2016 – The Year of Experiencing the Extraordinary
by Alarice
Last Monday, we had our first ever convergence for all our Awaken Generation 2016 students. The atmosphere was electric, full of faith with an expectation to receive an impartation & deposit from the Lord. There was such a strong presence of God from the moment we started worship with the song “Mercy” by Matt Redman, remembering Jesus’s mercy poured out at the Cross, to the heart-to-heart sharing on ‘The Power of Worship” and then ending the night with a powerful time of prayer & ministry. We even saw a number of students testify of physical healing as we gathered to pray for the sick. What an incredible demonstration of what we taught on!
Some may wonder – how did Awaken Generation all start in the first place? We launched AG by faith in 2015, but it was a dream that was years in the making. For Calvin & I, we knew that this “dream” had to do with a combination of worship & evangelism, which is the call the Lord had decreed over our lives individually. AND - we knew that MENTORSHIP would be at the heart of it. Calvin and I have been so blessed to have the Lord surround us with leaders and incredible mentors who have discipled us over the years. We knew that it was these relationships that brought us from one level of our faith and character to another.
Now, mentorship isn’t exactly the most glamorous of jobs. In fact, it’s a lot of hard work behind the scenes. It’s learning to help “tend the garden” of peoples’ hearts which can become overgrown with weeds of lies, bitterness, etc. if left unattended. The role of a mentor is to walk alongside them in the day-to-day, to celebrate victories together, to remind them of their call & destiny in Christ as well as to bring correction & enlighten them with truth from the Word of God.
So yes, while we love the music side of what we do i.e. the teaching, the creating & writing, the delivery, the recordings & productions, we also know that this - If we have not loved, we are nothing. Our heart & our character is important as we are ambassadors of Christ & we need to represent Him well as His sons & daughters!
& so that was that: like a whirlwind, Awaken Generation was born. Last year we saw a total of 49 students from 27 different churches graduate, & it was one of our proudest moments: to see our students empowered in worship to go back to serve their local churches. This year, including our student mentors, we have a total of 83 students from around 45 churches – an incredible number, far exceeding our expectations. We are living in the realm of His grace, favour & miracles, but we also know that the Lord commissioned Awaken Generation for such a time as this. He is doing something so special in the hearts of His believers to remind them of their first love & to build a culture of praise & worship in Singapore. What an honour & privilege it is to bring joy to His heart!
Love, Alarice