Simple reflection....

Travelling on a scenic path and early morning to one of the work place today was good. I could help but marveled at a sight I saw today. It was a sight of a very young girl holding onto the father on a m/cycle in the early morning mist.. It was really a pretty sight indeed. You see, the girl was seated at the back seat while the father maneuvered his way to send the young one to school. The small size young girl was practically clinging on/latching unto the well built father nestling her face at the back body of his father. This scene played on my mind as I traveled to my destination. I could not shake it off and I know, it is my daily lesson with God.

It often reminded me that just like the young girl - how much we have all forgotten to hang on to our Father in heaven. We are all so aware of the promises that had been laid in front of us by our Father in heaven but we always seemed to want to go our way or turn wayward. In a world where stolen waters, stolen joy, temptations and the lust of the night are considered norms of life, we have forgotten how to cling on to the One that mattered most, turned away from these temptations and rest in His soothing Words. I must say, I am no exception too, at times. Many times, when we are faced with our challenges, our fears, our adversaries or even the unfolding of unfortunate events in our lives and yet we run to a corner and hide ourselves away from the dusty and weary world we live in. Our problems, our difficulties, our pain, our reservations, our short-comings all seemed to be bigger than God himself. We have always forgotten that we have a bigger God indeed who just wants us to cling on to him and trust Him. A God of a future and hope. A God of love, merciful and great grace.  

To many detractors, trusting Him may be just a little absurd and a waste of time, but daily miracles in our daily lives don't lie either. We are the living miracle of God's goodness. Sometimes we abused our lives so much with envy, reservation, mistrust, negativity, jealousy and self-pity that we practically deprived God's miracle working in our lives. Sometimes, I do wish I was the young girl on that m/cycle clinging on to strong father and trusting the rider of my life, GOD. 

Let us not lose sight of God in our heart, our mind and our soul. Our adversary knows that when we lose sight of our rider of life, we get derailed in our faith and we fall into temptation and sin so easily. Hang on to our Father in heaven no matter what you go through today. Afterall, He had paid the ultimate price for us IN FULL! Have a great week ahead!~     

A sight....

Driving to work the other day, I am visibly impaired by the lush flying of posters, banners, buntings and flags from the political parties at every inch of the road, small hills, road verge and even lamp posts. Nothing is spared from the draping of these paraphernalia from the contesting political parties in the coming GE13. It is almost "choking" to find a sea of blue at every nook, bend and corner of the road. It kinda make you wonder, " Where did all this money come from?". we all know that it is only once in every 4 years and so, the festivities type of political wars waged on.

A lawyer friend used to tell me that there are good people on both sides of the political fence. I tend to agree but sometimes I do wish that the "good" could please stand up firmly and do the right thing. Following the masses of donkeys makes one a donkey at the end. An elderly man at my food table quipped that the behavioural patterns of the youngsters are alarming and bad these days unlike their time. Well, the other middle aged man nodded his head in agreement and then asked me on what I think of this view. I told both the gentlemen that in the earlier years, we depended a lot on susu gantung and less susu lembu. But with modern times, we depended a lot on susu lembu and that's why we produce lembus at times! Hopefully, those lembus don't come from the NFC stables!  This cracked up the two elderly gentlemen at my table.

In many ways, we want to built boys into manhood but instead we built more hoods than men. The level of atrocities, bullying and even rowdiness behaviour have taken a hold of our young people today. For fistful of ringgits, they would do anything. This is the culture we have created in our young people. Give them some money, go and create fear and do the intimidation war dance. It is sad not to be able to hear intellectually good debates on what the politicians have to offer for the country. There are always rowdies, bad hats, paid off hoodlums to mess up political gathering. This is meant to prick both side of the fences! I daresay, the Opposition nor the Govt are not innocent in this either. 

I remembered hearing good political ceramahs with very few incidences of interference or rowdiness. I think, basically, what the rakyat wants is to hear what can be done for the ailing economy of this country and the stop of continuous robbing our of EPF money. For me, I want to hear what are the remedies for our fast drowning policies and glaring robbing of the country's kitty. I am sick of the promises of "trying to clean up" from both side of the fence. I want to hear what are the clean-up plans and rewarding back to the rakyat. Short stop measures are not solutions. We need productive procedures to cut these draining leaks the corruption culture in our society. Every level of the society had been infected by this social disease call corruption or corruption culture. Sometimes it becomes a norm that it sickens you to the bones when dealing with it. There must be concrete evidence to really tackle the issues at hand.

BTW, the throwing of Molotov cocktails, throwing paints at the ruling party Bilik Gerakans and so on, are just scare tactics. I believe all these are intimidation to fan hatred towards one another and create animosity towards each other.Let us all not to be hoodwink by such "easy " targets and such dastardly act of playing the racial disharmony cards. What racial riots are you talking about? Malaysians today are not blind and dumb, anymore. Scare tactics don't work anymore because what good are we to say we love God in our own religion but we are allowed to hurt another fellow human being? If this happens, we are one mistaken and disillusioned society indeed. Then, one cannot be a people of God if we have that type of mentality. If one do have that mentality then,that person is the citizen of the evil. As far as I know, if one practises evil , neraka is the final fantasy destination. So, let's be civil and go through this GE13 the very best we can. We do our rightful duty by voting the right people into our government. Let's get rid of corrupt leaders and let's be daring enough to do what is right in the sight of God. Afterall, HE is watching us. My God bless us all !

Outbac CCC Melaka Youths Broga Experience!

Youths today are a bunch of interesting people and that's why spending 3 days with them at an adventure outing can be quite a task. However, I have learnt over the years that once they get into the groove of things about an outing they would be able to enjoy themselves as they experience the new challenges of a camp setting. I am tremendously honored to have been able to work with a team of youth leaders in CCC Melaka in regards to a camp/outing adventure. Though I have my reservations at first as I am still very "raw & new" in this church but the encouragement and the opportunity given to me was a real encouragement. I am humbled and I remain humble that there may be others who may have more experience than me in planning for such a camp but somehow, I am blessed to be given the honor to help out in this camp/outing.

Though camps and planning for an outing for young children and youths are my passion, I somehow attract the wrath of my lifelong partner, SLing as she was very concerned of my health condition.  Afterall, like I have said so many times, I ain't no spring chicken no more as bones and muscles creaked and tweaked like mad! 

To be honest, I couldn't resist the draw of my love for the youths to know of God's love that made me plan for this camp. How could I not lend or impart my knowledge and expertise in such a field for the glory of His Name? I prayed real hard that day and I prayed for God to grant me His favor once again. In fact, my only prayers for the camp is for the Lord to bless the youths and the leaders with His love. I also prayed for good weather, good message and even a great teamwork in the team of leaders and youths. I thank God that He gave us good weather, good instructors and solid teamwork of leaders & youths throughout the camp. I truly felt really blessed, honored and humbled by all that had happened.

So, Outbac Broga is the campsite chosen and the leaders' works began. As I was practically a newbie to the church, I hardly knew anyone in the church ministry and I struggled a bit knowing who is who in the youth group. It wasn't easy convincing these young people to participate in a camp such as this but the youth leaders were willing to go all out for this. The leaders were encouraging, excited, extremely patient and the support given was tremendous. I guess, it wasn't easy for them to support an "unknown " like me but they trusted me and that was very important to me. Afterall, we are to work together in this camp.

With great minds and concerted effort, the camp became a reality and I am glad they trusted an old fool like me. I count myself really fortunate to have the church leaders' trust & support, the youth leaders support and God's wondrous support. 

To equipped me with task ahead, I had recruited Stephen Raj, John Ng, Ivy Wong, Charlene Lim and Stefanie Sim to help me out during camp. The help given was tremendous and they gave their limbs, muscles, sweat , blood and tears to help the youths go through the activities without a hitch. Aaron, Jonathan, Kenneth, David, Joel gave their all for the young people and it was very satisfying to see that happening. I am truly blessed by the great tenacity and determination to get the youth safely when doing the activities.

The young people were treated to the Leap of Faith ( confidence building indeed ) , Broga Challenge Race, Wall Climbing, Kayaking, Archery, Rock Climbing ( really tough climb amidst the backdrop of a nearby waterfall ) , Water Tubing ( 5 seconds of pure madness! ) and the highlight of the events, Caving ( a  real squeeze at the narrow & tight waterways and the exquisite expression, " What have I put myself into?" scenario! ) The activities were chosen to basically equipped the young people with confidence, exposure to physical challenges and to gel together as a team. I can safely say that the youths and leaders had bonded well indeed.

The teamwork shown was tremendous. The co-operation given was superb and the steadfastness to complete an activity was astoundingly encouraging. It was a real blessing to see everything run smoothly as it is. I thank God for that and as the night rally comes, the worship team led by Joel Lim & Esther were tremendous indeed.

As the camp drew to the its finale, I want to thank GOD, the church, Pastor Joanne,  the youth leaders, helpers ( my machais ) and the young people for making this outing a memorable on for the CCC Youths. It was incredibly exciting and exhilarating in  many ways as youth whined and twined through the activities but they did great indeed. So, thank you everyone for trusting an old fool like me and thank you GOD for fine weather, incident free camp and once again proving that GOD is indeed Our Refuge and Strength!

Stall talk....

This morning, I stopped by at my favourite roti canai stall to enjoy my ritualistic roti canai fare as usual. I couldn't miss the irresistible draw of the crunchy yet less oily Malaysian favourite breakfast delicacy. As usual, the stall was packed with the early crowd and I sought out a place to sit beside a white-haired old Malay man who seemed to enjoy his meal. I nodded and asked if I could sit with him at the table and he gladly and warmly offered me a seat. After some small talk and pleasantries, Pak Bakar started the conversation on the blistering heat and stupendously hot weather these days. I echoed the same and that started the conversation. 

I guess, in many ways, I easily fit into his conversation as he spoke on what to eat in the morning except for the Malaysian favourites like nasi lemak, roti canai, mee goreng and so on. He went on to comment about some places nearby who sold these nice breakfast fares but somehow, they have lost the lustre of preparing it the old ways. It was an interesting conversation when he spoke of the old ways in preparing these favourite fares. He wasn't a boastful man like most people at stalls would do as he merely informed of the ways of the food preparation in the old ways. I guess, it was interesting those days and how true that food prepared in the old/traditional ways always tasted much better. I caught a few tips or two from him in regards to preparing nice assam fish, nasi lemak and cili garam fish - some of favourite dishes, actually.

Like all conversations, it slowly drifted to family and so on. I came to know that he had six children and he wasn't on good terms with the eldest son in the family. He looked pained each time he mentioned about his son. Slowly but surely, I managed to extract from this man on why the relationship was strained. It was sad to learn that due to a superstitions of the olden days, the son was sent to be with his grandma very early in his life and the relationship was strained further. I guess, the son felt the rejection very early in life and that probably would have scarred him with rejection.I don't know why but I told this old man that it is never too late to re-concille with his son. I even took the trouble to tell him that eventhough we may be old, if we don't say sorry for things we have not made right in our lives especially this one, life would not get any better. He looked at me stunned for a while. I continued telling him that if God forgives us for so many of our imperfections, why wouldn't he do the same with his son and re-concilled as a family? Boldly, I told him that it doesn't make us , the old ones , any lesser a man if we are to apologise for our wrong choices/actions. I was ready for a backlash from this old man but surprisingly, it did not come. Instead, I got an old man looking intently at me and as though waiting for more to come. I took the courage and told him that every child born in this world wants to be loved and need love. How could  we not give that and be a part of their lives? We should not spoil them but we should teach them the principles of God. I told him gladly too that I am a Christian and though I may not be much of a father but I would love and sacrificed my life for my children as they are a gift from God. He looked at me intently and then he told me that I gave better answer than some of his fellow brothers. I don't know what it meant but he sure looked genuinely lighted up by what I have just said. All the while , I prayed in my heart, "Lord, thank you for the boldness. Thank you! "

BTW, I also did tell him that all this superstitions and "tilik nasib" are nonsense and a bunch of lies concocted by soothsayers and people who are not of God's kingdom. I told him point blank that these things are karut, irresponsible and life damaging indeed.We should get rid of these things from our lives and start believing God. I didn't realised that there were so many people sitting around us. Some gave me a smile. Some gave me the thumbs up and some just looked at me unimpressed. Well, whatever it is , I have spoken from my heart. That's all that matters. I paid for the food, wished Pak Bakar well and before I leave, I told Pak Bakar to make the call and do what is right. Somehow, he seemed to look much......calmer and happier, I guess. 

To me, I had my miracle today - speaking boldly where it matters. I have learned over the weekend to expect a miracle a day. I am exercising that faith!~ What about you? Expect a miracle each day of your life. Exercise that faith of yours!