STEP 2019 Final Assignment - Shaun Yip

Yip Ze Yong Shaun

Synod Training Exposure Programme

May 27, 2019

STEP Final Assignment

          Thank God for being able to join this STEP programme, at first I was quite reluctant to join as I was supposedly going to training for work. But, God gave me a training for my life as a Christian. In the end, I still went for the STEP programme. It was a life changing experience for me as a young Christian that only accepted Christ for only 4-5 years.

           The weekend before the camp I was anxious that I might not be able to make a lot of friends cause I thought that this STEP programme will be a big programme that has 50 over participants. But thank God that on Saturday night, I went for my youth leader, Alvin’s birthday dinner. And during the dinner I talked to a brother-in-Christ that went for STEP last year which is Jia Le. 

And Jia Le filled me in on my doubts when I questioned about STEP, and thank God because He is amazing and He assured me on my doubts and gave me a courageous heart to face the rest of the 3 weeks, regardless of presentations or sharing about my experiences with God in the past, how I came to know Jesus etc.

The first week of the STEP was very enriching and fruitful as I learnt a lot from talking to different people from different churches, and God was speaking through Uncle David to me. I was serving for 2 years in church as a pianist, and during the 2 years of serving, all I knew was that I was serving for God and nothing else more. 

But little did I know that I was slowly turning it into an obligation, then into convenience. I got to this point where I was serving and I don’t know what I am actually serving for, except the fact that I am doing all this for God. And then I start to think about the first time I was serving God. Back then when I was in church for 2 years, I saw all these people serving and I thought one day I want to be like them, serving my God.

And after 2 years later I got the chance to serve Him with myself equipped for it, thank God for giving me the gift and the opportunity to serve Him and I promised Him to do it well. And back to the first day of the STEP programme, God was immediately speaking to me, answering the question I have been asking Him for the answer for the past few months. 

He spoke to me and told me that all these time while I was questioning Him for an answer, I was lacking something very important, which is Love. I did not serve with a loving heart, but instead I was just serving for the sake of it. That was not what God wanted, so He spoke to me and told me serving is not a separated action with my spiritual life and relationship with God, it is all linked together. 

And right after that day I finally understood why I was so troubled the past few months, and it is because I wasn’t putting God as the center of my life, and by not doing that, I was just serving blindly. And thank God after the first week, I was serving on Sunday, and I felt peace from God. And I knew it was God’s work on me. And from the first week I learnt that I need to love God because He first loved us. John 3:16 shows how much God loves us.

          Thank God for the chance to meet all these new friends and learn from them, and being able to join this STEP programme. During the second week, we were assigned to go to HealthServe, it is a place which provided healthcare services for migrant workers, and there was this section of the trip where we were given time to communicate with the migrant workers, and from the conversation, I really wanna thank God for the chance to talk to them, because from then I knew how blessed I am to be a Singaporean and more importantly being a Christian. 

Through the conversation, I learnt that they are actually working every single day in a week, and for more than 12 hours a day. And more importantly is that they have literally no free time to do what they want to, all because they need to send money back regularly each month to their families living in their  home countries that’s relying solely on these migrant workers. 

This showed me how blessed I am living in Singapore and God’s love, as I have a dream in life and I am currently pursuing it, where it is almost impossible for these migrant workers to do that. At one point of the conversation, it stopped because there is always the social status gap in between us no matter how many jokes we cracked. 

But I thank God because only God’s love can fill in the gap between us. God set up this HealthServe to serve these migrant workers for them to see doctors and get any body illness treated as much as they can and the people serving these migrant workers are all volunteers and the clinics and dental clinic or TCM only starts working after 6.30pm, the time where the doctors and dentists and TCMs are off from their work time. And this actions by these people shows us God’s love that these people could’ve went home or enjoyed their time at home or outside with their friends. But instead they committed themselves to serve these migrant workers fully showing God’s love to the migrant workers and others.

          Lastly, I want to thank God for showing me His love, and showing me how I can love others by loving Him first. Thank God for the chance to embark on this journey through STEP.