Sermon

Are you familiar with sadness — or have you learned to outrun it? Drawing from Mark 6, Ted Yip explores Jesus’s invitation to rest in community: four elements of a true retreat, and his own story of suppressed grief finally met. Rest is not a sin. You don’t have to carry this alone.

We measure what we deserve against what others receive — and miss the real gift entirely. In the Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard, the denarius is not the point: entry into the vineyard itself is. God’s grace is not distributed by merit or seniority. The door is always open.

“When no one asks your name, what happens to your sense of worth?” Frankie So explores respect through a bruising job search — and discovers that genuine respect needs intention, action, and the other person’s capacity to receive it. Every person carries weight.

Only when Jonah was thrown into the deep did he truly learn to cry out to God. Reading Jonah alongside Micah, Gia Yu leads us into our own “it’s not fair” — jealousy, self-centredness, self-righteousness — and shares nearly drowning off Kenting. Storm and fish-belly: the space God prepares to turn us around.

Fear narrows what we see. When ten spies could only see the giants, Joshua and Caleb still saw God’s promise. Pastor Hong draws on psychology and personal experience to lead us back to the grace already given — reminding us that even in the wilderness, love is already ahead of us.

Angels have no wings — they might be a classmate who leaves groceries at your door, or a stranger met at a snowy bus stop. Drawing from Hebrews 13, Dr. Sonia Wong reminds us that any ordinary person can be a messenger sent by God.

What does it mean when a community burns but is not consumed? Pastor Vicky Shiu draws from Matthew 10’s three fears to explore three divine reassurances — and from Romania’s Burning Bush Movement to call BMCC a chosen family: a place where, in the hardest times, we keep watch together, because the Lord is in our midst.

It takes more courage to ask for help than to simply endure. The Canaanite woman refused to be silenced — and received grace as her authentic self. Her story is ours: we do not need to be “good enough” before we come to God. Our truest self is the self God welcomes.

JY unpacks what “little faith” really means: not the size of your belief, but the direction of your heart. When Peter stepped onto the water, his faith was real — until the waves stole his gaze. Faith is not a guarantee of outcomes, but the practice of reorienting toward God, again and again.

“Your testimony is allowed to be unfinished.” During an online service amid a typhoon warning, Pastor Hong explored BMCC’s three-part gospel: creation, liberation, and building up. The most powerful witness is the story still in process — still struggling, still finding its way toward light.