Overjoyed

I feel so much satisfaction to hold the first book I have completed in my hands. Someone mentioned that the process is like giving birth. I can abstractly relate to that: first the pain and sorrow, then the joy and relief that the delivery went well. When the books were delivered to my home, Benjamin Foo, my publisher and founder of iPossible, was there to share in the joy. Without him, I would not know what to do next. I simply took it a step at a time. For each step, I had to trust in the Lord, leaning my whole weight on him. At the right time, Benjamin generously offered to help me through the process and I grabbed it. He is still helping me with publicity and sales.

One of the first things I did was to deliver the book to the book cover designer Grace Phua founder of O’ live & Write. Her work was amazing and elegant. I wanted her to be among the first few to see her creation in her hands.

It began with blogging and personal prophecy

Believe it or not, my journey began with blogging. The Lord blessed my blog posts and I received many affirmations and encouragement. It felt good that what I wrote enlightened and edified many Christians. I then wondered if there was a book in me and what kind of titles have been divinely deposited in me waiting to be birthed. It was nice to think about it but in those days of pastoral ministry, there was no bandwidth for such aspirations.

When I retired in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, I was invited to a dinner by P.J. John, as were Prophet Amos Jayaratnam and others. After dinner, the host requested prayer and Amos gave encouraging prophecies to everyone present. His prophecy to me was to write books. I received that word with gladness since it confirmed the aspirations that God had planted in my heart.

Since then, I have started musing and praying about subjects to write on. There were several titles and chapter outlines. I started depositing drafts into my blog chapter by chapter. When all the chapters were done, I began the tedious tasks of re-writing and editing. To my surprise, my draft required repeated edits and proofreading by a few competent persons. Then the cover was added, endorsements sought, and many other tasks that Benjamin did for me like formatting, table of contents, and ISBN registration.

I have seen how a prophetic word has inherent power to effectively accomplish what God intended it for. That power is released as we continually believe it will be fulfilled.

I also received encouragement, prayer and advice on pricing and promotion from Rev. Gabriel Han, the lead apostolic elder of Ministers Fellowship International, Singapore. I have two groups of pastors whom I met with regularly throughout this journey and they often prayed for me when I had writer’s block or procrastination cramps. Much prayer went into this book and I am most grateful to God for the strength, inspiration and insights he gave me.

Steps ahead

Now, I trust the Lord for the next step of promoting, distributing, and selling the stack of books against a bedroom wall at home. There are many ways the book may benefit readers:

• Meditations for Lent leading to Good Friday and Easter.
• Church or personal gifts to baptism candidates to ground their faith in the gospel.
• Sermon ideas for a sermon series.
• Bible study material.
• Discipleship 101 material for one-to-one or cell group discipleship.
• Slow reflection by believers who want to experience the length and breadth, height and depth of the love of God.

I hope to get this book translated and published in Third World countries like Myanmar and Nepal. In my missions to these countries, I noticed that this book can be a study for believers who want to be established in their faith and to disciple others. Furthermore, many church plants are small village fellowships where the pastors were bi-vocational and untrained. This book can be a resource material for sermon or Bible study preparation.