Thank you, Lord. You are still affirming

Preamble
While I must be conscious that this is a public domain so that I do not slander anyone, embarrass anybody and also in general, not get into trouble with the church or the laws, I am hoping this personal blog can also function in some way a record/journal of sort, of some of my experiences in the faith, especially if the “stories” can encourage or help somebody. I also must remind myself not to blow my own trumpet. Actually, sometimes I wondered why I want to write on this blog. I hardly get any feedback, my blog is not being read by many. By writing, I am also making myself vulnerable. Actually, the temptation is great for us not to say anything because by not saying anything, no one will know what we are thinking, and so we cannot be faulted. But in truth, someone knows, and that someone is God. He knows every meditation of our hearts. By putting it in writing, of course, because it can cause another to stumble, the responsibility is even greater – one more thing to answer to God. And if I ended up blowing my own trumpet in the process, God would not be pleased. I also do not want to lose whatever ministry, (if I could even call it a ministry to begin with) that I have, because pride has manifested. [This is not to say that God would not be upset with unexpressed pride in us]. Some of the readers here are members of the same church I attend, so I too must be careful so that what I say do not end up offensive or infringing on people’s privacy or confidentiality. Especially, I hope that my church leaders do not stop me from ministering in church just because I sometimes, write about something I am involved in.

With this, I like to pen down, maybe more of a expression of thankfulness than anything else, the follow through, to the most recent blog entry – More Lord, more (http://high-expressions.blogspot.com/2009/06/more-lord-more.html ).

Desire regularity/consistency
Actually I was concerned and still is (and I think it is not necessarily a bad thing, though fear should not be the basic driving factor), that my functioning in the Lord for a period of one year or so, may come to an end. I think we all could accept that God could use anyone from time to time to minister or perform exploits for Him, wherever and whenever God deems necessary. But I desire regularity, consistency. By way of analogy, we can drink from any cup. When we go to the food-court and buy a drink, we just drink out of any cup that the stallholder used. Likewise, we will drink from any cup used by the host when we visit a home. But at home, we commonly have our own cups which we used when we have our drinks. Dad will have his own cup, mom will have hers, and the children will have their own cups. (There is nothing wrong if in your family you do not have this “practice”. Indeed there are families that do not make any distinctions – they just share the cups). For a moment, think that you are Dad’s cup in the house, would you not want Dad to use you each time he drinks from a cup. You can’t help it if Dad is drinking at a food-court or at somebody’s home, because you are not there (unless he brought you along). Dad may once in a while use mom’s cup when he drinks, but I would be wondering, if he consistently omitted to use me when he wants a drink. I am like the cup, although more correctly not for holding “water” but for pouring out from. I want my master to use me, consistently. By the way, a few months ago, in church when we did a prophetic drawing session, a brother drew a prophetic glass picture for me.

He affirmed again
Again, just as the lapses in the use by the Lord begin to bother, the Lord again affirmed. This time, at last Saturday evening service in church, I was a little late. I was unable to sit anywhere near to the front of the church. The reason for that was really that for that service, many children would be baptized and many seats were marked out for the children and their families and for the “Sunday School” teachers. In fact, I could not even get a seat in the sanctuary after trying for a while. Without a choice I proceeded to the upper sanctuary after being informed by an usher that the upper sanctuary was opened. To get to upper sanctuary, one had to leave the sanctuary through the back (vis-a-vis the pulpit), manage a flight of stairs and re-enter. Likewise if one wants to go from the upper sanctuary to the sanctuary (“ground sanctuary”). I did not expect any time to be allotted for words of knowledge/prophecy. I also did not think any altar call would be made in view of the time required for doing the children baptism. Furthermore a special item was planned, to celebrate Father’s Day that fell on that weekend. Unexpectedly, the children baptism was done very expediently and the Senior Pastor finished his sermon fifteen minutes before end of service time. People were invited to the front for ministry. Initially only one adult went forward, and when he was prayed for, he was slain. But no others went forward. Then the Senior Pastor announced that the children could go forward for ministry. Many children did that. The Senior Pastor also gave a few words of knowledge, and with that more adults went forward for prayer. I was watching from the upper sanctuary, and when I saw more people had gone forward and on the left wing of sanctuary front, quite a few people were there waiting for prayers, I decided to rush down to pray for people, especially for the people on the left wing which were not attended to (because bulk of the pastors/staff were ministering to the children at the centre and on the right side).

It wasn’t so convenient, yet I must
Actually it really wasn’t so nice to leave before the end of service, and that was what it appeared to be what I was doing, at least to the people around where I was sitting, in the upper sanctuary. But I did it anyway, left the upper sanctuary door, rushed down the stairs and re-entered the sanctuary (ground floor) through a door at the back, on the right side (door nearest to the stairs), went down the right side of the sanctuary and reached the front of the sanctuary, on the right side. Realising no seats were available to put my stuff (bible, water bottle and Father’s Day gift, etc), I threw down my stuff against the right wall of the sanctuary, moved quickly between the narrow spaces between the people (ministers and children) and the front stage, right across to the left side where the unattended people were. There were perhaps, 6 -7 people there waiting for prayers, and a pastor had just started to attend to those waiting. Although I was not short of breath, I was not really in the “best of state” to pray for people after the rush. Actually, that was one of my hesitations when I decided to rush down from the upper sanctuary. What happened next was that I prayed for 3 persons. I first prayed for a man with some blood in his stool discovered only in the last day or two. Then I prayed for a young man with pain and discomfort in his arm and shoulder (unable to freely move his arms without discomfort and pain). When I prayed for him, I sensed that he was “swaying” under the anointing of the Spirit. I moved slightly to my left, with my left hand on his injured arm, in attempt to position myself to break his fall should he fall under the Spirit. The moment I done that, he fell backward like a tree, and as he fell, my hand moved from his arm towards his neck and then the back of his head. Finally, he landed on the floor with my hand between his head and the floor. Come to think about it, I should have felt pain when his head crashed my hand to the floor but I just did not feel any pain. He fell without a catcher and my hand broke his fall. He stayed down for maybe 5-6 minutes. The third person was a woman at the front row of seats. She must have seen the young man fell under the power of the Spirit and got encouraged to step forward. I remember I went over to the centre to see if anyone needed prayer before returning to the young man who was still lying on the floor. It was at this moment that the woman stepped forward and asked me to pray for greater anointing and ability to hear God more clearly. While I was praying for this woman the young man got up and went off before I could have the chance to check to see if he was healed of his pain and discomfort in the arm/shoulder. In any case, I believe the Lord must have ministered to him whilst he was down on the floor. Of course, it is not to say that people who are not slain are not ministered/healed by the Lord. It is just that often people cannot tell whether anything has changed immediately after the prayer and we do not get updated subsequently of their conditions. So, I take comfort that from time to time some people I prayed for got slain.

Why am I sharing this?
The main reason for sharing this is to acknowledge God’s honoring of the meditations of my heart, to thank Him for affirming that He still moves through me regularly. I know my life is not without reproach by the Lord’s standard, yet He was so gracious to move through me. It is an honor and privilege to be used regularly by the Lord to minister blessing to others. Secondly, it is to encourage people to press in and be faithful in the little that the Lord is doing through their lives in blessing others.

Not on duty, yet on duty
Those worshipping in the same church will know I am not on duty on any of the services. In fact, quite a number of the members of the church have been qualified as lay Altar Ministers but no one is on roster for duty, we are just supposed to help (i.e. left to the individuals[to help]). All these times, I was not on duty, yet on duty. I was not on duty because I was not on roster, yet I was on duty for the Lord. Because of this, perhaps it was also easier for me to “tune” for words of knowledge from the Lord than some of the pastors, not because they are not more “spiritual” (whatever that means), but because they are preoccupied with their duties to ensure everything turns out nicely for the congregation to “enjoy” the services, whereas I was free to “tune” to the Lord. I tried to discipline myself but I was not without reproach (the Lord knew), yet whatever I did (I mean release of words of knowledge/prophecy and altar ministry) in church services, it was not intended to pressurize anybody in the church. I had a job I needed to do for the Lord, and my son, Andrew often would remind me that I had to do my job, least the Lord gave me the “sack”. If in doing what I did, had come off to anyone as “show-off”, I apologise. I need prayers. Pray for me. Pray that I will always be humble, pray for my protection, pray that I will hear God clearly, and speak only the words of God and not my own when I release words of knowledge or prophecy. Pray that when I pray for others, they will be ministered by the Lord.


Once again, thank you Lord

Anthony Chia -Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O LORD, my strength and my Redeemer (Ps 19:14)

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