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Allow me to share with you the testimony that I delivered at the Tertiary Service of Hope Church Singapore on April 28. It attempts to spell out some principles I carry as a postgraduate student serving God. To God be the glory.
Living for God
Jayeel Serrano Cornelio, 28 April 2007
No, I am not working to develop Permanent Head Damage. I am pursuing Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology at NUS. Knowing that the idea of doing PhD might overwhelm many of us here, I wish to share with you my journey as a postgraduate student in the university. Without sounding too academic, I hope that in this testimony, you’ll get to see that God is at work in my life.
While I was working for an NGO in a far-flung province in the Philippines, I got word that my application to do Master’s in Applied Sociology at NUS was accepted – and with scholarship to boot. I quickly packed my stuff and flew in to Singapore with one clear thought for God. I was telling God, “Hey God, you know that I’ve been busy working for you all this time – leading the youth ministry in our local church, being part of the leadership in the church in the province, and even playing the keyboard for you. This time around, I want my stay in Singapore to be all for myself. I will be no busier than a good and faithful Sunday attendee.” I had that in my heart for two things: 1. Because I thought I was for the most part exhausted by ministry work back home and 2. Because I anticipated that postgraduate work at NUS should be pretty tough. Sociology was a relatively new field for me as my undergraduate degree was different although closely related. True enough, the first semester was demanding – with four postgraduate level modules. Every week, I had to finish reading books and hundreds of pages of photocopied materials and expectedly, I devoted my time to school work. At that time, I was already attending Hope Church, which was referred to me by a colleague in the secondary school where I taught after finishing my undergrad. But I was, at best, a nominal figure in ministry. Though I had some levels of involvement, my heart was still focused on school work thinking that it was, after all, the reason why I was in Singapore. The first semester rounded up and I thought I would get wonderful grades. Upon logging online on the 24th of December (on vacation in Manila) to check the results, I was devastated by what I saw. My grades were below what I was expecting. Looking back, they were not that bad but I had to monitor my performance as I was under an intensive scholarship scheme. The competitive spirit within me was – and I think many of you can relate – shocked. A couple of minutes after my state of shock, I realized that I could pray and did so. God’s response was loud, clear, and blunt: “But I did not send you to Singapore to study.” It was then that I spoke to God repentantly and resolved to give my life back to His purposes.
At that time, my leaders were already seeing the potential that I had in the ministry. When I came back from Christmas vacation in Manila, they sent me to Nehemiah Class and in my heart, I was convinced that my lifestyle in Singapore needed to be aligned with God’s intentions. Now this is where it’s getting more powerful. In a unit prayer meeting in February last year, we were praying intensely when God gave a moving revelation to me: I started praying for international students, in particular, those from China when God said that if we cannot go to China to do missionary work there, He has sent them to Singapore. The international students in Singapore are admittedly brilliant and have the potential to take on influential positions once they go back to their respective countries. If they have God in their hearts, that would make an impact on their societies. Right on that day, my Filipino friend, also a PhD student, came for the Matthew Care Group with another Filipino, a new master’s student in Economics – and she was a Christian with the same heart and revelation prior to her arrival in Singapore. Can you imagine how God is able to devise a plan that involves different people who do not know one another only to meet at a certain point in time and yet fully know that we have been destined for a specific purpose? Though I didn’t have the intention to become a care leader at that time, I realized that God was gradually planting the desire to lead a care group of postgraduate students in my heart. Weeks later, we had a staunchly atheistic Chinese PhD student attending our care group who was doing so because he was interested in one of our sisters, the master’s student. Consistent every week, he received the Word of God even though he didn’t want to accept the Lord. He is, after all, a PhD student in Mathematics whose hobby, until now, is to look at lengthy formula that only have letters and no numerical figures. One day, particularly on Missions Sunday last year, he voluntarily went down at the altar call. Our unit was in tears for a transformation that only God could do. When asked why he finally said yes to God, he said that he felt a big urge in his heart that he couldn’t say no to.
I am sharing this with you for one specific purpose: when I chose to obey God, after one semester of trying to get myself as far from ministry as possible, I saw tremendous breakthroughs left and right. When Lei, our Math student, received Christ, it was God’s way of reminding us that nothing is impossible for the living God. Eventually, we became the pioneer members of the first care group that targets postgraduate students and young professionals.
My desire to serve God in Singapore became the reason why I decided to stay at NUS – this time as a PhD student. Initially, I was hesitant because I had the option and ambition to go to a British university – especially so because my performance in the Master’s improved. But God assured me that He is in control as long as I just followed Him. He assured me that He will be the one to fight the battle for my future as long as I allowed Him to lead my life. When I finished my Master’s last December, my over-all performance literally leapt from the okay grades to outstanding. And even better, God blessed me with a prestigious scholarship grant from the Asia Research Institute. What more can I ask for?
So now, I am deeply entrenched in serving God: leading my care group that has seen another Chinese and one Korean turn from atheism to Christ, playing the keyboard in the music team, overseeing the musical presentation for our congregation’s anniversary in June this month, and many other exciting involvements in the church. All these on top of my workload as a PhD student. Perhaps at this point, the question is, so how do you balance your load, Jayeel?
I’ll be pointblank with you about the way God taught it to me – it’s not about balance because balancing things in your already full hands signifies two things: 1. It’s all about your human effort and 2. God is just one of the many compartments in your 24/7 lifestyle. Let me share with you what God has taught me: It’s about a desire to put God first and expect Him to battle it out for you. The Message Translation of Matthew 6:33 captures this very well:
“People who don’t know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met.”
But this is not a proposition to just put aside our books and stare at our teacher and pray for God to reveal to her the high mark we deserve because we are serving God. No. I plan my schedule well so that I am able to finish all my tasks on time. In following this plan, I always seek God’s presence so that the way I do them is not laborious but enjoyable. You know, God has never failed to provide the grace – and even efficiency - that I need to accomplish my projects excellently. When we put the most excellent God at the center of your life, everything around it has got to be excellent as well – what we do, what we think of, what our plans might be. Mediocrity in any area of our lives – studies, ministry, relationships, family – does not glorify God. Check out Romans 12:1
“So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out.”
When we honor God with everything in our lives – studies, ministry, relationships, family – we can expect God to give us the grace that we need to carry on. Why? So that people may realize that it’s not about us. It’s about God. Here, I end by citing my most powerful verse which is available in my friendster account, by the way (Yes, PhD students use Friendster!):
“The very credentials these people are waving around as something special, I’m tearing up and throwing out with the trash—along with everything else I used to take credit for. And why? Because of Christ. Yes, all the things I once thought were so important are gone from my life. Compared to the high privilege of knowing Christ Jesus as my Master, firsthand, everything I once thought I had going for me is insignificant—dog dung. I’ve dumped it all in the trash so that I could embrace Christ and be embraced by him. I didn’t want some petty, inferior brand of righteousness that comes from keeping a list of rules when I could get the robust kind that comes from trusting Christ—God’s righteousness.
I stand before you not as a perfect human being but as someone whom God continues to transform and use so that His Name may shine forth in this dark world. I am a PhD student not because I want to get a PhD and after it, I am off to enter the real world. I am a PhD student because with and through it, God’s Name may be glorified in this environment where the very identity of God is challenged in philosophical terms. In the same manner, appreciate the possibility that you are where you are because it is where God needs Himself to shine forth. Each one of us has only one life to live; it’s either we make good use of it for God or we don’t.
