Recently, I interviewed one of my Religious Education teachers whose faith I look up to. He is an active member of the True Jesus Church who is currently a J1 RE teacher, choir leader, translator, church board member, AV, cleaning team member and sermon leader. My RE teacher has had a significant impact on my faith because I can see how diligently he serves God and how he cares for the members of the church. His mother’s family began to seek the truth because his great grandparents were bothered by evil spirits, so they were introduced to TJC by relatives. After baptism, the evil spirit was gone. His father’s family came to the Lord Jesus because his grandpa had a liver problem. They originally worshiped idols, went to temples, and paid money for help but none of them worked. By the grace of the Lord, his grandma was introduced to TJC by a relative and went to church secretly with her children including his dad. At the beginning, his grandpa thought Christianity would prevent the idols from working, but after a while, he came to the realization that idols did not work. He then tried going to church and later found that the message was good. He began to attend worship services regularly and eventually applied for water baptism. After he was baptized, his liver illness was completely healed.The doctor even said his liver was like the liver of a child.
In 2004, he immigrated from Taiwan, and attended his first Student Spiritual Convocation in Toronto. He received the Holy Spirit in that same winter SSC. He shared that he was very determined to pray for the Holy Spirit, knowing that He will help him to mature spiritually. In SSC he prayed very earnestly,thereby 20-30 minute prayers became short to him. Thankfully, he received the Holy Spirit on the last day during the closing ceremony. He felt touched and warm when he received the Holy Spirit. He knew God was with him and He would help him through life’s difficulties and watch over his family.
He has shared his faith with some friends in the past, yet not all have responded kindly. One of those whom he’s preached to was his roommate in college when living on campus. He wanted to know the roommate a little better before witnessing to him, so they had in-depth conversations and played basketball together. One day, he invited this friend to the Evangelical Service, an event catered to truth seekers, and the roommate said he’ll try to come. Eventually he did not come. He was simply not ready to pursue the truth of salvation. Another person he invited is a co-worker in his company. They were talking about why he does not celebrate Easter and then the conversation shifted to chatting about faith and his beliefs. This colleague’s reaction was not very enthusiastic as he was a Roman Catholic, not receptive to a different faith. My RE teacher gave him our church’s leaflets. He did not read them because he was sure of his own faith. In the end, he did not come to church either.
My RE teacher serves in various areas. He is not only a RE teacher, he is a member of the cleaning team, a choir leader, translator, church board member, AV personnel and one of sermon leaders. He shared with me that a believer of Jesus Christ should be thankful for the opportunities to participate in holy work even though the work he is assigned to might not be something he likes. One should serve the Lord without complaining. He also reflected that there is still some holy work that he is still learning to do. He knows that Jesus will guide you once you put in effort and do your own duties faithfully. He also encouraged that we must ask God for wisdom to implement the work to completion and pray for God’s Spirit to guide us. 1 Corinthians 3:6 says ‘I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase.’ This verse tells us our part is to do the work, and it is God who eventually gives the result of our holy work.
Through his spiritual journey, I can see that he has experienced God in his life. When he was in university, he was very stressed because of the workload. He would be very busy throughout the week, but on Friday nights he would still come to church for services. Sometimes he was so stressed and worried to the point that he was not able to fully rest on the Sabbath day. There were a lot of things he needed to do and worry about. However, prayers helped. After his prayer, he could feel peace. He has also had experience with being mocked for being Chirstian, but he was able to deal with it with strength from God. He was teased in high school because of the name, True Jesus Church. He explained to his classmate why TJC is so named, flipping to Ephesians 4:4-6 which reads ‘There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.” After this the classmate stopped talking about this. Another time he was mocked was when he was handing out flyers to people on the street in Taiwan to invite them to evangelical services. Some people would reject it and others would utter rude comments about Christianity. It was the first time he got verbally attacked for being Christian. Still, he responded to their impolite comments by simply nodding and smiling. He says the mindset of a holy worker is like the mindset of a servant. A holy worker must be humble to learn what they need to do and be faithful to do the things that are instructed to them. They need to know that God is their master and not the people who reject them. We are serving God first and then our brothers and sisters. If the thing we are doing is pleasing to God and according to what God tells us to do, then that’s the most important thing. Holy workers should always be willing to respond to God’s calling. We could be afraid to do more things for God because it either involves a lot of time and efforts or it the things are very scary for us to do, but God will help us to do the holy work. He also says that before doing holy work, it is vital to prepare ourselves first. We must first develop the skill to do the holy work through attending all the training and workshops the church provides. On a daily basis, he prepares himself through regular spiritual cultivation to keep up his spirituality and faith. We must also put our own faith and spirituality first before the holy work. To prepare our hearts right before doing the holy work, we can spend some quiet time to reflect on what needs to be done while doing the holy work. For RE lessons, he first thinks about the lesson itself then about the students and what they might need to hear. Then he reflects on the words of God to learn the lesson first, and then digest it himself. After all this he shares it with students or members. We should also spend quiet time to reflect on bible passages and pray for inspiration. It is best to have a prayer to ask God to guide us through the holy work and to have peace. In conclusion, my RE teacher reminds me that we need to do holy work with our best effort; strive to do the best we can and leave the rest to God because God is the one who determines the results. God helped him in his times of need, and he will do the same for us.
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