Dear Church,

In 2022, God continued to lead us through all the Covid measures and changes. But finally, we are back to onsite worship services and face-to-face meetings. Praise God!

Staffing

We bade farewell to three staff as God led them to serve elsewhere — Rogers Phan, who had taken care of our Facilities & Maintenance since 2011, Pastor Paul Lau, our Chinese congregational pastor who relocated with his family to the UK, and Pastor Alfred Tan, who felt God leading him to serve in a new environment. 

We were glad to have Jim Tan join us as our Facilities Executive in July. Jim has been a faithful member of our church community for a few years and has previously served in the Ushers Ministry.

We are thankful for how God called Amos Tan to lead the Worship Ministry as a lay ministry leader. Ps Alfred’s other roles were delegated to other staff as follows: Hospitalisations & Bereavement (Ps Edward Chau), Worship Service Planning (Dorothea Chow), LCG Cluster (Ps Vernon Song & Rev Ivan Liew).

God also led Ps Dawn Lee to join us on 1 Jan 2023. She is serving with Rev Ho Kum Weng in the Chinese congregation, as well as with Ps Annabel Chau in the Next Generation ministries. This will strengthen the team of 3 pastors shepherding the Chinese congregation and also to strengthen the sense of belonging and participation of our young people in the Chinese congregation.

Khoo Hern Ern (Erny) started her Master of Arts in Counselling at TCA College in Jan 2022, and her husband, Khoo Seng Khong (SK), began his Master of Divinity at Singapore Bible College in July 2022.

Discipleship Focus

Our 2022 discipleship focus was FUN Discipleship in my Family. We looked at how our individual discipleship is worked out in our families, as our personal discipleship is lived out primarily in the relationships within our families.

In 2022, we preached through the book of Genesis, sharing 3 to 4 sermons on each of the following themes:

1. Fostering my faith at home
   Each of us can actively live out our faith in our family interactions, because the first place where discipleship matters is at home.
   
2. Unboxing my hurts to receive healing
   Each of us has hurts that need to be unboxed; only then can we receive His healing, forgive others, and find true freedom.
   
3. Navigating my biblical roles
   Each of us occupies one or more roles in our families, which may change in different seasons, and we can learn to navigate these roles with biblical wisdom. 

Worship

In 2022, the Covid situation finally eased up and we returned to onsite services. Thank you for your patience with the frequent and sudden changes in safe management protocols.

About 90% of the Chinese congregation has returned to onsite worship. (Sunday Worship: 230 people, Jericho Prayer Meeting: 75 people, LCG: 60 people, Joyful Learning Class: 30 people)  A large majority of the English congregation has also returned as well.

Church, let us not take our corporate worship for granted. We are continuing our online services as an outreach to those who are homebound and for those who are exploring who Jesus is. But do remember that God’s desire is not just for us to have an individual personal relationship with Him alone but also to see each of us being a part of the Body, the family of whom He is the Head and Father. Life-on-life relationships are God’s design for discipleship.

Our services continue to run smoothly only because of the many faithful servants who are quietly double-hatting in the background. We especially thank those who served sacrificially when help was urgently needed, and for your encouragement to the staff team. Your love and unity with us is deeply appreciated.

We still need many more to step forward to serve — as Sunday School teachers, AV crew, musicians and ushers. Will you say “Yes, Jesus! Count me in!”?

Looking Forward

In 2022 we completed our yearly focus on each of our Measures of Discipleship — Family, Obedience, Relationships, Mission (FORM). We are taking 2023 to consolidate all our learning over the past 4 years. These are not easy changes to make in our lives but I’m really glad to see that the church is really responding.

Members are beginning to see how our discipleship is so closely integrated with our Family life at home. More LCG groups are considering the seriousness of our Obedience to God through our “I will” statements. They are also starting to see the value of forming Huddles so that these life-on-life Relationships can address our deepest discipleship growth. God’s Mission is burning bright in many hearts too — fueled also by the easing of Covid measures that restarted mission trips, Community Dinners & Christianity Explored sessions.

2023 will be a year of consolidating and growing in the Measures of our discipleship so that we become the kind of disciple described in God’s Word.

2023 will also be the year we plan for our next 5 years. Please do be in prayer for our leaders as they seek God in prayer together.

In 2023, the invisible online church is now visible again! However, let’s also strive to make it personal as the Body of Christ comes together each Sunday to encourage one another. We must seize the opportunities Covid deprived us of. I wish to see the body reaching out to the body — to invite another regular worshipper for breakfast in Cana Hall. I wish to see more intergenerational conversations — to befriend a senior in church, a young family or to give an encouraging word to a youth or a child.

This is how I see us growing God’s family numerically — to draw our online audience to an onsite visit, to transform an occasional visitor into a regular Sunday friend, and a Sunday friend into a fellow disciple in our LCGs.

Together, let us make disciples who will transform Woodlands and the world for Christ.

Lim Kee Oon
Senior Pastor