HOPE FAMILY NEWS

"Hope Beyond Borders" Missions Conference

Praise God that our very first Missions Conference of the 21st century was a success! Over 700 people came for a time of learning, impartation and transformation.

Many expressed that they enjoyed it and wanted one every year. It was a first for many new members. For existing members, it was a rekindling of vision. Many made their commitment to grow to be a global Christian and to be involved in global missions.

Our guests included Rev. Stanley Ow, Executive Director of SCEM (Singapore Centre for Evangelism & Missions), Pastor Willie of Hope KL, Pastor Denis of Hope Kuching and church leaders from Hope Johor Bahru.

We enjoyed the partnership and teaching of 2 ex-missionaries from Victory Family Centre Singapore, Pastor Chua Hock Lin & Pastor Sandy Lam. Together with Pastor Ben KC Lee and Charmaine Chee, they covered 4 plenary sessions:

• Global Missions & the Local Church
• Missions Distinctive: Church Planting through Tentmaking
• Being a Global Christian & Global Track
• Missions Transforms!

Eight workshops ranging from cross cultural issues to team dynamics were conducted by our guest speakers, ex tentmakers and our church leaders.

We ended the Conference with Pastor Dinah Lee commissioning Tan Ee Lee who was going to strengthen our team in Hope Santiago, Chile.

It was a touching moment for the church and an appropriate end to a good conference.

Source: http://www.hopesingapore.org.sg/mission.html

Hope Singapore Adults Camp 2007

This year’s camp theme was called “Building a Prevailing Generation”. Ps. Simon Eng, Ps Jeff Chong and Ps Lawrence Ong were the camp speakers with 620 adults attending the camp which was held at a beautiful hotel in Malacca.

Pastor Simon shared from his heart on why people need to start serving God while they are in their twenties and thirties. Throughout his teaching, Pastor Simon’s personal life testimonies were punctuated by his candid humour. He continued to impart the word of God saying that through praying in tongues and moving in the spirit, our faith can be stirred, allowing it to thrive and help sustain our growth in God.

Pastor Simon ended his time with the Hope Singapore adults by inspiring and challenging them to take on the mantle of leadership and rise up to serve as leaders in the house of God. Many took the step of faith and responded to the call. Indeed, the campers were very impacted by the powerful teachings by Ps Simon. Praise God!

Ps Jeff’s and Ps Lawrence’s heart convicting teachings along with their lifestyle of dedication and commitment to building God’s church and God’s people, touched the campers tremendously too. Many of us came away from the camp with our faith being revitalised, believing together that it is INDEED POSSIBLE to stay fresh with God and thrive as a prevailing generation living for Him. (View Camp Photos)

Church Planting in Chemnitz, Germany

I am Yvonne from Hope Chemnitz in Germany. I used to live in Berlin for some years before becoming a Christian in Hope Berlin. After I finished my studies, I moved to Zwickau in the centre of Germany and then in February 2006, I moved to Chemnitz.

Right after I moved to Chemnitz, the whole church, Matthias and I were busy with our wedding preparation. The wedding came – the greatest event and party. We all prepared and celebrated together. It was a great day for Matthias and me, as well as a blessing for many of our guests.

Shortly after we returned from our honeymoon, it became clear that God wanted to send Annett (leader of Hope Chemnitz) to Prague for a year. Together with God, we organised everything to ensure things ran smoothly til and after she left.

After Euro Convention 2006, Annett stayed in Prague. We then moved into a new house together with two other couples of the church, Toni and Kerstin Böttger and Titus and Annett Lindl. Right after we moved into the first Ministry Home, a baby arrived: Tessa Böttger. Matthias, Titus and I were leading the church. We started to train three care group leaders and a team of thirteen people. One evening at the end of August, Annett returned from Prague to prepare for her exams.

One night, we were sitting at home talking about the church. Somehow we started to realise that we are a nice house church. We have a pleasant atmosphere whereby everyone loves each other. We are all living together. There is one Ministry Home for the girls, one for the guys and one for the families. All houses are within five minutes walking distance to each other. It is cosy and we are taking good care of each other.

However, we are not radical anymore. We are working quite hard in our studies and in our jobs. There are hardly any new people around and there have been no new believers. The care groups have stopped growing.

We started to ask questions like:

• What was the reason Matthias started this church?
• Why did I follow Jesus Christ?
• Why did we turn lukewarm?What did we compromise?
• 
• What do we want to see?

Then we made a decision: We have to start all over again. If we want to grow, it has to start with us. So we began to pray and teach. We restructured the team and sent them out two by two to start their own care groups. We went out evangelising together and helped them become disciples.

Now nine months later, we have seen many positive changes:

• We have weekly evangelism.
• People who were always afraid of witnessing are starting to talk about Jesus to strangers.
• Six teams with about eight people meet on a regular basis for Bible reading.
• We started to have parties again where we got to know the friends of people we know.
• We are working intensively with one Muslim family.
• The people in our team are growing in their personalities.

It is not very fast nor very big yet, but God gave us a word at the beginning of this year. It is Isa 43:19 “Be alert, be present. I'm about to do something brand-new.

It's bursting out! Don't you see it?” Yes, we see it. And this is becoming true to us!*

Yvonne, Hope Chemnitz (Germany) * Eurolife Newsletter Issue 2, 2007

Hope London: Pioneering European Care Group

The Story of OMG – Oh, My God! It all began when God inspired Becky and me to start a European group during May 2006. We were cautiously excited and started praying every morning for a couple of months. God gave us many signs of confirmation.

The most significant of which was from the passage on the "Valley of dried bones" in Ezekiel 37:1-3. Through that passage, God promised us that the spiritual lifelessness in the UK will be reversed as dramatically as it happened in that story. However, it will take our faith and obedience to see God's promises come to pass.

In July 2006, we began the first care group with Katarina Majirska, from Prague, helping us. It has been one year since then and OMG is currently attended by ten to fifteen people regularly. Praise God! We had our first water baptism during Easter camp!

Check out our blog! http://welcome2omg.spaces.live.com/

Becky and I believe that out of this mustard seed care group will birth a God fearing and Christ loving church of European believers! So, watch this space for our updates! God bless you all.*

Joanne Mak, Hope London

* Eurolife Newsletter Issue 2, 2007