Bite-Size Post #7

Ahh. Term is over. Will have one more supervision in 10 minutes but that's the end of it really.

It's been rather fast how my first term has gone by. Bit strange too having met quite a few people and now not seeing them for the next six weeks.

Anyways, the last week or so was good. Points of interest: sleep, went to London for the weekend and stuffed myself full of Chinese food - can't wait to get back and eat good food though, had a Christmas formal, got taken to Caffe Nero and bought drinks by our history supervisor for our final history supervision of the term - what a way to curry favour with us students, spent my last week working after having procrastinated the whole of the first week, watched some House, can't wait for Heroes finale, going to Notts tomorrow to play some bball, going on a Houseparty with my college CU from Sunday to Tuesday, slept some more.

Mmm. That's about it actually. Cambridge is in fact a very boring place in terms of entertainment -that's why you need a laptop and a good internet connection. Otherwise, it's really just a place for you to study.

Anyways, this will be likely updated for the last time before I fly home on the 10th of December. Until then, this is all I really have to say.

Bite-Size Post #6

It's been a long while.

I'm on the final stretch. Term's over in 2 weeks time.

Weather's gone down to below 0 over the past few nights. And it's stayed roughly below 5 in the daytime. Although it's starting to get a bit warmer again. Freak cold spell i suppose. But it's made for some very nice lie-ins. Which means that I have been quite well rested for the past 2 nights. God answered my prayer in this respect in quite dramatic fashion. Lol.

There was a Malaysian Food Feast tonight. I am stuffed. Extremely stuffed. Think 8 course wedding dinners, where you feel sick afterwards. Food was mixed. There was quite a lot of good stuff overall though. Although I'm still itching to get some proper Malaysian food back home.

Yesterday (Friday) was hilarious. They were conducting some fire alarm testing and it was meant to begin at 9.30 and be over by 1.30. Started quite late
around 10 something, as I was leaving at around 10.45 to hand in some work before walking over to lectures. Anyways, I get back at 1, thinking that they must have conducted the testing already because it was so quiet.

I hope too much really. It went off around 1.30, and there I though ahh they're running a bit late with the testing aren't they? Then it went off again at 2 something. Correction: It went off several times for the next hour and a half. Annoying.

This wasn't the worst of it. Another fire alarm in another block kept going off up to 5.45, which happened to be in the middle of my supervision. My supervisor could only laugh it off, because he had to abandon the previous supervision after repeated attempts to talk were interrupted by the blaring alarm. Thankfully, that was the last we heard of it.

Oh, and the funny part. The objective of the test was to approve the system as functional. I don't think they passed.

That's all.

Bite-Size Post #5

This really is a bite size post.

It's been almost 2 weeks since the last post. I got another free chocolate bar. I'm not sure whether that's because I'm extremely lucky, or I just buy so many the probability tips in my favour. In my defense, I believe I've only bought 5 chocolate bars over the last 2 weeks. And 1 free bar.

I've been working my bum off the last few days to get ahead of my workpile. It's coming along successfully, and I do believe that after this weekend (and probably a few days), I just might be a bit too free.

There's been a meningitis outbreak in my college. Well outbreak's exaggerating it. There's one confirmed case and the other's still undergoing lab analysis. And meningitis isn't overly contagious apparently so the chances of two or more cases is rare. In any case, that was surely reassuring, because just as the cases were being announced, I fell sick.

In retrospect it might have been a few bad nights of sleep because I certainly feel better now. But feeling a bit paranoid, I went online to check some self-diagnosing techniques. I only qualified for 3 of 7 symptoms, all of which are a result of sleep deprivation and the feeling of which I'm familiar with. (it was headache, though not severe, a slight temperature, but not overly high, and sleepiness - whether you can call it severe is another matter for discussion) And there was also a test for nuchal rigidity, or neck stiffness, which is a common symptom. And I was sitting on my chair, checking that I could touch my knee with my forehead/kiss my knee.

Yes people, it does sound quite paranoid. But you can't be too careful. And I was praying quite hard that I wouldn't fall sick this term. So even if it was a case, God pulled me through.

Well, that's all. I should head to bed before the party crowd gets back.

Oh and I should also add that Passion finally got the spelling of Kuala Lumpur right. I think they deserve an applause for that :p

Bite-Size Post #4

That title is sort of a lie. I have one story from today. And I have another thing I want to share. Story first:

 

Profiting from faulty machinery. So tonight, after the rugby finals, I decided to get some chocolate. Went to the candy machine, and placed in a 1 pound coin. I think it's a fake to be honest, because it's the third time the machines will not accept it. Anyways, I place in the requisite 45p, and select a Galaxy Caramel. Before realising there's this bright red light next to it. Oh rats. Looking at the text, telling me to please wait, I figured it was all out. True enough, I was told to make another selection. I mused at the selection for a bit and decided to go for Maltesers. It said please wait. I thought: This has never happened to me before. It's usually quite fast. Don't tell me they're all out, and the red light didn't come on... But then I hear the packet drop. After 10 seconds. Mmm, that was long. Then as I'm bending down, I hear another packet drop. And true enough, there are two packets lying there. Talk about luck.

 

And now the thing I want to share. People who like the Harry Potter books, JK Rowling has just confirmed Dumbledore is gay. (For story, click here.) Now this probably answers the suspicions of several people. And corroborates certain Christian protests against the book. But the question is: is there any place for this in literature?

We live in an increasingly tolerant world. Political correctness has become the norm. But this is the result of relativism. Truth has been cast aside. Rowling claims that she's trying to promote tolerance in the book. So for the first time, while I do say that the Harry Potter books have good plot and stuff, they are full of nonsense values. (Although I do think that kids reading it would have much stuff to think about regarding truth and relativism) And this last revelation is just a bit too much.

 

Homosexuality is wrong. It is a sin, because it is contrary to the nature of God and His designs for creation. It epitomises the fallen nature of man. And in this increasingly tolerant world, we can only do one thing: speak out against it. Now Cambridge is an extremely liberal university (and besides I have my suspicions about the people who are gay in my college), but the Christian mandate is to say the truth. And the truth is homosexuality is wrong and therefore we should not tolerate such behaviour. But I have to be careful with my words. Our intolerance is only against the behaviour. Yet we should equally love the person. Because we might not be in that distinct situation (I assume, not that I suspect anyone to be), but we are in one same general situation. We are all subject to the wrath of God. And the only thing that separates Christians, is that God has chosen to lavish His mercy and grace on us, and through Christ we are saved.

 

We have a whole bunch of arguments today saying that homosexuality is natural, e.t.c. Well sin is natural really. So scientific evidence for one thing does not exclude our views. And therefore, is the power of God sufficient to overcome such inborn behaviour?

 

Definitely.

Bite-Size Post #3

Ahh. The procrastinator is back. Here's a quick overview of my life so far.

The work's finally piled in. Was waiting for that. I have 3 supervisions a week with a similar number of assignments due every week. Two of which are essays and 1 which tends to be math related, so that means a whole load of reading and writing. History is definitely not a fun thing to do, what with the volume of reading.

We had a fire drill the other day. It was hilarious. I had got up to start on my essay and had poured myself a bowl of cereal. Feeling rather comfortable and geared to start work, two spoonfuls later, the alarm goes off. I'm there thinking: Is that the fire alarm? Followed by: Which fool set it off so early?

So anyways I proceed out of my room towards the main court, with a whole bunch of other people who were mostly rudely awakened and barely had time to pull on enough clothing, as it was quite a cold morning. One guy came out in only his boxers with a sleeping bag wrapped around himself - I think he was someone staying over - either that or he was very likely trying to make a statement. Of course, some (including me) had taken the time to put on long pants and wear our shoes and grab a jacket, although I geniusly left my door wide open, so in fact anyone cld have walked in and nick my stuff.

However, people were taking quite long, as most were asleep - this is about 7.45 in the morning. And so now we have to do the fire drill another morning, because they weren't satisfied. It's probably going to be tomorrow, on a Saturday morning, when we would love to sleep in.

On the spiritual front, the Christian Union here at my college is pretty strong, and at the moment I'm also still church hunting. There is a curse associated with sound mixing, namely that you get a bit picky about worship. Which is alright in Cambridge though, because a lot of the churches are very much solid on truth teaching, possibly a result of the intellectual community here. So all the sermons here have been good, the worship experiences a mixed bag. (with only two balls in it i might add since i've only been to two different churches)

Anyways, that's all I can think about at the moment. I'll try to be more committed to this in the future.

Bite-Size Post #2

So what has happened in the last two days?

Lectures have started. It's been quite a mixed affair. After all, half the lecturers aren't as interested in lecturing as they are in their own academic study. But that's part of their whole contract so they have to do stuff. But generally, some have been interesting, some have been dead boring.

There was a pub crawl on the Thursday night - which essentially involves going from one bar to another. Irony was 8/9 of the Econs freshers do not drink. As in drink towards minimal tipsiness. Bigger irony was half the second years don't really drink either. Haha. So we ended up with sore throats trying to talk over the sheer volume of the crowd.

Had football today. Quite fun in a way eventhough I felt quite off the pace. In part due to the extremely unfit summer I had. In part due to "freshers' flu" as they call it, where every fresher gets sick in the first term, whether due to the hectic schedule or the living adjustments or the fact that everyone brings their diseases from home and spread them around.

There was a party tonight, or a 'bop' in Cambridge terms. Oh yeah. Forgot to mention there are a whole load of fancy dress parties. So I suppose I have it a bit tough cos ppl bring loads of stuff from home whereas I have to maximise my 25 kg. There was a football social before that, although that was quite a drunken mess. Which probably explained why half of the team didn't bother attending, although it was compulsory for the freshers. Both aren't really my kind of thing, but it's one of the better opportunities to meet people from outside your course.

Anyways, the weekend is tomorrow. And I have some studying to do. (And probably go meet up with the Malaysians or something) So this is it.

Bite-Size Post #1

These bite size posts are for those who want to know how my day is:

Woke up at 8 something and went for an introductory lecture which was kinda dull. I think everyone now has mentioned something about seeking counselling when we encounter difficulties. Almost like the mortality rate is through the roof or something.

Went punting down the River Cam. That was quite interesting. Not as easy as it seems.

Dropped by the Freshers' Fayre. That's how they spell it. Got quite a bit of goodies and overall entertaining.

Oh. Should probably mention the fire alarm too. Some fresher used his toaster in his room and the smoke set off the alarms. A friend living on the same floor tells me it was enough smoke to cover the whole floor. Genius really. He apparently got into a lot of trouble. Although to be honest, I thought I set off the alarm. Cos I went to see the maintaenance department about my room, and as I stepped closer to the door the alarm went off, and for a while I was wondering whether it was a proximity alarm.

Had quite a satisying BBQ dinner too. Then watched some CL football.

So there ends my pretty enjoyable day.

Lectures start tomorrow. Is that good or bad? Not sure myself either.

#79: Remedy

A-ha. At long last.

I know it comes out on the 25th. But that never stopped piracy. And who's to say that it wasn't the band themselves who started distributing it all over the internet. Although, I later found out after having downloaded it over night that a site is giving a free preview of the CD. So perhaps the copy I have is possibly a recording of that. I doubt anyone would go to that sort of trouble

So, here's my review of Remedy by the David Crowder*Band. (in case you haven't figured out at this point, they are my favourite worship band)

There are only 10 songs on the CD. Shock and horror. Especially when their previous album, A Collision, was 21 tracks long. Although 14 of them are actual songs in themselves. Let me post a list of the songs to help you understand better:

1. The Glory Of It All
2. Can You Feel It
3. Everything Glorious
4. ...neverending...
5. Never Let Go
6. O For A Thousand Tongues To Sing
7. Rain Down
8. We Won't Be Quiet
9. Remedy
10. Surely We Can Change

Regardless, I still quite floored by it. Although this was also a progression. Let me explain. Everything Glorious, I heard first on the Passion 06 CD, and then they released it early in June I believe. So that got through my system. The Glory of It All was performed live at Passion 07 to which I went, and Passion released a live version. So that got through my system. Then I heard ...neverending... over YouTube. And then I found out about a freebie download of Can You Feel It.

However there was one song in particular which was quite different. Crowder rearranges hymns amazingly in my opinion. And at Passion he played his new song, O For A Thousand Tongues To Sing. And Passion had a live stream. Which cut short halfway through the Crowder song. So I'm not satisfied there. And then I realised I should have recorded the video, but the window was gone. And no one had really caught on to the song and recorded it as well.

And so I wait. And wait. Until yesterday, when worshiptogether.com released a preview of the song, and Remedy as well. I can't get over those two songs yet.

But that's for the review.

So how's the album generally?

Fantastic. Inspiring collection of songs on love, on grace, on glory, on redemption and the position that puts us in and the mandate we have.

The rest of the post is a specific review so read on if you want to be bored by me (or inspired when you listen to the album) - either way works.

Alright. How's the album specifically? This is going to be like one of those internet reviews drawn out longer. Much much longer.

The Glory Of It All on the album doesn't disappoint. The increased sonic clarity as compared to the live recording gives it a more reverent tone and you can hear the layers built beautifully as the song hits its crescendo. Makes you want a violin *cough*ShanBerg*cough* in worship services. It hits my list of favourites because it paints quite a vivid picture of the glory of God from start to finish and the story of redemption. Oh the glory of it all is you came here for the rescue of us all that we may live for the glory of it all.

Can You Feel It is well plain catchy. You can only classify it as a techno track. The loops and synths are quite awesome actually. But I wouldn't let the music distract you from the lyrics, which basically setup the rest of the album. It beggars the question whether you can feel the presence of God. And that we can't comprehend that God is there, is everywhere. But as the music dies off with that question, it builds up into the idea that regardless, we know and we BELIEVE that our God is here with us. And it is this belief, this idea of faith that gives us the platform to do much for God.

So we then head into Everything Glorious. This one I have to thank Tim for bringing my attention to it on the Passion 06 CD. I still remember him saying at camp "I think this song is going to be a hit." Good call Tim. This is yet another song about the glory of God, and how that is reflected in all God creates. He makes everything glorious, and the catch line here is: And I am Yours.

Then we head into ...neverending... Haha. Now this is one of two fun songs on the CD. He plays this with a Guitar Hero controller. But past the video game like connotations of the music, there is an interesting message here. It's probably the spiritual successor to Foreverandever etc. on A Collision. It talks about our eternal God and then goes on to say how He is in us, and that this makes all the difference, this changes everything and makes our whole existence worth something.

The next song is quite an abrupt change of tone. It's an especially poignant song. It is set within the context of a time of personal troubles, a time of spiritual turmoil and darkness, "when hope has flown", it clings to the promise that God is known to be ever faithful, ever true, and he'll never let go. And if we cling to that promise, we will begin to comprehend the overflowing power of the love of God, to drive out our despair. Joy and pain, sun and rain, you're the same, you never let go pretty much sums up the song as it draws to a close.

Now to my favourite of the whole album. O For A Thousand Tongues To Sing. I would almost think it'd suffice to post the lyrics of this song and let them explain themselves. But the lyrics are long. After all it's a hymn WITH an added chorus and bridge. So I won't do that. Why do I love this song? It's one of those rare blends of amazing lyrics and instrumentation. It's a song of joy over the love of Jesus and the glory of redemption which builts into a response to the "one great love, Jesus" - So come on and sing out let our anthem grow loud, there is one great love, Jesus. And the bridge hits a note on what it's all about. There are so few words that never grow old, Jesus. It's a foretelling of what heaven will be like, where this one word will never grow old. Can't really describe the music here so just go to http://www.worshiptogether.com/ and click on the newsongjukebox in the corner to hear it.

Rain Down. Haha. I first heard this on the All I Can Say album. It piqued my interest actually. Let me post the lyrics and I'll explain why:
Holy is the Lord, Holy is the Lord
Holy is the Lord, Holy is the Lord

Rain down your love on us, rain down your love
Rain down your grace and cover me
Rain down your love on us, rain down your peace
Pretty short huh. What caught my attention the most was the progression. It's a song of prayer. It's extremely rockish on both cuts, with added electronic flair on the new album, but it's essentially a prayer. And here's how I finally realised it linked. Our God is a holy God, and His holiness means we deserve his wrath, but we've been saved by His redemptive work through Jesus. So what we have here is as we try to be holy as God is holy, we hit a problem, the problem of our 'flesh'. And thus the plea that God rains down his love, his grace and his peace on us. Strange outro on the song though.

Next song. We Won't Be Quiet. Kind of like We Win on A Collision. It's one of those anthem like songs and it's the second of two "fun songs" on the CD. The title's pretty much self explanatory, that we won't be quiet about what Jesus has done for us. However, upon further reflection, is this always the case?

And now the jewel of the CD, the self-labelled Remedy. This song is amazing and it completes the list of my three favourite songs. I should just post what i believe the lyrics are.

Here we are, here we are/The broken and used/Mistreated, abused/Here we are
Here you are, here you are/The beautiful one who came like the Son/Here you are

So we lift up our voices and open our hands/To cling to a love we can't comprehend/Lift up your voices and lift up your hands/To sing of the love that has freed us from sin

He is the one who has saved us/He is the one who embraced us/He is the one who has come and is coming again/He is the remedy

Here we are, here we are/Bandaged and bruised, awaiting a cure/Here we are
Here you are, here you are/Our beautiful King bringing relief/Here you are with us

So we lift up our voices and open our hands/Let go of the things that have kept us from Him

He is the one who has saved us/He is the one who forgave us/He is the one who has come and is coming again/He is the remedy

Oh and I can't comprehend/I can't take it all in/Nor will understand/Such perfect love/Oh the broken and beat/The wounded and weak/Come fall at his feet/He is the remedy/He is the remedy

He is the one who has saved us/He is the one who forgave us/He is the one who has come and is coming again/He is the remedy/He is the remedy/He is the remedyHe is the remedy/So sing, sing/You're the one who has saved us/You are the one who forgave us/You are the one who has come and is coming again/You are the one who has come and you're coming again/You are the one who has come and is coming again/To make it alright/To make it alright/You're the remedy/You're in us/You're the remedy/You're in us

Let us be the remedy

Enough said there.

Final track is Surely We Can Change. Kind of like Stars on Illuminate but even more quieter, and more violin, less audible acoustic strumming. It talks about our mandate. That we seldom get into action despite all we've experience from God. The whole album has been about love and glory and grace and things like that, a stunning story of redemption, and yet we just never know what to do with such love - And the problem it seems is with you and me not the love who came to repair everything
- and that we must choose what our hands will do especially in our world today which is full of love and hatred. And it calls us: where there is pain let us bring grace, where there is suffering bring serenity, for those afraid let us be brave, where there is misery let us bring them relief. And there's an amazing line: And surely we can change, surely we can change something. It's not a question but a statement. That we have God on our side to go out and do something in this world.

And the whole album goes out on a tense note: The whole world's about to change... The funny thing, or maybe not, was that reading this line on a blog post of his, I thought: Isn't this a premature statement? But listening through the whole collection, if this message will not inspire us, then what will? The whole world will change, if only we realise what we have on our side.

Inspiring collection of music. I know this has been a huge gush. Ah well. I also realised that he uses the word comprehend quite a bit. But fairly accurate term as we try to take the vastness of it all in.

#78: Knowledge vs. wisdom

Well. It's been quite a while since I've done a sermon-like post.

The concept which I wish to consider today is the difference between knowledge and wisdom.

Or simply (succintly - another word to improve your vocab) put, what's right isn't always wise.

To illustrate my point, let me use two examples that are close to my heart. The first is what we call a Pyrrhic victory. The story behind the term is an interesting one. It originates from the story of King Pyrrhus and his invasion of Rome. The Greek and Roman armies were evenly match but Pyrrhus appeared to possess better troops, better tactics and a wealth of battle experience. Yet after several days of fighting, the outcome wasn't any clearer.

Finally, the Greek army managed to prevail and drove back the Romans. Yet, Pyrrhus was now in an incredibly weak position. Far from home and without reinforcements, the enemy may had lost the battle but were still in the stronger position. Pyrrhus said "One more such victory and I am lost". He never conquered Rome.

The lesson of the story here is that some battles are won at too great a cost. This is often the case in relationships with other people. You know you are dead right, and maybe the person eventually does too. But pride stops us from stopping when we should. And so we end up forsaking the relationship for the victory as we argue and slam the other person's opinions. It was right, but it wasn't wise. Treasure the relationship, not your pride. If the other person is wrong, gently correct, never assuming yourself as a superior example, but as a friend to guide.

The second illustration I feel applies to exemplary leadership. And this is ever more evident in the context of the church today. It can be summed up in one key bible verse:

"Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up." 1 Corinthians 8:1.

This verse was written in the context of eating food sacrificed to idols. Although all foods were proclaimed clean, for the conscience of the weak believer, the mature wise believer should refrain from such foods as to not condemn their weak consciences. The bible calls us to refrain from becoming a "stumbling block" to other believers.

And this applies across every facet of leadership. From your relationships to your actions, it is important that none become a stumbling block to others. Knowledge in its context here can be interpreted as a truth without love. And so I present wisdom as its extension, a truth practiced in love. The wise man is known by God, because he loves God. This is seen in verse 2. And to be known by God in this context is something not to be taken lightly!

This gives us the foundation to move from knowledge to wisdom. And as the wise man loves God, this love overflows onto others. And this love being rooted and established in God, who is Truth, the embodiment of all that is Right, thus surpasses knowledge. It's really the difference between "head knowledge" and "heart knowledge". The first precludes love, the second is borned out of love for God.

So here's the exhortation. In all you do, in every aspect of your life, always act rightly, not out of a knowledge of good and evil, but out of a wisdom that comes from loving God and knowing God.

And to the leaders (both present and future and even past) of the youth/college group at my church, this is an ever more important exhortation:

Don't go for Pyrrhic victories. Always treasure the relationship over your pride. As mentioned, this doesn't give us license to let wrongdoing fester, but it tells us to enforce the truth IN love.

And in all your ways set a wise example. Maturity does not give you license to do everything without consideration for love. The biggest example of this is, in my opinion, in the area of boy-girl relationships. Just because it's not wrong to pursue one discards the principle of wisdom. If you do not want to be a stumbling block, the wise course suggests to steer clear until you're 18, i.e. out of secondary.

And finally, to those who might think this post is directed at them, well you are in every sense right. But I do this out of love for you as a person, not out of a need to stamp my ways on you. The course of wisdom is always justified by the blessings of God, as perceived in the book of Proverbs.

14 days to go

Ah.. 2 weeks to get everyting done. Lol. Things left to do: Apply for student visa, get medical checkup and buy lots of T-shirts.

Anyways, I know I did say a post a day. Now I think about it, it's kind of impossible to do so. So maybe I should rescale to 2 moderately sized posts a week, or small posts every 2 days, bite sized news everyday and 1 big one a week.

Now that looks more realistic heading into term time.

Am I excited about heading to Cambridge? Haha. Let's just say I expect it to be quite the experience.

So I finished reading one of the books today, "The Worldly Philosophers" by Robert Heilbroner. I would think a must-read by anyone interested in the slightest in economics. It is a narrative description of the evolution of economics as a discipline from its founding father Adam Smith, to the world today. Surprisingly, it's not a dry text. Although Heilbroner has an annoying tendency to laden his text with big words, I guess to make it sound more intellectual, or perhaps it is the most accurate word available and in hindsight I think my vocabulary just expanded by another 200 words or so, it is quite fascinating and interesting to note that as suggested in the title of the book, he looks at the philosophers, not the mathematicians.

Thus, the book presents the grand scale of things, describing the oddities of the protagonists of the book and the environment(which he substitutes with the word milieu) in which they grew up in and how this influences their thinking.

And so as I was reading this book, it ended with the issue of the future of capitalism, the economic system of markets as we know today. For through the centuries since Adam Smith, many had theorised as to the direction of this economic system. And one comment caught my attention in particular - one of the philosophers, Joseph Schumpeter - states that capitalism may be an economic success, but not a sociological success.

Now I did not quite agree with the reasoning that followed that comment, but in my own way, I interpreted that quite differently.

It is without a doubt that we are at a point in time where the world is increasingly becoming more prosperous. Despite the fluctuations of the economy, the periods of recession and growth, there exists an upward trend of growth nevertheless. Yet prosperity does not equate with being better off.

I remember reading a John Piper sermon once that said, in my own paraphrased terms: Satan either attacks you through prosperity or pain, prosperity so that you will forget the need to depend on God, and pain so that you will doubt the existence of a good and loving God. This pattern is observed in the Bible with the Israelites who grew prosperous and forgot about what God had done to get them where the were, and with Job where in his pain he started to doubt that God was for Him in all things.

And in this age, the attack is in prosperity. For when God becomes superfluous, the devil wins. And with the economic success of capitalism, are we at all surprised that we are seeing a growing lukewarmness in the church, or that matters of spiritualism, of the purpose of life, are no longer important in the pursuit of wealth, or the pursuit of happyness, which was a good movie in one way and had a horrible value in another way.

Now, the disclaimer first: I think that without a doubt, this increased prosperity has been beneficial in the sociological sense that we are seeing more help going to the needy, also aided by the increased globalisation of this world. But then to look at the magnitude of everything, with the population of the earth at 6.7 billion, are the needy actually relatively getting more help, or losing out in the rat race?

I don't know and I can't back my hunches up statistically, but I certainly know that we are not doing as much as we can. Capitalism as a money making machine is incredibly efficient, but I believe that we are compelled, specifically as Christians, to channel that sort of wealth and time to help the needy. Don't just leave philanthropy to the rich, everyone can do their part.

Where does the future of capitalism lie? Like everything else, in the long run everything is meaningless. The future of capitalism lies with us today. Our decision to use this God given system to love the world is what matters. As half of the people reading this won't be working just yet, I suppose this post serves as a reminder to me and them in the future that we work for the accumulation of treasures in heaven and not on earth. Neither should we get so caught up in the money making machine that we lose our first love in the hustle and bustle.

I think this will be the first of 2 posts this week.

Picking up the pace

Interesting day today I must say.

First of all, I spent my morning in a stupor. How can your mind be on overtime but the rest of your body feel so tired is probably the most annoying thing in the universe.

Secondly, upon some reflection, I think my inability to learn to swim originates from a fear of asphyxiation/suffocation/not being able to breathe. This finds its foundation in that when I sleep, I have moments where I feel like my body is paralysed, and I'm struggling to get a breath but feel completely smothered. And so it becomes an intense struggle to regain consciousness, almost as if I'm limp under water or something. And then I wake up gasping for air. Before realising really that I'm not really gasping and that my body is in a breathable position - i.e. not buried in pillows. Although at this point, my heart is pounding quickly, and I've broken into a cold sweat.

Thirdly, Matt left for the US today. Sigh. There goes the cheese. What am I going to eat my corn with now?

Hehe. That was probably painful to read for some of you.

Fourthly, I am greatly looking forward to the release of Remedy. September 25th can't come any faster, can it? Although I'm also leaving Malaysia on that day for the UK, so the feelings are a bit mixed.

And now, after having a review of my day, I wish to rant on/discuss/discourse on the reason why reading is an unpopular activity. My opinion is that people are lazy to read simply because of the amount of brain power it takes. However, if it's reading a good fiction book, people can stay addicted to them. So I figured it boils down to one thing: interest. How can reading be made interesting becomes the logical question.

Well, I would think first of all, you would need to get a good book. However, it's easy for people to read Harry Potter. It's much harder to read the non-fiction stuff, or the 'deep' stuff as people would call it. Note the generalised use of people. So I suppose it's just a habit that has to be cultivated. I read somewhere that the slow person reads 200 words a minute, 3000 words in 15 minutes, 1095000 words a year if he reads for 15 minutes every day, if translated into pages, would be 3041 pages assuming that the average book has 360 words per page. Most books are at most 300 pages, which then translates into at least 10 books a year.

That is a staggering amount put into context. So I would say get some books and start reading 15 minutes a day. You'll be surprised how much you cover. And this assumes you read for just 15 minutes, slow enough to grasp everything.

And perhaps you might start to develop an interest for the things you read. If not, it's time to switch reading material.

And in fact, I do have a second insight. Or rather a second point of discourse: Do only-childs tend to seek the physical presence and acknowledgment of others more than those with siblings? I'll ramble about this further next post. The assumption here would be that the only-child in question is not of the introverted loner type, i.e. enjoys being by himself.

The return

Ahh. Well. I've managed to settle into a certain rhythm now.

Sure took a long time - 2 months and a bit in fact.

Anyways, this is my first post on my new laptop. Haha. Quite happy with it. Although at the moment I'm slightly disappointed because it still doesn't feel like a super powerful processor with 4GB of RAM. And to disappoint me further, I discovered that Vista takes up half a GB of RAM. So my laptop is officially listed as having 3.5GB of RAM. What a rip-off, in a way. I think I better install a really powerful computer game soon to test how powerful this laptop really is.

I finally finished all my driving. Just passed today. Quite a peculiar road test I must say though. Haha. There were so many people that my invigilator told me to go as fast as I wanted to. Her two most popular phrases: "Tak perlu berhenti" and "Tekan minyak!!" As a disclaimer, I wish to say that the first phrase was in relation to all those stop signs, which she told me to not bother stopping at unless there were cars, and the acceleration bit was when i was speeding (again the term is relative) at 65kph. Although in fairness, another testee in front of me was really really slow, so I tried to overtake them, except that the pickup is not that fast, and said testee didn't even look at his side mirror and just cut back in front of me as soon as i was about to finish my overtake, to which my invigilator then said, "Apa ini! Tak tahu memandu!" - to the car in front, not me.

Anyways, I've been doing quite a bit of reading in preparation for my economics course. And some shopping in preparation for going over. But I'm currently feeling quite under the weather - not at tiptop condition - for some reason unknown. So I've not really been in the mood to do much else.

To my faithful readers (7 according to my blog stat counter), I feel that this will mark the recommence of the daily post. I will try to think of a noteworthy theme to guide the next few topics. Although I should add one more disclaimer - I can only post provided I'm at home for at least 4 hours, not inclusive of sleeping, and in one solid block. Otherwise I won't have the time.

#73

Ahh. #73. I'll give a prize to anyone who can guess the significance of that number.

On a completely unrelated note, an update of life so far, since the last post.

1) I got tagged again. I can only ask you to refer to my previous post, in which I said you'll learn about me from reading my blog, in Bonus Fact #9.

2) I got food poisoning. Gave me a fever for one and a half to two days. Bleargh. Stomach's not feeling all that great at the moment. I won't go into too many more details

3) Been playing some Football Manager.

4) Learning what boredom is.

5) Went to an orphanage today(Saturday) with the group from church. Makes me feel grateful for how blessed my life is. Kids there were great. And I'm not great with kids. So that makes them pretty spectacular kids I must say.

6) Started on my summer reading list. Books covered so far: 1. Books to go: 19. Great effort so far.

7) Read the 7th Harry Potter book. Last Saturday that is. Pretty neat ending. I call the book movie material. And that's a compliment. I think I now understand what they mean by a 'spellbinding, richly woven narrative, which plunges, twists and turns at a breathtaking pace' (see inside flap of paper cover)

8) Currently looking around table for some semblance of what my life was like the past week. Mmm. I don't see anything.

Oh wait. Look. I just posted 8 facts about myself. Lol.

And that concludes today's post #73.

Double Tag

So ridiculously enough, I got double tagged. The second tagger was pretty blur, not reading the first taggers blog properly. However, just because I got double tagged, doesn't mean I'm going to post 16 facts about myself. I'll stick with the 8.

Anyways, let me cut to the chase:

1) Each player must post these rules first.
2) Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
3) People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
4) At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
5) Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.Here are 8 little known facts about me:

I'll add something else. I'm not going to reveal any toilet habits or anything.

Fact #1: I'm actually quite kiasu. Well used to be. Back when I was younger, I could not tolerate anyone who was better than me at something, preferring to use all sorts of excuses to justify my relative weakness.

Fact #2: I'm dead terrified of cockroaches. Come to think of it, I don't quite like insects on me. Although if I'm on one of my expeditions, I don't mind so much. It's very much an issue of hygiene. Anyways, the whole cockroach thing started when my brother lured me onto one when I was 5. To make things worse, I had just read that Hepatitis gets spread through cockroaches. So I was dead scared and crying quite badly as I ran to my mum. And cockroaches are really just plain gross. And they can fly too.

Fact #3: I would wet my bed because I would not be able to get up. This happened till I was 7/8 I think. Then one day, I just woke up and the whole spell ended. I still drool though. But I don't snore. Unless I'm really tired.

Fact #4: I used to think Harry Potter was extremely childish. Kinda scorned people who read it. Then my brother got the first book for his present. Was extremely bored. Book lying on table. What's the craze all about?? Pick up book and open page. Never looked back. Lol. Nothing like a good easy book with good plot to follow. Strangely enough, I still don't own the second book.

Fact #5: I used to think music was a waste of time. Ironic isn't it.

Fact #6: I had quite the 'potty-mouth' in primary.

Fact #7: I hated cartoons when I was young but now I love to while away the time watching cartoon after cartoon. Mmm. Talk about 'regressing'. Although I tend to prefer the comic-book type cartoons.

Fact #8: Despite garnering a reputation as a teacher's pet, I'm actually quite lazy, preferring to spend time on my computer surfing my regular sites or gaming for hours on end. I also enjoy watching TV and the occasional read. And the funny thing is that I require a lot of sleep, which is sometimes impossible with my habits, and therefore I find myself catching some shut eye in class quite a bit. Got someone into trouble once that way. Ah well.

Bonus Fact #9: The fact is that you'll actually learn a lot about me if you read my blog. When I get round to updating it a bit more frequently yet again.

And that concludes it.

Who do I tag? That's quite funny actually, because very few of my friends blog. And most of them have sunk into the 'cesspit of the internet'.

Sigh. If you feel like I would tag you, then do self-tag and tell me 8 facts about yourself. Or in fact, you could leave it under comments here, knowing very well that the people I would want to tag don't operate a blog.

A recollection

First note the title change. Now, I have no clue why I picked that phrase but it just popped out. After all this blog is really my thoughts expressed in written form. I chose the word fleeting though because my thoughts have an annoying habit of running off just as I'm about to say or write them.

Mmm. Anyways, a little history.

I started off this blog as an experiment into why people write blogs and why people read blogs. My results are startling zilch. I can therefore hypothesise that people write blogs because there comes a time in their life when they are really bored and sitting in front of their computer and they go "Why not start a blog? It would give me something to do."

Then there are those people who think it's a fad and they sink into the "cesspit of the internet" - that phrase is not of my own invention. And there are those who use it to keep in touch with friends although the rising popularity of facebook as a tool of colleges and university groups to keep in touch means that blogs are more or less redundant for this purpose. And then there are those who just want to tell the whole world what they think - and to connect with the rest of the world.

A lot are however very much introspective and just a ramble on their own life stories.

Why do people read blogs? I do that a lot. I think it gives insight into the character of a person. They can be quite amusing at times. And they alert you to what's going on. Because for some people blogs are public diaries. They kind of hint I'm going through something bad right now which you should know about when that person is going through something bad except that the person wants everyone to know that without knowing what the really bad thing is - if that sentence even made sense.

And blogs are just a way to follow someone's life. Even if the person treated his blog as a column, you follow his perspective on life and we humans are at heart nosey creatures who want to know what the other person is up to or thinking about.

Anyways last week was my Mt Kinabalu expedition. Terribly painful I must say. And I thought I had scaled the highest peak in SEA only to realise to my utter dismay that it is in fact the third highest peak. Although in my defence the other two are pretty much unscaleable to the amatuer mountaineer. The highest is on the indonesian side of the papau new guinea island and requires extreme technical ability, so much so that it is labelled as one of the "seven summits", a challenge issued to mountaineers. The second is in myanmar and would take weeks to climb, considering you even get permission to enter myanmar in the first place.

So in consolation I climbed "the highest scaleable peak in the shortest time possible" in SEA. My legs were in jitters for days after, i.e. up to Sunday although it tingled till Tuesday. And I played basketball for an hour and a half on Saturday morning and 2 hours of futsal that evening. Ahh genius me although my theory is that the endorphin release of exercise actually eased the ache (until I woke up the next morning).

I would post pictures except that I dont have good ones right now. They're on someone else's camera. And I have hood hair cos I was wearing a hoodie in the blistering cold.

I thought i lost weight. So I came home and checked. 1 kg. Bleargh. A bit disappointing although someone said that my face fat has kinda diminished. Can't be a bad thing. Quite a good intensive workout though - felt my heart humming quite a bit. Anyways it took about 6hr 45 mins to reach the summit, and took about 4 hours to get down. Compare that to some record of 2hr 50mins 38secs or something like that to go up and down - i.e. 21km. Although by our measurements the trail is only 8.5 km one way, i.e. two ways is 17km - so where did the extra 4 km come from. Hmm. Extremely mysterious. But it baffles me how someone made it up and down so fast when the terrain is quite killer. They must have been flying.

Anyways I think this is the end of today's imprint.

Who says pleasure and pain dont mix?

I am nursing an extremely bruised (the part below your knee that isn't quite your shin yet - unless the shin is in fact that whole part between your knee and ankle and not just the lower part where shinpads go - I won't know, I don't do biology).

Haha. It's been a long time since I got knocked up like that.

Here's another question that popped up in my mind also while playing futsal today - why do I always suffer from leg cramps during futsal but when I play basketball, I can do it for 3 hours straight without any problem? (welll straight is an exaggeration, insert 5/7 minute breaks here and there, but not too often)

Then you got all that about stretching more and blah blah blah.

And I think after today, it's safe to say that the goalkeeping position is probably the most dangerous one in football. Balls flying at you ain't fun. Haha. Especially when one smacks you right in the chest before the game even starts. And plus the fact that the bruising came when I ran out to make a challenge. By the way disclaimer straight away right here: I'm a horrible goalkeeper.

Which leads to a second question: How many people assume that basketballers make good goalkeepers and why? Just because we can handle a size 8 ball that doesn't swerve and has better grip doesn't automatically translate into a size 6 ball that has smooth sides and travels much much faster. Haha. Except that I don't mind playing it every now and then, when I need a break. (Although again my leg cramp attacked me when I was playing goalie - tis a cursed position)

Oh ya. And a really funny observation. Well, whether anyone else finds it funny is another matter. I noticed that how many people in goal (me included) always try to avoid a ball that comes really really fast (which equates with power which then equates with pain) at them. So I figured, that means we all know where the ball is really going and the only thing is is that we choose to not be in the path of that ball, and then the funny thing is is that goalies are meant to be in the path of that ball.

Lol. Football rant. Blame it on my bruising. Now I shall uh shift my attention to the title of my post at hand. And well, my rant wasn't quite a rant. There was sort of a point. Notice how I can complain about the pain, i.e. the bruising and the cramps, but if you asked me whether I enjoyed it, then yeah. So it's the same thing with 'religion' isn't it? People always think that life with God on your side is a bed of roses, and then stop believing when reality begins to contradict that belief.

So my answer is: Who says pleasure and pain don't mix? (haha, I believe this is the first time I've used a title in my actual post itself) And the thing is at the end, all you remember is the pleasure. The pain goes away in due course. So life is like that. Pain and pleasure, like ham and eggs, or bread and butter, or chicken rice, or whatever pair you want, will coexist in this life. But the best thing about it is that some pleasures are worth the pain.

Especially when the object of your pleasure is the most pleasurable thing in the universe. The question then becomes: Is it really?

Another disclaimer: That was a pretty simplified view of things. And I don't claim to cover all the angles with that. There are exceptions that arise as a result of different circumstances, e.t.c. But the basic principle is there.

The disappointment of the moment

Hahaha. I thought this would feel a lot more liberating. But I think my mind went on holiday the moment my exams started. So having no school (and even exams) now seems to feel no different.

Well. Quite disappointing I must say.

Things to do: Get my driving done.

That is all at the moment. I'm planning to bum this whole week before I get down to do something useful for the rest of my holidays. And Kinabalu is coming up in two weeks so there's not too much bumming around time between then and now from the looks of things.

Anyways, now that I'm free, I still can't think of what to blog about. Sheesh. You probably wasted your time reading this thus far. (not that you don't necessarily waste your time with all my other posts)

So yeah. Give me a few days to think it over.

Exams so far

Ahh. My important papers are finished. Bar one. But that one is a MCQ paper, so it shld be a piece of cake.

Mmm. Further math. First paper - should have done better. Second paper - not very good. Haha. Especially when you realise later what you should have done. Ah well. Will pray for my A, since I need it pretty badly. Bleargh..Didn't help that I had to fall sick today as well.

Econs and history shld be no problem.

Anyways, yeah, this is a bit weird. Nearly having finished the exams. I would be a bit more relaxed if I had got a better Applied Further Math paper and/or not made the really dumb mistakes on my pure paper. That way I won't be worried about the grade. Right now, I'm a bit nervous. And that's for 2 months. Lol. I wonder if I can sleep this off. If not I'm in for 2 months of incredible tension.

Next week, 3 more papers on 2 more days.

And then I have to figure out what to do. Long holidays = lots of bumming around. But then the holidays may seem even longer if I'm still as worried about that grade.

I have not been in this kind of situation ever.

And 'tis horrible.

This was probably the most irrational post ever, due to the fact that that dumb paper is still on the back of my mind and so my thoughts are very incoherent at the moment.

FM Paper 1 = 82? + FM paper 2 = 70?, aggregate mark = 76% - is this a predicted A?. That's the bottomline I'm looking at. Assumptions made: That I only dropped that many marks...Hehe. My margin of error is 12 which equals to one question. Not the best margin I would say.

Ahh. It's times like these where you just have to trust God for the grade. Which would translate into whether I end up at Cambridge or be the idiot who missed the A and had to go off to LSE - not that the latter is shoddy, but the former is a lot more desirable.

Kids today..

What influences kids the most today? Is it their peers, family members, TV, music or something else?

So here's a short story of what happened on the Wednesday of the second last week of school, i.e. 9thMay2007, coincidentally my Dad's birthday now I think about it.

Anyways, me, AJ and BB (names initialised to conceal identity) are walking into school after lunch, and so there's this bunch of students (Yr8s according to CC) sitting at the steps. And of course, being impossibly dense, they're blocking the path. So while I'm there signing everyone in, AJ starts walking down those stairs.

More like tries walking down those stairs. And then one of the Yr8s tell some friend of theirs, can't recall the name, to get out of the way. So I'm right behind AJ and I open my mouth and say,

"Yeah. Stop blocking the stairway."

I take a few more steps when suddenly behind me a voice rings out, extremely clear.

"*@#^ off!"

So I'm pretty shocked. Now it's one thing to be told that jokingly by a friend. But from a Yr 8 kid who's half my size and 6 years younger??

In disbelief, I glance around. "Pardon?"

"Yeah. *@#^ off!" was the reply. And then his bunch of friends start laughing. As if they scored a victory over some sixth former. Blah.

Now several options ran through my head at this moment.
1. Instinctively turn around, pick the boy up by the scruff of his shirt, and ask him the question one more time. Now this would have been a great option, except I think it's also classified as assault.
2. Turn around and confront him face to face, while his friends scatter and make a run for it, abandoning their smart-mouth friend to confront my wrath. Problem is, my thoughts were so scrambled at this point that my smart mouth wasnt in the mood to give someone a lecture.
3. Walk away. Give him his moment of immature triumph. This pettiness is way below me.

So I picked option 3, since I was facing the opposite direction anyways. Was too lazy to turn back around. Of course as I walk down that extremely long - and really Malaysian uneven - pathway, I was happily considering Option 2. But I guess as the distance grew longer, I kinda felt a bit..sad.

It's kind of sad the kind of kids we have today. Now of course, it's possible that this happens in an international school anyways. But i doubt that too.

So why is it that kids have such 'smart mouths' nowadays? Why are they so immature. Just two days later, on a Friday, they were fighting with the two protagonists being cheered on by their friends - wait a minute, I thought they were all friends? Or is it that this is the 'cool' group and everyone wants to join in. So they're not really good friends but just a bunch of kids who are trying to fit in with the popular guy/girl and the popular guy just loves being the center of attention (probably the same guy with the smart mouth) but otherwise has no good friends.

Well that's my theory of school society in any case. But it's kinda sad that the lower years are becoming quite immoral. Why do kids feel the urge to turn to all kinds of stuff like sex, drugs, what they think is cool rebellious disrespectful behaviour, e.t.c.?

Mmm. Well. Kids today. What can you say?

The end - not quite but nearly there

So school ended on Friday. It was quite a riot. Crowded corridors, balloons everywhere, and people chasing and being chased around. Quite an apt ending to years and years of school.

And well here I am. Well there I was. Actually both apply. Anyways, I was looking forward to better hours but I guess the consensus is that everyone will miss the spontaneity of school. The really random things that happen that makes life interesting. Especially further math sessions and the random chats, and attempts to avoid the lesson and go out for lunch, and the really random constructive vandalism of the room we're in.

I most definitely will not miss the canteen. I will not miss the homework. If someone misses them, like BB, I will laugh in his face.

Um yeah quite random that. There's also the fact that I think my arms will finally be stain free every Tuesday and/or Wednesday. And I wouldn't be so bruised by the random limb extensions of a certain trio.

It is little things like this that I will always remember. Although I don't think Andy would be flattered that every marker pen reminds me of those econs lessons sitting right next to him. But the big things like friends are still around, so here was the question I was thinking about. Is it school that I will miss, or is it the fact that you meet your friends everyday that I will miss?

Irrespective, haha, here's to a good 7 years of post-primary school education. Now just for those pesky exams. They better not try to be smart with the papers this year, especially those further math examiners.

Not another one already??

As quoted by Ben Bradley.

Mmm. Here comes the overdue breakdown of Utd's season so far. Watched them got dumped out of the CL. Was quite resigned to the defeat, seeing as how Milan played a fantastic game. Ahh. To imagine a trio of Kaka, Ronaldo and Rooney - makes you want to drool. That is if they play for ManU. And the rain kinda added to the drama of everything.

There have been a few ups and downs in the premiership run in, but I can safely say I was confident we would win the title that weekend. Thus when Vassell stepped up to take that penalty, I had the gut feeling he would miss. Destiny awaited.

And the FA Cup's coming up. Lol. It would be fun to crush Chelsea's miserable season. But the problem with that is the harder they fall, the harder they bounce back. So there's a danger there.

And my predictions as to who the transfer targets are? I have no clue to be honest. But I would like: Hargreaves, E'too and Robben. Then we'll truly rip apart defenses. Only problem is that these three have not had the best fitness records in recent times. And that raises the question of where does Giggs and Scholes go? Will Ferguson let loose the brutal axe? Doubt it, not with the way they can change games. And maybe a right back would be good. Neville's not going to last much longer.

Football aside, I can't believe that as of this writing, I only have 6 school days left in my whole life. Haha. Of course there's the revision for the exams, but still. Lol. With regards to that, I would still like a Sloman.

Again as you can see, this post is degenerating into mumbo-jumbo. So here's something for everyone to think about. This topic came up in my math class the other day. When we grow older, let's say 30 years from now, will our kids look at us the way we look at our parents and claim how 'outdated' we are? - of course this doesn't apply to all parents.

My opinion was no. We grew up in the age of technological exploration and as such have the skill sets to adapt to changing technologies. Before I went on to say that the generations below us are now in fact spoon fed on how to do stuff. Lol. I wonder how true that comment is. Then we went to the topic of music. This one has my interests quite piqued actually. Our parents usually label our music today as noisy, but that's because instruments like the electric guitar and drums weren't played the way they are played today, especially with the countless pedals being produced nowadays for electric guitarists. My opinion is that music has reached its zenith, where it becomes near impossible for new genre's to be produced. We'll see blending happening and consumer's tastes being divided into many different blends, with no one blend achieving dominance over the other unless a certain band or two become extremely popular.

Mmm. I should keep this blog running for another 30 years and see what really happens.

The devil loves mirrors

I believe that Satan wins a battle whenever he gets us to look in a mirror at ourselves.

When we get so caught up in our individuality, we lose sight of a lot of things.

Which in fact leads to one of the most dominant worldviews of religion today - that we earn our way to heaven. Having to do good works to satisfy God's demands. Thus when we believe in a certain religion, we are condemned to a life of slavery and struggling to do good against our inner nature.

I would have to agree that we enter a life of slavery, and I do agree that our inner nature always fights against our wanting to do good.

Except for one thing.

Because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions - it is by grace you have been saved. Ephesians 2: 4-5

In that one biblical statement, the root of the Christian faith is summed up. God is the judge yes, but he is also merciful. And because He loves us, he made us alive with Christ - now this is the key part, because no one can come before God except through Jesus - even when we were dead in transgressions - it is a fact that we are all dead in our evilness. Nothing we do can save ourselves, no matter the number of good deeds, we are inherently, by nature, evil.

And it is by grace we have been saved. Grace is an amazing thing isn't it. It's just like saying George Bush captures Osama bin Laden, then says, alright you're off the hook.

I myself, for one, would be outraged. And unless you're an Osama supporter, you would be horrified at this act of grace.

Except that God did that for us. It is by His grace we are no longer judged, as long as we are in Christ Jesus.

Many reject this simple offer, because they believe that it is too good to be true. We humans are by nature suspicious of offers too good to be true, because we think we are being conned. And this is exactly what is happening, but it is the devil that is the conman - he arouses our suspicions so that we become wary of this simple offer.

Someone once said, that in fact, this is a story too good to not be true. And this grace is indeed too good to not be true. Redeemed and the way to heaven open for us. It is too good to not be true. The inner child in us seizes at this opportunity, just as how a sick man would seize any cure within grasp in his desperation.

I'm not saying the Christian life is free of suffering. In fact, contrary, it is full of suffering. After all the Bible says that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God. The early Christian church suffered much. But what is suffering, when compared to the joy set before us? The Bible describes the kingdom of heaven as a treasure hidden in the field, which a man sold all he had in order to buy it after discovering it. Jesus himself even rebuked this notion of sacrifice, saying that "no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age (homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—and with them, persecutions) and in the age to come, eternal life." This is in fact quite a bold statement and there is much truth in it.

If small things can give us so much pleasure and joy, then what about the greatest thing there is in the universe, God himself? Because through Jesus, we can in fact come before the throne of God and call Him father. That relationships is our conduit, our river of joy.

That's probably Satan's greatest deception! Christianity is not about legalism. It's not about do's and dont's. It's a story of grace and love, it is about the hope of eternal joy. It's about exchanging the temporary pleasures of this world for what satisfies forever. And when this joy in God bubbles up in you, it overflows to other people. This is what love really is. It is not a willpower religion. It is a fight for joy. And the fight only begins when we choose to accept Jesus as our Lord, as our Saviour and as the thing we will treasure most above all else. Then the Spirit of God comes and dwells in us, and the fight between the desires of our flesh and the desires of God
take root. But it is a battle that can be won, and will eventually be won, if we look to God for strength to run this race with perseverance. So that at the end of our lives we can say that I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. And then we are reunited in heaven with God.

I know that this doesn't even begin to touch on many of the issues. Such as that that man is by nature evil. Or the contradiction that God needs us which is not true. But there is one message I want to get across. There is a story too good to not be true. And if you've read it, and its knocking at your door, it is a once in a lifetime offer of grace that you don't want to miss. For those who have lost sight of that grace and got caught up in the legalism, the do's and dont's of Christianity, now is the time to turn back in your pursuit of joy in God.

This is not a joyless life. And I can testify to that. So look at all those mirrors that reflect the fact that you're not good enough to go into heaven and say: I know I'm not good enough but I know the One who is more than good enough for me.

The weekend is out

The weekend is coming to an end.

I could also say the week is coming to an end, i.e. it is the end of the week, therefore it is the end of the weekend.

Then we have the people who will argue that Sunday is the first day of the week, although that is indeed what our calendars try to impress upon us - as you can see, it starts with a red S, not a M.

Mmm. Ramble time over.

It was a nice weekend. Youth group at church watched Luther. That was a pretty interesting movie. Just wondered whether the real Luther was as eloquent in his speech as he was in his writing. But the movie was quite inspirational in a sense. One of the modern heroes of the faith.

Wanted to watch Spiderman 3, but the queues are horrible. Which remind me of a newspaper article where kids were crying because they couldn't watch the movie as they couldn't get tickets. Moral of the story: reserve in advance.

I've always liked the weekends. Being with my church family and all is very refreshing, when you are among like minded people, pursuing the same passions.

And speaking of that, school is over in two weeks. Maybe I'll come to miss the weekdays too.

Book I'm currently reading: When I Don't Desire God: How to Fight for Joy. A must read. After reading the book before that: Desiring God. Both are by John Piper. I blame/thank Matt for his influence in this regard.

I'm not quite in the frame of mind (nor do i have the time) for a philosophical post. So I think I'll go to bed now. Currently trying to get into the habit of waking up early. Devotion times in the morning are highly recommended but I'm always just too tired - I'm the kind of person who falls into the category of "I can stay up but I can't wake up".

As for summer plans - yep I'm already thinking about summer - there are a few things on my agenda. After Kinabalu - the weeks before that will be spent getting into a bit of shape and finishing my driving - I'm planning to do something constructive. Not sure what that will be yet. Maybe learn a skill in who knows what. I also have to wrap up a few unfinished things, such as certain videos for those of you who kinda know what I'm referring to. And then who knows from there? Would also be a good time to read all the books on that recommended list for Cambridge. Bleargh. Quite an exhaustive list. Lol. Hope they're interesting.

I've finished the Command and Conquer 3 campaign. Pretty enjoyable game. Although it's distracted me from my studies. I highly recommend it, although it must be said I'm at heart a C&C fan. I'm also pretty thankful that the football season wraps up on May 19th, before the exams, so that's one less distraction - although i was looking forward to proving the Ellis Football-ExamGrades correlation wrong.

And finally, to wrap up my ramble. I know i did say end of ramble at the start, but how was i to anticipate that this post would end up with more ramble. And since we're on the subject of anticipation, I'm looking forward to Remedy. Hahaha. Should be a fantastic album.

What is your temperament?

I spent the last three days at my church camp. Which means one thing: I didn't get any work done. Bleargh.

Anyways, a brief overview of what we did. We had lots of fun and really interesting main sessions and workshops. One of them was about identifying your temperament - which for the sake of time had apparently been shortened considerably.

So the temperaments are described as the fundamental determinants of who we are - our actions, our personality, our motivations, e.t.c. And we have roughly 4 temperaments. To keep this short, I'll summarise what they were: the first is the 'sanguine' or 'happy-go-lucky' person who tends to enjoy life and is generally the life of the party, making friends easily and generally plunges headfirst into everything. The second is the 'choleric', who is brilliant in leading others and solving problems, matching intuition with ability to almost always make the correct decision. The third is the 'melancholic' or 'serious and sensitive' type, the latter which more or less sums up what he's like. This type of person tend to be more intelligent and excels in many vocations, with a tendency to desire perfectionism. The fourth is the 'phlegmatic', who is the 'cool and steady' person, taking life at a slow and steady pace. This person is often the quiet, reserved person who observes everything, analysing and evaluating everything at his own pace. And thus he makes a good listener, and often a good giver of advice when asked.

Of course all these 4 temperaments have their downside. These are logically deriviated. For example, the sanguine person tends to be restless and unable to stick to a single task, always wanting to jump from thing to thing in search of fun. The choleric always tends to be right, and is driven to maintain his 'rightness', thus often trampling on those who get in his way, adopting a sense of superiority and never willing to experience defeat in anything. The melancholic who takes life too seriously ends up being all bottled up and self centered and worrying too much about things. This person would also be called 'emo'. Lol. And the phlegmatic tends to border on being sluggish and lazy, wasting much time, and in his relationships tends to be stubborn, not willing to listen to advice.

So anyways, there I was looking at the bunch of characteristics. For the sake of length, I have in fact shortened the list of attributes that might help to determine the make up of your temperament. And I was wondering what my temperament was - by the way, there are two: one is your primary and one is your secondary. Haha. For those of you who know me, I'm definitely a choleric. Mr. I'm-always-right, I can do everything myself and no problem is too big that I can't solve it. What I'm trying to figure out is what my other temperament is. Am I melancholic or phlegmatic? I have the strengths of a melancholic but none of its weaknesses, yet I also have SOME of the strengths AND half of the weaknesses. As I see it, the balance is finely poised. In short, I'm both slow and steady in my ways and also serious and sensitive, when I'm not my choleric, overpowering self. Mmm. The vote seems to be swinging heavily towards melancholic.

But how about you help me decide?

I will see about posting a more comprehensive list.

Disenchantment - An evaluation of my spiritual condition

That pretty much sums up how I've been feeling lately. Well I'm pretty sure I got the word right - as in nothing fascinates you any more.

And it's a horrible feeling.

What are the things I'm disenchanted with?

1) School
2) Hours after school

Haha. Yeah...things are boring me out. I mean there's quite a bit of work to be getting on with but I just find no gain in the things I do. There's no excitement and every day is lived in so much routine.

The human soul was created to be fascinated. And I think as bleak as this period of my life is, it has taught me at least one thing - this life can only satisfy so much, then it gets boring.

Of course the problem comes when you try to go to God to get satisfied, and you don't seem to get anything out of it. If the first thing was horrible, I think this borders on suicidal.

Lol. Umm. I am not suicidal btw. Just a choice of words - quite apt in a certain sense, for those who know what I mean.

But yeah, I think everyone has dark periods in their life like these. My last one was quite a long time back, about two years back, when my life felt quite aimless.

This time round though, I've learnt one thing. Its moments like these, when the darkness seems oppressive, stifling, suffocating the joy out of life, its moments like these when God's light shines brightest. It's just a matter of waiting for the light to come - because it will. God is the everlasting God. Even in the darkness He reigns. And He will place a limit on what we have to endure and lift us up when our time of testing is finished.

For those who have believed, John Piper calls us to fight for joy like a justified sinner. We often take for granted the power of the cross of Christ. I'm doing injustice to a great book (When I Don't Desire God: How to Fight for Joy by John Piper) which I think is a great book for those who just feel stuck and stagnant in their relationship with God, but to summarise the key bit to this concept, the idea is that the fight for joy is a fight to see the glory of God - because Piper argues that the Bible preaches the idea that "God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him" and our satisfaction only comes when we see God for who He really is, i.e. glorious. And the glory of God is most tangible in the cross of Christ.

Paul says it himself when he says "Far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ (Gal 6:14)". Our primary source of power is found there. Because there we see God in His full glory - the merciful and compassionate God who loved us so much that He died to take away our sins, something we could not do ourselves. The story of the cross, the story of redemption is the full display of the glory of God. And thus it is there that we are most satisfied. God gives us little glimpses of His glory in our daily lives, but none compares to the fact of Christ crucified and risen.

It's like this David Crowder song, Heaven Came Down:
Heaven came down and glory filled my soul/When at the cross my Savior made me whole/My sins were washed away/And my night was turned to day/When heaven came down and glory filled my soul/O what a wonderful wonderful day/Day I will never forget/When I was wandering in darkness away/Jesus my Savior I met/O what a tender compassionate Friend/He met the need of my heart/Shadows dispelling with joy I am telling/He made all the darkness depart/O what a wonderful wonderful day/And O what a glorious glorious day/The day you came, came to save me/O what a wonderful wonderful day/The day you came and you saved me

And Piper acknowledges that the fight for joy exists. Christianity doesn't promise instant gratification. There are moments of darkness. And the biblical writers had their moments. But Piper encourages us to fight with what he calls ' gutsy guilt'. In Micah 7 : 8-9, (Rejoice not over me, O my enemy; when I fall, I shall rise; when I sit in darkness, the LORD will be a light to me. I will bear the indignation of the LORD because I have sinned against him, until he pleads my cause and executes judgment for me. He will bring me out to the light; I shall look upon his vindication.), Micah acknowledges that moments of darkness exist. Because we are truly sinners and we deserve to bear the indignation/anger of God.

But here's the amazing truth here. For those of us who have believed and have been justified by faith in Jesus Christ, we do not face the wrath of an angry judge but the discipline of a loving father. And so while we bear the indignation of God, we have to but wait a little longer, when God will lift His darkness and restore our joy. And this joy is all the more sweeter. It's like how an ice-cream tastes much better after baking in the sun all day rather than having spent the day in a freezing room. The contrast emphasises it.

And Piper calls this manner of fight for joy the way of gutsy guilt. Because while we acknowledge that we're guilty, when the enemy (for most of us this would be the devil) rubs it in our faces, we can stand up and say that God will be my light. He is for me. He will not forsake me. Because of what He had first done for us at the cross. Moreover, God will execute judgment for us - now the tables are turned on our enemy.

Piper contrasts this with 'cheap grace', which I would succinctly described as a "all will be good and happy. If things are going bad, then you do not have faith" sort of doctrine. The fact is that we have really fallen short of God's standards. There is real judgment for what we have done. There is a darkness we have to face. But because of the cross, in what was once a dark world, we have a hope - the promise of the light of God. This light may sometimes seem dim, but it's always there and in our greatest moment of darkness, if we can seize hold of the power of the cross and the fact that we have already been made righteous, we can endure until God chooses to lift the oppressiveness of the darkness.

Haha. I have to say that was pretty heavy doctrine there. But the darkness is real. It suffocates and stifles our joy. The fact is the Christian life is not all prosperous and comfortable. But there is joy. An eternal joy. Because in the darkness, when life seems to go nowhere, we can lay hold to the power of the cross - that Jesus has redeemed us - and that will be enough for us, until God lifts the darkness and a greater joy descends upon us.

And for those who don't believe, the offer of joy is still free and available for all those who choose to believe. Because I can tell you that night is here, but morning will come for those who hold fast to the joy that is found in the power of the cross. And then this life wont seem so bad, because we have a light to lead us through the darkness, to heaven where we will be forever satisfied in the presence of our great and glorious God.

Lol. In fact I'm feeling a little bit happier now. Haha. I think it helped to get this off my chest into the open.

When Silence Falls

This may comes across as a depressing post for some of you. But I just feel some things have to be said...



Some things just shock you to your very core.

Like the Virginia Tech shooting. 33 lives gone. Just like that.

Living in Malaysia, I am pretty grateful, that despite all the fallacies of this country, it is a safe place by comparison.

But things like these just feel so inexplainable. It reminds me of the year before, when one of the guys in my year died just like that after being stabbed.

You feel indignation, anger, a need for justice, a need to right wrongs, especially when it becomes personal.

To many death is the ultimate foe. It is unbeatable. The sting unbearable.

But why do I feel so shock when 33 people die, and when all over the world 0.86% of the population dies every year, which works out to roughly 1.8 persons dying a second or 156773 people dying a day, I hardly blink an eye?

Is it because it was 'before their time'? That they had their whole lives ahead of them? That it was unfair for them to die because they did not deserve it?

The fact remains that people die, eventually. Immortality on this earth is a sham. Medicine might prolong our lives. But then we die.

And it is this very fact that should lead you to ask the very question: To what end am I living this life? What happens after I die? Am I living life to the fullest here?

Questions like these beg more than simple answers.

Because until you find these answers, life is but a fleeting thought, a vapor in the wind, a flower that blooms then shrivels and dies.

And that kind of life is not worth living.

For all those just trying to get through the next few hours, for those finding answers, for those looking for hope, for those in pain and sorrow, for those in the darkest night of their life, for those who can no longer find words to express yourself, when silence falls it is then you hear the whisper of God. If you would but listen. If you would but ask God for eyes to see the truth.

The truth is that while the world seems to be heading for ruin, God is still God, through it all. And when all around is fading, when nothing seems to last, we still have hope in a Saviour who has rescued us from the sting of death. And in Him, we find strength to live every hour of our life. And while rescue is present in every moment of our life, when we need Him to pull us out of the darkness of the pit we find ourselves in, there is a greater rescue that is coming. When He comes to bring us back to Him. The victory has been won but just wait a little longer.

That is the story of Easter.

Thirty three (33)

For some reason, my printer screen is in German. Well, at least I think it's German. Mmm. Still trying to discover where the language settings are.

Anyways, 33 is the number of days to go before school is finished.

Officially.

Although there are exams.

But it's school that I dislike.

The many things I dislike about school include: the really tedious homework, the early hours, the sometimes boring lessons which are of no benefit, lousy canteen food that is the main cause of my malnutrition - you're better off starving in this respect

The many more things I like about school: accounting classes - I am one big distraction, further math classes - another distraction, people in school, the times when I'm not feeling sleepy

But overall the hours and the boredom kind of tip the scale in favour of me disliking school.

Anyways enough of my school gripe.

I currently have no interesting thoughts of the day. Kinda. I do have this thought i came up with but it slipped my mind. Also, I'm currently wondering how I (and am pretty sure other people do this as well) seem to waste the hours away in front of the computer doing nothing and mucking around. It's seriously unproductive and yet time just flies when you're doing nothing.

It's a mystery. Attempting to figure out how the time is actually used.

Sleepless in KL

*warning* the following post may contain graphic descriptions. Reader discretion is adviced. *warning*



Phlegm.

The very word just sounds really phlegmy.

Haha. The wonders of the English language.

I've spent the second week of the Easter break pretty sick, for the first three days. And then there comes all that lingering phlegm. Which just wakes you up at night so you can sip some water and clear your respiratory channels because the phlegm moves up into your nose. After all phlegm, mucus, nose boogies are all the same thing, just in different parts of the body and all that technical stuff. So anyways when morning comes, there are a bunch of tissues with green semi-solid substances in it, which have migrated from my throat up my nose down onto the tissue. And it's a pretty distracting migration.

So yeah the previous night are kind of sleepless because I end up waking up a lot. I think this is really slowing down my recovery as a result.

Ahh well....

On another note, because I tend to like my posts to be more educational, I'll talk on a subject close to my heart.

I mean that pretty literally, since it's in fact right next to me.

Haha.

Computer games.

Now, I'll place myself in the category of a person that loves the following type of game: all Command and Conquer games (I have to get myself the third one soon - looks sooooo good, but i digress); building games, because at heart I love planning and building stuff and seeing the money roll in and things grow etc etc; role playing games although lately there's been a dearth of ones i like. I kinda hate the long convoluted adventures where you get lost without a walkthrough and requires so much walking in jungles and dungeons and stuff. Give me a quick story to blast through. Best RPG I've ever played? An oldie, the Fallout series. Although apparently Fallout 3 is in the works, under the production of the creators of ElderScrolls - should be good. Then there are the odd game or two i enjoy once in a while, like Civilisation IV, and other real time strategy games like warhammer and thing like that. Oh and don't forget the FIFA series, which I'm pretty good at albeit a bit rusty.

And I didn't forget first person shooters, because i personally dislike them. They're nice to play multiplayer. But I just don't like the gameplay. It's way too brainless. Puzzles are just there as eye candy for whatever new physics engine they've created. Most of you will disagree. I will agree to disagree.

But anyways, here's the game that bothers me.

Grand Theft Auto.

Mmm. One of the first games to make the leap from 2D to 3D. I have to say when GTA3 was released, I went ooh-ahh over the whole gameplay, which was just really cool.

Then of course the series starts evolving. GTA3 was clean. Very clean. Especially when compared to GTA: San Andreas. Now that last one, I hated. All the vulgarity, the blatant criminality.

Wait a minute, that's what GTA is at heart - a game where you are a criminal. (Getting into a police car and playing vigilante still makes you a criminal, which explains why the police are always after Batman in that whole universe, which is pretty ironic considering that without Batman, they're a pretty impotent force)

So anyways people who read the news, even just gaming news will know that (eventhough this is old news), that GTA has sparked a whole bunch of controversy. Issues like: does the game glorify violence and sex and all that? etc. And in turn what effect is it having on the kids of this generation? Mmmm. Very deep questions.

I have to say that computer games are my one weakness. I easily succumb to addiction, if the game is really good. (dumb command and conquer and city building game developers) Anyways the point which I'm trying to consider is this:

I know these kind of games are bad, especially games like GTA. But at the same time the gameplay's just so engrossing. But here's how I quit that series for good.

When I was playing the vice city version (which wasn't that derogatory yet), my then 7 year old cousin comes over and I'm driving this really fast car speeding down the highway and my cousin LOVES racing games. So I thought, ahh this game is pretty harmless, let him get in the car, let me turn on the invulnerability cheat and let him crash and bang and drive all he wants.

Now fast forward one year later, and San Andreas gets released. The covers look virtually similar to a kid that young. San Andreas is definitely deserving of its mature rating, although it pushes me to question whether having to resort to use of much vulgarity and other indecencies is actually a mature thing to start with - it's more of an immature maturity (a phrase which makes no sense).

SO anyways he pesters me to want to play it, and I think the elements in this game are just so horrible, I hide the game and blatantly lie to his face that I forgot to delete the shortcut on the desktop. (I uninstalled the game later that day)

Because we should never expose kids to this sort of thing.

Sure people say it's the real world. Stop protecting them

Well, here's the newsflash, it's actually not the real world. It's a MTV culture. There was a news article that day, with the owner of MTV saying they control the teenagers of this generation. The only reason why the culture is the way it is today is because people say that's how it has always been, when in the first place it has never always been like this, but because of ignorant persistence we assume the culture is as such, i.e. culture is what culture says.

Haha. That's a chunky statement to digest but the moral of the story is this.

Make a stand. Let's chuck out all the undesirable elements and transform the deteriorating morality of today's culture. Because culture is what culture says, say something different.

Say something morally right.

(This post is long enough already. So I have to refrain from delving into the spiritual elements of such an issue. And of course the whole issue could span pages and pages. So I've just written what's on my mind and quickly jump from intro to conclusion. The processing bits have to be left out.)

The wait is over

Ahh.

So what has happened in the past 2 months and quite a bit?

Well. Firstly, I have to say I was busy. My half completed post is lying somewhere in the deep recesses of another person's hard drive, which I used as borrowed storage space when I had to format this computer.

And it all started when my internet connection failed.

OK. So it was either a hardware or software problem.

Well, I can't be bothered to post the whole process up but the conclusion was that it was BOTH a software and hardware problem.

So I had to format this computer, and then I went out to buy a wireless USB adapter.

And there we are. I'm back.

What's happening in my life?

For those of you who know I'm a huge David Crowder Band fan (although I don't quite like the use of the word 'fan', it's more of an affinity for their work. I don't go crazy over them.), they are recording their new album, as of 3 weeks in the making. If you go to this site, you can catch them recording their new album, Remedy. Pretty neat the webcams and the clip of the days and all.

Easter is over. It was a really busy week, editing videos and all. And then I spent the earlier part of this week pretty sick.

And finally, I'm 18!

Haha. I just had to say that. Ah well.

Next post will be up soon. I hope. Haha. Again it depends on the teachers at school. I'm half tempted to just miss every single lesson except history, since my As in those subject are no longer going to be dependent on lesson attendance.

The Philosophy of Weng: Fiction or Truth, Coming Soon

I have released the title of my next post.

Here I shall attempt to briefly explain the reason why I believe the Bible is without a doubt the word of God, the one and only truth. That it is not mere fiction or a collection of stories and sayings as the world falsely claims, but it is the living Word, with the power to transform lives, not because it preaches good philosophies to live by, but because it essentially condemns the sinfulness of man, the futility of trying to live a good life, and points to the one and only way, the one and only truth, the one and only life, that through Jesus Christ, that by His power in us, He not only forgives us of our past wrongs, but gives us power to live the present by His holy standards, and assurance of a future with Him in heaven.

This will be updated shortly. It's still currently being word processed. I don't want to make this overly shoddy yet I know it will be impossible to put forth every single argument, because I might as well attempt to write a book at that point, which I know will be an impossible task, what with the immense research and planning needed.

Instead, to a satisfying standard, I wish to highlight why I have such faith in the Bible, briefly explaining the evidence that has convinced me as such. And beyond the physical realm, I also wish to point out the supernatural power of the Bible, not like that of the movies where you show it to an evil spirit and it forces it to flee, but the power to take man from his depravity into the divinity of the Godhead. To live for what he was really created for.

I realise there might be many terms I use that are unfamiliar, as I seem to use a lot of Christian lingo here. But I'll do my utter best to couch it in terms that are familiar and explain that which is unfamiliar.

Be warned. This post is not one you should merely dismiss. And I'm dead serious on this. Because yet again I will reiterate this line: If you really believe that what you believe is really real, then you will indeed live by that belief no matter what..

And I really believe that my belief "that the Bible is the truth of God, the living Word", is really real, and as such I strive to live by it daily.