“This is a story about how God uses our surrender,” Nelson Tan begins our conversation intriguingly.

When Tan was asked to lead a fledgling new start-up marketplace group in Changi Business Park, he was at a loss.

“I have served in church as cell group leader and in many areas. But for the marketplace, how do you lead people from many churches and companies? I had no idea.

“Where do these people come from, how do I reach out to them? I had no idea as well.”

Tan had no model to follow but sensed that it was the Lord’s leading. So he fell back on what he did know.

“I thought, ‘I shall pray’, because that’s something I can and know how to do,” said Tan, 47, an IT industry veteran.

“As we surrendered, pray-walked and poured out to Him, He brought people in and connected us,” says IT industry veteran Nelson Tan.

Groundbreaking work

At the end of the work week, when everyone left the workplace with happy abandon, Nelson would trek back to Changi Business Park every weekend. Not to catch up on his work but to do groundbreaking work for the Kingdom.

For six months Tan, who works at an MNC (Multi-National Corporation), would return to Changi Business Park every Saturday and prayer-walk the entire area. Covering an expanse of slightly more than 70 hectares, it was certainly no walk in the park.

However, it was a necessary time of consecration. “I would walk the entire Business Park. In the prayer walk, ideas just flowed. It’s amazing! I would walk and pray for God’s vision and His leading.”

Doors opened as the Lord provided him contacts in the area to connect with. Within two years, the group multiplied from a group of four to five persons to having 40 to 50 people coming together from the different companies housed in the Park. He now has a core team of 20 working alongside him in this ministry.

Marketplace Transformation @ Changi meets every second Tuesday and conducts a variety of activities, Alpha classes and John Maxwell Bible Studies.

Marketplace Transformation @ Changi Facebook page.

“God also provided resources to have a bigger outreach to the people in Changi Business Park,” said Tan. “We thought it would be good to do lunch-time talks. I was introduced to Lucas Chow who agreed to speak at one of the meetings.”

That lunch-time talk held in February attracted 120.

But the senior financial controller, who scrutinises figures for a living, is dismissive about the jump in numbers in the marketplace group he leads.

“It’s a story about how God uses our surrender. As we surrendered and poured out to Him, He just brought people in and connected us,” he said.

“The Lord has also impressed on me the strategies that would make this ministry work. Firstly, to connect with both Christians and non-Christians. Secondly, to empower and equip Christians to lead a Christ-centred life at the workplace. We teach God’s Word, giving them purpose and redefining success in life. Thirdly, to do outreach. We put the three together, it spells CEO.”

How apt – Christians doing CEO work in the marketplace: Connect, Empower and Outreach.

“What we really want to do is to connect people back to church,” said Tan. “If there’s a need to, we will do the follow up, but we want them to have a church community to go back to. That’s a goal for us.”

One marketplace ministry under his belt and two years down the road, Nelson is almost a veteran, but one with fresh insights.

“In schools you have Campus Crusade, Navigators and Youths for Christ who are not part of any church but Christians coming together to serve and reach out to the students on campus. But that breaks up when we go to work.

“So the Lord opened our eyes to show that people from a combination of companies can work together. There’s a synergy when you combine and gather Christians to serve together. You will see a powerful movement that will take place.”

“We are just a connection point. We want them to have a church community to go back to. That’s a goal for us.”

Just as Marketplace Transformation @ Changi is flourishing, Tan shall soon have to take his leave. The MNC that he works for is planning to move to Mapletree Business City.

Would he start a marketplace group all over again, and if he did, would he go about it in the same way?

“The Lord told me that this is something that He wants me to do. I do not know why and how He is going to use me. I do not presume that He wants me to do things in the same way as I did the first time. I want to hear from God and be directed by Him,” said Tan. “It’s a heavy burden and it’s not easy.

“I would start with prayer. It needs to be a call of God.

“God has already started to connect me with the people over there so I believe something amazing will happen over there as well!”