Dance like no one's watching

I was so damn freaking pissed off yesterday.  I was mad enough for my pulse to quicken, furious enough to wish for bolts of lightning to strike the stupid chao angmoh who tried to push the blame for something he did wrongly to me.  Lightning aside, I would’ve settled for him being ran over by a double decker bus or falling into a manhole.  Yeap.  You get the idea.  I was really really furious – then I read Our Daily Bread.  Here’s what it says:

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“Not fair!” Whether you’ve said it or at least thought it, you’ve got to admit, it’s hard to see someone get away with something and not get what they deserve. We learn this early in life. Just ask the parent of any teenager. Kids hate to see their siblings get off scot-free for the things they got spanked for. Which is why they so readily tattle on each other. But then, we never really grow out of this. To our way of thinking, fairness means sinners deserve God’s wrath and we, the good people, deserve His applause.

But if God were into being “fair,” we would all be consumed by His judgment! We can be thankful for this: “[God] has not dealt with us according to our sins” (Ps. 103:10). We should be glad, not grumpy, that God chooses mercy over fairness and that He is willing to extend grace even to those who are undeserving and hopelessly lost. And while we are thinking about it, when was the last time we let mercy trump fairness with someone who offended us?

It’s not God’s fairness but His mercy that drives Him to pursue us so that heaven can have a party when we are found (Luke 15:7). Personally, I’m thankful that God has not been “fair” with me! Aren’t you?

Source: http://odb.org/2010/06/09/it’s-not-fair/

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How apt it is eh?  So I prayed this morning, not for the stupid chao angmoh to fall into a manhole or get tyre marks on his face, but for God to deal with him.  To get him off my back.  I’m not in a position to tell God what to do, but I trust everything will work out.

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The youngest member of our cellgroup, MY, got married yesterday.  Considering that he was 19 and about to enter the army when he first joined us 9-10 years ago, I feel really old!  Anyway, we had great fun at the wedding.  Congratulations Mingyao and Qiaoyun!  May the Lord bless your marriage with endless love and joy.

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I love songs with great melodies & lyrics.

Amen!

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Saw on Facebook that Airbus is married.  Happy for him.  Congrats Airbus!!!

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Thanks, Azure!

Posted by Wordmobi

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My church will be staging a musical in a gameshow format this Christmas.  It’s called The Great Big Christmas Giveaway and I would like to invite all who are interested in signing up to register online.  Registering will help us determine the amount of refreshments to cater for, as well as to ensure there’re enough seats for everyone.

Advertisement aside, there’s also synchronised prayer at 10:30pm every night for the musical.  Being the forgetful person I am, I set a reminder on my hp to sound nightly so that I won’t forget to pray.  After doing this for a week, I realised that remembering to pray was the least of the difficulties.  I have to admit that sometimes, I just don’t feel like praying.  Not that I don’t pray daily… but… it really takes discipline to stop whatever you’re doing (be it having dinner or watching TV or playing my DS Lite) to pray. 

I suppose this is part of what being an “everyday Christian” means, versus being a “Sunday Christian”.  Just like it’s wrong to cuss and swear at other drivers from Mon – Sat, but drive graciously on Sun, or to be considerate and patient on Sun while losing your temper at your colleagues from Mon – Fri, it’s also wrong to only pray in a disciplined fashion on Sun. 

Emulating Christ really takes a lot of discipline.

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Just went through a massive clearing of old stuff from my room… continuation of the cleaning process that stopped at 3am last night. I threw out loads of notes from KC days, TPJC days and TJC days. Gosh. I’m an incredible hoarder.

I suppose the process could be much quicker but I couldn’t help pause to read the old Christmas cards, birthday cards, letters, and so on from old friends. (Azure – I even found our scribbles from lectures during JC days! Haha… I couldn’t stop laughing when I read what you wrote about CS pouring water on my now cousin-in-law… I saved the paper to show you some day… hahaha).

Even more coincidentally, I found photos from our old church youth choir performance at Takashimaya, Deck the Mall, and guess what? Some people in church are thinking of re-staging the musical for Christmas this year. Haha. How time flies… 15 years have past since we first performed it at Taka.

While physically throwing out stuff, I was also backing up data from my desktop pc, aka the “iCute”, to my portable hard disk. All the old photos, old videos, bittorrents, etc, have now been moved to my portable hdd. (This is probably the last post that’s being typed from the iCute).

Looking back at the past 17 years of history that I just sorted out, I think the lesson I’ve learnt is to cherish the “here and now”. Not that the future or eternity isn’t important… but we need to be aware and mindful of every second that ticks.

I want to say a big THANKS to everyone who has been part of my life the past 17 years. God bless.

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*Prays for dry weather in the afternoon – photoshoot!*

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That’s the NEA weather forecast for the next 3 days.  I really really pray that the afternoon will be cool ‘cos of the morning rain and not too sunny so we can open our eyes when we take photos!

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Matthew 5:43-48 (New International Version)

Love for Enemies

⁴³"You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor^[a] and hate your enemy.’ ⁴⁴But I tell you: Love your enemies^[b] and pray for those who persecute you, ⁴⁵that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. ⁴⁶If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? ⁴⁷And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? ⁴⁸Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Footnotes:

1. Matthew 5:43 Lev. 19:18
2. Matthew 5:44 Some late manuscripts enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you

Every time I consider how my day to day living can reflect Christ working in me, I struggle with the above passage.  I find it insanely difficult to love my enemies.  Perhaps it’s my nature to be more “reactive” in my treatment of others… people who are friendly to me, I will naturally be nice to them.  Friends who are generous, I always remember their kindness and generosity in my heart and try to return the kindness.  All this unfortunately, falls starkly short of what God requires of us. 

Having a more vindictive nature than most, it’s a natural reaction for me to plot and scheme ways of executing revenge on those who have aggrieved me.  In situations where I’m unable to “exact revenge”, I harden my heart and cut off any concern I may have for the aggressor.  For e.g., the girl who used to bully me in kindergarten, when she died when we were in primary school, everyone thought it was “sad”.  I thought (and still do) it was “good riddance”.  I probably would’ve felt sadder for a stranger who died in some traffic accident than her.

And so today while I consider what it means to love my enemies, I conclude it’s not enough to disengage them from my life.  I need to actually care about how they fare and not have a “if you die, that’s your problem” attitude.  Maybe that’s what an older friend meant when he told me long time ago that we need to forgive, even if we don’t forget.

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