Was having lunch with some of my bestie colleagues this afternoon, when boy!, we ended up having a very interesting discussion about God, church and the different encounters we had with different breeds of Christians.
It all started with a discussion on the recent City Harvest Saga. Anyway, that aside, some of them mentioned the most ridiculous, hillarious and out-of-this-world experiences with Christians. One of them mentioned how she was being shared and street-evangelised when she was in her teens. For some of you who don’t understand what’s street evangelism, it is actually those times when someone stopped you on the streets and shared with you about Jesus. Quite passe already nowadays, I guess it doesn’t work with people now. Anyway, back to her experience, she was asked to repeat a prayer that came naturally after the sharing, and she followed suit. When she came at the sentence that said, ‘I accept Jesus as my Lord…’, she stopped. Being a person who took conversion as a serious and important decision, she declined to continue praying, even though the Christian insisted that she did. There was another time when she was visiting a church meeting, and because the whole congregation was praying fervently in tongues, she felt uncomfortable as a visitor and went out of the room. There were Christians who later followed her to the toilet and waited outside till she came out.
Another one of my colleagues shared about how she went to a church meeting too. Being a Catholic who wasn’t attending church frequently, when the pastor was giving an altar call for people who want to reconcile with God, she lifted up her hands, after having the assurance from the pastor that nobody’s eyes were looking. When the time came for the respondents to go up to the front to receive prayer, the neighbours sitting around her, turned to her and said they saw her lift her hands and asked for her to go up and be prayed for. Boy, she felt so cheated and at the end of the meeting, scolded the friend who brought her to church and even severed their friendship.
After hearing all these stories, I was so grateful that I had met sound-minded Christians ever since Day 1. I was being brought to City Harvest Church at the age of 15. As a student of a Mission School, I had long heard about the gospel and even became a Christian (secretly, behind my mum’s back) at the young age of 12. However, you know how some Christians who were not committed to attending church, and kept coming up with lame excuses when their Church leaders asked? I’ve been there and done that. Therefore, I continued my walk with God, survivng on the bare knowledge of who God is for a few years, before my sis, who became a Christian at her own Mission School too, took me to City Harvest when I was in Sec 3. And from there onwards, I started my exciting walk with God for a good 15 years and counting…
These 15 years at City Harvest were the most interesting, adventurous and life-changing period in my life. My 1st Cell Group Leader, who was later promoted to be a pastor, became my brother-in-law. He and my sister were really the mentors whom have contributed most in my life, having taught me the common sense of people relations, work excellence, money management, leadership, integrity, and tips on love relationships too (Just to name a few). To the amazement of my colleagues, I told them that yes, I was part of the tithing congregation, gave to the building fund, knew how to pray in tongues (thank goodness they never asked me to demonstrate on the spot), and had the experience of how it was like falling under the power of God. What amazed and shocked them even more was when I shared that I knew my husband in church too, who once used to work as a full-time pastoral staff in the church (Double Shock). My 2 kids were dedicated to God in church, I went to a mission trip in Taiwan and even set apart a year to attend a Bible College (gasp!!)… Oh, and did I mention that I preached before a crowd of 200-300 people, and led praise and worship songs with a live band?
I had read so many analysis of the operation of mega churches, ever since CIty Harvest came up on the headlines. There was even a report on the business model of the church, and casual comparisons and conclusions were being made with regards to the way charismatic churches praise and worship, give, do missions, in general, conduct their weekly services. It is hard to explain why we practise the things we do just through an email, an article, a blog, a facebook post, or a tweet. What I was taught from the Bible on prayer, worship and giving, was done through a good long 15 years, and 1 thing for sure, I did bring my brains along to analyse and understand in every weekly service, cell group meeting and bible study. Therefore, it is not so right if Christians are being described as people who adopt a herd mentality. Though no doubt there is also a group of believers who are blindly following the faith.
We left City Harvest about a year ago, as the responsibilities of parenting have taken a toil on us. Literally for 1 whole year, I had to watch the weekly service from the church’s Nursery Room, as my girl was still barely 1 yr old. My elder boy, who had just turned 3, did not want to stay in the Sunday School, all by himself. Somehow or another, he could not fit in to the rest of the teachers and children. I couldn’t concentrate when the sermon was preached, as it would usually be disrupted by the cries of the babies in Nursery. My hubby always had to attend the service all by himself. I was the most affected, as I felt spiritually dry, not ministered to, and attending church became just part of a routine.
Just out of curiosity, we brought our kids to another Church for its Sunday School, as we’ve heard good reports of their bible classes. It was made compulsory by the Sunday School teachers to leave our kids by themselves. So while Audrey was with my helper at the Nursery, George was made to stay in Sunday School by himself, after I accompanied him once. I liked the way they conduct their bible classes, and George enjoyed himself as well. I was able to attend the services with my hubby, and we were refreshed by the teachings and God’s presence.
I am so thankful for the strong faith teachings and Christian foundation that I was taught in CIty Harvest. That when I was feeling spiritually dry at this current phase of my life, I managed to find the strength and self-motivation to search for God at a place where I could draw the Living Water from. 15 wondrous years of my walk with God have passed and I am so looking forward to many more years to come.
I joked to my colleagues who have had bad experiences with Christians, ‘Aiyah, you should have met me earlier! I believe I could share with you about Jesus using a better approach..’ On a more serious note, I think believers have to treat non-believers as true human beings, to put themselves in their shoes and think about the most natural and ‘humane’ way to present who Jesus is, instead of stuffing the gospel onto their plate. I feel sorry for my colleagues that they had such unpleasant experiences with Christians, but having said that, I truly believe that they will get to experience God’s goodness at His perfect timing one of these days.
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