Today was the farewell service at Jaffray for our Senior Pastor, Reverend William Yung and his wife, the charming Mrs. Margaret Yung. They have served our church with diligence and fervor for the past seven years (if I am not mistaken) and so it was quite an important event for every single member that has been under their care.
I’m not entirely settled on quite why they had to leave us but it was, apparently, not abrupt since there had been ample warning since many months ago. I don’t really think it’s important or useful for us to poke too far into why exactly such an excellent exemplar of a man of God had to leave our church. Like our speaker, Professor Dennis Ngien, said today, an excess of information is not a good thing to have.
I’m not particularly shocked or disheartened at Rev. Yung’s departure from our midst, and I don’t think that that’s a bad telling on his ministry here at Jaffray. I have profound respect for him (causing me to get almost nervous when addressing or responding to him) and so I’ve never dreamed of insulting his service to God and man. And yet I have never been directly (or rather, heavily) ministered to by him since his focus was more on the Chinese congregation and performing visitations (from what I’ve gathered). Of course, I’ve been spoken to (as in, preached to while in the pews, not personally approached for a reproach) by him and I’ve always rather liked his style of preaching.
I do hope that wherever he and his wife are off to, they will find a new home even more accommodating than Jaffray if that is the LORD’s good will for them. I’m sure that God can use such a humble servant mightily whether as Jaffray’s senior pastor or otherwise and so I would not be uneasy as to the prospects of his future ministries.
My fondest memories of Reverend Yung consist almost entirely of moments when he and I would cross paths on Jaffray property and we would always share greetings–his “Hi Carl!” has an irreplaceable ring to it. He was always decisive and crisp with these greetings that I am sure to miss now that he is gone.
And so even though I’ve never had the pleasure of working closely under or with Reverend Yung, it’s with a bit of sadness but mostly joy that I congratulate him (though he will probably never read this) on his many years of faithful service to my church and pray for a Spirit-filled and -fulfilled future for him and his wife. In the end, “We are more than conquerors through him who loved us” and nothing could ever separate any of the body of Christ permanently (Rom. 8:37-39) as was sung so triumphantly by the choir this morning. This is where we all bust out the “Peace!” signs and cheer.
Note: By the way, if you’ll kindly avert your eyes to the banner at the top, it says “more than conquerors” at the bottom, and has Romans 8:28 as a passage lookup beneath it. Don’t be confused (or mortally alarmed, if that is your fancy) if you find that the two (quote and reference) don’t match up since this was not accidental. I just felt it’d be important to make that distinction, since I wouldn’t want any emails saying “You got the wrong verse!” or crying “Typo! Bloody typo!” from my more Bible-opening readers.