Gracestoration Matters
GRACESTORATION MATTERS
Grace for the Rest of Your Life, "And the God of all grace...will Himself restore you" (1 Peter 5:10, NIV)
WHO and WHAT
The ministry of Gracestoration was founded by Dottie Connor Bingham as a result of her discipleship to students and couples (1985-1993) while serving in Dallas. She went on to author the "Grace for the Rest of Your Life" discipleship notebook. You can find out more from the link: gracestoration.org.
Gracestoration is dedicated to the restoration and renewal of God's people by providing spiritual encouragement, direction and discipleship - all designed to encourage believers in their Christian lives and equip them to reach out to others in their sphere of influence with the transforming message of God's grace.
HOW I GOT TO KNOW GRACESTORATION
In 1998, during one of my low spiritual points, God led Lorie Petro (whom Dottie had mentored) into my life. At that appointed time, Lorie was transferred from Indonesia to serve with the new Tribes Missions in Singapore for a couple of years. We met at a missions conference. That first encounter led to a visit to my place to share one of Gracestoration card lessons on "Burnt Out". Subsequently, I gathered a couple of pastors wives for Lorie to mentor us.
Through the course, we thanked God for His restoration, renewal and healing as He continued to empower us to serve Him in His grace and confidence again in our various pastoral ministries.
MOTIVATION TO PASS IT ON
Through the years, I am so grateful to God for the opportunities to share Gracestoration in the various churches He assigned us to. Praise God for restoring, healing and renewing marriages and spiritual lives as members appropriate His various graces diligently and dependently in their daily living.
Commencing in 1998 and graduating in 2000, the women from the Yishun Lutheran Church's Dorcas Ministry became the first batch of Gracestoration students. They continue to be one of my joys and pride as several of them learned to pass it on in their spheres of influence. It was a joy to be back to teach the Gracestoration course in 2015 to a new batch of Dorcases. In 2009, Queenstown Lutheran Church became the first congregation to go through Gracestoration over a span of two years. Thank God for the privilege to share Gracestoration over the pulpit. That was a very challenging journey for me to learn to share through PowerPoints. Little did I know that He has LCOR in mind for the second run in 2016! Thankful for the privilege to share with brothers and sisters in our Second Service over the pulpit.
For the benefit of those who missed the first six lessons in our Second Service, allow me to share this summary from a sister-in-Christ.
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"In life I am burdened with many things, including my sins and struggles. I am tired and I need a rest. Thank God for RESTING GRACE as promised in Matthew 11:28. God asks me to come to Him to cast my burden upon Him.
To appropriate His resting grace, I need to commit and entrust my care to Him. I learn to let go and let God's grace enter into situations to redeem them for His glory.
Thank God for His ENTRUSTING GRACE. Though I know I need to let go and release all burdens to Him, sometimes, it is very difficult to do so because there are things which I have held tightly all these years.
I need to appropriate God's FREEING GRACE as I believe He has a better plan for me, better than what I am clinging to. Romans 32:8.
God is not prying my hand to want to hurt me for nothing. He is interested in building my character. Daily I sin as I succumb to temptation. Thank God for His CLEANSING GRACE as I appropriate 1 John 1:9. I learn to call sin - sin, and deal with it as God calls it. He is refining me as gold is being refined in a refiner's pot.
There are times where I feel that I am not good enough as a Christian. Hypocrite as it seems. As I contemplate on Satan's accusation, lies and deception, I got myself into the pity pit. Thank God for His CORRECTIVE GRACE - I need not stay long in the pity pit. He delivers me out of it as I am reduced to cry out to Him and He gives me a new song. All of God and none of me indeed!
I do not desire to live my Christian life like that of a roller coaster. Thank God for His PREVENTIVE GRACE where I learn how to trust Him in a spiritual warfare when Satan throws darts of accusation, lies and deception at me. Thank God the battle belongs to Him and Jesus Christ is my advocate and He has set me free to live the victorious life as I submit to God, resist the devil and he will flee from me."
A testimony from a sister-in-Christ
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Pass it on...
∼ Persis Lim
Image Source: Gracestoration
