went to church today... and church today, is at Shaw Towers (yeah, the beach road one)... lolx... but yar, it's really very very different because we're having our service right in a cinema!!! ok la, it's probably the only place that can fit in all 3 branches of our church in order for us to have our annual combined service...

but it's really kinda weird, because going to a cinema and sitting there, really makes it extremely passive... it's like when you go into a cinema, it just automatically makes you feel like you wanna retire into the comfy seat and let the music (and pictures) bring you to a fantasy world...

but that's not what a service is supposed to be... gRRR... so i was fighting a very hard battle to really sing out loud (in a cinema - my very first), against just attending a church concert... hmmz... and a presbyterian church service in a cinema ain't the best combination... yes, baptists and methodists can do that, but presbyterians? it probably matches as fittingly as holding a funeral in the Singapore Indoor Stadium... lolx...

but the sermon was really quite good... it speaks of the great multitude of facts (like how christianity takes up only a third of the world population; with another 30% of them heard of the gospel but don't believe; while the rest haven't even heard about it before)... and about how we christians can penetrate the great walls of china (and other communist and military-governed states that openly ban christianity)... he speaks of how people (like me) who received lots of blessings from God, and simply "thank god", "thank god", and more "thank god"... without actions... he speaks that in this world, if you tell people you are going to preach, the door is automatically shut... but if you tell them, "ok, i have some money, and you seemed like you needed a school, can we build it?".. there, a door is opened for us... and well, that school can be used to teach on weekdays... but weekends, a service can be conducted there... a win-win situation... it's really good, because i guess that's what many people are doing outside... and finally someone brought it up to the Presbyterian community...

hmmz... well i hope that'll really bring forth a tidal wave of people really going out to do charity using win-win situations... i believe that should be the way christians do their preaching... not going out and saying "you don't believe in jesus, you will go to hell"... but rather doing what we are taught to do based on the bible, by showing love and care for the people around us, so that by our actions, other people can see the strength, motivation and guidance we receive from a true and living god, that they will come to know the difference between themselves and christians.. as Esther brought forth in this blog post, it's really true that we christians are lagging behind... and as ironically as it seemed people who have not read, or do not subscribe to the teachings in the bible, do it better than us who actually read it over several times... as far as i know, buddhists have more (or perhaps of a larger scale) hospitals and other charity organisations than we christians have... and how then can we show to the world that we have love, when the buddhists are doing it way better than we are doing now... it'll be quite an awakening for us christians if we really take this note and work on it... the world would be a better place if we christians were to really commit ourselves to servicing our community more...