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An update on recent upgrades in church

Dear BPCWA worshipper, Things had been rather busy around the church prior to the lockdown, and worshippers may have noticed some changes too.  This pastoral will give worshippers some background on what was done and why they were needed.  But most importantly, it is so that you may know the constant providential leading and ongoing help from our living God and His answers to our weekly prayers to Him as a church.  Knowing this, BPCWA worshippers should give thanks to and praise Him together for His help in these various works.

Installation of lighting, projector, and TV monitor.  When we returned to church after the first COVID-19 lockdown, large parts of the congregation were scattered at various rooms in the church.  Those seated in the adjacent fellowship hall area had to depend on what they could see of the stage without a TV monitor.  Worshippers in other rooms had to listen and learn through simultaneously televised videos.  As a result, when the whiteboard or presentation slides were used during the Bible studies, church study series, or church communications, those in the other rooms were unable to clearly see what was on the slides, or what was drawn on the whiteboards.  It was also difficult for those in the cry room too.  Furthermore, during the hard lockdowns, the whole congregation had to continue to worship and learn through online livestreaming.  With COVID-19 restrictions as a way of life for the foreseeable future and with the whole church now having to use our video facilities during lockdowns, I felt that it was important to resolve some things to help everyone worship the Lord and learn God’s Word better since these aggravate the already challenging situation of it being difficult to concentrate when we are not able to worship and listen to the preaching in person.  The lag between the audio and video also had to be reduced and the dim lighting had to be improved.  To start this moving, a new TV monitor was purchased several months back when there a sale.  A new projector was also purchased, which has since been mounted on the ceiling.  Projection instead of whiteboard usage allowed all in the cry room, various worship halls, and at home to view clearly what was illustrated.  Stage lightings were also installed to prevent what was projected from being “whitewashed” during the livestreaming.

But all these had to be installed by electricians.  Some gave very expensive quotes or were unavailable.  The one we wanted to work with did not appear to be keen.   At that time, we found out that the father of a worshipper’s classmate was an electrician.  He quickly provided a far more reasonable quote and was ready to do the work exactly on days the church was able to accommodate the work, and without interruption to our meetings.  How the Lord answered our prayer meeting pleas to Him!  After he got the work done, he even agreed to leave his scaffolding with us for a few days so that we could further adjust the projector setting by ourselves.  In the course of the installation, he highlighted that the bar installed on our ceiling to hold the lights was not secured by any timber and only mounted on the ceiling.  To ensure the safety of the new installation, we asked him to secure the new installations on a solid timber mounting above the ceiling instead.  These installations having been completed, I can now write and make illustrations during the Bible study at any time, without the need to wheel the whiteboard in/out or set up projectors.  We can now turn on and off the projector and TV screens, and use the laptop for illustrations directly from the pulpit.  Together, these changes enable slides and drawings to be viewed a bit more clearly during livestream. With the expected and frequent COVID-19 changes, we need to provide a better way to worship and learn God’s Word.

Electrical rewiring.  At the time when the church bought the existing building some 35 years back, electrical specifications and requirements were quite different.  Also, the early church extensions seemed to focus primarily on the brick-and-mortar work, tapping on the existing electricals already in place to support the extension.  In fact, we have become so used to operating this way for so long that many of us don’t realise that we turn on/off the lights in our church through a sub-circuit breaker panel instead of through light switches!  In recent weeks, as we worked on our extension as well as on the government requirements on capacities for public buildings due to COVID-19 restrictions, the need to have some electrical rewiring of our circuitry to current building and health regulations came to light.  Providentially, this happened just after the installation of the Audio-Visual upgrades that we had just completed, and we were able to engage the same electrical company to do the work for us.  With the rather dated electricals, there was the risk of major complications being uncovered when he did the work.  Some difficulties were encountered, but thank God for helping us with the rewirings, in answer to the church’s prayers.  We now have a better and safer set up.  We must thank God that the work could be completed in 2 days without disruption to our regular meetings.  As the final piece in this project, the emergency exit lights were also fitted in the church and we praise God for providing the technical expertise to set up the emergency lighting requirements for approvals. We thank God not only for the timely provision of the contact that could work on these electricals, but also for providing His church with the electrical knowhow who was diligent in managing these projects and able to discuss and supervise the needed electrical work at each step.

Sale of the HiAce van.   As also announced some weeks ago, we sold the HiAce van that had sat outside Nehemiah’s place for some time now.  In earlier years, this had been used for transporting people to Nursing Homes, church camps, and university outreaches.  However, with the changes in habits and profile of worshippers, the use of this van was largely limited to a rapidly diminishing handful of worshippers who were able to drive the manual van.  Even from more than a year ago, there were a number of occasions when the van could not be used for Nursing Home as the battery had gone flat due to disuse.  Despite the infrequent use, we still had to renew the road tax and insurance and service the van – and yet still have it checked and serviced again prior to it being required to ensure that it would be roadworthy and dependable.  After careful considerations and some checking, we concluded that it would be cheaper to rent a van on the rare occasions that the church needed one.  Hence, we made arrangements for the sale of the van, beginning with the removal of the church decals.  God also raised willing helpers in the church to do all these. Even after all this, with the age of the van, finding a buyer may not be easy.  It was also amazing how God provided a buyer very quickly through a worshipper.  Through God’s providential leading, during a “chance” conversation of a worshipper with a neighbour, the latter showed immediate interest in purchasing the HiAce van for his family and business needs, and at a price within what we had researched earlier to be the market rate for a van of that age too!  Once again, we thank God for His providential leading, and those who have helped in the sale and at various stages in preparing the van for sale. 

Use of congregational singing mp3’s for livestreaming during a lockdown.  Finally, as some of you may have noticed, we have started to use recordings of our congregational singing for our recent online livestreams.  This began hastily as a trial during the last lockdown back in February, in response to some worshippers who felt even more isolated singing with only the piano accompaniment online.  I hoped to provide a better environment for worshippers to worship God well even at home during the lockdown.  With the congregation having largely returned to worship together in the main worship areas in recent months, the singing could now be better captured by the mics as well.  While not expecting to use it so soon, I requested someone who readily agreed to help with downloading audio clips of our hymns from our livestreamed YouTube recordings in mid-April.  Unexpectedly, the lockdown was announced a few days later.  However, having set up and trialled a few clippings, we were a bit more ready.   The audio editing work had to be accelerated with the helper working hard through the nights so that these audio clippings could be used for both the English and Chinese worship services.  The AV team also had to make changes to their processes to preload these recordings.  Last week, the hymns used at the worship services largely reflected what had been chosen by the worship leader prior to knowledge of the lockdown.  This also required more of the Audio-Visual team, who now had to be alert to play the respective recordings at the appropriate times as the worship progressed.  We have much to thank God for how He has enabled all these to help us worship Him at home!  As the effort to download our audio clips continues as a longer-term project, we will also involve someone to review the clips for appropriateness and consistency of playing style.  The earlier implementation of the pianist commitment forms and guidelines to play consistently now allows us to clip music from various worship services to help worshippers sing consistently to God, without the worshipper being distracted by different styles, and so being able to worship God without distractions.

I hope that these updates enable worshippers to get a glimpse of what happens behind the scenes at church.  What worshippers see on the surface is supported by His people serving in the background – unseen, but not unknown by God.  Like I mentioned in the beginning, we must not miss God’s providential Hand and providing through the various instances, and how, even more than we could do so ourselves, He is the One behind the scenes preparing His church for what we didn’t expect.  Yet He expects that we are, at the same time, diligent in exercising our due human responsibility in the planning and labour for His church.   It also happened because many were willing and diligent to use what abilities He had put in their hands to be able to be of service for His work when it is required, even in many background matters in His church.  We have seen how the seemingly inconsequential comes together all in His great plan under our Lord, the Master Planner and Designer.  The fact that all these happened so smoothly is because God heard and answered the prayers of His people who gathered weekly to pray for His church.  This must give us greater motivation and faithfulness in our service and worship of Him and at our church prayer meetings, having seen that we indeed serve a living and true God. 

A Psalm of praise. Make a joyful noise unto the LORD, all ye lands. Serve the LORD with gladness: come before his presence with singing. Know ye that the LORD he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless his name. For the LORD is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations.  (Ps 100:1-5).

Yours in our Lord’s service,

Pastor