Prayer For A Friend

(do try to listen and understand the meaning of the song, its very meaningful. Pls view the blog using IE, firefox wont be able to play the song, thanks)

Lyrics:

Lord, I lift my friend to You, I’ve done all that I know to do

I lift my friend to You

Complicated circumstances have clouded his view

Lord, I lift my friend up to You

I fear that I won’t have the words that he needs to hear

I pray for Your wisdom, oh God, and a heart that’s sincere

Lord, I lift my friend up to You

Lord, I lift my friend to You

My best friend in the world, I know he means much more to You

I want so much to help him, but this is something he has to do

And Lord, I lift my friend up to You

Cause there’s a way that seems so right to him

But You know where that leads

He’s becoming a puppet of the world, too blind to see the strings

Lord, I lift my friend up to You

My friend up to You

Lord, I lift my friend to You, I’ve done all that I know to do

I lift my friend to You

Behind the Song:

This may be the earliest of any of my songs to be used on a Crowns record. Maybe 15 years old. I was heartbroken before God for a friend who wouldn’t listen. God showed me that nothing is impossible with God. ~Ephesians 3:14-21 / Philippians 1:3-11 / 1 John 3:16 / Proverbs 17:17 / Proverbs 18:24 / Job 6:14 / Philippians 2:2-4 / 1 Timothy 2:1 / 1 Peter 3:8 / Romans 14:19 / Luke 18:1-8 / Proverbs 12:26 / 1 Corinthians 15:33 "This is the oldest song on the CD. I wrote it back in college. I had a friend who was making some bad life decisions. Several of us who had been praying for him decided we needed to talk to him. So we confronted him and stayed up until four in the morning, praying and crying and talking with him, but he didn’t listen. Over the next few years, he really reaped the whirlwind for the choices he made. It’s a helpless feeling when you think it’s on you to change or save a person, when all you can do is speak the truth in love and lay them at Jesus feet. Today, that valley is a mountaintop… He’s walking with Jesus and has a great life and ministry. So this song is just a reminder to never give up on your friends." - Mark Hall (Casting Crowns)

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Having a burden for a close friend who is slipping away? If God never gave up on us to draw back to him, let's not give up on those who we regard as good friends despite the setbacks we might encounter when we reach out to them. Continue to pray and trust that God will do the work for you in drawing the person back to Him.

Mutual Submission

Since sermon teaching on Sunday touched a little bit on submission for each gender, i think it would be good to know more and from a differnet angle what u'll be heading into when one gets married in the near future and how to view marriage in a differnet light altogther. Blessed learning all.

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True servants of Jesus who are married understand clearly what Ephesians 5:21-33 really teaches about the roles of husband and wife in biblical marriage. They do not have to fight or argue over what respectful submission to the husband means for the wife, and what sacrificial and nurturing love for the wife means to the husband. They are already servants or bond slaves of Jesus Christ: they understand that Christian marriage means they will be loving and humble servants to each other, as husband and wife in mutual submission, because each of them is first submissive or surrendered to Christ (Eph 5:21). They realize that mutual submission to each other out of reverence for Christ in Ephesians 5:21 precedes the rest of the text that speaks of wives submitting to and respecting husbands, and husbands loving their wife even to death, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up and died for the church!

Paul Stevens insightfully points out that mutual submission is actually reversing the curse that came after Adam and Eve fell into sin (Gen. 3:16)

Rule and revolt is not what God wants between the sexes, but the inevitable consequences of separation from God. But in Christ, instead of ruling his wife, the husband loves her to death. Instead of revolting against her domestic master, the wife is free to bombard him with respect. This is not what each deserves. It is not even the duty each has to each other. It is gospel freedom, sheer grace ….. The key to understanding the marriage section of Ephesians 5 is the emphasis on Christ. We submit to one another, Paul says “out of reverence for Christ” (v.21) ..... All of these relationships – mutual submission, servant headship and reverence – are in Christ. They are not roles but expressions of spirituality. Our life together in Christ is not based simply on mutual submission or on a male-female hierarchy, but on Christ who chooses to dwell in the covenant.

Servants of Christ who are married know they are married in Christ, and need the continual filling of the Holy Spirit (Eph.5:18) with his presence and power, to be such loving servants to each other as husband and wife. They become “intimate allies” in the battle against the chaos in life in this world.

Gary Thomas had written what I believe to be one of the best and deepest books on what marriage is really all about from a biblical perspective. He asks the searching question: “What if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy?” He writes not about how to have a happier or more fulfilling marriage, but about the real purpose of marriage as sacred marriage: a spiritual discipline that helps us to know God better, trust him more fully, and love him more deeply. Hence, marriage is not as much about you and your spouse as it is about you and God! In Thomas’s own words: “Marriage calls us to an entirely new and selfless life ….. Any situation that calls me to confront my selfishness has enormous spiritual value, and I slowly began to understand that the real purpose of marriage may not be happiness as much as it is holiness….. If we view the marriage relationship as an opportunity to excel in love, it doesn’t matter how difficult the person is whom we are called to love; it doesn’t matter even whether that love is ever returned. We can still excel at love. We can still say, ‘Like it or not, I’m going to love you like nobody ever has’….. But there’s another challenge when two believers are both committed to pursuing a deeper spiritual reality in marriage – the formidable task of working to become not just a holy spouse, but a holy couple.”

Some examples of ways in which we can grow to become more like Christ in sacred marriage include learning to love and respect others, fostering good prayer, having our sin exposed, growing in the spiritual discipline of perseverance, embracing difficulty to build character, learning to forgive, developing a servant’s heart, becoming more aware of God’s presence, and developing our spiritual calling, mission and purpose. A crucial part of sacred marriage therefore is learning how to serve our spouses with a true servant’s heart.

- Tan Siang Yang

Love for everyone - are we able to ?

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. {John 3:16}

This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. {1 John 3:16}

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Almost anyone and everyone can memorise by heart word for word John 3:16 but have u ever thought of 1 john 3:16? U've read abt God unconditional love for U, willing to even give his only son for our eternal life but how much love are we able to give unto others because He first love us?

You Are Not An Accident

You are who you are for a reason.
You're part of an intricate plan.
You're precious and perfect unique design,
Called God's special woman or man.

You look like you look for a reason.
Our God made no mistake.
He knit you together within the womb,
You're just what he wanted to make.

The parents you had were the ones he chose,
And no matter how you feel,
They were custom designed with God's plan in mind,
And they bear the Master's seal.

No, that trauma you faced was not easy.
And God wept that it hurt you so;
But it was allowed to shape your heart
So that into his likeness you'd grow.

You are who you are for a reason,
You've been formed by the Master's rod.
You are who you are, beloved,
Because there is God !

- Russell Kelfer

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Trust that your existance and where you're placed in is in accordance to his will. Be truly yourself always and let the blessings and talents you've been given to impact those around you. You're part of a great plan of God, that is just waiting to happen if you continue to have faith in your creator.

POSB

Received this little thought during service on Sunday and decided to share this with some of you especially since it’s even more meaningful when you link it with the sermon teachings.

So what does the word POSB mean to you when the letters appear in front of your eyes? I’m sure you’ll instantly think about the bank and the benefits you might get from it. What if we look at the letters in a different manner and instead of thinking about earning interests from our deposits, we share the treasures that are kept inside. Don’t get the wrong idea that I’m saying we should redraw whatever money we have inside to bless others. There’s in fact already an even better option that God has given to us.

I think at times, everyone might feel that they can’t contribute to the cell as much as one would love to do so. Well, everyone have different gifting that are obvious to some and not obvious to many as well. So sometimes, it’s really the situations that enable one to “shine”. However, one gift that all of us are bless with and should use more often is prayer. One of the best blessings a person can give to someone else is to pray for the other person especially in secret since God’s the only one who sees it. The main point isn’t about praying in secret more often from now onwards but to instead point out that we should use more often this gift that we have been blessed with. Just like the bank which safe guards our “treasures” and let us withdraw cash whenever we needs it, let’s look outwardly and seek to bless others around us with our prayers.

So any ideas what other meaning can POSB imply? Well, here’s a hint. We are going to some place at the end of the month so even before the planning starts, we need the Lord to open the way for us. If not, what was preached on Sunday is something we might have to face. “The greatest failure for church people in reaching people with the gospel is the failure to pray to the Lord to grant us the ability, the power and the burden to reach souls.”

Well, hope by remembering this simple name which everyone grew up knowing, we can set aside time individually and corporately to pray for the missions’ trip on the 29th to 30th of Sep. And finally, POSB when I received it meant Praying for One’s Salvation in Balai.

Jesus loves the little children, All the children of the world, Black and yellow, red and white, They're all precious in His sight, Jesus loves the little children of the world!

Kindness - Essential Fruit

Philip Kenneson wrote the following about cultivating the fruit of kindness in the midst of self-sufficiency in our society. "Kindness is a particular manifestation of love's other-directedness. Kindness seems to manifest itself as a certain way of being helpful to those who need help. Such a helpfulness stems first of all from God's helpfulness, of which the Christian is imminently mindful. ..... This fruit by its very character, therefore, is one of the most outwardly visible fruit of the Christian life. ..... we regard people as kind because they go out of their way, often quietly and without fanfare, to engage in kind actions. Nitty-gritty, concrete, everyday kinds of actions."

However, servanthood that is characterised by this spirital fruit of kindness is not about doing or practicing " random acts of kindness" as car bumper stickers and other signs and billboards have been challenging us to do for some years now. Such random acts of kindness should be called "random acts of niceness", not kindness, as Steve Sjogren has pointed out. There is nothing random or accidental about kindness as the fruit of the Holy Spirit. (Gal. 5:22-23)! The Holy Spirit substantially and intentionally produces the fruit of kindness in us as we yield to him and nurture our spiritual lives by walking with God daily and practicing the spiritual disciplines as disciplines of the Holy Spirit. Kindness has been defined by Sjogren as"practical acts of mercy done by followers of Jesus who are inspired by the Holy Spirit to see others through the eyes of God. Paul writes that ' the kindness of God leads us to repentence' (Rom. 2:4). The bible seems to distinguish between the divine quality of kindness and the human quality of niceness."

In a similar vein, Kenneson also critiques the idea of simply doing random acts of "kindness" (or niceness). The main limitation of such acts, according to him, is that genuine other-directedness is lacking - we feel good about doing these random acts of "kindness", regardless of what the recipients may really need

Kenneson suggests three major ways in which true kindness can be cultivated in our lives in the Spirit as Christians. The first is in remembering our story, especially as undeserved recipients of God's great kindness and matchless grace in Jesus Christ and his sacrificial love for us on the cross. We therefore gather regularly for worship of God, being constantly reminded, because we need to be, of our utter dependency on God and how he gloriously works through our human weakness

The second is in nurturing connections, especially as members of the body of Christ, who see one another as precious gifts of God to each other. We are therefore challenged to give up our self-sufficiency and autonomy. We are empowered by the Holy Spirit instead to become true servants to one another in mutual service for the building up of the body of Christ. The giving and receiving of acts of kindness (not random acts of niceness!) are crucial aspects of such servanthood.

The third is in listening to one another. In order to nurture deeper and more loving relationships with each other, to connect with one another in the Spirit in the depths of our soul, we need to listen to one another carefully and attentively. This kind of listening will help us discern and know each other's deeper needs and to respond lovingly and appropriately to such needs with Spirit-filled acts of kindness that are truly other-directed. In fact, listening itself is a kindness we can give to others in a self-obsessed world where very few people are heard deeply enough to feel understood.

- Taken from "Full service" by Dr Tan

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Don't u think it's a wonderful time to give thanks for the many blessings in our lives. Just as God place us here in this same cell grp, continue to build up one another and offer the listening ears to one another as well whenever u can to the people who are especially close to you. It's great to know that kindness can be displaced in this form of loving one another. Continue to encourage and walk together on this life journey.

Sharing On Prep For Sat Cell Grp

After reading the past few posts, did u feel this is an odd blog since I never mentioned about anything happening in my life? (Well, my life is dull most of the time, but I love it a lot) Fear not, this is the 1st! (Many more to come?, I don’t know for now, haha)

God works in interesting ways all the time!

Withheld this post till after cell group since by now, u already knew and played the welcome game. Hope it’s not only a unique and fun game but also one that can spur u onwards through the good and bad times in your life. Always remember, God is closest when we are going through the worst of trials because he too feels our pain and cry along with us. Fix your eyes constantly on what's waiting for you at the finish line!

Was traveling down to school on the train in the morning on wed when the thought that I had to do games this sat came about. Was telling myself that I had to go home and search the net for some interesting games. But God is awesome! Helped me solved the problem in school and what more, during class and yes, we were playing ice breaker games. Before u get the wrong idea that we broke rules or whatever, I’m taking a module in NIE so we get to be teachers ourselves and can conduct lessons in any way we want(as long as our objectives are made). Anyway, my teacher introduced this game since he was conducting the lesson that day but I remodify it. The actual one had 2 different sets of paper, 1 for guys and 1 for gals. The topic was education for girls and the game was to show us how the world discriminates against females. The ladies set of papers had more events that causes one to move backwards. Therefore, of course need to change it somewhat, if not later all the ladies complain about the rules and the rest will say I promoting disunity! Well, managed to change and modify it to benefit and teach us so yup thanks be to the Lord.

Another interesting event to give thanks would be worship as well. Was supposed to lead only next week but Diana asked me to swap duty with her. Had already 2 songs in mind a few wks ago but realized next wk no guitarist, was scratching head already on what to do. So yup, God must have planned all these events. Like when I received her sms, was having a project meeting at that time, my friend( a Christian as well from the catholic church here in TPY, got time I go check what the name exactly is) was using some used papers to write down notes and we were talking about writing down our emails add. So he flipped the paper over and there were the lyrics “We want to see Jesus lifted high”. Thus, what a great way to get some confirmation on leading worship, don’t u agree!

Life is mysterious and yet when u do see and understand the big picture of what God does, it is amazing how he can speak to millions of us in different ways! Okie Dokie, continue to press on in whatever professions you might be and yes always be alert to when He is speaking to u. Blessed day ahead to all my readers

REST

Rest can be defined as a state of peace, contentment, serenity, refreshment, stillness, tranquility or calm. It is usually described as having four dimensions or aspects: physical, emotional, relational and spiritual. These 4 types of rest are actually interrelated. Our eventual experience of rest is a holistic one, integrating all these dimensions of rest as the shalom or peace of God that transcends all understanding (phil 4:7).

In the physical area, there are many people today who suffer from heart diseases, panic attacks, exhaustion, insomnia, high blood pressure, muscle tension and headaches . Our tired and worn-out bodies,, that result from the constant overload and hectic schedules of hurried and harried lifestyles, yearn for physical rest. While physical rest may not be the most important aspect of the rest we need, it is nonetheless an essential type of rest for us. Physical rest requires time for leisure and sleep(at least 7 to 8 hours a night!), including taking a Sabbath day off every week. It also involves regular exercise, good nutrition, and learning at least one good relaxation technique as part of effective stress management.

In the emotional area, many of us have a hard time coping with demands and stresses of our over-busy lives in today's high-speed technological world. We may experience emotional struggles such as anxiety, panic, fear, depression, confusion, and feeling overwhelmed or trapped. We long for emotional rest from our overstimulated and drained emotions; we yearn for peace, quiet contentment and serenity. Mental or intellectual rest is also part of emotional rest. Our emotions can relax when our minds are tranquil and at rest. Emotional rest is also deepened by spiritual rest.

In the relational or interpersonal area, we often experience stress and turmoil that come from difficult or broken relationships, unsolved conflicts, bitterness, misunderstanding, gossip and even betrayal and breach of trust. We long therefore for relational rest: for peace and harmony in our relationships with one another, whether in our homes, churches, schools, workplaces or the larger community and society in which we live. Such a relational rest is often found in caring and loving relationships with others. Deep friendships and fellowships with each other, founded on prayer, open sharing, forgiveness, support and accountability - spiritual community - will help us experience more relational rest and wholeness.

In the spirtual area, we may struggle with doubt, confusion, disappointment with God and co-workers in the ministry, guilt, emptiness, dryness and despair. We all long for spiritual rest deep wthin our souls. We want to experience the peace of God that transcends all understanding(Phil 4:7), that comes from praying with thanksgiving (Phil 4:6) and casting all our anxiety on him (1 Peter 5:7). True spiritual rest, or supernatural peace, comes ultimately from growing in our intimate relationship of love with Jesus Christ, our best friend (Matt 11:28-30).

- Written by Tan Siang Yang

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Well, we all are constantly weighed down by lots of work and commitments everywhere. Yet, we still need these 4 aspects to be fully recharged to be effective in the many areas/situations we are placed in daily. Therefore, after reading the article, u know yourself best dont u? So which aspect(s) need(s) to be recharged asap, do remember to get it done soon! Always set aside enough time to work, play and rest, we should try to lead a healthy lifestyle as much as we can, this so that we can serve the Lord in our best physical condition. { We need to have more games after cell on sat!, hehe}