Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Christmas is here, lots of celebrating to do and much to be thankful for. This year has been a difficult one for me personally, but I thank God that He is sovereign above all and that I can always trust in his gracious leading in my life.

More to update soon - and I might have a chance to do so after Christmas. But for now, have a Merry Christmas celebrating the incarnation of the Son to this world :) And have a safe holiday!

Toowong Baptist Young Adults

Last Saturday night I had the chance to head to the Toowong Baptist Young Adults service. A mix from both the English side and Chinese side were in attendance in a cosy room where everyone was seated around small tables.

I ended up speaking from Mark 6:30-52 - the feeding of the 5000 and walking on water (I've previously blogged a summary of my points here). The talk went well and I was quickly reminded that it is quite emotionally and physically taxing to preach. Praise God I was able to get through it and praise God for TBC's youth :)

Next up is BCCC's English service and 1 Corinthians 10:32-11:16 - the infamous passage regarding women and head coverings! Any thoughts on what this passage could possibly mean for Christians today? :)

P.S - my moustache/gotti has come along ok...Andrew ended up piking on me!

Movember and speaking engagements

Movember - the month formerly known as November! The Prostate Cancer Council, in response to the overwhelming success of the 'Think Pink' Breast Cancer campaign launched 'Movember' a few years ago and it has grown (pun intended) every year since. The basic idea is that guys will spend the month of November growing out their moustaches to raise awareness of men's health issues. Andrew (that good-looking guy on the right) and myself will be doing Movember this year, not so much to raise money but to certainly raise awareness. I also have the side-goal of losing a little bit of weight to return myself to a healthier Body-Mass-Index (I'm currently sitting at just under 27 - which is considered overweight...). So if you see me at church unshaven ask me how my weight loss is going :P

On another note, the coming month of November will certainly keep me on my toes. Each weekend will be filled with various speaking engagments of some sort and I'm looking forward to the coming weeks! Here's a quick run down:

9/11 - St Lucia English Congregation - Jeremiah 20:1-18
15/11 - Toowong Baptist Young Adults Service - probably Mark 8
16/11 - Chairing St Lucia English Congregation
23/11 - Brisbane Cantonese Christian Church English Service - TBA (either Mark 6 or 1 Corinthians 11)

Please pray for my preparations for these talks as well as my health/weight-loss goals :)

CIA-SALT Camp 2008

So much has been happening in the past few months that things have started to drag - like this blog and our newsletter! Our apologies for the delay.

SALT had its first combined camp this year with CIA (Christ in Action - our Coopers Plains equivalent). We headed off to Koojawaren campsite in Toowoomba (well, Highfields - 10 minutes out from Toowoomba) and heard some great talks from guest speaker Sam Mak. Smak (as he is affectionately known) shared with the teens different parts of scripture and themed his talks on 'Humility'. The talks seemed to hit their mark with 13 teens responding after the Saturday night evangelistic talk and more teens probing with questions and being convicted of the truth of the gospel :)

Praise the Lord for all that happened on the weekend and praise the Lord that more teens came into His glorious Kingdom!

Here's some of the photos in a slideshow set to the camp theme song 'Before The Cross'.

BLT Plus 2008

Tomorrow evening begins BLT Plus 2008. I've been asked to chair a couple of the sessions and I feel quite under-prepared for my chairing! But I know that God is good and faithful and will be at work within me to help me finish my chairing (hopefully tonight).

In the meantime, here are some prayer points that you could be praying for us this weekend.

Praise points:

• Praise God for the power of His gospel to change and transform lives. That though we were once his enemies and without mercy, we are now His chosen people and have been shown great mercy.
• Praise God for another opportunity to gather in Brisbane/Qld to hear God's word faithfully and passionately taught
• Praise God for the chance to grow in our understanding of how to teach and apply scripture faithfully

Petition:

• Pray for Steph and I - I've been recovering from a cold, and Steph is coming down with a cold.. Pray that God would sustain her through the busy weekend and that she would not crash too hard when we get home.
• Pray for my chairing sessions - pray that I would be godly and faithful in my speech and help point people towards Christ and His glory in my leading.
• Pray for the delegates there, for soft hearts to hear God's word and for encouragement in our speech and conduct towards each other.

Thanks all!
Steven

P.S - I've posted up some thoughts on the upcoming release of the ESV Study Bible over on my Salteee blog. Check it out!

New Wheel (covers)

It seems like quop is not the only one having to replace some things on his car. On my drive to Grunt (the St Lucia men's ministry) I lost one of the wheel covers (specifically the front driver's side). I remember being in stop-start traffic along Coronation Drive when all of a sudden I heard this crunching sound - like somebody rear-ended someone else. It sounded so close to my car that I actually wound the window down to pop my head out and do a quick visual inspection along my side. There appeared to be nothing wrong until I parked at St Lucia and realised what had happened.

So this afternoon I went to Super Cheap Auto and bought 4 replacement covers. You can see the difference in aesthetics in the comparison below.

So if you see our car on Sunday and it looks slightly different to what you remember, it's because we've gotten new car wheel covers :)

SALT Library!

Last week we kicked off SALT's library! With a relatively generous church budget allocated to SALT this year we have been steadily raiding Koorong and Word bookstores during their sales to stock up on various books. Here's a list of some of what you may find in our reading list:

• the Manga Bible (Genesis & Exodus) - this has proved very popular with both the guys and girls!
• The Case for Christ/Faith/Creator youth & student editions by Lee Strobel
• Jesus Among Other Gods youth edition by Ravi Zacharias
• A Hell of a Life/Hanging In There/Sneaking Suspicion - great books for teens by John Dickson
• More than a Carpenter/Beyond Belief to Convictions - excellent apologetic's books by Josh McDowell
• I Kissed Dating Goodbye by Joshua Harris
• and a great little series of 'The Little Black/Pink Book' on various issues for teens

Pray with us that we'll continue to build up the library with solid resources and pray that the teens would find encouragement, growth and conviction of the truth of Christianity/Jesus through these resources!

My love/non-love relationship with SALT

I wonder if it's natural for me to feel a sense of dread week in and week out in the lead-up to SALT (SAint Lucia Teens). I'm not sure it should be.

Tonight was a great reminder of how buzzing and exciting youth ministry can be. I led one of the teens through the prayer of repentance! How small minded I am, how inadequate is my love for the teens that I minister to, and how great is the awesomeness of God!

Pray with me that this young teen would grow into a much more godly man than I am.

YF Camp reflections

Last weekend we held our annual YF Camp. Tonight was the related 'YF Camp Reflections' in which everyone who went to camp got together one last time to share what they had reflected upon during the week after camp.

Lots of people turned up tonight which was incredibly encouraging. Plenty of the first timers as well. I led a largish group through the reflections and was able to share my own thoughts.

This year's camp wasn't the greatest one. Previous camps have had a better feel and better fellowship, however the lessons I learnt this weekend were quite profound compared with previous years.

Our guest speaker's talks from the book of Jonah were excellent. I learnt more about the technique of preaching from listening in, but the greatest thing I was reminded of last weekend was to remember that God is always bigger than the box we put Him in.

Now, this should come as no surprise really. However I realised that I have put God in a box. It's a box with the labels of 'theology' and 'got this figured out' plastered all over it. And I honestly believe it to be a very big box as well. But the surprising message of which I have been mulling over the past few days has been that even though I believe my box is very big, God is still much bigger than that. His ways are far beyond my ability to fully comprehend and I'm thankful that He condescends to my level and communicates His will to me through His word. I have so much to learn and so much more to be thankful for that I must continue to ponder and be in awe of God's greatness.

What a privilege it is to have God reveal Himself in His Son. I pray that I'll be able to encourage you (and vice versa) to keep pondering the vastness and depth of God's greatness.

YF Camp 2008

Small man, big fish, even BIGGER God!

This is probably the furthest campsite we've been to for YF Camp - I'd have to do a whereis comparison between the Somerset site and this years site at Lennox Heads. Both were roughly a 2 hour drive, but this year's drive felt longer.

Anyway, it was another good weekend of great talks and fellowship. The campsite was good, skit night was as brilliant as ever, and the talks were spot on. The fellowship this year felt a little disjointed, but that seems to happen every so often.

For those of you who missed out, here's some of the fun. Turn up your speakers ;)

YF Camp

Tomorrow we'll be heading off to YF Camp. I think this is now my 7th one (7th for Steph as well!).

Each had their own highlights.

'02 - Pete Ko/Sergio, the book of Genesis, baptised on the beach, Steve Irwin appearing in 3 different group skits
'03 - Eugene Hor, various gospel talks, leading a bible study for the first time, Dai Gor Gor (Asian Big Brother), the Oh's cooking for us, the big challenge to enter full-time paid ministry
'04 - Gary Koo, the gospel according to John, massive bible study groups, fire alarms (!), leaving early because the PA thought I had TB(!), the first time Derek Zoolander made an appearance on Skit Night...
'05 - Pete Ko, fantastic talks on the topic of 'Love', fantastic camp site, Derek Zoolander makes his final appearance on Skit Night
'06 - Bill Colyer, talks on the 'Last Days', Ronnie with a face full of flour and looking very Geisha-ish, Helen's inspiring testimony, me doing a very bad impersonation of Tom Cruise...
'07 - Michael Kwan, talks on various 'Parables', very challenging discussions during bible study, the best camp site ever (pity we can't use it again), gorgeous sunset photography opportunities, Ivan and Stella in an impressive display of Bollywood finesse...

This year Steph and I have an opportunity to lead the 'beginners/non-Christian' group. The challenge before is bigger than I sometimes care to reflect upon, but praise God that He is bigger than the challenge. Our preparations this week have been good, but I get the feeling that we're looking forward to Monday night when it's all over with.

For your prayer considerations:

• Praise God for another YF Camp again - for the opportunities get away with our brothers and sisters to hear God's word taught faithfully and to encourage each other to respond obediently
• Praise God that preparations have gone relativley well so far, and pray that Steph and I will be trusting in God's sovereignty throughout the camp
• Pray for Steph who will be leading on her own this year, for confidence in God, for confidence that scripture is sufficient, and that she would not be anxious in the time she leads
• Pray for myself that I will also place my trust in God and not in myself as I lead
• Pray for the non-Christians in our groups, that they will be impacted by the talks and the bible studies, and that the Spirit would be at work powerfully in them to bring about conviction of sin, repentance and new life in Christ
• Pray for the patience of the non-Christians friends who bring them, that they would not be dissappointed at a seeming lack of fruit from camp, but trust in God's timing and sovereignty over their friends lives

Now, to finish packing...

Back and somewhat refreshed :)

It was important for the two of us to get away for a week and a bit. Over this past year we've been learning to guard our time off and seek to creatively rest from the work of ministry. This hasn't been easy, but we're beginning to get the hang of it at last!

Getting away also helps. Mt Tambourine was a great couple of days away. We spent a good deal of out time with a great book, a fireplace, and a warm cup of tea. And we ended up going for a horse riding experience - which you'll have to ask us in person for more details!

Last Sunday we returned from the Hunter Valley in NSW. We hired a car and braved the pretty rough roads (with potholes the size of small dams) to enjoy some of the valley's finest wines and celebrate the wedding union of Steph's cousin. You can see some of the wedding photos here.

Now we're back to work and getting back into things. RICE is upon us very soon, so keep praying for that as the first event - the RICE Big Day Out - is happening this Saturday!

P.S - our newsletter is overdue, we know! So keep an eye out for that soon!

We'll be right back :)

Steph and I are heading away for a week for a much needed break. We'll be spending a couple of nights in Mt Tambourine reflecting on our 2 years of marriage together - praying with each other and deepening our relationship further.

Then we'll be heading down to the Hunter Valley for Steph's cousin's wedding. We'll be back soon (and hopefully there will be plenty of photos to share!)

Sapporo short-term mission blog up and running :)

The absence of blogs here and at Salteee are not a reflection on my busyness this time! Instead I've been working on getting another blog (yes...I know!) up and running to share more of our recent short-term missions trip to Sapporo.

So without further delay I present to you my 'Sapporo Short Term Mission (Dec 2007)' blog.

On this particular blog you will find:

• Unseen photos from the trip
• My daily journal entries with thoughts and reflections on our activities and the people we met

Drop by and leave a comment or two :)
Steven

Most embarrasing moments whilst chairing!

I recently read a blog competition requesting submissions for the most embarrassing moments of leading Sunday services. Some of the entries were pretty funny and as I reflected there have been a few moments I’m not overly proud of either:

• Once time I was chairing for Pastor Mun and as he finished I got up and thanked him for his message. I then attempted to summarise his message in a sentence or two to lead into the final song of response. I said something like, “Thanks Pastor for your message this morning. As Pastor has reminded us… umm… what did you say again Pastor?” I totally zoned out and forgot what he had just preached on!
• One time I gave the guitar intro for ‘No Other Name’. I started much too quickly but didn’t realise and also stuffed up the chord progression. To add further insult to injury it was a relatively new song and nobody sang :P It wasn’t my best musical moment.
• This one time, not whilst leading but whilst a musician, I was asked to do an intro for ‘How Deep The Father’s Love’ – my guitar had suffered greatly under the heat that morning and all of a sudden I was *incredibly* out of tune. Not only that but the pianist had not communicated to me earlier that he intended to play the song in a lower key – so I had an out of tune intro in the wrong key!

Thankfully things have been a lot smoother!

Finally!

After two and half weeks the coriander breaks through...

!!!

I love coriander :)

Picking up yet another hobby!

I was thinking recently that these blogs have been very neglected. This is in part due to our pretty busy schedule in the last few months and the growing tiredness which has crept upon us.

Next week we'll be flying down to Adelaide for a short break to visit my old home-town (first time back since I moved to Queensland!) as well as visit friends and...the Barossa Valley!

In the meantime I thought that I could update you on our newest hobby together - gardening!

Ever since moving into our new place in Kuraby we've been frequently encouraged/hassled by my in-laws to start up something in the garden. After the busy period of BLT finished we set ourselves to working the soil...and here are some of the results:

Pak Choy @ 2 weeks

Pak Choy @ 4 weeks

Rocket @ 2 weeks

Rocket @ 4 weeks

Roma Tomatoes @ 1 month

Roma Tomatoes @ 1 month and 3 weeks

As you can see, things are growing nicely! Praise God for all the rain we've had over the past few months. It's made this new venture more exciting than I originally anticipated!

We also have two types of basil growing nicely (English Basil and Thai Basil) as well as Vietnamese Coriander/Mint, Chives, Spring Onion, Cherry Tomatoes and Mint. We planted some Coriander seeds earlier this week but they have yet to sprout.

We've had one nice harvest of Basil so far which I turned into two types of pesto - Basil Pesto and a Sundried Tomato Pesto (with store bought sundried tomatoes). Recipes will be up shortly on my 'Wine, Food, Photos' blog! We also had a great first harvest of Rocket which intensely flavoursome. My mouth waters at the thought of our second harvest!

Oh, and one thing I noticed also - all sprouts look the same no matter what you've planted. They all come up with two rounded leaves and then spring into action afterwards. There's got to be a sermon illustration in that somewhere...

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year and all that...!

Wow it's been a long time. Since arriving back from Japan there have been many things happening, most of which revolved around illness and BLT!

Watch this space as I'll be updating very shortly on all that's happened since we left for Japan until the present day.