We thank Pastor James Bahn for the amazingly good news this week. After many years germinating and growing in the fertile garden of our Vietnamese Evangelical Church, the English Service is blossoming into Thrive Ministries this year. Over the last four years, the seed of Thrive Ministries burst into the world, growing, developing and being nourished by the Holy Spirit to love the Lord and reach into our hearts to help us all become disciples of Christ.

Pastor James lays down the foundation stone for Thrive Ministries: the relentless, reckless love of God for us, and His commandment for us to strive to embody that love for God and for one another as He loves us.

And strive we must because it is hard for us to understand exactly what love is and what it means. However, we know what lack of love is and that is suffering. We need love and when we feel unloved we hurt. We seek love in all the wrong places, we do things we are not in order to gain it.

God has given us the Bible to show us that God's love is always there and God wants us to turn to Him and be loved. God has given us Jesus Christ to show us that His love is worth more than suffering, betrayal, humiliation and death.

As we gather together as a church (the bride of Christ) and love and support each other we honour God's love. As we love and support each other, we do God's will and manifest His love in this world. More than words, more than judgement, more than condescension, our testimony of God's love taking away our suffering will serve as a light on the hill to others in this world who are suffering and looking for love.

Thrive Ministries is coming into being through the love of those who are before us who have lived to love and we submit to God's will to live to love to do the same for those who are suffering and in need of love.