Contributed by Li Bijia

PHOTOS: Tan Song Kow

Money makes the world go round. .. as the saying goes, but some may beg to differ. Revile it or revere it, money rules in a materialistic world. Money can be seen as power — power to fulfil not just needs, but also wants. On the flipside, having money also gives one the power to do good — to feed the hungry, clothe the poor and make a difference in the lives of others. Perhaps it is the recognition of this fact that caused the participants from different walks of life to come together over two Saturdays to learn more about money: “what it can do for you, how to keep what you’ve got and, how to get more of it.”

The instructor of the useful course was Bernard Lim, 40s, a Certified Financial Planner (CFP) and Financial Services Director in a major UK-based financial institution with 17 years of experience. Lim is a Principal Trainer of Wealth College — an organization that was formed for the sole purpose of educating, equipping, engaging and empowering not only financial planning professionals, but also, the public in the area of wealth planning and management. When asked about his purpose for developing and running these courses, Lim replies emphatically that he wants to “empower people to make intelligent, informed decisions; taking charge of that which is important in their lives — money.”

The course began with a short introduction on the role of money in people’s lives. The participants had a chance to share some of their views on why they had decided to take charge of their finances, and enrol into the course to learn more about it. Reasons given ranged from wanting merely to enjoy the freedom of financial independence, to wanting to be able to wield the power of money so as to be able to make an impact in the world.

As the course wore on, the course delved into the technicality of financial management, financial independence and financial empowerment. The participants were given a comprehensive overview of all the components of their financial lives and also touched briefly on the finer workings of the government’s financial planning: such as, how to navigate the sometimes confusing sea of schemes and policies.

Through the course, the participants learned how to avoid the common mistakes that many make in the different phases of life. They also learned about the cost of ignorance and the empowering value of being able to take one’s finances in hand and work intentionally towards financial goals. One of the participants, Kevin Lau, a products specialist for Bloomberg, managed to put it quite succinctly when he said that “… this is an education on life.”

With a two-storey high playground, mini slides, inflatables and state of the art bicycles and tricycles, children attending City Harvest Children’s Church (CCH) services at the Singapore Expo Hall 8 are experiencing the time of their lives.

The facilities, known as “Kids@Play” was introduced in CCH at the Expo location since 2008. Lynn Tan, 30s, manager of the facilities explained that the rationale behind Kids@Play is “to make church a fun and memorable experience for the children, as well as to benefit them in terms of development and social interaction.”

According to Tan, the current hot favorite among the children are the rides and bicycles. A visit to Kids@Play during operating hours found several children laughing away as they zipped around on their bicycles, or dived themselves into a pool of coloured balls.

A volunteer for Kids@Play, Regina Kam, 20s, observed that the children do not just have a good time playing, they also learn how to wait their turn, share, and problem-solve as they interact with others.

PHOTOS: Alvin Loh and Gabriel Seow

The equipment is well maintained and sterilized to ensure that it is free from germs and bacteria. The area is cleaned at the end of each operating day and even the coloured balls in the playground are properly sterilized once a month.

Kids@Play is open on Saturdays from 4pm to 5.15pm, and from the time the worship service ends to 8.30pm. On Sundays, the facility opens from 9am to 9.45am and 12pm to 2pm.

Writings on the Walls is the latest album produced by City Harvest Church (CHC). This album is essentially a sampler of the latest songs, majority of which are written by KC Gan and David Yem, Creative and Music Directors of CHC. The tunes found in this album sound the heartbeat of CHC. The main focus of WOTW is to present heartfelt melodies that carry the redemption message of Christ.

WOTW features different styles and genre from CHC’s previous albums, such as ‘Your Generation’ and ‘Beautiful’, crafted and styled with evergreen talents in mind—Annabel Soh, Alison Yap and Calvin Ho.

For Gan, who has written numerous songs for local productions, musicals, films and the pop industry, it is a privilege to pen the love of God down in songs that enable people to be drawn closer to God.

One particular track on the album that tugs at the heartstring is ‘Because of You’. This song is the especially personal to Gan, as it symbolizes the 20 years he has been a believer of Christ, reminding him of God’s unfailing grace, love and forgiveness.

There is a simple, hymn-like track in the album entitled ‘For Janelle’. Janelle is the 4 year old daughter of a personal friend of Gan and Yem, who is diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. This song is dedicated to the brave girl who is battling for her life, telling her that God is holding her in His hand, just like how He hung the stars and carried the cross. It’s a song of comfort and assurance of the love of God.

Writings on the Walls is available at Attributes Online.

At first glance, this sounds like a fail-proof partnership in comedy. There’s the king of crass humour Judd Apatow (of The 40-Year-Old Virgin and Knocked Up fame) behind the camera, and leading funnyman Adam Sandler in front of it. But Funny People is wrong on so many counts, as it tries to tread both drama and comedy.

In one of his less memorable roles, Adam Sandler plays George Simmons, a successful comedy actor living the high (but lonely) life. When he not only gets diagnosed with a rare form of leukemia but faces a slim chance of survival, he falls into depression. After some introspection (aka re-watching his lowbrow blockbuster comedies), he decides to go back to his roots performing stand-up comedy. While he hires Ira Wright (Seth Rogen, Apatow’s preferred accomplice), an aspiring stand-up comedian to help him write lines and run errands, Simmons himself plots to be reunited with his now married ex-fiance Laura (Leslie Mann, who is in real life Apatow’s wife)” part of his own live-your-life-to-the-fullest regime.

It seems that Apatow is gunning for more out of his audience besides laughs here, but with a bumbling narrative that is neither serious enough nor funny enough, it fails to cover any base. It also looks as though he has bitten off more than he can chew, in attempting to weave comedy into comedy by having the characters perform stand-up routines. But either the audience lacks Apatow’s sense of humour, or the jokes are just not funny at all. There are admittedly a few good lines, but those are too few and far in between. What fills up the gaps are endless jokes about the male anatomy but then again, this is a Judd Apatow outing.

With the premise of juxtaposing mortality against a comedic backdrop, Funny People could have been so much more, in terms of tone, depth and quirk, and so much less at 2 hours and 20 minutes long, the movie was unbearably drawn out. We did not leave the cinema with split sides so much as a splitting headache.

Rating:

In September, City Harvest Church (CHC) organized a mission trip to one to our affiliate churches in Kuching, Malaysia, helmed by George Tiong, Senior Pastor of City Harvest Church, Kuching.

A team of 16 went up with Kong Hee, Senior Pastor of CHC, to assist in three fully-packed evangelistic services and a power-packed leadership training session. All held within just two days, from 21 to 22 of September, it was a short but impactful time for the missions team from CHC, the staff of Kuching Harvest Church, as well as the many who had attended the services and training.

It was evident that this was a much-anticipated event, as the people were highly excited to receive Kong, and were obviously hungry to hear the word of God. From the very first session to the last, the praise and worship was loud and exuberant, with youths and adults packing the 400-seater hall.

At the leadership training session the next day, Kong preached powerfully and the presence of God was very tangible. During the last evangelistic service, the atmosphere of expectancy was so strong that it led to a great move of God as Kong laid hands on the many that came forward to respond to the altar call.

PHOTOS: Seth Gan

It was truly a time of impartation for City Harvest Church, Kuching as they received motivational teachings from Kong, and gained practical advice from the CHC praise and worship team on how to play better to bring down the presence of God. The mission team from CHC felt ministered themselves too. Alan Chan, 27, IT Executive, who was part of the mission team, mused, “The way the Malaysians praised and worshiped brought back memories of when I first gave my life to Jesus. I am inspired to love God more.”

On 20 to 25 September 2009, a team of 16 City Harvest Church staff and members embarked on a mission trip to Glory Christian Center, located in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia.

The contemporary church, led by William Vun, has a great hunger for God, and has began preparing for the evangelistic weekend with Kong Hee, Senior Pastor of City Harvest Church, weeks before the actual event. Some members even went to online social networking site Facebook to spread the news about the evangelistic weekend. The members’ fervency paid off, with many new friends coming to church that weekend.

PHOTOS: Seth Gan

During the services, Kong preached powerfully on salvation, healing and prosperity. These messages impacted the hearts of the people, many of whom were first-timers to church. The relevance of the messages brought home the truth of God’s love and mercy, and hundreds of people responded to the altar call.

Truly, the mission trip was a success. Not only were new believers added to the church, the members were also strengthened and edified by the preaching of the word.

That weekend, Glory Christian Center experienced a breakthrough record attendance of 1,213.

Kong Hee announced, “While man is looking for a better job, a better house, God is looking for a better man. 1,2,3…”

“YES!!” declared the congregation of 266 men.

On 25 September 2009, Kong Hee, Founder and Senior Pastor of City Harvest Church (CHC), preached at the first ever Men’s Meeting in Harvest School of Ministry in Seremban, Malaysia. The Harvest School of Ministry is a ministry with a vision to build a strong local church in every community. It has partnership with 22 churches in both East and West Malaysia. In his message, Kong expounded on the importance for men in the church to rise up to be better men, to direct, protect and correct his family. “It was a touching moment, full of anointing, when Pastor prayed for the men during the altar call and encouraged them to fulfill their promises and to make up for letting their families down,” said Leong Yan Chee, a Zone Supervisor from CHC.

PHOTOS: Seth Gan

Following that Tan Ye Peng, Deputy Senior Pastor of CHC,  focused on ‘Faithfulness’ and the ‘Importance of the Word’ in his ministry to the men. The congregation was drawn to the simple way he put across his revelations. With examples and testimonies, he reminded the congregation to be grounded in God’s Word and to remain faithful in what is given to them. “Pastor’s revelation is simply mind-blowing,” a member of the congregation was overheard saying.

Prior to these sessions, a team led by Joseph Ang came earlier to organize team-building activities with the men. The tele-matches and pool games allowed the participants to rough it out, bond and have good clean fun. The Men’s Meeting demonstrated that just as Manhood and Christ-likeness are synonymous; spirituality and masculinity are compatible.

Over three days at the beautiful Mercure Johor Palm Resort & Golf, Malaysia, more than 200 members from Wu Yu Zhuang’s pastoral district, including zones under the care of Wu’s wife Audrey Ng, Lee Yi Lun and Tan Yah Lan, participated at Refresh Retreat 2009.

Wu, a pastor at City Harvest Church, led this enthusiastic entourage of families and young adults through three days of play and prayer. After a raucous welcome, the retreat kicked off with a game of Human Monopoly. The entertaining adaptation of the popular board game saw members pitting their wits against and playing alongside one another. If there was any initial awkwardness, it was effectively obliterated with this game. It wasn’t just fun and games.

At the session on the first night, Wu deliver an impactful word on “persistent faith”: “One does not allow reasoning to stop oneself from receiving the miracles of God.” Over the next few sermons, he taught his members how to not grow weary when faced with an uncertain wait, which is also the acronym for Withstand, Anticipate, Intercede and Trust.

Edmund Ng, 29, a business manager, was amazed at how uninhibited members could be when in an environment of trust. Besides meeting many interesting people, he adds, “It was a time of spiritual renewal, of receiving a transforming touch from God.”

John Butterworth, 63, president of Intelagents Asia, who hails from Manchester, England, joined in the fun despite the obvious age difference. He says, “It has been a great bonding session with people whom you do not get a chance to meet during weekly service.”

PHOTOS: George Tan

The key “emcee” for the retreat was Bernard Loh, 29, a familiar face in City Harvest Church as he is a regular actor in church dramas. Loh led the members in a number of well-executed programmes such as the interactive pool games, in which members had to play cooperative water games that not only encouraged teamwork but also allowed them to compete. Another highlight was Wu demonstrating his prowess in a relay.

Members also strutted their stuff in a “Hercules” competition, delivering — with great aplomb — performances that brought down the house on the final evening. Refresh Retreat 2009 touched all the lives and brought laughter to every member, as it equipped them to be triumphant, and more than conquerors through Christ.

Celebrities and performers graciously donated their talents to raise funds for 37 beneficiaries in a dance extravaganza during the live telecast of the President’s Star Charity (PSC) show on 11 October, Sunday.

Hosted by MediaCorp stars Adrian Pang and Michelle Chia, the night of high-energy performances by a star studded cast raised more than S$6 million — the highest amount ever on a PSC show. This landmark annual charity event also marked its 10th anniversary this year — chalking up a decade of fundraising to improve the lives of the less fortunate since its inception in 2000. The tradition of PSC is to have TV stars perform items that are unusual or highly unique (read: funny). For a worthy cause, local celebrities endured weeks of grueling practice to put up a showcase of mostly dance, rarely seen on television. In one of the items, Gurmit Singh performed an enthusiastic rendition of the Oscar-winning song ‘Jai Ho’, from the soundtrack of Slumdog Millionaire.

“I am enjoying myself totally and am having a ball of a time,” the popular Phua Chu Kang actor told City News during intermission. But behind the fun and frivolity of that night’s entertainment, Gurmit “met a boy at the Muhammadiyah Welfare Home and I was very touched by his story.”

Like Gurmit, many of the celebrities came face to face with beneficiaries of this year’s PSC. Each star filmed a clip to highlight the plights and stories of the less fortunate who would be helped by the funds raised for PSC. This made them determined to put their best foot forward for charity. Organizations such as the Yong En Care Centre, Food from the Heart and Action for Aids will benefit and empower the individuals with the donations raised.

The show culminated with Asian diva Coco Lee’s performance of ‘A Love Before Time’ and her new single ‘Party Time’. Together with the rousing performance by the Beatles Unlimited, these two acts raised the highest amounts in donations.

PHOTOS: Courtesy of O School

They were joined by the other performers including Kym Ng, Patricia Mok, Jade Seah, Michelle Chong, Nat Ho, Andie Chen, Daren Tan, Ben Yeo, Sarah Aqilah, Indra Chandran and the Singapore Idol finalists. The performers fired up the dance floor with their dance moves, ranging from martial arts to line dancing. Anugerah Band 2008 winner Rancour, skipping sensations Jumping Jewels and dance groups such as the Floor Techniques Crew and O School also collaborated with the celebrities.

Although some of the performers injured themselves while practicing for the performances, many of the participants felt that it was a rewarding experience.

“We had only three weeks to rehearse, and had to get it right on a very tight schedule. But it was lots of fun and a good experience to work with the celebrities,” said Gin Lam, a dancer from O School. “We are very glad to be part of this, to be able to contribute to society with our passion and talents.”

The group of 23 dancers, consisting of five local artistes, did a dance tribute to Michael Jackson. The crowd was visibly entertained by comedienne Patricia Mok, who was the lead dancer in the dance medley and mimicked the slick dance moves of the late King of Pop.

“I think the celebrities put in a lot of effort to master the routines, and I was very touched by the stories of the less fortunate,” said audience member Nanette Passion, 30, a homemaker. “It was a good reminder that we should not forget them even as we’re going through a financial crisis.”

Singapore Idol finalist Duane Ho, 16, took time off from his hectic school schedule to perform a song and dance item during the PSC show.

“It’s new to me and I’ve never done it before, but it was enjoyable. It was difficult to coordinate the steps and we took some time to get everyone together. We are doing all this for a good cause so that people who are less fortunate will get the help that they need. So we are here to play a part since we’re public figures and we want the public to help the less fortunate,” he said.

Beneficiaries of President’s Challenge 2009:

• Singapore Anglican Community Services
• Persatuan Pemudi Islam Singapura
• Teck Ghee Youth Centre
• Kampung Senang Charity and Education Foundation
• Ain Society
• Life Community Services Society
• Lakeside Family Centre
• Beyond Social Services
• Methodist Welfare Services
• Islamic Theological Association of Singapore (PERTAPIS)
• Young Men’s Christian Association of Singapore
• Very Special Arts Singapore Ltd
• Canossaville Children’s Home
• Boys’ Town
• Shan You Counselling Centre
• Muhammadiyah Welfare Home
• Woodlands Social Centre
• Christian Outreach to the Handicapped
• Students Care Service
• Singapore Children’s Society
• Food From the Heart
• Yong-En Care Centre
• Society for the Physically Disabled
• MILK (Mainly I Love Kids)
• Rainbow Centre
• Community Chest
• Yellow Ribbon Fund
• Singapore After-care Association
• Bright Vision Hospital
• Action for AIDS
• Muscular Dystrophy Association (Singapore)
• St Andrew’s Community Hospital
• Autism Resource Centre (Singapore)
• Autism Association (Singapore)
• Dyslexia Association of Singapore
• Association for Persons with Special Needs
• National Arthritis Foundation

1 October marked Children’s Day — 2009 being the 48th year that this occasion is celebrated in Singapore.

At City Harvest Church, thousands of kids flooded auditoriums East and West of Singapore to celebrate Children’s Day in a big way!

Held across two locations (City Harvest Church at Jurong West and Singapore Expo Hall 8), the hugely successful parties hosted by City Harvest Children’s Church attracted 11,027 visitors, the highest ever attendance. What’s more, 6,001 children and parents made a decision for Christ at the altar calls.

Themed “It’s A Small World”, the party began with kids being divided into two clusters, each one screaming their lungs out in this loudest-is-winner marathon. Then J7, Children’s Church’s very own homegrown pop group, stormed the stage with their solid rendition of Miley Cyrus’ popular dance-along hit ‘Hoedown Throwdown’.

The highlights of the day were magician Kyros who captivated the kids with his close-up illusion tricks, and physical comedian Keith Coast. Whether Coast was making a balloon or getting inside one, every child was charmed to the edge of their seats! His art of ballooning left a side-splitting experience no one could forget.

All this led up to the heart of the party. The Kids Band, made up of children like the spirited Joie Teo, 8, proceeded to lead the crowd in a heart-warming time of praise and worship. The Band opened the way for a light-hearted message by Eileen Toh, pastor of Children’s Church. Toh was right to call this the best opportunity to bring friends as Children’s Day is international and neutral.

PHOTOS: Johnny Wee, Jason Lee and Koh Meng Kwang

Such a great finale would not have been complete without the firework-like spectacle of confetti, balloons and paper streamers as J7 closed with the ever popular ‘Superhero’. Fae, 7, and her sister Zoe, 3, were just two of thousands who thoroughly enjoyed the party, especially the balloon act. Glenda, 10, who keenly followed the program, was very happy and thanked her friend who first invited her to church two years ago.

It might have been a small world, but it certainly was no small feat. More than 400 helpers spent four weeks on event planning and home visitations. The target that Toh and her team had for the event was 10,000 children. It was a journey that this pastor and her faithful helpers embarked on, and savoured the sweet results of.

Toh credited her team members for their tireless effort and endurance. “As these parties were not held consecutively (but split up over two weekends), it was hard for us to keep up the momentum. Personally, I can see that everyone has grown, learned to look after each other’s welfare, played their part and stretched their capacities. This whole event made each us a better person. It was worthwhile.”

What motivated them to do so much so well? Toh gave a befitting summary from her favorite book: “Take heed that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I say to you that in heaven their angels always see the face of My Father who is in heaven.”