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Testimony
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 HOW
I COME TO COMMUNITY
- By May
Fong
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Servants of the Lord, Singapore
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To start with, I need to tell you a little about my life
before I joined community. I grew up in a Christian family.
My father was a deacon in church and without fail,
every Sunday we would go to church.
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This went on until I was in my late teens, those rebellious
years, when I rejected everything that was of my parents’
generation, including Christianity. When I was in the
University, I took a course in Anthropology. Here we learned
that in every society, there is a religion or a set of common
beliefs about life, so that people will conform to rules, and
there will be civil order. At this point, I thought
Christianity was something along the same line, except more
developed and sophisticated since it has a longer history.
That was when I felt I was too smart to be duped by religion
and Christianity. However, try as I might, I still could not
completely convince myself that God does not exist.
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A few years after I graduated, our family had a double
tragedy. My father died when I was 10. At age 23, my mother
and sister died together in a car accident. I had just a
brother left, but he was someone I could not relate to very
well. To deal with the pain, I did not take time to grieve
over the deaths, but instead, threw myself completely into my
banking job. But God had His plans for me. I was then
beginning to go back to church, and at one of the gospel
meetings, I was baptized in the Holy Spirit. Soon after this,
I began to feel restless in my job. I had just been promoted
to AVP, the youngest ever to be so…but I felt an emptiness,
and felt that there had to be more to life than what I had.
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That was when I felt the Lord was leading me to take time
off from work. And so I looked around for a graduate business
school in the
U.S. Since
this was the leading of the Lord, I felt sure that He must
want me to go to a Christian university. At that time, a well
known one was Oral Roberts University. To cut the story
short, I received acceptances to Oral Roberts University and
the University of Michigan. But I wanted to go to the U of M,
as the degree would be more bankable. I began to struggle with
the Lord. During that time, I developed an infection in my
knees, which kept me immobile in bed just, as I was getting
busy preparing to go. I was frustrated and asked the Lord,
“Lord, You’re supposed to be the Divine Healer and the Creator
of my body…why did You let this happen to me?” That’s when I
heard Him telling me that I was like Jacob, always struggling
with Him needlessly, and trying to run ahead of him. At that
moment, I knew that He wanted me to go to U of M.
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Meanwhile, at the U of M, a year before I arrived, the
Asian Outreach (a branch of University Christian Outreach for
Asian students) had already been set up and the people in
charge, namely, Dave Quintana and John Keating, had sensed the
Lord showing them that He will start a community in
Singapore.
The Singapore group was already meeting for a year, but the
problem was, there was not even one sister among them. So for
sometime, they were praying for the Lord to send a sister. Can
you make the connection now?
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I didn’t know why the Lord called me to
Ann Arbor
and U of M, but I was soon to find out. The brothers and
sisters from the Asian Outreach, reached out to me, and I was
beginning to form friendships. Even before I made any
commitments to the community, I was assigned under a pastoral
leader. At first, I wasn’t comfortable with the idea of having
someone ’overseeing’ me; I clung to the illusion of my being a
‘free’ spirit. But soon, I began to appreciate her love and
the commitment she showed towards our relationship. Earlier, I
shared that I did not take time to grieve over my mother’s and
sister’s death. On hindsight, I realized that the Lord led me
to Ann Arbor, for me to go through the grieving process, as I
would not have been able to cope with it in Singapore,
without supportive relationships then.
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I began to have frequent flashbacks, dreams. I began to
experience pain and loneliness. I even became suicidal. The
lowest point was, when I was walking along the road one day, I
heard a voice telling me to throw myself into the path of an
oncoming car, since life wasn’t worth living, with all that
pain. That was when I knew I needed help. My pastoral leader
gathered a group of brothers and sisters, and they prayed over
me for deliverance. That was the start of the healing process,
but the whole journey of deliverance was much longer, and very
painful. I could not have gone through it without the support
of my pastoral leaders, and my brothers and sisters in
community.
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That was how I first came into community. But, what kept me
on and convinced my husband to be a part of it, too? Early
on, the Lord showed me that community was His gift to me.
Living a victorious, and Spirit-filled life is really hard
work. There are too many distractions, temptations and
pressures to go the other way. Life in
Singapore
is demanding, even something as harmless as working hard to
provide for the family can be stretched to the extreme, and
used by the devil to shut God out of our lives.
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Personally, I feel that it is almost impossible to do it
alone, without a strong network of supportive and affirming
relationships. In my brothers and sisters, I receive
protection and strength. In my 17 years in community, my
experience is that, it is a bit like the flying geese
formation. Some periods, I’m more on fire for the Lord, have
more reserves to share with others, and more tuned to hearing
the Lord, so I move to the front to lead the charge. Other
times, I may be struggling, and there will be strong shoulders
for me to lean hard on.
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The community is my protection, in the sense that it’s
harder to sin, when there are so many holy people around! But
seriously, life is such that, the pull towards worldliness, as
opposed to holiness, is often subtle and gradual. It woos you
slowly, and often you don’t know it, until you’re trapped.
Over the years, I have seen good Christians falling by the
side, involved in adultery, addictions to gambling,
alcoholism, broken marriages, etc. I can’t help but wonder,
how many of them could have been saved, if they also had
strong supportive relationships, like we do in the community.
If we live in the light, and are open to each other’s
corrections and inputs, it will help us to fix our eyes on the
Lord.
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I also found the ecumenical part of our Community very
appealing and radical. To me, it makes a lot
 of sense, and is a response to Jesus’ call to unity, before
He ascended to heaven. In the Servants of the Lord, we have an
equal balance of Catholics and Protestants, and we truly
celebrate our commonalities, and respect each other’s
different traditions. I know of no other group in
Singapore
that has this issue lived out so fruitfully. It’s truly quite
an amazing phenomenon in Singapore, where Protestants don’t
consider Catholics as saved, and vice versa. We have had many
guests visiting our meetings, just so that they can see
Catholics and Protestants worshipping side by side.
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As for my husband Mervyn, his only experience of community
life before we got married, was living with the brothers at
the brotherhood house (a household for brothers living single
for the Lord), for one week (and during Lent too!) before I
went back with him to Singapore for our engagement. At that
time, the thing that most intrigued him was the food that the
brothers ate during Lent (or rather the lack of food!). I did
not make it a condition, that I would marry him, only if he
stayed in the community. Since I was sure that God had called
me to be a part of the Singapore community, and I was also
sure, that our marriage was in His will for us, it followed
that God will also give him his own personal conviction, and
calling, for being in the community. I only asked that,
because the community was such an important and big part of my
life, that he would be open to checking it out seriously.
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That was my prayer for him for quite a few years. I’m glad
the Lord did show him and also gave him a clear vision about
community life. Today, he is one of the coordinators of
Servants of the Lord.
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In conclusion, I would like to say two things: One, that
much of the benefits of community life can best be experienced
in the long term, when strong, established relationships are
in place. Secondly, community is not, and cannot be, a
substitute for our own personal relationship with the Lord.
Our personal relationship is still the foundation, and basis,
from which we live out our commitments in community.
Therefore, while community life provides the necessary
fellowship, we still need to continually pray and study God’s
Word, in order for us to move forward in our growth and
maturity.
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TELL US
LIKE IT IS!
- Has
something wonderful and unique happened in your life lately? Did
God answer your prayer in a very unexpected way? Did you, like
Isaiah, meet God’s whisper?
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you felt His powerful hand working in your life recently?
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Everyday, people are experiencing God’s mighty Word in their
lives and it is a pity that very few know about it. Do you have
a story to tell? Some Good News to share?
- E-mail
us (genesis@catholic.org)
or fax us (021-6627384), and tell us about it. That’s right! You
don’t have to be a great writer to do this. We can help you
write it – just tell us like it is!
- Don’t
forget to write the subject: “Let Me Tell You A Story”
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or ideas:
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Genesis
Catholic Community
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Place of Refuge
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Surabaya Corner
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Testimony
By May Fong
Community Life
By Pinky Torres
Reflection
By Fr. Agustinus Belo,
PR
Straight from the Heart
By Carolle Bautista
God Answers Prayers
By Beth Manibog
On Focus
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