A Puppet to Lift Spirits and Giggles

By Anna Kilgo

During this past week's SEW, elementary students got a chance to dive into a few of God’s numerous names while enjoying the presence of some unfamiliar faces- including puppets with big personalities. 

From October 23rd to the 25th, students from Preschool through high school participated in SEW, or Spiritual Emphasis Week. During this Wednesday-to-Friday occasion, a group of speakers was invited to travel from Texas, USA, to our school here in Penang, Malaysia, to speak to each school division. With this SEW’s theme being “God Is,” each guest spokesperson shared a variety of stories—some from the Bible and others from their personal lives and families back home. Each gave messages aligning with the attributes of God and guiding students through what the Bible says, providing passages from scripture. 

Between the worship, activities, and messages all the students would participate in during the day and the optional night services, many enjoyed the fun and intentional atmosphere the speakers brought and Dalat’s hard work and preparation. Mrs. Sierra Veerasingam also invited elementary students to attend the night sessions and encouraged them to bring their parents and grandparents.

At the start of each day, beginning on Wednesday, children ages preschool to grade 4 gathered in Harbor Hall. They sang worship songs such as “Yahweh (No One)” and played games to get in the spirit. Then, they explored different themes of who God is, such as Yahweh, Immanuel, Jehova Rapha, King Of Kings, and Lord of Lords. 

When asked what she learned during the week, Mei Chen Fan (3) replied, “That nothing is impossible for God!” 

A fan favorite amongst the elementary students was a skit led by two of the speakers and performed by a puppet named Joe, who did not like his fur being touched and loved singing a song about the Bible.

 “My favorite part about SEW is that before lunch, we learned about a funny puppet named Joe, and it was very funny because if you said the word ‘Bible,’ he would sing a song!” Dora Wang (3) exclaims.

Overall, elementary school children of all ages enjoyed the various videos, activities, and entertainment that each day brought. They excitedly shared all the joy and laughter that came with learning more about the Lord and all He is capable of.

Yahweh, Emmanuel, Rapha

 By Onyou Kim

The week began with the hustle and bustle of students tittering and chattering about the upcoming Spiritual Emphasis Week. They had just finished fall break with an extra Monday off, and many were excited about the ‘work-free’ days ahead of them.

The first day of SEW for high school began with the worship team leading the audience to a series of worship songs. With shiny eyes expecting eagerly, the students were introduced to the theme, ‘God Is,’ and their speaker, Tysha Solomon, who explained one of the many names of God: Yahweh. She preached through the story of Moses, who encountered God through a burning bush, and evoked intense emotions among the students with her statement, “Every name has a meaning.” With her enthusiastic and powerful words, students started SEW off strong with joy and excitement.  

Seojeong Park (11) conveys, “I felt really connected to God during SEW, and I believe that these sessions are a good way to experience the presence of God since the amazing speakers and my peers glorify God so passionately.”

On the second day, high school was presented with another speaker, Will Perry, who grasped everyone’s attention with the colorful magic eye puzzles on the screen. All the high schoolers were engaged as they tried out different methods to see beyond the picture, struggling to figure it out. By defining another name of God, ‘Emmanuel,’ the deeper meaning behind the puzzle was revealed to show that “God is always with us” even when we aren’t aware of it.

The last day of SEW started with Pastor Bob bringing all the speakers onto the stage for the students to thank and appreciate their willingness to spread the word of God. The high school students were finally introduced to the two speakers, Dammon Passons and Kristi Passons, who unfortunately didn’t get to speak to the high school students throughout the days, and the crowd applauded and cheered for the four speakers who had journeyed all the way to Dalat from Texas. The session ended with a sermon from Tysha once again, who elaborated on the name ‘Rapha,’ the God who heals. 

With SEW wrapped up, students expressed feelings of both jubilation and sorrow for their wonderful week. Lindsay Goh (10) marveled, “SEW was cool, and I love Jesus. Jesus is cool.” 

It was indeed a cool week filled with memories that the whole Dalat community could cherish and continue their relationship with God.

God Is.

By Kyra Brewster

SEW, or Spiritual Emphasis Week comes once a year and is a time of worship, messages, and prayer. The theme for this year’s services was “God is,” which refers to the many names of God, and the idea that God was before anything. The first two days included a service for ES, MS, and HS in the morning as well as a combined service at night. The last day also had a morning service, but the night service was student-led, and many seniors shared their testimonies. Almost 300 people attended every night service ranging from Elementary to parents. 

With so many people crowded in the Harbor Hall on the last night, many nerves ran through the seniors who were prepared to share. They had all put tons of thought and time into their stories to make them meaningful, impactful, and relatable while highlighting how God has moved through their life. Andy Tan was the first to go and as he started talking, immediately captured the crowd’s attention with his serious and, in some places, heartbreaking story. After sharing the major struggles he experienced as a young teen and the darkness he thought he could never crawl out of, he praised God for the salvation he received and the new man he has become. Andy went on to explain how God saved him and how he used other people to speak truth into his life. 

As Andy said his closing words, the crowd erupted in applause for him as many were deeply impacted by his words. Following him were impressive and meaningful testimonies from Nate Johnson about knowing God, Michael Silverstein about finding identity in God, Sean Lee about relying on God in hard situations, and Josh Conklin about remembering who God says we are. 

When asked how he felt about the testimonies given and which one was his favorite, Stephen Branum said: “I think that the seniors all had good testimonies of all the ways God has worked in their lives, and I would say Andy’s testimony was my favorite because it just showed how much God loves us and is with us through hard times. It really resonated with me because I have been in a similar situation, and it reminded me of the lengths God goes to, to reach us and us just to run to Him in those dark places and times.”

Sowing Seeds

By Esther Jung

Lead: The burning question of who God truly is was this year's theme of Spiritual Emphasis Week, where speakers from Texas came to teach the word of God, impacting student’s lives.

As I opened my eyes, I saw the beautiful image of the Harbor Hall room filled with people ranging from 3-year-old kids to grandparents, praising the Lord with all their hearts.    

This is what Spiritual Emphasis Week, or SEW, strives to achieve each year. Dalat sets aside three days dedicated to encouraging students and adults to grow spiritually and learn about the word of God. Each year, Pastor Bob and the Leadership Development team work hard to make SEW a memorable event by picking a theme and inviting speakers from different parts of the world to share during Chapel and evening services.  

This year, from October 23rd to 25th, a team from Frisco, Texas, came all the way down to Penang, Malaysia, to talk about this year’s theme, “God is.” We learned about the different names of God, what they meant, and how we can apply these teachings in our lives.  

“I really enjoyed looking around and seeing so many people of all ages praying together and worshiping the Lord,” said Sophia Coker (12). 

During the evening services from 6:30 pm to 8:00 pm, a designated person from the Frisco Team would come up and speak. After the speaker finished the message, the rest of the time would be filled with worship and prayer. The LD team would come up to the front to have the opportunity to pray for the students and teachers who needed prayer.  

On the very last day of SEW, instead of the team from Frisco, Texas, coming up to speak, we had the opportunity to hear some of the Leadership Development team’s testimonies.  

When asking Stephen Branum (12) what he thought about the testimonies, he commented, “I think that the seniors all have really good testimonies of all the ways God has worked in their lives and how He has shown himself to them. I would say Andy’s testimony was my favorite because it just showed how much God loves us, how He gets us through hard times, and how He is always there for us. It really resonated with me because I was in a similar situation in my 8th and 9th grade years, and it reminds me of the lengths God goes to reach us and for us just to run to Him and not be confined and trapped in those dark places and times.” 

All in all, Spiritual Emphasis Week is a yearly tradition that the Leadership Development Team and Pastor Bob organize. It has significantly impacted many students and adults, bringing spiritual growth and a love for God. It truly sows and plants seeds in people’s hearts.  

Sewing My Heart

By Hyorim Ahn

On the first day of the Spiritual Emphasis Week (SEW), the worship team made a mistake on starting on the song “Another in the Fire,” where everyone stumbled and stared at each other for a moment. I was stressed out, feeling trapped and squished inside a box, but bless the Lord! He gently guided me and the worship team to get backtrack to the original tempo to the song. 

For me, one of the greatest fears for leading worship was myself messing up and leading people off-track from glorifying God. However, I often struggled with staying focused and solely singing for God, which made me panic and make mistakes frequently. 

Thankfully, the mistakes I made so far had not been very obvious, until the second day for SEW came. In the morning for MS Chapel, God helped me to hold on to Him and praise Him with joy. Nevertheless, during the HS chapel, without the time to rehearsal, my anxiety made me forget to pray to God and to make my heart fully dwelling on Him, and it happened. My voice cracked. 

“I believe in YoOuUu~” As soon as I felt my voice lose its melody, I could not help it but just laugh at myself while singing. It was the worst mistake I ever made during worship, and I had to force myself to ignore everyone laughing at it. 

After the service that day, people who passed by me always mentioned it, either trying to make me feel better or teasing me. I told myself that I should have prepared myself and more with prayer. 

To be honest, the embarrassment I felt made me in part mad at myself and a little bit at God. Furthermore, my falling behind on art, struggling with college application, preparing for worship, added with my earlier mistake of a voice crack just ripped off the bag I tried to carry on and just tripped me to fall.

Despite my frustration, I knew that I could not blame God for anything, for I knew His plan was and is always great. I decided to trust and feel excited to see how He would  through my mistake grow closer to Him. 

So that night, I wrote a prayer, surrendering myself to God, asking the Holy Spirit to fill me with His power and enable me to glorify Him through the talents that He’s given me. I asked Him to heal me from my wounds of lostness and take me out from the sins of pridefulness. I asked for Him to give me a hand to stand up again so I could march on again. 

And strangely, a surge of confidence came up to my heart, and somehow I knew that God would help me through the last day of worship services and allow me to recover from the trauma of the voice crack. 

The last day’s worship service, I really experienced God working through me and the worship team, allowing us to bring a heart-filling worship. Now I even felt glad that I made a voice crack because I knew that this let me recognize again that God is the one who enables me to sing, and that He is the one who also makes me recover from my mistakes. I cannot even explain the joy that splashed on me when I truly Serving God through this SEW for me was an experience of immeasurable value. 

SEW: Behind the Scenes

By Emma Emis

Big, bold letters sprawled out on the backdrop of the of the stage, surrounded by bright lights in every corner: “YHWH.” 

Spiritual Emphasis Week is a week that Dalat encourages students, parents, friends, and faculty to dive deeper into their relationship with God. This week is beloved by all who attend, as it is a fun way to worship and get to know God more. The Leadership Development class worked enthusiastically to plan, organize, and pray for SEW months in advance. We worked diligently to synthesize all of our ideas into one single theme to encapsulate who God is. Then we found it.  

This profound statement “ God Is.” was unanimously voted upon in our class after being suggested. We all came to the realization that God didn’t need to be defined by simply anything. He just is. And if he is, then nothing else matters. We hatched a plan- purposefully defining a few specific names of God for each chapel, in order to understand his character. We would put the name of God for that chapel in the background, to help the audience visualize His mighty power. Our class worked along side guest speakers from Texas to execute these Elementary, Middle, and High School Chapels and night sessions. In the process, we gained knowledge, wisdom and overall experience on what it means to be a student leader. 

However, there were stressful moments at times, like designing the shirts or choosing the banner colors. The moments of designated time the past few months for quiet Bible reading and group prayers in class provided peace and comfort that hovered over us leaders for the weeks to come. Pastor Bob wanted us to realize this time we took to plan truly wasn’t about us, but about God and glorifying Him. I would say it was one of the most essential parts that went into organizing this event. Our individual hearts growing for God helped equip all of us.

A fellow member of the LD class, Joshua Conklin (12), said it perfectly: “Having been a part of SEW worship teams for a few years now, I knew that it would take work. This SEW, I finally saw the administrative side of that work in a new, very real light and realized it’s importance. Between voting and praying on the theme itself, to our LD class taking time to spiritually intercede for the school, to running the student led prayer time, I got to see a different and just as meaningful and impactful side of SEW that I hadn’t experienced before, and I loved it in all of its tiringness.”

The Golden Eagles

By Gerald Yang

Varsity Boys Volleyball have secured gold. On the evening of October 19th, the volleyball boys made history winning gold in ACSC Volleyball. 

“Shave that beard! Shave that beard! Shave that beard!” the voices echoed around the gym as Coach Riffey was picked up by the volleyball team. The boys’ hard work, dedication, and effort all lead to this moment in ACSC. Some might’ve thought getting gold would be an out of reach dream and others would not settle for anything less than a gold.

It was the last game of the day. The championship game. Dalat faced the ACSC defending champions, Faith Academy, who had knocked the Dalat Eagles out of the ACSC championship game last year. Many of the members were afraid of history repeating itself, but this year was different. The Dalat Eagles had cruised through the elimination round undefeated, placing them into the finals against a vengeful Faith team. 

Tensions were high as the Faith Vanguards started strong and questionable call by the referees only made it harder for the Eagles to build their momentum. As Dalat lost the first set, Coach Riffey led the team to come back answering with two sets for Dalat. The Vanguards, however, were not keen on losing so easily, climbing back to earn the fourth set. The momentum had shifted. 

In typical Dalat fashion, the boys had to make this game close, as doubts arose as to whether history would be repeated. The Eagles weren’t satisfied with coming second. In a tough nail-biting set against the Vanguards, the final point was awarded to Dalat after a net touch. The score was 15-13.

The match was as close as ever, momentum shifted as each team left everything they had on the court. However, Dalat pulled through. For the first time in ACSC Volleyball history, Dalat had won gold. “That game was as close as it gets, a match worthy of a final,” Mr. Owen Mcintyre, the Athletic Director at SPH Lippo Village, stated in the closing ceremony.

Photo Credit: SPH Media Team