May 2023

Hokkien Testimony #95

A little grass, a little dew. God will take care of you. Rely on him, avoid troubles. There is always a way out.

Today we welcome you to the 94th testimony in our Hokkien Harvest series. Each week we have different people from different churches share their stories with us. Everyone has their own special story of how God has changed their life. Today Pastor James Lim interviews husband and wife, Brother Tho Bi Koan and Sim Sio Pheng. In our world today there are so many challenges when people often feel that they have no hope and no where to go.Let’s listen to their story as they share with us. An English summary is also provided below.

Brother Tho Bi Koan and Sim Sio Pheng’s Testimony:

In Chinese the meanings of names are considered to be very important. My name, Bi Koan, means that there is no money. And Sio Pheng’s name means that she shouldn’t gamble. Interesting enough, these names are definitely connected to our testimony and are related to money. In addition, my last name, Kho, in Hokkien also can mean bitter. So this would point to a bitter and difficult life. So some people would say that to marry me would result in a bitter life. We can laugh about that now, because in Christ a bitter life can be transformed into one that is sweet.

As a child my family worked hard in business to make money. My mother took care of the family at home. When I was fourteen I started playing Majong with friends and of course this involved money. So little by little I moved from this common game into all kinds of gambling. After a few years I was into big money and would even steal from my mother to try and cover my bets. At that time for me to steal $1,000 was a huge amount. Since my parents loved me they really wouldn’t say much about this, so when they were sleeping I would slip in and continue to steal money from them. They knew what I was doing, but wouldn’t say anything to me about it. It was as though they accepted the fact that they had a bad and difficult child. As a result, from the time that I was young I was in bondage to this gambling addiction. The more I gambled, the bigger the problems that I faced. Needless to say this impacted my education, and I had no desire to study. I was deep into gambling. I stayed in school until my 6^th year, then I dropped out. So for more than twenty years I was a prisoner to this gambling habit.

With gamblers, when we win then we foolishly spend money on drinking or whatever. If we lose, then we start looking for ways to get more money because we are definitely going to continue gambling. So gamblers will go anywhere they can to borrow money: friends, the bank, etc. This can get so bad that the gambler will owe large sums of money. Gamblers are smart. When money is scarce, they can think of all kinds of ways to get more money. Actually, a successful gambler could really be a good business person, because they have a good mind. For me it was certainly true, it got to the point that I owed a lot of money.

Sio Pheng:

This kind of gambling addiction has a real effect on the family. At the time he was gambling, he was not a responsible person. He was very selfish and only thought of himself. So I felt very fragile and vulnerable. We had two children to raise, and I had to think of them. Honestly speaking, I had a lot of pressure on me and a big burden. Things in the extended family really got worse and the responsibility for all of this actually fell on me personally. He was actually blind to all of this, because from childhood he had never taken care of a family and didn’t know anything about this. His head was totally filled with the thought of money, and really was unaware of anything else.

Emotionally speaking, gambling also had a huge impact. We as a married couple seldom talked. All that was involved with this affected our family, and the children were also afraid. Our family really was in a mess. I didn’t trust him, and when he came home he would often criticize the children and hit them, so of course that affected the children as well. They were afraid of him. And of course this affects the children as they grow up and go out into the world.

Bi Koan:

When I won, I felt like I was on top of the world and could win everything. When I lost then I wanted to run and hide, but winning even a little made me feel like I was lucky and I couldn’t wait to gamble again. I was all in and thought I could win everything. So I would gamble until I lost everything. There’s a saying that if you gamble ten times, you will lose 9 out of 10 times. However, for me it was just about gamble 10 times and lost all 10. What I’m saying is that I lost more than I won. On Friday and Saturdays I would gamble huge amounts of money. If I won, I would gamble again with it. If I lost, I would find money somewhere else to continue gambling.

In 2004, I gambled and won $10,000 Singapore dollars. However, I lost many times more than that. It was like I was going to go crazy with all the pressure, because all that I could think of was money. That was all that was on my mind. So if I did win a lot then I would try to run away and avoid those I owed. There were times that I intended to stop gambling. Numerous times my parents paid off my debts. I even made a vow in front of my grandfather’s sacred family tablet that if someone would pay off my debts then I would stop gambling. There were periods of time that I would stop, maybe 6 to 8 months. But every time I would start gambling again. The truth be told, gambling is an addiction like cocaine that is difficult to overcome. Borrowing money is an addiction too. The more a person borrows, the more comfortable a person feels. So this too becomes an addiction. I didn’t care what people thought of me or what they said, I was addicted to gambling and had my eyes on money. Of course all of this brought huge problems into the lives of my family. There was no joy or peace, and every day was filled with conflict.

Things grew worse and worse until some of the grandparents’ houses were sold. Things were really tense and the family was very insecure. What a mess. How did the family solve these issues? If you would like to know, then tune in for part two of this program next week to discover how their lives were changed.

God bless you.

Hokkien Testimony #94

A little grass, a little dew. God will take care of you. Rely on him, avoid troubles. There is always a way out.

Today we welcome you to the 94th testimony in our Hokkien Harvest series. Each week we have different people from different churches share their stories with us. Everyone has their own special story of how God has changed their life. Today Pastor James Lim interviews Sister Chhoa iok pin. In our world today there are so many challenges when people often feel that they have no hope and no where to go.Let’s listen to her story as she shares with us. An English summary is also provided below.

Chhoa iok pin’s Testimony:

I feel so blessed to be able to come here today. I have been a Christian now for more than ten years. I am grateful for the Lord’s grace and for his salvation for both me and my family. It is a blessing for me to come here today on this program to share my testimony. I will share some of my life in earlier days. Years ago my husband really liked to drink alcohol and gamble. Actually, he gambled because he drank. Things were really in a mess. He liked to drink and would get angry and criticize people. No matter what was going on, if he was drinking then he would be upset and there was no peace for him or the family. Things really were in a mess.

Today I really want to thank the Lord Jesus that I have had the opportunity to know him and for him to save my family. Now my family is satisfied and meaninful. God saved my family so that we can trust in Him. Earlier, when I was around 40 or so, I had people share the Gospel and tell me about Jesus. However, I would get angry when I heard them share because we worshiped local gods and I felt we didn’t need to hear that. I would tell them off because I didn’t want to hear anything about Jesus.

However, you know our youngest daughter first believed in Jesus and she was praying for our family. Well, I was not pleased with her at all. She was very fervent in her prayers and would get up in the middle of the night to pray for our family. At the time since we were not Christians, I really didn’t know what she was praying about. I didn’t understand about Christianity. Actually, I wasn’t angry about this. Instead I was pleased because I noticed how her behavior had changed in the family.

Later I made a friend, Siu Hong. I had been friends with her older sister for more than thirty years. She saw that our family was really dysfunctional and also knew that our son was ill. She wanted to help and came to visit me and told me that I needed to believe in Jesus. Well, I was angry about that too and didn’t answer her at all. Every time she mentioned this, I was opposed to it and would get angry. But she didn’t give up. She asked me to take my son to church so they could pray for him. Well I promised, but back out twice. However, the third time I was embarrassed to say no, so I told her not to wait on me. I would just go by myself. At this time my son really was not doing well. He was weak. I don’t know if he had taken drugs or what, but he was dizzy and would fall down. This had gone on for some time. I went to temples all over Singapore to pray for his healing, but he wasn’t better. The doctor tried for several weeks to help him, but he finally told us to just go home and take care of him ourselves. So that’s what we did. When our other son saw that he was no better, he was very tense. I was really hurting too, because I love my son very much and it hurt to see him in this condition. Siu Hong told me that this church could help me. I had no where else to turn, so I got in a taxi and tried to find the place. However, I couldn’t find it, but I saw some women coming out and asked. They told me that this was the right place.

When we went through the door, there were a lot of people worshiping Jesus. At that time I had no knowledge about any of this, but the people there warmly welcomed us. They mentioned prayer to me, but I really didn’t know anything about this or how to pray. I just started talking to Jesus and begged him to heal my son because he couldn’t walk. I told him that if he could heal my son I would leave all those idols and follow him. Jesus did heal my son and I give all praise to him.

This isn’t our only story. My husband as you know drank heavily. Well he asked me to pray for him because he couldn’t see. However, I knew that he was opposed to hearing about Jesus. But he asked me to have the church people come over and pray for him. They did, God healed him and he accepted Jesus as his Savior. We had thirteen idols in our house, we asked the Pastor and friends to come and remove the idols and they did that. I praise the Lord for all that he has done for us. So we made the decision to not worship idols, ancestors or anything but Jesus. No matter whatever we have needed, Jesus has provided for us.

As Pastor Lim said, some people criticize Christians and say that we don’t love or respect our ancestors. Actually, we do revere them but use a different method to do that. We highly respect and admire all that our grandparents and ancestors have done for us in our lives. So we revere and show our respect in different ways.

After our son had been healed I mentioned that our daughter also had a problem. Her knee was swollen and the doctor had scanned to determine the problem, but it was not better. So our friends prayed for her and the Lord completely healed her. The Lord really does love us, and we are so grateful. He abides with us and hears our prayers. Without the Lord’s grace and healing, I would not be standing here sharing my testimony with you. So today the message that I have for those of you who are listening to this program is that if you don’t know Jesus, then I encourage you to trust in him. If we as children of God will trust in him, he will help us. Without him, there is no way that we can make it in life. Don’t look to other people or what we can see around us. Instead we must trust in the Lord. The Lord will take care of us and protect us.

Pastor Lim:

Thank you Chhoa iok pin for sharing with us today. As you can see, whenever she had great needs in her life, the Lord made a way for her. In the most difficult times, the Lord helped her and heard her prayers. I have heard that because of her faith, her family and many others have come to Christ. The Lord has greatly blessed her. Friends, today as we have listened to this testimony we know that we really can’t just depend on ourselves. We must trust in Jesus. He said, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No person can come to God the Father, except through me.” This means that if we don’t put our trust in Jesus, then we cannot be saved, and cannot receive eternal life. The Lord is good. He came to this earth to save YOU and ME. This enables you and me to receive this great blessing. So I hope today that after hearing Chhoa iok pin’s testimony that like her, you can open your heart and receive Jesus. He definitely will make a way for you. No matter how difficult your situation or how much pain you are experiencing, God will not abandon you. If you, like Chhoa iok pin, would like to open your heart today, I want to give you that opportunity. You can close your eyes and follow me, sentence after sentence, as I lead us in prayer.

Dear Jesus, I thank you. You love me. In the past I have offended you, I misused your name, and I did not glofiy your name. I genuinely believe that if I sincerely trust in you, your peace and joy will reside in my heart. From today forward I will change and be transformed into a new person. In Jesus name we pray, Amen.

The Lord bless you.