I just posted the following article, Faith Like A Mustard Seed, on the alpha@wefc website that I am building for church but I thought I’d like to share it here as it has been the source of inspiration for me today..

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The Alpha Guest Weekend has just ended and all of us who were involved are tired but yet we rejoice that God has allowed us the opportunity to participate in the event and to share our stories.

Earlier in the weeks ahead, things hadn’t seem to go very smoothly. Small little errors arose because of miscommunications amongst ourselves. We had print issues with the cards that had been prepared. We seemed to be making one mistake after another.. even the bulletins for the services didn’t seem to come out right.

Things seemed to get worse as we got closer to the event – Karen started coming down with the flu; I got hit by an allergic reaction that took the week to clear up; Irene L’s office came under internal audit which demanded long hours and more of her attention during the week; Lena C decided to leave her job.

“The Lord himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.” - Deuteronomy 31:8

And all of these were committed to prayer.. by individuals, by our Care Groups and by the church’s Prayer Ministry.

The first service during the weekend seemed dismal – the turnout was low; the response was lukewarm; we were nervous and we forgot our lines. Karen felt even more sick than before at the end of that first service – she was feeling more aches and pains. I too started to feel a little under the weather..

As part of the Alpha Guest Services weekend, Karen Y, Lena C and I were supposed to be part of a segment during the service where we would be sharing our Alpha experiences. The segment had been set up as an informal talk show with the worship leader acting as a host interviewing us about Alpha.

At the end of that segment, I had to deliver the following tag-line which I’d been struggling to remember all week:

“I believe God has a plan for all of us.. that plan becomes obvious when we become a lot less focused on ourselves and a little more focused on Him”

Rather than sit in the service like i had at the first service, anxiously trying to remember our lines and keep calm, I decided to do something a little different.. I decided to wait in the little stairwell next to the sanctuary instead to rehearse my lines and as the service progressed, to pray.. to turn the time to our Lord Almighty instead.

That tag-line i was to deliver became a lot more real to me during today’s Sunday services. I no longer felt nervous and i actually felt a sense of calm come over me as we walked onto the stage in front of the congregation during the first service of the day. And that calm visibly increased as we went into the second service [with a lot more confidence] the same day.

“The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!”
He replied, “If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it will obey you.” - Luke 17:5-6

All we needed was faith… faith in our Lord to do what He needed to do. Faith is a powerful medicine. I don’t need to know how or why faith works. But faith does work!

“Faith is not trying to believe something regardless of evidence,” says Sherwood Eddy. “Faith is daring to do something regardless of the consequences.”

Elton Trueblood points out: “Faith is not belief without proof, but trust without reservations.”

And the fruit for that trust became apparent after the last service of the day had ended.

Lena C, the family and I were getting ready to leave when i was approached by a visitor to the church who had been invited to the Guest Services by a work colleague who worshipped at the church.

Her name was Ruth. She was a young adult. She was not Singaporean but was visiting our country on an internship and was leaving some time in September.

During the segment, I had been sharing about how Alpha allowed me to ask some of the questions I had been thinking e.g. was i still saved after having turned from God? Would i be allowed into Heaven despite what I had done? Would God still give me the gift of eternal life unreservedly?

Ruth shared that she coincidentally seemed to be asking the same questions during this period of her life. She seemed to be seeking answers to those questions. I don’t think i answered her questions well but i shared what i could from my own experiences.

All the problems we went through.. all that work and effort preparing for the weekend.. Even if we did not manage to interest anyone else in Alpha, all of it seems worthwhile now. Though it seems strange to me, I believe the Lord truly has a plan in store by Ruth approaching, sharing and directing her questions to the most cynical member of the group today.

Carter Lindberg puts it succinctly when he states,

“Faith enables persons to be persons because it lets God be God.”

My post ends with something for Ruth, the young lady who approached me today..

Ruth – if for some reason, you are reading this.. and it is my prayer that you manage to do so somehow..

I’d like to encourage you to join us at our Alpha Dinner and at any of the Alpha Sessions. It may not be possible that you will get all of your questions answered in the limited time you have remaining in our country but I have faith that the Lord will answer your most important ones and with time, address all your questions in one way or another.

There comes a point in our lives where it seems that there are no answers to the seemingly endless list of questions we could ask.. because of the limits of our knowledge and understanding. When we reach that point, all we can do is muster the courage to take that next step in faith and trust in Him

That faith was made real to me by our Lord yet again today.. and I believe that God will do the same for you.. all you need is take that next step in faith and God will become real for you just as He has for me.

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And I guess the same applies to those of us who continue to have questions.. who are yet to commit to the Lord with all of our minds and our hearts.. or we may have set high expectations for God and the Christians around us. We may be doing all this without realizing that we can claim what Jesus has already said.. all we need do is step forward and have faith like a mustard seed.

Amen..

- adrian t