Pastoral Work Begins

After attending my first elders' meeting last Sunday, my pastoral work begins in earnest with meeting my worship team. About 25 people turned up and it was wonderful to share heart to heart with the team members about praise and worship in church. I gave a short introduction of why we were meeting and handed over to the leader of the worship team to update me and the team with what has been happening since I have come in as the new pastor. Then we had about 30 minutes of getting to know one another and I prayed to God that I am given the gift of remembering names which I don't have yet. I also shared briefly my testimony since I am sure some of my church members would be wondering why a Chinese would want to pastor an indigenous church in Ranau. I felt I had connected with most of them and it is a good start with the worship team on your side serving the Lord together in love and unity.
This morning I was welcomed in the pastors' fellowship. At the beginning I felt out of place, not because of race but more because of socio-economic status and level of education, the former being dependent on the latter. Though I have made myself poor but even my 2nd hand 4-wheel drive pick-up made a statement when most pastors could not afford the cheapest cars in Malaysia. If the Lord so pleases, this is surely one of my burdens and tasks to alleviate the socio-economic level of my fellow pastors, at the very least they could buy Axia, the cheapest car in the market.