Living by Faith

It’s now over a month since I left my former church as pastor and now I live by faith. In fact, I have lived by faith since 1989 when I opened my law firm as a young lawyer just barely 25 years old having worked for two law firms for two years; five months in NZ before admitted to the Bar in Christchurch and then about one and a half years in Kota Kinabalu.

Last Promise

“I desire peace but when I speak, they are for war”, says the Psalmist. I had spoken the last words in my former church yesterday. I attended because the church we visited last July came to visit my former church and when the leaders asked me two months ago (after I had resigned) I told them I would attend as a sign of courtesy as well as Christian fellowship. My absence could be a talking point, so I went.

5 Sessions on Leadership

There are six sessions altogether but one session is Q & A, so I do not have to prepare notes and PowerPoint for that. The rest of the 5 sessions are fully loaded with notes and PowerPoint slides. Three sessions of lectures or talks are on leadership and two sessions of workshops for which I also prepared notes too to guide the participants along. I was told two days ago 120 people already registered for the seminar. Initially I thought maybe 50 was a good number.

Calm before the Storm

I don’t know how I will fare with about 10 hours’ long seminar over one and a half days. Even preaching for 37 minutes and a song of response for 4 minutes took me three days to recover and even now I am not fully recovered from the exertions of last Sunday. But tomorrow I will speaking for one hour 15 minutes talk followed by an hour long Q & A. We will see how it goes. We are supposed to have a 3 hour break from 4.30pm to 7.30pm and then another two and a half hours long sessions with the last hour on a workshop.

Weariness & the Anointing

I give glory to You, O Lord for the anointing I felt and the words You put into my mouth over the course of my preaching. Truly it was as if borne by the wind of the Holy Spirit. I spent several days meditating on what I was going to say and prayed hard that the Lord would grant me words to declare the mystery of Christ with boldness and wisdom. But I paid the price of exhaustion and this morning I am still tired from yesterday's exertions and I may take another day or two to recover.

Writing Endorsements

It was the second endorsement that I wrote for my former supervisor who is one of the top New Testament scholars in Australasia. I asked him in 2023 how many PhD students he had personally supervised and his answer was a staggering 55. I only supervised two DTh students during my time in Singapore, but one student changed supervisor mid-way as I marked her drafts full of red ink, as I could not understand her English half the time. The other, I suggested it was not her gift to do a doctoral degree as I saw her struggling reading just one academic article. One has to cite or interact with at least 100 learned articles and just as many commentaries and monographs for a proper doctorate.

Serving God with Joy

It's my first month out of a cage or the metaphor I gave in my farewell speech at the end of January, I will fly with wings unbound and those who are willing to accept my ministry I will bring them fly with me for God's glory. I am in full flight in less than 3 weeks out of a "job". I feel unbound and not just freer but free to do what Christ wants me to do. I have written over 100 pages for my commentary on John's Gospel from 13-21.

Three in a Row

I did not expect that invitations to preach would come so quickly. In fact I told my youth, a young man of 15 years old asking, "Is writing your side hustle?" I told him that writing would be my main hustle and preaching and teaching will be my side hustle. Yesterday, I visited a church member's newly rented place. The couple has four children, all regularly attending church and when I was asked to come to pray for the family and house I could not refuse even though I had already resigned. But last night one leader's wife whom we met at the stairs told me in the hearing of 5 or 6 others: "Pastor, we miss you", it has only been two weeks since I stopped attending the church I pastored for 15 months.

Best Decade

I think this will be the best decade of my life yet. Though it is not the best wine kept for the last as I don't think I am in the last legs of my ministry; it is as if just a beginning, a new beginning. A few months ago, I testified that I was now in the peak of my powers in the Lord. Why is that so? By God's grace, I could walk as fast as I did in my 40s. I have not slowed down in the past 20 years. Maybe not as strong as I was in my 30s, but I was a green shoot then, and now I am mature in almost every way.

8 Years to Go: 3 Main Lessons

When I saw my details on my age and it is just barely 8 years before I hit the magical number 70. Where will I be in 8 years' time? Time seems to pass so quickly. What have I accomplished in the past 16 months, as if nothing (my strength is spent in vain, says the prophet in Isa 49) except for a few friendships which I shall treasure. What I have learned from wasting almost one and a half years of my life? Three main lessons.

With mind uncluttered

My original plan taking up the pastorate last December 2024 was that perhaps on my day off Mondays and perhaps onto Tuesday I could write my book. But for 15 months I did not write a single page despite several times trying. But now in one month with peace and quiet I wrote 22,000 words and perhaps in less than a month from now I could complete my first draft of the commentary on John's Gospel 13-21. All these I could put down to having a mind uncluttered.