A Christmas Okerrance

Greetings to everyone! We thought it about time to get another Okerrance to you before the Christmas holidays to update you what has been happening with us since we last wrote (a long time ago… Ahem).

We are in the throes of the final weeks of term as I write this, and it has been an exhausting time for us over the last 6 months or so. When I last wrote, it was just before the summer, and I was looking forward to the summer bible studies in both the books of Mark and Romans at the CF, as well as our leader’s training. The summer is also a time to plan and prepare for the following year. However, things didn’t go quite as smoothly as we planned over the summer because I got a bit burnt out and sick. I had committed to a number of outside speaking engagements for the holidays to keep me busy and sharp, but I don’t think I realized how much I needed a break by the end of term! Maria has had a tough time with reoccurring bacterial infections and her health, ever since returning to Singapore (I’ll let her fill you in on that in a minute). I have therefore been spending a considerable amount of time looking after both her and the children, as well as trying to continue the work at SMUCF. So, by the end of June, although I had completed those outside engagements, and many of the students had gone away for their holidays, I still felt as though the fuel gauge was running on empty and damage had already been done to the engine! This meant that both preparations and the amount of discipling I could do over the summer and into this first term have been severely hindered as I tried to recover from my exhaustion. I am feeling better now, but my doctor said I will need perhaps up to 6 months of cutting back on how much I am able to do. Please do pray with me in this, that our Loving Lord will restore both Maria’s and my health.

Now, having said all that, we do have much to give thanks for at SMUCF, because the work has been ongoing, even though I have been limited!

At our Freshman’s orientation camp in July this year, there was an extremely enthusiastic bunch of freshers who came to see what we get up to at CF. I gave four talks from the book of Colossians, and many of them were encouraged to come back and hear the word some more (which they have). We followed through with a series of talks on 2 Peter, with ‘the knowledge that matters’ being our central theme over the first half of term. Since then, I have been doing a four talk series entitled ‘knowing God’, of course stressing that unless God makes himself known to us, then we can’t possibly know him! Whilst I have been giving those talks, the bible study groups have been training in the use of ‘2 Ways to live’, which has challenged some to think more about evangelism, but has encouraged others to know the Gospel that they believe in better! We have recently had one of our three camps for the year – the December Bible Camp – and we are really glad to have Andrew Cheah (another Moore College Graduate and now at St Mary’s Anglican Cathedral in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia), speak on ‘Sin: How bad can it be?’ Pray that the we will all understand both ourselves better, and our great God who has acted mercifully in the Gospel towards us.

Not that numbers are a reliable indication on how the work is going at the CF, but we were encouraged and thankful to see the average attendance for the first half of term at 90+, keen to get stuck into studying the scriptures. Since the second half of term, that figure fell to about 60+, with increased academic rigour amongst other things causing the fallout. We have been very thankful that the students continue to bring their friends along to our evangelistic lunchtime talks that we had in weeks 10 & 11. We decided upon a ‘If I were God’ series at the start of the year for our evangelistic lunchtime talks. Christopher Ash (director of Cornhill training course in the UK) did a talk on ‘If I were God, I wouldn’t allow all this suffering’. We had about 6-10 newcomers, many of who had not heard the Gospel before. And the following week I did a talk entitled ‘If I were God, everyone would know who I am’, with a similar number not yet confessing the faith. On this occasion some with different faiths heard the good news, and have since been in follow up conversations and studies learning more about Jesus. Please do pray with us that they might repent and believe that Jesus is the Lord, the only way, truth and the life!

Thank you for keeping up with us, and praying for this very precious work.

Maria’s update

Greetings! Below is an attempt to give you a brief overview of the past half year!

Health
Just prior to writing our last newsletter, I had not been in good shape physically for quite a period of time – tiredness, lethargy, monthly re-occurring sicknesses – I often felt so weak that I had to stay in bed. After a thorough checkup, found out that it could have been a re-occurring bladder infection & that my stress levels were way too high. So naturally, I was hoping to concentrate on managing my stress levels & concentrate on getting back to health in the months that followed. However the month of April brought the full spectrum of emotions as we confronted news of pregnancy & then news of miscarriage. At the time, the knowledge that our God is good & is unchanging in both good times & bad times is always a comfort to me, but what I struggled with most was trusting God regarding my poor health over the long period of time. Being sick & weak, not only could I not help serve my family, I also was hindering James’ ability to do SMU work & to rest. It has been indeed a very testing time for me, but God has His purposes & they are good. (If you would like to chat more with me regarding this, I would be happy to.)

Thank God for kind & generous doctor friends in Christ who helped me through this period, please continue to pray for improvements in my health so I can continue to serve God in roles given to me.

Josiah
Even though primary one has been tough & full of school work, exams, assessments and so on, Josiah has been enjoying new friendships at school. When school ended in November, he was thrilled to have the chance to celebrate his birthday early with his school friends at an indoor playground nearby.

above left - Jos & some school friends at his party

below right - Jess enjoying the company of her two cousins from Australia

Jessica
Jessica is into all things pink & girly. Ballet, fairies, princesses, dress-ups, you name it, she likes it! She has been whirling & twirling away in our living room, asking for ballet lessons. She still thinks her brother is Number One, and is his greatest Fan!

Thank God for bringing the kids through the past year, helping them grow up physically, emotionally & mentally. Please pray that they would grow in understanding of the love of our Saviour.

SMU girls
Have really enjoyed keeping up & praying with some of the female graduates & students this past half year, they have all been a real encouragement to me in wanting to see their friends grow up in knowledge of Christ & in love for each other. Before school started in August, we also managed to go through with the female co-leaders a series of seven studies to help with knowing & explaining the Gospel & with what Gospel living looks like.

Thank God that He who started the good work in these girls will Himself carry it through to completion. Praise God for their growth & their enthusiasm!

Generous Gift
We have also been very thankful to generous brothers & sisters in Christ who contributed to the gift of a car for our use. We managed to purchase a car in September & it has been a tremendous practical help to us as a family.

Please join us in thanking our generous God for the generous hearts in God’s household.

A Rare oKerrence

Hello! We trust that this latest oKerrance finds you well. It about 4 months since we last wrote, so the attempt to keep up our news every two months has failed miserably. As a result, we have a lot of news in this letter, which we will try and keep abbreviated!

As you may have read in our last newsletter, it was a great privilege to be able to visit South Africa with James’ family in December last year, and which was kindly paid for by them. We all had a great time, travelling within the Western Cape Provence. The scenery was spectacular, as was, of course, the wildlife. It was a real eye opener for us to see the polarity between the poverty of the townships and the wealth of the suburbs in Cape Town. Pray for that country that the Good news of the Lord Jesus would continue to grow as it has been doing, and that justice and mercy would prevail.

This coming June sees us take some leave to visit Batam (Indonesia) for our annual ORPC church camp and Malaysia (for a week long family break). Pray that we will be challenged and refreshed to serve our Lord Jesus ever more fervently as we do what we do this Summer.

The Labour that springs from Love at SMUCF (1 Thess 1:3)

We have just finished our corporate meetings for this year at the CF (which will start again in August), although that doesn’t mean we will stop meeting over the Summer! As you may vaguely remember in our last update and the calendar of events, we had a five week series on Love, Sex & Marriage in January - February, which was (of course!) well attended. This gave me an opportunity to tackle this topic in depth, spelling out the Biblical truths and the practical implications for the student’s lives. It spurred on many conversations and it was encouraging to see the students thinking through the issues. Give thanks that many were challenged to think through implications, and pray that the word that was preached is imprinted on their hearts.

The day after Valentine’s Day saw the CF hold an evangelistic dinner at ‘Surf and Turf’ in the Funan Centre (an IT mall here in Singapore). The event went off well, with the talk provocatively titled, ‘Freedom for Sex’, which followed on from our series on Love, sex and marriage.

We were very glad to have Richard Chin, the national director of Australian Fellowship of Evangelical Students join us to give the talk, and a number of people expressed an interest to find out more about Christianity. We have since begun a group for those interested to find out more about Jesus Christ, through the ‘Christianity Explored’ series in Mark’s Gospel. A number of international students are attending the course so please do pray for both the teachers (to proclaim clearly the Truth) and for those students (local and international) who do not yet know the Lord, that they would come to understand, know and believe in Jesus.

Following the busyness of the opening two months, we have been studying 1 Thessalonians (our series was entitled, ‘Turn, Serve & Wait’). Its an encouraging letter, challenging us to ‘Keep on Keeping on’ in faith, love and Hope in readiness for Jesus’ return. Pray for the students who are graduating, that they will persevere in their desire to serve Christ at a time when their focus on the return of Christ can be lost by the worries of the world, either as they look for prestigious jobs or are become obsessed with success.

Below are some things to be praying for as we enter into the mid year holidays,

*Pray for those who have been attending the ‘Christianity Explored’ Group

*April Bible Camp – ‘How to be a fool’: Studies from 1 Cor 1-4, challenging us to the heart of ministry and life (21st- 24th April. Speaker: Foo Yuk Yee)

*Annual General Meeting – pray as we vote in our new EXCO – that we would be faithful and responsible to the Biblical truths regarding who we should vote for and why (26th April).

*Pray for our Potential leader’s training, that those invited would be challenged to understand, and live biblically as well as be trained to present the truth clearly in their teaching (May – June).

*Summertime Mark Bible Studies (Tuesday & Thursday evenings)

*Summertime Romans Studies (Tuesday evenings)

*Pray for the planning and organization of the Freshman Orientation Camp, as well as the planning for the year with the new EXCO (June / July)

*And lastly, pray for me (James) that I would be faithful, bold and clear in preaching and teaching at various youth fellowships and churches over the summer and at SMUCF.

From Maria,…

New things for the New Year

Whats new?

Josiah & Jessica starting Primary 1/pre-nursery at schools that are new to them, new teachers, new classmates, new schedules & routines, new school bus rides, new swimming class, new uniforms, new books, new bag, new shoes,…etc etc

I thought both Josiah & Jessica would be overwhelmed by it all, but it turns out that to get on top of all their ins & outs, all the scheduling & logistics & administration, I was more overwhelmed than they were! I think it took me a good month into the year to think through how I could juggle Jos’ timing with Jess’ timing, when I could do… when I could go… when I could bring… when I could attend…

Although overwhelming to start, this year’s schedules has seen a lot of answered prayers from last year.

Please join me in praise & thanksgiving to our Lord for the below!

Praise God that this year’s schedule allows me to have a 2 hour break during weekday lunchtimes to pray, to read & meditate on the bible, to prepare studies & some days to exercise & grocery shop! It’s a much needed time for me, a nice break since Jessica was born!

Praise God too that the timing allows me to join a bible study group which consists mostly of stay-home ministry mums. Although our kids are around, we are still able to get through our bible study & to pray & support one another. This group has been a real blessing to me, after having felt rather isolated for the past 2 years.

Praise God that both Josiah & Jessica have settled into their school & routines happily. Jessica took 3 weeks to ‘let go’ of me, but now she asks for school everyday!

Josiah (18th Dec 2001)

Josiah had a smashing time holidaying with his grandparents & aunty in South Africa last December. He loves the sand & the sea, he loves seeing & interacting with lots of different animals, and he loves the fact that there are more people (besides mummy & daddy) to spend time talking to & doing things with. He even got the chance to celebrate his birthday together with grandma!

Thank God for the continuing relationship building with his grandparents & aunty & a safe & fun holiday for Josiah.

Josiah is enjoying Primary 1 so far. He was happy that his friend Nicholas was going to be in the same school as him, & he was happy his Chinese teacher took time in the beginning to explained things to him in English when he did not understand what was going on. His favourite subject is PE (Physical education) & he looks forward to Recess (half an hour’s break) at 3pm. He gets on the school bus at 1130am for 1230pm start at school, & he returns home at 7pm. School has been good for him as there is routine & predictability & a good outlet for his youthful energies! He will have exams coming up in April-May period, which means more hard work will be needed in the study of the Chinese language.

Thank God that Josiah is enjoying school, please pray that he will be more motivated in things that require more hard work when he grows in the knowledge of Jesus.

Jessica (5th Aug 2005)

Jessica works on ‘trust’ when it comes to adults. As a baby, she would only be held by anyone who ‘fed’ her - she trusted them as they looked after her need for food. Growing up, building trust took more than just giving her food. It meant playing alongside her, talking to her, dressing her, & doing just about everything with her. So naturally, having been away from grandparents & aunties, it took her a while to trust them last December. It took about 2 & a half weeks of staying under the same roof to ‘warm up’ to them & by the time she was happy to be with them alone, it was time for us to leave! Similarly with pre-nursery school, 3 weeks were needed for her to trust her teachers. But once you are on her ‘good side’, you will be able to enjoy lots of affection & lovely smiles. Needless to say, mummy gets lots of hugs & kisses along with lots of ‘I want Mummy’s echoing in the background on most days!

Thank God that as a result of a good transition into pre-nursery school, Jessica has also been able to go to Kids’ church by herself, freeing mummy & daddy to listen to Sunday sermons together after 2 long years!

Thank You for your Support

SMUCF is completely independent and self supported. If you are able to be involved in our work in giving financially either to us individually or the organization, please do contact Lee Keng Yi at (65) 97692360 or at kengyi@gmail.com . Thanks : )