Tolerance vs. Refinement

This is an article taken from the Chinese section of last week’s ‘My Paper’. I’ve attempted to translate it here, so pardon me if it sounds weird. I’m still more comfortable with translating English to Chinese. Of course not very pro, otherwise I wouldn’t have gotten a certificate of participation for some bilingual translation competition in sec 3.

I used to collect meaningful and well-written essays submitted by readers of the Chinese newspaper. Hardly do that nowadays, so I really only have that few clippings. This article about tolerance vs. refinement somehow relates to the bible’s teaching on being slow to anger. So ENJOY!!!

All those pent-up anger and frustrations from work we yearn to vent them out but if we complain too much to our friends, they may get irritated or something. Therefore, many people will tell us to be more tolerant and gracious about it.

People like to equate tolerance to refinement but Ms Shenton, the author, begs to differ. She believes that tolerance is a low level thing whilst refinement is a high level thing. (I hope I won’t be using too much thing)

When we talk about tolerance, we often have this mentality: I can’t afford to offend you now, so I’ll tolerate. But you wait and see, one day...... Such tolerance has a deep underlying motive; you tolerate only to hide or protect yourself. However, your eyes are dead-fixed on your target. When the time is ripe, you will jump out and attack.

In reality, these people are highly respected. They are deemed to be intelligent and material for success.

Their tolerance is in fact a plot, a hideous act. What’s more scary is that such tolerance can perverse the human mind.

Let me tell you a story from the ancient history of China. Before the Tang dynasty was this short-lived Duo dynasty. The good-for-nothing emperor of this Duo dynasty is called Yang Guang. He demonstrated tolerance to the max.

Before he became an emperor, he could take a lot of things lying down. He was not particular about his dressing or meals and did not have a servant. He even married an extremely ugly wife.

In this way, he tolerated for 10 years. Both the emperor and his subjects felt that he would make a good emperor.

Who would expect that after this fellow became an emperor, there was a drastic change in his personality. He became extremely extravagant and useless. Not long after, Duo dynasty fell.

This is the result of tolerance.

Tolerance can enable a person to grab certain kinds of benefits but such perverseness often causes him to do the wrong things. Once he can take it no longer, he will resort to foolish acts.

Refinement is different. It is like pardoning and forgiveness; it’s a higher intellect. Refinement also requires tolerance but such tolerance does not derive from the basis of revenge and self-centredness. This tolerance is to get rid of the anger which enters the body, maintaining the stability of the mind and emotions throughout.

Tolerance is a kind of attack. Because you need to attack, you need to defend. Refinement does not require defense, because you have never thought of attacking.

To become a company’s managerial talent, the more you need to turn tolerance into refinement. Because of the power and influence you hold in your hands, if you survive on mere tolerance, you will vent it out on someone someday when you can hold it no more. In the end, you will only turn your organisation into scattered sand.

If you can turn tolerance into refinement, you will consider first the benefits of others. It’s not easy to be refined but once you grasp the different elements, you can develop your own charm and become the great general.

That was some food for thought....

An interesting question revisited

Girlfriends and wives love to ask their spouse this age-old question. We hardly hear men ask this question maybe because women are really quite bo liao sometimes. If your mother and me both fall into the sea, assuming both of us can’t swim and you can only save one, who will you save?

Dead-meat: Many men will avoid answering because either way makes you a heartless creature.

Liar: He will say save the mother in front of the mother and say save the wife in front of the wife. So fake!

Excuse me: Just say they can’t swim let alone save the other two.

Resourceful: This is what I heard employers will ask. Your purpose is to make any hopeless situation look hopeful! Before you save anyone, call the fire engine or whoever. While waiting for help to arrive, save one of them and hopefully the other also gets rescued later on.

Cheesy: This is what I heard from my colleague. Of course save the girlfriend/ wife (without hesitation). His parent(s) have already passed on.

Romantic: This is a really good one and first time I’ve heard about it from another colleague. With this one, you can’t go very wrong. The boyfriend says he will save the mother. How can you forsake you mother for a girl who’s not even your wife right, so a pat on his back. But after that, he will jump into the water and die with his girlfriend. This is so terribly touching. How can it not melt your heart?

To the guys out there, good luck!!!

Random talk

There’s this toilet below my office which I normally use. Pasted on the wall is a sign which reads “Please lift the toilet seat before you pee”. Huh? Then what’s the toilet seat for? If it’s for guys only, I can understand, but not for every one right?

I think the bus handle is an amazing invention except that I don't understand why there's allowance for so much movement. It doesn't help that when the bus makes a sharp turn, I have to stabilise myself with all my might. I don't suppose I'm that light but it seems like I'm the only one so prone to sliding from one end of the bus to another.

I always thought Proforma Invoice was Performa Invoice. Sam Heng will know what I’m talking about. I’m actually that blind not to have noticed that even though I’ve handled many Proforma Invoice.

Angeline – A Story of Love

This is a story from those little books that you get from gift shops. My friend gave this to me quite a long time ago but I’m revisiting it to share with you and bring some warmth to your heart as well. Enjoy!!!

Somewhere in the evening sky a little angel lived on a puffy white cloud. Her name was Angeline.

One day she saw herself in a shiny raindrop...... And realised that her wings were very, very small. Angeline tried to think of ways to make them look bigger.

“I know, I’ll glue extra curly fuzzy feathers all over them.”...... But they just blew off.

Then she thought, “I’ll paint them bright colours”, and ran for a brush......But she just looked funny.

She even tried to hide them under a giant, enormous straw hat with lots and lots of fancy flowers...... But she just looked silly.

Angeline felt very sad. “How could anyone love an angel with such itsy-bitsy wings?” She softly whispered.

Then she started to cry.

As she gently wiped away a tear, she felt a bump. A big, dark cloud blew by and almost knocked her over. Angeline watched it slide past and sadly thought, “I’ll always look strange. I can’t fix my wings and they will never grow.”

Suddenly she had an idea.

“I’ll jump into this cloud and sail far away into the sky where no one will ever see me.” So she hopped on the fluffy cloud and floated like a big, white bubble into the still blue night.
With a big sigh, the little angel tucked herself in and fell fast asleep. But as she glided along she began to slowly sink deeper and deeper into the cloud’s soft, black center.

Angeline tumbled upside down and sideways until...... She finally landed on the bottom with a gentle thud.

She was all alone and very, very scared.

Suddenly she looked down and saw a beautiful rainbow.

“Oh my,” she sighed, “Maybe if I jump on this rainbow it will take me somewhere... Anywhere... Away from this gloomy, sad place.”

Angeline began to slide down...down...down until... THUMP!

She landed on a soft warm blanket. Angeline could see nothing in the shadows. “Oh no, another scary place.” The angel stared into the darkness and realised she was on a little girl’s bed.

Then she saw the little girl...Hiding behind a big pillow.

“I’m so afraid of the dark,” she whispered.

“I know just how you feel,” Angeline cried. “But I’m here now so you don’t have to be frightened anymore.” And with that the little girl scooped up the angel in her arms and held her tight.

Her tears dried, her cries stopped and she drifted off to sleep.

Angeline never felt so loved and cared for. She was so happy that even her wings looked a little bigger. And from that day on the little girl and the angel were together, wach helping the other in their own way.

And just as there are stars in the sky, there’s a special angel for every little girl and boy...... waiting to be held and loved.

Whether you feel like the angel or the little girl, I hope the story meant something to you. What I make of this story is two different ways of looking at it.

Firstly, God loves us like the angel and the best part being He understands every fear that goes through our heart.

Secondly, we put ourselves in the angel’s shoes and realise we are never too inadequate to love others. The point is whether we are willing to find that someone who needs your love to love.

meapple

19th may prayer request!

My sister is crying again... she came down suddenly last night while my mom and i were watching TV and asked if she was fat. According to my mom she has been doing that alot recently, until my mom told her that she had to stop thinking like that, that such thoughts were untrue... Anyway my mom was so happy that she and a friend attended a church event yesterday, the topic of discussion was about cutting... and today she is crying badly again. She locked herself in her room, and wont let my mom in, until mom got the key... Sigh, it really seems to have no end, and if i weary so about this, how much so does my mom?

Sorry have not been posting much, mainly because there hasnt been many nice things to post about. Prayer request!-- May God help my sister to overcome her problems and mindset, give my mom strength as she helps my sister, and grant me the emphathy and patience to continue loving her.

Isn't it still water?

Methodist churches practise baptism in three modes: immersion, pouring and sprinkling. Have you ever wondered what’s the difference between them?

The most unanimously agreed on and biblically supported method is immersion. In fact, it’s much easier to find articles on the net arguing about the other two methods being objectionable. The significance of immersion lies in its reference to our burial with Christ “by baptism unto death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life” (Rom. 6:4). To come out of the baptismal water is like rising from the dead to newness of life, “dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus” (Rom 6:11).

Pouring speaks of the cleansing we receive by the “washing of regeneration and the renewal of the Holy Spirit which He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior” (Titus 3:5-6). Similarly, pouring also signifies the outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon the believers (Acts 2:17; 10:45).

Baptism by sprinkling has perhaps an older tradition, with its roots in the Old Testament ritual of sprinkling the blood of the sacrifice upon the garments of the priest to signify that “he and his garments shall be holy” (Exod. 29:21). To be sprinkled means that we have been set apart for God’s service. More often, however, sprinkling with blood (Lev. 4:5), water (Num. 8:7), or with oil (Lev. 14:16) signifies cleansing.

However, baptism is still baptism. The attitude and intention are much more important than the mode that one chooses to undertake. I’m in no position to argue which modes are right or wrong but I’m sure God need not work in only one way. At least we agree that baptism is a mandate from God. That’s what matters. People like to argue over ways of doing things, stance on certain issues, which denomination is better blah blah blah..... Intellectually stimulating though it may be, sometimes it may not be a bad thing to have different denominations. As my TRACkers pastor said, different kinds of services and church environment may appeal to different kinds of people. Every one is different and if they can find one where they are comfortable worshipping God in, we should rejoice. In other words, we can reach out to people using a variety of baits. At the end of the day, we are still brothers and sisters in Christ isn’t it?

Workplace Woes

Today’s my 5th day at my workplace, somewhere near Boon Lay. My nightmare begins the moment I get out of the train at Boon Lay MRT. It doesn’t help even if you’re that close to the escalator because people literally rush or run to the escalator. I never realised the morning traffic there is so bad. Really can’t imagine what the place would be like when there’s a track fault or train delay. To make things worse, bus 252 which I need to take is at berth 9, right at the extreme left end of boon lay’s gigantic circular bus interchange. Very far loh and I queued at the wrong lane before. The queues are so long you can hardly tell which belongs to which bus number until I see people boarding the bus but my queue didn’t seem to be moving.

Actually I feel like quitting already; maybe because I’m lazy. It’d be great if I can work on alternate days. If I want to quit, there shouldn’t be any problems with the job agency. But how should I break the news to my direct supervisor. Even if she doesn’t blow her top – spending so much time teaching me how to do stuff and me irritating her with questions – I think she’ll curse and swear at me every day after i leave. The best thing now is if they find a permanent, I have all the reasons to stop working. Then again, if I go somewhere else, won’t I have to pick up from scratch and go through all the pain again?

The receptionist at the 1st floor counter seems to be having an easier time than me. General enquiry phone calls are rare. It makes sense doesn’t it? How many people need to call a crane company? She spends her work hours watching vcds like CSI, FBI, etc. She needs only to help us mail out the letters. My supervisor makes me call Fedex all the time so sparing the receptionist of more work. I’ve called Fedex quite a number of times to send documents and parcels to China, Malaysia, Korea, etc. The number of times which they call Fedex is more than the times we send emails. Never mind that when I’m filling out the form, I can’t tell which is city and which is province. Because the company wants to cut cost, the pen we are using now is so lousy no matter how hard I press, the carbon print on the last sheet is still very faint. But Fedex is really Fedex. It’s so fast. The thing I want to send out always disappears the next moment I go to the counter. Fedex must be a really really huge company with tons of workers. Can’t imagine the amount of paperwork they need to do. Fedex is literally operating all over the world!!! I wonder if they serve Sahara Desert too.

Of course there’re good things to be mentioned too. The radio is always on in the office so it’s good for me at least because absolute silence like in the church office unsettles me. But coz the radio is so lau pok and dusty, it sometimes changes channels on its own. Lol...Because someone drives, we get to go to a different place every day for lunch. They are used to their 45 minutes lunch break, so they walk and eat really fast. Stressed stressed......

Since my office is located somewhere in the Jurong West Tuas area, there’re plenty of warehouses there. 3 of my colleagues including my boss are mad over the bed sheet warehouse sale. They have decided white is a bad colour to buy because the side where the husband sleeps always ends up with some dirty yellow mark, the outline of the body. What is this man? Never heard of such a thing in my life!!! On Friday, there’ll be a Meiji warehouse sale. Oh man, I love meiji. I recall how I was addicted to chocobeats for a period. I ate almost 10 tubes until I got sick of it. Not to mention I ate so much of Sam Leong’s chocobaby. So I’ll see how and try to buy as much as I can. :p

So far I’ve been pretty accurate with the numbers portion of my work. Does it mean I’ll make an ok accountant? Haha...

Random stuff

To Elisabeth, last week’s digital life section of The Straits Times featured very pretty and classy laptop bags but quite expensive also. At least there’re already such bags out there which can out so many other things apart from the laptop, so I don’t need to design one for you anymore! Lol..............

I never had much luck in lucky draws – those you send in or during prom nights, lucky dips, spinning the wheel, scratching the card which is very fun, those win-things-by-chance events. So I certainly believe lotteries, sweepstakes, Toto and 4D are a total waste of money. I did this survey for brightsparks hoping I would actually win the top prize of a itouch but yea, obviously I didn’t get it. This captions contest in the weekly Sunday Times seems attractive and maybe my chances will be quite high since people hate to use their brains to think. But neither do I; no time to think and don’t want to kill my brain cells either. As if not enough are dead. The last time I really won something should be eons ago. It was this travel scrabble set which I got from NKF at that time. Hope it was bought legitimately. Haha.... love it a lot coz I love scrabble.

Do you know Felicia Chin changed her chinese name since four months ago? Not like anyone would care but her new name’s quite nice. Her old name, feng ling, sounds like feng li which is a pear. Haha...

Prayer for 11 May to 17 May

Thank God for our earthly parents who are providing us with the best of everything they could give with a simple wish that we can stay happy and comfortable. Ask God to help us love them verbally, physically, patiently, gratefully, generously, attentively and honourably although it may seem difficult or impossible at times. Pray for any problems, if there are, between our parents and us to be resolved by God’s divine intervention. At times, we may not understand where our parents are coming from or what is going through their mind. Other times, our parents just appear plain unreasonable and overly-protective. Whichever the case, pray that God will be the bridge between us; that as we seek to grow closer to Lord Jesus, our love for our parents will increase also.

meapple

Mid week meeting on the 15th May

Hello everyone, this weeks mid week meeting will be on Thursday, at 6pm at holland village. The restaurant we will be eating at is called Essential Brews. It is along the row of shops where swensens and starbucks is. The price range is from 20.95 to 25.95 for a set dinner. It is inclusive of a soup of the day, a drink, and a main course. Most of the dishes and drinks there are flavoured with floral or tea herbs, and there are many unique interesting dishes. Also, nerine will be joining us this week, so ya! Hope to see you there! Please Sms me confirmation by Wednesday night!

Heya, i have an idea...

Hey meapple! Im glad to see you still posting! The past weekend i was sick and feeling not just a little lethargic, so i did not check the website or post anything, and i was afraid that you might feel like you were talking to yourself afterall and stop too, so ya, im glad i worried for nothing :). This week nerine's SYF is over on tuesday, so she would be joining us for our mid week meeting, bringing the number to about five out of nine :). P.S im also hoping she would start posting regularly. I think if we persevere we might actually reach 7/9 eventually or even 9/9 on certain weeks. But besides the joy of seeing everyone making time to turn up everyweek, im glad to see that our pcm is growing closer. The more we communicate, the more we will know about each others' thoughts and lives, building a stronger friendship between us. I feel that this is very important, to build a sphere of trust and faith outside of our seperate lives, so that when one of us is in need of help, we are there to provide unjudgemental and stauch support. Not to say that we should not rely on God, or that he alone is not sufficient for our needs, but people are also tools used by God, like the three friends who loved Job enough to travel all the way to his house during his trials, to sit with him without uttering a word for seven days, unable to provide comfort, but unwilling to give up. I wonder, at this stage if one of us were to end up in the hospital, how many of us would be willing to take time away from our busy schedules to go visit? Im not sure if i will. But i hope in the future when i hear such dire news, my first question would be " which hospital? " instead of merely " what happened? ".

Anyway, i was traveling on the bus today, when i had an idea. To help us know more about each other, i propose to start a chain mail. Not those bad luck letters that curse you if u dont send to other people, but one that hopefully would demostrate how things will bear fruit in time. Let me explain myself. It would be an envelope containing a piece of paper segmented into nine portions, each portion bearing each of our names. We would write a single word describing that person under his assigned portion, and then mail it to the next person, who would do the same thing and so on. finally when it comes back to the original person( probably me ), i would flip the paper over and segment it again into nine portions, writing each of your names at the top again. Then i would write TWO words i think describes each of you under the assigned portion. On the next cycle i would add another piece of paper, and the description would be THREE words. The objective would be to see how our views of each other grows as our friendship progresses. It would also be a form of encouragement as we affirm each other. As the number of words increase, they would not need to be in sentences, it can just be individual words, eg ( Proud, Kind, Bluntly honest, Fiercely intelligent, happy-go-lucky ) What do you think? Any suggestions or objections? Please comment and tell me what you think.

Find Us Faithful

On Monday, I decided to be healthy and so went for a slow jog in the evening. I ended up walking half the time... There’s quite a lot of people given it is a normal working weekday, so either these people are super ultra rich and therefore don’t need to work or they are simply too healthy!!! It seems like the government’s effort in promoting healthy living through physical exercise kind of paid off :) Congratulations!

A couple of interesting observations made. I saw this dog literally wearing ‘shoes’. I haven’t seen a dog wear something like that except of course on tv when their owners dress them up like a clown for Christmas parties. These shoes I saw weren’t those pretty canvas types with laces and definitely not shiny heels or beach sandals.....haha.... From a distance, it looked like each foot was bundled with a black garbage bag. It’s quite a funny sight; at least it drew quite a few stares apart from mine. On a closer look, the shoes look quite comfy and for a while, it reminded me of the bandits in maplestory (for those who have played it before) because of the black gloves they wear. I hope the owner wasn’t afraid the little run would actually dirty his doggy’s feet coz that’s totally a clean freak :O

Then, I saw this Caucasian family also with a dog. Don’t ask me what breed, I never bothered. Just another skinny dog. Lady boss keeps stopping to teach the dog some manners because it was obviously pushing and it ain’t a very nice thing to do. So she at the top of her voice said, “Dog, you are pushing..............naughty dog.” This poor dog hasn’t a name so it’s called DOG. I realised a similarity there in training obedience in both an animal and a child. The other day when the kindergarten children were making their way to the pantry for breakfast, the teacher was holding back this girl at the lift lobby. The teacher told the girl that she is no to jump in the lift again. The girl was allowed to go off only after she responded. Quite similar eh except that the dog can’t say yes. It’s obviously a nightmare raising kids, and it doesn’t seem any easier training a dog. So why d people find trouble for themselves? Dog-lovers, please enlighten me!!!

Today I went to SGH to visit my uncle. All the beds were occupied. A lot of operations going on nowadays. 5 out of 6 in the ward are elderly men. Weird thing, men hurt themselves more easily? The remaining guy was a pretty young man, a tough-looking one in fact. He hurt his right elbow i suppose and therefore an interesting way of wearing his shirt. Basically the right arm didn’t go through the sleeve. Imagine!!! Looks quite man loh. One of the times when you can see the weak side of a guy is probably this ba.

Pastor Lynette has covered pretty thoroughly on how faith without deeds is dead. I’m inspired to touch a bit on faith on a personal level, something which I shared for devotions in TRACkers. The scripture reading is taken from Genesis 12. We all know Abraham is a god-fearing man and a man of great faith. Nearly every time God instructs him to do something, he proceeds without questioning.

What’s interesting in the first four verses is that God wants Abraham to leave his homeland and everything behind. And he followed with obedience. In the later chapters, this same obedience is demonstrated. He just believed that God would deliver on His promise. Like later on in Genesis 22, Abraham was told to sacrifice his only son Isaac as a burnt offering. He actually did just as he was told without hesitation. And seeing his faithfulness, an angel came to stop him as he prepared to slay his son with the knife. We look at ourselves and we realize that ‘Hey, why can’t we be like Abraham’. We ask ourselves: Do we question or doubt God every time He tells us to do something that perhaps disrupts our own plans or gets in the way of things that we want to achieve.

But we can take comfort in that Abraham has times when he lacked faith too. In Gen 12:10-20, the king shows Abram if he trusted in God and told the truth, everything would have been all right. Pharaoh was so far from any design to kill Abraham. Instead, he took particular care of him. Pharaoh charged his men not to hurt Abram in any thing even after the truth was uncovered. But Abraham was so fearful that he got his wife and servants to tell a lie to ensure his safety. We often perplex ourselves with fears which are altogether groundless. Many a time we fear where no fear is. Even if there’s a reason to fear, we pray to commit to God all our anxieties but we don’t really trust completely because we are so gripped by fear. Although we understand the nature of our Father, we are just afraid that we’re taking the wrong step in life when pursuing the various educational careers and options, afraid we won’t rise to where we are, afraid we can’t get a certain GPA, afraid our Sec 1s will not grow up into Godly men and women under us, afraid of deaths around us, afraid our God has been a lie all this while, etc (I’m not sure if you fear and what you fear).

We need not be discouraged. Abraham also showed a lack of faith before but God is in the business of growing Abraham into a man of great faith, and this requires circumstances where Abraham must trust God. Likewise, we should seek to grow in faith. Faith is an amazing thing. It is believing that the blessing of the Almighty would make up for all we could lose or leave behind, supply all our wants and answer and exceed all our desires. When we have faith, we are not easily discouraged by the difficulties in our way. What we undertake, in obedience to God's command, and in humble attendance on his providence, will certainly succeed and end with comfort at last. I am still learning too....

This irish prayer was given to us on a small card by our teachers before our O levels which I still find relevant today:

May God give you...
For every STORM, a RAINBOW,
For every TEAR, a SMILE,
For every CARE, a PROMISE,
And a BLESSING in each TRIAL.
For every PROBLEM life sends,
A FAITHFUL FRIEND to share,
For every SIGH, a SWEET SONG,
And an ANSWER for each PRAYER.


PRAYER for May 4 - May 10

Thank you, Father, for revealing your faithfulness to us time and time again. Forgive us, oh Lord, when we of little faith choose to take things in our own hands. Father, whichever level of faith we each are at now, help us to grow deeper in faith. Take our faith to a new level because want You to use the events in our life to teach us what faith is all about. Father, we also want to pray for faith to be no longer something we keep to ourselves. Because of the faith we have in You, help us to practise it through deeds which are seen by our family, neighbours, freinds and spheres of influence. For we know that as the body is dead without th Spirit, faith without deeds is dead also. Thank you for promising us salvation as long as we have the faith but help us understand that Christian living isn't just about paying lip service and telling others how important faith is. Many times in life we have to walk in faith, so grant us the peace which transcends all understanding, claiming the promise that You have nothing but the best for us. Amen.

“Faith is not a mushroom that grows overnight in damp soil; it is an oak tree that grows for a thousand years under the blast of the wind and rain.” (Barnhouse)

P.S. Jun Bin, remind me to give you your Christmas card!!!

meapple

Guess the location of our mid week meeting!

When stars shine and moonlight glimmer
Swirling eddies of foam and ripples gather
Magical spheres of warmth and light floating
Against a wall of waters gushing

Waters dancing to your laughter, resounding,
Caressing fingers of the wind playfully, running
Warmth of your smile against setting sun, glowing
Among these we shall have words of all things, pleasing

So cast your cares and worries to the winds
Let your hair down and dance within
It’s a time for love, heart and fellowship
In a place made pleasant by your companionship

Thus under soothing trees and rustling leaves
Surrounded by graceful spectacles of waters weave
Amidst joyous laughter of warmth and glowing light
Let us, my dear friends, enjoy this night!

The location of our next mid week meeting would be at united square, next to newton MRT. If anyone needs directions feel free to ask me. We will be meeting next wednesday, at 6pm, please reply via post or sms to me to confirm. If u cannot make it, please inform me of what time or day you would be free in future weeks so i plan these meetings better :). Any last minute changes are also fine, so dont feel pressured or obligated to come if u are not feeling well or have urgent things to do. But i do hope to see you there. Well wishes all! Bon

Cheers and a toast to Gods people( And important notices!) PLEASE READ!!

Heya peeps, this is happin3ss, and for once i will say that im Bon :P

Anyway enough about sad stories, enough about stern sermons, where are the songs of birds on carefree winds? I just want to congratulate Teo Mei Ping, for completing her internship in trackers and church. I think its a great thing to be able to serve, especially for so long, doing rather mundane and under stimulating jobs from nine to five. Way to go, and the drinks are on you the next time we go out k? :D :D Anyways, i guess im gonna be very free from now onwards as i would be doing a private course, sooo i would probably write alot of stuff and post it here, be sure to check in from time to time k?

Ya, anyway, todays sermon got me thinking, am i in anyway serving God? If so am i doing enough? If not, how do i take action? I for one think im not serving enough, and i want to take action. But i am unable to satisfy this immediate and pressing urge as im not sure how to volunteer. This isnt exactly a new dilemma and i was hoping elisabeth or tim could help me out. I was thinking that maybe our pcm could serve together in the same ministry? So that if any of us run into problems the rest would be able to better identify with the problem and help. It just happens that many of us are already serving as teachers or guides to the secondary ones, maybe i dont have the training to teach yet, but maybe i could be involved by interacting with and thus keeping tabs on the students, heh. Anyway, in order to encourage one and all to visit this website, im going to be posting information on our weekly outings here, so if anyone wants to find out ( and EVERYONE needs to find out ), please check the website frequently, thanks!

As for the song of birds on carefree winds... I was thining of incorporating a short worship session in our midweek meeting. Maybe just singing a song together before we eat? Doesnt have to be nice or loud, but loving God is something we all have in common right? This is where i need help from our pcm songbirds... to help pick a simple song that we all can chirp along to? I can help print the lyrics if need be, or carry a radio on my shoulders and act like those 'a hip and a hop' rappers. So ya, our group is so talented it would be a criminal waste not to let everyone hear our chirping and croaking. Heh, soooo ya, look forward to the beautiful vocals of our pcm songbirds and frog princes next week!

BY HOOK OR BY CROOK

Hope your week has been good thus far. You all know where I was doing my internship; no names mentioned. Wednesday morning, I was sitting at my cubicle when I heard an extremely loud noise. It sounded like a wall had just collapsed. Quite scary actually. Imagine a part of our building had just fallen away. Nothing seemed to be amiss until the receptionist opened the door to someone’s office. Lo and behold! A broken brick had fallen through the false ceiling (those with removable boards) onto the table, knocking out everything in its way. Now, this is scary because should the occupant of that office have been around at that time, her head would not be spared. Thank God this young lady is enjoying herself somewhere far far away and won’t be back for at least another week or two. The brick is believed to be some debris but since the ceiling is hollow, it is bizarre where the brick fell from. Elisabeth’s mentor, as hilarious as usual, was video-recording the ‘crime scene’, complete with self-invented commentaries.

I just happened to be thinking about all the interview places I went to in the last two years. Many times, the security and lift systems amongst many other things make me feel lost and embarrassed.

I was at this place and I thought for once I could bypass the security counter and just take the lift. I went in, the door closed but I couldn’t press number 18. Luckily I wasn’t trapped. It was later that I discover you need a security pass to flash at this something before you can press the button. So basically if every one in the lift is going to a different floor, everybody has to flash his or her card. Now, this is bothersome but yeah, it was a tastefully designed lift. After the interview, I was crossing a road which has been blocked out. Forgetting the traffic light wasn’t even working, I pressed it furiously out of habit. I always believe the more times you press, the system will be made to believe that there’s a lot of pedestrians waiting to cross, so it’ll change to green light faster. This lady who saw me doing this must have thought I was mad or something.

Usually when you wait for a lift, you just need to press either the up or down button. Whilst I was at this Ministry, in place of the up and down buttons was a gigantic number pad. I thought to myself surely I don’t need a password to take the lift. At least the security person didn’t tell me anything. It was not until someone came over that I realised you are supposed to press the number of the level you are going to. And boy, this is the most efficient lift I have ever seen.

There was this mini luggage-checking system at this other Ministry. For a moment, I felt like I was at Changi Airport. Kind of exaggerating, not as if there’s a lot of money upstairs. But I suppose terrorists just need to cripple a ministry to create fear and unrest in the entire country.

There’s this statutory board whereby you have to exchange your IC for a security pass. After which, there’s this MRT gantry thing which you need to pass through. Initially, I didn’t know where to tap my card because there’s no sign which says “Tap here”. Unlike the MRT one, there’s this small door bell-like thing in place to tap on. Weird. On Monday, I was pacing outside the interview room waiting for my turn. I was told the panel would sound the bell as a signal to go in. When I heard this faint ‘ding’ sound, I wasn’t sure where it came from and the HR person wasn’t within sight for me to check. I wasn’t expecting those loud canteen bells anyway, so I entered. I heard the panel talking about confidence so I kind of knew I entered at the wrong time. Luckily they weren’t too alarmed. I just told them I mistook the lift bell for their bell.

Now that one of my house lifts has been changed to the stop-at-every-level kind, I think some of the older residents think that when you want to go down, you press the up button to ask the lift to come up. Oh dear! Back to my headline: By hook or by crook. We’re all familiar with this phrase and might have even used it in our essays before. Did you ever ask yourself why is it by hook or by crook? What does it mean? Since crook refers to a thief, cheat or criminal of sorts, I always thought it means you can resort to bad and underhand methods if the proper ones don’t work as long as you achieve your aims. Anyway, it’s wrong and the origin of this phrase isn’t very interesting either.

What I want to talk about is how this phrase applies to God’s calling for us. This is something Pastor William showed me from a book. Hopefully I remembered correctly. We all know what a hook is. As for a crook, it is a staff used by the shepherd. It has a curved handle normally wide enough to fit around the neck of a sheep or goat, allowing a herder to catch an animal that is straying and reroute them to a different direction. Crook represents the shepherds who are really those in full time ministry because their role is to feed and look after the people. We are all called to be fishers of men. Therefore, hook represents us or even the lay people. We like to think that God’s calling is for the full-time ministry people but in actual fact, we all have a calling. A calling to bring the Good News to pre-believers. The difference lies only in whether we are doing it as a church staff or in our respective professions. What can we be sure of then? We will fish for men BY HOOK OR BY CROOK.

PRAYER FOR THE WEEK

Pray for forgiveness especially since we tend to ignore God when we are caught up with our work and give little regard to God agenda. If there is something in our life that is not right with God – prayer life, walk with God, service in ministries, habits, sins - and we have been wanting to do something about it for weeks, months or even years, let us procrastinate no more. Pray for God to grant us that willpower to change and not wait for another tomorrow. If we have made a commitment to God or God is calling us to do something, pray that we will cast it aside no longer and but seek to fulfil His will in our lives.

Please take a look at this Global Day of Prayer 2008: http://www.globaldayofprayer.com/10days.php

Lastly, just want to make a small plea. When smses are sent out, can we all try to reply as promptly as we can, even if it’s just a simple acknowledgement, so as to facilitate arrangements?

Thanks!!!

meapple

My first year in secondary school, my story

I know it sounds really cliche and a little bigotry but, bear with me. It all started when i was 12 going on 13, during my first year in SJI. I was very popular, and got elected by a majority vote to be class chairman. It might sound insignificant, but at that time, it was a symbol of popularity and something to boast about. I was good at everything, third in the entire school in academics.

But with it came a price, i manipulated others to further my own goals. Used gossips to tear down others, directed friends to my own ends.

Then one day, the image still raw in my mind, a staunch friend of mine since day one, a simple jolly chap, turned on me. He scalded me with such venom that i was at a loss, shocked at the words coming out of his mouth. I just stood there, as the others quietly crowded by watching as he sneered at me, his usually amiable features twisted into a mask of comtempt. Then in the corner of my eye, i saw one of my rivals, smirking at me. In truth as i look back, i cant say for certain that he had anything to do with it, but it hurt. Something just clicked in place right then, and the sky slammed into me. I turned and walked up the stairs, hands gripping the railings to boost me along, wounded and at a loss. After that i just worked, and worked. But no matter how much i did, it didt seem sufficient. My grades dropped, my classroom duties always seem to be done shoddily, basically it went downhill. The week of my birthday, i worked extra hard, burning the midnight oil to free that special sunday for play. I succeeded, only to find out that i was too tired to play on that day. I just stopped, nothing left to give.

The following events seem to take place in a haze of memory, i seem to have slept for five days, waking for short periods of an hour or two to eat, then going back to sleep. Subsequently i dropped out of school, but not until i was forced to see the school councillor, who made me stay in school for lengthy periods of time doing nothing in the library. What i did was so out of the norm that i was embarrassed to meet my classmates, and shunned them. In the end i felt like a hunted animal, playing hide and seek with my former friends. I fell from grace, and my duties were taken away, friends slowly became strangers, and my teachers became shorter and shorter with me. They didt understand what was happening, nor did i. One day, when i was meeting with my form teacher to discuss my immediate future and what i am going to do, she lost her temper. She asked me to do things, and always i said i will try, but always i failed, so when i replied similarly she just snapped at me, " If u want to do it, then just do it! " She is fabulous teacher, patient and kind. It was hard.

I dropped out of school entirely for the rest of the year, and changed counsellor after counsellor. The school councillor suddenly turned cold and severe with me, no longer the friendly face i took comfort in, and i stopped seeing him. But outside visits to different doctors continued. That is the story of my first year, at lest the highlights, heh, the rest is rather mundane, but all in all i am behind by two years, having dropped out again the next year after two months. I then went to Saint Francis Methodist, where i stayed for 4 years and completed my secondary four this year. Well, there it is :), succiently, a part of my life's story thus far.

The above is a truthful account that i wrote a year or so back, having posted it on a support website meant for people suffering from depression or mental illnesses in singapore. Somehow i have never fully recovered from that day, and i always tire easily. Since then, i have changed schools several times, and each time, my attendance has been less than 10%. My psychiatrist has always given me blanket MCs to cover my absences and placate my teachers. My relationships with friends has always been strenuous at best, but i have always been a magnet for needy people, those who appear different or socially not accepted because of various difficulties. I guess my own experiences go a long way to understanding some of the problems they face.

Anyway, this is one of the reasons i am leaving Ngee Ann, mainly because i get exhausted after a few days in school, and need to rest for a day or two. Understandably, the school finds this hard to tolerate, and the work in class just piles up. Sorry that i have not told you guys until now, reason being that its hard to tell so much face to face, and also because i know how absurd or illogical it sounds that the reason for my not going to school is because im " tired ". Anyway, i felt that if we are to be closer to each other in the pcm, we need to be honest and willing to share, something that im glad to do.