wonderment

Horror of all horrors!

My arms are sore!

My legs are buckling!

My nose is itching!

My back is breaking!

And I hardly made a dent!

After lunching with Jack today, I rushed home as quick as my legs could carry me to begin on my mission: OPERATION THROW OUT!

But at the end of 4 hours of back breaking work, I only got as near as clearing my shoe rack and one shelf of costume jewellery.

This is not good. We still have an entire house! How will we clear 16 years of junk???

Stay tuned.

I wish to be an ostrich.

ABRACADABRA!

*pok!*

*ruthie turns into an ostrich in the Great Australian Dessert*

I came into work today and discovered my table looked different.

How different? I didn’t know. It just looked different, and I felt different.

Then I looked up and realised that someone has pulled the blinds back and I have an awesome view of the skies outside. I never realised the difference that this could make. I should have known. I’m the kind of girl that can’t have too much nature. In fact, I can’t do without some sun and sky regularly.

It’s just a little change, yet it makes a world of difference.

However, more than that, God reminded how much He loves me, even for who I am, and that just gives me strength to go on another day.

It’s been over a year now.

I don’t think too much of him anymore.

Neither do I watch the light and wonder, “Is he doing fine?”

My heart doesn’t ache each time I pass McDonald’s.

Best of all, I forgot his surname the other day. My sister had to remind me.

I wrote this post not to remember, but to finally close the chapter on a cruel April Fool’s joke.

To forget is not easy but to do so is freedom and release.

In this one year, I’ve clung onto the hurt but He gently pried it away.

My arms are empty without something to dwell on but I’m going to say …

“I’m willing to turn it over to You now.”

And walk on with You I shall.

No turning back.

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathise with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way - yet was without sin.

Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” (Heb 4:15-16)

Weaknesses come in all sorts of different ways. I’ve realised one thing. Sleeping late makes me less able to deal with the bombardment at work. Suddenly, things that I could handle yesterday are blown out of proportion today. Things I didn’t feel were important to me yesterday can make my mood hit an all time low of zero degrees today.

Sleep. I need to sleep properly. I’m as lethargic as a mealworm right now. At the rate I’m yawning, I could have caught quite a few flies already.

Besides the fatigue, I was confronted once again with a potential change to come. This isn’t the first time that its been “shared” to me, but hearing it again is making me jittery. If it DOES come to pass, it means that I will have to make certain changes to my life. As it is, I am very happy with how life is now and I don’t want it to change really. However, it seems that events have been happening to set the stage for it.

If this DOES happen, it will mean that a dream I have carefully stored away in cold storage can now be unwrapped and shown to the world - but it will be at the expense of a lot.

I am glad that I have had the opportunity to hear/read the above verse within this past 2 days. It’s as if God empathises …. but what am I talking about???He does! He knows exactly what I’m feeling!

Talking to a friend last night. We so totally agreed that the Word of God just appears at the right moment to the right need.

But if our wrongdoing only underlines and confirms God’s rightdoing, shouldn’t we be commended for helping out? Since our bad words don’t even make a dent in his good words, isn’t it wrong of God to back us to the wall and hold us to our word? These questions come up. he answer to such questions is no, a most emphatic No! How else would things ever get straightened out if God didn’t do the straightening?

It’s simply perverse to say, “If my lies serve to show off God’s truth all the more gloriously, why blame me? I’m doing God a favor.” Some people are actually trying to put such words in our mouths, claiming that we go around saying, “The more evil we do, the more good God does, so let’s just do it!” That’s pure slander, as I’m sure you’ll agree.

~ Paul argues for the cause of the gospel in Rome (Rom 3)

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Jeri brought a Vietnamese friend, Wan, to the studios today. She’s graduating from TTC in just a couple of weeks time and FEBI is hoping she can be part of the Vietnamese programming section.

We spent some time in the studio letting her do a bit of recording as well as explaining a bit about how gospel radio works. It’s real exciting to see someone get a vision for the ministry and want to serve.

Later, I got to listen to a little part of her salvation testimony and somehow God just has His right timing. Wan came to Christ 25 years ago … through her love for the piano. Apparently, one of Wan’s friends first brought her to church but that friend was hardly a good Christian testimony and even the pastor’s character left a lot to be desired. However, a deaconess in that church shepherded her and loved her and brought her to Christ. Now she’s in seminary and preparing to be a servant for Christ.

For my poor little one track mind, it sure didn’t occur to me that God could use anyone, good testimony or not. For a long while, I’ve wondered how I would bring people to Christ if my life wasn’t as perfect as I’d like it to be. I even chastised myself for not being as nice, as loving, as generous, as patient, as blah blah as I’d like to be. Come to think of it, it’s a real good excuse not to bring someone to church.

Wan has come one full circle now. Besides her friend, she was exposed to FEB’s Vietnamese broadcasts as a little girl and now she is preparing to go back into the same field that sowed those first seeds.

Wow. We’re all miserable sinners, worthy of a thousand deaths, but God makes our life stories rich and meaningful so that we can be really, a lighted city on a hill.

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Happy belated birthday John Tay!!

Hahah, John and I go a long way .. we’ve known each other since we were Primary One and for those 10 years in Fairfield, we were in the same class for 6 years! Wow, like he’s my longest friend besides those I know from church.
Read more about the party at his girlfriend Priscilla’s site.

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After the party, we headed to Taka to get my contact lenses and while we were wandering past a row of high-end boutiques, John and Pris suddenly stopped in their tracks, their jaws so open they swept the floor. Me and my usual blurness didn’t notice a thing and carried on walking away. It was only when Pris gripped me on the shoulder did I look back and guess who I saw??

It took me a while to recognise her but no mistaking it, there was Megawati Sukarnoputri!!

(For your information, that’s the ex-Indonesian President.) Without the coiffed hair and power suits that she usually wears to public functions, she looked like a normal tai tai out to do some shopping with her kakis. Her tiny entourage consisted of 3 middle aged (presumably) Indonesian ladies and a man that looked hardly like a bodyguard. Perhaps he’s the driver.

By the time I got over my shock of seeing her and actually whipping out my camera to take a photo,, she was too far away and her head was turned away from me. Nobody in the vicinity recognised her except us 3 and a couple of security guards.

The 3 of us stood there gaping even after she walked away from sight. I guess we couldn’t believe our eyes that a political character we knew so well from the TV was right there in the flesh, brushing past us without us even knowin it.

Be aware of who you walk past today. Who knows who you might bump into?

Sometimes you wonder if you’ve made the right choice.

Perhaps God didn’t want me to choose that choice.

Goodness knows how much time I’ve wasted wondering out the pros and cons of various alternatives I have.

On Sunday, a friend shared how she’d chose that morning to go to church instead of attending Qing Ming (annual Tomb-Sweeping Festival) with her non-believing family. It obviously exacerbated the uncomfortable tension at home but she came out of reverence and He rewarded her for that. A well-respected leader found her for a chat during the breakfast get-together and it seems that this older lady knew exactly this friend what this friend was going through. She’d been through it before, you see. My friend really needed that encouragement … You could see in her eyes that she was pretty near breaking point.

However, I thought, “What would be different if she had chosen to attend Qing Ming with her family then? Would God have rewarded her in a totally different way?”

As I walked back to the office swinging my takeaway lunch on one hand, I suddenly saw a vision of what might have happened if my friend had chosen to attend Qing Ming instead.

Sure there are the cons like her parents might think that church is actually pretty negotiable if they make the right amount of fuss, or her parents might force her to go even further like offer joss-sticks and the like …

But they also could see that she wants to honour them, that she was willing to forsake church to be with them. Although she may shie from doing the usual Buddhist rites, it would give her family an opportunity to see how a Christian behaves while she is in the world.

At the end of it all, I think sometimes there is no right or wrong choice. In fact, both choices may be very good. So often we cry out to God, “DADDDDDDDDDDDDDYYY, if You’re out there, please tell me EXACTLY what to do???”

I’ve done it so many times. I hate having too many choices in fact. The more I try to choose, the more frustrated I get. I’d rather have someone decide for me or have everything laid out in black and white which makes choosing a lot easier.

As long as we have chosen to follow Jesus, He can use us in all sorts of situations. Remember Rom 8:28, “And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to His purpose for them…”

The chief end of man is to glorify God forever … ~ The Westminster Confession

When I entered Mass Com at the urging of my mother - I wasn’t so sure whether it was what I really wanted to do. In second year, I was sure that I had made the wrong choice, but by graduation, I knew that God had unfolded His marvelous plan. Media was exactly where I should be.

God is bigger than we give Him credit for. Even if we do choose out of selfish motives or ignorance and begin regretting after the deal’s been closed, God can train you and set your character even in the “wrong circumstances”.

This is what I learnt today. Don’t give up on today just because it seems “wrong”. It can become “right” when we know who we serve.

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My heart burns for my uncle who buys books that give such a comprehensive overview of the history of the earth. I nearly laughed in the face of the one line in the book he showed me. It said, “It is amazing how we were created out of nothing.”

Every single word in that book alone vouched for the presence of a Deity but my uncle does not see it. He swears by everything that author says. And I am kicking myself in the butt because I dared not ask him if he believed that preposterous line in the book. It would be such an amazing way to talk about God in a non-threatening way.

My cousin, his son, lent me his National Geographic to read in the visitor’s lounge and while the photos blew me away, I wondered if he ever thought about how he came to be, about God.

My heart can burn a thousand degrees, but if I don’t step out and do something, it means nothing.

¹⁶Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers. ¹⁷Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. ¹⁸He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created. (James 1:16-1

If you’ve ever prayed for a gift from God; you do not need to manipulate or struggle with human strength to get it. You don’t have to twist God’s hand to get it. You don’t have to victimise yourself to get. You just have to trust and believe. You just have to wait.

God is your heavenly Father and like your earthly father, He wants to give you good and perfect gifts. Waiting and trusting and not settling for something less will make the receiving of that gift nothing short of miraculous.