Don’t Be Slow to Pay Your Vow

How Real Is the God Whom My Parents Have Been Serving

　　I have been blessed with God’s grace by being born into and growing up in a Christian family. Going to church on Sunday and attending Sunday School were the mode of life I knew and accepted since I was a small child. As my parents are ministers, through their experience in trusting and serving God, I have seen how God cares for and blesses our family. Although our whole family lived on my father’s income, God provided well for us so that we lacked nothing at all in our daily living. Later, God led my father to Australia to pastor a church and the whole family thus migrated there. In Australia, God had wondrously prepared enough money for my parents to buy a house which would be their living quarters when they retired. From this, I could see that God’s provisions are perfect and beyond our expectation. All these have made me see that the God whom my parents have been serving is so real.

　　I made a vow to God to serve Him all my life in a spiritual revival meeting on April 28, 1990. It was when I was only 15. From then on, I harbored the thought that when I “grew up,” I would serve God full time. However, when I really grew up, I forgot the vow that I had made to God. In my university days and later when I worked in society, I willfully led my own life, intoxicated by material enjoyment and living a life style no different from any non-Christian. The result was that I lost my freedom for I could not escape from the bondage of sin. As a result, I was tormented by the feeling of guilt and my heart was filled with struggles, emptiness and loss.

　　I must thank God that He did not forsake me but through the Holy Spirit’s constant prompting, He called me to turn round and slowly guided me back to my true self. He rebuilt me through the words of 2 Timothy 2:21: “If a man cleanses himself from what is ignoble, he will be an instrument for noble purposes, made holy, useful to the Master and prepared to do any good work.” When I was truly willing to let the Lord Jesus rule over every part of my life, submit and follow the Bible’s teaching, my Lord, who is so wonderful, began to change me step by step!

　　The thought of serving God full time once again emerged in my heart. I then enrolled in the Pre-Theological Education Certificate Program run by HKBTS’s Lay Theological Education Department in 2004. This program is targeted for those who are dedicated to exploring full time ministry or seeking God’s will in their lives and making clear God’s call. During the study, I did seriously think about whether or not I would serve God full time. I felt I would not want to let go my job and I was not mature enough to be God’s servant. As an alternative, I took the Lay Theological Training Certificate Program (major in music ministry) to get myself better equipped so that I could both serve God in the church and did not have to forsake my career and steady income.

A Severe Warning: Job Limitations and the Reminder of Life

　　In retrospect, I returned to Hong Kong to take the Master Degree Program in 1998 and took up a career in Social Work after graduation. Although it was a secure job, I always found that there was a limit to what a social worker could do. Merely counting on man’s advice, theories and technique taken from psychology and counseling, I found that the result was not significant after all. However, when I could help students through my faith as a school social worker, for example when we prayed together and asked God to intervene in their lives, I could take the opportunity to testify to God’s life-changing power and felt contented and excited. My life was then full of meaning. I repeatedly experienced that it is only God who can change a person’s life! Even with professional training and with experience accumulating over the years, I was well aware of the limitations of my job. Then too I was not sufficiently equipped in knowledge of the Bible, I found myself unable to use scripture effectively to counsel and help people I met.

　　In August 2009, I found on the dining table a scripture card with these words: “If you make a vow to the Lord your God, do not be slow to pay it, for the Lord your God will certainly demand it of you and you will be guilty of sin.”(Dt 23:21) These words of God were a severe warning to me as if God were speaking to me, “Tin-wai, when will you honor the vow you made when you were young?” Although I put aside the vow I had made (I thought taking a part time theological study would be enough), God never forgot. God always takes our promises seriously.

Come and Follow Me: Exploring and Affirming God’s Call

　　Then, I began to pray fervently before God and to ask my church minister to pray with me and help me seek God’s will. Two questions puzzled me:

1. Is God pleased to accept my vow to Him when I was young? Or is it only my wishful thinking or only my “wild imagination”?
2. How about the financial aspect? Could my family make it financially if I decided to study full time and to rely solely on my husband’s income. We still had to pay for the house mortgage! Could I wait for one more year in order to save enough money for my seminary study?

　　To my first question, God gave us a response. Once when I prayed about my studies, a scripture verse came to me: “Take care of my sheep.” Feeling it was a call from God, my heart was deeply touched.

　　Later in my devotional time, God spoke to me again through scriptures: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”(Mt 16:24) I also read the words Jesus spoke to the rich young man: “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” (Mt 19:21) These two verses gave me one identical message: “Come and follow me!” I began to comprehend God’s will. He had truly called me to serve Him and affirmed that He was pleased to accept the vow I had made many years ago.

　　Another verification came to me: God moved my husband and my parents who all along prayed for my consecration and gave me much support. It was especially touching when I shared how I had come to comprehend God’s call, my husband immediately promised to support me wholeheartedly to set out on the road of consecration. This was clear to me when he told me that to offer oneself up to God is the greatest blessing in life.

After the Surgery: No More Waiting for This or That

　　Later on, God further reminded me through the lyrics of “Who Is Your Lord”: “You only have one heart; your life can live only once. In this world no one can serve both wealth and God together. In your heart, who is your Lord? If you love the world, how can you still love God? In fact your heart knows it well …” God seemed to say to me: “Would you rather choose the world and its wealth or choose to follow the Lord Jesus?” In pondering when to respond to God, there was an episode that I had never anticipated.

　　In March 2010, I went through my fourth major surgery: removing a benign tumor in my thyroid gland. The time from when the tumor was first discovered, to the diagnosis and then to the surgery was only two months. It all took place when I was not psychologically prepared for the events that happened so suddenly! In the past, I had made excuses for my procrastination as I was unwilling to offer my life up to God. Through it all, God in His incredible patience continued waiting — waiting for me to “grow up,” waiting for me to save enough money and waiting for my spiritual life to be steady and healthy before I began my seminary study. But after going through this surgery, I came to realize that life is not in man’s control. I could not assume that it was within my ability to control and plan “my future.” I ask myself, “How long will I tarry before I wholeheartedly decide to serve God? Could I even wait till my retirement before I go to the seminary? Why can I not make good use of the best years of my life when I am in good health and full strength and offer myself fully to God for His use? At that moment I finally prostrate myself before the Lord and willingly let go of any of my own thoughts and my plans.

　　Then, what about the second question? It was true I had been worrying about my financial situation. Then I had a wonderful experience: after I had prayed and promised God and that I would let go of my job to follow Lord Jesus, the worries vanished immediately. That day when I resolved to set out on the road of consecration, God spoke to me through the words of a hymn “Because He Lives”: “Because He lives, I can face tomorrow; because He lives, all fear is gone; because I know He holds the future …” The promise God gave me is this: fear not what the future will be because the future is in His control. God led me to remember how God had provided for my parents when I was small. (Even until this day, He continues to take good care of them.) Likewise, God will certainly provide for the daily needs of both my husband and me. Today, as I have been studying in the Seminary for three months, I can testify that God’s provisions are truly sufficient.

　　I have always kept alive the hope that through these three years of theological equipping, my life is being transformed, molded and remolded by God. I pray that I will always strive to learn to be a servant after God’s heart.