Writing and blogging

Category: Writing and blogging

Interesting Developments with my Book

1 April 2025 blogpastor Leave a comment

It has been my sincere wish and prayer that my book, “The 26 Gifts of Christ’s Finished Work”, would be used to help Third World country preachers, pastors and church planters. I was pleased when Pastor Thomas mentioned that a Myanmar pastor who runs a Bible School in Yangon can translate, and would check whether he would be willing to translate my book. I was glad to hear that. If this works out, it has to be God at work to further the work of the gospel.

My book gives a better understanding of the gospel, which is what Christ has done for us through his death and resurrection. I always remembered that John Stott said, “The greatest need of the church is to have an enlarged vision of Jesus Christ”. I pray that God will enlarge vision, strengthen faith, deepen love and establish hope for all readers and hearers. With the scarcity of understandable writings about the vastness of salvation, such a book, I pray, will bless the believers as well as the workers in the harvest field.

I praise God that surprising people have asked if they could help me sell my books. I met one last Sunday. Her name is Suzanne. She helps organize the Academy of Prophets for Prophet Amos Jayaratnam. She offered to help me promote my book to her WhatsApp chat group, and I was surprised at her kindness.

A secondary school classmate ordered a book, which I posted to him. He, too, offered to pass a copy of my book to someone in church linked to a Christian bookstore. I felt so encouraged that the Lord is opening doors for me, and I pray this book will bless many.

I have to pray because many books are bought and not read. I have many books on my bookshelf that I have yet to read. Therefore, “Lord, I pray that those whom you move to buy will also be moved to read, and that you will strengthen and enlighten them as they do so. Amen.”

On Sunday, I preached about the history of Pentecostalism as requested by the church staff. It included an account of how the Revival of 1972 had impacted the Singapore church and resulted in the formation of World Revival Prayer Fellowship. The older members were enthralled and enjoyed recalling their personal experiences and filling in missing pieces in the story. A few of them suggested I write another book about that revival. What did I feel? I felt how a new mother would feel after she had just given birth and somebody asked her, “How about having another baby?”

“The 26 Gifts of Christ’s Finished Work”: the Journey

3 March 2025 blogpastor 2 Comments

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.

Watchman Nee’s influence on me

1 February 2025 blogpastor Leave a comment

I have been influenced early in my Christian life by spiritual giants from China and India. These were Watchman Nee, John Sung, Pastor Hsi from China, Sadhu Sundar Singh, Bakht Singh and Zac Poonen from India.

I would think the books of Watchman Nee have influenced me the most since he has written scores of books about spirituality. His influence on me can be seen in my posture reflected in my book, “The 26 Gifts of Christ’s Finished Work”. I hope this book will be published by the end of February. Here are some quotes about Christ’s finished work from a few of Watchman Nee’s well-known books:

From his classic book “The Normal Christian Life”:

“God makes it quite clear in his word that he has done all that is necessary on his side. Now he is waiting for us to take an attitude that will bring us into the experience of what he has done.”

“The normal Christian life must begin with a very definite ‘knowing’, which is not just knowing something about the truth nor understanding some important doctrine. It is not intellectual knowledge at all, but an opening of the eyes of the heart to see what we have in Christ.”

“Our old history ends with the Cross; our new history begins with the resurrection.”

“The blood can wash away my sins, but it cannot wash away my ‘old man’. It needs the cross to crucify me. The sinner needs forgiveness, but the sinner also needs to be delivered from the power of sin.”

“Outside of Christ, I am only a sinner, but in Christ, I am saved. Outside of Christ, I am empty; in Christ, I am full. Outside of Christ, I am weak; in Christ, I am strong. Outside of Christ, I cannot; in Christ, I am more than able. Outside of Christ, I have been defeated; in Christ, I am already victorious.”

From his classic book “Sit, Walk, Stand”:

“Christian life does not begin with walking; it begins with sitting. We begin our spiritual life by resting in the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Christian era began with the ascension of the Lord Jesus, not with his crucifixion. He sat down at the right hand of the Father, and that is where we begin – we are seated with him in the heavenly places.”

“If we merely try to imitate Christ’s life, we will be exhausted. The secret of the Christian life is not imitation but participation. Christ has already done everything; we simply step into the reality of what he has accomplished.”

From the less-read work “The Spiritual Man”:

“The Christian life is not about trying to live for God but allowing Christ to live through us. It is not self-effort, but Christ’s power working in us.”

“Many try to crucify themselves, but we cannot crucify ourselves. God has already crucified us with Christ; we must simply reckon it so.”

From his book, “The Overcoming Life”:

“Victory is not something we work for; it is something we receive. It is not our victory – it is Christ’s victory, which he has freely given to us.”

“To overcome means to rest in Christ’s victory, to reckon upon what he has done, and to allow him to live out his overcoming life in us.”