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Great Toronto Area, Hamilton UBF & Guelph UBF (Canada)

Chapters in GTA, Hamilton and Guelph had a united SBC at Belleville, on June 22-24. The conference site was two and half hours of driving from Toronto. The conference title was “I Desire Mercy” (Mt 9:13). 160 people attended including Dr. Charles Kim from Chicago, and S. Joshua Brinkerhoff and Danzell Jackson from Ottawa. Our merciful God blessed this conference so abundantly.

First of all, God gave us his words through sincere and living messages. The opening message was given by M. Peter Moon on Hoses 6:6, “I desire mercy...” We could think of God’s unfailing love for his people and his desire for them to know his mercy and practice it. Samuel Mukwedeya delivered Friday evening message on Ephesians 2:1-10. In this passage God’s rich mercy is revealed: we were completely dead in our sins and transgressions but God made us alive with Christ and seated us with him in heavenly realms. In his mercy we are God’s workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works. What mercy shown to us in Christ Jesus! God’s transforming work in Samuel’s life clearly testified to the mercy of God in Christ Jesus. Saturday morning devotion message was given by Joseph Minielli on Mark 5:1-20. Jesus drove 6000 demons out of a man and restored him to his true self. Jesus was powerful and merciful to do this. Likewise Jesus saved Joseph from his demon-possessed life. Joseph spoke as if he were the demon-possessed man in the passage. Paul Lee Jr. delivered the main message on Matthew 9:1-13. Jesus’ mercy for a paralytic was accepting him as a son in the grace of forgiveness of his sins and making him get up and walk as the proof of Jesus’ power to forgive. Jesus’ mercy was also well shown when he called Matthew, a tax collector as his disciple, saying, “Follow me.” Then Jesus said to the Pharisees, “…go and learn what it means, ‘I desire mercy not sacrifice.’” Jesus wants us to go and learn his mercy in our practical life. Without learning God’s merciful heart we can become only enemies of God. In his message Paul confessed that it was only by God’s mercy that he became a messenger, because he was not thankful but rather burdened when he was raised as a conference messenger again. Paul is a talented speaker, but more than that the Holy Spirit moved the hearts of the people through his message.

Louis Perdomo gave the Saturday evening message on Luke 23:26-56, “Father, for forgive them…” Interestingly his surname “Perdormo” means “forgiveness”. In the message he expounded that when Jesus said on the cross, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing,” Jesus was willing to take all the burdens of our sins upon himself. The cross of Jesus was the foundation of his mercy. He wants us to have forgiving spirit for others in his forgiving grace. It was a touching confession that Louis offing forgave his father who had abandoned him when he had needed him most. Sara Lee served Sunday message on Isaiah 6:1-13, “Who will go for us?” While she was preparing the message, for several weeks she could not escape God’s constant calling “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” She was so much burdened by God’s relentless call. Finally she repented of her ambition to be somebody in the world by studying MD-Ph. D. and decided to be a full-time UBF shepherdess. When she asked the people, tearfully and earnestly pleading them to respond to God’s calling to be representatives of the King and embody his mercy to the world, almost all those present responded by standing up. It was none other than the work of the Holy Spirit. It was a beautiful scene that young and old all wanted to participate in the work of God’s mercy as the body of Christ. Then God’s servants specifically prayed for them. Closing message was on Matthew 9:35-38 by M. Steve Kang. “The Harvest was plentiful, but the workers were few.” Again, Jesus wanted us to take part in his merciful heart and the gospel work. Thank God for granting us his living and active words so that we could think of the heart of our God, who said, “I desire mercy.”

At this conference God raised four mercy symposium speakers: Charles Kim Jr. on God’s mercy to David, Sheilla Htoo on God’s mercy to Gentile woman in Matthew 15:21-28, Jemmie Hwang on God’s mercy of cancelling all our debts in Matthew 18:21-35, and Tino Minielli on God’s mercy to Paul, who was transformed from a merciless sinner to a merciful shepherd. It was a well organized symposium which revealed God’s mercy throughout the Bible. God also raised six life testimony sharers: Wah Paw, Natan Bekit, Rebekah Kim Jr. Allen Fu, Julianna Htoo, and Joel Fast. Each testified to God’s mercy on his/her personal life. Five presiders also shared their short version of life testimonies: Paulina Lee, James Augustine Oh, Mary Cha, Rebekah Lee and Fergus Crawford. On Saturday night there were four one word testimony sharers: Edmond Mok (baptized at the pool on the conference site), Aaron Yau, Kevin McQuarri, and Chris Campoverde.

We offered all our vocal songs, a skit, violin Solo, movie clip, drama and dance as our whole-hearted offering to our merciful Savior Jesus..Particularly the African drum dance was our prayer for three 2012 African conferences in Uganda, South Africa, and Nigeria. And we finished our conference with Dr. Henry Kim’s prayer.

When we began the conference preparation six months ago, we did not know what kind of conference we would have. But our missionaries, 2nd gens and young leaders all worked together, beginning from choosing the conference theme and title. Our messengers and directors gathered three times, one time for Bible study on the main passage and two times for messengers’ rehearsals. All missionary coworkers throughout the 8 chapters met together to have united prayer meetings on the two Sunday evenings immediately prior to the conference, while each chapter kept separate prayer meetings. God accepted all our prayers and the prayers of our supporters and enabled us to have this wonderful conference in the powerful work of the Holy Spirit and his words. Thanks and praise and honour be to our God, the God of mercy! May we share God’s mercy through our 1:1 bible study and disciple-raising ministry in Toronto, Hamilton, and Guelph and expand his kingdom that Canada be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation!

In Christ, 
M. Joshua Lee