First Sunday 2019

I received an invitation to preach today in the Sunday service about 10 days ago. At first they did not give me the topic so I prayed and came up with what the Lord laid in my heart. So today I preached in church “the righteous man shall live by his faith” from Romans 4 and Habakkuk 2:4. I had three main points in my sermon. How we are made righteous before God so that we can approach Him in boldness and rejoice before Him. Rejoiced I did today and the Dusun song moved me to dance along. Then one of my favourite worship songs was sung. Tears flowed as I worshipped the holy God. I told the Lord that I am entering my 25th year in ministry - a quarter of a century (suku abad).
Then I shared from 2nd part of Romans 4 of how Abraham became the father of many nations by faith and how God would bless us like He blessed Abraham only if we have the faith of Abraham. How hope against hope Abraham believed. I testified how I almost lost hope that my son could find a job in NZ. I prayed for 16 months before he landed his first job and it took 18 months before he was confirmed. How as pastor of a Ranau church earning little I still sent him money when he was seeking employment. But God is faithful. I shared how I gave up my legal career and earnings of more than RM200K annually to serve God in the interior for RM700 per month. I began with nothing and had nothing but today I am debt free because I believed in the God of Abraham who raised the dead and called into existence things out of nothing. Only if God will show His hand and bless us. My third point seeing that it is the first Sunday of 2019 I read from Psalm 90 about counting our days and making use of every opportunity this year. Make every day count for God. And presenting a heart of wisdom. I talked about two things about gaining wisdom to live in Malaysia. First mastering English and for the indigenous people it is still a mountain to climb for many of them. Second I talked about financial management and savings. Even RM50 per month into an account bearing 7 percent will be repaid over and over if we are consistent in saving for 10 years. I told them in this new Malaysia things have gotten expensive and prices have gone up. KFC raised the prices by 15 percent. Petrol prices have come down worldwide since November but we only got it reduced yesterday. It is a challenge to live in Malaysia but gaining a heart of wisdom and believing a God who is all powerful His people have nothing to fear but to trust Him to watch over us and bless us in all things. Almost half the church came forward when I made an altar call. Not a few wept openly. Having laid hands on 50 people men and women young and old I returned to my seat giving glory to God for a good start to the year.