Coming Home…& Moving Forward
By Theophilus Tan
Our theme for Advent 2024 was “Come Home for Christmas”. The sermons were titled, “An Unexpected Home”, “A Restoring Home”, “A Welcoming Home” and “A New Home”, pointing to Jesus’ invitation to return to God’s embrace. In each of the sermons, we saw how the characters in the Bible had obedience and faith in the Word of God and through the act of drawing near, their lives were transformed. “Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you” (James 4:8a).
Acknowledging that Christmas is the best season to invite our family and friends to church, our Witness & Evangelism Committee put together a toolkit, to aid us as we reached out to our spheres of influence. It was encouraging to see new faces in our congregation during the last few weeks of December. I had the privilege of praying for a new sister who shared that God had been speaking to her to come home to Him. A simple invitation to a friend, a simple “yes” to the invitation and God makes a miracle out of it! Our God is truly amazing and invites all to come home.
We continued our previous year’s practice of Carolling @ Raffles Holland V, but this time we included more carols and scripture readings, anchored by our children and youths. As we prepared to sing every evening, we nervously wondered if people would stop and listen to the gospel message through the carols - yet, we remained steadfast, and were amazed to witness people stopping in their tracks to hear us sing, families bringing their little children closer to us, and some even joining in to sing. I believe everyone who volunteered was doubly blessed by the experience, as we brought Christmas cheer to Holland Village.
For the fourth year, we also brought back “Advent Carols by Candlelight”, an event that started in 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic. Churches, then, were unable to gather to celebrate Christmas, so our Lifegroups and families gathered on Zoom to sing carols to each other and read scriptures. Therefore, Advent Carols by Candlelight has always been a night for family, by family. 2024 was no different. Our Lifegroups served us dinner, read scriptures and sang carols. We had a special treat by our Children and Youth Ministries who re-enacted some of the nativity scenes. They performed so well that we reprised their segment during Christmas Service!
We wrapped up 2024 with our Covenant Renewal Service as we came together as one church to remember our charge as Christians and to reaffirm our covenant with God. Our Pastor-in-Charge, Rev Jeremy Ong, shared from 2 Corinthians 5:17-21, highlighting how we have a new hope in Jesus. Regardless of how 2024 had been, we can look forward to 2025 because we are made new in Jesus Christ. However, the challenge for all of us is to point the world to Jesus because only He can transform our lives. In the 365 days of 2025, let us invite the Holy Spirit to reveal more of who Jesus is, so that when we gather at the end of this year, on 31 December 2025, we can say we have grown in the knowledge of Jesus and have been His ambassadors to a world in need of a loving Saviour.
As we close 2024, HVMC has grown in many ways, and we pray that we will continue to do so in 2025 as we behold the glory of Jesus and point others around us to the grace and peace we have in Jesus. May 2025 be a blessed year with new breakthroughs for you and your family!
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