See my friends perform!

CLICK HERE Can skip to 2:35 I guess.
OMG, MY JJ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OH MY JJ MY JJ JJ JJ
4:12-4:15 & 4:31-4:33 :D

So Dorothy took my place in J4M haha. What if JJ thinks Dorothy is me? :(

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Youth Meeting with Pastor Kong really was more of a huge meeting than a service. I think it's great that he brought up his concerns with the rest of us.

Asia has the greatest population, yet the Christian population is dying. Churches are sticking to old practices and refusing new methods (like the Christian college failing a student for suggesting merging pop/rock with Christian worship songs long long ago...oh how I love Hillsong/Planetshakers)... and as a result people find it "boring" and stop going as a result. Submitting themselves to 2-3 hours of supposed "boredom" every week is pointless anyway because it means they don't feel or learn about God.

I experience God in my church. Pastor Kong is also very enlightening when he preaches. You sense the Holy Spirit when he preaches something powerful. The Holy Spirit is what keeps me coming back every week, and shouldn't it be that way? A church isn't just a building, it's more of when people come together to worship and the Holy Spirit is there among them. Even during cell group in Daniel's house, when we sing and pray, the atmosphere changes, you know when He's there.
"For where two or three gather together as my followers, I am there among them.” -Matt 18:20

If every Sunday a group of bored adults go for service and fall asleep, would you say they are being obedient Christians by going to church every week? They don't feel spiritually enlightened; they don't feel the presence of the Holy Spirit; they don't learn more about Him. In my opinion that doesn't count. You end up not growing spiritually at all.

(BTW PLEASE DON'T THINK I'M IMPLYING THAT SMALL CHURCHES ARE BORING/USELESS. I AM IN NO WAY SAYING THAT!!!!!! I love small churches. I'm talking about the PEOPLE finding church boring. People definitely can find big churches boring too! What I'm trying to say is that we should constantly search for methods that help motivate people to come to church until they eventually feel God for real and no longer need "outside motivation". After all, not everyone starts out immediately on never-dying fire for God.)

But this wasn't the point of the youth meeting. He said the percentage of people below 19 years old in the church is lower than ever before - 19%. When City Harvest started out, Pastor Kong was 24 and he and another woman were the only working adults in the church (and would you consider 24 much of an adult?); everyone else was a teenager. The church got laughed at and called a "giant Sunday school" - I was quite taken aback upon hearing that.

People think we youths aren't serious, but they were and they worked fervently for God. Cell group leaders, zone supervisors at the age of 16-17, song leaders at 15.... there were times they had no money but they pressed on. Now all we have and enjoy at City Harvest are the fruits of their labour.

On the way home with John and Julia, John told us a little true story..

John's Testimonial

So, John's doing Mechatronics in ITE. There was this practical exam where he had to build a machine that worked or something like that. Ten minutes before the end of the exam he had already finished building it but it couldn't work. And, not knowing what to do, while everyone else was focusing on their own machines, he knelt there and prayed for help. After that he felt God was telling him to abandon everything he had done and start on a totally new question. So that's what he did: with only ten minutes left, he told his teacher that he wanted to abandon everything he was doing and start on a new question. And when ten minutes was up and the teacher told him to stop, he was done. And he pressed the button on the machine.
And it worked!

I think what John did was incredibly courageous. Would you have done what he did, to listen to the crazy voice in your head telling you to start on a whole new question ten minutes before your time was up? Would I have? I probably would have brushed that thought aside and tried to make my present model work. That means I would have ignored God's voice. I guess I'm too insecure to trust that voice in my head. I will question it endlessly. John's faith, displayed at that moment, is amazing, just as God is, and I think this testimonial has taught me a lot.

Anyway, the reason I love City Harvest and other youth-oriented / non-family churches is that they bring God to people who don't come from Christian backgrounds or have Christian friends around them. Hardly anyone in CHC has parents who were originally Christians (and that includes me) - in fact, a considerable number grew up Buddhists (like John and JT). Some members used to be...gangster-ish (or, as Willie calls it, "old dragons"). Most of us weren't "born" into Christian families or taught Christian principles since young; we fought for our faith once we were touched by God.

I was fortunate enough to be surrounded by Christian people... when I was around 4 or 5, my mother told me that Aunty Suming wanted me to go to church, so I did. Apparently I went to the church she was in for a while before dear Sarah and her family offered to fetch me to and from their church every Sunday (St Andrew's Cathedral).

This post is super lengthy so I shall end here. -.-