Our Building Committee has been meeting diligently the past several months to interact with three design-build firms for the purpose of receiving their master plans and construction cost estimates so they could use them to compare and choose the best one that New Life would work with in building our future facilities. The criteria that the committee has used in selecting the firm are as follows: 1. Will the firm help us build the facilities that are simple and functional yet inspiring? 2. Will the firm help us build the facilities that are not just economical to build but also to maintain and operate in the future? 3. Do we sense that there will be ...

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It's been more than 10 years since I came to Seoul Baptist Church and exactly seven and a half years since we began New Life Fellowship. Times have passed by very quickly. I will be 41 years old this June and I sense that our time on this earth is short and fleeting. James 4: 14 comes to my mind often these days. "Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes." (James 4: 14) Since our earthly life is brief and momentary I feel more compelled to live my life in such a way that it will count before God and His Kingdom. I yearn and desire to invest my life ...

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It's great to see our church facilities including our gym being used for many weddings these days. At first, we had a difficult time imagining and thinking of having our wedding receptions in the gym. The basketball nets, the scoreboard and the absence of a dance floor were all unappealing to us as a reception hall. So, several years ago when I suggested to New Life the idea of having their wedding receptions in the gym, it was not well received. I think Martha Stewart, who took weddings and receptions to the next level of extravagance and immaculateness, had a lot to do with the response I got from people. Just in the past several months, ...

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Amazingly, this year is rapidly coming to an end. It seems as if it was just a few months ago that we began 2004 with lots of hopes and expectations, and now we are about to face 2005 with a different set of goals and dreams. Now is a good time for us to reflect on and praise God for what He has done in and through us this past year, and entrust ourselves to Him once again for the coming year for Him to use and work through us for His awesome Kingdom work. Our baptism service is always a special time because it speaks clearly to the world that our God is real and He is still working powerfully in the lives of people. This year we were able to ...

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For the past several years, Seoul Baptist Church, which is made up of the Korean Speaking Congregation (KSC) and the English Speaking Congregation (ESC aka New Life Fellowship), has been steadily growing both spiritually and numerically. We praise and thank God for this growth and pray that He will continue to grow our church until Christ comes for the second time. The numerical growth, however, has created some inconvenient situations in the life of our church. For example, New Life had to move the place of our worship from the trailer house to the gym, and we have been setting up chairs and taking them down every Sunday. KSC started their ...

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When my mother visited me last January and attended New Life's Sunday worship service, she noticed that the worship was rather long (I think I preached a typical 45 minute message!) but was very surprised and impressed at how all of you were very focused and attentive throughout the worship to the end. My mother, however, isn't the only one who thinks this way. I feel the same way about you and our worship. Every great once in a while I see one or two of you dozing off during my message time because you probably worked very hard all throughout the week and are physically tired. But it truly is amazing to see all of you making your best effort to ...

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Why T.? I grew up knowing that missionary work was important and that praying for "lost souls" in other countries was important as well. But I always believed that missionary work was not that important?it wasn't central to being a Christian, it was just for people who wanted to take that extra step and make that extra effort. Even though I went on several short-term missions as a student (and one after graduating college), I still had the mindset that my summers?my "dead time"?were times for missions, but the school year was for things much more important like school and career. However, this flawed thinking was completely changed after the 2003 ...

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