Venue Research - done in Sept 2007

Looks like going back into the old files can be very interesting. Found this about the venue research committee that I was in back in 2007 as we already sensed that the current location is not ideal for our church.

Apparently, we're still there and no idea when we'll be moving? Our lay leader hopes by June 2012.

Anyway, have put some of my comments down in the article in red
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Venue Research

Objectives, options & plans, pros & cons

The objectives for us to have this task group to be done is aim to have a large enough venue for our congregation in the future time, either by long term lease or purchase. After a month research and discuss, few options have be selected.

First at all, we will look at current church financial capability. According to 2006-2007 financial statement, $18000 was allocated for property rent. Due to inflation fluctuation, + - 10% of current amount will be considered for this research. This will give more flexibility to conducting this research. <--luckily enough, our rent has been reduced however, we have also been moved into smaller spaces

After research and discussion, 3 options are listed as below,

Option 1

Remain the downstairs, but let go the upstairs. Estimate rental for downstairs might need $9000p.a.  This will cut down part of outgoing expenses.

As we still need to have office setup for doing admin paperwork and outreach new friend, two alternative options will be giving

1)     Residential property

Find a residential property in nearby suburb, perhaps 3 spacious rooms townhouse, convert it to office block and other room could be use for Sunday school, counseling, tuition or other purpose.

2)     Commercial property

The advantage to have commercial property is good exposure to outsider and non-believer. This enhances the effectiveness of missionary, maximum foot traffic. As it designs for commercial purpose, some possible usage will be consider such as tuition, photocopying, Fax (send/receive), office, internet cafe, pool, snooker. This also provides great opportunity to student to gain working experience by being admin, receptionist etc. But cost of renting commercial property have to take in consider, too expensive and it beyond budget.

Option 2

Keep existing rental agreement for 2 years and fully utilized the upstairs such as provide library facilities and tuition service. On the other hand, financial plan need to be prepare for 2 years later to accommodate the future expenditure as in property outgoing cost. Perhaps have AUD$12000 by July 08 and AUD $25000 by July 09 on church development funds. <-- As of today, I think we have over $55,000+ already for the church development funds, so good work to those who have give into this fund~!

- Current location is not fully utilised to its' financial spending

- It's a risk to be too comfortable at an existing place, lose heart to evangelise or grow more <-- I believe we have experienced this for the past few years. Not easy to wake up the sleeping giant!

Option 3

- Rent warehouse type of property

- Too costly

- Renovations will costs a lot too

- May not get permit due council zoning

Tasks delegated & report

- Raymond: City of Melbourne council doesn't have the list of properties available. Suggested we look at town halls. None available. Meat Market (North Melbourne) a possible alternative but unable to contact or look through the spaces. Has 3 rooms to lease now. Drove through North Melbourne, plenty of shops available to lease and sale. Recommends to follow up on Meat Market

- Lok Kiong & Daniel: 123 Little Bourke Street still under renovations, asked us to approach them at the end of the year (Oct, Nov) to see how things progressed. Welsh Church has been unreachable.

- Shawn: VicTrack has no property available near CBD or Docklands.

- Fund raisings are hoped to be done to raise funds for property use. Car wash, house cleaning, garage sales, dinner.

- Hope a longer term task group would be form to always keep in touch and look out for properties for church. Members have to have commitments and responsibilities. Do not need to meet every month. <-- often neglected, hopefully can improve~!

- In the short term, car parking is not an issue. Should it become a greater issue, we could negotiate with the commercial car parks beside to see if we can come up with an arrangement. <-- at least we had the privilege of using the car parks until recently. So that's nearly 4 years of free convenient parking! Amazing sometimes we can foresee problems earlier. Sad thing is this committee has not been ongoing to tackle the challenges we faced yearly. So we're stuck without a car park now! Ouch!

Reminder:

- Our comfort zone MUST NOT be build financially, rather on God <-- Still a big reminder today especially with DGR

- Our purpose must not be financially driven or profit driven.

- We must always aim to outreach to the lost souls (primary goal), the venue itself is a centre for outreach, not business.

- A lot of things are good to be done, but we must remember to do the things that are RIGHT. <-- Still agree to what i said in 2007 :P

Conclusions:

- As the way current market is going and based on our financial capacity, it's recommend that we take option 2 with a clear saving plans in mind so 2 years later, our circumstances will be different than what it is today. <-- Thank goodness we chose this option 4 years ago! Our savings plan have given us about $55000+ to work on now. However, the journey is still long. Hopefully the venue research committee for 2012 can work out a better plan accommodating our church's needs!

Old Document From 2008

Was browsing through my old files and saw this. One of my proposals back in 2008 to cater for church's growth. Unfortunately, it was never approved or implemented. 

Still interesting to see if my ideology or principle has changed or not throughout the years.

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Proposed LCEC Structure 2009

Purpose/objective: Current church administrative system is failing and hard coping on the effectiveness of our ministries. The present system is designed for 1 service church, we have 2 and it’s hardly working as we would want. When we had the opportunity to experience 3 services, “disaster” happened. We see a lot of disappointments, setbacks, confusions, and tiredness. In other words, we couldn’t cope and keep the church growing. So, we try to refine what we have to cope with the workloads that are involved. It’s nothing new, just re-arranging the positions & ministries structure to improve effectiveness & efficiency. In other words, separating administration and ministry related issues.

 

LCEC

1. Chairperson
2. Vice Chairperson
3. Lay Leader
4. Stewardship & Finance
5. Treasurer
6. Secretary
7. Pastor Parish Relations (consist of Lay Leader, Chairperson, Pastor Representative, Service 1 Rep, Service N Rep)
8. Property Management
9. Service 1 (Task Group 1)
10. Service 2 (Task Group 2)
11. Service N (Task Group n)

Brief explanations

-          The LCEC will be responsible mainly for the church as a “whole” rather than individual services

-          Task groups may be set up to manage issues involving only individual services or special groups

-          Under LCEC, there can be a maximum of 35 committees in total. Special exemptions apply. As above example, only 10 committees are used but we can look after at least 2-3 services efficiently.

Typical Task group for Services

1. Task group leader (aka chairperson)
2. Secretary

3. Italics = subgroups

   Treasurer
4. Mission & Evangelism
5. Social Concerns
6. Christian Education
7. Small group
8. Activity
9. Worship & Music

-          This is the typical task group to manage a service

-          This group will be responsible for their own service only

-          Any issue related to the whole church will be brought to the LCEC via  the Task Group Leader

-          Any purchase of properties/inventories will need to go via LCEC Property Management Committee and all assets belong to the church, not service or task group.

-          Each Task Group can have more or less subgroups depending on needs

-          The subgroups do not need to held separate meetings; their meetings are done in the Task group meetings. They however, can have subgroup meetings if they wish to.

General

-          Meetings to be held once in 2 months, the task group meetings should be done at least 2 weeks prior to an LCEC meeting

-          Pastor, Chairperson, and Lay leader are to attend task group meetings.

-          Task groups should consist of members of one service only. 

-          This structure allows more focus on issues and more appropriate discussion during the LCEC meetings. 

-          The task groups can have more detailed discussion regarding their specific issues and needs.

FAQ

1. Are you having 2 or 3 LCEC in the church?
   - No, just one.
   
   
2. Does it mean we now have 2 or 3 LCEC Chairperson?
   - No, only 1 LCEC chairperson. The other is task group leader acting as a representative for a particular service.
   
   
3. We only have 2 or 3 services max? Why the introduction of this structure? Is it really necessary if we have more than one pastor?
   - Short answer yes. In the coming 3-5 years, we can only see probably 3 services max, further down the track it could be 4-5 services in total.  As we see from the current situation (5 months trial), we are crying to go back to 2 because it’s almost impossible to keep up. IF we had more than one pastor, yes we still need a structure change. Having an extra one or two pastors does not mean that the current structure will work even smoother. It just means the pastor do not have to look over so many services. The workload of a pastor is reduced, that doesn’t mean the workload of the LCEC is reduced. We’ll still face with the same problem of human resource and ineffectiveness in dealing with 3 or more services. The new system will simplify a lot of issues.
   
   
4. Won’t committee members have twice as many meetings?
   - Not really.  LCEC meetings occur as usual to discuss church issues.  Task group / subgroup meetings take the place of the previous subcommittee meetings. 

5. Will we have problem of disunity among task groups if there are people from different services?
   - There’re many ways to show unity. Not necessary physical unity. We can be united in terms of visions, goals, policies, etc. We can show unity by providing assistance when required, able to compromise on matters that affects the church, etc.
   
   
6. Will it create more trouble for matters to be brought forward?
   - There’ll be an extra layer or so to go through before it reaches the LCEC. However, Chairperson & Lay leader is always in the meeting to handle any issues.
   
   
7. Are we in compliance with the Laws & Constitution of the Methodist church?
   - Definitely yes. It’s just a matter how it’s organized.
   
   
8. Can a member of the LCEC be a member of a Task Group or Vice Versa?
   - Yes, except for the position of Lay leader and Chairperson. They would have to be from that “service” to be in that particular Task Group.
   
   
9. Can any members of the church attend the meetings?
   - LCEC meetings, no as general rule of thumb. Task Group meetings; yes but are not eligible to vote.
   
   
10. Previous year’s structure has always benefited the Chinese side more due to the majority of the LCEC members are from Chinese side. How will this one be different?
    - English side will have their own task group, which will be run totally by people from English side. This gives them the flexibility to plan at their own pace & style. If there’re matters regarding the whole church, they can always bring it up during the LCEC meetings.
    
    
11. How about combined activities or services? Evangelistic events? Training seminars?
    - We try our very best to avoid combined services as it’s not good and doesn’t serve much point except for our own enjoyment or fellowships. There’ll probably be just one or two for the whole year. This will be set in the LCEC and delegate to a special task group or existing task group to organize. As for evangelistic events or seminars (should it be approved by LCEC), normally the party that proposed it will be given the priority to organize it. If they are unable to, then a special task group is to be formed or other existing task group to organize.
    
    
12. I’ve always wanted to see a big church rather than “churches” within a church. It just doesn’t seem right! Why don’t we look for a place big enough for all of us and stay on the current structure & system?
    - In an ideal world, anything’s possible. In reality, it’s near to impossible to find a church or worship space big enough for it. We can look and look, and each time your results will be another disappointment. It can be very stimulating to say let’s go to the Town Hall, MCG or Telstra Dome, but we all know in reality, it’s not going to happen, at least we don’t have any glimpse of the possibility now! So, instead of dreaming & hoping to that way, we need to workout what’s best and a solution to welcome growth & manage it in our church. The world has changed; churches mentality needs to change too.

Hung Parliament

The good Oz witnessed or going to witness a hung parliament for the first time in 70 years! How good is that! The people have spoken...The leaders have learnt from their mistakes.

On 29/8/10, will we speak? I'm sure there'll not be a hung parliament.

I'm just hoping we are not hung by the end of the day. :)

Reconciliation

As promised, I'd share my devotion insights at least once a month. So here goes:

¹⁹that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. ²⁰We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God. 2Cor 5:19-20

I was reading through 2Cor 5:19-20, it struck me quite hard. This is because just yesterday when I was leading the prayer meeting (I forgot I was supposed to lead), I was touched by the Holy Spirit to lead all of us to come back before God. We have gone astray for the past few months, probably even years.

So I asked everyone to come back to God before even planning or talking about any other things. Even though I don't sense the urgency among us then, I believe God has His time and His ways.

Through the short verses mentioned above, it reminds me again about God who is initiating the reconciliation process with us through His love by sacrificing His only begotten Son in order to clear us of our sins.

Paul also stated clearly on verse 20, "Be reconciled to God". What a strong message to remind me!

Now, brothers, as we all know that we are faced with a lot of difficulties ahead, we cannot ignore the simple basic fact of reconciliation with God as the foundation for our ministries.

We cannot be planning for the ministries ahead unless we have reconciled with God

We cannot be making decisions for the church unless we have reconciled with God

We cannot be church leaders unless we have reconciled with God

God's invitation for reconciliation has begun and is still active today. We need to repent and go back to God. Some people might said it's easier said than done. It sure is easier however, it ain't too hard too!

Some practical steps we can try:

1) Repent & deny yourself

2) Seek for forgiveness from God or others (if any)

3) Recommit yourself to God

4) Pray for Holy Spirit to give you strength

5) Join in fellowships with others of the ideas with you in the process of reconciliation

6) Be accountable to God and others

I pray that the Almighty God will bless you and keep you in His mighty arms! Let's reconcile and revive our works for Him!

Are you with me? :)

Simple Majority Rule Does Not Rule

Thanks to Experiencing God by Henry Blackaby, we have all confirmed that a Simple Majority Rule simply does not rule. It only creates tension & division among us.So this practise should be avoided at all costs!

An obvious example which is still hovering in our minds was last year where our leaders decided to change the Sunday service time to 1.30pm from 7pm. It was determined that we would change it based on a simple majority rule.

One would have thought, a simple majority from the LCEC? No. Simple majority from the LC? No. However, it was decided a simple majority from the WHOLE congregation or whoever was present on that Sunday! Woooaahhhhh~!

Anyway, the result was a close one. I think those prefered 1.30pm only outnumbered the ones that prefer 7pm by 5 votes out of about 90 in total. Something like 42-47? Forgot the exact tally.

The results today, our Chinese congregations dropped to about 50-60? Clearly something is not right.

Just a classic example of why simple majority rule does not rule in churches.

Some then would argue that the Methodist Constitution that encourages voting is flawed, where most voting would just require a simple majority but major decisions requires 2/3 or sometimes in rare cases 3/4 majority.

I would beg to differ.......

The Constitution stands as a guideline for Methodists to practice. It all depends on the interpretations and applications by those who are using it.

Just like the bible is a good book, it can be misused by cults to deceive others.

As Christians, we must always go back to seek God's will and plans for us. Let us not depend on ourselves in making decisions for God.

Be a discerning Christian with wisdom.

What to do when our leaders are making the "wrong" decision? Pray for them, voice your concerns but if things don't go your way, just accept it.

Time will tell, just like in the case stated above. :)

Sorry, Such A Hard Word To Say

A lot of people think, "I love you" is such a hard sentence to cough out but it's nothing compare to a simple word called "Sorry".

I'm not talking about "Sorry lah", "Sorry loh", or "Sorry eh". I'm referring to the sincere "Sorry".

As our human self defence mechanism, normally the first thing we do is to shift the responsibilities away from ourselves and point the fingers at others, directly or indirectly, conciously or subconciously.

It takes courage and huge humility to express that you're sorry. Some rather die than say sorry.

For a leader to say sorry, it means a great deal for him/her and it's indeed a great achievement.

Though the journey is still a long way from the end point, a small step forward is definetely an encouragement to everyone.

To Invest or To Tighten

Life's so much fun with all the decision making ability given to us by God. For Christians, it's known as the "free will" though some would argue otherwise.

From people to organisations, countries to churches, we all have learn to make the best & right decisions. This of course includes financial decisions, which is quite an exciting challenge!

As a Malaysian Chinese, we're often taught to be thrifty, to save as much as you can and only start to spend it when you have a comfort "buffer". In another words, it's to tigthen up to survive.

After spending a decade in Melbourne, I come to regconize the pattern of Caucasians governance in some sense. It's very obvious during the GFC, most of the governments adopted the strategy of investing for growth.

Stimulus packages, grants, tax reliefs, etc. All are aimed towards futures prosperity and not just the short term.

So, it's a little culture shock when we started to see the governments spending like crazy in times of crisis! Billions are poured in multiple industries just to keep it going while from our background, we would have been cutting expenses as much as we can.

Having said that, they also did some costs cutting measures to keep the ball rolling. Even with billions spent, without proper restructuring, it wouldn't last as well. Billions would end up like cents!

So, as a church, what can we learn from this GFC?

We need to continue to invest into the future by laying out plans and goals for the short, medium and long terms. Then we can work out budget around it to achieve those plans. By injecting the proper resources (human, funds, etc) into the right ministry will help the church to continue to grow.

At the same time, we need to evaluate on our current ministries. Which ministries that we can afford to temporary lay off or shut down. There's a saying, "All things are good, but not all things are right".

By properly channelling our resources, we can ensure greater works being done in the church ministries. These are the core ministries that our church can never neglect. These are:

1) Mission & Evangelism

2) Christian Education

3) Small Groups

4) Prayer

If we're not investing more resources in those core ministries, I'd like to know what else could be more important? Day-to-day church admins? Spending on technologies & equipments?

I know some might say, "let's get our books balance first then we can plan" or the ever famous "we will wait for God Himself to lead".

Let us remind ourselves that, God has initiated His works. Are we spiritually sensitive enough to feel it or how are we going to respond? keep on waiting?

I have a funny feeling that our belts are too tight now. Perhaps we should increase our belt size and start to invest on what's right? Let's not choke ourselves to death!

King Asa = Us?

Yesterday, while we were studying "Experiencing God", we were asked about King Asa's situations whether he was God centered or Self centered in 2 scenarios. Well, the answers are pretty obvious and you don't have to be a genius to figure it out.

Then suddenly a funny thought went through my mind. Before I get into that, let's have a quick history flashback on King Asa.

Basically, the first 35 years of his reign was all nice and good because he was reliant on the Lord.

2 Chron 14:11 Then Asa called to the LORD his God and said, "LORD, there is no one like you to help the powerless against the mighty. Help us, O LORD our God, for we rely on you, and in your name we have come against this vast army. O LORD, you are our God; do not let man prevail against you."


2 Chron 15:19 There was no more war until the thirty-fifth year of Asa's reign.

After that, he started on rely on himself and his allies rather than the Lord.

2 Chron 16:2-3 Asa then took the silver and gold out of the treasuries of the LORD's temple and of his own palace and sent it to Ben-Hadad king of Aram, who was ruling in Damascus.  "Let there be a treaty between me and you," he said, "as there was between my father and your father. See, I am sending you silver and gold. Now break your treaty with Baasha king of Israel so he will withdraw from me."

2 Chron 16:7-9 At that time Hanani the seer came to Asa king of Judah and said to him: "Because you relied on the king of Aram and not on the LORD your God, the army of the king of Aram has escaped from your hand. Were not the Cushites and Libyans a mighty army with great numbers of chariots and horsemen ? Yet when you relied on the LORD, he delivered them into your hand. For the eyes of the LORD range throughout the earth to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him. You have done a foolish thing, and from now on you will be at war."

So my comparison is this:

We have always relied on the Lord from the day our church started back in 2000/01. Prayers have always been the driving force for us from doubling our members each year and to accomplish a near to impossible tasks (in everyone's else's mind) by forming a local church in 2007.

God was heavily sought after during those times but in the last few years, we seems to have forgotten our root and started relying more on ourselves. Prayer meeting numbers dropped significantly, ill-advised decisions were made, etc.

Even up to today (though I may not know the full picture yet), we have not been awaken yet. We all (especially LCEC members) knew that we're being told that we're going to be in charge of the 2013 Annual Conference. It's quite a big thing, it's almost like when King Asa was threatened by Baasha, King of Isreal.

While King Asa decided to seek help and support from Ben-Hadad, King of Aram; We seek help from Camberwell Church.

Instead of praying to God for directions and help, we are seeking financial help from our allies, Camberwell Church because everyone in CLMC (or 99%) believed that we can't do it by ourselves. As far as my limited knowledge knows, we're not doing anything else except waiting for an answer from Camberwell on whether to help us or not and the decision should by known by this year's AC around end of November.

Now, the question is, is this act God-centered or self-centered?

If this is a God-centered act, how so?

If this is a self-centered act, shouldn't we repent now and started praying hard and seek God's will? This could be the turning point for CLMC to come back to God in unity?

Or are we going to end up like King Asa?

2 Chron 16:12 In the thirty-ninth year of his reign Asa was afflicted with a disease in his feet. Though his disease was severe, even in his illness he did not seek help from the LORD, but only from the physicians.

Anyway, those are just my observations and feel free to correct me if anything I said is wrong....:)

MCA, Now MIC & Maybe CLMC?

Over the span for the past few weeks, we have witnessed a string of (by) elections & voting processes going on around us. It seems that everyone just loves the democratic process these days.

Recently it was the MCA Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) orchestrated by the sacked deputy president to try to bring down the president and climb back unto the ladder. Though he only barely "succeeded", at least he tore MCA into 2 parties now. Insiders are reporting a possible 3rd party in the leadership crisis too.

Now, the MIC also wants to bring down their president. Well, they versed it to sound more noble, to save MIC. Whatever the outcome is, one thing is for sure; There'll be even bigger divisions within MIC.

On the coming Sunday, CLMC will also have their annual Local Conference election for the stewards positions for next year. Instead of having the usual "fat heads" structures at the top, this year they have successfully reduced the number from about 16 to 9. 

Anyway will the election process have the same effects as MCA & MIC? Definitely not.

Why? Because we are not capable of pulling such feat yet! We're still young & naive. So will the voting process runs smoothly? Yes & No.

Yes, because everyone will vote very quickly and all seems efficiently handled.

No, because of our "naivety", most of us are irrational voters. So to know what irrational voters do, please read my previous March posting in my blog.

However, sometimes we need to compare our passion for the church to those members of MCA & MIC. At least they really want to do something for their respective parties, though some are for their selfish ambitions, especially those over zealous ones.

The honest question we need to ask ourselves is, do you love your church?

If yes, it's not too late to show it by voting rationally this coming Sunday, 25/10/09.

If not, I'd recommend you not to show up or even forfeit your membership. It's better to wash your hands off any blood that you may draw so you may still be innocent. Having said that, I hope you'd make a wiser decision instead of choosing this path.

Sports Cancelled On 20/9

Just rang up Collingwood College to find out what went wrong yesterday and of course I get the expected answer.

The person in charge is on leave. The replacement thought that everyone has been informed. So they apologize for it.

Apology accepted. No problem but please don't do it again. :)

Anyway, just found out that this Sunday, our booking was cancelled too! And yes, nobody was planning to inform us as they thought we were told. Anyway, not going to make a fuss about it.

So guys, please note.

Sports on Sunday (20/9) is cancelled!

Back to normal on 27/9.

Heavy Legs Rules?

Gone are the days where we used to think places like Camberwell, Box Hill, etc is a far away suburbs. Few years ago, most people would be complaining about how far it is to go to those suburbs and everyone is reluctant to go.

Today, the people that attended prayer meeting regularly are from Box Hill, Altona Meadows, and a couple from CBD and North Melbourne. Basically, 2 BH, 2 AM, 1/2 CBD, 1 NM.

The funny thing is, when we thought distance is a serious factor affecting numbers, today the longer the distance, the more constant the attendance????

The nearer the distance, the lack of commitments??

Where's the logic today??

Gone are the days where prayer meeting is having 30+ people.

Maybe organisers should evaluate sooner than later?

WTH Happened To "Go"

GO

Definition: To pass from one place to another; to be in motion; to be in a state not motionless or at rest; to proceed; to advance; to make progress; used, in various applications, of the movement of both animate and inanimate beings, by whatever means, and also of the movements of the mind; also figuratively applied.

I guess this is a simple word for everyone of us to understand the meaning of.

However, it's probably the least understood word for Christians. I guess the word "Go" doesn't exist in their minds or at least it can only be applied to circumstances which suit their comfort zone!

Sad but true.

Spring To Life

Can't believe it's already the 2nd day of Spring here in Melbourne! Time really flies!

Past 2 days have been quite sunny, which is good! Not too cold or not too hot! Excellent weather for relaxing!

Some flowers blossom in Spring, which made it beautiful to watch.

Can CLMC finally blossom too? After years of Autumn and dry spells?

We need more rain.

We need more sunlight.

We need God.

Roads To Recovery

With all the doom and gloom behind us, perhaps it's time to start paving the roads to recovery. Or is it really behind us yet? Hearing still quite lots of negative sentiments floating in the air. Confidence, satisfaction and efficiency level still at its' lowest ever since the beginning.

We have heard of talks of the first month, first 100 days or now nearing first 6 months and how things are progressing or should I say downgrading? It's fine and totally acceptable for the first 6 months on how things are doing. It's totally within expectations. No problem with that.

However, post 6 months period, no excuses are going to be accepted if we're still standing at where we were 6 months ago or worse off. Everyone must be accountable to God, be accountable to each others and be accountable to the community.

The privilege God has given us to be in the City of Melbourne is not to be taken for granted for. We were in the heart of the City during our golden days, now we're at a small corner of the City struggling to make our presence felt.

It's the time of the year to group our people ranging from the rich to the poor, from the smart to the not so smart, from the older groups to the younger groups. However, we don't need dogs and cats. We people who are willing to surrender themselves to God, who are willing to make sacrifices and who are teachable and obedient to God's Words.

It'll costs a lot of your personal private times, your hard earned money, your stomach and your mental state.

Roads of recovery needs to start with the people.

People need to adjust their current lifestyle.

It doesn't matter whether we only have 3 people who are willing to step up and offer themselves as living sacrifice because 10 people, we can change the world. 3 people we can change the church!

Other things we need to look into at this stage are Small group ministry, Mission & evangelism, and social concerns. Those should be the core ministries after rebuilding.

$11,000 deficit? I don't see it last very long if we're able to get on the road quick enough!

Lone Ranger's Walk

Today marks the 6th rounds I've done walking and praying for RMIT students in the city. It all started after Bishop's sermon about more than a month ago.

I must say, it's not easy to continue doing what I'm currently doing especially if you don't have others to do it together with you. You always feel discouraged or being tempted to just give up.

However, as I do my rounds today, I saw our brothers from the RMIT Christian Unions sitting behind their setup desks promoting their club. There were 4 of them there but nobody approaches them or anything. Most people treated them as invincible, or should I say transparent as a better description?

It reminds me of the days when RMIT CCCF was still active! However, at least the Chinese students are always happy to see us and wondering what are we doing there! Perhaps they long to see something of their background!

Anyway, my heart just drowned when I see such a picture. The world today rejects the truth or doesn't want anything to do with the truth. It saddens me to see such things happening. As I look around the faces fo the students in the campus, I see smiles and laughter but are they truly joyful inside? What happens when the people besides them are gone? What happens after the curtain closes? What happens when the lights are turned off?

I felt the Holy Spirit is raising my conscience and sensitivity. It triggers me to do more and more for the students and people in the City of Melbourne. I hereby call all of you to step up your game! Let's not be the spectator or "kay lei fay", be the role players that God want you to be!

Let's do it together. It's a lot easier than doing it by yourselves. Come talk to me to see what can we do for the City of Melbourne!

^{Matthew9: 37} Then he said to his disciples, "The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.

Let us at least be the "few"! Let the Holy Spirit sets our hearts on fire!

Renew Our Church Our Ministry

Tonight we heard of the sermon to call us to renew ourselves, renew the church and be called to serve.

However, I think theoritically people know but the problem is, nobody knows how to do it. So next time, try to be more practical?

Unless we dare to carry out large reform, we'll not go anywhere towards the right direction.

Well, maybe they can but it will be a very very long process.

A good news from today would be 2013 is still on track. It'll be a pity to lose that priviledge.

Swine Effects

Previously I mentioned about H1N1 and the bible, it seems that our church is also in the swine effects mood! About 2 weeks ago, the Chinese congregations was about 55 people or so. Last week, it only has 44! Only English service has been consistently float around this figure ever since they started but have now reduced to 30-35 lately.

I must say, this is a number we have not seen since mid-2002 except for summer time. Unemployment in the US is about 27 years high, ours is about 5 years high for unchurched members while our church history is just less than 9 years old.

Could this be related to swine flu?

Not quite! Most of our members are in Sydney visting Jay Chou, Malaysia spending time with families, and some on holidays interstate. However, if we really count the heads, do we really have half (50%) of the people away?

Maybe 25% but 50% is a bit hard to believe.

Could the panic button be hit or will we just have more excuses to ourselves? Personally, I'd have reviewed when we're floating around 80 mark and seriously reviewing when we hit 70. Nearing 50 would be damage control.

Oh well, I might be thinking too much. It could just be a false alarm. After all, I think we managed to hit over 50 today? :D

Road to recovery is too hard to be accomplish by one person, we need a team. At the moment, we're not a team yet.

We're still in the midst of swine effects, not swine flu effects.

No Pain No Gain

When I was little, I often heard the phrase "No pain no gain" from all those Hollywood movies from HBO and Star Movies. Not that I really understood the meaning back then but it sure sounded cool.

It didn't take me very long to understand the true meaning of that phrase. So all my life, I've been enduring lots of "pain" to get a little bit of "gain". Nothing ever comes easy.

I'm not a legalistic person but more of a discipline person. A lot of people still couldn't tell the difference between a legalism freak and a discipline practitioner. I'll make it simple for you to understand.

Legalism: Being bounded by set of rules word for word
Discipline: Mastering a set of rules through its spirit

Whenever we try to introduce discipline living, they said we are going back to the Moses days of commandments. Thou shall not this, thou shall not that...

So instead of practicing spiritual disciplines, they're "forcing" God to give them grace and they'll be so thankful that God has heard their prayers. For example, I don't really study much for exam, I just watch TVB series all night long. When exam comes, I pray hard for God to give me good results to "glorify Your name". It's a bit like, God, if You don't act, it's not me who is shamed but You are!

It may sound right in some sense but my question is, wouldn't it be better if we had live a discipline lifestyle and God bless us with His grace? Isn't that a more beautiful picture? For example, I study very hard for exam, I don't skip prayer meetings or Sunday Service just because I wanted extra study hours, I pray for God to bless me abundantly with good results for His name sake. Isn't this a lot better?

So why are we still living like parasites?

The bad news is discpline lifestyle doesn't come easy. It involves a lot of sacrifices, commitments, determinations and endurance.

Of course, young people these days know NOTHING about "no pain no gain" or in Chinese words 先苦后甜.

Sure they wanted growth (in fact, lots of them!) and lots of gain but they're unwilling to sacrifice themselves in any ways or put much effort into it. How many times have we heard them say, "Oh I wanna grow more in Christ" but their actions always show the opposite?!

Nothing comes easily in this World. Try scoring HD in all your university subjects without studying for a single second! If you can do it, I'll buy you a BMW. Try to be like an apostle without learning and applying the Word of God in your lives, then I'll call you Master!!

Stop acting like a pampered baby that wants mummy to change your diapers everyday. GROW UP & take responsibilities to your own life! It's YOUR decision.

NO PAIN NO GAIN, Christians are no exception!

柴九 & Laughing 哥

TVB certainly has done great in the last few series with 2 very admired character being developed. First it was Laughing 哥 then it was 柴九. Gotta admit, both of them are also characters I quite liked.

What're the reasons that everyone like them so much? What made them so special?

Some of the common personalities between the two are: loyal, champion for truth, self sacrifice, selfless, etc.

When can we as Christians learn to be like that? The series reminded me again & again, we need to make a difference and stop giving ourselves excuses to be pathetic Christians!

We have Jesus Christ, whom is far greater than both these 2 characters combined! Yet we're acting like the total opposite!!

God, forgive us! Give us the courage to live the life you want us to live and guide us into the path of righteousness, for Your name sake!

Failure To Initiate Change

I've been quite preoccupied these days hence the lack of postings. Sorry about that.

Anyway, it's now 3 days away from June! Also, it has passed the 100 days of our new Reverend in office. As usual in politics, normally they'd review your first 100 days like Obama's 100 days or Najib's 100 days. So, it's not surprising to have our own mini Rev's 100 days.

Certainly, from the rakyat (in our case, members) point of view, things seen to gone downhill after a minor boom in the beginning. The rate of decline is far greater than the mini boom that we had.

Could the Rev be blamed for such results? Sure the Rev has made some unpopular or politically correct decisions but hey, nobody is perfect. For example, getting the whole congregations to vote for Mandarin service time with only 50% votes required, bowing to the pressure from the congregations, etc

Let's examine why being a new Rev in CLMC is not the easiest thing to do.

- Postmodernism and years of cliques or gangs ideology has infested the CLMC people. People are often in groups of their likings and doesn't have love for others except superficial loves. So when decision making is required, you'll hear many different types of opinions. Worst of all, the opinions are mostly "I" centered. How many are there thinking about the church as a whole?

- Lack of counsel for Rev. According to the book of Proverbs, a good leader needs smart counsels too. So who is giving the right counsel to the Rev now? Are they long sighted, know what it takes to make the right but hard decisions, etc? Or are we witnessing more what power the positions can give to the individuals? Just look at politics around the world, how many leaders are there truly for the people but not their own gain and fame?

Having said that, the success of the church does not solely depends on the Rev. It also depends on the LCEC and other church leaders. (Yes, most important is God, I know but I'm talking in more "practical" sense now)

What are the LCEC doing? Heard of rumours of resignations and some even planned to leave the church once their term is over. At the beginning of the year, we have wonderful plans of doing this and that but as usual, till now, nothing has been done. All talk no actions. What kind of mentality is this? My advice for you is, buckle up or pack up!

What are the small group leaders doing? We heard about them saying studies are much more important and we can't commit more than what we already have. Fair enough, but the question is, why did you choose to commit when you knew you couldn't do it? Are you thinking leading a small group is just like leading a "big group" fellowship? Some said the small group has no directions but I can tell you there's only 1 direction: The Great Commission. All other things are just methods towards that direction.

So what's happening here? No leaders or LCEC attending prayer meetings now? What happens to the covenant you made when you pledged before being appointed as leaders?

Transition period is nearly over. It's time to step up or else we're going round in circles. Back to where we started.

Oh by the way, I was just browsing through my files to delete and I saw something I wrote back in Sept 08. Not sure if I sent out the letter though, forgot.

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Inability to lead & manage the church properly

LCEC 2009 to be postponed or void
Reasons:
1. XXX has no burden for CLMC anymore
2. XXX has poor knowledge of church management
3. XXX has no vision or directions to lead the church
4. Nomination committee has only met once to select the nomination lists
5. No prayers were offered to seek God’s guidance in terms of selecting nomination lists
6. Criteria for nomination is not adhered fully
7. Motives & goals by the NC may not be right when nomination happens
8. Number of LCEC positions in 2009 has not been disclosed even to NC
9. 2008 LCEC has been a good example of poor selection by previous nomination committee. No direction, no improved results, inability to make right decisions at the right time, and church continue to go down in terms of quantity & quality.


Risks if not postponed:
1. 2009 LCEC will be directionless, ineffective and inefficient.
2. 2009 LCEC members will be selected “by men rather than God”
3. 2009 LCEC members will unable to be examples for the members
4. An added burden to whoever the Minister is for 2009
5. Created a false sense of identity for some of them
6. Further no-confidence towards the church leaderships
7. Another year will be wasted
8. More dissatisfaction towards the church
9. More members leaving the church
10. CLMC will just be another “typical” church that no one has burden in

Proposed solution:
1. Nominated name list be void or at least postpone until a new Minister arrive
2. Nomination committee should be chaired by the new Minister
3. LCEC be restructured for 2009

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Anyway, all the 10 predictions have happened. Guess I'm the Postmodern Prophet #2?! LOL