Taking A Leap of Faith Going To Turkey!

Honestly even since I took the step of faith to believe in Christ and forgo my greed for money and walk my life as an open book for Jesus it has been a extraordinarily blissful journey. My family recently went to a concert at Church organized by AGBC and during that event they had 10 prizes to allow people to attend a bible college module for free.

I was not at the concert , but my wife who was there was sitting beside the chairman was talking to my wife. The chairman who was seated beside my wife reach under his chair and found an envelope and decided to pass it to my wife.

When my wife was home, she pass me the envelope, and I was wondering what’s inside. Actually before the concert I was praying to have a calling to be a pastor one day if the Lord allows. When I open the envelope I was shocked in amazement that I got a free module to study at AGBC.

So I recently went to AGBC and applied for the free module. After some discussion with the staff there she recommended me a few choices. I decided to take up three modules which are

- Biblical Interpretation
- Old Testament Foundations
- Evangelism

The lady told me if I like to convert the modules to a degree program is highly possible too where they allow me to take up modules slowly up to 8 years I honestly was not real sure I was ready to go full time study yet so I decided to take up these 3 modules first and let the Lord lead me what to do next.

The modules takes about 2 to 3 weeks each, and the schedule of the class runs on Monday & Saturday 9am to 5pm, Tuesday and Thursday 7pm to 10pm each cost only $321 per module

You can find out more about the school @ http://www.agbc.edu.sg/

After completing my application, I was sharing with the staff my testimony and also telling her I had an interest to want to go to Israel Jerusalem ( that is the place Jesus was crucified and resurrected ).

Suddenly because I mention that and I was a little impatience to wait till Dec 2012 to go for that trip to be honest and was praying to the Lord if he can grant me an earlier trip.

The staff suddenly told me the school is organizing a trip to Turkey end of this month from 27th May 2012 to 8th June 2012. At first I was puzzled why Turkey, not Israel.

Then she explained to me that Turkey is the place where Apostle Paul journey started in the new testament on how he started the early churches.

Lots of people do not know that there’s actually lots of things from the new testament happened in Turkey, and that is the reason why they organize this trip to Turkey to understand more about what Apostle Paul did during the early churches time

Pastor Peter who is the person who is organizing this trip by the school will be teaching us during this study trip. A total of 12 of us will be going this trip I am planning to document everything I see and learn there and share it on my blog as well

Earning Money By Faith

“We Walk By Faith, Not By Sight” – 2 Corinthians 5:7

To many people it is a real sensitive issue when it comes to God and money. I personally have enormous wealth even until today, but my mindset for money undoubtedly changed when I fully accepted God’s words in June 2011 and baptized on 28th August 2011.

To be honest, I am the worst Christian example out there as I sin a lot through the many years of my life. I actually believe in Christ way back  somewhere in 1995, but I backslide terribly far from God. (Click here for full story video).

When I started doing my online business, I faced lots of troubles and problems trying to figure out how to make a living and make money. After many trails and errors I managed to pull through and made my first US$1,000 after 4 months trying blogging, and I like to thank God for that.

As a non believer in the past, I used to think I do not need God. I believe that the only thing that is essential in life was to make money, and I think lots of people can relate to that.

Why Money?

It is clear, it is our way of life that we need money for many things. But what’s so brilliant of accepting the Lord is that he always will provide a way and provide your needs even money

“No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.” – 1 Corinthians 10:13

You may be thinking – “Yeah Alvin it is easy for you to say that because you have money now.” Honestly even now I have money it is a struggle for me too as a Christian because I love money too much for too long about 5 years before I was a Christian.

However, do not get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong to seek the Lord for money, but it is love of money that is a problem. As it is was written.

“For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.” – 1 Timothy 6:10

So you can see why I prefer to hunger for God more than money because Jesus said:

“Again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” – 1 Timothy 6:10

That is because of the love of money that people are not willing to let go. In the bible it also said this as well

“No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.” – Matthew 6:24

So here’s what I did

I Stop All My Work & Shine For The Lord

Not many people know this, but I stopped doing my online business and workshops since early Jan 2012 and decided to spend ALL MY TIME to shine for the Lord in whatever ways he ask me to.

I told the Lord I will shine for you but ensure you take care of my finances and ensure my bank balance does not hit below SG$10,000 I will continue to serve you as much as I can.

So I did this since Jan 2012 and here’s what I have done so far

- I started reading the word of god daily now
- I started attending more bible study classes
- I started to know more brothers and sister at cell groups and church
- I volunteered to help out my church website
- I volunteered to help out the people at BreakThrough Missions
- I setup a blog called “GatherFaith” dedicated to the Lord Jesus
- I started my first open source WordPress Theme “JCTheme” dedicated to the Lord as well
- I just started a video project on Jesus to start a moment online as well and much more to come

While I was doing all that, I totally did not even bother with my internet business or workshops that I normally conduct. What was so captivating was while I was doing God’s work I had a couple of emails from people kept asking me when is my next workshop and got a couple of emails people wanting to joint venture with me.

Honestly I was extremely tempted to accept them, I even had a deal shown to me where I can earn up to $6,000 per month, but I reject it because I wanted more time to share the Gospel with people online and offline and do more influential works for him.

So when Jesus said that a rich man will find it harder to enter the kingdom I can understand why and because I cannot serve two masters ( in my case is money or the lord ). I decided I choose the Lord instead.

When I Did All These For His Glory He Really Blessed Me

God not only bless me with money, but he gave me something I honestly never expected and that money cannot buy. The Lord listens to my prayers and my parents just got baptized recently 2 days ago and got saved!

The best part about this was my father right now looks more healthy and now has more strength to walk and that is a miracle by itself, and that is something money cannot buy.

I know in my heart if I continue to seek the Lord and pray he will fully healed my father and a time will come I can boost to everyone that my father got fully healed, not by doctors, not by medicine but by faith!

On Top Of That Blessing The Lord Blessed Me With Business As Well

Because I was not active in looking for business, I found it extremely fascinating that the period from Jan 2012 up to now 1st May 2012 business was finding me instead!

I managed to closed many deals where people approach me through my new company called “DesignPerform.com” and wanted me to do websites and promotions for them

So there wasn’t a time I did not have money through the pass 4 months I decided to live my life for Jesus so now you know why I am so hungry for the Lord

My Prayers For You

The reason I write my experience is I hope through my example you can learn and understand “Money is important, but it should not be the purpose of your life.”

If you have a loved one or someone you care about, take this time and give that person a call and say “I Love You, are you free this weekend to go out for a coffee to catch up.”

Sometimes through our busy life and work, we worked so hard to make money we forget the fundamental things in life which are normally our loves ones. Spent this weekend giving yourself a treat and relax with your love ones and realized you worked so hard to make money not because you want to but because you care and love your loved ones

I love to hear your comments below, and if you love this post do share it with your friends below! God Bless You!

GatherFaith.com – My New Blog

I just setup a new blog dedicated for Christianity do check it out @ www.GatherFaith.com