School of Ministry, Term 1, 2023
“Come, sit at my feet and listen to my teaching”
the Lord said.
Raising 7 children, homeschooling them and managing a household has made my default mode the Martha mode – always busy with work, forgetting to choose the better thing, like what Mary did. (Luke 10:39-42). Sitting at His feet to just listen for an extended time is a luxury.
So when presented with an opportunity to spend 3 months at Tung Ling Bible School (TLBS) after I graduated my youngest child from PSLE in 2021, I said “yes”. But my original plan to start TLBS in January 2022 was thwarted when I had a cataract operation done on my right eye in January 2022 and my left eye in August 2022.
And so, I started TLBS only in January 2023. Even then, I didn’t get to start on the first day of school on 9th January with the rest of the cohort, but only on 13th January 2023 because I had accompanied my husband to Malacca for the 2023 Pastors’ Summit.
You could say that I took the long route to get up this eastern mountain!
And so, at TLBS, I sat and filled up on God’s Word with teachings that satiated my hunger for and increased my understanding of His Word. I am so grateful to be able to set aside 3 months to spend time with Him and His people.
For those who are curious about how the school functions, here is a glimpse of what happens.
Early Bird Morning Devotions
Class officially starts at 8:30am and finishes at 1pm. (Psst…we always start on time but never finish on time!) But every day, we are given a bonus Early Bird Devotion sharing by Dean Guek Ju herself. We are not required to attend but I have been blessed by the early morning devotions and have not missed any except once when the MRT failed me.
Towards the end of the term, Dean Ju invited some of the students to share their testimonies at these early morning devotions instead and we were richly blessed by them as well.
Chapel
Early Bird Devotions are followed by Chapel which lasts from 8:30am to 9am. It includes a 15-minute praise and worship session PLUS a 15-minute sharing by students pre-selected by Dean Ju at the start of term.
I have been so blessed by the students who have led chapel praise and worship sessions during the 3 months at TLBS. These sessions have been such a powerful time to just luxuriate in the presence of God with fellow brothers and sisters who have come to seek God’s face. That feeling of peace, when I walk in each morning into the classroom, is what I miss now that school is over.
The 15-minute testimony/devotions which followed the praise and worship segment by pre-selected students were very encouraging and showed over and over that God is very much still in the business of restoration, healing and miracles. Some of the students’ sharing have been published in the school’s magazine, Polished Shaft as well.
Food!
Our highly subsidized school fees include breakfast, lunch and snacks! It is A-M-A-Z-I-N-G! Breakfast is not just bread and spread. Curry puffs, tuna/sardine buns, chye tao kway, dry mee siam, are what I can recall eating. Just wow!
Our batch was further blessed by Brother Jimmy who ordered chye tao kway – black and white versions from a stall in Bedok. He roped in Brother Francis and Joshua to help him carry more than 100 packets to TLBS one morning!
Lunch was provided Mondays to Thursdays and we even had a change of caterers because the school was concerned that we would get bored if we ate from the same caterer the whole 3 months. We were well looked after indeed.
Teachings
22 modules in 3 months. Mondays to Fridays.
- Praise & Worship
- Prayer & Fasting
- Prophecy: Principles, Practises & Activation
- The Spiritual Believer
- Father Heart of God
- Character Formation
- Conflict Resolution
- Jewish Roots
- Faith & Sexuality
- The Great Digital Commission
- Mental Health & Soul Care
- Breaking Bondages & Inner Healing
- Silence & Solitude (Retreat)
- Discovering Jesus in the Old Testament
- The Joy of Personal Bible Study
- Exposition on the Book of Romans
- New Testament Survey
- Spiritual Leadership
- Book of Ecclesiastes
- Go-Forth Mission
- Finishing Well
- Knowing & Fulfilling Kingdom Assignments
It is A LOT of teachings to absorb and process. I have likened it to drinking from a water hose. My husband calls it church camp on steroids.
Depending on the season of life we are in, the number of years we have been a Christian, and how many teachings we have consumed, some teachings will hit us harder than others.
– modules that made an impact
I liked the module on Prophecy: Principles, Practices & Activation by Ps Jeremy Witherow. He was very systematic, explaining and laying down the foundations of the practice of prophecy carefully. He was also very clear that prophets need to be held accountable.
After all, not everyone who says “The Lord tells me…. ” or “I sense the Lord saying…” is accurate or truthful.
The exercise he made us do to activate our gifts was a bit nerve-racking. But it reminded me that we all can hear the prompting of the Spirit if we would only be sensitive to it. We also need to hone this gift or it will just atrophy and die. Horrors!
Father Heart of God by Brother Joseph Chean was a wow module. Highly recommended! Brother Joseph was very real and very vulnerable. And he made all of us cry – A LOT. He also made us do very difficult exercises that many of us were loathe to do. And yet, they needed to be done.
We cannot minister from a hurt and bitter spirit. Yes, God does not despise a broken and contrite heart but we cannot minister from there. We need to go before God in all transparency and authenticity and allow Him to minister to us as our loving Father and then we can go forth to be a blessing to the people around us.
Mental Health & Soul Care – SP Chua Seng Lee
This is a very needed module in today’s world. Ps Chua’s fatherly demeanour was perfect for this module. He taught and shared with us how we can be compassionate as we minister to those who are suffering from mental issues. He also taught us how to manage our own mental health.
And then there were the modules about the Bible itself, such as:
- Discovering Jesus in the Old Testament by Rev Samuel Kim,
- Exposition on the Book of Romans by Rev Les Wheeldon and
- Book of Ecclesiastes by Rev Paul Jeyachandran
Digging into the Word of God always excites me or as Instagram influencer, @sharonsaysso says, “It gives me brain tingles!” The modules make me want to spend more time reading the Word and getting to know it better. All the lecturers were engaging and carried with them a wealth of knowledge that was a blessing to us.
I love how we finished up with Ps Daniel Foo’s Finish Well module and Ps Henson Lim’s Knowing and Fulfilling Our Kingdom Assignment. Because as I have said to my children – it is not how we start that matters but how we end. And in our faith walk, our obedience to our King to fulfil our Kingdom assignments is always, always better than sacrifice.
Tests & Quizzes
While most of the modules were for us to just sit, learn and absorb, some modules had quizzes! The questions are in MCQ format and thankfully, no essays were required. The only essay required was a short 100-word essay that we needed to submit to Polished Shaft, the in-house magazine.
Unless we had been asleep during class and had not even glanced at our notes, we should clear the tests and quizzes.
Cell Groups
Each person is assigned to a cell group, according to age and gender. Sadly, we did not get to know each other very well as we had maybe just 4 sessions in the 3 months we were there.
We were to meet every Thursday, 2 – 3:30pm. But since the school prefers not to hold us back more than once a week, extra activities (eg. photo shoot for Polished Shaft and International Day) were often also scheduled for Thursday afternoons as well. They were all fun events but it did mean that we did not get to meet often as a cell group. Some groups met more than others as they would organize sessions beyond the official gatherings.
Silence & Solitude Retreat
This time, we had our retreat (2 days, 1 night) almost right smack in Orchard Road at Orchard Rendezvous Hotel instead of at Changi Cove. Although it is a good and necessary module I think we all went with different expectations. But despite that, God still spoke and many had a good experience.
I had been seeking the Lord about a Kingdom assignment I felt Him asking me to take up which I was hesitant and a little bit afraid of. And during the retreat, He answered very simply with an invitation:
“Come and you will see.”
John 1:39, ESV
It was lovely to be able to just be silent, listen to Him and journal it all down.
The Student Body
What I really like about attending TLBS in the January intake is the make up and mix of students. We come from a mix of different churches, different denominations, different countries, different genders (just male & female, thankyouverymuch!) and different age groups. There were 107 of us in total.
- International Students
Our batch had 12 international students who came from the US, Rwanda, Myanmar, South Korea, Japan, India, East Timor, Kyrgyzstan, and the Philippines. It was interesting to learn from them and hear their stories.
- Youths, Young Adults, Mature Adults
There are 2 intakes of students each year at TLBS for the School of Ministry: January and July. The school tends to see more youths at the January intake than the July one because the youths would be waiting to enter Polytechnics and Universities and are able to spare the 3 months at TLBS.
And this has been true of the SOM T12023 batch. And it has been really lovely to have the youths in our midst. They remind me of the energy and enthusiasm I no longer have.
- Class Monitors & Class T-shirts
Shockingly I got appointed co-class monitor at the end of the first week. Mind you, I wasn’t able to start school with the rest of the cohort and was hoping to blend into the background. Hahaha! But Dean Guek Ju approached Samuel and me, and lo and behold! we ended up being the most laid-back class monitors ever!
The class was so gracious to us. Also, we had the best youths who volunteered to take up the project of designing and ordering the class t-shirts. A team was very quickly cobbled together and we ended up with a nice navy blue tee to help us remember our time spent at TLBS, as Eu Jin, who is fondly called Mr T-Shirt Man, said to encourage all of us to get a t-shirt.
Graduation!
It was so heartwarming to see the whole class plus the alumni coming together to bring the whole event to pass.
The entire worship segment (opening and end) was just so amazing. We really have such massive talent and giftings in the body of Christ.
The cheers and hoots by the student body as each of us walked up onto the stage to receive our Diploma from Chairman of TLBS, Rev Yang Tuck Yoong, was heartwarming too.
What Did I Learn?
- We All Have Stories
I learnt that we all have stories to tell – of God’s love, mercy and faithfulness. More than 40 of us were asked to share during Chapel devotion time. But there are a lot more stories waiting to be told.
God is working patiently with each of us to make us more and more like Jesus. And I am reminded, as I shared in my devotion segment, to not dismiss the seemingly boring and uneventful story God is writing about my life or to compare my story with others.
Because your story is yours, my story is mine and either way, He is not done with you or me because,
“he who began a good work in (us) will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”
Philippians 1:6 ESV
- His Kingdom is Global
I am reminded again that the body of Christ is more than just our local church. His Kingdom is not local but global. Listening to Brother Joseph Chean’s stories of how God has worked and is working to get the nations to know Him is so powerful. Not all of us are called into the mission field. But if all of us would respond to His call to fulfil the kingdom assignments He has given to us, it will impact our family, friends, society and nation.
Like a jigsaw puzzle, each of us brings a piece of God’s Kingdom into the fold. And at TLBS, I got a glimpse of what heaven looks like when all of God’s children (from various nations, denominations and age groups) come together to worship Him day and night.
Come and See
If you are feeling tired, burnt out or just need to reboot your faith system, do consider setting aside 3 months to attend TLBS. You will not regret it if you would put in the work to learn AND to process what you have learnt.
“Come and see” was the invitation the Lord extended to the men who would become His disciples. (John 1:39 & 46, NKJV). They went seeking and found the Messiah and King.
If you do respond to His invitation and sign up, may you be blessed as I and my classmates all have been!
You can find out more about TLBS at: https://www.tungling.org.sg/