Monday, June 4, 2007

Basel Church Jesselton


Basel Church Jesselton
Rev. Lee Wok Sing 1948-1960

3 June 2007 Morning I came to Basel Church on Signal Hill. It seem that my last visit to this church and attended the service was a Sunday in 1972. Memory is fading now.

35 years has changed so much the environment that only the old wooden church building remain for me to identify. With out this old remain of wooden church, I might think that I came to a wrong location.

1952 My parent married in this church (photo above). Of course he has his ceremony in this church because, we, the Wong family and many other Hakka families transfer the Basel Mission to North Borneo and reestablish the Church here. This is the church of the Wong family.

1 year later I was baptized here. Later I studied here. Attended Sunday school here.

Today I came back to see the place where I came from. I found the old church, a part of our family history is gone. This is the church of my grand parents.

The church building is now converted into an office. The wooden cross on the roof tome is now one made of steel.

But the main body of the church remain - the wooden wall, wooden doors, the pillars. All these are still the same original during my time 35 years ago or even of those 50 years ago in 1952.

Basel Church, as the Wong family always called it, but they called it BCCM, has been moved to Likas with a bigger modern building. In 1980 the old location here in signal hill is Bible Training Center in Kota Kinabalu (Pusat Latihan Alkitab Kota Kinabalu or PLAKK)