Hoong Wu’s POV

I was a truth-seeker and was brought to church by a brother during his NS days. The first time I met Rachel was outside a church hall after an evening service. She heard that I was a truth-seeker (TS) and came and talked to me. During that conversation, she asked for my opinion of the church. I shared with her what I thought about our “true church” doctrine.

From that conversation, I find that some of her striking characteristics are that she is wise and very honest. I found it very rare to find someone with her personality, even among outsiders. Subsequently, I attended the University campus fellowship (UCF). We had discussions on different topics, and Rachel also honestly shared her opinions. From her sharing, I can tell that she is serious, open to others’ inputs and willing to share her thoughts. She made a TS like me feel very comfortable in church.

After a while, I had a major issue to deal with, that is, my faith. I remember it was the year 2014, and I decided to get baptised in TJC. I told my parents about it and even though they didn’t reject, my dad was concerned. He shared that baptism is a very big decision. My life would have a lot of new restrictions, and as a result, my potential to find a partner would be affected as well because the church clearly advice to not marry outside. My current female friends were automatic made unsuitable, and I got worried. Most of the youths in church already know each other since young, so what chance do I have?

My dad advised me to wait for a few years - find a girl, get married, then get baptised lah! On the surface, this made sense, but God already made it clear to me that this church has the truth and He wants me to be here. I was scared of what my dad said, but at the same time, I was also scared of God. If I don’t take the chance to be baptised, God may close the door of salvation to me. I went ahead with baptism and I was happy. Shortly after, I received the Holy Spirit. I made a firm stand not to date any outsiders, but I constantly struggled to make this decision.

A few months later, Bro John brought me to IYF. Then, I was already feeling very down and thought it might be a good idea to attend IYF. Some of the sermons of the IYF talked about marriage, and I started getting worried again and prayed very hard. During one of the prayers, I told God what I was feeling. I told God, “I don’t think the chances of me getting married is good. Firstly, I’m new. I have a weird personality, and I barely know anyone. Why do I have to go through these tests? Why don’t You just bless me? Would there be anyone to even like me?”

God was merciful and was still the same to me. He didn’t punish me for doubting Him, but I felt that He didn’t like how I prayed. During the prayer, everyone around me was praying very seriously. That motivated me to remember God’s promise. I tried to remember God’s power and His faithfulness. Slowly, I felt strengthened. My prayer slowly became smooth. God was using the words of the Bible to speak to me directly, and I felt the power within these words and was comforted.

Three words rang very clearly in my head, “I am God”. Is there really nothing that can be hard for God? I realised that I’m talking to the king of miracles - nothing is difficult for Him. I reflected my attitude during my prayers, “How could my prayers be so faithless?”

Then it appeared in my heart, “Do you need God to manifest before you for you to believe in Him?”

The next question was, “What do I really want?” I started telling God what I wanted to a partner but every time I brought up a certain criteria, His words would tell me my criteria was not good. For example, I tell God, “God, I want a girl with an attractive personality.” The word of God would tell me, “Charm is deceitful.”

Next, “I want a girl who would say nice words.” His words would tell me, “Open rebuke is better than words concealed”.

I gave up and asked what trait I should look for, and I knew I asked the right question. God used the example of good girls in the Bible, for example, Rebekah was praised not for her beauty but that she was diligent in her work. Ruth was blessed not because she was young, but because she was loyal. Sarah was beautiful but was praised by the Bible for her faith.

I thought, “Ok!” But I got worried again, “Is God willing to find someone for me? Someone who would accept me?” Then I remembered God’s goodness to me. Being able to come to TJC is a grace to me. God has accepted me and won’t leave me to be lonely, so ,”Surely God will prepare someone good for me right?” Yes, He did.

Ever since after IYF when I got fearful, I would remember this prayer and I calmed down. I slowly to become more focused in my study, and started to let God in. After a while, I had many chances to interact with Rachel and I felt comfortable because I could be honest with her. She also shared with me her experience and hurdles she went through. I found more positive attributes in her: she loves her family, she is very intelligent and she takes services seriously. I started to fall for her. It was during this period when I realised she was serious in looking for a partner, but the problem was that I procrastinated in indicating my interest in her. I can think of one reason why: I had no confidence in myself.

I have been asking God to give me a sign, “Is she the one for me?” I procrastinated for a long time until one day I realised that if I keep waiting, I will wait until the Second Coming (LOL 😂). I also felt that it was rude to keep her waiting and plucked up the courage to ask Rachel to be my girlfriend. We started to get into a relationship.

When I started dating Rachel, I knew I would be stepping into a new life. I didn’t know what the future entails and got stressed. The IYF prayer reminded me to always pray. Our relationship wasn’t a romantic drama. I had questions in my head every day. Our relationship, lives and we ourselves were not perfect. My proposal to her was not perfect. (I held a ring box upside down and proposed to her. It was going so well…..) Every day I asked God to calm me down, “God I’m afraid. I don’t know how to be a good boyfriend.” I always ask God to preserve both of us. Thank God we eventually got married in church.

Looking back, I’m even more certain God gave to me Rachel as my wife. We share very similar beliefs and values, our faith complements each other and she can help me in areas where my faith is weaker.

God helped us on many occasions to create a close relationship and it made my marriage blissful. Whenever I stay close to her I feel emotionally stable. Whenever people ask me, “How sure are you that she is the one?” My answer would be, “Without God, I would not be sure. Without God leading us, our relationship would be hard to build.”

To conclude, I would like to encourage my brethren who are not married: Nothing is too difficult for God. We may feel that entering a relationship may be too difficult. We don’t know how to find a partner but as long as we pour our cares unto God, He will help us.

Brothers who are not married, I encourage you to take the first step. A few months after marriage, Rachel told me, “If you procrastinated any longer, I would have lost interest in you.”

Dear brothers, don’t wait. Don’t be afraid to take the first step. God will help us.

For brothers not of marriageable age, WAIT. Make friends with brothers and sisters in church first.

I end my short sharing here.

Rachel’s POV

I first met Hoong Wu in 2014. It was my second year at university. There was an evangelistic service that night and I noticed that John brought a Friend. A few youths and I decided to chat with him to help him feel more comfortable and also to find out his thoughts of the sermon. We managed to talk a lot that night. We walked about the different doctrines and form that conversation I found out he was very determined to find the truth of the Bible and searching the church with an accurate doctrine. That conversation made me hopeful that the church would gain a new believer because it’s quite rare for a TS to be so interested in looking for the truth. Because of this hope, I also felt very stressed during the conversation because I didn’t want to answer his questions wrongly. Thank God He continued coming to church after.

This formed my first impression for him: he is God-fearing and he believes in the authority of God. After that, he continued attending night services and eventually started joining UCF. Before, he never missed a single session of UCF.

Through this fellowship, we interacted more and talked about other topics. We both like playing video games a lot, but that’s just an example. Through these conversations I can see that he’s very serious in his faith, he’s very sincere and honest, and I found him very interesting. But he wasn’t baptised so I ignored my interest. He got baptised at the end of 2014, and I remembered telling myself, “That means can already lah.” We continued being friends, but I tried indicating my interest as well. Then, he was still adjusting to church life and I was still busy with my duties and we didn’t get to interact frequently. My interest also gradually died off. (“But don’t worry, everything is ok now!”)

Early 2015 I encountered a very big test: I met a guy in one of my university classes. He’s a Christian from another church. We shall call him Mr J. Because we took the same classes, we interacted a lot and we also shared similar interests. After some time, we talked about religion and doctrines in general. He was interested in this topic and we continued to talk.

After a while, I had an interest in J. I tried explaining our church’s doctrines to him. I brought him to church to attend evangelistic services as well but he wasn’t convinced. He insisted that all doctrines were acceptable as he had a very open mind. He still wanted to interact with me and I found out he was interested in me. This made me stressed because this person showed an interest in me, we had similar interests and was honest in me and helped me out a lot in my university days. He was a special friend to me then, but was missing something very important - he didn’t believe in the church’s doctrines.

I prayed to God, “Can You help J believe in You?” I admitted then that this temptation was quite strong. A part of me hoped that God would make an exception for us. I continued discussing doctrines with me.

At that time, my mom was also aware of this and prayed with me. My mom made 3 things very clear to me:

1. We have no power to change a person’s beliefs unless God decides to work.
2. The sheep of the Lord will listen to the sound of His voice. If a person refuses to listen to sound doctrine, it means he’s not willing to become a sheep.
3. If I really want to date this person, I’d suffer. I would have to fight for my faith every day and be in danger of losing my faith.

I know what she said was true but the temptation didn’t go away. I didn’t want to lose my faith and I also acknowledged that I know I would not be able bear this for a long time. I don’t like conflicts, so how long more until I give in because I’m tired of arguing doctrines with him? How long more until I give in to going to his church?

I prayed to God to ask, “If this guy is never going to believe in You, please open my eyes for me to see clearly.” A small part of me still hoped for an exception, but God answered my prayers.

One day I was discussing with J the efficacy of foot washing. He still was not convinced and it was quite a long discussion and I thought, “This person is so stubborn…!” Then, I remembered 2 Timothy 3:5;

“having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away!”

These people know the contents of the Bible and they look godly, but they deny the expectations God has and refuse to humbly believe. For example, we know foot washing is tied to our salvation. But J thinks he knows better. The answer was very clear and this made me very sad because God was clearly showing what He was expecting me to do - stay away. The temptation doesn’t immediately go away. I was still tempted daily because J was also trying to chase me.

I struggled with these conflicting feelings for several months and only at the end of 2015 I took the courage to reject him. Even though I made the rejection, it made me feel very lonely because I lost a good friend in university and I felt that there would be no one else like him. I thought that no brother in church would like me and I was sad for a few months. This was nearing the end of 2015.

In early 2016 around February, I got sick of being sad and decided to pray to God and I told Him, “Since young, I’ve been told that You would prepare for us and your prepared partner would be the best. I don’t know when Your time is, I don’t know how long I have to wait, but since You’re God,, I’ll believe your preparation. I will wait. No matter how long, I will wait.” I got up from that prayer with a resolve to wait. Although, I was scared.

I told myself to focus on work, church and on improving myself. I still felt sad at times, but each time I would remind myself of this prayer and hold on to this resolve. This is a very tiring process and was a struggle.

Thank God, He didn’t make me struggle for very long. About 2 months from that prayer, I received a message from Hoong Wu. It was a nice message. I praise God as He extended a very great mercy for me. He cut short my waiting time and through our relationship I discovered that Hoong Wu is a partner prepared by God. He had many qualities I didn’t realise I actually needed. I can say what criteria I want in a partner, but what I want may not necessarily be what I need. Hoong Wu may not share all of my interests, he may not fulfil all my criteria, but he definitely makes me feel safe and be a better person. Our values in life are quite similar but most importantly, we share the belief in the true God and His doctrine. We know the importance of doing work in church.

Looking back, God guided me very very clearly. He guided me through good advice from my family and by directly answering my prayers.

To brothers and sisters seated here, God’s promises are real. He is faithful. He will keep His promises and provide for us as long as we follow His expectations faithfully.

For sisters who are of marriageable age, I encourage you to pray to God. God can guide you by directly telling you what are the correct criteria. While you do pray, don’t be afraid to take the first step too. If neither of us are proactive, this is not going to work. I end my sharing here. Thank God.