18th Church Anniversary Celebration

August 15, 2010

Thank God for His blessings in bringing our church to its 18th year of ministry! The theme this year is “I’m 18!”.

Before the start of the service, sisters from the Filipino group put on a special dancing performance for the congregation. Their energetic performance seemed to show that our church is as young, dynamic and strong as a teenager in serving the Lord!

After the performance, the Praise and Worship Team led the congregation into a powerful praise and worship session, which was followed by the Holy Communion.

After that, a video testimony was shown in acknowledging the importance to spend time to grow in Christ, Sister Lolita decided to apply for a switch of posts in the hotel she was working for. She testified that although she was not familiar with the work of the new post, God led her to overcome and blessed her through continuous raises and promotions in these years. This strengthened her faith in continuing to serve the Lord. Although in the beginning, the size of her care group at work was very small, yet through her faith and persistence her three-people care group has already been expanded to 4 separate care groups!

Sister Gemma also testified on how God strengthened her faith and improved her characters through honouring her as a leader for the Filipino Group. She faced a lot of challenges at the beginning, particularly her health problems which made her unable to speak. Through God’s healing Sister Gemma overcame these challenges one by one.

Besides, she was also thankful for God’s grace in raising the Filipino group. Sisters from the group devoted their limited and yet previous off-hours to participate in God’s ministry. She was also thankful that God not only blessed the Filipinos in Hong Kong, but He also passed His blessings back to their home country. In this summer, with the help of the Sister Arlene and brothers and sisters of Youth Group and HK team, the mission trip to Philippines brought a result of 143 new believers there. Thank God for His blessings!

Brother Alex then shared how God brought him to Australia and to know Christ. He also shared how God changed and strengthened him in different aspects. Through his participation in the ministry like shepherding, decoration and mass-communication, he experienced abundant blessings from God. In particular, he learnt how to remain humble for God, and to have faith that God would provide all his needs. Alex was optimistic about the future under the grace of God. He hoped that people will no longer come to know Christ one by one, but crowd by crowd.

Sermon by Ps. Gavin Toh John 15:1-15

At the beginning of the sermon, Ps. Gavin recalled the theme of this year “I’m 18!”. He said that for a person in our community, being 18 years old signified that she/he was officially an adult. However, as an adult, it was more important to be clear about the fundamentals, so that we would be prepared for what lie ahead of us.

Through the Bible verses which mentioned that Jesus said to His disciples that He was the true vine (John 15:1). Ps. Gavin shared with the congregation that Jesus was the source of life. Moreover, Ps. Gavin shared that Jesus, as the source of life, produced fruits for us. He reminded us that for those who did not bear fruit, Jesus would remove and for those who did, He would help to take away the little defects and imperfections in our lives so as to make us more fruitful in the future He pruned our lives.

After the sermon, Ps. Gavin prayed with the congregation for our faith and willingness to remain and grow in God. He also invited our visitors to accept Jesus as their saviour. 16 people said Yes that day. Thank God for His wonderful work in the anniversary service!

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