How I Tithed My First Year To to God

In late 1999 or early 2000, at one of the combined services, Bishop Moses Tay gave a challenge out to the youths of the time. He challenged us to tithe of our work to the Lord. His suggestion was to tithe the first year of work to the Lord. I was very convicted by this challenge and decided then that I wanted to tithe every first of ten years of my work unto the Lord in direct service to Him.

Since then I have been a regular thorn in my pastor's (Rev Joshua Shaam) side. I have reminded him on many an occasion of my intention to work in church for a year upon graduation. I soon met the new Vicar of the Chapel of the Resurrection (COR), Canon John Benson, and so I became a thorn in his side too.

I graduated from the National University of Singapore (NUS) with an Electrical engineering degree in May 2003. In my last semester (2nd quarter 2003) I decided to join a friend of mine and attend a Diocesan Lay Training (DLT) course being conducted at St Andrew’s Cathedral (SAC). The module was “Joshua to Esther” and it was taught by Mrs. Patricia Aw.
In the process of the sessions, I found out that Aunty Pat was the person in charge of the CITYKids church and so, after the last class, I sought her permission to come and pay a visit to her children ministry so that I may learn something of how children services are run here at SAC with the intention that I may be able to take something home with me to COR.

Having served in the children ministry since Nov 1997, my personal preference for my tithe year was to become a full time member of the church staff in the children ministry. Unfortunately, the church was not hiring any new staff in the children ministry. The only option available to me was as a mentor in the St Andrew’s Junior College (SAJC) ministry arm of COR. Though excited to be getting a job in church, I knew that I was 'settling' for an available job rather than one that I wanted.

My parents are not yet believers in Christ and so, not unexpectedly, were very much against my working in church. My father threatened to cut me off financially and my mother threatened to cut me off completely and told me to not even be present at her funeral should anything happen to her while I was working in church. Such was the extent of their opposition.

The Saturday after the last DLT lesson was 30th May 2003. It was the exam date of the DLT course I attended. SAJC is the usual exam venue. I wasn't taking the exam but was at COR that morning for worship training. I received a voice message from Aunty Pat asking me to return her call. I called back and what she asked me made my cry.
She asked me if I would like to come to Cathedral and work in the children ministry there. It was then about 1pm. We made an appointment to meet at 3pm at the SAJC canteen.

We met as planned at the canteen. In the process of the discussion, I highlighted to her the ‘constraints’ I had when it came to work. Being Malaysian, I had to obtain work permit to be eligible for work. I also needed to pay the rent for my place of residence as well as finance my study loans incurred during my time at NUS. I therefore needed a take home pay of about $1300 to make ends meet on a monthly basis. Aunty Pat said that I should be paid more than that but she would be unable to confirm it as yet. She then proceeded to tell me her side of the story.

Hambali Leornardi, her CITYKids Administrator at the time, had indicated his intention to convert his part time course at Trinity Theological College (TTC) into a full time course effective January 2004. His course would last approximately 15 months. Having asked around and getting no response, Aunty Pat had suggested to the Dean that SAC could approach some of the theological schools and request them to send their students to SAC as part of their attachment. Dean disagreed with this approach and suggested that a fresh graduate who wanted to serve the Lord for 1 year would be a better option as the attachment students may or may not have the passion for the children ministry.
Ds Bessie Lee had also approached Aunty Pat asking if she knew of any person, preferably with some engineering background, who would be able to come on staff and work on the Quiet Places Project (QPP).

We finished the meeting at 4 pm and I returned back to my pre-service prayer meeting. I had switched my phone to silent mode. By the time the prayer meeting was over at 5pm, I already had an sms from Aunty Pat saying that Dean had already given his verbal approval to hire me.

It all fit too well for me. I was intimidated, especially knowing that I was a fresh engineering graduate, 5 years of children ministry experience and wanting to tithe my first year in service to the Lord. The job even seemed to cover my financial need. It took me a full month to decide and make the decision to take up the job.

In the time that it took me to decide, I returned home to Kuala Lumpur (KL). My father had a very good friend of his who was a Christian. He did not agree with my decision to tithe my first year to the Lord and so I had to have a few conversations with him to defend my decision. The final standpoint was that we agreed to disagree as I had made up my mind on the issue.

While at home, having already run dry of money in Singapore, I was steeling myself to beg my father for RM500 to help see me through till I started work. To my utter surprise, my father drives home from work and horns for my mother to come out to the car. There he gave my mother RM1000 and basically said, “Nah! Give it to him.” Poor faithless me was willing to beg for RM500 and God blesses me with RM1000 without me lifting a finger.

My mother’s decision to sever ties with me stems from my grandmother who cut off her eldest son for marrying outside of the Brahmin family (Sadly, grandma held on to this till she passed away). Two weeks after my mother threatened me, she called me again to say that she would not be able to cut me off like her mother had done. The relief I felt is unbelievable.

I finally decided to take up the job. The day before I left, with my mother’s permission, began raiding her pots and pans to furnish my sparse kitchen. My dad even brought home a cardboard carton for me to pack the items into. After packing all the items in, my father suddenly decided not to let me take any of it with me to Singapore. When asked why, his reply was along the lines of, “If you are going to work in church, you can go and ask your Jesus Christ to give you all these stuff. I am not going to make it easier for you!”

I decided not to argue, but came to Singapore without the utensils. I had the following items in my pantry, an electric rice cooker with a tiny hole at the bottom, a fork a spoon, 2 plates, some serving dishes and a wooden spatula.

In Singapore, the interview process with the Dean was amazing too. I needed to meet the Dean within a small window of 2 days. The Dean was on leave till Saturday and was flying off to Cambodia on Tuesday. Canon John Benson would be in Cambodia too and they were flying back together. Canon Benson had previously interviewed me and so the two Canons were to have a chat about me. Aunty Pat did some magic and got me an interview on Tuesday morning (Dean’s off day is a Monday). At the interview, Dean asked me what my expected salary was and I told him that I had no expectation but needed at least $1300 to make ends meet. His response was, “We’ll definitely be paying you more than that.” I then met with Mabel, the Human Resource Manager, and she too assured me that I would be paid more than $1300.

I started work officially at St Andrew’s Cathedral on 1^st August 2003. I had been willing to work for $800, doing other jobs on the side to make up the shortfall, but God provided a salary significantly above the $1300 that I needed.

In the office, I was understudying Hambali. He was so nice to me that when he upgraded his phone to a one with an integrated PDA, he gave me his old PDA. He even gave me a music CD player.
Within 3 weeks of being in Singapore a church friend asked me if I needed any kitchen utensils and I said yes. He finally gave me so much that I initially had a space constraint to put away all the items. I now have enough plates, bowl, pots and pans to organise a dinner for about 6 to 8 people.
In my house, we needed to get for ourselves a shoe rack and a TV. On separate occasions, two of my uncles offered me a shoe rack and a TV respectively. They even kindly drove the items to my house in their vehicles. The TV even came with a table for it. Out of the blue, one of my church children’s parents called me up and asked if needed a 4 seater, 3-piece couch set. I said yes and he delivered the couch set to my house at his cost. My living room has no purchased item in it. Everything either came with the house or was given to me.
One of my cell group members, being unable to sell his 17” monitor, decided to give it to me. Another cell member gave me a wireless mouse (together with a Powerpuff Girls mouse pad!). After reading my testimony, someone even blessed me with a P1 CPU. Granted that I need to spend some money to fix it up but I basically have been blessed, part by part, with a complete working computer set!

When Jehovah Jireh provides, it overflows, always!

I have now been working in SAC for 15 months. I have already travelled to the Philippines and to Vietnam. I have had the opportunity to minister at other churches and speak to large groups of adults. God has brought me here and He is making things really start to happen in my life.

It is a fantastic peace to know that you know that you know that you are exactly where God wants you to be at this time.