Life in General

Its been some time since I last posted about Mom. She's been doing great and her recovery is progressing well. She currently now at TTSH Rehab at AMK Hospital and shes expected to stay there for the month of Nov for intensive daily rehab. They're training her to walk, sit and coordinate her movements and stimulate her swallowing. She's been pretty emotional, sometimes laughing and crying for no reason, could be due to neurological as opposed to pscychological reasons. On the whole all's looking good.

Shuttling up everyday is tiring though. I usually head up after work if its a full day in the office and stay till about nine plus. Most times Im so zonked at the end of the day that I just go there and watch TV - theres this nice 9pm Channel 8 drama on HIV haha. Sometimes Mom slaps me irritably motioning me to pay attention to her instead haha.

Works been good, with a new found purpose since Ive made the decision to not go into full time ministry. Ive learnt that significance is derived from the difference I make to the lives of the people around me as opposed to my vocation, the call to spiritualise the secular. So if I'm gonna be around, then I'll jolly give my all to be the best finance guy around for His glory.

Dads and Dads to Be

When I watched this video, I recalled my growing years and how Dad played a pivotal role in my life. He wasn't perfect and I picked up both the good and the bad. But he was there for me and showed me what being a man was about. I wondered if my Dad could have been better, but I know he was the best he could be. Of all the roles, the most pivotal was that he mirrored, albeit poorly the love of my Father in heaven, who is perfect in every way.

In the same way, I am challenged to be the man God has called me to be now as the youths are watching and later on in my family for my kids, that in all things, the love of the Father might be reflected in me. For the men out there, may we embrace God's call to living a life of integrity, love, courage and humility for His glory.

KTM Supper

Was at KTM on Deepavali Eve. Obviously we were high on teh and doing crazy stuff on Malaysian land haha.

ACE

Was going through my hard drive and I came across these pics and decided to learn how to string em together in an animated gif. Realised Imageready and Vista are so not compatible. At least I managed to get something out haha.

This is dedicated to you boys who have grown and are on the threshold of becoming men. It was a great time and I thank God for bring you all into my life and using imperfect me to make a difference in your lives. It was swell, looking back haha. Too many Macs breakfasts too lol.

Why Don't U Got to Church

As I watched this video, it broke my heart and stirred within me a desire to reach the lost. Not to force dogma or religion on others, but to hear them out and understand the issues and needs they face and somehow show them who Jesus is?

I've been considering full time ministry and I'm really afraid that its just a form of escapism from the world's system. We're called to be full time Christians whether or not we work in Church and to reach the lost. If I'm currently not as effective as I'd like to be in where I am now and completely discontented, then what difference would it make if I went into full time? Isn't the bulk of the lost out there in the marketplace and not in a Church? Its just a blunt and honest reflection and I'm really really giving this alot of thought as to where I can be most effective.



Watching this video makes me cringe and leaves me sad that sometimes the Church has missed the mark. Have we focused more on theatrics and fancy buildings and attendance than real spiritual transformation and being a shining light in this dark world. I stand convicted and guilty and I repent of my apathy and lack of love for others. Even as I reflect, I pray that Rhema will not be one fancy circus with lights and fog machines but yet we miss the point that its all about meeting God. Sigh.

Reflections

Work has been good thus far, though not terribly exciting, Ive been able to deal with whatever comes my way and its really because each morning I wake and realise I really do not know how im going to surmount the challenges fo the day and come to God for strength and wisdom. Time after time, He has seen me through and slowly the fear and apprehension I once felt each Sunday as the week loomed slowly dissipates.

A big struggle I have is the inertia and laziness to guard my heart and Ive realised that my heart naturally tends to slip away if I don't do anything about it. Woke this morning feeling rather distant and its time I reoriented my soul back to God and to discipline my life once again. Need to cut out the things that distract, exercise and eat healthily and rest well haha. ALso Ive realised theres a fine line between sharing my unhappiness and complaining on and on and it eats me up within. Its been awhile since I thanked God for everything and to acknowledge His goodness in my life. Sheesh.

Tomorrow I'm taking half a day off to have lunch with Joey, and its been awhile since we caught up bro. Gonna do some grocery shopping and cook a nice dinner for Dad since its his birthday and my telecon call tonight got cancelled haha woot!

Ok break over. Back to productive labour.

A Semblance of Normalcy

Its been more than a month since Mom was hosptialised and shes now recuperating at home. Shes made a whole lot of progress and can smile, move her left limbs, move my head to her for her to kiss me and its really a miracle that shes reached thus far. Indeed God has been so close and it has been a journey of faith, driven by an utter sense of despondency requiring absolute dependency.

I'm back to work and time off is a rarity now. But I think work helps break the monotony and helps with the caregiver stress. I don't really do much and sometimes its hard being there all the time, but its teaching me to care and love others.

Besides all these, theres a friendship that I'm most thankful for, you know who you are haha and its has been awesome thus far :):)

So life is far from normal and when people ask hows life, I tell them it's rich. There so many things I'm experiencing and learning with God moulding and shaping my inner man. Truly the Christian life is one of purpose and meaning and I wouldn't trade it for anyting else.

Our Security

I really do not know what lies on the road ahead and it seems wrought with challenges, yet with promises of joy and celebration and I guess thats really what life is about. But what's different is the knowledge that through the ups and downs, Christ is the focus and my life is continually transformed daily and that my security, my all is in Him. And at times when I feel that I'm totally powerless to affect any change, I am reminded that I need to cultivate a dependency on Him, to be plugged into the vine that gives life abundantly.

Hosanna

"I looked for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it, but I found none. So I will pour out my wrath on them and consume them with my fiery anger, bringing down on their own heads all they have done, declares the Sovereign LORD."

How To Waste Your Theological Education

Found this post while surfing this morning. Alot of it applies to life in general and ministry too. Food for thought.

1. Cultivate pride by writing only to impress your professors instead of writing to better understand and more clearly communicate truth.

2. Perfect the fine art of corner-cutting by not really researching for a paper but instead writing your uneducated and unsubstantiated opinions and filling them in with strategically placed footnotes.

3. Mistake the amount of education you receive with the actual knowledge you obtain. Keep telling yourself, “I’ll really start learning this stuff when I do my Th.M or my Ph.D.”

4. Nurture an attitude of superiority, competition, and condescension toward fellow seminary students. Secretly speak ill of them with friends and with your spouse.

5. Regularly question the wisdom and competency of your professors. Find ways to disrespect your professors by questioning them publicly in class and by trying to make them look foolish.

6. Neglect personal worship, Bible reading and prayer.

7. Don’t evangelize your neighbors.

8. Practice misquoting and misrepresenting positions and ideas you don’t agree with. Be lazy and don’t attempt to understand opposing views; instead, nurse your prejudices and exalt your opinions by superficial reading and listening.

9. Give your opinion as often as possible - especially in class. Ask questions that show off your knowledge instead of questions that demonstrate a genuine inquiry.

10. Speak of heretical movements, teachers, and doctrine with an air of disdain and levity.

11. Find better things to do than serve in your local church.

12. Fill your life with questionable movies, television, internet, and music.

13. Set aside fellowship and accountability with fellow brothers in Christ.

14. Let your study of divine things become dull, boring, lifeless, and mundane.

15. Chip away at your integrity by signing your school’s covenant and then breaking it under the delusion that, “Those rules are legalistic anyway.”

16. Don’t read to learn; read only to refute what you believe is wrong.

17. Convince yourself that you already know all this stuff.

18. Just study. Don’t exercise, spend time with your family, or work.

19. Save major papers for the last possible moment so that you can ensure that you don’t really learn anything by writing them.

20. Don’t waste your time forming friendships with your professors and those older and wiser than you.

21. Make the mistake of thinking that your education guarantees your success in ministry.

22. Don’t study devotionally. You’ll never make it as a big time scholar if you do that. Scholars need to be cool, detached, and unbiased - certainly not Jesus freaks.

23. Day dream about future opportunities to the point that you get nothing out of your current opportunity to learn God’s Word.

24. Do other things while in class instead of listening - like homework, scheduling, letter-writing, and email.

25. Spend more time blogging than studying.

26. Avoid chapel and other opportunities for corporate worship.

27. Argue angrily with those who don’t see things your way. Whatever you do, don’t read and meditate on II Timothy 2:24-26 and James 3:13-18 as you prepare for ministry.

28. Set your hopes on an easy, cushy pastorate for when you graduate. Determine now not to obey God when he calls you to serve in a difficult church.

29. Look forward to the day when you won’t have to concern yourself with all this theology and when you will be able to just “preach Jesus.”

30. Forget that your primary responsibility is care for your family through provision, shepherding, and leadership.

31. Master Calvin, Owen, and Edwards, but not the Law, Prophets, and Apostles.

32. Gain knowledge in order to merely teach others. Don’t expend the effort it takes to deal with your own heart.

33. Pick apart your pastor’s sermons every week. Only point out his mistakes and his poor theological reasoning so you don’t have to be convicted by anything he says.

34. Protect yourself from real fellowship by only talking about theology and never about your personal spiritual issues, sin, and struggles.

35. Comfort yourself with the delusion that you will start seriously dealing with sin as soon as you become a pastor; right now it’s not really that big a deal.

36. Don’t serve the poor, visit the sick, or care for widows and orphans - save that stuff for the uneducated, non-seminary trained, lay Christians.

37. Keep telling yourself that you want to preach, but don’t ever seek opportunities to preach, especially at local rescue missions and nursing homes. Wait until your church candidacy to preach your first sermon.

38. Let envy keep you from profiting from sermons preached by fellow students.

39. Resent behind-the-scenes, unrecognized service. Only serve in areas where you are sure you will receive praise and accolades.

40. Appear spiritual and knowledgeable at all costs. Don’t let others see your imperfections and ignorance, even if it means you have to lie.

41. Love books and theology and ministry more than the Lord Jesus Christ.

42. Let your passion for the gospel be replaced by passion for complex doctrinal speculation.

43. Become angry, resentful and devastated when you receive something less than an A.

44. Let your excitement for ministry increase or decrease in direct proportion to the accolades or criticisms you receive from your professors.

45. Don’t really try to learn the languages - let Bible Works do all the work for you.

Original post can be found here.

My Prayer

Dear Father, stir within my soul a passion for my generation and a love that will overcome all my inertia and apathy. Help me see that without you, men and women will surely perish. May my life's goal be to make disciples of the people you have placed around me and further out into the nations as you lead. May my life be poured out as a drink offering, pleasing unto You. I am poor, and greatly in need. So empower me to do your will and grant me great success! Amen :)

Lost & Found

Today was Big Sweep Cupboard Saturday (Da Shao Chu) when we rearranged the furnitture to get the house ready for Ma's return. Moved the TV cabinet and my bed to the study room which will now be the nurse's room, shifted Ma's hospital bed into her old room and put the split the study desk between her room and the hall where my desktop is right now. Big time moving and cleaning sia.

One great surprise out of the whole operation, was that I found my iPod v2 haha. It fell behind my desk and somehow it never dawned on me to search there, or maybe I just wasn't thorough, as usual haha. Was hoping to find my handphone too, alas I think its beyond redemption somewhere out there.

Karang guni man just came by and I sold him an old handphone for 2 bucks haha, enough to eat Kuay Peng haha. Listening to Forever Young now, eh its just changed to We Believe. Its a very queer day haha.

Both of Ma's eyes can now open and she can raise her hands and all trying to pull out her tube haha, bad momma. Really excited for her to come home so we can really spend more time in a familiar evnvironment and it wont be so tiring or us all.

Boss just told me they granted me my sabbatical of one year and I'll probably leave end Jan when the replacement comes. So will see how things unfold in due course.

Good News

Just got an sms from Dad saying that the buyer of our Kim Tian Flat has agreed to drop the purchase, so we wont be having to move after all. Thank God for this! It's definitely another load off.

Working, or at least trying to, from home today. Not having to dress up and go in is really nice haha. Got a report which I need to churn out by tomorrow, so I should start cracking.

I'm looking forward to Christmas this year, the close of a challenging but wonderful year. Hoping that ACS will be a possibility again. Christmas is nice haha.

Rest

Today was a day of rest and I am thankful for it.

Wasn't the wisest of sorts as I played Battle Stations Midway till 0030. Think I just wanted some entertainment and mind numbing time. But alas when I woke this morning I was zonked and I had to drag myself to work and my day was horrid. Buddy treated me to lunch at Curry Favour, which was great, then I headed home to crash. Was knocked out for 2 hours straight and am now back at the hospital. Am in a pensive and prayerful state as I'm typing this. I've found physical rest, but I realised I've neglected entering into God's presence for quite awhile and its been really empty. But the hunger draws me to seek Him and to find true rest.

Moved: Ward 44 Bed 25

For those visiting, Mom's been moved to her own room at Ward 44 Bed 25, like how cool la haha? Blogging next to her right now, she looks alot better, been coughing up alot of phlegm cause of her trachy.

Cooked Small White Veg (xiao bai cai) this afternoon and will probably head home to steam a couple of fish. The whole routine really no joke man. I'm like super shack liao and I'm just hanging in there. Theres lots of work to be done at work but I'm mostly effective in the morning only and the afternoons are really spent takin care of the house stuff or with Mom.

Ok I should get down to doing my work.

Song of the Moment

Our Hope

My harddisk was acting up over the weekend so I decided to get a new one to back it up before all the data goes kaput. Bought a new 500GB Seagate Barracuda drive and since I couldnt find my old XP OS, I relunctantly had to downgrade to Vista haha. So been busy over the last couple of days installing and backing up my drives so now I have a combined storage space of a whopping three quarters of a terabyte (750GB). I'm wondering how I am ever gonna use up all that space. Vista seems to be working fine, its definitely more swanky and I could upgrade my sound card drivers, to maximise all that X-Fi goodness. Music never sounded so crisp and clear :)

Ok nuff geekspeak. Mom's the same as usual, maybe I should stop saying same and only post if theres a difference haha. But even though it may not be apparent, I believe God is healing her bit by bit within and I thank God for every single new day. This afternoon while testing my new soundcard drivers, I worshipped to At the Foot of the Cross and I realeased all the accumulated burdens and weariness in the presence of God and I weeped so freely at the comfort and embrace of the Holy Spirit. Truly He is Emmanuel. I've also taken a step to explore moving in the direction of full time ministry. There's no specific call, but this incident has stirred within me a hunger and passion to serve God at a different level, to pursue a life of eternal significance and to just lay everything temporal aside.

A beautiful verse that Dad shared with me last week really hit home, that one day all the suffering, wealth, joy will be eclipsed by the new life we will have in God. That day holds promise that everything will be made new and it is the believer's hope, irregardless of his current circumstance.

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away. Rev 21: 3-4

Week 2

Mom's getting better day by day, though she's still unconscious. Her eyes do open from time to time and she seems to be responding somewhat. We're making preparations to bring her home and we're getting the equipment and a nurse for her. Dad and I are also planning the layout of the house to accommodate her and her needs so thats cool.

its been rather tiring, going to and fro from the hospital, juggling work and making all the arrangements at home. We're also hoping the buyer of our flat will revert with positive news that he wont proceed with the purchase and we can get to keep the house so that mom has a familiar place to recover.

Tommorrow is a brand new week, with its own challenges and joys. Am trusting God to lead me on and am taking it a day at a time. To God be the glory!

Down But Not Out

This has taken a toll on my body and I'm down with a slight cold. Been going into work in the mornings and heading off in the afternoons. Today I went home to cook lunch and nap and now am at the hospital. Mom's doing alright and more or less the same. Docs say they'll be performing more scans and test over the next few days.

I really feel like dropping everything and just sleep. When I go to work, my heart's just not in it, but I know I have an obligation. Sometimes I wonder where is my life heading, will this be the life 2-3 years down the road? Will I ever amount to anything? It's times like these that I find my faith tested and the only thing I can do is to worship and remember how great our God is and that He will deliver.

Many things are looking good too, the Farrer Road house transactions seems close to being settled. We're downgrading to a B1 ward to enjoy the subsidies since theres no differentiation currently in the high dependency ward. There's reassurance and care from many people and that's really worth giving thanks for.

I am seriously considering taking a year off completely to care for mum and to go to Bible School. Its another unknown, but I've been thinking through it and this incident has really made me reassess what's really important to me. With this decision, I'll have to forgo the sense of financial security, though I believe that is a mirage. The greatest fear is entering a full time calling and realising that maybe I just wasn't cut out for it. Its alot harder than a secular job, cause striving and effort just doesn't translate to success. But these are just fears and worries. If God has brought me safe thus far, then I'm sure He'll lead me all the way.

Work

Mom's condition has been the same since Saturday and sometimes its rather disheartening. But as I look at her, I learn to yield the time for her recovery to God and to see with eyes of faith that there is healing at work though it doesn't seem apparent in the physical.

I've rejected the offer to move to the bank and I've asked for a one year sabbatical from Shell. My boss has been understanding but that option will have to be approved by HR. To get a replacement is pretty tough right now and I'll probably be expected to carry on with my present job till the end of the year before i can effectively hand over. But I'm able to work virtually and unless there's a need for face to face interaction, I'll probably work at home or at the hospital. Boss has also offered me the option to work part time, with a 50% reduction in pay and jobscope to have the flexibility to support Ma through her rehabilitation and that'll give me some continuity in the job.

So I'm praying for wisdom to decide and to trust God for His direction and provision even though this trying season.