UPDATES FROM MYANMAR

TOE SET (EAST faculty) and his wife Mag returned to Myanmar for more relief ministry.

Here's some news from their latest email:

"After praying and fasting, our team members decided to reach out to villages further in another region that have not yet received much help.

"These are villages that can only be reached by boat. The plan was to leave this week, bringing in medical and food supplies sufficient to reach several villages in the area.

"In preparation for this, we flew out four of our team members to Singapore to bring back medical supplies to Yangon. We arranged for them to leave in pairs on two separate days, carrying a total of 400 kg of medicines.

"Thank you for praying!
After two days of running around town from one government department to another our team finally got the approval for the release of ALL our medicines. Please continue to pray for future relief efforts. . . . "

Toe & Mag

I WILL BLESS YOUR GOING OUT AND COMING IN

RIGHT after our commencement ceremony, various ones left immediately for ministry overseas.
Tunji (Nigeria) and Siew Kim (Singapore) went to Cambodia to serve with a church.
Barnabas Jung (Korea) and his family joined a church-planting ministry in Mongolia.
Also in Mongolia was Ying Kheng (Singapore) to conduct communications and team building workshops for Mongolia Campus Crusade workers.
Anita (Singapore) led a team to the Philippines to reach out to a poverty stricken community.
Toe Set (Myanmar) returned home to help with relief ministry.
Siew Hong (Singapore) also went on relief mission, with a team to China.
This is really what EAST is about, isn't it?
All those studies, class work, exams are meant to build up to this:
giving our students values, convictions and practical skills that will be of use to God's work on earth.
Equipping people to better reach and touch people.
Developing Christlike leaders for the Great Commission.

CLOSING COMMENCEMENT SPEECH BY LIM CHIN LENG, receipient of the President's Award for Leadership 2008

EAST IS LIKE a big family for us.
Although we come from different countries and cultures, EAST is where our friendship with one another has been forged, our passion for missions has been kindled, and our love for God has been renewed.
As we look back, I am sure that many of us will remember the times we studied together in the classrooms, did our projects in the library, prayed together in chapel, ate together at Cambridge market, raided the biscuit tins in Agape Room, visited one another in our homes, and served together in the community.
We will definitely remember how we played together and won this year’s trophy for the Inter-seminary Sports Day. . . .
There is a Chinese saying饮水思源 that means as we drink the water, we should remember its source.
As we graduate, it is only right to remember and appreciate the different groups of people who made it possible for us to complete our program. 4 ‘F’s (or F4):
First, the Faculty and Administrative staff at EAST. Thank you for teaching us and modeling for us what it means to be Christ-like leaders. . . .
Second, our Family: Wife, Children, Parents, Grandparents, Brothers, Sisters, Nieces, Nephews, Aunts, and Uncles etc. . . . You even cooked wonderful meals and made sure we are well nourished, sometimes ‘overly’ nourished. J Thank you and we love you!
Third, our Friends, Alumni, Ministry Partners, Church, Pastors and Leaders. . . . May the Lord remember your generosity and bless you much more in return.
Finally, our heavenly Father, who is the reason we are all here. . . . .

Lim Chin Leng

THE ONLY WRONG WAY TO PRAY

"The wrong way to pray?"
"It's only when we don't pray."
With that, Pat Flynn (right with Gab Su) summarized his exhortation; and we started our worldwide day of prayer.
It was good to set aside a day to intercede for the lost and suffering around us.
And it was great to have Didymus (our alumnus) visit us with Peter Kashun, the head of LTC (a church planting and equipping ministry in India).
They reminded us of the tremendous challenges facing workers in India, Nepal, Bhutan, Tibet, and the countries around them.
Places that are faraway from, and sometimes forgotten by, us.
We prayed for displaced people, people under persecution, people who are blind to the gospel for centuries.
We opened the newspapers and prayed for those living in poor and war torn countries.
We shared our hearts with one another and prayed for unsaved family members.
"A day of prayer certainly puts things in perspective for me," commented one student towards the end.
"Exams are coming but they're not the most important things in life."
"What's important is to always remember there's a world out there that needs to be won for Christ."

SWEET VICTORY

No wonder they say victory is 'sweet'.
It sure tastes good.

Last Friday, at our inter-seminary sports meet, we tied with TTC and won the overall championship.
Lim N, if you're reading this, you'll be happy to know we got the Golden Boots this year round!

It was great to see everyone turning up.
The wives, babies, faculty, students and admin team.
Everyone did his or her level best to play, cheer, and connect with one another, . . . .

Besides soccer, we had captain ball, tennis (Mrs Jeong came to help us), volley-ball, dodge-ball (our girls won the gold despite playing it for the first time), and a principals-challenge of Jenga (we were all so proud when Chiao Ek won).

Enjoy the photos. Rejoice with us.
Praise God.

LONG TIME NO SEE

We did it.

We had the first alumni get-together on 16 January, a Saturday morning.

It turned out much better than I'd expected.

The group was small--22 of us faculty and alumni turned up--but cozy.

It seemed like everybody came with the same purpose: to have a good time and catch up.
Joseph--who's as funny as ever--started us off with games (very silly ones, which I was very thankful for at nine in the morning), then we got to hear from one another.

We learned what each other was doing (e.g., Wan Jee will leave for Japan in March, and Lim N, who came back for a wedding, plays football once a week with Chinese migrant workers, good for him!).

We also found out what some people did for fun in their free time, e.g., Jan plays computer games (so big already still play ah), Alfred loves gardening, Tony jogs, and Wai Ling, who's back from Melbourne for a break, is into jig saw puzzles.

Then Kenneth Bong, South-East Asian Director of OM, spoke on how we could all last long and well in ministry.

By the way, he is an alumni of sorts--with Campus Crusade's student ministry. Said he learned from us he could change the world.

So the verdict?

"Good. I enjoyed finding out about what's new at the school." said Chae-Rim.

"And it feels good seeing old friends and professors again."

back to school

After a term of much hard work, everyone took a two-week break in December.
Here's what some of us did: Bataa flew home to Mongolia to see his sister, who's diagnosed with hepatitis A.
"It was a surprise; she cried and cried when she saw me," he says.
His sister received Christ six months ago when she visited him in Singapore.
Tunji returned to the Seychelles where he served as a missionary and spoke at his church.
"I taught 70 workers church growth principles I just learned at EAST.
"And I applied what I learned on 'Steps to freedom' to help a lady who came to me for counseling."
Tunji is pleased to announce that his congregation saw the birth of a new church in a port area before he came back.
Siew Kim led a team to Cambodia on mission trip.
"God answered many prayers and we learned a lot as we reached out to the people," she shares.
Roland and Ying Kheng Tan, faculty, went to Japan to minister at a staff retreat for more than 100 Campus Crusade workers.
"It was cold--minus 3 degrees C when we left--but the hospitality of the believers and the love the Lord showed us through His provision kept our hearts warm," says Roland.