LATEST UPDATE: MAY 2010

Hello to all alumni and everyone  who  have checked into  this information column of  our  website. All I can say  is, see you in SOL! Especially at a time like this – oh, how we need to get into the spirit of prayers and pleadings, how we need to have the Father Himself pour upon us the spirit of supplication from above. ( Zech 12:10)  Do not burn for ministry (that’s why people burn out) but burn for God. As you  burn for Him, He will  take you into a lot of places you do not want to go and also do a lot of things you do not want to do;  but as you submit to Him and go and do them as obeying Him,  there will be a  great sense of  fulfillment and joy. Joy and fulfillment is always  the  by product of obedience.

 That’s what Jesus meant when He said that His meat is to do the will of God. Meat is satisfying and it ‘substantiate’ our diet. Doing  God’s will, will indeed  ‘substantiate’  and  satisfy us. Remember Jesus  told  Peter  that when he (Peter) matured in the Lord, Peter will have to stretch out his hand and  be led ‘by another’  to do the things he did not want to do. Have you learned to be led ‘by another?’  The  ‘another’  is the Lord Himself  who come to test our spiritual  maturity by leading us into places  we do not want to go and doing the things which we do not like to do Like Peter, we must learn to submit.

Certainly at  this age and stage of my life and  ministry,  ( I want to study,  pray and write)  I did not expect to  pick up a hoe  (changkol) and  dirty my feet with  farm soil to  plant vegetables or  to shop for smelly fermented tapioca to cook for ‘sea gypsies;’ to mess myself up with lice medicine and  teach them how to get  rid of  their  kutus or  to kneel on  the dirt road  under the dark sky to lead my intercessors to pray at  midnight. Neither did I expect  to teach  indigenous  or ‘kampong’ pastors  in the Bahasa Malaysia language because I know so little of this language. Well, this is what happened as I stretch out my hands like Peter  and  got  led by ’another.’  

Yes,  as  we allow the Lord to  work into our lives, the course of  our ministry will  definitely  change. Too many of us do what we like  to do and stay in it for years, that’s when the ‘brook’ dry up…and the  unfulfillment sets in. God’s  river don’t  remain the same and I am surprised at the course His river had taken me. At this strategic time of our Lord’s soon return, the greatest that we can be is to heed His voice to  “watch and pray,” so that we will be found worthy to escape the horrifying calamities ahead and  to stand before the Son of God  ( Luke 21:36)  God is  NOW calling for His church to return to priestliness. God is NOW calling for  watchmen  in the nations of the world to arise at this late hour and  when I heeded the  call, He just led me and led into  things I do not want to do but found pleasure and fulfillment  as I did them.

 To stay  back in this dingy insecure town and enter into the quiet labor of prayers and watching, to raise up other watchmen and intercessors, to impact God’s people from other nations, to write  and to continue to overseer the church here had been my focus these days. I have no conflicting stimuli, praise God for the rest He had given. Prayers and waiting in God’s presence had also been the desire and the  backbone of the life and  ministry of the rest of the other  three teachers at SOL…whose support I deeply valued. This  is why, in these trying and strategic days, SOL had turned its whole emphasis on the work of the priest, or the watchmen and intercessors.

SOL is actually the educational arm of the church, (CALVARY CHARISMATIC CHURCH ), which I planted some 28 years ago. God had lengthened this educational  arm  of the church  to touch  the  nations of the world  and it has been our joy to see students coming to the school  from almost every nation now. If  God had been directing us, then what have we been doing on the church level?   Firstly, God gave us the word He gave to Cornelius – that  only two things, prayers and taking care of the poor, were truly the things that mattered to Him. They went up as a memorial in heaven. We  have moved on to build houses for the poor and a school for poor kids. We call this RUMAH AGAPE  ( houses 18 people ) AND SEKOLAH AGAPE. Education, (not just food and gifts which is transitory ) is the thing we should give to every  child  as it arms them for the  future. We  provide two meals for them too, lunch and tea and is now catering to 130 poor kids. However poor and depleted  people may be in this life, they must have an education and the saving  knowledge of  Jesus Christ.

Secondly, we have initiated  the call to corporate prayers and unity among the churches here weekly and  will be building  a PRAYER HOUSE to cater to the needs of the churches here. The Prayer House can also serve as a camp-site or retreat for about 100 people. Both the school and the prayer house (two-storey building) should be finished by the middle of next year. Thirdly, we have also  adopted  5 ‘sea-gypsies’ teens (BAJAUS)  into our community with the purpose  of educating them so that they can return to educate  and evangelize their own people who are truly  the ‘rejects’ of societies

The Bajaus are pathetic people. They are not permitted  to  land by the authorities in  Malaysia or the  Philippines or anywhere, so they just stay in their  dirty little boats in the sea to multiply  with  filth, ‘ kutus’ and babies ! These five ‘kutued’ kids  adopted  by us  are  from our outreach church in Kunak. About 100 of them are Christians  and our strategy is to get these five kids to “come clean” of both physical and spiritual filth so  they can be impacted in the right way to return and serve their own people. These people,  had  indeed  found favor in the eyes of the Lord when they came into His saving knowledge.

We  shaved their ‘kutued’ head  bald while the two  girls had their hair shortened.  They are taught hygiene, manners and the word of God besides the regular subjects of science, phonics,  mathematics, English, etc.. I know they  missed the “ probing-pressing-scratching-looking for kutus” lifestyle;  so we teach them  how to plant vegetables and worked the soil. They  are always  hungry and had almost stripped our mango and coconut trees bare. They love salt fish, smelly fermented tapioca, sea weeds and little fishes or  anything that seems dirty, is smelly, tastes sour and of the sea!  When they are scolded,  they always scold back – in their language. I do not mind because I do not understand.

I took them to preach the gospel to their own people last evening but  they wanted to eat, so I took them to a stall that sell ‘baksu’ – a bowl of  whatever (dog  or cat meat?)  with some noodles, for just 1.50rm. Whatever meat it was, it was cheap, piping hot and delicious! Got chilly  sauce too. Yes, it has to be cheap, for every time I pay for something, it has to be  multiplied by five! You should see them eat! They wolfed down the contents,  and since the chilly sauce was free, they took plenty of it – that’s when   some of  their ‘bajau’ eyes popped,  their noses dripped  and  they opened their mouths, trying to suck in fresh air,  but well,   not a drop of soup was  left. Then they looked into my face..  I dare not ask if they want some more, we all know the answer. These teens are like bottomless pits!

 About 22 ‘Bajau’ boats  had landed here in town and these pathetic people were ‘spilling’ all over the place, sleeping on pavements near rubbish heaps and dirty drains. where rodents hang out. They sleep with rats and cockroaches. I wanted to enter one of their boats, but as I got nearer, oh …  a harbinger of nausea. I quickly pulled away as I fear I might vomit.  This family have five  kids and the eldest is a girl about eleven years. The mother told us she had prayed and waited for two years for someone to come and help them because she wanted her kids to be educated.

All her kids have glum and dirty  faces but the oldest child, Aisa, whom I found crying at the sea shore  had  a sweet but haunting face. I  knew she was in some form of suffering. Today Aisa, who was sexually abused is with us. We took her home with us when her mother begged us to. Now who washes her hair and deal with her  ‘kutus’?  Sarah and Rebecca – the  two Bajau   girls  whom we adopted   three months ago.   Aisa’s mother  is not a Christian but she had  cried out to the  great ‘God in heaven,’  to help her children. Now we know who heard her! There is only one great God  in heaven who hears the  cries of the poor, the ‘bullied,’ the  pathetic and those who are violated (like Aisa) That’s why He came to the Cross.

We cannot remain a body  of  light or  salt  if we do not do something about these people. We cannot be so pseudo-spiritual to want to go to the ends of the world  to preach the gospel  but are not willing to help the poor at  our very door-step. Why would the Lord  direct me as I was writing  my book to go and see them? He  transferred me from my comfortable office to the smelly boat. One moment I was alone and the next moment, I have these five rugged  smelly teens crawled into my car to  go evangelize  these boat people.  God  acts in accuracy! God had  heard the cry of this sea gypsy woman and connected us. Watchmen and intercessors do not just pray – we hear God’s voice in accuracy and  see what He sees to move in His timing.

This is why we opened the BM  SOL for the indigenous and BM speaking people about a year  ago.  It is called “PENJAGA.” O, we have much joy to see  so  many set free and  nourished by the word of God and by food, food, food  and food. I repeated food four times because we fed them four times a day!  I have never imagined  that  interior indigenous pastors and leaders would come here to Lahad Datu to be trained and that I would be the main one teaching them.  Again, it is hearing the voice of God and acting in  spiritual accuracy.

 I could not have done all  this if the church  I am now  pasturing  had not move on  further in the Lord, but praise God, they had. One cannot lead if others do not follow. My people were willing to add another slot of prayers, from midnight to 3:30 in the morning.  We now  have a group who comes to pray from 12 pm to 3;30 am besides the regular groups who came in from morning, noon and night. This is normalcy, yes, normal church life.  Jesus told us to “watch and  pray” so that we can be counted worthy to escape the calamities in the end times and stand before Him. (Luke 21:36) Any church that prepares for the end times must have less of other activities so that they can return to “watching and praying.”

 The quiet labor of prayers, of  watching and ministering to God had yielded much fruits, both in the church and school. The Lord had also  directed me to write two very timely books on the end times entitled,  “LIVING BETWEEN THE SEALS”  AND “MIDNIGHT PRAYERS.”  This book “ LIVING BETWEEN THE SEALS” had already been translated in India into  Tamil. Persecutions of  Christians in India  had been very  intense lately and God’s timing to have this book printed in Tamil is just  perfect.

Many had turned up for the training of WATCHMEN AND INTERCESSORS  in the first week since we initiated the training about two and a half years ago, but many did not  stay back for the follow up teaching of THE DEALINGS OF GOD AND INNER HEALING AND DELIVERANCES in the second week of school. Honestly, you  have almost missed the ‘CRUX’  of the school ! The lessons of the first week is merely to prepare you for the SECOND WEEK OF MORE INTENSE DEALINGS AND TEACHINGS FROM GOD  AND IN - DEPTH MINISTRY.

Ministry  of   INNER HEALING AND DELIVERANCES   is done very differently in the school – this is why crowds are not accepted – we minister as we teach. Deliverances  and inner healings  OCCURRED AND IS ACTIVELY WORKED INTO THE STUDENTS DURING CLASS TIME  by the sharp word of God, who ‘discover’ sins and administer healing. The anointing is strong as we seek God corporately. Often, when a rebuke is given in general, spirits will  surface as the Spirit of God moved  actively in the anointed surroundings. God declared that “the anointing breaks the yoke,” and it happens here often in the classroom. The testimonies from pastors and  lay  leaders had been overwhelming. They had told us to keep their stories confidential, so we honor their requests and did  not put in their testimonies.

Do not forget, as you apply for the 1^st week of SOL WATCHMAN,   consider  the 2^nd week too. Actually, the 1^st week  of  the school is basically for the alumni and for those who could not take leave. To set aside two weeks for the change of a lifetime is SO LITTLE!  Many alumni return because  they want deeper impact. Beyond my wildest dream, God had truly turned this insignificant insecure town into the safest place,   by transforming it into the  ‘ ENHAKKORE’  or  “Spring of the Caller”  of  Judges 15:19.  Many who are thirsty,( nigh to death like Samson,) had come to  drink and be refreshed again to serve,( like Samson) for another twenty years! See you at the school!

Susan Tang