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Stony Brook UBF, US
April 14, 2014

“They will call him Immanuel (which means God with us).” (Matthew 1:23)

Immanuel God has been with me in 2013 and I ask His presence with me in Christ in the coming years.
{Or the waterfall, or music heard so deeply That it is not heard at all, but you are the music}---from T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets Musicians compress their life testimonies into composing beautiful harmonious music pieces. Every year’s annual report is like compressing one year into a music piece to please God. We are the music in God’s timeless time.

I. 2013 ANNUAL REVIEW
I chose Psalm 1:1-2 as my 2013 life key verse,
“Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers,
but whose delight is in the law of the LORD, and who meditates on his law day and night.”

I wanted to read the entire Bible until I can say that I practice “Back to the Bible.” Meditating on God’s word on my commuter train was especially a blessing to me and God’s ministry.
We studied Mark’s gospel to learn the servantship of Christ. In this world nobody wants to serve others. In my office, I happen to serve many bosses who are younger than me. I began to learn the servantship of Christ. I also wanted to serve Stony Brook students.
Last year God restored Samuel Lafleur (Pure Math / Music History-senior). He told us that there is no God. However, by our prayers, he began to attend our Sunday worship service regularly. Now he confessed that Jesus is His redeeming Lord and Savior. We pray that he may receive God’s abundant grace to be a remnant. Ha-young Song (Political Science) graduated from Stony Brook University in May and went back to Korea. We thank God for giving us the privilege to serve them.

Last year in May, I applied for a North Korean visa along with Missionary Grace Lee and Paul Koh to visit Pyongyang University of Science and Technology (PUST). But I was denied. So I visited South Korea instead of North Korea. I visited many chapters and had fellowship especially with Dr. James Suh, Shepherd Moses Kim, Shepherd Moses Yoon, Shepherd Daniel Baik, Dr. John Cho and Shepherd Bach Lee. Each one of them is like a great spiritual mountain.
In August, we had the International Summer Bible Conference in Pennsylvania. A Chinese student Yin attended the conference. Through Missionary Rebecca Yoon’s faithful campus visiting, Yin came to study the Bible. For the first Bible study, she ran 20 minutes on a hot summer day not to miss the Bible study. Through the conference I felt God’s sacrificial love despite my shortcomings. After conference, we had a fellowship with Anam, Kwanak 3, Germany, French missionaries. They saw New York and tasted New York pizzas, and Korean foods.

Last year, in the fall, Dr. Mark Yang and Pastor Ron Ward came to New York to lead Galatians Bible study. Only by God’s grace we are living in this sinful world.
Besides the Bible study, I studied Chinese reading. It was not an easy task. I also tried to understand T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets. His famous poem “The Waste Land” was written before he met Christ. He described the dead and barren world after the First World War. In Four Quartets, he sang the hope for humanity in Christ passing through the Second World War.
I can also summarize my life in 2013 near the Atlantic Ocean from Ernest Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea, “Everything about him was old except his eyes and they were the same color as the sea and were cheerful and undefeated.”

II. 2014 VISION AND STRATEGY
My 2014 key verse is:
Deuteronomy 6:4-5, “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.”
To the Jews, this is the most important text in Deuteronomy. Moses was here trying to teach Israel where her priorities lay and how to guarantee that she would never forget them.
I want to love the LORD my God with all my heart and with all my soul and with all my strength.” Jesus said, “Love God and love people! If you love me more than these, feed my sheep and take care of them.” In this New Year, I want to obey God’s word through feeding His sheep on campus.

Stony Brook Prayer Topics:

1. LOVE THE LORD our God with all our heart and with all our soul and with all our strength
2. Twelve “apostolic” disciples through 1:1 ministry to receive God’s allotted spiritual inheritance in Stony Brook
3. Sunday messages

Wesley S. Yoon