Know what you want, and what is yours.
Know your motives and deisires.
Counter them with Wisdom and the Word.
Worship and live.
We will have unfulfilled desires. Not all our desires are meant to be fulfilled.
Content thee.
You love me this much.
Friday, March 11, 2005
Wednesday, March 09, 2005
Tuesday, March 08, 2005
Move me gently.
I'm really tired and spent now. And that brings down my spiritual and physical immune system. Bitterness, lonliness and indignation. It will pass. Blessings.
We were talking about roses. Since Sarah received a beautiful bouquet today, from a secret admirer. He's still secret. Who would you like to receive flowers from.
Many people.
None I would want to receive.
I'm really tired and spent now. And that brings down my spiritual and physical immune system. Bitterness, lonliness and indignation. It will pass. Blessings.
We were talking about roses. Since Sarah received a beautiful bouquet today, from a secret admirer. He's still secret. Who would you like to receive flowers from.
Many people.
None I would want to receive.
Sunday, March 06, 2005
Sex and Sinners.
Dennis is embarking on a very interesting project about prostitution.
I just came back from W*I*S*H. Women's instruction and safety house. A place set up by united way church to aid women in the sex-trade industry. They give them make up, soap, food, health check ups, condoms, and most importantly, a place to feel safe and human. I watched a video filmed in the 90s and a woman (God knows where she is now), immigrant-because-son-needed-medical-care-but-got-hooked-on-crack-and-son-got-taken-away-to-foster-care type, was weeping into the camera.
Grateful for that one moment, when she felt human again.
When have we become so base that we cannot even grant ourselves humanity?
It was for a navigator workday. We re-painted the entire room, and gave muffins to a lady on the streets, who knows where that aching heart has been.
I bleed.
__________________________________________________________
*Edit 12.34 am*
When the response to "so where are you from?" unfolds into a tale of pentatuchal proportion, and depends on who you're talking to.
We want to start a TCK* club here at UBC.
We belong to those who don't.
It's funny, my experience as a TCK wasn't granted to me simply by nature of my geograpcial situation. Having been born and raised in Canada till I was 5, then moving to england for a year before settling in Singapore for the next 15 years hardly calls for such classification of my confusion. But really, it was given to me.
I've been holding on to a duel citizenship (Singapore-Canada, or Canada-Singapore) for the past 21 years, and the tacit knowledge that I belong by right of birth, in Canada has always been in my discourse. Purely political, ignoring the occasional slip of an accent in Singapore. Had I remained in Singapore, I wouldn't have thought twice about being Singaporean through and through. But just by being here, and engaging with Canada, has forced upon me the implications of my nature of birth.
In Grace Hospital, Windsor, Ontario.
I pay local fees in UBC, I am seen as 'Domestic'. Despite the painful evidence that I am NOT culturally local.
Wah lau, cheemology sia... taboleh ta nah ah...sisder... relac one corner...
eh?
The next step to my identification with third culture comes from the cold expulsion of my identity as Singaporean. On January 22 2006, I will cease to be a Singaporean, and will henceforth travel on a Canadian Passport. Granted, the choice was mine, and granted, I no longer identify with Singaporean either. But hell, I've sung the national anthem for 12 years, the pledge is written in me, in stone. I am just discovering Canada. It's like my third date with the guy, heck.. it's an arranged marriage.
So yeah, when I return to Canada for my 4th year, I will be, according to my passport, coming home. I do not share the same citizenship with my parents or sibling.
Holy crow.
Dennis is embarking on a very interesting project about prostitution.
I just came back from W*I*S*H. Women's instruction and safety house. A place set up by united way church to aid women in the sex-trade industry. They give them make up, soap, food, health check ups, condoms, and most importantly, a place to feel safe and human. I watched a video filmed in the 90s and a woman (God knows where she is now), immigrant-because-son-needed-medical-care-but-got-hooked-on-crack-and-son-got-taken-away-to-foster-care type, was weeping into the camera.
Grateful for that one moment, when she felt human again.
When have we become so base that we cannot even grant ourselves humanity?
It was for a navigator workday. We re-painted the entire room, and gave muffins to a lady on the streets, who knows where that aching heart has been.
I bleed.
__________________________________________________________
*Edit 12.34 am*
When the response to "so where are you from?" unfolds into a tale of pentatuchal proportion, and depends on who you're talking to.
We want to start a TCK* club here at UBC.
We belong to those who don't.
It's funny, my experience as a TCK wasn't granted to me simply by nature of my geograpcial situation. Having been born and raised in Canada till I was 5, then moving to england for a year before settling in Singapore for the next 15 years hardly calls for such classification of my confusion. But really, it was given to me.
I've been holding on to a duel citizenship (Singapore-Canada, or Canada-Singapore) for the past 21 years, and the tacit knowledge that I belong by right of birth, in Canada has always been in my discourse. Purely political, ignoring the occasional slip of an accent in Singapore. Had I remained in Singapore, I wouldn't have thought twice about being Singaporean through and through. But just by being here, and engaging with Canada, has forced upon me the implications of my nature of birth.
In Grace Hospital, Windsor, Ontario.
I pay local fees in UBC, I am seen as 'Domestic'. Despite the painful evidence that I am NOT culturally local.
Wah lau, cheemology sia... taboleh ta nah ah...sisder... relac one corner...
eh?
The next step to my identification with third culture comes from the cold expulsion of my identity as Singaporean. On January 22 2006, I will cease to be a Singaporean, and will henceforth travel on a Canadian Passport. Granted, the choice was mine, and granted, I no longer identify with Singaporean either. But hell, I've sung the national anthem for 12 years, the pledge is written in me, in stone. I am just discovering Canada. It's like my third date with the guy, heck.. it's an arranged marriage.
So yeah, when I return to Canada for my 4th year, I will be, according to my passport, coming home. I do not share the same citizenship with my parents or sibling.
Holy crow.
* TCK = Third Culture Kid.
Friday, March 04, 2005
Thursday, March 03, 2005
?
8�But you are not to be called �Rabbi,� for you have only one Master and you are all brothers. 9And do not call anyone on earth �father,� for you have one Father, and he is in heaven. 10Nor are you to be called �teacher,� for you have one Teacher, the Christ. 11The greatest among you will be your servant. 12For whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.
~Matt 23.
I don't understand then. Why church as we know it today?
Paul isn't Jesus.
8�But you are not to be called �Rabbi,� for you have only one Master and you are all brothers. 9And do not call anyone on earth �father,� for you have one Father, and he is in heaven. 10Nor are you to be called �teacher,� for you have one Teacher, the Christ. 11The greatest among you will be your servant. 12For whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.
~Matt 23.
I don't understand then. Why church as we know it today?
Paul isn't Jesus.
Wednesday, March 02, 2005
Monday, February 28, 2005
Love
1If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.
4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not selfseeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
8Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. 11When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. 12Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
13And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
I have decided that it is true. I like the navs not just because they believe in what I believe, but because they really do care, and they care about things that really matter. They love, and they love not because of what I am, but because of who God is.
El.
"Do you trust me?"
Why would the cosmic creator of the universe care if I trust Him or not?
More mind-boggling, why has He trusted me with His life, message and mission?
1If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.
4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not selfseeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
8Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. 11When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. 12Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
13And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
I have decided that it is true. I like the navs not just because they believe in what I believe, but because they really do care, and they care about things that really matter. They love, and they love not because of what I am, but because of who God is.
El.
"Do you trust me?"
Why would the cosmic creator of the universe care if I trust Him or not?
More mind-boggling, why has He trusted me with His life, message and mission?
