I don't dare lar.

Moving on...

It's been two months! And I don't even know whether I want to continue doing this. =/

Life's been busy, life's been exciting, life's been beyond words. Hence the hiatus.

Need to start picking up writing again. Argh.

As for now, a thought to ponder:

Faith is not about feelings, faith is about choosing.

Strength

Saul's son Jonathan went to David at Horesh and gave him strength in God.

1 Samuel 23:16

Thank You for the Jonathans in life.

For The Rest Of Your Life

First jobs, especially when so many have gone before you, can have hazardous effects on your wellbeing. But then again, this is not restricted to you first job. Apparently it gets easier over time.

Physically, in your first job, or when you start a new job, you happily get to do all the menial tasks that the stable boy does. You show up at 7am in the office when the lights aren’t even on, and leave when the janitor gives you the funny look as she refills the toilet rolls at 11pm. But while the stable boy gets to play with the horses when he waters them, you get to play with the photocopying machine when your boss tells you to photocopy 500 pages, double-sided, stapled into landscape booklets ready for the meeting at 10am that day. And then for that same meeting, make 50 cups of coffee/tea, whichever each executive prefers and according to their tastes of milk and sugar and even the time of when they would want it during the meeting. After that, take minutes of the whole meeting, which means you can’t leave for a toilet break even though the others can, order their lunches, again according to each executive’s taste and from which store, miss your own lunch, and at the end of the meeting, clear up, wash the cups and collect the booklets that are left behind, and do what your boss orders again as response to the meeting. And you look at your boss who earns a 6-figure salary each month and wonder if you're ever going to reach there before you die.

Mentally, it’s pretty easy. You just know you’re going to do this for the rest of your life. And then it all goes downhill from here emotionally, financially, socially, and just your life in general. It’s so comforting to know this after you’ve slaved off for the past 15 years to get an education to prepare you for your oyster.

I don’t think our ancestors had it any easier, and it’s not likely our descendents will too. I can’t look into the future, but there are plenty of examples in history where we’ve got it all wrong if we think our lives are going to be what we expect it to be. Abaraham, Moses, David, Esther, Ruth, all the apostles, Paul, and, um, a whole bunch of other people in the Bible we haven’t got to know better, not to mention all the inspiring stories of people we hear about in our modern culture, and what about the people whom we are in contact with everyday who do great things but we just never see! These people started way off from where they ended up, and I have been assured by one of these people, who now can afford a comfortable vehicle and eating well from driving taxis and babysitting me, that I will not end up how I think I will end up. Ten years is a blink of an eye, he says, and many things can happen in ten years I’m sure.

And what he says is true. Apart from his personal experience, there is sound advice from Jesus himself, saying “who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? (Mt 6:27) Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” (Mt 6:34). To be frank, that last statement sound like something out of a self-help book rather than from the mouth of Jesus. But then again, the Bible is the best self-help book there is on the market, with Jesus being the only worthy motivational speaker, and God the incomparable movie director in the universe. Ever.

Many, O Lord my God, are the wonders You have done.

The things You planned for us no one can recount to You;

were I to speak and tell of them, they would be too many to declare.

Psalm 40:13

Easter Sunday

I know this is a bit late, but ya...

Blessed Easter.

Good Friday

It's so easy to teach and preach,

But is your life on the same pitch?

It's so easy to do and do and do,

But is your life following through?

It's so easy to plan and organize,

But is your life focused on Christ?

Jun Yi, you are worried about many things,

but only one thing is needed.

Blessed Good Friday, everyone.

Vaporise

How fleeting life is, that what we just encountered at one afternoon can depart us on the evening of the very same day. And we are not the victims; on the contrary, we are the perpetrators. On one angle, and scream and squirm at the fauna that pass along our tracks, or pluck or destroy in delight at the interesting flora we come across. And then we move to kill bugs even though we invade their natural sanctuary with our environmental holidays, after which it is killing nature in general when we erect our tents, mud houses, private bungalows and eventually multi-storey condominiums. In the hostel that I was staying at, I noticed more squashed brown beetles on the ground than there were previously. Thinking it was just a curious incident, I disregarded it until I chanced upon speaking with a child who was also staying at the hostel, and who confessed he had been stomping on them while he was here. I couldn’t react much after hearing it, since he was only a child, and I simply laughed it off saying that he was a cheeky boy. But in my heart I reflected that it starts with this mindless murder at an impressionable age that we can graduate to cutting whole sections of the forest without as much as a thought. And at that time, we know what we have not only taken away life, we have also killed ourselves. We have been reminded time and again by James in his 5th chapter and 14th verse, “why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes”. We know that our lives are under God’s mercy and judgment, but what makes us think that the lives of His creation are also not under the same, or that we can play God and take away life that He created? Yes, it can be argued that God told the Man in chapter 1 verse 28 of Genesis to “be fruitful and increase in number, fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground”. But as subjects to our own powers and authorities of earth and of heaven, would we want to be subjects of a tyrannical ruler? “Even the stork in the sky knows her appointed seasons, and the dove, the swift and the thrush observe the time of their migration. But my people do not know the requirements of the LORD.” Jeremiah 8:7 We are a mist, a vapour, a cloud that will vanish when the wind blows, or when the sun appears. And we are certainly not God that we can take away life, for in fact, God is the wind and the sun that can take us away at any moment. It is hard not be cynical or pessimistic when we know that our lives can be stomped out just like those beetles. One minute they are busy running their own errands, and the next they are struck down by an acute cardiac arrest, or more precisely a foot. One minute we are having fun mamaking with our friends, and the next our friends are the ones giving us a CPR to save our lives. And we can only cry out to the Lord, just as David did, “Show me, LORD, my life’s end and the number of my days; let me know how fleeting my life is.” Psalm 39:4 or “Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” Psalm 90:12 And this is wisdom: life is better than death. Like fo’ shizzle. This focus on morbidity only leads us to focus on the grace of life, because why be dead now when you will be eventually anyway? In times of darkness and death, life and breath is even more prevalent. It makes us appreciate our blessings, be thankful for our trials, be grateful for our disappointments, and to love our sorrows. “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might, for in the realm of the dead, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom.” Ecclesiastes 9:10

One day.

Better is one day in Your courts than thousands elsewhere.

Even when we feel like we can overtake everyone and everything else on earth, even when everything around us seem to be going our way, even when we feel like we are on the tip-top of the world, it does not compare to one bad day in the presence of God.

Life without God, even though it may be that we are aware we do not even feel God, is still something to be thankful for. The tears maybe more prevalent, the questions will be more angry, we can only see frustrations in our actions, and God will be blamed. And there are many people who have experiences such as these, and they wallow in self-pity and misery. They lament about how distant God is from them, how they do not have an identity, how they feel God is not speaking to them or giving them directions in their ministry, career, education, and life in general. But what is to be praised is that GOD is still in the picture! God is still being sought in all these areas of their lives! In fact, God is sought!

“Remember the wonders he has performed, the miracles and the rulings he has given, you children of his servant Abraham, you descendants of Jacob, his chosen ones.” Psalm 105:5-6

The very fact that we are His chosen ones is something to focus on in itself, not that God is distant, or that He does speak to us, or that our lives are a complete misery. But if we re-focus our attention to our God, we will remember the wonders He has performed, the miracles and rulings He has given , and how he chose us to be His children, and for Him to be our Father.

If there is any confusion about who we are or what we are, then know this: we are servants of the Lord, soldiers of God, and co-heirs with Christ. Know that servants and soldiers and co-heirs serve upwards to something. Know that is not what we do, or what He does, but simply WHO HE IS. Know that it is not for Him to work towards us, although that is happening all the time, but for us to work towards Him, be patient and wait on Him, be disciplined for Him. And know that He must increase, and we must decrease (John 3:30).

“Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere; I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked." Psalm 84:10

Listen...

20th March 2011 (Sunday)

Today's QT:

(From Numbers [23:26])

"Did I not tell you that I must do whatever The Lord says?"

(From Luke [1:38])

"I am willing to be used of The Lord."

(From Psalm [57:2])

"...to God Who finishes all things for me."

I'm tearing up my personal canvas.

This morning's worship is about God's faithfulness. That God remained faithful despite my unfaithfulness. And how as I looked back, He has been faithful over and over again. And I can trust Him to continue to do the same as I seek for the fuller canvas. As I seek to do what He wants me to do now. As I learn to remove all distractions.

"Great is Thy Faithfulness, O God my Father

There is no shadow of turning with Thee"

"And step by step You'll lead me

And I will follow You all of my days"

Thought of [a friend]'s advice - to take a step at a time. And as I take each step, following closely behind The Lord, I get to see that God will never turn away from me - no shadow of turning. Just speak volumes of God's faithfulness.

Taken from Jun Yi's Journal 20th March 2011

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Sometimes God speaks through lines in the Bible. Sometimes God speaks through lines in songs. But one thing we can be assure of, God DOES SPEAK. Especially when we need Him to. If only we're attentive.

Anymore, Lord?

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