Outreach in Penang – Goh into the Nations! November 2019

Hello family and friends!

What a privilege we have to have spent the last 2 weeks pouring love into the city of Penang. One key ministry we have been serving in is Kawan.

Kawan

Kawan is a drop-in centre that serves the homeless community of Penang. On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings, we would be in the centre preparing lunch in the kitchen, excited to feed our hungry homeless that would stream through the doors. Usually we expect almost a hundred that would come for the meals.

Besides cooking, we also help to lead bible studies with the homeless and spend time building relationships with individuals that God lead us to. It’s an interesting challenge to lead bible study in English, Chinese, Hokkien, and Bahasa Melayu all at the same time! We even had to translate the bible study content to our Thai DTS students who sat in for the sessions. 5 languages all coming together to unpack God’s word and lead our homeless brothers and sisters into Truth. Nothing short of amazing!

We also help out at a 2nd hand shop owned by Kawan, which raises money to fund the meals at the drop-in centre. We pack and sort clothes, throwing away donated clothes that are filthy, and ironing clothes to be ready for sale. Even though it might be monotonous, we are so in awe of how God provided all these donated items to populate the shop and allow it operate for the past 10 years. 

On Saturday mornings, the centre turns into a church for the homeless. We get to share our testimonies and present song items the service. Although it is a very different picture of what church looks like, we are sure that God is so pleased with the gathering of His people in this way. 

You can read more about the ministry by visiting this link! https://ywampenang.org/ministries/kawan/

 

PENHOP

On Tuesday and Friday nights we visit PENHOP to join them in intercession and worship. We absolutely love the experience of intercessory prayer through worship, especially for our students who are new to the idea of spending extended time to hear God’s voice and pray the things upon His heart. An added bonus for us was to meet fellow Singaporeans who are serving with the PENHOP ministry. 

 

 

Street Outreach

On Wednesday nights, we would hit the streets to reach out to the homeless as a team. For the past 2 weeks we’ve been working together with another team of American youths (World Race), and it’s been refreshing to be ministering with new people outside of our team. Praise God for how He empowers Sheryl and I with a prophetic voice pointing to the revelation of Jesus as we preach the Good News. We had the opportunity to pray for our M brothers as well as prophesying over the homeless. It’s been such a fruitful time of outreach on the streets as we walk in faith. 

 

Team Status

In our first week here in Penang, our students had such a hard time adjusting to the new culture, especially our Thai students. The food, language, and culture are so different. Many of them had headaches due to the scorching weather, and all of us experience fatigue early in the day. We struggled to pull through our team meetings and stay awake for ministry, but we are thankful that we survived the initial phase together. Now, they are much more adjusted and can function much better daily. We’re thankful for your prayer covering, especially in this period of culture shock. 

How to pray for us?

1. Pray for our team to adjust well to Penang culture and weather

2. Pray for us to fix our hearts upon God’s heart and not just our tasks or our struggles

3. Pray for an evangelistic event happening this Sunday. It’s organised by the Penang government officials and involves many other Christian organisations in Penang. We will be performing an Thai dance item and sharing a testimony 

4. Pray for our team health: the food here is delicious but quite unhealthy

5. Pray for added wisdom as we serve in the capacity of a staff during this outreach

Thank you for praying with us!