Thanksgiving & New Year Prayer Meeting

31st December 2009

On the last day of the year 2009, all three congregations from the English, Chinese and BM service gathered together as a church to give thanks to God for 2009 and committed 2010 in prayer for a Year of Great Faith.

 

Christmas Celebrations

Victor Lee's Zone

16th December 2009
by Denise Chhoa  |  photos by Garry Lin

If there’s one thing we love about Christmas (apart from the fact that Jesus was born), it’s the food! That beautiful gleaming turkey just waiting to be carved, juicy and tender, with stuffing so good that you start wondering if you are in paradise. The Christmas pudding covered in brandy, warm and moist drowned in thick custard sauce… oh my… a dream come true…

Because we recognized this love of food, Victor’s zone consisting of the Monash and Sunway Faith Station and Kim Loong’s Share Group decided to have a Christmas dinner with a twist. 6 different brands of pizzas were bought: Pizza Hut, Brava’s, Dominoes’, Papa Johns, Canadian Pizza and Marco’s Pizza. Games ensued which were won by Timothy Chung’s group.

Victor had ‘rebranded’ the pizzas by switching their packaging around; then asked if anyone noticed anything different about the pizzas and no one said anything, or even suspected he had a point until they recognized Pizza Hut’s pizza wasn’t in the correct box. Then, the message was brought towards the crowd – Christmas is now recognized by its packaging and not its original meaning. Immediately after, a short spontaneous play of the birth of Jesus went on with Garry winning the best actor’s award and the manger animals won the best group performance award.

 

Howard Chong's Share Group

19th December 2009
by Beatrice Goh  |  photo by Phoebe Chan

After a long drive from SS2, we gathered at Jonathan Koh's place in Puchong, who graciously opened his new house and welcomed us in to celebrate this year's Christmas. We were blessed with 'unlimited' and various dishes prepared by each share group member. As one member, Min Jun, commented, "...we just can't finish it no matter how hard we tried to clear it." After the first round of eating, we proceeded to sing carols together; adding to the joyous atmosphere and had a meaningful sharing session about each other's expectations for Christmas 2009. Continuing on with desserts and a second attempt to clear the dishes, we concluded the celebration that night by exchanging gifts; where each were blessed in his or her own way. We left the place (and also the food) late at night, while feeling thankful to God for the blessed fellowship as a share group where we could share and learn from each other.

 

Christmas Fusion Setapak

20th December 2009
by Caroline Yan  |  photos by Ken Ha & Caroline Yan

Christmas Fusion was an event that was organized by all the leaders from Setapak area and was led by our supervisor, Jimmy Wong. The leaders involved were Jimmy Wong, Ken Ha, Richard Lam, Gavin Lee, Wayne Lim, Winnie Chin together with their share group members. In the event, there were games, dinner, sharing and gifts exchange.

There were around 40 people who joined in this event and among them were more than 15 new comers. All of us were separated into five groups to go through 10 game stations and each group consisted of 5 to 6 persons. Each station was guided by one station leader. Group members were required to pass in all the puzzle solving and team work games, in order to get pictures as clues to complete a map of the story line of Jesus Christ’s birth.

This was one of the stations which needed two of the group members to dress up with all the accessories provided and act out a drama that was narrated by Peter. This group was the last group and had been nominated as the group with 'Best Team Work'. After the game, we managed to take a quick picture with them.
After dinner, Jimmy explained the storyline to all the participants and announced the winners of the game. All of us were invited to sit in the sanctuary hall for the prize giving session and also for the gifts exchange. At the end of the event, we had a blast during this celebration, as well as being able to get to know new friends and invite them for other church events. We took our Share Group picture at the end of the event. Michelle and Yew Yew were two new friends who were invited to join us in this celebration. This event was a blessed event as God had provided us with enough strength to carry on His purposes. The weather that day was good, new friends could get along well with us, the games were smoothly handled and God had reminded us to do more great things for His glory.

 

BM Faith Kids

27th December 2009
by Samentha Chai  |  photos by Cedric Chan

I am thankful to God that I can serve in the BM Faith Kids ministry. For the Christmas celebration, we organized a puppet show for the children, with the purpose of letting them know what Christmas is all about, and it's not just about Santa Claus, Christmas trees or presents. It's more than that, it's about the birth of Jesus Christ, a saviour born to us. It was also to remind them about the love of God, too. The response from the kids was good, as they were excited about the whole puppet show. Other children from the Chinese Faith Kids and St. Paul's Church were also invited and attended the puppet show, giving them an opportunity to get to know each other.

Although it was challenging during the planning stages, as we only had one week to craft the puppets and rehearse the whole performance, but everyone that helped seemed to enjoy themselves very much. Especially the backstage helpers who were from the English and Chinese services. Once again, I would like to thank everyone for helping to give the children a memorable Christmas performance.

 

Christmas Caroling

Timothy Wong & Wayne Lim's Share Group

11th December 2009
by Caroline Yan  |  photos by Caroline Yan

During our caroling sessions, each of us worried that we couldn't attend the caroling practices and events. Some of us were having our mid-term test, some were busy with industrial training; myself was doing my final year project experiment and two of our Share Group members' Adrian and Marilyn had to travel all the way from Petaling Jaya and Puchong to join this caroling event. Surprisingly, all of us showed up for caroling that day. We felt the blessing of our Lord and we knew that God listens to our prayers. We were having Kentucky Fried Chicken as our dinner and had our last practice before we start our first caroling.
This is our first visitation at Sri Pelangi Condomium at Setapak. One of them is my classmate and they are also our Share Group leader’s housemates. We had an enjoyable moment with them as they were the first group and some of us felt awkward because I believe this is the first caroling event that most of us had joined. We even sang a verse wrongly, when the lyrics should have been “We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year!”, we had mistaken sang it as “...and a Happy New Year!”. Once we realized that we had sung wrongly, it was already towards the end of the caroling. Timothy Wong (Share Group leader) had gone back to Sabah for industrial training and Wayne Lim (temporary Share Group leader) was in Sabah for the Diocesan Youth Camp performance, thus the leader that sacrificed his time to lead us that day was Jimmy Wong.
This was our second visit at the condominium nearby. This house was supposed to be the last house that we were visiting, but in the middle of fellowship, Peter received a call from his classmate and that they were inviting us to have caroling at their house. We were surprised but we needed to wait for them for almost 30 minutes for them to get prepared. While we were waiting, we had a great time in this house, where they served us drinks and snacks and we got to know each other.
This is the house that we had waited for, which is truly a blessing from the Lord. Their house was small compared to the previous houses, thus when we were having ice breaking, we disturbed some of their housemates. We received some minor complains but we still had a great time there. After caroling, we had our supper at the restaurant nearby and continued with our Share Group fellowship. It was a new experience for me and also for other members; and I believe it was a day that each of us would treasure.

 

Liew Sio Yean's Share Group

20th December 2009
by Beatrice Goh  |  photos by Sio Yean

Spurred by the morning's sermon of Gideon's clan - the weakest and the least - that was sent out by God (Judges 6:12, 14-15), Sio Yean gathered a group of five carollers to enter into Ridzuan Condominium. The plan was to knock on strangers' doors and invite them to welcome the group into their homes to bless and bring the Christmas joy through caroling. Starting off on the 11th floor by caroling to a colleague of Sio Yean's, the group bravely knocked on neighbouring doors until a door was opened to them on the 8th floor. A few doors later, the group encountered a surprised blessing on the 5th floor, where they were greeted by a pastor from Zimbabwe and his fellow church members of Celebration Church, Taipan. They gladly joined in singing carols and even sang a Christmas song in their mother tongue! Both groups were blessed as they prayed for each other. After descending and knocking on more doors later, the group softly sang 'Silent Night' to a couple and their sleeping grandchild, although some of their caroling invitations were politely declined by other occupants. While the group left the place feeling exhausted and hungry, they were also filled with excitement from experiencing God's work in that place that evening.

 

Cedric and Shu Jun's Share Group

21st December 2009
by Darren C.Edward  |  photos by Cedric Chan

We gathered at church around 7.30pm for one last practice before we headed off to the caroling destination at The Compassion Home in USJ, Subang Jaya. We got lost for awhile but eventually found the place. It was a large caroling group that day, comprised by 2 share groups, one lead by Cedric and the other by Shu Jun.

We started off by sitting in a large circle together with the children to break the ice with, yes, you've guessed it, GAMES!!! The Game-masters, Samantha and Garry, did a great job as the children really started to open themselves up, especially when we were giving out prizes.

Right after that, we started caroling to the hosts, followed by Garry's reading of the Gospel. We were given a surprise by the children as they themselves donned their Santa hats and sang us their rendition of "We Wish You a Merry Christmas!". After that, we continued our fellowship with the children while munching on cakes and nuggets and washing it down with fruit juice boxes.

All in all, we were very grateful and felt truly blessed to have the opportunity to spread God's message of peace and love to the children of the orphanage. Before we left, one boy asked me about the small tag that we tied to their gifts that said "Jesus Loves you!". He asked, "How do you know?"

Right there and then, I knew God's work is at hand.

 

Tim Lim's Album Tour & Diocesan Youth Camp

4th to 11th December 2009
by Timothy Lim

From 4th December until 11th December, I led a team from FCC to Kota Kinabalu on a tour to two churches; then subsequently joined the annual Diocese English Youth camp. We embarked on this journey to promote FCC to the youths and also to impact the next generation.

We visited the youth fellowship of two churches in Kota Kinabalu - Good Samaritan and All Saints' Cathedral - where we joined them for worship and icebreakers while using songs from my debut album as a tool to share with them. As bridges were built, we eventually joined them for fellowship and hung out with them.

Next on the agenda for us, after touring those two churches was the Diocese English Youth camp. We were told this is the biggest attendance ever for the camp - about 335 plus campers! Of course, being in the camp allowed us and the youths from all over the Sabah Diocese to know each other better through the fellowships and programs. The theme of the camp is called DIG DEEP, where everyone was given an opportunity to study the Gospel of Mark and all of us learned how to dig deep into God's word together. Apart from that, we also led worship in a few sessions and it was really a great experience to see youths getting passionate about worshiping God - whether they are jumping or lifting their hands to Him.

Overall, we had a great time in Kota Kinabalu, ministering and fellowshiping with the youths. We sincerely thank everyone who has supported us in this tour especially in prayer. We also want to appreciate the hospitality that was given to us by the Diocese, Good Samaritan church and All Saints' Cathedral.

Lastly, I would like to close this sharing with a Bible verse from Ecclesiastes 12:1a - "Remember your Creator in days of your youth" - a clear reminder for us all to continue to fix our eyes on God in everything that we do.

 

Confirmation Service

13th December 2009

 

XEE Recognition

19th & 20th December 2009

The first XEE semester training started from September to November 2009. A total of 15 students enrolled and participated, and they were trained by seven certified facilitators from FCC itself.

We give thanks and praise to God, as throughout the whole training where the trainers and students go out weekly to share the Gospel to their family, friends or even strangers, 3 new friends have accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour.

On the weekend of 19th & 20th December, the church recognized and acknowledged that the 15 students have completed their training and are now equipped to share the Gospel and lead new friends to Jesus Christ.

The official graduation of the students will be held next year.

Below is a short sharing by one of the students, Garry Lin.