Time for a check

Now is 15th Nov, almost half of the month has gone by… Have you stopped & asked yourself: what have I done for the whole of this year?

In the midst of the business of our life, it is easy to get lost in the crowd… but have we taken time off to cut ourself away from the crowd & really spend some time evaluating our life?

It can be your walk with God,your ministry,your career, your relationship with your family, relationship with your peers/friends/colleagues, your financial health status, etc… The question is, “do you want to do it” and “when are you going to do it”…

Time passes by faster & faster each year as we know that the second coming is nearing… Before the year comes to a close,take stock of your life…

Have you make your life count each day? Have you touched another life in your daily activities? Is this the kind of life you want to live again for 2007? If your life is nothing to look forward to, what are you going to do about it?

Let’s really end this year well, end it with a great shout of triumph..Remember, it’s not how you started but it is how you end… How you end will determine how you start next year…

Contributed by Small & Super “I” Rachel@ E394

Souls from Heaven?

Agnes (ok, it took me some time before writing that without the “Sis” in front, but anyway, she…) commented the other day that everyone in heaven is already saved and does not need our help to know Jesus (since they are already in the kingdom of God).

So what does that mean for us?

Basically, what struck me was that while God has sovereignty (or control) over other things we usually pray for - like health, promotion and prosperity - God chose to have no control over man’s decision to love and accept Him as Lord over their lives.

We cannot, like Agnes said, just fast and pray for growth and revival in our CG, then sit back, do nothing and “wait for souls to drop from heaven” like the way we seem to do with God’s blessings, simply because there are no souls to save in heaven! All the souls that need to be saved are right here on the earth, and God has commissioned us to go out there and DO SOMETHING about it while we’re still here on earth. 

Now I found all these pretty amusing, especially the pun on souls dropping from heaven, but jokes aside, I think it illustrated a very important truth in how we approach reaching out to the lost: the Great Commission is to save souls, not to earn more money or excel in life. If we don’t do it now, and do it passionately, then we’ll never get the chance to save souls!

Brothers and Sisters No More?

A few of us were slightly surprised when pastor “abolished” the addressing of church leaders as “brother” or “sister” and insisted we call them by name instead.

Myself, for one, found it hard to make the switch… Afterall, I’ve been addressing them as “Bro Poh”, “Sis Jacq” and “Bro Suraj” ever since I knew them! It’s going to take more than weeks to get this “habit” changed! (At least I can still address Auntie Shirley as “Auntie” when I see her at the nursery! Phew…!)

But while it would be easier for the ‘younger’ ones (in church) to make the change, we should understand that though we have stopped addressing the leaders as “brothers” and “sisters”, it doesn’t mean we should therefore respect them less!

At the end of the day, the spirit of the whole announcement was to make it easier for everyone to be more effective in the marketplace, and not to remove the distinction of and respect for leadership and authority, right?

In fact, now that we have one way less to show our respect, we should be “making up” for it by doing other things?

What do you think? What are your views? Comments? Thoughts?

All Up and Running!

Finally, all the pages on this blog are up and running!

Now we’ll have to devise how to spread the word to everyone. Meanwhile, I’ll just wait for the leaders to preview, test and okay everything before disseminating the URL to the whole zone. (Those of you who promised to leave comment yesterday better do so soon!)

Guys, we’re in business!

More Stuff Up at Glory Shines!

The pages in this blog are rapidly being built up.

So far, completed pages include:

• About Glory Shines
• Announcements
• Contact Us
• Guest Book
• Welcome to Glory Shines

Pages that still need more stuff to be complete enough for launch are:

• FAQ
• House Rules

I was also thinking of putting in a foreword from AS herself, something like a welcome note. At the moment the default page visitors come to when they enter the site is the “Welcome to Glory Shines” page. I can set visitors to be directed to AS’s welcome note for the first 2 weeks or so after the launch, then switch to the welcome page again thereafter.

At this moment I have disabled the moderation function so that those previewing the site would be able to see their comments and posts immediately after they submit them, instead of having to wait for approval. (I will of course enable it again before it’s officially launched.)

Hopefully tonight we’ll be able to trash out most of the issues and content at the meeting and get the nitty gritty details ironed out by this week.

I’m targeting a read-to-launch blog by next Tuesday (7 Nov) so that we can disseminate the word to the zone during CG that week! =)

AS Zone Launches Exciting Zone Blog!

Singapore - AS Zone has launched its first zone blog to raise an active spiritual community in cyberspace!

The blog - Glory Shines - will allow members in the zone to interact and share snippets of their lives with others, as well serve as a platform where members can find help, prayer and counsel from its online community.

“It’s a very exciting idea coming to pass,” said XXX, from XXCG. “Imagine looking back at the blog archives a year from now! It’s going to be so fun, and I’m looking forward to see what others will post on the blog!”

Glory Shines can be accessed at http://gloryshines.wordpress.com. The blog administrators can also be reached via email, gloryshines@gmail.com.