No other faith can give anyone salvation as well as eternal life except Christianity. This video illustrated it so vividly.

Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me". John 14:6

Guests in Church

On Sunday before our service started, we had guests sharing with our congregation. We had Bro Tim Toh from Haggai Institute sharing with us what the institute is about. They are organizing a one week conference here in Kuching and was inviting our Church members to join. In fact, our Brother Teck Lim had attended last year and found it motivating and useful.

The other guests we had was a German couple, Wolfam and Heidi. They are with Nehemiah Team from Germany now based in Indonesia. They have been in Indonesia for about 8 years serving the people there. Prior to that they had also been to Africa on mission.

All these guests gave us a lot of encouragement, the sacrifice they gave to help people in need around the world. We hope to be able to give back a little to society.