Over many years, the Graduates Christian Fellowship (GCF), Chinese Overseas Christian Mission (COCM), and Overseas Christian Fellowship (OCF) labored hard planting seeds and expanding the Lord’s Kingdom, not just within our nation but overseas as well.
Near the end of last year, on November 8th to 10th 2024, they celebrated their seventh annual OCF/COCM/GCF/Others Returnees Conference at Awana Genting, Genting Highlands, Pahang. Typically, this conference is held every year since its inception as an appreciation of the hard word by the alumni of the organisations.
The conference in 2024 was by far their largest, attended by 96 participants from Singapore, Malaysia, Australia, UK, UAE, Myanmar and Sri Lanka. The organisers shared that for this conference, they took the step of faith to invite speakers from UK and Australia, trusting that the Lord would provide for their airfares and expenses and that these expenses would not pass on to the participants. They also managed to find sponsorship for a few pastors, missionaries, and full time workers to attend the 3-day event. “All in all, we can look back and thank the Lord for His faithfulness and thank our sponsors for their generosity,” they expressed in gratitude.
A distinctive feature of these annual conferences has been the opportunity of having a good variety of adjunct speakers for participants to be encouraged and inspired by as they listen to the speakers’ faith journey and their great exploits for the Lord. The theme for this conference was “Finishing Well ”. Besides the two plenary speakers, Rev Pastor Tan Kah Thuan and Rev Merrilyn Teague, they were blessed by having the following adjunct speakers sharing their testimonies, as summarized below.
Sister Mary Chan – Mary only has a standard six education and she set out by faith and a great passion to provide free or affordable medical treatment for cancer patients. She acquired a dilapidated hospital which had a monthly operating loss of 1 million ringgit. However, within 5 years, she had transformed the place into a much sought after hospital by a venture capitalist. Pastors and full-time workers receive free medical check-up and medical treatment at the hospital. God has blessed her faith in helping the poor and she also branched off into several thriving ancillary health care businesses.
YB Yeo Bee Yin – YB Yeo came from a very small village in Johor and came to know the Lord through a local church. God opened doors for her to obtain a scholarship in a top university such as Cambridge and blessed her with a good job to pay off her scholarship grant. She saw the great need to address the political situation in Malaysia and being a mother of three young kids, she made great sacrifices to participate in politics and was chosen to be one of the youngest ministers at the federal level in the Malaysian government. In her role as a minister, she has saved the country billions of dollars and she continuously pays great attention to preserving our green environment. By faith, YB Yeo came to speak at our conference at a very busy period and tight schedule, where the next day was her party state bearers election. God honoured her faith as she scored the highest votes at the election. She wrote two books entitled Reimagining Malaysia and The Unfinished Business.
Brother Nehemiah Lee – By faith Bro Nehemiah left a lucrative job and sold his house to start a construction company. He is well-known for conducting his business without getting involved in corrupt practices. He invented the notable concrete road retaining wall called ‘The Nehemiah Wall‘ and his faith journey is narrated in his book, The Wall Stories Of A Jar Of Clay. Bro Nehemiah was awarded an international prize from the British Institute of Civil Engineering for conducting his businesses in an ethical manner.
Brother Ernest Kong – Brother Ernest was a student in London and served in various student fellowships. His mainly quiet and low-profile role has been to serve and help his late wife, sister Mary Wang, who served as General Director of the Chinese Overseas Christian Mission (COCM) for over thirty years. During her tenure, the organisation saw a great expansion of mission work in the UK and Europe.
Other conference speakers included Bishop James Kwang from Perth and Pastor Bernard Ee from Melbourne, a Sister from the International Student Mission, Bro Peter Ho (the President of Graduates Christian Fellowship of Malaysia), and the executive director from Scripture Union.
There were also short sharing of testimonies from pastors from many countries, including Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and two missionaries from restricted countries. The organisers shared, “We are glad that through this conference these full-time workers have been blessed by some participants and they are able to enlist more prayer partners and supporters in their spiritual endeavors.”
The two plenary speakers, Rev Pastor Tan Kah Thuan and Rev Merrilyn Teague each has over 40 years of serving the Lord and are still serving the Lord today. They have a heart of gold in shepherding and caring for people. The main thrust of their message in finishing well is that we all should live a life of humility, serve with passion, perseverance, patience, wisdom and self sacrifices, coupled with lots of prayers. Their lives have been a model and inspiration for many to follow.
The Returnees from OCF, COCM and others had a good time as they fellowshipped over the happy memories they gained while they were students overseas and were being so well-looked after by respective mission agencies.
“This conference has reignited and rekindled our bond of love for one another and the missions,” the organisers expressed. “From this conference, we pray and purpose to build up a networking fellowship to connect with one another, praying and supporting one another and getting more involved in God’s kingdom work. The conference does not end with the end of the conference but its impact should continue to flow and touch us and others. Hallelujah! Glory to God in the Highest!”
This article is an edit from a report shared with us by Pr David Liew. Christianity Malaysia would like to thank the organisers of the event and Pr David for their generosity in sharing this meaningful event as an encouragement and blessing to our readers. May we never tire about planting seeds for God’s Kingdom. All photos contributed by Pr David Liew.
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