Sunday, April 29, 2007

Greater is He

Greater is He who's in me /
Greater is He than all the earth /
(something something and something) my closest friend, my saviour /
So much more than I deserve..


I really love the chorus of this worship song..

"Greater is He who's in me"
- Relating who and where God is to who and where I am is just so mind blowing. God you are so far above me, your thoughts are not my thoughts; your ways are not my ways - they are higher, better and far wider than I could dream of.
Yet You choose to live in me. Of all the places in the universe.

"Greater is He than all the earth" - Bigger and greater in size, thought, understanding and wisdom. And also, bigger than all our problems and tiny little issues. Did you say you had a problem? That's alright, when it's so much smaller than our God.

And finally, so truly.. He is so much more than we deserve. True companion, faithful friend, present help in times of need.. If we could have one earthly friend like that, it would already be beyond anything anyone deserves. What have we done to deserve this? Absolutely nothing and nothing we can ever do can deserve it..

Thank you Jesus.


OH YESSSS.
I really typed (something something and something) before I decided it looked too silly and smsed resident stork to find out what the ACTUAL lyrics were. So much for being musical! Super can't remember song lyrics EVEN WHEN I AM NOT ON DUTY *grumble grumble*. Bah.

Oh and yesssss!!
Mr CHOW YONG QUAN is in the Emerge Manhunt!!! OMGGGGGG!!! Lets all vote for him, when he wins and becomes famous we can blackmail him with all the unglam photos taken during section chalet and outings! ROFL!!!!

Finally, saw this while surfing on the net.. Haha! I like!

Practicality courtesy of Benefit Cosmetics, SF. Woo. Shall go check them out when I go there in June (OMGGGGGGG only one month more!! Help!)


Update: Got the song lyrics finally right.
who am i
that You wash my feet
prince of heaven's blood
shed for me

who am i
that You called my name
nailed my sin to the cross
unfailing grace

greater is He who's in me
greater is He than all the earth
my closest friend, my saviour
so much more than i deserve

let my life bring You honour
let my words bring You grace
Your great love is what i want

my refuge
my shelter
my healer and rest
almighty redeemer
salvation and strength

Thursday, April 26, 2007

Tanjong Katong Road

Sometimes you don't realize how much memories you have built up in one place till you revisit it.

Waiting a long long time for a bus is a good thing sometimes as you have nothing! to do except reminiscence.

Skinny narrow roads packed with shophouses aside, cars parked double that drivers nonchalantly wind their way around, food shops outnumbering every other kind 2 to 1, windy busy roads, old school buildings, short HDB flats, small and big hawkers behind (i think i saw the char kway teow there still!), the place where I learnt to love ban mian, rojak and Teh C ping. Taking 197 from home to church even though the journey takes close to 2 hours cos of the circuitous route because it's only route that didn't require a change of bus and hence saves money. The simple devotion and single heartedness that meant scrimping and saving for months on end to give to building fund. A world less complicated. Queueing on the steps of Hollywood in the sweltering sun to 'chiong' into service. Sitting on the same steps after service has finished and hall is cleaned up and only the ushers are left. Briefing under the huge carpark trees. Umbrella service to and from KFC in Lion City Hotel.

The thought struck me that maybe we should have a building fund to buy back Hollywood again and transform it back into the place so many of us knew and loved and grew up in. From our humble beginnings to where we are today. OK OK don't stone me. But still.


The gathering storms while I was waiting for my tardy bus reminded me of the songs we used to sing too.


When the oceans rise and thunders roar / I will soar with You above the storm / Father You are king over the flood / I will be still and know you are God

And even through the long bus journey from Tanjong Katong to Yio Chu Kang, I kept on singing these songs in my mind.

I miss the simplicity.

Monday, April 23, 2007

Two Prawns and a Stork

Once upon a time, there were two prawns who lived on the bottom of the sea. They were best buddies and their names were John and Christian. They swam everywhere together, hung out together and generally did all the prawny things that prawns do.

John and Christian generally had a very happy life, bar only one worry: They were afraid of sharks, because sharks eat prawns. So whenever a shark swam by, John and Christian would hide for fear of being eaten.

One day, John the prawn was swimming along by himself when he saw a codfish stuck under a rock. Being a very kind prawn, John decided to help the cod out of its predicament and began tugging and struggling with the rock. Soon, the cod was free.

"Oh thank you for your kindness in helping me," the cod said. "I am a powerful cod. Let me grant you a wish in return."

John gave the matter some thought. Finally, he replied:

"I know. Make me into a shark, please. I have been hiding from sharks all my life and I don't want to be bullied by them anymore."

"Sure!" And the cod turned John into a shark.

John excitedly swam back to the prawns' hangout to look for Christian, his best buddy. However, Christian hid when John came near - after all, John was now a shark, Christian's worst fear! No matter how many times John came to look for Christian, Christian would always hide and refuse to see John.

John became angry, depressed and lonely. He thought long and hard about his situation and came to the conclusion: He would have to find the cod again, and ask to be restored.

Well one day, lo and behold, John the shark spotted the self-same cod stuck under another rock. (Seems like this cod had a rock fetish but no, let's not go into that...) Very pleased, John the shark rushed over and freed the cod. As expected, the cod granted John another wish and John immediately asked to be turned back into a prawn.

John, now restored to his prawn form, headed straight for Christian's.

"Christian! Christian! Where are you?? I'm John and I'm back to see you!"

"No! John! Why can't you understand?" the hidden Christian yelled. "We can't be friends anymore - You are a shark and I am a prawn!"

Whereupon John shouted: "No! YOU don't understand! I met COD, I'm a PRAWN-AGAIN CHRISTIAN!!!








(long pause for the silence of incomprehension to pass)

OMG SO LAME RIGHT?????

"I met GOD, I'm a BORN-AGAIN CHRISTIAN!!!"



Wait a minute, then how does the Stork come into the story?

Ah.

The story, above, courtesy of 4S5 resident Stork, Jingxuan.

Teehee.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

I died laughing

“I have this theory that if one person can go out of their way to show compassion then it will start a chain reaction of the same.”

- Rachel Joy Scott, victim of the Columbine High School Massacre

The Ride of Your Life


If only proteins were really rollercoasters. The alpha-helices alone would be well worth it.



See link here.

Sunday, April 15, 2007

The Lion and The Stork

(or how seemingly random conversations degenerate into the nonsensical in the presence of storks)

JX: hihi. I could recognize you from across the indoor stadium today cos of the way you smooth and touch your hair.. lol!

HM: erps!

JX: Yes! STORKing you la!

HM: Suddenly, the stork fell over. The good samaritan rushed over to help and discovered that the stork was LAME!

JX: So the healing evangelist came over and asked what was wrong for all these years, and the stork replied: Years ago, the LION made me lame.

- SMS exchange proudly brought to you by Jingxuan (stork) and Huiming (lion)

Friday, April 13, 2007

走火入魔

Dreamt last night that I was attending Pst Benny Hinn's service and he was prophesying over me. Forgot prophesy what though, except that it was something eminently ridiculous.

And started blabbering to my student about BH logis over the phone, thinking he was my usher.
When what I actually needed him to do was help me buy food.

Sigh..

Friday, April 06, 2007

the greatest love of all is mine

now i've found
the greatest love of all is mine
since you laid down your life
the greatest sacrifice

majesty
your grace has found me just as i am
empty handed but alive in your hands


--------------

Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.
- Aristotle

It is constant effort to be first-class in everything one attempts that conquers the heights of excellence.
- Orison Swett Marden (1850 - 1924)

Excellence is best described as doing the right things right - selecting the most important things to be done and then accomplishing them 100% correctly.
- Author Unknown
The quality of a person's life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor.
Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection, we can catch excellence.
- Vince Lombardi (1913 - 1970)

I want to be excellent.
Not because of me, but because of You.
Jiayou..

Thursday, April 05, 2007

Sucks to be sick

and completely out of it for the past two days.

Heck I just woke up at 11plus pm thinking it was time to go to work on Thursday morning and with a totallyfuzzy recollection of answered-and-promptly-deleted-from-memory calls and smses and a sensation that these people who have been disturbing my drug-induced sleep are terribly, terribly rude to have interrupted my slumber at such completely unreasonable times as 9pm - hence they deserve to have everything! they've told me in the past 48 hours forgotten.

Or is that just my attempt to put off those vague sheepish "sorry-but-did-you-call-me-or-was-I-dreaming-and-what-did-you-say" calls. Haha.

So here I am at 1am, not because there is no need for more sleep, but because drifting in and out of headaches, bodyaches, pyrexia and druggedness has left me with a massive amount of undone work. And up goes the temp again, its going to be hard to fall back to sleep for the rest of the night.

Ok work.. Enough of whining already!

Wednesday, April 04, 2007

The Reason

"What is it, Yeshua?" she asked.

I swallowed. I felt my voice would be too big for me if I tried to say it, yet say it I did.

"Only what everyone has to learn," I said. "I don't know why I didn't see it before." The man on the stones. The lamb. The children. I looked at her.

"Tell me," she said.

"Yes!" I whispered. "Why didn't I see it?"

"Tell me," she said.

"It's so simple. It won't mean anything to you until it comes to you, no matter who you are."

"I want to know," she said.

"It's this. That whatever is born into this world, no matter how, and for whatever reason, is born to die."

She didn't answer.

I stood up. I went outside. It was getting dark. I walked through the street and out to the hillside and up to where the grass was soft and undisturbed. This was my favourite place, just short of the grove of trees near which I loved so to rest.

I looked up at the first few stars coming through the twilight.

Born to die, I thought. Yes, born to die. Why else would I be born of a woman? Why else would I be flesh and blood if it wasn't to die? The pain was so terrible I didn't think I could bear it. I would go home crying if I didn't stop thinking of it. But no, that must not happen. No, never again.

And when will the angels come to me with such bright light that I am not afraid of it? When will the angels fill up the sky with singing so that I can see them? When will angels come to me in my dreams?

A quiet fell over me, just when I thought my heart would burst.

The answer came as if from the earth itself, as if from the stars, and the soft grass, and the nearby trees, and the purring of the evening.

I wasn't sent here to find angels! I wasn't sent here to dream of them. I wasn't sent here to hear them sing! I was sent here to be alive. To breathe and sweat and thirst and sometimes cry.

And everything that happened to me, everything both great and small, was something I had to learn! There was room for it in the infinite mind of the Lord and I had to seek the lesson in it, no matter how hard it was to find.

I almost laughed.

It was so simple, so beautiful. If only I could keep it in my mind, this understanding, this moment - never forget it as one day followed another, never forget it no matter what happened, never forget it no matter what came to pass.

Oh, yes, I would grow up, and there would come a time when I would leave Nazareth, surely. I would go out into the world and do what I was meant to do. Yes. But for now? All was clear. My fear was gone.

It seemed the whole world was holding me. Why had I ever thought I was alone? I was in the embrace of the earth, of those who loved me no matter what they thought or understood, of the very stars.

"Father," I said. "I am your child."

- Anne Rice
Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt

(also published at the sectionblog)

Inexorable

do you ever feel like time is bearing down on you?
and you will go crazy in your own skin because there are so many, so many things to do.

i writhe under the impossibilities.

and, therefore, i blog.

Haha.

Burdens

i wish i could see into each one of your hearts
and find in me the right words to say
to bring you back again.

Yet not my ways but Yours
not my thoughts but Yours
not my wisdom but the Spirit's outpouring
that can make the difference.


Be still, and know that He is God.


find rest my soul /
in Christ alone /
know His power /
in quietness and trust /
when the oceans rise and thunders roar /
i will soar with You above the storm /
Father you are king over the flood /
i will be still and know You are God /

Sunday, April 01, 2007

He is in control

Yes. He is.

That leaves me nothing to worry about, nothing to stress about, and nothing to pull my hair out over.

Amen.