Haven't had a chance to blog about this until now, but last Friday at youth group, Carmen fell and was injured while playing a game. She's mostly ok, though there are a couple of things we have to do to make sure everything's fine. It's a bit of a hassle, and there will be ongoing medical costs, but we're thankful that her injury wasn't worse (it could have been much worse).

Give thanks that Carmen's injury was relatively minor and that we were able to get help for her very quickly. Pray for her as she recovers not only physically but also mentally and emotionally from the shock and the stress.

Thanks to everyone who prayed for my sermon on Saturday. I was so nervous that I had sweaty palms beforehand! But as far as I can tell from a human point of view, it seemed to have gone alright. In my preparation, I struggled to find a good balance between an evangelistic sermon (which the couple wanted) and a wedding sermon. In the end I was happy with the final script, and I think the delivery was what I wanted as well.

In hindsight, I think I found it easier than preaching at my normal church service. With a larger congregation, there's always someone who will laugh at your jokes. Whereas those same jokes may not have gotten to same response on Sunday, I imagine.

Not that humour is the measure of the quality of a sermon. But when people laugh at your jokes, you feel more relaxed as a preacher because you know that the congregation is on the same wave length as you and are therefore following your train of thoughts. Whereas if a joke falls flat, you think, "How can they understand my exposition if they can't even understand my jokes?"

Give thanks to God who enabled me to prepare a clear message which was able to engage the congregation as well as speak to the newlyweds. Pray for the non-Christians (especially the father of the groom) who heard the gospel that God will use that to stir their hearts to seek him.

I am preaching my first wedding sermon tomorrow. It's for a good friend, so I'm a bit nervous!

Pray that I will speak clear and faithfully from the Scriptures, and that the message will be relevant to both Christians, non-Christians and the couple getting married.

Pray also for the newlyweds that their love for each other would be modeled on the love between Christ and the church.

This is something my church is organising for students in Year 11 & 12 and their parents. It's not a Christian event (though all the presenters are Christians), but simply an opportunity to contribute something to the community.

Pray for the presenters that the seminars will be helpful to students who are anxious about their HSC. Pray also that this event will help raise the profile/awareness of our church in the community, and that in the midst of helping people with their earthly problems that there may be opportunities to deal with deeper spiritual problems.

One week to go! Registrations close this Sunday.

In my previous post, we saw that many Chinese people live in the South, particularly in Hurstville. In fact, there are more Chinese people living in suburb of Hurstville than anywhere else in Australia. Here is the breakdown of the top 10 suburbs populated by Chinese people in NSW (click the image for a larger version):


As you can see, Hurstville is way out on top by a large margin! And on top of that, Chinese people make up a staggering 44% (10,269 out of 23,333 people) of the population in Hurstville! - even higher than Haymarket.


And not only is Hurstville full of Chinese people who live there, but it is also the gathering place for Chinese people. I have no official statistics to prove this, but walk through the main road on any day of the week and you can see that's where lots of Chinese people of all ages gather. It's the real Chinatown of Australia!!

Hurstville also has good public transport (at least by Australian standards). On weekdays, there are trains to the City on average every 4 mins in peak hour and every 8 mins in off-peak time. Plus there are 18 bus routes that services this suburb.

Add all that together and you can see that Hurstville is a great place to do ministry!

Pray for the many Chinese people who live in this suburb and the surrounding areas that God may have mercy upon them. Pray that their hearts will be prepared to hear the gospel and that God may bring them into contact with Christians who will introduce them to Jesus.

PS Andrew Hong had already posted these same statistics a few months back. But I thought it'd be good to do it again since it's directly relevant to my ministry.

Had an "interesting" day at church yesterday.

UP: Found out one of my youth group girls became a Christian on Saturday night at the Yeah Show. Everyone was very happy to hear the news and welcomed her into the family.

Praise God for bringing her to a saving knowledge of his Son Jesus. Pray that she will crave spiritual milk as a newborn and that we as a church community will help her to grow and mature as she begins her new life.

DOWN: There has been a number of rumours in the Cantonese congregation stemming from money issues that has caused a division in the church and one family to leave us. There was a meeting yesterday and what I hope was the start of a peaceful resolution.

Pray for a spirit of unity amongst all the members such that the gates of Hades may not prevail against it. Pray that we will entrust our worries about money to God who richly provides us with everything we need. Pray also for the pastors and leaders as we seek to heal the hurt and find a way forward.

Here are some interesting statistics from the 2006 census that I found on the Australian Bureau of Statistics(ABS) website:

• There were 4 million people living in Sydney in 2006.
• 6.8% (281,305) of those were Chinese.
• 15.4% (33,568) of those live in the St. George Region (SGR) - what I call 'the South' (sorry Shire friends).

The ABS census collects data in 3 regions (technically called Statistical Local Areas): Hurstville, Kogarah and Rockdale. Don't confuse these regions with the suburbs. This is how many Chinese people live in each region (click for larger image):

Hurstville Region: 15,169	Kogarah Region: 9,221
Rockdale Region: 9,178

Here is a composite image:

As you can see, many of them live in the suburb of Hurstville. More on this later.

Pray for this rich harvest field that there would be more workers sent out to preach the good news.