INTERNSHIPS

“You need to do 3-4 internships to make your CV look good! If not, it'll be very hard to get a job!”

Internships are often during the summer (Jun-Aug) or winter (Dec) break. Both of which are when the church organises Youth Theolo, Bible Sem or Student Theolo. While it was the supposed norm among my peers to do 3-4 internships, I questioned whether it was really necessary, or just being kiasu (scared to lose out). I also heard of church seniors who only did one internship and did fine securing a reasonable job. Given all these considerations, I decided that I would only do one internship as I wanted to reserve time for church matters.

SECURING IT

Thank God I was able to secure a summer internship in my third year. I heard that another intern was granted leave from the internship for reservist, and that gave me the idea that there might be a chance for me to request for 1 week leave to attend Youth Theolo! I prayed for God’s guidance and took the opportunity to speak to my supervisor. I was apprehensive that requesting for leave (i.e., a shorter internship service period) would make him have a bad impression of me, but the possibility of attending Youth Theolo was too precious to miss out on, so I plucked up my courage to ask. Thank God the supervisor was very receptive! He was a Christian too and easily agreed to my request. I didn’t even need to add an extra week to make up for it.

CAMARADERIE

There were 4 others who were interning with me at the company and we were all from the same university. Before I started the internship, I purposed in my heart (taking inspiration from Dan 1:8) to preach to them. Because of ongoing renovation in the office, the interns were put to sit together in a small meeting room. Usually, interns would be spread out to sit in empty cubicles near their respective supervisors. On hindsight, I realised this arrangement facilitated my preaching attempts!

BRINGING IN THE SHEAVES

During breaks, queuing for food, walks to the pantry or the MRT, I would try to create opportunities by asking what they did on the weekend, directly asking if they had a religion and what their thoughts on God were. I tried to have these conversations one-on-one over the 3 months as they were very diverse.

Thank God for working with me to create the opportunities to try to preach about Him and the truth. I had tried inviting each one of them to church on different occasions and although they did not accept the invitation, I told them they could message me anytime in life that they felt they wanted to seek God and come to church.

THE HARVEST IS PLENTIFUL

Besides my fellow interns, I also tried to preach to my Christian supervisor, the IT staff who helped me to set up my computer, the cleaner uncle and aunty, and the caifan store aunty who I bought food from almost everyday. On my last day on internship, I gave them each a farewell gift which included our church tracts.

From this experience, I learnt that in matters of seizing hold of spiritual opportunities (going for Theolo, preaching), the phrase “you never know unless you try” is especially apt. When your heart yearns to draw close to God and to do His will, you can really experience how God works with and opens the way for you.

(Hebrews 13:20a-21) - "Now may the God of peace…make you complete in every good work to do His will, working in you what is well pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen."