Tuesday, June 03, 2003

The Unexamined life is not worth living.

- Socrates

It has been another long hiatus in between my blogging. I really have no excuse for these intersperse updates… I can only say that I have been occupied with other things thus far. The month of May has been tremendously hectic and it is only now that I can take a break and reflect on everything that has happened. So here’s the general update about the last month. Campus Challenge As mentioned in the last blog, I attended the Campus Challenge conference during the Victoria Day long weekend. I was unable to attend the wrap-up meeting, however, I was able to bring look at the responses from the surveys that were distributed at the end of CC. The varied responses were positive overall, but there were fine points that fascinated me. I helped with the planning of CC because I wanted to learn more about campus ministry. I personally felt that one of the main purposes of CC was to inform/train/encourage students and prepare/challenge them to do more for their campus fellowships. I realize that as much as I wanted to go hardcore with this conference, a lot of people felt like it was a little too much. I found many other comments quite interesting (and funny). There are a number of people who’s primary complaint is the food. Or maybe there should be more time allocated to sleep. As much as I want to easily dismiss such minor complaints, I think my vision for these conferences have expended. I think I would tend to tell people to ‘suck it up’ if they have a complaint about the quality of food. Yet, it is these little things that can affect a person’s perspective about the entire conference. Hopefully at the next CC planning meeting, a lot of new people may come out and voice their opinion. The Foo’s Wedding The following weekend after Campus Challenge was the Foo’s wedding. This was a big thing in our church because the groom (Ken) was the first kid from our generation to get married. He has the fortune to be married to Ann Cham (a very interesting person) and I am sure the Lord will bless their marriage. The day of the wedding was truly packed. My brother and Ken’s brother (Peter) had to drive the bridesmaids to do their hair and make-up in the morning. They had to leave the house around 4 am. I was staying over at Ann’s condo downtown and I was in charge of the sound equipment set-up. There was some miscommunication with the wedding planner of Knox College, so we could not enter the church to set-up until later. With a deadline pressed on me, I had to quickly set-up sound in the chapel… I was still in models and t-shirt (my sleepwear) when people began filing into the place. As I finally finished the sound check, I rushed downstairs to change. All the groomsmen were done changing and they were waiting for me. I quickly reached into my bag to grab something and amazingly… I had cut my middle finger on my razor. This was really bad news because I was supposed to play violin for the ceremony. Thankfully, we were able to find Rani and she played piano instead. In spite of the craziness of the ceremony, I really enjoyed the service. It was great to see that the couple wanted to focus on ‘worship’ as a theme. They wanted to utilize their wedding as a means to evangelize to friends and family. The banquet was just as eventful… full of surprises and general madness. It was great to see so many surprise performances. The couple has impacted many different people and they in turn wanted to do something to show their appreciation for the couple. It was wonderful to see the awkward toast, the MCs fumbling with their words… overall a time of genuine love was demonstrated, in spite of the little mistakes. I can now see how weddings are really a celebration of the community. It was inspiring to see all my friends and family come together to help out with this wedding. Prevailing Church Conference in Montreal On the last weekend of May, I went up to Montreal to attend Willowcreek’s ‘Prevailing Church’ conference. Matt Mark has recently been extremely enthusiastic about the Willowcreek ‘small groups’ conference and him and a team from his church was going to Montreal to be better equipped for church planning. I decided to go last minute and off we went to Montreal. I had never been to Montreal and I had never attended a Willowcreek conference. My expectations for both were minimal at best and I think I entered the weekend with a mindset of desiring a vacation. I totally respect Willowcreek for what that mega-church has done, and I love their resources, however, I was always a skeptic about the mega-church model. Boy was I wrong. Bill Hybels (the senior pastor of Willowcreek and author of courageous leadership, contagious christian) was the main speaker. After hearing his first message, my impression about Willowcreek has completely changed for the better. Hybels is a dynamic speaker… yet he is so genuine about himself and his church that I could immediately tell that he has tremendous love for his congregation. During his second message, he was sharing such a moving story about the power of small groups that I was moved to shed tears. Yet, as I looked up, I could see he was openly crying as well. Here was a polished speaker who knows many famous and powerful people around the world on a first name basis and he’s moved by the spirit by a memory from his church. As I look at Hybels, I’m coming to believe more and more that leadership is tremendously important. How can my fellowship change for the better… how can it change the community if I am only haphazardly working out my faith? Hybels also challenged my view about the importance of the Acts 2 church. I was very much a skeptic about people who always cling to the Acts 2 model. Hybels has convinced me that the Acts 2 model of church is possible and that it is a great template for CCF to follow. Our fellowship can continue to grow while being dynamic and loving if we continually pour a stream of new believers into our fellowship. As a committee, UWCCF has decided that evangelism will be one of the main focuses next year. I hope that what I have learned from the conference may be from the spirit and that anything that is of my own thoughts may fall away like chaff in the wind. Certainly a lot of things have happened the last month. I feel sad that I could not continually write down all that I have learned. There are many things to look forward to for the rest of the summer. I hope that I can remain committed to record all the things I have learned. Tune in again for more hoppin’ and boppin’ to the crocodile rock.


Yu-Ling posted at 6/03/2003 04:42:00 PM