Taking stock: 2010 and embarking 2011

It is this time of the year again when I must take stock of my previous year. I usually do this really towards the end but I foresee that I will not have a lot of time on 31 Dec and 1 Jan. So as usual, the normal practice, I prefer to review the past year first.

January
Work pace was still slow, and things were going as per normal. There were 4 newcomers joining in the cg (previously my cg, YGC2) but unfortunately, they disappeared thereafter, which was a pity. But the unit grew quite large as a result. I was beginning to get used to the work that I was doing... although I was still doing menial stuff and there wasn't much to do anyway, given that my AD was so busy. I was also called to be involved in the planning for the YG conference, which was a big thing for me, as I prayed that I could get involved in the planning of YG conference 2010. And that kickstarted some late nights at Mount Sophia... oh well... those were the days.

February
This month's highlight was the YG conference. The planning went through some scares, including venue changes and stuff. But it was a successful conference which ended in RP... for some reasons. But there was the thing about the networking sessions with all the old birds. David and the rest felt that it was as good as it could have been, hearing the war stories and testimonies from all the old birds. This month we also decided to embark on a fund raising effort as a unit, with two con-concurrent streams - bazaar and busking. Busking was the result of big mouth from me and Wanqi, when we jokingly suggested to Joyce that we should busk... and the two of us kena the arrow... but it was fun.

March
Joyce called me sometime this month to inform me that I will be leading a new cg, a small one, which comprises of me, Sharon, Justin and Nicole and eventually added Elvis. And I will be taking up Justin as a follow uppee (which I saw it coming but eventually never takes place). And I will be taking up the role of unit administrator. A lot of new roles and as usual, I went into my normal planning mode and started plotting how to lead this new cg. I started to think about how to disciple this new cg, given its special purpose, which ultimately I have to scrap. This is a cg, where I was the only so-called old bird around, with a sister being a new CT, and two new believers and one moving over to NS. It was meant to be challenging in the beginning but I was promised reinforcement. This month I also went back to NUS to attend the Mad Hatter event (unknown to me, one of my future cg members was one of the year 4, and I dun even know her existence until next month). It was a good time of catching up with my classmates, and listening to how my junior batch is like. Amusing to hear that my class' experience of losing the honors room key and some of our inner jokes have became some sort of a legend in the history dept.

April
The YG transitional groups came in. It was funny cos I was almost in the same position the previous year. We had Easter, and of course start to get involved in the jamming sessions with the PnW team, therefore also dropping the obvious hint that I will be involved soon. It was also a sickening month, when I got to know some sickening news about my brother, but if you know, you know. It is also this month that I start to think more deeply into certain theological issues, and I started to discover SKS, my favourite bookstore currently. April is also the month that we prepare to restructure, into the new cgs in anticipation of the new transferees.

May
The new structure pre transition was announced, and I began my pre-restructure communications with my cg, namely Elvis and Sharon only. It was easy as Justin and Nicole weren't with us at the moment, and our communications have to be done through a separate channel. Restructuring will also happen at the end of the month, with the beginning of the ID2010 Conference. I think that was the highlight for the month. I stepped up as a CL again to lead a cg, at the beginning of a conference. But this was met with different challenges along the way. But it was easy in the sense that I only had 2 pax to worry about. Oh yeah, did I mention that we caught a peeping tom at Nexus that month also...

June
What was I doing in June? We moved to MSC, after being chased out from HSR. It was a blessing that we are able to use MSC. And I noticed this particular pattern that my usher team seems to be 'pioneering' new lands and serving in new venues. We were also preparing for our mass recruitment, for new ushers to join in. I also helped out in the sound testing in MSC, having an impromptu PnW there, playing the song 'Shepherd'. It was almost more or less confirmed that I would be inducted into the PnW team. It was exciting.

July
Previously Benaiah challenged me to take on more sheep, and I responded to that challenge. So I was given two more new sheep, one in YG and one in NUS to take care of. Our busking also came to a fruition with the audition, which we did not pass in the end. But the experience taught us a lot on the provision of God and God's leadership in the whole entire project. The usher team also began to start thinking about doing something for mid-autumn. This month also saw my cg grew, as the transition people got moved over. New dynamics in the cg, and new relationships. It helps that their convo are mostly in the evening and therefore it created a chance for the cg to bond together. I also started my service as a stage guitarist...

August
The ESS saw Bei Ru's bf, Liang Hong, receiving Christ. First convert of the cg and we rejoiced! One more sheep to take care and that amounts to a total of five... and coupled with new responsibilities in the church as a guitarist etc, I felt like an AO in Hope Singapore. As for work, pace starts to intensify and my bosses seemed to have quite a good opinion of my work.

September
I believed in this month, we had our first unit GFG at Aloha Changi... talking about being a real man. The planning process was tough, particularly when me, Jan and Ellson have to meet up night after night to confirm what we want to do for the guys' side. The ushers' team mid-autumn project also came into fruition. We sold a lot of mooncakes, and we spent a lot of time in Rachel's place to make the mooncakes. It was a step forward for the usher teams, as this is our first time doing such a stuff. More to come I believe, but I will not be there, sadly.

October
This month, for work, was special, due to a training course for healthcare leaders which I was staffing beforehand. My work hours became quite special, and I sort of enjoyed the time sitting in those sessions and listening to those lectures. I felt that I learned a lot of things. After one of those sessions, I also found time to talk to my boss about Christianity and intellectual proof for Christianity. That was the first time I entered into such conversation with a non-believer and I had hoped that I had more time to talk to my boss. But then I really enjoyed that particular conversation and she mentioned that I was the first person she knows who reached the conclusion that I reached through the intellectual channel... oh well... The planning of the YG Camp also started. We went to Batam to recee for place and obviously, the places there were too expensive and considering all the logistic (I will die...)... The trip to Batam was also a chance for us to take a look at the spiritual landscape of the place and search for opportunities for church planting.

November
November... we had another GFG. It was funny, cos we learned that our back-up plan should never be more attractive than our first choice. We planned to go swimming but our back up plan, in case of rain, was to go eat dim sum. Turned out that dim sum was more attractive, and upon seeing the weather, we wavered and decided to proceed with our backup plan... The planning for the YG Camp began to move in motion and we started to gather all the people. This was the first time I was leading a camp planning, and I had to muster all the experience that I had beforehand... Doing logistic last time in matric helped, cos I decided that I will not repeat the mistakes the people made during that time. I decided that I will be the gatekeeper in the team and be the one who decides how to utilise the manpower, in the case when the programming team thinks that they can use anyone and everyone for any purpose and every purpose... which is a tendency to happen.

December
The plan for the YG Camp was beginning to take shape though I would have to think that we still have a long way to go. As usual, there was Christmas and there'll be New Year, and it was great to see the cg bonding together during the Christmas party... think we were the most happening group during the party at Yee Kan's place.

And so, that sort of sums up my whole entire 2010. Looking back, I think I have more or less accomplished my resolutions which I have set for the year. For 2010, there were three resolutions:

1. Continue to serve God in greater capacity. Currently I am taking on 3 sheep officially and supporting my CL in leading the cg. I hope that I am able to take on more pastoral role this year. And I think I have enough rest from CLship anyway. I also hope to take on more sheep in the process and play more part in doing male discipleship in the YG group, as well as the NUS group, if there is a need. I would also hope to serve in more ministries. I dun think I want to leave the ushering ministry yet, but I am also involved in logistic already. I hope that I can improve on my guitaring skill to be able to play on stage for praise and worship. 

2. Grow in skills and knowledge. My aim currently is to finish two new books every month and also to up my own guitaring skills. There are also other skills that I will hope to upgrade, such my theological knowledge, my reasoning skills, and my evangelism. Addition to that, I would hope to up my own professional knowledge in work so that I can become more useful in my workplace. 

3. The Christian in the workplace. I hope that I will be able to shine for God in my workplace. This includes being able to churn out good quality work on time, showing integrity in my work, and building strong and biblical relationships with my colleagues and bosses. I hope that I can achieve that this year, or at least see some result out of it. 

Simply put it, it's three growths, growth in capacity, growth in skill and knowledge and growth as a disciple. For the first one, it was a definite. Taking up the role as a CL, SDA, and new sheep, and entering into the worship ministry, taking on the role to plan for YG conference and YG Camp, a certain sign that I was growing in my capacity to serve God. This, coupled with my growth in theological knowledge and reasoning skills etc, had helped me in my own discipleship. My work in my workplace has also received good appraisal from my bosses. So I can say that this has been a fruitful year. The only question is: what is the next step?

Over the past year, I have also given some thoughts on what's next after MOH and YG? Two options remain, though I have not really explored more. One is to pursue further studies, preferably with Biola and the second is church planting in the future. Of course, the assumption for all these plans is that I remain as status quo and I can do what I want to do without other external considerations. Unfortunately this is not true. There are a few wildcards which I have to consider, like the health of my parents, my own marital status, my own finances etc. My marital status is the one which constantly bothers me as well. It's not that I am desperate to get into a relationship at the current moment, but I have to bear in mind that the girl whom I consider as life partner has to be comfortable with me pursuing these plans, which may or may not be the case.

Then how?

Only God can tell.

Those are possibly long term goals, and of course I want to ask what's next in 2011? As usual, I want to set some goals which are achievable and hopefully relates to my long term plans.

1. Continue to grow in capacity to serve. This requires myself to grow in my relationship with God, as above this level of service, I think I need God more than ever. Yet, I want to serve more. I had this weird conversation with the unit DMM the other day, when I told them that one pitfall for me is that I have the tendency to think I can take on everything. Joyce was laughing and commented that she really thought I can do it and wanted to test my limit by continually asking me to take charge of things. Actually, I have the bandwidth, but I sometimes decide to hold back a little to ensure I do not get burn out, which is becoming a risk. But I want to serve more.

2. Continue growing in my knowledge. I cannot stop at where I am now and I want to continue to build up my knowledge. For some reason, 2010 is the year when everyone starts thinking of me as an intellectual, or at least it seems. Perhaps that is one value-add that I can contribute to the community. I need to complete the books that I have been reading and read up more.

3. Grow my sheep. There are five now, there may be more in the future. I hope to grow my sheep, esp those who have been around for sometime, to take on more discipleship role. Let's see how it goes.

Since this is still early stage, these are the preliminary ones which I have thought out of. I am giving myself till after my trip to Chiang Mai to confirm my resolutions. Before my birthday of course. Call it a time of seriously seeking God.

Going is 2010 and coming is 2011. Sit tight for an exciting year ahead.

Happy New Year, my readers..

Belonging to God

Then the Pharisees went out and laid plans to trap him in his words. They sent their disciples to him along with the Herodians. “Teacher,” they said, “we know that you are a man of integrity and that you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. You aren’t swayed by others, because you pay no attention to who they are. Tell us then, what is your opinion? Is it right to pay the imperial tax[a] to Caesar or not?”
But Jesus, knowing their evil intent, said, “You hypocrites, why are you trying to trap me? Show me the coin used for paying the tax.” They brought him a denarius, 20 and he asked them, “Whose image is this? And whose inscription?”

“Caesar’s,” they replied.

Then he said to them, “So give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.”

Let's ask a follow-up question, we give back to Caesar what is Caesar's. The denarius coin bear the image of Caesar, and therefore it belongs to Caesar. Implicitly, Jesus said one thing, and would have asked one more question, "whose image is on you?"

We bear the image of God in ourselves, and this therefore means a lot of theological implications. For one, we belong to God and therefore we give to God what belongs to Him, which is us. And it also means that we dun suka suka desecrate this body of ours for it not only houses the Holy Spirit, but also in God's image, the body is the temple that belongs to God.

Chim...

The new year is approaching

The new year is approaching.

It means that the time to take stock of my life... past year is coming soon.

5 years on

It is hard to imagine that I have been on this journey for 5 years. As I think back, it was really funny. I remember blogging (and you can still find the post here in this blog) that the content of my blog will not change. And it changed, dramatically. I remember saying that I will remain true to some of my commitments, and those were the least of my priorities today.

What exactly has 5 years done to me, this I cannot fathom. It is like the marathon that I recently ran (again). I was excited and had a good run in the first few km. Then the distance became longer as I progressed on. Circumstances changed and my mindset changed too. Likewise, I cannot fathom what 5 years of walking in the faith has done in my heart. Things were not as rosy as one might imagine to be. To those who are given more, more will be expected. I would like to think of myself being someone who is being given more, first with financial support and good results, then with a good job with comfortable pay and flexible working hours. Given more, so that I can serve Him more...

But these are not exactly the things I would have thought myself doing right from the beginning. I might as well imagine myself doing my own stuff, while just doing the weekly routine thing - attend cg and service.

Not all these things I'm doing now, I expected to do from the start.

And yet 5 years have passed. I have changed cg many times, more so over the past two years. I have taken on many responsibilities in church, and have done a lot of things. I have seen fruits, both good and bad in my life and other people's lives. I have seen successes and failures in discipleship. I have suffered from disappointment, and also enjoyed the fellowship. I have even entertained thoughts of leaving the church but with each victory of that, I found no reasonable reason to do so,. I take care of sheep spiritually older than me and new believers as well. Over a period of 5 years, I accumulated biblical knowledge, perhaps much more than people who have been around longer. And yet, I still feel inadequate sometimes.

This 5 year journey is by no means an easy one, though I have hoped that it is the case. It is neither that difficult. Learning to trust is one important lesson that we need to learn. And this is one lesson that a lot of people fail to learn. Or they learn to abuse the lesson.

I just wonder how life would have been different if not for this 5 years. I wonder how would I be like? Perhaps still wandering out there without even discovering the purpose of life? Perhaps bumming around or maybe still working in the office because I have nothing better to do? Or maybe going out and party and in the meantime indulging in things that I should not be.

It is difficult to imagine and think about it, and I certainly would not want to go through that now.

5 years and it will continue to accumulate...

It is not easy

I was just thinking on the train, it is not easy being a leader.

Just as a case example. I am imagining myself leading a cg in uni, and now is the exam period. I have a cg member who wants to study for his exam rather than attend cg. I challenge him to come for cg. Now if my result is good, then he may say, "of course you can go for cg lah, your result so good". If my result sucks, he may say, "if I go, I will end up like you". Then if I teach him, "trust in God and He will bless your study", I am not sure if I am teaching the correct value and I will be leaving potential for backlash.

Not easy.

Useless inventions1. Non stick Cellotape
2. Solar Powered Flash Light
3. A black highlighter pen
4. Glow in the dark sunglasses
5. Inflatable Anchor
6. Smooth Sandpaper
7. Waterproof sponge
8. Waterproof Teabags
9. AC adapter for Solar powered calculators
10. Fireproof Matches
11. Fireproof Cigarettes
12. Battery powered Battery Charger
13. Seatbelts for Motorbikes
14. Hand powered Chainsaw
15. Inflatable Dartboard
16. Silent Alarm Clock
17. A Pedal powered wheelchair
18. Braille Drivers Manual
19. Double sided playing cards
20. Ejector seats for Helicopters

Philemon 6

NIV 1984: I pray that you may be active in sharing your faith, so that you will have a full understanding of every good thing we have in Christ.

NLT: And I am praying that you will put into action the generosity that comes from your faith as you understand and experience all the good things we have in Christ.

MSG: Every time your name comes up in my prayers, I say, "Oh, thank you, God!" I keep hearing of the love and faith you have for the Master Jesus, which brims over to other believers. And I keep praying that this faith we hold in common keeps showing up in the good things we do, and that people recognize Christ in all of it. Friend, you have no idea how good your love makes me feel, doubly so when I see your hospitality to fellow believers.

NET: I pray that the faith you share with us may deepen your understanding of every blessing  that belongs to you  in Christ.

NIV 2010: I pray that your partnership with us in the faith may be effective in deepening your understanding of every good thing we share for the sake of Christ.

It is interesting, especially after the revision of the NIV bible. We have always been using the NIV 1984 to encourage others to evangelise. However, scholarly research has shown that this was not Paul's intention when he wrote to Philemon. Instead, according to the NIV 2010 note, it seems to suggest that Paul is praying that Philemon may welcome Onesimus back into his household and not punish him. It seems to be encouraging Philemon that the partnership with Paul in the faith will bear fruits and help him to understand where Paul is coming from, that one of the 'every good thing' is the servant Onesimus.

In fact, other more recent translations have reinforced that idea, that the sharing of faith is a sharing within the believers, and not from believers to non-believers. The footnote from the NET states the difficulty of translating this verse and why it should be translated in the way:

Grk “that the fellowship of your faith might become effective in the knowledge of everything good that is in us in Christ.” There are numerous difficulties with the translation and interpretation of this verse: (1) What is the meaning of ἡ κοινωνία τῆς πίστεως σου (Jh koinwnia th" pistew" sou, “the fellowship of your faith”)? Several suggestions are noted: (a) taking κοινωνία as a reference to “monetary support” and τῆς πίστεως as a genitive of source, the phrase could refer to Philemon’s financial giving which he has done according to his faith; (b) taking κοινωνία as a reference to “sharing” or “communicating” and the genitive τῆς πίστεως as an objective genitive, then the meaning would be “sharing the faith” as a reference to evangelistic activity; (c) taking κοινωνία in a distributive sense referring to fellowship with other believers, and τῆς πίστεως as a reference to the common trust all Christians have in Jesus, then the meaning is Christian fellowship centered on faith in Jesus; (d) taking κοινωνία as a reference to “participation” and the genitive τῆς πίστεως as a reference to the thing participated in, the meaning would then be Philemon’s “participation in the faith”; (2) what is the meaning of ἐνεργής (energh"; Does it mean “active” or “effective”?) and ἐπιγνώσει (epignwsei; Does it refer to simply understanding? Or “experiencing” as well?); (3) what is the meaning of the phrase παντὸς ἀγαθοῦ (panto" agaqou)? and (4) what is the force of εἰς Χριστόν (ei" Criston)? It is difficult to arrive at an interpretation that deals adequately with all these questions, but given the fact that Paul stresses what Philemon has done for the brothers (cf. the γάρ [gar] in v. 7), it seems that his concern in v. 6 is on Philemon’s fellowship with other believers and how he has worked hard to refresh them. In this interpretation: (1) the phrase ἡ κοινωνία τῆς πίστεως σου is taken to refer to fellowship with other believers; (2) ἐνεργής is taken to mean “effective” (i.e., more effective) and ἐπιγνώσει involves both understanding and experience; (3) the phrase παντὸς ἀγαθοῦ refers to every spiritual blessing and (4) εἰς Χριστόν carries a locative idea meaning “in Christ.” The result is that Paul prays for Philemon that he will be equipped to encourage and love the saints more as he himself is brought to a place of deeper understanding of every spiritual blessing he has in Christ; out of the overflow of his own life, he will minister to others.

Nonetheless, I dun think the change in translation in one verse is going to negate anything that we have been teaching so far. I think so for several reasons: 1. evangelising to the non-believers is a biblical imperative, the most obvious comes from Matt 28:18-19, 2. if sharing our faith helps to refresh others and gain better understanding of the blessings we have, then surely sharing it with non-believers is going to be the same as well. I just think that this particular case study should encourage us to do more in-depth study and research into the word of God before we actually teach it to other people.

Reviewing what I have been taught in my early days, I realised that I need to revisit these verses and seriously think about whether the verses mean what we meant them to mean, and very often, I found that many of these teachings need to be revised and further thought through. This is by no means saying that these teachings are futile or we should stop teaching. Again, my point is that as believers, let's be serious in the study of the word and not take things out of its proper context.

Reflection on the soil

That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. ² Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the people stood on the shore. ³ Then he told them many things in parables, saying: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. ⁴ As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. ⁵ Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. ⁶ But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. ⁷ Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. ⁸ Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. ⁹ Whoever has ears, let them hear.”

...

Listen then to what the parable of the sower means: ¹⁹ When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in their heart. This is the seed sown along the path. ²⁰ The seed falling on rocky ground refers to someone who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. ²¹ But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. ²² The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful. ²³ But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.”

Many people have read the parable of the sower in the gospel a lot of time. I remember last year, my cg went through the OIA method and we 'tried' to apply the method to this parable... we failed miserably although by the grace of God, it was still a fruitful session. But after that session, I am constantly concerned about how people interpret this parable. From what I have heard, it seems that people always interpret this as a parable of our relationship with God. But nowhere in the passage does this allude to our relationship with God, rather it alludes to the conditions of our heart and how we receive the word of God (though this will affect our walk with God). It talks about how the four different kinds of heart conditions (liken to soil) and how our reception to God's word is directly affected by the conditions.

It is not my intention here to go deep into the four conditions but recently, I just heard something which helped me to see this passage differently from a fresh perspective. You see, we have always focused on the conditions of the soil, which is rightly so, since seeds cannot grow well in bad soil. However, we forgot to look at the kind of seed we plant into the soil. The passage states directly that the seed is the word of God. It assumes that we are planting the word of God into our heart. But is that so? I was at a talk, conducted by Prof Neo Boon Siong, who is an expert in dynamic governance and organisational change and he was talking about this example about a seed which he tried to grow. He mentioned that he tried planting seeds from cooked dates... which is not going to happen since the seeds are dead and they will never grow in the first place. The context behind this example is change. He shared that in order for change to occur, we need to plant the correct seed, and nothing will happen if we plant dead seeds.

In a similar fashion, we need to think about what are the seeds that we are planting in our hearts right now. The correct seed - the word of God, will grow to bear fruits, assuming it is planted on the right soil. The wrong seeds, like worldly wisdom contrary to the bible, can likewise grow in the right soil, but it saps up the nutrient and it grows the wrong kind of fruits.

Another point to note about the seeds, that is we need to know what it takes to grow the seed and know what we want to grow. The second question is obvious, you dun grow durian using mango seeds. If you want the fruits of the Holy Spirit, you grow the word of God in your heart. And if you want to see fruits, you have to work, in partnership with the Holy Spirit. The bible instructs us to keep in step with the Spirit. It is work, in the sense that we need to commit to ensure that the word bears fruits. It is never the case that we listen and see, and then expect something to happen out of nowhere.

And so, these are some reflections on the soil. The right seed, and the right soil with the right soul will bear the right fruit.

What was the problem before?Taxiing down the tarmac, the jetliner abruptly stopped, turned around and returned to the gate.

After an hour-long wait, it finally took off.

A concerned passenger asked the flight attendant, "What was the problem?"

"The pilot was bothered by a noise he heard in the engine," explained the Flight Attendant, "and it took us a while to find a new pilot."

I dun know how to title this post. There was this North Korean girl who recently shared her testimony in the Third Lasaunne Congress in Cape Town. Her parents escaped to China and received Christ there. Then, her father, after the mother passed away, started conducting bible studies and eventually went back to North Korea to spread the gospel of Christ, only to be caught by the North Korean government and never to be heard since. This girl eventually came to know Christ herself and now God began to place in her heart a burden for North Korea.

It was a heart ranching testimony, but I have decided not to post the link up to protect the girl. The video is not found in the official Lausanne website as well. This reminds me, really, that today, the things that the churches face, and all the individuals face are only so small compared to what this girl and some other believers out there have to go through. True that we are living in different situations and contexts, but to complain to God about the lack of Starbucks in the neighbourhood pale in comparison to the one who has to endure the loss of family and possible persecutions in their homeland just for their belief.

This is something for us to think about: are we denying ourselves and taking up our cross?