See China Right In Front of You

November has been a month of confirmation after confirmation. I just have to write it all down since I seem to express myself better through this blog - which is also my little outlet to document the different changes in my life.

As some of you know I've felt the Spirit tug on my heart about China since the summer of 2003. It was a gentle prodding of the heart. Through the past year the Master Planner was piecing each puzzle piece together bit by bit. Obviously, without me realizing it all. The tug grew stronger as time went by and finally it lead to this past summer where the calling to East Asia was simply undeniable. There's something so significant and so affirming about finally being on Chinese soil...

Anyway, much has happened in between that time - lots of God stories, especially this summer. But tonight, I want to blog about the past 20 days of this month.

At the beginning of Nov. I was invited to go down to Atlanta for a short two day meeting with Passion Network. Having the privilege to literally 'sit under' Louie Giglio, a visionary and a man of His heart, I heard him speak of university campuses all over the world. China in particular. Being in the States and having expected to hear about what God is doing on college campuses in North America - I was taken aback at his 'in tune-ness'/understanding the times, where the number of college aged students are alarmingly ginormous in China. He spoke about how these Chinese college students would be the future leaders of the next superpower. What influence they will have on this whole earth...

Later on in the month Mike and I got the chance to sit down with some leading pastors of the Chinese churches here in Toronto. We were all gathered at the dinner table for Dr.Philemon Choi from Breakthrough in Hong Kong. Mike and I had the honor of meeting this elderly man - [who reminds me of Abraham (his faith, his obedience etc.) and who was also appointed by the government of Hong Kong as a counselor for the youth of the tiny island], in Macau during the CCOWE conference.

That night he spoke of his love for our mother country and his heart for re-building the New China through the marketplace. He desires to see honest business people, engineers, doctors, teachers and the like full of integrity, going into this great nation to help rebuild the infrastructure - ranging from the society to the economy. Dr.Choi also exhorted Mike and I in front of all these senior pastors saying that 'we' (the young Asian Canadian/American adults) are the future of the Chinese church. Things will be done very differently in our day and age. To reach this rich, vast, beautiful piece of land - we must go through the marketplace with honest intentions to rebuild this country.

This past weekend the people from EQUIP (John C. Maxwell is the founder of this leadership group) have been coming to my home church for leadership training for the past few months. Dr.John Hull (President) has been training our pastoral staff and has also been a common preacher on our pulpit on Sunday's, was here again this past Sunday. He brought along, Dr.Doug Carter who partnered with John Maxwell to start EQUIP, who also preached for the English service yesterday.

He spoke about the importance of multiplication opposed to addition. Our churches are very good at bringing in the 'numbers' - adding on - and sustaining it for various reasons. We're excellent at addition. But we're just not at the multiplication process yet. (For example, you train two people, those two people train another two people, now four people train another two each and so forth) Actually, I'm not very good at this whole multiplication process. But I guess it grows as you grow.

Anyway, he talked about how in his 50+ years of ministry it is only recently that he has been super excited about serving the Chinese people. He's fallen in love with us! He shared some pretty amazing stories and an exciting new adventure that involves EQUIP, RHCCC, a million leaders and my dear China.

In any case, after service Dr.John Hull and Dr.Doug Carter wanted to have lunch with the young adults (and it was also FREE!) so a bunch of us went. I wasn't even hungry. I was way more interested in hearing what Dr.Carter had to say about China. EQUIP has a similar heart and vision of Dr.Philemon Choi of Breakthrough in the sense that they want to invest and deposit into this great nation leaders in the marketplace as well as other sectors of society.

EQUIP has a vision called the Million Leaders Mandate. Their heart is to raise up one million leaders worldwide. They have already surpassed this seemingly lofty goal. They were in Hong Kong this summer holding the leaders conference - it filled up fast so we didn't get a chance to attend. But they showed a bit of the video at my service yesterday. I saw people from The Vine there!!

Anyway - yesterday's detailed talk was awesome - if you want to know more about how God's affirming things on that side of the world. Message me and we'll talk more!

Today, I got the opportunity to meet Jaeson Ma. I first caught wind of what he was doing over a year ago when a friend sent me a link to his blog. God was using him to literally preach to the student body in UCLA. Much fruit came out of his boldness and obedience. Ever since his inspiring story that led many of us here in Toronto to take action - his name has been popping up everywhere. From meeting people in Hong Kong and even in Macau who have told me to connect with him.

It wasn't until another friend mentioned meeting him in Taiwan that put things a little closer to home. So finally, after a while, I got the chance to sit under him and learn from him. Man oh man, can I say just how 'in tune' to the Spirit he is?! Everything that he spoke about tonight, all the 'long stories made short' were complete reflections of what I've been hearing from the Lord and from individuals about East Asia. The Lord used him to open my eyes about a lot of what has gone on in the past - from Youth on a Hill to unity gatherings at York to the present day and how that all somehow ties into my potential future in the mother land. The big picture isn't complete yet.

He said, "You feel a strong tugging and burden for your motherland, you don't know how and you don't know why. But you just know that whenever anyone speaks of it you have goosebumps on your arms, your heart beats a bit faster and your whole face just lights up. You feel this because it's sovereign."

In the past month - God has led me to four different spiritual 'giants' who have invested and deposited into me wisdom as well as confirmation and affirmation to my convictions of the past 2.5 years. I know that all this is not by accident. Although my heart literally aches to be in a place where the window of opportunity is open - I know that I am here to be here right now. I need to trust God in His plans for me and East Asia. He knows best.

But gosh - after sitting under these men of God and learning from them...what's next? I can't help but wonder why the Lord has allowed me to see, hear and experience all this right now. I get goosebumps just thinking about how eerily similar these four different encounters are since they are from people of different ministries, ages, backgrounds and races. Their message to me sounds as one: China is on the rise.

May my eyes see and perceive and may my ears hear and understand.

"See China right in front of you..."
Beautiful Day -U2