HIM FAMILY NEWS
Hope Ecuador - REACH English Conversation Club
We celebrated the launch of our REACH English Conversation Club yesterday afternoon. It was a milestone! We had 14 people signing up to become members – five from the Young Adults CG and nine from our friends. The idea is for members to learn English through the conversation classes, movies, songs and fun activities. We called the English Conversation Club REACH because we want to help our Ecuadorian friends reach the world through learning a new language. We hope to reach the community through our social projects in the future too.
Karen and Katty did a great job introducing the club and welcoming the people. We had great fun playing a communication game that allowed people to introduce themselves. After that, the people were distributed into three groups to learn and speak English. I took the intermediate English speakers group while Phoebe and Karen taught the beginners’ group.
The people really enjoyed the event and all of them signed up to become members of the club. Thank God for Karen who headed and led this project. We will continue to have this conversation club every Saturday afternoon.
Written by Timothy Ho
Hope Taipei Bible Conference.
The theme of 2012 for Hope Taipei is “restoration”, with the focus on restoring our personal relationship with the Lord, with the church and with our brothers and sisters. Through our Bible Conferences themed “Holistic Church” and “Healthy Church”, and our mid-year camp “Passion”, our aim is to help our brothers and sisters experience true-life restoration. This was why Hope Taipei was greatly blessed and encouraged by the visit of Ps Kwong Lie in October, both through the teaching of God’s word and by his life example. Ps KL repeatedly emphasized that “the church of God must be healthy in order to fulfill the vision of Christ”.
This powerful truth reminds us all that God must transform our lives, not only in knowledge, but also through the changing of our hearts. Through his life example, Ps KL once again encouraged us to believe that with God, all things are possible and not to despise God’s ways. Throughout the “Healthy Church” Bible Conference, our hearts were challenged to respond with immediate actions, and we practice various spiritual disciplines. We expect Hope Taipei to move on towards the goal of building a glorious church.
Written by Jessica Jen
HIM Thailand Bible Conference
Hope International Ministries (HIM) Thailand held its annual Bible Conference for the northern region in Mae Hong Sorn province from 22-24 October 2011. The theme was "A Vibrant Church".
The conference brought together people from HIM churches in five provinces: Mae Hong Sorn, Chiang Rai, Lampang, Phrae and Chiang Mai. Total attendance at the Bile Conference was about 600. The speakers were Ps. Chuchart Chaisombat, Chairman of HIM Thailand; Dr. Siriporn Chaisombat of HIM Chiang Mai, and Ps. Soradej Meesangtham and Dr. Unice Meesangtham from HIM Manila.
The worship and preaching brought revival and the teachings built up everyone in attendance. The program included fun activities, workshops on topics such as missions, worship, evangelism – there was even one on beauty and good manners, and an interesting testimony about how to become rich in the eyes of God.
The scenery of Mae Hong Sorn was very beautiful and even though the roads travelled had many turns, they could not keep the hearts of God’s people away from His truth from the Holy Bible. The brothers and sisters in HIM family were very happy and impressed by this revival Bible conference, and they all returned to their home churches with renewed hearts and minds.
Hope Brisbane 18th Anniversary
Excitement and anticipation fills the air as fluster of people started to gather in the hall with music blasting from the sound system and beautiful lightings that surround the hall. The countdown timer begins, the worship team members takes their place on the stage, and then, the crowd starts to chant - 3, 2, 1…. It has begun! The celebration for our 18th Anniversary is here.
We celebrated our anniversary identically in three individual locations - Gold Coast, Sunday Morning, Sunday Afternoon. Our services began with vibrant praise and worship followed by a time of communion. Power-packed performances were lined up on that day and kicking start the first performance was the Ground Breakers, who treated us to a great upbeat dance performance that left the audience wanting more. A multimedia was then shown with the title, “A Walk Down Memory Lane”, reviewing our past year as a church. After that, three high school students took the stage by reading a passage from Psalm 145 that spoke of being the next generation. Our very own youth band then took center stage and delivered a spectacular performance with their own rendition of “Believe” and “The Time Has Come” by Hillsong.
After all the hype of the performances, it was time we dug deep into the Word and were all ears to what Ps Wilson had to say. Ps Wilson shared a heart-warming message about our legacy and we viewed a clip of our site visit (UNIDUS). Upon leaving the celebration, everyone was blessed with a bible and was encouraged to pass that bible on to someone else. The passing of the bible symbolizes us passing on our legacy to others through the Word of God. Indeed, praise be to God for His faithfulness in the past 18 years in the life of our church. We are all reminded through our 18th Anniversary that the house of God is about generations and of passing the baton well from one to another.
My Twitter update on 8 October, Saturday at 6.54 pm (GMT +8) read as follows: “The atmosphere has reached a fever pitch! Youth's Got Talent is about to kick off!!!!”
When I tweeted that update, I was standing amongst the throng of people at the Hope Kuching hall. Gospel music was pumping from the speakers. The lights were dimmed and multi-coloured spotlights flashed their brilliance in the darkness. The hall rapidly filled up with groups of excited young people consisting of high school students, college university students and young working adults. The whole atmosphere so pumped up with excitement and energy!
Wondering what Youth’s Got Talent is all about? Youth’s Got Talent is Hope Kuching Youth Ministry’s annual talent competition. We kicked off our first Youth’s Got Talent last year. With the success and popularity of Season 1, we launched Season 2 this year. The objective of this event is three-fold. It is an evangelistic event to attract the youth, it is an avenue to assimilate new visitors and it is an alternative way of discovering hidden giftings in people.
The event saw a turnout of more than 400 people. In Season 2, there were four competition categories. The categories were Solo Singing, Group/Duet Singing, Drama and X-Factor (unique talents). Altogether, there were 20 entries. We even followed the format of Britain’s Got Talent with a panel of three judges who gave comments after every performance…and yes, we had our version of Simon Cowell among the three!
Solo singing category proved to be the most popular category with 11 entries! The audience heard a variety of music genres, ranging from pop to opera from the performers. There were also songs in Chinese, English and Malay. The new talents that emerged this season blew us away! The champion of this category, Joshua Ng, sang a blues number with great flair, power and emotion. At first glance, you would have never expected this shy Malaysian-Chinese medical student to belt out a blues number like an African-American blues singer! Little dynamite Hanni clinched second place with her powerful, deep, raspy voice singing Jaci Velasquez’s “Imagine Me Without You”. Third place went to Quintus, who sang with much drama and expression as he belted out the operatic piece “Music of the Night” from the Phantom of the Opera. The group and duet singing also saw some great new talents with beautiful harmonies and blending of voices. The singing categories saw the youngest contestants in the whole competition with a 12-year-old in the solo singing category and a 13-year-old in the group-singing category.
The drama entries were amazing and showcased the immense reservoir of creativity in young people. Many of the drama scenes sent the crowd into a frenzy as funny scenes unfolded causing outbursts of laughter and applause. Not only were the dramas creative and funny, the message conveyed through every drama was a compelling one, that is, to trust in our One and only God, Jesus Christ. The champion of this category went to the House of Tutulele with their musical drama incorporating acting, dancing, rapping and singing covers of secular songs with modified lyrics to reflect Christian values.
The X-Factor category had four entries. There was Henshaw on the saxophone with a jazzy version of “Here I am to Worship”, Celine on a traditional Chinese instrument calling “yang chin”, Andy on the digital piano with a medley of classics and “The Students” drumming out a group percussion performance in a classroom setting just by using tables, pens, hands, feet and their voices. Every performance was thoroughly captivating and entertaining.
One of the highlights of the night was a special appearance by a team of dancers from Praise Kids’ Club (Hope Kuching’s children church) presenting an awesome dance number. Despite their young age, they danced with great coordination, uniformity and strength!
The night closed with the presentation of prizes, a short exhortation and closing prayer by our Senior Pastor, Ps Denis Lu and of course, a crazy photo-shooting sessions! The night did not end there. The fellowship continued with some groups of young people gathering for supper after the event. Ultimately, beyond all hype and drama, our main objective is to get the gospel message to the youth. We heard a testimony from a leader that two of his visitors engaged in a conversation with him about Christianity and the Bible until 2 a.m.! There are also comments that visitors could not believe that they were in church and this really challenged their mindset that the church is irrelevant to the youth.
In conclusion, we had an awesome night of fun with so many memorable jaw-dropping moments. However, most importantly, we are now following up on the many new visitors who came to this event and we pray for many of them to come into the Kingdom of God. The Hope Kuching Youth Ministry covets your prayers in this! Last but not least, watch out for Youth’s Got Talent Season 3!
Reported by Nicola Song
