Saturday, November 27, 2004

a friend asked why can't we get attached now

this is an excerpt from 'i kissed dating goodbye' by Joshua Harris

"
'but when i changed my attitude and made pleasing GOd and blessing others my first priorities, i found true peace and joy. when i stopped seeing girls as potential girlfriends and started traeting them as sisters in Christ, i discovered the richness of true friendship. WHen i stopped worrying about whom i was going to marry and began trusting God's tmiming, i uncovered the incredible potential of serving God as a single. And when i stopped flirting with temptation in one-on-one dating relationships and started pursuing righteousness, i uncovered the peace and power that come from purity.i kissed dating goodbye because i foudn out that GOd has sth better in store!'


basically, if u 'love your neighbour as yourself', you would express true love for a person u like. and true love isn't just expressed in passionately whispered words or an intimate kiss or an embrace' before 2 ppl are married, love is expressed in self-control, patienece, even words left unsaid.

while relationships are great, they're extremely attractive, i would have no business asking for a girls' heart and exclusive affections if im not ready to consider marriage. until i can do that, i'd only be using that girl to meet my short-term needs, not seeking to bless her for the longer term.


would i enjoy having a girlfriend right now?
YEA MAN
but i wouldn't be truly loving her
and putting her interests first.



matthew admired God's creations at 2:57 AM [comment]

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our team photo! 

matthew admired God's creations at 2:07 AM [comment]

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GRAD NIGHT PICS"RE UP! (much to the joy of zul)


matthew admired God's creations at 1:27 AM [comment]

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Friday, November 26, 2004

haven't blogged seriously in a while, i think its difficult to gather so many thoughts from such a long period of time and chart them down all in a session.

life after o's hasn't been as ideal as much of us have eagerly anticipated. for me, its been filled with lethargy from moving heavy boxes and attending trainings for the mission trip. there was also the graduation dinner which was really a great time, i didn't feel sad at all cus i know i'd see most of my friends next year again.

i used to enjoy moving alot, because it meant a new environment. i got tired of having to face the same look everyday, so i looked forward to moving. however, i recently realised why my parents hated moving, its a taxing process...after u painstakingly pack everything into boxes u have to unpack them again. the worst part was transferring my fish tank. its super heavy..and the movers couldn't transport it for me because they were afraid of spillage or killing the fish. so i had to get two movers to help me carry the fish tank to the car, and it was put on my lap till we got to farrer court, which fortunately isn't too far. then my poor grandpa had to help me carry it up, fortunately to the 2nd floor. so im in the midst of unpacking...and i must take it seriously cus i'll be in this place for a pretty long time.

i went for a session of training for mission trip yesterday, it was quite meaningful i guess. i wasn't able to attend the past few sessions because of grad night and other things(can't remember what)..so i had a little trouble catching up with the songs. we were trying to speak in chinese all the way which was really amusing because ben khong can't speak chinese hahah, and our prayers in chinese sounded weird. yet it doesn't really matter cus God knows our heart. the people in n.thailand speak chinese, so this was necessary to prepare us for a 'culture shock'. nevertheless, we had fun learning art and craft (so that we can teach the children there), and singing chinese songs, and learning how to spread the gospel with a tiny colourful booklet.

the books with 5 colours, gold, black, red, white, green, so roughly we're supposed to ask them what gold reminds them of. usually its something precious, like money, or something beautiful. so we're to relate it to heaven, and tell them that its a beautiful place, and add stuff like its streets are paved with gold. most importantly, its a beautiful place because nobody will ever be upset, or anxious, but joyous for eternity. God loves, you, he loves everyone, and he wants us to live with Him forever, in a place which he has prepared for us..heaven!

then we flip to the black paper. what does it remind you of? coal, tar, basically something dirty. like these black stuff, sin dirties our life, and makes it impossible to get to heaven. how can the dirtiness of a black paper compare to the splendour of the golden paper? so we ask them whether they've lied, or hated anyone before etc, and tell them they've become black. put simply, we want to live without God, and to do as we please...to be as bad as we like. this is called sin! everyone is a sinner. so when we sin...we make a barrier between us and God. the result of sin is death and separation - away from God forever. and we can no longer become 'gold'.

we can try to get back to God, but efforts would be in vain. we can try to rely on our self effort to be good, we can try to buy our way to heaven with money, we can try to seek God with our knowledge, and we can even go to church, but we are still the same on the inside! we can't break through this sin barrier ourselves, but there is good news!

then we flip to the red piece of paper. what does it remind u of? usually its blood. so we say God sent his only son, Jesus Christ to die for us on the cross.

john 3:16 "For God so loved the world that He gave us His one and only Son, Jesus christ, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have Eternal Life."

His blood bore the burden of sin for all of us. Just a side note, let me create an analogy.
"during the japanese occupation, there was a POW camp. and this POW camp stored a lot of food supplies for the japanese. so one day, a few sacks of food supplies went missing, and the japanese soldiers rounded up the POWs to interrogate them as they were suspected of stealing the food supplies. none of the POWs stepped forward to admit they had stolen the food, so the soldiers threatened to kill all of them if nobody stepped forth. after a stifled silence, a POW stepped forward and was shot instantly. the rest of the POWs were allowed to go back to their quarters. a few days later, the japanese found the food sacks that they thought had been missing. they had killed an innocent man!"

similarly, Jesus took the blame for all the sins that we have or will commit. He came to earth and suffered in many ways. he got rejected by pharisees and such, as they thought the messiah's coming would be a grand one. the christians knew of a messiah's (meaning saviour) coming as predicted by the prophets in the old testament of the bible. but they didn't believe that God would send Jesus, who was born in a stable and led a humble life. they probably expected trumpeting angels and a gold-studded cradle or something. this is why the jews and the muslims (i think) are still waiting for the messiah till this very day.

back to the coloured papers! we then flip to the white piece of paper. what does white remind u of? purity right, just like what Jesus was. Jesus was absolutely sinless, therefore he had the authority to die for us (not any Tom, Dick or Harry can die for us on the cross right). So in order for us to get to the 'goldness of heaven', we need to get rid of the 'blackness of sin', which can ONLY be done by the 'redness of Jesus's blood', so that we can become like the 'whiteness of sinlessness/purity'

what makes it even more remarkable is that after Jesus died, He was buried, but HE rose from the dead on the third day! ressurected! this is something the jews/muslims(i think) refuse to believe..but anyway this means Jesus CHrist is ALIVE today! and he has broken the power of SIN for us! there is no longer a barrier between us and God!

so after that we're supposed to ask if the person wants to accept Jesus as his/her personal saviour ( in other words, get back to God and the marvellous life He promises), we're supposed to pray the sinner's prayer with him, which basically focuses on

repenting - to be sorry for our sins, and to ask Jesus for forgiveness
believing - to believe that Jesus came to earth and died for us.
inviting - to pray and invite Jesus into our hearts and our life, to let Jesus be the Lord of our lives.

"dear Jesus, thank you for loving me and dying on the cross for my sins. i have sinned and gone my own way. please forgive me of my sins, come into my heart and be the Lord of my life today and forever. In Jesus' name i pray, Amen"

there..isn't it simple? attaining eternal life and having Jesus being the Lord of our lives? its a very assuring and wonderful thing, and God promises
"whoever comes to Me, i will never drive away." John 6:37
"i am with you always." Matthew 28:20
"i will never leave you." HEbrews 13:5

haha...i bet some of you aren't impressed by all this. hey, i dont blame you all, singapore's such a great place with a good government (relatively). so everyone's leading material-wise healthy lives, and so, everyone's contented with their lifestyles. when everyone's happy, change isn't necessary. but what people fail to realise is that they aren't happy inside, because life has no purpose. why are people on this earth? they can't answer that. so while mugging their heads off night and day, students like me strive to score good grades so they can get a good job, have a happy family and die after that. but they fail to realise the story doesn't end after that.

anyway...back to boring, everyday life.

grad dinner was a blast. it wasn't sad at all (except for the batch song), and everyone looked different dressed up and with their hair dyed. quite cool..hahah joey's outfit was amusing. anyway, the food sucked. it was so little and not that great. only the fish, the bread, and the free flow of drinks were good. =D come to think of it...it wasn't a free flow -_- anyway the performances and games were pretty good...yabbie was an amusing mc...hahahh. and i liked the the play with the aloe vera joke ( what did one aloe vera say to the other? ALOE!!!) and the torchlight time portal with the increasing pupil size. that received the loudest applause. after that team x went to teo's house, but everyone was loitering outside taking pictures. i took with team x, with the gymmers and the inofficial soccer team. the gym picture was cool, we did it with handstands! and after that there was the short video of us doing back somersaults outside the toilets hahah.

so we headed off to teo's house...and we watched peter schmeichel's video. luckily cedric wasn't there or else he'd say he can 'do that too' or something. i didn't like the video cus dan petrescu and zola kept missing -_- i played a bit of fifa 2005 and i couldn't score but i didn't concede any either! after that i went to sleep cus i was tired. i was the earliest to sleep and the last to awake! taoni's made, he slept at 6 and woke up earlier than me. -__________- then i watched matchstick men. i haven't finished watching! and it seems like quite an interesting show! and i haven't finished it...only 3/4 way through. so im gonna borrow it sometime and finish watching it.

we were late for the PAE briefing. hahah and cedric's wife/mistress/girlfriend wuz screaming at us as we entered the hall. after that i went home....and it was MOOOOOOOVING TIME. haii actually moving was quite frustrating, i was quite tired and i became bothered cuz my parents were ordering me around to help carry things or pack things. so i haven't been having very good thoughts lately. like when my mum asks me to go down to the carpark to bring something up, i start grumbling..so i realy hope everything gets unpacked soon. nevertheless, its nice having a new environment. my shared room w my brother has a orange wall...which matches my very first soft toy garfield...hahah.

anyway, tomorrow's an exciting day. i think i wont be blogging till i come back from n. thailand. then i'll tell you all about it! but after that i'll be going to japan. then i'll come back and tell you all about it! this is what i call an exciting holiday =D









matthew admired God's creations at 7:00 PM [comment]

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i've moved! and i have a new house number!

151G King's road
#02-27
S(268164)

my new house number's 64723733

please update!


matthew admired God's creations at 9:41 AM [comment]

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Friday, November 19, 2004

heeeeeeeeyyyy its ovERRRRrrrrrrrrrr =D

i can' t think of anything meaningful to write cuz what i'd write would be what you'd be reading on others' blogs about how the o levels are over and how happy they are ^_^

my sentiments exactly


matthew admired God's creations at 10:07 PM [comment]

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