By Desmond Law in Taiwan
On a hot and humid Saturday, watery eyes, clammy skin and beautiful smiles filled the local community center in Tianwei, Taiwan. Perhaps some of the watery eyes were the result of the touching, moving and inspirational atmosphere created by our church-planting team’s Mother’s Day outreach. But the fountain of tears that streamed down my face could only be credited to the adjacent temple and the people furiously burning ghost money to the dead.
When I say adjacent, I don’t mean down the block, or even next door. Most community centers in Taiwan are built connected to a temple and Tianwei is no exception. It was quite a juxtaposition, hearing melodious praise songs to my right and the roar of a raging fire to my left.
In the relatively unreached community of Tianwei, our Mother’s Day outreach was the first of its kind for our church-planting team. We planned live performances, some little giveaways, a group aerobics session and, most importantly, a meal.
In order to prepare enough food, we asked people to register at our ministry center. Initially excited and filled with hope, we patiently waited for names to fill the sign-up sheet.
Days went by, and Mother’s Day weekend slowly approached, the sign-up sheet looked as fresh and blank as the day we first created it. Our original emotions — excitement and anticipation — become clouded with doubt and uncertainty.
Finally, it was the Friday night before the Saturday outreach, and I was sitting in our living room preparing my camera. I had been appointed as the official photographer of the event. I asked my dad how the sign-up sheet was looking and he gave me a cheerful “zero.”
As cheerful as he could bring himself to be, I knew how discouraging it was to have worked so hard to prepare for an event that might result in nothing. I nervously asked what we were going to do if no one showed up, and he honestly didn’t have an answer for me.
SEND International is partnering with like-minded churches to establish new congregations in Taiwan. The Tianwei church-planting initiative is under the leadership of Pastor Timothy Tang of Living Water Baptist Church in Taichung city. We had anticipated that around 30 volunteers from the parent church would be attending, and we dryly joked that this outreach event would turn out to be “church members only.”
With a heavy heart I began to lose faith as I drifted off to sleep, mentally preparing myself for the worst possible outcome.
The next morning, we began our weekly commute of around 45 minutes to Tianwei. As we pulled up to the center, I saw a large banner strung proudly across two poles, inviting the local community to our humble Mother’s Day celebration. The community center was an open area with a high ceiling equipped with some small fans to help with heat management, with the temple and its burning offerings glowing just feet away.
Ladies received flowers at the event.
Local volunteers had graciously helped us wash and arrange 100 folding chairs that had been in storage for what seemed like forever, their age betrayed by the thick layer of dust we originally found on them. As the scheduled time to start the program rolled around, people started slowly trickling in. By the time the program officially started, I would dare say there were 40 people from the community represented. Even the village chief attended and graciously welcomed us to the village before he had to return to his fields to work.
The village chief, right, connects with Pastor Timothy Tang.
As the teardown phase of our outreach came to a close, I finally had time to reflect on all the amazing and not-so-amazing things that had happened that day. We had made a positive impression on the village leadership, as well as the villagers themselves. Our goal was to create new relationships and to establish a presence in the village. I can honestly say we accomplished our mission.
The day was a show of faith in God: the stage Tianwei, and our church-planting team his actors. God masterfully orchestrated his will not only through us but in us to take the first step in the long journey toward reaching his lost people in Tianwei, Taiwan.
As the team moves forward, pray for open doors and hearts in Tianwei Township, especially as summer camp will be held soon. Also pray for seminary intern Bright Liu, his wife, Joyce, and their two children, Mini and Cooper. After Bright finishes his seminary degree in June, he will move to Tianwei, giving the church-planting effort a permanent face within the community.
