December 11, 2006

Chopsticks Mission Theory

In Taiwan, a pair of chopsticks is a very important tool. A Chinese Christian told us about chopsticks theory in mission: We can’t eat fried rice with only one chopstick. When using chopsticks, one is stationary while the other one moves. This metaphor represents two types of missionary. Some missionaries are called to go out into a mission field while others remain in church, fasting and praying for the ongoing missionary work, and raising funds for programs and salary support. Therefore, all of us have a part to play in mission according to our God-given gifts so that His will may be done on earth as it is in heaven.

As you know, we truly need financial support from you for our salary. We pray that you do your part as we do our part with all our hearts and strength—to spread the good news to the people of Taiwan, especially to aboriginal college students. This way, we can build the Kingdom of God both here and there.

With God’s grace, this year we reached out to many new students of Buddhist Nursing College (BNC) and the National Teachers University. (This year they changed the name from college to university.) Last year, we had 37 students at BNC, but this year we have 97 students. Because of the increase, we have to hold our activities outside because they can’t all fit into one classroom. In fact, we had an activity in BNC today, which was held in the open hall near the student dormitory. Choon delivered a short message, and then we sang gospel songs and played games. When the 97 students were singing with loud voices “Come, Lord Jesus!” students passing by the hall can hear it! It is a great opportunity to witness to our Lord Jesus Christ. The reason we have attracted so many new students is partly because they want to join this singing group, even though they are not Christians. When we had the worship service to welcome new students and a party in our center on October 14, we had to buy new chairs for the center and rent a bus to bring everyone there.

The Christian group in the National Teachers University has doubled from 14 students to 28. We have also seen their faith growth. Choon used to pray at the beginning and ending of all the programs, but now the student leaders pray, and Choon just delivers the message. As they grow up and leave us as matured Christians, we can only say halleluiah, “Praise the Lord.”

We have been busy doing other programs, such as our fall retreat and our special praise night at the church of the Ami tribe. Due to increased participation we had to change the location of the retreat. Besides a good program, the weather was perfect for the retreat. We were worried that a cold rain could make our nights uncomfortable, but for two days there was no rain at all (unusual in Taiwan in November) and we had warm weather throughout.

For the special praise night at the Ami tribe church, it took two hours to get there from our center by car. There were 17 members of the praise team. It took three cars to take us there. Normally we have about 12 members, but a lot more students asked to participate this year. We always practice for it for at least two months. So it is not easy to be a member of this team. Until now, we have always had to recruit people to go, but this year they actually asked us to be on the team. The youth groups of five churches gathered together to praise God in the mountain village. But since this mountain area doesn’t have many children, this time we invited adults to come hear us as we shared the good news, led gospel songs, enacted dramas, and gave testimony.

We truly felt God was with us and led us. We know that our Mandarin needs improvement and we lack many talents. But somehow the things we do here have turned out well. We do believe that someone is always praying for us. That is why we deeply thank you from the bottom of our hearts. Without your prayers and support, we couldn’t have done what we did this year in Taiwan, where the Christian population is only 3 percent. God will bless you as God has blessed us.

We pray that you have a peaceful Christmas and a blessed New Year. We can’t wait to see what God will do for us in 2007!

Yen Hee and Choon Lim