Editor’s Note: Today’s AMI QT Devotional is provided by Kate Moon, who is currently serving in E. Asia.
Devotional Thought for Today
John 15:18-27
“If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. 19 If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you . . . 23 Whoever hates me hates my Father as well . . . 26 When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father—the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father—he will testify about me. 27 And you also must testify, for you have been with me from the beginning.”
John 16:8-9
When he comes, he will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment: 9 about sin, because people do not believe in me;
In a world that is hostile to their cause, Jesus tells His disciples that they must testify about Him. The Holy Spirit would testify, but they, too, were to testify. Below is the story of someone who decided to receive Christ about a month ago as she moves from being resistant to the gospel to embracing and in the end even proclaiming it. May it encourage us to keep pointing people to God, even in a hostile world, today.
I always believed in destiny, that is, that everything was planned out without your realizing it – what kind of people you would meet and what kind of things you might do. Once I passed by a church and suddenly had a strong desire to go into it and see its magnificence first-hand. I went inside, sang the songs with a sincere heart, and for a long time afterwards the melody of those songs would not fade from my mind. At that time I basically knew nothing about Christianity.
The very first time I heard about God and the Bible was at English Corner. The topic, “Which book has influenced you most?” came up, and two Christians shared about the Bible. Because of the philosophy I had been taught since I was young, I at first felt offended by things like God and Christianity. It turned my ideology and values upside down. Another time we talked about, “Can people actually feel satisfied and fulfilled?” My answer was, “No, because I have never felt fully fulfilled in my life.” Many people agreed with me, but to my surprise, all the Christians present said unanimously, “I felt fulfilled the moment I received Jesus Christ.” This made me start to think, “What am I pursuing exactly? What can actually make me feel fulfilled? Why am I living in this world and what makes me different from the grass or flowers?” Ultimately I realized that all my current knowledge failed to give answers to these questions.
Gradually I started to read the Bible and listened to others’ reflections and testimonies, and then one day I became a Christian. It’s not like everything has suddenly become so clear, but I feel at least a door has opened to me, leading me in a certain direction. A brand-new beginning started for me when what Jesus did for me on the cross washed away all my sins. I now live to worship and serve Him, helping more and more people receive redemption through Him. I know that I am deeply loved by Him and will never worry that this love will vanish because He is an unfailing God!
~translation provided by E. Liu
Prayer: Holy Spirit, help me to testify even as You testify today. You are already working in the hearts of people in this world; I want to join in that work. Open my eyes to the opportunities and empower my testimony today. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.
When summer was in full glory and my garden was in full bloom, I had tomatoes dripping off the vines and enough basil to make buckets of fresh pesto; however, I wasn’t satisfied until the day I placed a birdbath in the garden. This element completed the garden dream that I had so longed for. In no time at all, there were fluttering of wings, the sound of twittering and splashing, and birds of all shapes, sizes and color bathing and drinking water. Who knew that such a simple thing as this could bring so much joy to me and my family?
Recently, I have been feeling an increased sense of responsibility and with it, the often accompanying feeling of being overwhelmed. Because of the particular journey through which I’ve ended up where I am now (overseeing a small house church in Asia), I’d often felt a sense of not having the right background for this work, wishing I’d had more training, etc. Before I came out here 14 years ago, I had learned much from being a member of and serving our church in NYC, but things were, of course, different out here; there were challenges I had never faced or even imagined before.
One day this past spring, one of the college students in our church came up to me and told me that several weeks ago, she had seen a particularly vivid vision of a plane with many Asian passengers fall out of the sky and into the ocean. At the time, she could only make out the letters “–” and “–” in blue painted on the plane and wondered what they meant; but a few days ago, a teacher in one of her classes mentioned that “—–“ was a Japanese airline. Knowing that I was flying to Japan in a few days, she made a connection and begged me not to go.
Have you ever been in a situation where you thought you had been communicating something to someone, only to find out later that they hadn’t actually been getting it the whole time?
On a recent visit home, I came out of my room one afternoon to hear my mom in conversation with someone at the door. Overhearing the person give my mother the name and address of a church, I thought perhaps it was an over-zealous evangelist and wondered how they had gotten to this point in the conversation. Perhaps my mother, shy and language ability still limited, hadn’t been able to convey that she was a believer and already had a church she regularly attended? Mild concern brought me to the door to find out what was going on when my mother turned to me with a sad, surprised look on her face and said, “C—- passed away.” C—- was our good neighbor of over 20 years, and the person at the door was a relative delivering the news of her prior week’s passing, giving my mother the address of the church where the funeral services would be held.
Editor’s Note: The AMI QT Devotional for September 10-11 are written by Pastor Ulysses Wang who are now serving at Radiance Christian Church in San Francisco. 
Since when did the command to love one another become a “new commandment”? I’m pretty sure I’ve heard this one before: “you shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18). In fact, Jesus, when responding to questioning from a lawyer, said, “You shall love the Lord your God with` all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:37-39). In His own response He acknowledged the important place that this more-than-thousand-year-old Law maintained. So what then was so new about what Jesus said?
Of all people, Jesus knew what this meant: “With friends like you, who needs enemies.” Maybe you can relate to it as well. Allow me to explain.
We know historically, that the washing of feet was the most menial chore reserved for the lowest slave in the house. In fact, it was almost considered a breach of human dignity to force someone to wash the feet of guests; and because of that fact, Jewish servants were exempt from this awful duty. In a city like Jerusalem, it would have been a common thing to dump your refuse on the streets; and so you could just imagine the grime and filth that would have found its way under people’s feet. It was so bad that some of the rabbinic teaching advocated that only Gentile slaves be used to wash feet.