About Me

So who am I? I’m an Australian born Chinese, born in Sydney Australia. I was converted at High School during one of my Scripture lessons when I was 14. I noticed three  big whopping changes. I stopped swearing. I stopped reading Playboy magazines and I started reading the Bible. As I read the Bible I began to understand more and more about what Christ had done for me. I understood about my sins, his judgement, and the fact that Jesus died in my place. I remember one night I knelt beside my bed and asked God to forgive me and give me new life. So did I become a Christian during the scripture class or when I knelt beside my bed? I don’t know and it doesn’t really matter unless we want to get into the whole discussion about regeneration and conversion and the “Order of Salvation” however my friend tells me to keep these blogs short and sweet.

Anyway this was a turning point in my life. By God’s grace I was led to a Church which has been my home church ever since and of which I am now on the staff as an English Pastor but more of that later. Maybe episode 2.

Back to the story. For the next few years, although my life was changed, I was very much a closet Christian until I hit year 10 in High School. Again the turning point was in my Scripture class. We had a fiery  and feisty lady who really scared the hell out of me. She challenged us young guns to be serious with Jesus and to preach the gospel. She invited anyone who wanted to be serious to put up their hands. I did. Afterwards I stayed back to talk to her. She prayed for me and then challenged me to come back the following week and to give my testimony at her next Scripture class. This really floored me. Up to this time I kept my faith pretty secret but now I was coming out. Anyway to cut a long story short, I gave my testimony to a bunch of year 10 hooligans. That was a real turning point for me. I was fired up to preach the gospel and became an evangelist to my school as well as becoming the first leader for the Christian group at school.

After High School I went to University of NSW and was blown away by the teaching. I learnt to love  the Scriptures and how to read it properly. I was challenged to go into full time ministry however I did the “Jonah bolt”. Instead of going into ministry I ran the opposite direction and kept running for 4 yrs but God would not let up on me. I eventually ran out of steam and gave into God and went into seminary for full time study. I loved every bit of it except the study and writing essays. (You have to know that I studied Engineering because it was the only course where I didn’t have to write an essay. However after enrolling into Engineering  I discovered to my horror I had to write a final year thesis – Ugggghhhh!) That was not in the prospectus otherwise I would have done accounting.

After Bible College I was invited to join the staff of the Chinese Christian Church in Sydney, which is my home church. This was crazy.I had had enough of Chinese churches and was intending to be Anglican in a non-Chinese church. Anyway the way things worked out I went back to the Chinese church and have been there for nearly 20 yrs (at the time of this writing). Mind you I think they invited me back only because they thought I had changed. I was a major headache to the leadership.  Think Maverick!!!! Anyway they quickly discovered that I was still the same old me and now it was too late to get rid of me, although they did try. I can’t say it has been easy but I’ve survived and have thrived and like I said I’ve been there over 20 yrs.

The irony is that over time I’ve developed a strong passion and love for the Chinese churches. In later blogs I will probably write something about how to survive and thrive in Chinese churches. Today I’m still in the same church and loving every bit of it. It has is moments but what church and ministry doesn’t?

As far as ministry is concerned, I am one of the English pastors in my Church. I head up our Men’s ministry, the Teens Ministry, the Pastor for the Bilingual service. and the training coordinator for those thinking about full time ministry in my church. One of my passions is one to one discipleship and  evangelism, something I’ve been doing for nearly 40 yrs. Outside the church I’ve been working with different teams of people to help establish lay leadership training conferences around Australia and overseas. I was the chairman of the English Task-force for the Chinese Congress on World Evangelisation (CCOWE) and am the chairman of the English Task-force for the Sydney Chinese Christian Church Association (SCCCA).

As far as my theology is concerned, I guess you can call me a Reformed Evangelical who believes in the 5 solas ie Scripture alone, Christ alone, Grace alone, Faith alone, to the glory of God alone.

On the home front, I’m married to my lovely wife Ivy. Have three great kids. I’m a mac user through and through. Can’t stand PC’s. Mac (My Awesome Computer) PC’s (Painful Computer). I love anything techo -  I’m a guy, what else. I love coffee. I bought a coffee machine for our 18th Anniversary. The only problem is that my wife hates coffee. Oh well, it’s the thought that counts. I love reading, watching Star Trek or anything that involves smashing, crashing and little dialogue. I am a wannabee photograph – hopefully i can turn it around to be the next Ken Duncan but maybe that will be in my next life.

I think that is enough about me. Hope this helps.