Mission District Annual Meeting

March is a very busy month for us because we need to prepare for and conduct the annual Mission District meeting.  There was heaps of work to do, like coordination of different programs, preparation of reports and venues, etc. We are exhausted after arranging so many things in order that the whole process would go smoothly.  However, God granted us much more than we expected.  I was also very happy to see the progress of our congregations.

The alertness of future leadership

We usually think that the missionaries’ role is to lead and train the local churches to head in the right direction.  Nevertheless, we sometimes ignore their invaluable ideas and perspectives.  Before the annual meeting, the local pastors had already expressed the need for a strategy to cultivate future leadership for the churches, due to  the age and health situation of our existing pastors and leaders.  Therefore, in line with the theme for this year, we invited Pastor Derek Ho to conduct a seminar investigating more about leadership.  Even though we only have a few pastors and church planters, the church and mission need to work together in order to find out ways to sustain the ministries.  In addition, some local pastors and leaders observed conditions at other churches,  and they proposed ways to reveal the actual situation, instead of just commenting in general.

Communication through queries

According to Khmer culture, people are seldom ‘courageous’ to ask questions in public.  They may talk among themselves in their seats or gossip about the issues after a meeting.  However, this year, some participants were enthusiastic to ask about things such as inconsistencies in the statistics, the context of the reports, some ambiguities and the like.  The atmosphere became more participative and interesting, rather than before when most of the people just sat and looked “bored” throughout the meeting.  Although there was some confusion over things like the election process, nominations, etc, we all had positive attitudes to seek improvement in the  future, instead of finding fault with others.  We are all getting more mature in communicating with each other.

The same old problems

When we talked about respective issues for our churches and mission team, we found out that the shortage of  pastors and leaders is our biggest limitation.  Of course, we also discussed about financial issues, but the growth of the church depends NOT on the physical or financial resources.  It relies on the quality of the congregation’s spiritual life.  Some churches may still face financial needs, but they also realize that it is important to cultivate the leaders of the next generation.  The economy of Cambodia keeps growing fast (even though the rich get richer and the poor get poorer), but the real satisfaction in life comes from inside instead of the outside.  Spiritual leaders are the hope of our churches to glorify God’s name in these latter days.

Prayer points

1.  Praise the Lord that He guided and provided all we needed for the annual meeting, especially that Pastor Polly Ho, Pastor Derek Ho and Pastor Raymond Wong could participate and encourage our local pastors and leaders.  Please pray for the newly elected members of the various committees that they can serve and learn from each other

2.  Pray for the strength to prepare the weekly Bible lessons for our University students at the boys dorm starting on March 25 ( meeting on Tuesdays)

3.  Pray for the economy of Cambodia as everything in the market, gasoline and rents (our office’s rent is increasing 30%) are suddenly getting more expensive.  May God have mercy on the poor farmers and  workers.

4.  Pray for our health as we are entering into the hot and dry season here

5.  Pray for the young people as they pass through the different stages of life like adolescence, dating, working and the like

Psalm 48:14

Davis Lam( )

Cambodia Mail Address: P.O Box 602, Phnom Penh, Cambodia