6 more weeks...

I remember that day I met with Coral to hear her share about VGM. The more we shared, the more I felt this was an opportunity for me. Truthfully, I've never felt this excitement for serving on mission trip before. Although I still wonder whether I'm "good enough" for joining the team, I have to believe God is going to work awesome things through us this summer.

However, we cannot do this on our own. We need all your prayer support. It's going to be a real spiritual battle there. Satan hates when people share the Gospel and God's love, so he's going to try hard to distract us from doing His Work. In Sunday School class, I asked why there is so much opposition against Christian faith and not much of other religions. It is because Satan does not want people to come to know the Truth. We are His children; we are blessed and so "rich in Christ." In our mission trip, we want to share this love to the people.

Please pray that during these preparation weeks, each of us can have a stronger personal relationship with God so we can stand strong in hard times and to encourage one another.

--Ruth

VGM Taiwan Team 2009 - Introduction to VGM

    Taiwan is a country of various religious beliefs, mostly a combination of Buddhism and Taoism, folk religions which originated many generations ago. Because respecting family ancestry is highly valued, traditional worship is a strong root throughout Taiwan.  From a spiritual aspect, local beliefs occupy this island; the underground rotten roots make it impossible for gospel seeds to sprout.  It is the vision of Village Gospel Mission (VGM) to treat the roots and to improve the soil.

      VGM was founded in 1971 by an American missionary couple, which focuses on bringing the message of Christ to the local communities. Annually since 2002, Taiwan VGM holds week-long bilingual English camps in 10-15 different locations. At each camp, the team interacts with the students through English lessons, worship music, and other activities. It will also have an opportunity to build friendships with the students’ families and to be a channel of Christ’s love. When children are touched by His love, they can be effective witnesses to their families. In these bilingual camps, the team’s desire is to spread the gospel seed to the youth and bring them to know Christ. Six members from Home of Christ will make up this summer’s team.  

      Prior to the trip, we will meet regularly to strengthen unity and develop a stronger personal relationship with God. We not only want to change the students’ lives but we want our lives transformed as well. Preparation includes open group discussion, bible study, service learning projects, group bonding activities, and intensive training near our departure. We leave July 2 and return on July 21. Please pray for our team, the local co-workers, students, and their families. As Jesus said, "The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” --Matthew 9:37-38 

VGM Taiwan Team 2009 - Team Members and Testimonies

Here are the team members:

Coral Shih: Coordinator

Sheila Lee:

I will lead this team to the mission field. I went to similar VGM mission trips some years ago. The kids there were excited and curious that we were there. They liked to ask questions about America. It was an opportunity to spread the gospel and showed them Christ’s love and our care. I’m excited this year that I can join the team to serve the LORD.

Ruth Cheung:

I am truly blessed to be in a loving Christian family. I attended church ever since I can remember. I heard many bible stories, learned many songs, and met many friends there. However, I was a worried-looking, sad person. I feared when anyone got sick and had to go to hospital, thinking anything bad could happen. I didn’t feel peace even though I heard of Jesus many times. One year at a church retreat when I was 10, the teacher shared the story of Jesus, that Christ died for our sins and rose again-- He is a forgiving and loving Lord. The gospel spoke to me. That morning, on Thanksgiving Day, I accepted Jesus in my life. I was so happy. People don’t become a Christian just because their parents are Christians. I had to personally tell Jesus I am a sinner and to accept Him in my life.

Our God is amazing, He works in amazing ways in our life. When I was young, I learned piano but did not like it at all and stopped lessons soon. A few years ago, I got a call from a church sister asking me to play piano in a summer retreat. Although I was surprised she would ask me, I agreed to practice as best I could for it. God turned my passion for music completely around in this opportunity. I love music and I want to serve Him with it.

It is a wonderful gift that He has given me. I thank God he didn’t allow me to forget it but even so, He gave me this deep passion for music.

I am also thankful I can be a nurse; I have more understanding about health to help family and overcome the fear of illness, knowing that God is the great Healer.

Even though I’ve known Jesus for many years, I still have ups and downs in life, but I have joy and peace knowing that He is there with me through it all. “I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.” - Philippians 4:13. My walk with God is a lifelong journey but each year I want to follow Him more, grow in Him, and be more like Christ.

Andrea Weng:

Before being a Christian I didn’t really know about Jesus Christ or God. My mother and I would pray every night before we went to sleep. I was very young so I didn’t know what the purpose of it was. I would fold my hands together and repeat what my mom said. At the same time, I would be staring at the blank ceiling, wondering why we did this every night. She would talk about her business, the family, and what we did that day. Soon, it became a routine. I didn’t know half of what my mom was praying about. All I knew she was talking to or about God and how he has given us a good day and has protected us. We didn’t go to church at the time because of my mom’s frequent business travels so I didn’t have an idea of what we were doing.

I received Jesus Christ when I was about 8 years old, 3^rd grade. That’s when we started to go to church. At first I thought it was a bother going to church in the morning when I could sleep in a little more. But then I started to learn that it wasn’t a waste of time. Going to church helped me as a person to understand God and a whole lot more of what I was repeating about at night with my mother. We were thanking God for what he has done to make that day special and how he cared and protected us.

Christ became a difference in my life in many ways. When I was little I use to be the most impatient and loudest person in the world. I would get very impatient when my question weren’t answered immediately or very slowly. I would also yell at people if they weren’t listening and I cried a lot. I would also get very mad easily and just sit there and stare at the person I was mad at with a frown. After learning about Christ and accepting him, I learned to be calmer. I learned that being patient, people can rely on you more and that it makes life easier for me and the people around me. Being mad at someone just made the situation harder, and God doesn’t want that. He wanted me to learn to let things go. He told me that it was okay if my little sister touched my stuff or copied me frequently. Just let it go because that’s a sign that shows she admired what I am doing.

I am getting baptized because I want to learn more about Christ and God. I always thought that you had to know a lot about God in order to get baptized until my Sunday school teacher told me that baptism is the first step in knowing Christ. I hope after being baptized I can be closer to God and turn into a new bulb that will soon bloom into a new person.

Joshua Chen:

I am one of those people who basically grew up in the church and have gone to church as far back as I can remember. While this makes writing testimonies more difficult and less interesting because there has never been a huge, drastic change in my life, I consider myself very blessed to always have had the support of my Christian friends and known about God. I continually thank God for placing my mother in my life because along with the millions of other things she's done for me, she brought me to church when I was very little and I have continued going since. I became a Christian while I was very little during Sunday School, however, like many others, I did not know what it meant. I continued for a couple years living my life unchanged by Christ until I reached 7^th grade and came to Youth Group. Although at first it was scary to attend because I felt uncomfortable with all the older people, I eventually became more at ease with going because I saw people who were different and lived a life different from others. There, people cared for each other and encouraged one another. As I continued attending, I slowly began to change towards becoming more Christlike. Snow retreats were especially powerful. It was my first exposure to what being a Christian was all about. There were people fellowshipping together and praying for one another. Also, many were really intent on pleasing God with everything they did. I came back from that retreat with an increased understanding of what the meaning of Christian really was. A year later, in 8^th grade, I felt became baptized. Although I was a little nervous, it was one of the most memorable days of my life. After my baptism, I continued to come to church, youth group, and more Snow Retreats; however, I have never experienced anything as powerful as what happened the evening of February 18, 2008 at Snow Retreat. During the evening worship set the presence of God could be felt by many there including me. Many broke down and almost everyone's hearts were touched. People everywhere were praying for one another. I was a cabin counselor and spoke with everyone in my cabin. Everyone was moved and the unbelievers became more open to the gospel. Although they did not accept Christ as their savior there, I believe the seeds of the Gospel were sown. When I returned home, I felt changed and with God's help saw the need for me to act more like Christ. I felt prompted to go on a mission’s trip last year, so I went on the Mexico trip. There, I saw the many powerful actions of God and experienced great changes in my perspective in life. God worked miracles there and several accepted his gift of salvation. God truly is all powerful and he is the God I follow.

Sheen Lueh:

I was born into a Christian family, but I never had thought much about it. Throughout my childhood, it just had been going to church and Sunday school on Sundays, but there was no deeper feeling than that. I also had been baptized before, but I didn’t always think that God was genuine and working in my life. Because of Sunday school and church, I always knew that there was a God, but I never actually felt him in my life. As a result, I developed the mindset that if I believe in God, I will be saved. However, contrary to this fact, I had never felt him do anything to me yet so sometimes, I would think, “What if there isn’t a God? Then would all I do be a waste?” However, during the Snow Retreat of 2008, my mindset drastically changed. During the final worship set, I was told to pray to God about anything we wanted to. So I prayed that I might be able to feel God in my life. Right after I said those words, I broke down crying. Nothing about the message or songs touched me, but I just cried. This was when I discovered that God was really true and working in our lives everyday. After this, I went on a mission trip to Mexico. There, yet again I felt God and was able to see how much he can do through us and affect other people in this world. We all think that the only evangelists are people such as Greg Laurie but in reality, God can work great wonders in everybody’s life, even mine.

Jason Ye:

I was born in Shanghai, China, and moved to California when I was about 3 years old. When we came here, my parents were invited to a local church, where they became Christians. As a result, I’ve grown up in the church for almost my entire life. The whole “church” thing just became a part of my life. It was something I did on Sundays and Saturdays and sometimes on other days of the week. I actively participated in church events and all the fun activities they had. Not only that, but I also attended a Christian school, where we had weekly chapels. It was early in elementary school, during one of these chapels, that I accepted Christ into my life. Later on, in 3^rd grade or so, I remember thinking that I was not really living my life the way Christ wanted me to live, and rededicated my life to Him.

I was a “Christian,” in the basic definition of the word, but even after that time when I rededicated my life to God, I wasn’t really actively pursuing Christ. It wasn’t until 7^th grade or so, when I began attending the youth group at Home of Christ in Cupertino, that I really understood what it meant to be a follower of Christ. There, the messages were much deeper, and made me question many of the ideas I had about being a Christian. Also, the Snow Retreats I attended throughout the years impacted my own personal relationship with God and challenged me to change my thinking and my attitudes, and through those experiences, God touched me. As a result, I realized that I really needed to surrender my life to God, as I wasn’t really following Him. Then, on Christmas Eve of 2006, I was baptized at my local church, declaring my faith publicly. Since then my walk has been seeking after what God wants me to do in my life, and with my life. While I still struggle with many things, I can definitely see that God has helped me grow in these past few years and has drawn me closer to Him.