JC times were the happiest times in my life. I was growing much as a christian, and I liked my class a lot. They were a fun bunch to be with, and I guess we clicked. :)
In JC, my classmate Derek was a super onz christian in his own church, a youth leader and drummer, and I was pretty encouraged by him. He wanted to start a class cg, but we didn't really get to do that. Instead, we had online sharings, and I also typed some sharings on God and shared with the class.
I wrote this testimony to Pastor Kong when I was in JC2:
Dear Pastor Kong,
I am Xiaojia from N01. I would just like to share my testimony with you. :) I am currently studying in VJC and I'm in the second year. Every week, we have common test on Saturday. About three weeks ago, I was sick on Thursday and Friday and I was thinking of going for the Sunday makeup cell grp instead of my usual Firday one since I had not finished my revision. But I decided to make a stand for God, to put Him first and to trust in Him. So I went for the Friday cell grp. Praise God, as I was worshi[[ing Him during cellgrp, my fever went away! I also got back my maths results and I got 71%! I really thank God for His grace because I know given the amount of time I studied it is really impossible without Him. As for the rest of my common tests so far, I also got back my physics results and I scored 73.5%! Also thank God for my GP results. In the essay section, I usually get borderline marks like 24 or 25 out of 50, this time I scored 37/50!
I know that even as I put God first, He would bless me! In the past, I had been unwilling to give God my time as I thought that to get good results, I needed to use that tim to study. I was basing it on my own strength. But God is really good and we should depend on His strength and not that of our own.
I hope that this will encourage everyone else too. As most of us are students, there are times when we feel as if spending time with God is such a waste of time, and we just want to do things our way, stay in our comfort zone and just be a normal church going christian. We want to honour God as long as we have enough time to do our own things. But No! Even as we stretch our faith, as I have learnt this year, God will honour us in our grades!
Thanks Pastor Kong for all your sermons that have changed my life, I now hold on to things that are eternal and not things that the world chases after!
Love,
Xiaojia
In JC, I was deeply convicted that as I gave God my time, He would bless and provide for other areas of my life, esp in my studies. To me, letting go of my studies was difficult. In JC, the girls also often went out after school to watch movies or to Parkway, and I also joined the PA crew which was quite busy. But I had to make a stand to do God's things and sometimes I had to be anti-social when it came to outings. ;p I was active in church, going for bible studies and all that. I remember rushing to church in my VJC beige uniform with my clothes and shoes in my bag, and changing them to serve as an usher. I did well during my JC days, and scored good grades. God granted me favour with many of my classmates and I brought some of them to visit church.
It was then that I had a desire to become a cgl. I wanted to serve God more, and I thought that by being a cgl, I can impact even more lives! :) By then, my sister was training to be a cgl, and I was wondering when it would be my turn. In a sense, I was even jealous that she had the opportunity before me! I was also hoping to become an usher IC, though actually I didn't really enjoy ushering. I felt that it took time away during praise and worship as I had to be filling seats instead of being able to worship.
One night, I prayed to God, and very distinctly, He asked me this question, will u still serve Me if you are not a leader? And I said yes I would, and then I started to cry, cos I knew that wanting to be a leader was not just for reasons of serving God, I wanted self-glorification. And as I surrendered that to God, I knew that I was willing to serve Him without name or status to just be an usher, or to do simple follow ups for Vene. I was willing. =) Although this willingness was tested now and then. My motivations again and again. My feelings of jealousy at others rising up faster than me, becoming ICs, team leaders when I felt better than them. Questioning God when my time would come and all that. Sometimes I felt impatient. I felt that I was sidelined though I felt I was godly and ready enough. (all these which will be tested much more in latter days)
It was also in JC that God implanted dreams in my heart. Other then being a cgl, I had the desire to go overseas to study psychology. I also had this vision of myself preaching to men/women in business suits. Another vision was the vision of healing broken hearts-in this vision, people were crying before me, and I laid hands on them.
Why were these two important to me? Well firstly for the business suits. I felt that God has extremely blessed me in the area of studies and I want to shine for Him in the mkt place. I wanted to tell non-christians that God is our provider, and that instead of seeking our own worldly plans in business, we shd seek Him. In fact, christians with the power of God can be better in their businesses than non-christians with their own clever planning! I know that I can address a grp of ple who trust their own planning cos I know what that feels like. I've always been a very prideful person, proud of my academic success until I knew God and realised that these things didn't have much meaning in them. They were not the ultimate purpose. Knowing God was!
Secondly for the broken hearts. I will share more in the next post. But I know that I am more sensitive than others when it comes to emotions. I know how it feels to be lonely, depressed and negative, and its not as simple as positive self talk! We need the healing touch from God. Whenever I saw a person who was smoking, my heart felt for them and I wanted to run over and give them a hug and say that, hey, its ok, God has a future for you. And I feel extremely happy when I make someone sad happy again.
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