T4C's Venezuela Short Term Mission

Venezuela STM Sharing Night at T4C (8/1: 8 - 9:30 PM)

2008-07-08T22:42:00.001-07:00

What did we learn from our short term mission trip? What did we see in our trip? To answer your questions, our short term mission team is going to share our experience at T4C from 8 to 9:30 PM on 8/1 (Friday). Mark it on your calendar and hear more of our exciting stories and God's mighty power!

Day 11 (6/30): Coming back to Minnesota

2008-07-08T22:25:00.000-07:00

Salida

10 days have gone by really fast and our mission trip came to an end before we noticed. We had to say goodbye to our new friends made in Venezuela. Thank God for the safe flight and we were welcomed by our family and friends at the MSP airport :D

Adiós, our dear friends in Venezuela!

Thank all of you who greeted us at the airport :D

We couldn't thank God enough for His provision, guidance, protection, grace, and much more. He's watched us over in the 12-day trip and protected us through ailments, a potentially bad car accident, and most importantly He's let us experience His greatness, love, grace, and gave us the opportunity to participate in His ministry. God, you're wonderful and amazing!

Day 10 (6/29): Worshipping God on Last Day in Venezuela

2008-07-08T21:54:00.000-07:00

It was funny that a friend asked me if we got stuck in Caracas since the blog stopped at day 9. To make people not to worry about us, we decided to wrap up our blog and tell our dear friends that we did fine and came home safely. Here's the retrospect of our last couple days in Venezuela.

Busy Sunday

You might think we could relax after we were back to Caracas. We actually had a very busy Sunday since we attended Sunday service at both Baptist Church in Caracas and Iglesia Evangelica China "Gracia de Dios".

We attended the Baptist Church in the morning.

Grace and Norman shared their testimonies. Grace told us how God led her through the hard days of raising her three kids alone and God has saved her familiy from fire which burnt part of her house. You might think one would be mad at God for all the bad things that have happened but Grace acknowledged God was her protector and Lord. She couldn't praise Him enough.

Grace shared with us how God led her through the hard days.

Is getting rich your only goal in life? Do you think there's something more important than money? What's your purpose of life? Before Norman knew Christ, he was no different than many people who pursued their American dream and put in numerous hours on building wealth until he got to know Christ through his wife many years later. He repented for his sin and found his true meaning of life and joy on earth. He vowed not to leave God, re-prioritized his life and now enjoys family time with his lovely wife and kids. May God be glorified, amen!

Norman has been living a new life since he knew Christ.

Pastor Har gave a sermon on the gospel and invited non-believers to accept Christ as their personal Savior. Praise the Lord one gal decided to re-commit her life to Christ and another young man felt led to accept Christ as his Savior!!! It was very encouraging to us the mission team.

Pastor Har told us the key to have an eternal life.

Some of our mission team members also performed a couple songs with Pastor Har's flute music during the service.

Along with Pastor Har's flute music, we sang "Yahweh is Love" and "Jesus is My Best Friend".

Day 9 (6/28): We're safely back to Caracas

2008-06-28T20:50:00.000-07:00

Safely Back to Caracas

Thank you all of you for your prayers. We've arrived at Caracas safely this morning. Pastor Har is going to give sermon in two churches tomorrow. Please keep him in your prayers that he can sleep well tonight, Sunday service will run smoothly, and people will accept Christ as their Savior tomorrow.

Have a blessed Sunday tomorrow!

Day 8 (6/27): Last visitation and Goodbye to Punto Fijo

2008-06-28T08:20:00.000-07:00

Last Visitation

Pastor Har and Norman visited the two guys in the picture a couple times. In the first visit, the man on the right hand side accepted Jesus Christ as his Savior but the man on the left hand side wasn't ready and he was distracted in the middle of the visit. Pastor Har and Norman decided to go back for a second visit and the man who rejected the gospel the first time was very interested in the gospel and made the decision to be Christ's follower!!! (Pastor Har could share with you the details of this exciting story!) Praise the Lord two more people have entered the Kingdom of God.

These two men accepted Christ as their Savior and Lord in this trip, praise the Lord!

Grace, Alicia, and other people visited a couple and the accessory shop owner during the same visit period.

We took the bus back to Caracas at 9 PM. It was a very meaningful trip to Punto Fijo and all of us have learned a lot, may it be sharing our faith, seeing God's work in Punto Fijo, or learning about teamwork. We can't thank God enough for the opportunity to participate in His ministry through this short term mission trip.

Day 7 (6/26): Visitation Again and Workshop "From Sichuan to Venezuela"

2008-06-27T15:53:00.000-07:00

Visiting More People

We continued visiting more people and sharing with them what we believed and how they could have an eternal life. Some of them were very receptive but some showed less interest. In either way, we did our best to share with them our faith and let God do the rest no matter what their responses were. Our team leader reminded us several times not to focus only on the result though it was important but also focus on the process. God asks us to be faithful servants but not high achievers. This is another important lesson we´ve learned in this trip.

These believers have missed church for a while. We encouraged them to attend church again.

Story time by our guest. We little girls are listening to his sharing on history and views on life. We also tried to share our faith with him but he wasn't ready for accepting Christ yet.Please keep him in your prayers.

Brother Keung and Pastor Har shared with this man about our faith and loving God.

Grace and Lisa offered prayers for this young lady during the visit.

We told the lady in white and the man in orange about our amazing God.

Workshop: From Sichuan to Venezuela - Where Can You Find True Peace?

A severe earthquake just happened in Sichuan, China, less than two months ago. Robbery happens in Venezuela every day, many people live in distress. Where is peace? Where can we find true and long-lasting security? Can we find a place without any crimes? Where are we going after this life? Pastor Nip and Mr. Leung shared with us we could find true peace and they could overcome the fear of being robbed again. The key is knowing God who is the way, truth, and life. Do you know God already?

Mr. Leung shared with us his experience of being robbed and how he overcame the fear.

Pastor Nip told us where we could find true peace.

Whisky :D (it's equivalent to "Cheers" in the US) The three people sitting on the left in the first row are new believers!

Day 6 (6/25): Congrats to New Believers and Workshop on Faith Strengthening

2008-06-26T14:16:00.000-07:00

Another Day of Visitation.... With Great News!

Alicia's eyes were slightly infected and she sort of had pink eyes. She got some eye drops and rested for a day. Thank God she felt better in the evening.

The rest of us were divided into different teams and visited different people in town. One group visited a new believer who is a young mother who has been busy taking care of her 2-year-old daughter and taking in charge of an expanding convenient store with her husband. Since she's busy with work and family, she hasn't been able to attend church in a while even though she has a desire to know God better. We showed our care for her and gave her a book on Christianity basics. We hope the local fellowship will follow up with her and may she grow in Christ continuously.

Pastor Har, Muling, and Norman visited a few people and a couple. Praise the Lord a young couple accepted Christ as their personal Savior and Lord after listening to the gospel!!!! We were all very excited and happy for them now that they've become our brother and sister in Christ.

God bless this new believing couple!

Pastor Har's team also visited four other guys. The guy in dark orange top accepted Christ that day!

God so loves us that He sent His one and only beloved son to die for us so our relationship with God was restored. Thank you, Jesus!

Workshop on Faith Strengthening through Mutual Support at Church

Why do some spiritual giants have such strong faith? How did they attain that? Can we achieve that just like them? If you want to, yes, you can certainly grow strong in faith. Thanks to Pastor Har for teaching us how to strengthen our faith. Thank God we don't have to do this alone.

Pastor Har shared with us how to strengthen our faith.

A few of us sang a couple songs accompanied by Pastor Har's flute music. The audience liked it a lot and requested Pastor Har to play more music after the talk. (Pastor Har could consider being a flutist in the future ;) We then played a team game to better understand what is needed in an effective team. Pastor Har told us our faith could be strengthened not only through God's Word but also through other people.

Our fluist Pastor. Everyone enjoyed his music.

This pregnant young lady and her husband just accepted Jesus Christ that morning, praise the Lord!

Day 5 (6/24): Visitation and Workshop

2008-06-24T09:47:00.001-07:00

Visitation

After a night of rest, we again were divided into groups and visited some people working in convenient stores. Dr. Wan, Lisa, Grace, and Vivian were accompanied by Florence from Punto Fijo Fellowship to visit people working at an accessory store and a convenient store. We learned more about them and showed them our care.

What's the typical life for Chinese in Caracas and Punto Fijo like? A lot of them are from Guangdong Province in China. Some of them immigrated to Venezuela with their whole families and some still have family members in China. It's very common for them to send their young kids back to China for education. As a result, the family members are scattered around and can't enjoy quality family time. Some young adults might come to Venezuela for better opportunities but due to the language barrier, it could be hard for them to get a job and make friends. They could feel very lonely and bored but felt there were no other options. Safety is an issue in Venezuela. Robbery and kidnapping happens very often and this is detrimental to the development of a society.

We listened them and shared with them they could be hopeful and find the truth and light in Jesus Christ. At the end of the visit, we prayed with them and invited them to come to our workshops in the next few days. For sure life for immigrants is hard but God knows our hardship. He empowers us and leads us through. God, we so need you!!!

Grace and Florence prayed with a lady who's working at a convenient store.

Dr. Wan and Vivian prayed with this young lady before they left. (Don't get me wrong, Vivian is NOT shopping:P)

Some sharing from Grace:

This trip has reminded me how blessed I am to have a good church to attend, much love from brothers and sisters at T4C. I love T4C and all of you, my dear brothers and sisters in Christ!! Brothers and sisters in the Restaurant Fellowship, I miss you all!!!

More Visits

One team visited a couple other families in the afternoon. They've overcome many challenges after moving to Venezuela from China such as learning Spanish, getting used to a different lifestyle, meeting new people, and finding jobs. One of their relatives is going through a really tough time so the whole family is discouraged and feels somewhat hopeless. We shared with them our faith and God can bring us hope and lead us through. Our life is in His hands, God can build us up through challenges so that we can carry out His plan upon us. May you all know Christ and live an abundant life as promised by God!

Workshop on Married Couples Communication 101

No one is immune from interacting with other people in the community. Teamwork is emphasized over and over again at workplace and communication is a critial key to make it successful. It seems like we practise communication every day but why do so many people complain their message isn't heard or their feelings are neglected by their spouses no matter how hard they try? Are women really from Venus and men from Mars? Dr. Wan gave us some tips on effective communication and shared with us five love languages between couples:

1. Words of affirmation; 2. Quality time; 3. Gifts; 4.Service; 5. Physical touch

These skills aren't only applicable to couples but also in other relationships (hey, tip #5 physical intimacy is reserved for married couples though.)

All communication experts-to-be are paying attention to Dr. Wan 's talk.

Participants engaged in the workshop and shared their examples and experiences. It was a good evening.

Story time: The workshop was planned to be held in a hotel conference room but it poured before the worshop began and electricity was out. in the entire neighborhood. After waiting for 30 minutes, we decided to hold the workshop to Willam and Florence's house. (William and Florence are part of the host team of Punto Fijo Fellowship.) Many thanks to both of them for opening their house. We also found it cozier to hold such workshop in their house. Thank God for His better plan :D

Day 4 (6/23): Riding to Punto Fijo

2008-06-24T09:07:00.000-07:00

Let's go!

On 6/23, we took a bus ride to our second stop of this trip, Punto Fijo. We were told the bus would be like a freezer and were suggested to bring thick jackets. To our surprise, it was pretty hot in the bus because the air-conditioner and some mechanics weren't working quite right. We had to stop on the road on our way to Punto Fijo and the driver fixed it. All passengers were a little worried if the bus was fine and how long it would take the driver to fix it. Thank God that it only took the driver 15 minutes to get it going again!

Look at us, we were ready for the second stop except that lazy Viv was dozing off, zzz :) (Hope she wasn't snoring too loudly.)

We were waiting in line to hop onto the bus to Punto Fijo, yay!

Our skillful driver fixed the bus in a flash.

Safely Arrived

After 9 hours of ride, we finally arrived at Punto Fijo at 8 PM. Thank God for His protection throughout the long ride. Brothers and sisters from the local fellowship treated us with much love. They picked us up at the bus station and took us out for a late dinner. Apology to starve them for a long time (well, food tastes even better when we're real hungry so they should thank us, right? :)

Cheers :D Look at our happy faces after the long ride and a yummy dinner!

Day 3 (6/22 The Lord's Day): Market and Worship

2008-06-22T09:49:00.000-07:00

Reaching out at Chinese Market

"Social Club China" is packed with people every Sunday morning

Where would you think to be a good contact point to reach out to people? Restaurants? Subway stations? Starbucks? Supermarket? We went to the "Social Club China in Caracas" on Sunday morning. This is a place where people can buy fresh veggies, poultry, Chinese drama VCD, Chinese style accessories, etc. It's like the farmer's market in the US. This market was packed with Chinese and native Venezuelans busy doing grocery shopping.

There were people standing by the entrance of this market to wait for their family or friends. Some were listening to music or chatting. Our team members grasped the opportunity to talk to them and find out more about them and invited them to join us for Sunday service and meet some cool people. Most of them came from China and have encountered much hardship and have been trying real hard to fit into the culture. They showed hints of frustration about life but couldn't figure out a way out and seemed lonely and bored. This doesn't only happen in Venezuela but sounds familiar among any new immigrants in foreign countries.

Pastor Har talked to a couple men (the standing one and the one in a white top sitting on a chair)

One of the people we spoke with were a little reluctant when we first approached her but her attitude has changed later and even showed up at church in the afternoon!!! We couldn't thank God enough! We also handed out "Chinese Today" gospel magazines to some vendors. Hope they'll enjoy reading the testimonies and learn more our true God in the universe. God has everything planned out and this social gathering place could very well be a focal point of where the gospel is spread out in Caracas not only to the Chinese but people of all nations.

Sunday School in Caracas

Pastor Har, Dr. Wan, Muling, Alicia, and Lisa taught three different Sunday school classes on "Why Study the Bible", "Q&A for New Believers", and "Lessons from Joseph" before Sunday service at 4 PM. We hoped the believers would be better equipped with God's Word for their growth in Christ and this fitted one of the 5P's we talked about yesterday (hint: please check the first P).

Worshipping God together

At Sunday service, we started worshipping our God with songs in both Cantonese and Spanish. Though the congregation consisted of people who speak different languages and with different background, we were united together because of Jesus Christ. He's the head of the Church and links all of us together through His love and salvation for us. It was a beautiful picture :D (The Spanish worship songs were VERY WONDERFUL too!!! :) Well, we've to admit the great worship team played a big role too. (Come back for snapshots of Sunday school and Service!)

We praised our God together.

Dr. Wan gave a sermon based on Paul's teaching in 1 Tim. 4:12 on "2 Attitudes and 3 Hearts" (兩意三心) (2 attitudes: sincerity,(言語中要有誠意) respect (行為上要有敬意); 3 hearts: love (愛心), faith (信心), and purity (清潔的心)). Thank God for His Word as the lamp unto our feet and light in our path. May we all grow in Christ and walk the walk in Christ together.

Dr. Wan gave a sermon on 1 Tim. 4:12.

Next Stop

We're headed to Punto Fijo tomorrow which is 8 hours from Caracas. We'll keep you posted on our eventful journey.

Your participation: Please pray for us to have safe trip to Punto Fijo; our safety there; wisdom to say the right things at the right time to people there; courage to share with them the gospel and our testimony; physical strength; unity among team members.

Something funny for you: It's 1:10 AM right now (we're just 30 min ahead of the US, yea, that's right, it's 30 min) and one of our teammates just got up and was going to get ready for the Punto Fijo bus ride. She was puzzling why the night felt so short and I just put her to bed again, LOL :D (Don't ask me who she is :P)

Day 2 (6/21): Visitation

2008-06-22T08:42:00.000-07:00

On the second day of our trip, we were divided into three teams and partnered with brothers and sisters from Iglesia Evangelica China "Gracia de Dios" to visit a few families in the morning. Sine of them have been in Venezuela for a long time but some have only been here for a couple years and are still trying to get used to the lifestyle and society here. Some of them attended church in the past but have missed it for different reasons and some are new to church. Each of them has a unique story and our team members were
priviledged to learn more about them and the challenges facing them.

The first picture below shows the Central which is equivalent to our downtown. There're many stores and street vendors. We visited some store workers on the first day of our trip.

In the afternoon, we attended the Spanish Fellowship targeted at the Spanish speaking youth and young adults. Their worship team did a fantastic job in leading us to worship our Lord with not only our hearts but also our voice.

"Praise the LORD. Sing to the LORD a new song, his praise in the assembly of the saints." (Psalm 149:1) We so enjoyed worshipping our God through music.

The Iglesia Evangelica China "Gracia de Dios" is practising God's teaching of preaching the gospel to all nations. The second generation of Chinese immigrants make use of their unique gift of knowing both Chinese and Spanish to reach out many Spanish speakers and expand God's Kingdom together!

Alicia and Lisa shared with us how God led them through different challenges in the past and they concluded God is our great and loving God for He created our inmost being and knitted us together in our mother's womb. He has plans for us way before we were born. They trust God will continue to guide them for the rest of their lives. Following Alicia and Lisa's sharing, Muling told us her story and how God has changed her over the years since she accepted Jesus Christ as her Savior and Lord.

In the evening, Dr. Wan continues to share with us some secrets of serving God together as a team, "5P" which refers to

Be Prepared

Be People Oriented

Be Present

Be Passionately

Be Proactive

These principles can help us in all interpersonal relationships.

God is an awesome God and bestows His blessings upon us and gives us an abundant life! If you want to know more about God, please let us know and we'd be more than happy to tell you about Him!

Day 1 (6/20): We're here!!!!

2008-06-20T22:19:00.000-07:00

Guess where we were in the picture? You bet, we arrived here in Venezuela! We couldn't thank God enough for letting Alicia and Lisa to enter the country without a hitch. Praise to our loving heavenly Father for His protection and provision. Thank God for being in our team as our great translators together with Muling. Wait a min, where is Muling in the picture??

After starving for hours (just kidding, we actually enjoyed a late night meal in the plane), we enjoyed our first breakfast in Venezuela. See how hungry Alicia, Lisa, and Vivian were :D

We were actually worrying about Muling when we were having breakfast because we lost touch of her. She landed in Venezuela in the evening of 6/19 but our friends missed her at the airport and couldn't find her till 3:30 AM. We couldn't get a hold of her nor heard from her. We decided to head to the hosting church. After an hour, Muling called us and we united, yay!

After our first lunch in Venezuela, we had a meeting and prayed together before we visited our brothers and sisters in Christ in downtown Caracas.

You might wonder how Venezuela looks like. I had the same question too before I came. Here's a picture of some housing of the needy people in the society. These houses aren't structurally sound and many of them collapsed during a landslide a few years ago. When our car drove close to these hills, we could see tons of bags of trash were on the hills. Thanks to Minister Chan and Fernando for helping us know more about this country and the life of people. They also told us traffic could be very bad (I mean, VERY bad) here so people might be real late for meetings (well, no one is considered late, it's all the traffic's fault, right?:)

We were divided into two teams and each team visited a few people who were working in different stores. They all welcomed us. We're learning a lot about their life and challenges facing them. Some of them showed strong faith in Christ and they're our encouragers. We're blessed to hear how Jesus has changed their lives and continues to lead them to live an abundant life. God is an awesome and God of everyone! We were also thankful for some brothers and sisters in Christ to take the day off to accompany us the whole day. They're great hosts!

In the evening, Dr. Wan gave a talk on "3 secrets of coworking" based on Paul's coworking experience with his brothers and sisters in Christ. There were about 30-40 attendees and the presentation was well received. We're so encouraged to see so many people at the workshop.

After the workshop, we had a briefing before bed. It was an eventful day filled with God's joy and peace. Time to go bed now, zzz.

Day 0 (6/19): Leaving for Venezuela!

2008-06-20T22:06:00.000-07:00

After a few months of preparation and anticipation, we finally set off for our Venezuela trip! It was a very exciting start of a 12-day journey to experience God, see His work in other parts of the world, and have the honor to participate in His ministry.

We've witnessed God's provision at the airport. How? The airline staff didn't give the twins any hard time regarding their passports. They were issued the boarding passes without any problems. Throughout the whole process, they've learned a big lesson on trusting in God and this further strengthened their faith and walk with God. It was an invaluable lesson. Their next challenge back then was to see if they could enter Venezuela or not.

Thanks to those who sent us off on 6/19. Thanks for your prayers and sharing with us our exciting moment :D

Come back to our blog again to walk this short term mission trip journey with us!

Why are we going?

2008-06-19T14:08:00.000-07:00

An experienced short-term missionary from our church asked us why T4C should send us to Venezuela though it seems inefficient in terms of expenditure and church planting effort. I'm sure many of you have the same questions. Both he and our team leader have reminded us important things. Often times, we think WE are doing great work in Venezuela but the reality is we're actually there to LEARN. We're learning to be FAT: Faithful, Available, Teachable! (How often do you hear being fat is good?? :)

So here we go, we're learning to be FAT!

We're leaving soon!!!

2008-06-19T14:02:00.000-07:00

It's finally 6/19!!! We're leaving for Venezuela in 3 hours!!! A few praises:

1. Alicia and Lisa are going with us! They're using their old passports. Hope they'll get through just fine.
2. God's provision is sufficient. He's blessed us much financial support so we've met our fundraising goal of $8400!! Thank you all of you for your generous gift.
3. We had a teleconference with our team leader last Sunday and an experienced short-term missionary shared with us his experience and gave us some tips which were helpful.

Our schedule:
6/19 Leave MPS at 7 PM
6/20 Arrive at Caracas at 5:30 AM
6/23 Bus ride to Punto Fijo
6/27 Bus ride back to Caracas
6/30 Fly back to MPS

Prayer requests:
1. Pray for whomever we're going to encounter. Hope the non-believers will accept Jesus as their Savior and Lord.
2. Our safety, health.
3. Unity among us.
4. Let go of worries, have peace.

We're going to post our updates here in the next week and a half, stay tuned!

Urgent Prayer Requrest

2008-06-11T21:32:00.000-07:00

Alicia and Lisa have sent in their passport renewal applications a couple months ago but still haven't gotten them back yet and the situation is getting tougher since there's only a week left before we set off. We need your prayers!!!

Like Dr. Wan said, "The Devil would do all things fearing us or making us in doubt to our Lord. But we're experiencing what our mighty God will do for us. Let's pray and pray to witness the Holy presence of the Lord who has promised us "And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age." (Matt 28:20)". We're not desperate and no matter what's going to happen, we're in His hands. Alicia wrote, "Things happen for a reason, nothing is by accident." Let's put our faith in our almighty God and see what He'll do for us.

Our team from T4C

2008-05-26T20:57:00.000-07:00

Praise the Lord for putting together a team of six people from Twin City Chinese Christian Church (T4C)'s Cantonese congregation to go on a mission trip to Venezuela from 6/19 - 6/30. We're all excited to see God's work in Venezuela real soon.

There's only less than a month left and yet we have a lot of preparation to do before the trip. God will help us through :)

Which cities are we visiting? We're visiting the capital of Venezuela, Caracas, and Punto Fijo (we'll post our schedule later, we only have a tentative one at this moment).
We're excited to create this blog to share with you our updates. Stay tuned for further information. (Sorry that all the info here is from the support letter :P)