The rebirth of Hope NY Church & our journey

August 31, 2012

Sept 2, 2012 is the real re-birth of our church. To begin with, Doreen & I had been praying and planning to move into the City of New York for 2 years now with the goal to be close to our beloved church Hope NY. We had been pastoring our church in Manhattan literally from our home with a distance of 1.5 hours drive or train. SO much conviction about the need to live among the people you want to reach out to makes us resolved to move. God spoke to us in Isaiah: Who will bring us into the fortified city, except the Lord our God?

I have gone through so much spiritual warfare’s before this date that it’s incredible and all I can say is my soul praises the Lord for He has heard my cries and shielded me from the storm and the forces that had been unleashed against me, my family and in my sense, the church’s rebirth. It’s about the big harvest God will bring into Hope NY Church starting Sept 2 and in a fast pace according to the prophecy given to us back in July 2012 in the NA Camp by John Jacks. The prophecy is so accurate to the extent it’s breath-taking and the promise of God to us is even more breath-gasping. The work that the Lord told us He will do, instead of us, is like He answering from a mighty storm.

We have gone through the challenge of getting our Syosset house to be rented out starting from July 1 when we spent thousands of dollars to repaint the house and fixed little things here and there; and when it was finally rented out after 3.5 weeks (we felt nervous by then); we had literally 1 week to find our new rental home in the right city. After 1 + month’s search that brought us to Hamilton heights, Upper West side, Roosevelt island, we finally picked Forest Hills for its good neighborhood, the bang for the dollars, and close proximity of subway commute (20 min) to midtown. We combed every rental home in the city within our budget and time was running out…and thank God that finally we got a gorgeous looking house and we got it. We would had to move into a hotel and put tons of stuff in a storage otherwise!

Moving out of Syosset house was a nightmare with so much stuff accumulated over the years. Worst still is our cleaner didn’t turn up on Sunday as promised and scheduled on the day we moved out (8/19) and as a result, we worked from 10 pm till 3 am in Syosset house to get the house clean enough for tenant to move in on 8/20 Monday. As it turned out, it was not good enough for tenant, and I got nasty emails and calls from him. My heart sank as this financial impact from this rental is very important for us to survive financially in Queens/NYC. A few more days of anguish and we sent another pro cleaner for 2 hours ($210) to further clean up the house for tenant. Finally that storm passed.

Another new storm began just as soon as the previous one settled. The dust barely settled, before we found another, perhaps bigger storm looming. Suddenly we had to re-look at our son’s senior year in Syosset HS . Heart anguish and turmoil as this is being brought into question. I prayed and fasted the day before making this phone call to the principal this morning. He returned call, and we had a nice chat about the situation. Initially he had his doubts, but after him hearing the good news that Rebecca got into a top private school Chapin School in Upper East side Manhattan, he was so excited for us! I concluded all is good and in the Lord’s hands.  Trust the Lord with all my heart for He is good.

After all these storms, I am ready for the sunshine kicking off Sept with the new church’s rebirth! Thank you Lord.