Bulletin for December 18

Today is Yung’s retirement thanksgiving joint service. We welcome our special guest speaker Dr. John Healey, ECD superintendent, to come to encourage us and farewell to Rev. Yung. The farewell lunch will be after Joint Service at 12:30pm at Scarborough Buffet (1221 Markham Road & Ellesmere Road, NE corner). All who join the lunch, please drive safely to the place as soon as possible.
Finance announcement: Our church deficit amounts to $90,761.88 at the end of November. By God’s grace, we would need $209,876 offerings in December in order to balance and meet our bank’s requirement. As of Dec 11 we received $83,921. There is a gap of $125,955. Please continue to pray for our needs and brothers and sisters’ steadfast offering. On average each of 2 remaining Sundays requires $62,978.
Christmas Eve Musical Worship “A Child Is born” will be held this Sat, Dec 24 at 7:30pm. Please invite your family and friends to join this joyful event.
Awana Clubs will be off next Sunday (Dec 25) and Jan 1 and will resume on Jan 8. There will be children program provided during 9:30-11:00am.
Our target set for Pastor Lewis & Felain Lam mission fund this year is $10,000. We have received $11,100 which has reached our goal, praise God. Please continue to support and remember our missionaries in your prayer.
Mission Fund Faith Pledge and Mission In Germany Faith Pledge (Original targets were:$114,515 & $10,000 respectively): Until last Sunday, we have received 7 pledge forms of Mission Fund for $3,150, 8 pledge forms of Germany mission for $2,250. If you haven’t filled out the pledge form last Sun, please get it on the reception table and drop it into the drop off box on the reception table.
Year-end Thanksgiving and Worship Nightwill be held on Dec 31 (Sat) New Year Eve at 7:30pm. Please reserve that night to praise Our Lord and share the grace of God together.
Elder Board Resolution in December as follows:

It is resolved that the appointment of Rev. Daniel Tang as Acting Senior Pastor effective Jan 1st, 2017 be approved.

1^st quarter of 2017 Sunday School will start on Jan 1 at 11:15am. There are three courses:

a) Ephesians (suitable for Junior High School students, room 5)
b) Joshua (suitable for High School students, rooms 6-7)
c) Gospel of Matthew (suitable for University students and adults, rooms 10-11)

Encourage everyone to study the God’s Word together.

Currently, applications for next June’s (2017) baptism is OPEN. We are promoting baptisms early as the deadline for the English congregation is Feb 26, which is different than the Chinese congregation. The reason for the change is mainly to allow for more time to prepare the candidates. Please take note of the date, if it is missed, the person desiring to be baptized will have to wait for the next round in Dec. Please hand in application forms to either Pastor Darren Tsang, Cecilia Ho, or Philip Cheung.
We will be launching our newly redesigned church website in Feb. The website will have information about our church for seekers, sermons, announcements, and various forms which people can download, and more! As such, we will be printing a decreased amount of worship bulletins to encourage members to refer to the website either on their tablets or smartphones. We hope that the new website will be a great tool for us to use while also being more environmentally friendly and decreasing wastage.
Pastor Darren Tsang & administrative assistant Karen Fung will take a day off tomorrow, Dec 19.
Daniel Tang will take two days off on Dec 28-29 (Wed – Thu).
Pastor Anthony Yuen will take a day off on Dec 29 (Thu).
2016 Winter Camp will be held in Countryside Camp in Cambridge on Dec 26 to Dec 29(Mon – Thu). The theme is Inside Out. Please pray for the speaker, Pastor Aaron Owen, the message and the open hearts of participants.
Joe Chan will take his leave from Jan to Apr next year to complete his D. Min thesis. The details are as follows: From January 2 to March 9, is his remaining annual leave of 2016, annual leave of 2017, study leave of 2017 and make up holiday. And from March 10 to April 30 is a no pay leave.