Week 52

I am proud of my humility. I want to shout to everyone that I am humble and that there must be some credit given to me, because I am able to concede I am so.

My pride has swelled and returned to getting in the way. I did put it to death, but now I have resurrected the old nature and given it a small steady diet to live on. My pride magnifies me and steals glory from God's grace. That all the good things received were hard-fought and taken by my own person instead of given out of lovingkindness from Him.

Sometimes when we give thanks for a meal, especially one we make ourselves, we may think: why are we thanking Him when we have made it? But we need to go back and think, Who managed the conditions for the crops to grow? Who permitted the farmer's industry to reap produce? Who caused the seeds and the creatures to grow?

Everything on this good earth reflect God's sovereignty and His providence. If we do not acknowledge Him or give thanks, we are ungrateful.

I am borrowing words from Leonard Ravenhill:  Isn't it amazing that God gives breath to a man who is going to blaspheme (curse) Him all day?

We are ungrateful most times. When we thank Him, it seems that those times are aberrations- exceptions.

*

I have not written because I have not had concrete reflections, or the time to represent them here. I have given a lot of time, mind and heart to my new relationship, which I do not regret in the least, but I have displaced my First Love with my new sweetheart in many ways and times. My relationship with my Father cannot be overtaken by any other, though it is easier/ convenient to relate someone who is corporeal and very near.

At work and all through life, a challenge is this: to be honourable men even when nobody sees.
With minimal supervision, we must still strive to be blameless and upright.


This world has so much stimulus! It recommends, and inflames us with lustful desires, envy, and unclean appetites. The world environment, culture is hostile. It does not permit holiness. TV, advertisements arouse our lust and whet our appetites for violence and other dark things.

What is my defense against sin, trials, temptations? Only the powerful Word of God.

In self-reflection, I am surprised at how I can hate a man in a matter of minutes! It is so easy and so natural to hate and to harm. Not even with weapons, but with harsh words. We need to put our hearts right and ask for Him to shed His love abroad in our hearts by His Holy Spirit. 

May we relate to the world with clean hands, and to God with pure hearts. 

*

I am not persistent in prayer. I presume that having addressed it once or twice, it has been taken up for action by Him and that I can ease off. It is recommended to pray without ceasing and I have not been able to keep at this.

I am pessimistic about people and the quality of their profession of faith, and the activities of Church communities. But I am so hopeful that those who belong to Christ and are assured in Christ will be secure in His love and grace. That their endeavours are sanctioned and helped by Him, and not vain human efforts to move people.

I hold on to this,

Titus 2

New International Version (NIV)

¹¹ For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people.¹² It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, ¹³ while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, ¹⁴ who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.

-What His grace offers and how it transforms us, and what we are all waiting expectantly for.


Next post will be a close, to record, what I have learnt, how I have been blessed, and who have helped me in all ways of my living this year in 2011.

Ravenhill said this: Are you wiser in God (now) than you were last year this time? Peter says we are to grow in the grace and  knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Where may I say that, yes I have!

The awkward merger between Soldier and Student

I returned to the use of my old Nokia phone today, because the new red one that cost me $65 was a useless blend of plastic and unknown substances that could not make audible phone calls.

It was good, because it was a reminder of where I was in August and it preserved the numbers of important friends from before NTU and during Army. I also made several short reflections in the saved messages, while I had not grown sensitive to the power of the Blackberry:

- I am looking for someone to share a life with, raise children and worship God together. 

- Why do we read the Old Testament? Because the LORD our God is the same yesterday, today(and forever). How He deals with men is always out of His righteous justice, love, mercy and kindness. 

-Flew over Greece, Lebanon, the mountains, Naples and other landforms, over oceans and all.
(while en-route to Rome, Italy)

And today, I met a new person who was neither a commando nor a commander, but a private soldier and he was so arrogant and severely deficient in the department of respect; for even the seasoned Warrant Officers and the Officers. I suspect S3 picked on him because of his irreverential posture.

My thoughts were these: is there a need to compete egos with proud people? What is the basis of his constructed ego? Is it competence, popularity or public affirmation? 

Pride or the lack of humility is mostly ignorance. One does not know his proper place relative to his seniors, his betters, and his elders and while having a false view of himself, behaves as if the rest are beneath him.

We are a generation who lack respect for those who are our elders, our peers and those who are placed socially lower than us.

My baptism was not spectacular nor especially special. It was a necessary obedience. But it was significant, and according to my mother, it was "irreversible" and that I could not offer incense to my grandparents later in time. I believe she had more to say and mourn about, but they will come later, when she can find the words to say.

Like Jimmy says, sometimes non-believers have a better sense of how significant something like this is. I was not expecting a party or a swarm of well-wishers. But I was glad to have my OCS buddy Ahbi, my spiritual brother Jeremy Loh and my elder brothers in faith, Tze Liang and Daniel Lim come to the service.

I'm really glad Jeremy took a good HD video, that I could re-visit in later years to see the amazing growth in Christ since Dec 2011 and give thanks appropriately. Tze Liang and Daniel were good Christian brothers when I was in the BB that showed me the amount of patience, kindness and gentleness a man can have, learning in the pattern of Christ.

My aunt and cousins and my sisters came as well. It was a good time to be with family, and we had many laughs after at the Soup Spoon, especially now that we were more grown up and understood humour better. We talked about forming committees in the family for feasts, and taking over the decision making for birthdays and mothers' day. I think these days will come soon. Leticia and co. helped me pick out cards that I would use to write to friends.

I really appreciate the good gifts that add to my Christian library and how my cell mates came to the later service out of their usual schedule. I am glad we may fellowship and grow together. It was a good day and I realized that it was the proper timing and proper place to be baptized. To wait no more, but be baptized!

In so many ways, I do not expect God to help me. And this way, I forget He cares, and undermines His deep love for me. There is a need to remember He loves us and that we are now worthy because He has loved us. The Lord is my first love and I must return to Him, and remain with Him.

Lastly, I was also dreaming of the disconnected future and succumbed to imagining events that were not due for a long time. Today, I could almost hear the Lord say, "these things I am preparing for you. You must not think about them before time".

I need to learn to obey and ask for His help in so many ways. Although many times I am so unwilling to pray, I know enough that so many (all) things are subject to Him and I must recognize and plead for His grace. I also know that prayer has the power to bring about change.
So we must pray.

Stole some time to write before I would get ready to leave the house and go for part 2 of the wedding at Four Seasons Hotel's Ballroom.

This is the most happening week in a long time - reporting back to the army, a wedding and my baptism make up one weekend. I do not have time to see the people I love, and for long also because I have been claimed by so many engagements.

I still have to adapt to this foreign pace of things and spend time with the parents, with my brothers in the faith and with Agnes. It does not help that my phone is going to become a dummy phone with no internet capabilities. On that the day in Singtel when I settled for a Blackberry Bold with camera, I suspected I'd feel the backlash on some day. That day is here.

I came across the tagline multiple times, "live fast, die young".
It sounds cool, detached and uninterested. However it is a terrible carelessness and captures the irresponsible living of people who use this as their maxim.

Often, they live to please their own persons and they leave out God. Our lives are not lived for ourselves and our individual pleasures. We live with others, and we live lives before God. We are accountable for how we have lived, why we have lived and if we have known Him and walked in His ways.

Daily, I need to reconfigure my entire person - Who to hope in and what to hope for? Only good things or to continue in Him?

"Am I doing well" - I find it hard to answer this question. There are so many parts of me that are inconsistent and to correctly represent where I am in all these parts is difficult. I am teetering on the edge of sickness, I am hardly mentally sharp and I am not as in shape as I would like.
I am vulnerable to weakness, temptation of all forms and mild depression. But in my living, I have His grace with gives me the ability to go on, because His grace enables me to stand and stand against all these parts that bog me down.

I will do better, because He is still at work to make me like Him. Although it takes time to get to completion or anywhere near.

On the Cusp of Soldierhood Again

I am on the other side of time, looking back on the past November and it is clearer that God is good and closely present in all parts of my life.

I am returning back to service, and comparing with when I was leaving, I'm returning to the army so much better off! I did not imagine that I would return with someone special in my heart and that I would do so much better in His grace.

Ikea Wednesday was a simple and sweet outing, and it was unexpected that I actually ended up doing the bulk of the buying. Things that were good and cheap could not be let off! Wednesday was a good food day, and I managed to eat a great deal. There were so much good food that had to be savoured, and at her place, we were blessed with a steamboat dinner. It was time well spent, and with a very excellent group of people, and of course, a single delightful person.

Meeting her parents was not easy, but very important. We are not in a secret relationship, and we need to be accountable to those that love us. It was necessary for me to meet with her father and share with him my faith and my life. It is good to be in a proper, official relationship where her parents are involved and they approve. I am not to enter into a close relationship with someone's daughter without letting him know. But now, we have their parents praying for us, and looking out for us. This is a good and safe way to go.

I think He brought us together certainly not only for our individual joy and pleasures. We are to grow in love and faith, and edify others. We are members of the body of Christ, and we are not the only members.

We are to come together and honour God, and we should seek that God will continue to confirm that this is His will that we join together not casually, but with stronger and stronger commitment to each other. There is a need to be careful, because we see that it can be exceedingly good if we obey Him.

There is timely goodness in store for both of us.


After the exams, a man needs to take a good look at himself. We must be capable of reflection and self-examination. Paying attention and writing notes helped seal the lessons into memory, and revisiting them helped build more onto the roots for recall.

I must not squander free periods, recess week and the weekends. There are a few good work habits that must be cultivated. Books not read, lessons placed aside and hasty revision instead of gradual increment of knowledge were the methods I resorted do this time. They likely will not reap good rewards. Thankfully the small measure of consistent class-attending helped. I will still be able to keep the head above the water.

I understood that Pride coerces me to act hastily, in a showy kind of way. At my last paper, I finished quickly and was able to astound others by leaving the exam venue with a swagger. Modern contemporaries call it 'like a boss'. While I was pleased that I did well, it was illuminating to understand more of my own proud person, and how it is so deeply a part of me - I must do well, and I must have others see. 


We need to grow in our relationship with our Father. I am not just a child asking my Father for gifts on His lap; I am to grow into a son and a man who obeys His Father and pleases Him.

In praying: If I had not spoken to Him regularly, it will be awkward for me to address Him, to find the words to say to Him.

There is a lack of effective Christian men in the church. What does God do when this happens?
He raises men up. Hopefully, we are counted among those He is calling and preparing for His use.

In all, this year and semester has been truly and thoroughly blessed, in ways I did not expect. I do not see what is ahead, but if I follow Him, I have security. Even if life lived is hard and unpleasant.

I belong to Christ, I am to be more and more His. God's grace given to us has us live and respond differently, passionately and reverentially to Him. We must not resist Him in any way.