William Chong

Have been a little busy with work, worked overtime most every day last week to finish a big job. Consequently felt under the weather Saturday and had to cancel all my classes… but at least I’m a bit better rested now. And this week has dropped back in workload… so much that I’ve been able to catch up on mindless TV series, heh. I can safely inform everyone that Lost is pretty exciting but totally hard-to-follow if you’re not clued in on basically every season before it…

The church visits have been pretty good so far – I’ve been keeping in touch with all the people that go to different churches, and pretty intrigued by the differences in visitor treatment, doctrine and general church stuff. It’s very exciting to worship with people you don’t normally see on a Sunday, and to share and learn why each church operates the way it does.

As you can tell I’ve tried to do write-ups of the places I’ve been, though I apologise because one visit could never totally encapsulate what a church is about. Also, rating a church is never a particularly easy thing to do, since it is to some degree a subjective approach. The best compromise I could think of was to include the “You’ll like/not like this church if…” sections, giving a more balanced view. Ultimately giving an A, or an AA or whatever is a reflection of my inherent bias (as is every review), so don’t take them at face value – visit the church if you want to find out more. At the end of the day, every Christian is trying to build God’s Kingdom in some shape or form – you can either lament the fact that his Kingdom is so disparate and divided, or you can embrace what you do have in common: the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Kim’s got exams at the moment, which is pretty stressful… and everyone around is harrying away at work or study or other lifelong pursuits.

Take care everyone.

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Website: http://www.howickbaptist.org.nz/; Ph: (09)534-5142; Cnr Piction St & Wellington St, Howick, Auckland; Senior Pastor: Peter Somervell; Sermon topic: ”Leading with Love” (1 Cor 4:14-21), from Adventures in 1 Corinthians series. Communion service, 11.5.08.

Rating: AA
(A=return worshipper, AA=excellent and growing, AAA=must be my home church lol)

You’ll like this church if you: appreciate/can handle expositional preaching, have family service requirements, prefer an exegetical approach to doctrine/Bible reading, enjoy mix of traditional and modern hymns.

You won’t like this church if you: need to worship and pray with professional musical backing, prefer wholly-topical insights to sermons, are seeking a Spirit-led experience.

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As part of our church jaunt/visiting tour/period, we (Cheryl, Kim and I) decided to attend a local (defined as in the area, not as the Lord’s recovery) service at Howick Baptist Church. After returning a camping pillow in the carpark to a friend I knew, we were given warm welcomes from greeters at the door. Being Mother’s Day, there were hand-made bookmarks being given out at the door to any woman that looked old enough to be a mother. We sat in the middle of the wooden pews, and noted large banners declaring God as creator of all things (Rev 4:11) – definitely not a church shy about who they are (I say this in light of the various churches and groups that remove the term “Church” or “Christian” from their names). 

Worship: I appreciated the thought that the worship leader (Calvyn Jonker, assistant pastor) had for mothers as per the occasion, as well as his earnestness to pray for and encourage the 200-odd congregation. The careful thought put into song choice also bears mentioning, with a mix of modern songs like “How Great is Our God” thrown together with faithful hymns like “Blessed Redeemer”. Largely negating the “worship wars” that’s fractured a great many congregations and caused some tension at the very least, it’s reassuring to know that you can focus on worshipping God with a broad spectrum of respectful lyrics and music (HBC gets it in that order, which is another plus). Adding in Scripture-reading and a solemn, almost guarded Communion service, it was a very respectful experience.

Speaker: While chatting with a lady named Kathy after the service, she told us that one of the strong points of HBC was its preaching – strongly grounded in the Bible. Like other expositional preachers (going through a book of the Bible verse by verse), senior pastor Peter Somervell methodically moves through the Bible (in this case, the 1st letter to the Corinthian church) with clinical exegesis and thoughtful insights at each verse (adding a few useful Greek definitions to augment). Rather than a dry seminary-style overview, Somervell is astute in tying each verse to a key word, and insightful in applying each to the congregation. In this case, chapters 4 verses 14 to 21 came under the points of Admonishing, Mentoring, Modelling, Teaching and Correction/Discipline. Plenty of notes to take and reference to other Bible passages, and his theme of spiritual leadership was explained to include elders, pastors, parents and older Christians. Particularly encouraging was his statement that “love for Jesus Christ should be the driving motivator for all of his points.” Definitely strong and (more importantly) relevant Bible-based teaching.

Church history: There’s not much of an overview on their website, but a friend shared that Somervell has been particularly good for the church, having moved up from Wanganui East Baptist Church after HBC had a tumultuous period without a fulltime pastor. HBC is part of the Baptist Churches of New Zealand, a collection of like-minded congregations that share some pastoral and NZ-wide resources and cooperate on outreach and ministry training efforts (more information on the Baptist movement in general can be found here.) – it’s notable though that the church also has strong links with the Reformed tradition, evidenced by their theological perspective as well as participation and cooperation with other Reformed churches in Auckland.

Other faculties: There’s a definite sense of close community at HBC, with groups and services catering for all ages (birth-college age), family news, giving and going opportunites all listed in the church flyer. Strong involvement/association with the Baptist Union of New Zealand, as well as Creation Ministries International.

Visitor treatment: A discreet card can be found in the back of each pew, where you can fill out details and drop it into the offering bags. Chatted with one lady, and three people which we knew (2 fellow visitors), all amiable and very friendly discussions.

Conclusion: A very God-focused, Biblically sound church with evident spiritual growth and maturity.

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(Disclosures: 1 friend is an existing worshipper. EDIT 25/7/08: Howick Baptist Church is currently our home church.)
Next week: Elim Christian Centre (East), Evangelical Formosan Church of NZ.

(This review may not be representative of all of the church’s ministries, or their overall teaching. Opinions expressed in this review are that of the author, and may not wholly reflect all aspects of the church or its national body: nevertheless, comments have been humbly made in both truth and love as much as possible. Please contact the church for more detailed enquiries about their services.)

Went to Grace Baptist Church for the last time on Sunday. Felt a bit sad as well as firm on my imminent change of service. From Grace Baptist I gained a strong appreciation of the need to make decisions with the backing and the blessing of God, as well as a real disdain for finality to interpreting the Bible. I loved the expositional preaching, but yearned for greater relevance to the atrocities of life that six-monthly-sermon-blocks couldn’t cover. I loved the equipping of Biblical knowledge, but felt that there wasn’t a real outlet or focus to serve and impact upon the lost. I loved the people, but grew wary of the machinations and political hypocrisies which as men we all fell victim to.

In any case, an even greater challenge is this – where to from here? Obviously the next step is to find a church that is doctrinally sound, a place of sincere fellowship, welcoming and open, and is driven to reach out to the community. Formulating one’s statement of faith is a daunting task, but every church does it: on reading some church websites some will give this information out, some won’t. So I’ll be looking for a church where I can be an active participant.

Hopefully if you read this blog, you’ll be able to keep track of the churches I’ll be looking at over the next weeks and months. They will all be in the East Auckland area, and will be Gospel-centred churches.

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Graduation ceremony tomorrow. Hopefully it will be a very exciting day!

On the 16th April 2008, most of New Zealand woke up to nonstop coverage of a horrible tragedy – 6 students and 1 teacher from Elim Christian College were killed when overcome by a flash flood in the Mangatepopo River.

How does a Christian come to terms with losing someone they love? Why did these 7 die and not someone else? What was the plan behind it? Is an accident like this punishment from God, or nothing to do with Him? How much control did He exert on the events that took place? I don’t think there are any easy answers.

The best book I could recommend is Philip Yancey’s “Where is God when it hurts?“. It pulls no punches, and it’s honest in saying that no-one can fully understand why the things happen as they do. But it offers a comforting perspective on pain and suffering.

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While the circumstances surrounding the loss may vary, there’s a sombre sense of similarity in the questions that flooded my mind around the time my mother passed away. How did I react when faced with these questions?

• I grieved. It didn’t matter that I was thrown back into friends and family, traditions and rituals I didn’t understand or affiliate with. I was there, I cried and shared in the sorrow of my brothers and sisters, my dad, my relatives.
• I regretted. Times when I could have been a better son. Times when I said and did things which I didn’t mean. Promises that never came true. Hopes and dreams that remain unfulfilled.
• I doubted.  One question I posed to my brother sounded a bit like this: “If I believe in God, will I see her again?” No one can tell me that their faith is not shaken when bad things happen to good people. Even though I knew that God doesn’t change, I still struggled. I questioned why my mother couldn’t have come to known Christ. I didn’t like the answers to my questions. I struggled to accept His plan.
• I was comforted. Many of the Psalms deals with suffering and trusting in God in times of happiness, and times of sorrow. Psalm 23 is beautiful, and comforts me.  “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Even though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; though its waters roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with its swelling.” (Ps 46:1-3).
  
  It’s hard to look back, because you see things that you can’t change besides your own thoughts and perspectives on what, why, and to what end. Pain and suffering? It’s a part of this fallen world. In Philip Yancey’s book, he says: “I hope I do not so insulate myself from pain that I do not feel pleasure.” 

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One thing that these seven were able to cling to: the promise of eternity spent with God. As Christians, perhaps part of you looks forward to the time when you will go to be with the Lord. I recently heard a Sovereign Grace Music song that seems to really drive it home…

“It is not death to die,
to leave this weary road
and join the saints who dwell on high
who’ve found their home with God.
It is not death to close
the eyes long dimmed by tears
And wake in joy before your throne
delivered from my fears…”

The best thing we can do in response? Perhaps it’s just to pray for God’s comfort and shelter for these families and friends. We may not know them directly, or well. But I think each of us can do something about it, no matter how small it seems.

Suffering reminds us that we live in a less-than-perfect world. The circumstances of our suffering is not up to us. Whether we draw closer to or away from the Lord because of it, however, is up to us.

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 “The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away; may the name of the LORD be praised” (Job 1:21).

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This article briefly works through the debate in Christian churches on their stance on music during services. However it also highlights a long-running question which I’ll try and allude to more often in the future, once I’ve successfully formulated clearer thoughts about it.

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If you sampled 5 different churches today, sometimes the differences in their songs and musical styles during the service are more apparent than differences in theology and teaching.

One church may employ a full rock band and professional singers to lead the singing, choosing “praise” songs written to express in the simplest of terms how much they love the Lord.

Another congregation may sing with the help of just a choir group, or a guitar. Some may prefer singing through a set hymnal with multiple verses. Some congregations include songs that don’t even reference God. And then some split their morning and evening services, with hymns in the morning and CCM in the evening (perhaps they couldn’t decide.)

Is this a recent phenomenon? No. For a time, hymns by Isaac Watts were the source of church divisions among 19th century worshippers. Four-part hymns were a big issue when first introduced – some even objecting to having musical notation written out! Music is but one of many things that the body of Christ seems to enjoy dividing itself over.

Let’s look at one of the extremes in today’s musical spectrum. One view deems any form of musical accompaniment to a cappella singing to be inappropriate. By selectively quoting Romans 14:23, which says:  

“But the man who has doubts is condemned if he eats, because his eating is not from faith; and everything that does not come from faith is sin.”

… this writer’s logic is that anything not expressly condemned by the Bible shouldn’t be done anyways. By this same logic, the internet forum the article was presented on should technically be taboo too, not to mention the millions of new things not available 2000 years prior - I’d question the wisdom of a blanket ban of everything without explicit written Biblical approval.

It’s also useful to note the context - chapter 14 was written to Romans who were concerned about which meats were clean and unclean. In 1 Timothy 4:3-5, it’s pretty clear that “every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused.” I concede that Romans is most complex and requires lots of think-thinking to delve through – but to conclude that anything in this world today not mentioned in the Bible is pretty much a legalistic, pseudo-Amish view of the Bible.

We could conceivably apply this to the debate on, say, “clean and unclean” types of music in the church setting. The question is not whether the Bible explicitly approves of music or not. David accompanied his psalms with a harp – would you then say that only harps should be used to praise God?

Here is the opposite end of the music worship spectrum – CCM. Applying rock and pop styles of today to praise Jesus Christ is immensely popular among young Christians, and a big pulling factor for many services. It makes it “relevant” to people today, and some of the praise songs speak right into your heart, as if they were directly inspired by the Holy Spirit.

Yet some people will choose to leave a church because they find they “just can’t worship there” – not very far off from, they “just don’t like the music there.” Some will even equate this good endorphins to good worship. I wonder if this is the right attitude to church.

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There are more important considerations in church besides music. Our attitude should be to exalt God in whatever capacity we are able to. When we choose an exclusive, non-negotiable musical preference in worshipping God, we are selfishly saying, “My musical tastes are more important than my taste for God.”

You can sing 5 verses of theologically-rich “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” and not even understand the words, or care to. You can scream out “Hosannah in the highest” and not mean it.

Our worship, will always be imperfect and a miniscule offering that’s dwarfed by the enormity of His sacrifice for us. But at the very least, our main focus is on God. I love this quote from John Fischer, who says:

“It’s our life, not a worship service, that will make us worshipers. We don’t go to church to worship; we go to church because we are already worshipers. And if someone is a true worshiper, which means their whole life is an act of worship, then what happens for 30 minutes of music once a week is a small thing indeed.”

It’s all about perspective, it seems.

Worship shouldn’t be just about the music. It should be an attitude-change – a commitment of emotion, intellect and will.

More silly names in Sydney: Ali Barber, Thai tanic, Thai Foon.

Went to lots of different places in the weekend, despite the rain. Gerald and his registered-partner Karen were kind enough to take me out and about, despite the rain. We changed the temperature by trying our luck with the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney: very, very foggy. I think one of the Three Sisters was visible for about five minutes while we were there. Also had a look at the Sydney Olympic Park, Darling Harbour on a Saturday night (think Auckland Viaduct, except much bigger and a wider selection of Floats, Loaded Hogs and Provedors). Had dinner at a place called Mamak, which served Malaysian food that I have craved for a long time. Price difference aside, if I lived in Sydney this would be a local haunt, nestled snugly in Sydney’s Chinatown area.

You know when I mentioned there were mentally uneasy people around the city? One of them, a short squat man with a backpack and a pair of DJ ‘phones, approached me whilst I was on my lunch break yesterday. The conversation was mostly one-way and made no sense. He was in essence responding to triggers in our discourse and detailing fabricated side-stories as we went along.

“Here, I’m giving you this. It’s a travel magazine, I flew there yesterday. See? That’s a bargain, $400 for 5 nights. Would you dare to that in the picture? I don’t need to jump, I can fly. You have to be careful. Where you from? Vietnam? I went there last week. Working for the Secret Jewish Police, keep it hush. You have to be careful. I tried to tell him he dropped his wallet, and got it for him. Wouldn’t listen to me, they’re all watching you, you see? Look that those two. I’d love to **** it into them, but I bet those black**** are on it, gotta watch out. Where do you work? Yeah, I work round here too. I’m the President of the company there. Those guys work for me. OK, I’m gonna see.”

I’m glad I left my wallet in the office that day, heh.

I’ve just found out our church’s missionary pastor is leaving for the US for 9 months. This is big news in a congregation of say, 10-15 people.

Might meet up with a few Aucklanders here in the next few days. Going indoor climbing with a few colleagues after work today, not long left in this city. Wonder what happens next in Prison Break.

I started the weekend with a swim in the pool. It’s a shared pool between two apartments (ours and the one next door), but it was beautiful and the water was just right. Did the tourist thing and walked all round the city centre, lots of interesting pics of the various landmarks. Did you know that the roof of the Sydney Opera House is all tiling? You only discover this when you get up close. Very expensive shows in there too, most of them will set you back at least $100 if it’s opera. (I’ll leave the BridgeClimb, which was awesome, for another post.)

Also got to see one of Sydney’s many markets, the Paddington Market. Had to go through major gay and lesbian area to get there though. Very unsettling sight when it suddenly hits you why the tavern on the corner is packed, and there are no females in there, lol.  The market itself was pretty good. Lots of clothing-related stuff, some arts and crafts. Most of them too pricey for my limited budget, but very interesting to look at. If you’re wondering what the second picture above this paragraph shows… well those are decorated cakes. YUM.

(On a side note, some Sydney food places have funny names… try some Chinese food at “Wok On Inn”, or have a nice lunch at “Thai Me Up” restaurant. Not joking.)

The internet I’m borrowing is a wireless connection that’s not the best in Sydney apparently. I met up with a close relative of mine (his name is Gerald) – works as an IT manager setting up major hotel logistics and analysis, very well paid in Sydney. Everything here is more expanded: the salaries, the suburbs, the stress levels, the expenses.

I also managed to attend church – it’s a notable comfort that we can worship God no matter where we are in His earthly domain. The pastor here is also called John, he’s somewhat older (in his 60s), and oversaw a pretty efficient service (we went through 5+1 hymns, a Bible reading and a message about Christians and authorities, in Romans 13:1-7, in just over an hour. (John later told me that the mind can only handle as much as the backside, lol).

John and a couple of people from the congregation went from the church (based in Dundas Valley, west of the main centre) to a food court in Parramatta City Centre where a famous local Malaysian stall was. It’s a pretty good travel tip to go with the local wisdom, and I enjoyed the food so much I brought another pack home for a future meal.

YUM.  (I’m pretty sure I have a wider belly. Mm.. crispy pork belly.)

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Enough about me. I wanna hear how *everyone* is doing. TELL ME.

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