Thank you for taking the time to join us in our annual ARROW Ministry, NUS orientation event. I’m very excited because this is the start of a brand new BLESSED semester for all of you!

You, the Benjamin Generation, are marked for success! I believe that you are blessed in the library, blessed in the lecture theatres, blessed in the tutorial rooms, blessed in the canteens, blessed going in and coming out of every location on Campus. It is also my firm belief that everywhere that your feet tread upon, death, disease and evil has to flee! Demons tremble at the mere mention of your name – the name that is inscribed on the palm of His hand and engraved in His heart. And everywhere you go, you exude the fragrance of the knowledge of Christ!

As you enter this new semester, my prayer for you is that you will you become less self-conscious and yield less to the enemy’s voice of condemnation. May your relationship with Jesus deepen in these precious growing years and may you make Christ the object of your affections and your greatest priority in life.

Shine with the Light of Christ within you, His Light sets you apart and can never be extinguished. Christ in you fulfils your every hope of glory (Col 1:27). He died to ensure that you REIGN in every your life!

This is your year to REIGN & SHINE!

Love,
Coach Maddy
Overseer, NUS Cluster
ARROW Ministry

Here are some details:

Date: 26th July 2008

Time: 9am to 5pm

Venue: NUS

And just a little sneak peek for those who are curious, we’ll be having games, workshops, and plenty of time for fellowship and getting to know each other during lunch and dinner! Of course, not to forget the great time you’ll enjoy at our very own talent time and a phenomenal time you’ll get experiencing God as we end with praise and worship!

Do keep checking back for updates or changes, and check out below for sign-up ways and dates!

Looking forward to seeing you on the 26th of July!

The Shining Lights 07 materials have now been archived and can now be accessed from the side bar via the pages link. Shining Lights 07 blog entries can also be accessed by clicking on the Shining Lights 07 logo on the sidebar. Do click there to find out what happened last year if you’re new to Shining Lights!

In His love,
Hei

Unsure of what kind of laptop suits you best?

Click here to view a presentation about NUS Notebook Ownership Scheme and things to consider when purchasing a laptop (courtesy of Christopher Chang )

Which should I buy? Acer? Mac? Fujitsu? Or Toshiba?

THE SHORT
The event was extremely blessed, with each person receiving a portion from our Daddy God, whether attending as a freshman, serving, or just coming to enjoy the great activities lined up. We had about 133 cheerful youths meeting up bright and early at the steps of our Arts Forum, participating in games, workshops, and just having wonderful fellowship over these exciting activities.

I believe that all who stepped into the orientation walked away different. Impacted with knowledge, kingdom friendships, and a fresh view of school before starting the new school term, and a fresh anointing from the Lord.

THE GAMES
The games committee had prepared an amazing game of … The Amazing Race! Opening with a hilarious skit, the story unfolded…. the saga of The Quest for the Lost Lights! (it’s a long story, watch the video=)).

In this search each team had to race around the school grounds and perform tasks to complete 21 Stars. Small envelopes were strategically placed around the school, with tasks of varying ‘star’ levels matching to each difficulty level. It was a great time of bonding for each caregroup, as only exercise and the Jesus-factor can do =)

The Matrix: Neo fighting Agents…in NUS?

And the winners of the game are from Arts, Ireen’s cg! All were elated as the prize consisted of very attractive, and expensive but graciously sponsored.. SIGG BOTTLES!

Each care group had to come up and perform a cheer! After all the running, it was a good time to rest and start cracking our brains to personalise one. Here are the cheers from each cg, courtesy of Kenny. =)

Engineering CG’s Cheer

Arts(Ireen) CG’s Cheer

Science(Others) CG’s Cheer

Science(PR/CZ)/Computing CG’s Cheer

Science(LSM) CG’s Cheer

Arts(Charmaine) CG’s Cheer

Arts(Samuel) CG’s Cheer

Medicine/Dentistry CG’s Cheer

Business/Law CG’s Cheer

For the last team, however, it was a mixture of excitement and perhaps trepidation, as they were directed to the side to be blindfolded. Led by Charmaine, this huge Arts caregroup gamely took on the challenge in FEAR FACTOR, or what soon became known as FAITH FACTOR. They were made to put their hands into a jar (of their random, or not, choice), and guess what was inside. There were bloodworms, meal worms, and crickets, but the one the girls would scream most at were the live frogs.

The games committee was quite merciful, however. Some hilarious placards had been created, with words of ‘Scream!’ or ‘Eeee..’ on it. The ‘SCREAM’ Card would appear for the safest items (like a hand, or a steel wool dish scrubber), and Taurus would show a ‘LAUGH’ during the most dangerous ones, to help the poor contestants strike a good balance of nerves. =)

THE PRESENTATIONS
After a heart lunch and wash-up, we proceeded to Eusoff hall, where we collected our goody bags!

The girls and guys were separated in the room as Joy and Keith spoke to each side in the Personal Grooming Workshop. I found it extremely excellent and informative, as they spoke of the little things that hardly anyone brings up, but is so essential and practical for our everyday lives. Beauty comes from within us, and understanding that every girl in that room was beautiful and wonderfully created by God was a first priority. I’m sure that every person in the room was impacted, excited and wonderfully blessed, also thanks to the attractive colour-printed notes and tips that were provided.

Next came the Personal Financial Planning talk by Deacon Matthew Kang. Truly, behind all wealth is God who gives us the power to get wealth! What he shared was simple but powerful, highlighting the principles of tithing and saving. As the bible says, God has chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God has chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty. (1 Cor 1:27)

Deacon Anthony Lau also blessed and prepared us for a new term of education, speaking about Life-Long Learning. This session was a mind-opener, challenging us to think differently, and to realize that learning is really not confined to a classroom. All of us are created to be learning creatures, in the image of God. It was a short time but packed with many useful tips about our careers and important decisions that we would face in future. And what he believes our degree course in NUS is for – more than to learn theories and skills, it is to develop our character.

We also enjoyed mini presentations by our very own Mark and Christopher! About hall-life and laptops, they unraveled many details that most freshmen and even seniors would be unaware of.

After dinner came a talent showcase by our youths eager to share their exuberance and life with all others. Everyone greatly enjoyed seeing them just come and do what they loved, from dancing to singing and making music. It’s amazing to see how Jesus has blessed us with talents in not just one area, but many more to enjoy with.

Our first part of Shining Lights concluded with a heavily anointed time of Praise and Worship. Despite technical hiccups and challenging sound systems, it did not stop God from reaching out to minister to us and show His love to us then. Truly, it is not us but our Lord who made everything smooth, made all our paths straight and caused His light to shine through the entire process of the orientation.

Click here to see more photos!

Got your Shining Lights T-Shirt yet?

Grab them from your CGLs!

Dear Friends,

Thank you for taking the time to join us in our annual ARROW Ministry, NUS orientation event. I’m very excited because this is the start of a brand new BLESSED semester for all of you!

I believe that it is the Lord Who places us in our various faculties and causes us to be LIVE ADVERTISEMENTS His goodness. We are God’s living testimonies that He blesses His people with every good thing. We are also living proof to our friends and loved ones of a joy that is out of this world because it is not dependent on our natural circumstances! So every which way we turn, everyone around us will see that in our lives, truly, the Lord lives!

And what awesome liberty to be a people under grace! We realize that this is only possible because of God’s special favor upon our lives. Only people who have experienced Jesus (the grace of God Himself), can recognize that every blessing we have is a gift from God; that there is no pressure to have to work hard to maintain His blessings in our lives.

As you enter this new semester, my prayer for you is that you will be more and more SHAMELESS! I desire to see you becoming less self-conscious and self-occupied and becoming more Christ-conscious and Christ-occupied. I pray that you will begin to be sensitive to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, Who always places us at the right place at the right time, to invite a friend, a classmate or a neighbor to your CG and to ARROW Ministry services. I yearn to see a generation rise up who will PROACTIVELY trust God for open doors to share Jesus (with wisdom and favor) to their friends and schoolmates. We are not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation for all men! The fields are ripe for harvest here in NUS! I see it and I believe it!

You are the light of the world! Continue to let your light shine brightly before men, that your Father in heaven may be glorified.

Shining Lights, this is your year of New Beginnings!

Love,
Coach Maddy
Overseer, NUS Cluster
ARROW Ministry

Few days later I was contacted by a senior from the NUS cluster… Raphael, who was in charge of bringing me around school for the day. He was also the person who put my mind at ease at the seemingly confusing CORS bidding system whereby NUS students choose their modules and stuff… It’s a piece of cake  *freshmen out there, don’t sweat it when others describe the system to you , you’ll only get more confused…try it out yourself and you’ll get the picture… hahah ever tried learning to drive by reading an instruction manual??*

Well back to the day of the orientation itself… It wasn’t so much the programme itself that made the day memorable to me but rather the thought of the people putting the whole show together to make us freshmen feel welcome… Honestly I could tell that the team put in a fair share of effort to piece together the info pack, putting together an overflowing goody pack and organising the day’s programme. What really warmed my heart was that all this effort was to ensure that we, freshmen, would have a smooth transition into NUS life & into the NUS caregroups…

To be honest, this time last year wasn’t exactly a high point in my life. Most of my close friends weren’t going to NUS. I was not too comfortable about entering university life without my band of brothers… *the thought of lunching alone didn’t really appeal to me.* Furthermore, I was not exactly attending a caregroup as I had left my JC caregroup quite some time ago.. To top it all, that was also a period of time where I was experiencing a whole lot of personal problems… Haha. So as you can see, the transition into NUS life was not as cool as what I had envisioned when i just left the army(O.R.D.).

Well , though it was not a good start in my opinion, Daddy God had other plans for me.. In the months that followed, God just showed his abundant provision for every one of my concerns… I was soon integrated into my new caregroup where I found both friendship and safety… *If you guys are reading this, just want to say that “I LOVE YOU !!”*

This past year has also been a season where I truly went deeper in my walk with God. I would say that the things which I trusted God for during my stay in the army and when I came to NUS were entirely different. When I just got into NUS it was definitely trying when I was faced with negative circumstances such as the occasional poor grades, unenthusiastic project group mates and coping with the dynamics of independent study. Thankfully, I had my caregroup to share this journey with me and listen to my complaints. Haha.

Well, I guess WooHoo ’06 marked the beginning of my journey in NUS. Looking back at all this, I truly see the faithfulness and love of our Daddy God. That He would be vitally involved in each and every detail of our lives including stepping into university. Back then I would never have thought that I would be helping out in the committee for this year’s freshman orientation event, Shining Lights. It’s really the collection of the little thing done in great love which has made that difference in my life. Come to think of it, my journey started with a simple invitation over the phone. Haha.

For those of you who are joining us for the upcoming Shining Lights event, I pray that eternal kingdom friendships be forged and that no one shall leave the same as when they came. See you there!!

Carried in the Arms which shaped me,
Christopher Chang
NUS Arts (Psy, Social Work, Soc, Econs), SDE
Caregroup
Shining Lights Main Committee

Cool T-shirt design entries for your viewing pleasure. The winning design will only be revealed on the orientation day itself. Sign up and get a chance to wear a hip Shining Lights T-shirt!