Faith, Our Vision

Dated 15th January 2009, a historical moment in New Life Restoration Centre with the presence of our beloved God, the new committee of Campus Alive 2009 have successfully organized the first CA meeting in the new year!

This year we have set a new vision and mission. The mission for our movement this year is to spread the good news until the end of the Earth and to have faith in God and with great love among each other in Christ.

There were a total number of 100 people present that night. We were very blessed, and had indeed, not worried about the number as we truly know that God will provide us with the people. The only thing that is obvious is the Atmosphere at that moment is packed with lots of people and of course, with many new faces! Praise the Lord!

Among the crowd, we had special guests too. Two of them were not from Malaysia, and they were Amy and Heaven from Korea. They had come to Malaysia to learn English for one month and I guess they are visiting around Malaysia too during their study period here.

Other special guests include the vibrant, and wonderful people from ACTS Church Subang Jaya! Not forgetting about our speaker: our speaker of the night is Brother David from ACTS Church Subang Jaya whom had been described as a charming and enthusiastic guy by Samantha!! :)

Concentrating on the humorous and nostalgic slide show.

Our very much loved Sam, and Steffie.

The night started rolling, literally with a slideshow of photos of the previous committee, along with pictures taken during many previous CA meetings last year. It had been done up by our nice and cute Masters of ceremony, Mr Samuel and Ms Steffie. Samuel started CA after that with a prayer. Steffie had even learned uttered ‘good evening’ in Korean to further welcome our Korean guests to CA.

This was then followed by the happy-go-lucky game master, Mr Graham from AUSMAT program leading and guiding the crowd through a game involving much animal antics. Everyone was separated according to their birthdays. So the crowd was separated into 4 groups with each group consisting of members who had their birthday on every three consecutive months starting from January. The game is simply about imitating animals. However, that was not it. The leader of each group had to start by imitating an elephant. The second person in that circle had to follow what the group leader had done, and subsequently imitating another animal of their own. And the third had to imitate both animals, and add their own as well. Thus some groups started with an elephant, then a dog, cat, and various other animals came into play. The game would continue until the last person imitated all the other animals correctly.

Darsh having fun imitating the elephant.

The winners of the game. I think. :P

The game ended in enjoyment and it was for certain that everyone had an enjoyable moment playing and cheering others along. After the happy moment together, it was the time to worship our beloved Father in the heaven. We sang four beautiful songs (Hari Ini, We Will Sing, I Am Free, and Amazing Love) and shouted to the Lord in our praises, committing ourselves fully to God in midst of worshipping our mighty Father. Larry lead the worship, with Anderson on drums, Esmond on bass, Chewie on the guitar, and Joanne, Sam, and Nicole as the backup singers.

Larry and Sam introduced the new mission and vision for the year. A new ministry that had been set up was then formally introduced to the CA crowd. A Missions Ministry is now part of CA, and anyone who is willing to serve can contact Larry or Sam. Li Sia, who leads this new ministry had spoken about it as well, during CA that night.

Samantha, explaining the mission and vision of the year Faith, and Love.
(More about this soon.)

That night we had invited ACTS Church Subang Jaya to deliver a wonderful speech about faith. It is indeed a wonderful and fruitful sharing to everyone by Bro. David. He told us about his wonderful story in his life, sharing his story about becoming a Christian 15 years ago. He originated from Penang and shared about his humble life there where he had to struggle hard to live. There were even a few moments in his life when he had thought of committing suicide to end his life as his didn’t really like what was given to him in his life during those days. He suffered from great tension since his young age till one day he came to Christ through a movie “The Story of Jesus”. He said that this movie had greatly inspired him to receive Christ and this was what that had brought such a big change in his life.

As for the students in INTEC UiTM, he convinced us by asking us to think about things positively. In the Malay language, the word “Shah Alam” came from the root word “shah” which means Sultan or king and another “alam” which means realm. In full, it means that Shah Alam is the land of the King or a kingdom and all those who live or rather students who are arranged to study in UiTM should be thankful to have been able to enrolled into such prestigious university in Malaysia. And if the students feel that Shah Alam is such a boring place, we should claim back this land, as the land of the King. Bro. David inspired us to make a change in this place. He told us that the students of INTEC must start doing something. And when we leave, we will not have regrets, and be able to say, “At least I have done something here.” He is indeed a very great speaker, having been thoroughly convincing and with his wide smile on the face, he created laughter among the youngsters.

Brother David inspiring us with what he had shared.

The talk ended in about one and half hour. It was then followed by a few announcements by the MCs who reminded us that cell group would commence as usual this Thursday. The former president of the CF of KDU, Brother Jason, too, shared a few words with us. He introduced us to a certain program organized named Malaysian Youth Prayer meeting which was first held in Kluang, Johor.

Finally, everyone broke up for refreshment and fellowship in the refreshment corner. Some mingled around, chatting together, and had enjoyable moments together in laughter and friendship. At the same time, what was happening in the Atmosphere is that some grouped together to pray for the AUSMAT seniors who are going to set flight to Australia and New Zealand very soon. I sincerely wish them all the best here and hope that they will have great moments with God there too! After that, it is the time for everyone to go back home. It was late when CA ended and the NLRC resumed back in its normal quietness, but indeed it is still burning hot in the Holy Spirit flame. Whatever, that ended the first CA of the year!! Yahoo!! Bravo to all the organizing committees!!

Last but not least, our next meeting will be on the 12th February 2009 which is two days before the well-known Valentine Day. In conjunction with the soon-to-come Valentine Day, the theme of the sharing of our next meeting will focus mainly on the contexts of LOVE. Either it is about a boy-girl relationship or it is about love from our heavenly Father, it is for you to find it up the next CA meeting!! See you!!

We are one in Christ.

Faith in God,
Julius Tan Jin Soon

p/s As Chinese new year is drawing near, I sincerely hope that everyone will have an enjoyable moment in the fun of the Lunar New Year! Enjoy yourselves and of course together with the presence of God! I hope that everyone will have a safe journey back to the hometown, including those Koreans who are going to depart back to their own country on the 31st of January 2009! All the best to all! Have a joyous Chinese New Year!! :)

Faith, Our Vision - 15 January 2009

It has been a while since we have had a Campus Alive meeting, due to the holidays. I hope that all of you were still faithful to Him during the holidays and have made the holidays an enjoyable and fulfilling one. If not, it was still relaxing and refreshing, no?

Anyway, this will be the very first CA meet of the year. And we're all very very excited, whee! The theme for this meeting is, Faith. More about the vision and mission for this year, and all about the new commitee will be talked about later during the meeting. :)

Please be there!

Symbols for the New Year

Symbols carry with them very powerful meanings and imageries. They represent a group of ideas linked together in one visual or verbal representation. In fact, the word symbol is derived from the Greek words syn- meaning ‘together’ and ballein meaning ‘to throw’. So taken literally, to create a symbol is to throw a couple of ideas together into one representation.

As we use symbols describe things, we are invoking the ideas that have been associated with the symbol and connecting those ideas with the particular subject. Since this year is the year of the ox, perhaps I shall use the ox to illustrate an example. For instance, say I described someone as an ‘ox’. The ox becomes a symbol that calls forth several different ideas and places that person in possession of those qualities signified by the symbol. In this case, the symbol of the ox could carry the significance of strength, vitality, loyalty, devotion, etc, so to describe someone as an ox could ultimately mean that the person is strong, youthful, loyal, etc. In other words, the qualities that have been ascribed to the ox have now been ascribed to that person.

As we enter a new year, I would like to present two powerful symbols that I believe challenge us to live a life that is worthy of our calling – peace and resurrection.

Nowadays, we often hear the word ‘peace’ in the news, public discussions or even casual talk. But what do people really mean when they talk about ‘peace’? Often times, we discover that ‘peace’ in contemporary terms has been diluted to mean merely the absence of conflict, i.e. we’re cool as long as we don’t step on each others’ toes.

However, the Bible presents a whole radical idea of peace. The Hebrews would call peace shalom, while the Greeks eirene (for those who are interested, the name Irene actually comes from this word). I would particularly like to focus on the symbol of shalom. Throughout the Old Testament, we observe that God’s commandment to the Israelites place much emphasis on community living. In fact, when we examine the Torah, God instructs the Israelites to care for those living amongst them, look after the welfare of their neighbours (including foreigners), greet each other in love – or to summarise it all, to seek the shalom of the community. Hence, the symbol of shalom (or peace) brings together the idea of not only the absence of conflict, but also the obligation towards the health and life of the community.

Even today, we are not exempt from these commandments that God gave to the Israelites. As we become part of a community of believers, the New Israel, God expects us to go beyond peaceful coexistence or personal isolation from the life of the community. Rather, He calls us to contribute and be part of the heartbeat of the whole body of Christ. We are called to care for one another in love, to seek each other’s welfare and to greet one another with joy. In other words, peace (shalom) calls us out of our self-centred survival status to life-giving love-filled latitude as we gather together as one body to seek the face of God.

The second symbol I would like to point our attention towards is the resurrection. First of all, I would like to address the idea that ‘resurrection’ is an event that will happen ‘someday, somewhere’. I believe that this is an incorrect perception of the resurrection. In fact, I would go further to suggest that we already have the power of resurrection within us. It is merely a matter of tapping into that power.

Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:17 that “those who are in Christ are a new creation”. In other words, those of us who believe in Christ and have received His Spirit are already a new creation. And as a new creation, we are now living in a whole different kind of power, i.e. the power of the resurrection. Paul tells us in Romans 8 that “if the spirit that raised Christ from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies”. The power of the resurrection is already accessible to us through the Spirit, right now, and not in another distant reality.

Then comes the question then, “But how does the power of the resurrection look like?” The same Greek word that is used for resurrection, egeiro, is also used in several ways in the New Testament. I would like to point out four of them, all found in the book of Matthew.

1. To rise up and go – “Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child’s life are dead.” (Mat 2:20)
2. To rise up and stand – But Jesus came and touched them. “Get up,” He said. “Don’t be afraid.” (Mat 17:7)
3. To rise up against – Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. (Mat 24:7)
4. To raise up people – I tell you out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. (Mat 3:9)

Therefore, the symbol of the resurrection draws together these ideas. In my opinion, to stand in the power of the resurrection means to get up and go in faith as the Spirit leads. It means that we were once afraid of taking brave steps to uncharted territories, but now we have the faith to make choices that no one else has ever dreamed of.

To stand in the power of the resurrection means to rise up and stand for our faith. It means that we were once insecure about our own identity, our purpose, our calling, or even our life, but now we hold onto a new hope and a covenantal promise in God that far exceeds any other promises of the world.

To stand in the power of the resurrection means to rise up against the ways of the nations, and the status quo. It means that we once tried to impersonate and mimic the ways of the empires around us, wallowing in our self-preservation and survival games. But now, we have caught a glimpse of a new way of living that is not based on following social norms or trying to meet the human expectations, but that which is based upon faith, hope and love. And because we have witnessed that kind of life, we rise up now to fight against the influences of the world that will try and pull us back to our ways of living.

Finally, to stand in the power of resurrection means to raise up a new generation of people who too can embody this hope in their lives. It means that since we have experienced this freedom and life in the Spirit, we now pass on this freedom to the next generation so that they do not have to start from scratch and go through all the painstaking process of discovery that we have been through, but so that they can build upon the foundations that we have laid, just as we build upon the foundations that Christ has laid.

Indeed, there is nothing foreign about resurrection. Dare I say, as we engage with every single day of our lives, we make choices each day whether to follow the leading of the Spirit and to tap into the power of resurrection that comes through the Spirit. We make choices each day whether to go to new frontiers, to stand firm in our faith, to fight against the ways of the world or to raise up a new generation of Christians. And as we step out in faith to take up these challenges, we are living in the power of the resurrection of Christ.

So, brother and sisters, I exhort you then, continue to live in the power of the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, making peace with all men. Have a blessed new year ahead! Shalom!