Christianity

I remember crying during a Christian camp years ago. When asked why, I replied that I cried because everyone else was crying. And it was true. I was desperately trying to squeeze out tears just to blend in and pretty stoked that I managed to. I pictured a loved one dying.
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Everyone laughed at my reply, but I suspect that I wasn’t the only one who cried to blend in, or at least tried to look as sombre as possible. It is easy to go with the flow, without realising for oneself the profoundness of what Jesus did. It is easy to pretend to be an outward Christian, just because to turn away from that is to alienate your friends whom you grew up with. It is easy to be a Christian only when you are surrounded by Christians, and hide one’s convictions when you are surrounded by non-Christians. Like a chameleon, changing one’s colours according to the background. Trying hard not to stand out.
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It is easy to do all that when you don’t realise for yourself that God is true.
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I’ve wondered sometimes, how president Obama can be a Christian. I mean, he must be one of the smartest people in the world right? How can he believe in something so irrational as Jesus? To believe not only that there is a God, but that he send his son (whom is Him also, try working that out) to die to pay the sins of the world so that we might be sinless? What kind of brainwashed idiot would believe in that? For a long time, deep down, so deep that I can ignore it most times, I doubted that Christianity is true.
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I’ve often prayed to God that if he is true, would he please just tell me that in a clear voice that I can instantly recognise as his, or send an angel to appear right now in front of me. When I was younger, I put my hands over my short-sighted eyes and told God to give me perfect vision again. None of that happened. So I stopped praying. I stopped praying for my parents and my brother and my friends, because I doubted if God existed.
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Coming to New Zealand and being part of christian fellowship forced me to wrestle with my doubts. At times, I feel convicted that God is true. At times, I doubted. I am thankful for the opportunities I’ve had to express my doubts and not be shot down with a routine ‘go read the bible’ or ‘you need to pray more’ reply, or be met with a shocked ‘you infidel!’ expression. Honestly, responses like these only encourage Christians to stop thinking about why they believe what they do. When the rest of the world is thinking, how can we afford not to? 1 Peter 3:15: “… Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have…”
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Although part of believing involves God’s spirit working through us, a stronger conviction requires it to be rationally possible, at least, for the Christian God to be true. I know for me it does. Because I cannot believe in something that has a 0% chance of existing. Why don’t I just jump off a cliff instead and believe that something will save me?

.To come to the conclusion that the Christian God can be true, I’ve wrestled with questions such as:
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Is there a God? Is this God the same one as the one proclaimed in the Bible? Is the Bible true? Did Jesus really exist? Did he and his disciples speak the truth? Like Buz said, there is no reason to assume that Peter and the other writers of the Bible weren’t as intellectual as we are now. Some of these writers saw and knew Jesus personally, and even died horrendously because they knew that Jesus was true.
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To be honest, I am still grappling with some issues, as any thinking Christian should be. But I know the basics of Christianity to be true, from thinking rationally about it and being convicted by the Spirit.
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I came back from student leadership camp last week, feeling refreshed and renewed in my faith.
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One lesson from SLC is contained in Psalm 23. God is sovereign. What Nigel said is true. To worry is to sin, for then we stop placing our trust in God. My future is in God’s hands, and deep down, I know his plans for me can only be good, even if it involves some suffering and hardship here and there.
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Another lesson is that of having an undivided life. To be a Christian is to be a Christian all the time, not just in church. And when you know the truth of the gospel, how can you compartmentalise your life? The joy of salvation cannot be contained.
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I’m writing this down so that I can come back to it when doubts haunt me again. Also, I hope it encourages those who are struggling with their faith to not be afraid of expressing that doubt and to take steps towards resolving them. Like Andy prayed after his talk, I hope that anything I’ve wrote which is not from God is erased from your minds, and that which is from God remains forever.

All for Thee

Take my life, and let it be
Consecrated, Lord, to Thee.
Take my moments and my days;
Let them flow in ceaseless praise.

Take my hands, and let them move
At the impulse of Thy love.
Take my feet, and let them be
Swift and beautiful for Thee.

Take my voice, and let me sing,
Always, only, for my King.
Take my lips, and let them be
Filled with messages from Thee.

Take my silver and my gold;
Not a mite would I withhold.
Take my intellect, and use
Every power as Thou shalt choose.

Take my will, and make it Thine;
It shall be no longer mine.
Take my heart, it is Thine own;
It shall be Thy royal throne.

Take my love; my Lord, I pour
At Thy feet its treasure-store.
Take myself, and I will be
Ever, only, all for Thee.

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For once in a long long time, I can mean what I sing.. more thoughts on Student Leadership Camp soon!

I should have thought of this...

BEFORE I lost all my earrings T_T

My creative juices were overflowing, so I made my own jewellery holder! Not bad right.. As you can see, I love my hoop earrings.

This one Ruth gave me one.

I love my accessories, because no matter how fat I get, they still fit! I still have more apart from those above sigh. Think I need to go to AA-- accessories annonymous

Planning Frenzy

These past few days I have been spending every available hour on the net planning my parents’ trip to New Zealand (and maybe surfing facebk, trademe and blogs too :P).

My itinery so far:

Meet parents in Auck when they arrive. Drive to Bay of Islands. Stay 3 days. Head back to Auck to pickup my big brother (who is still single I think and a doctor *ahem* interested ladies please submit CVs to muah). Drive down to Welly in 2 days, stopping by undetermined places on the way.

Stay 3 days in Welly, bring my parents around, introduce bigbro to pretty girls, and graduate. Fly to Christchurch, stay 1 night, and drive down to Queenstown in morning, stopping by Lake Tekapo.

Stay 4 days in Queenstown doing whatever tourists do, and visiting Milford Sounds one of those days. Parents fly back to Auck and I fly back to Welly!

Phew, makes me tired just thinking about it… Right after this, I need to plan my trips to Brisbane, back to Malaysia + Sabah, Hong Kong, and Bangkok! Travel til siao. Maybe I can start my own travel blog. Anyone who wants to meet up with me better book appointments now haha, chewah sound like some bigwig hot shot.

Any suggestions on stuff to do and offers of places to stay in the places above (apart from Malaysia lah) would be very very much welcome and earn my undying gratitude!!

Smoothie Baby

Today, I will talk about the purplish goo that I’ve been having for breakkie! Every morning, my long suffering flatmates wake up to the alarm clock that is my beloved Philips blender. I’ve tried damping the sound by wrapping my blender in a cloth but it’s still quite loud… I think they still love me though :)

For a super duper powderful smoothie, I usually use:

Banana, kiwifruit, and some mixed berries... (Blueberries + strawberries + raspberries are the best combination I think. Currently, I have cranberries, blackberries, and blackcurrants in stock. I also microwave them a bit so that I don’t get brainfreeze.)

A few slices of mango...

About half a cup of plain yoghurt... If you want it sweeter, you can add vanilla yoghurt:

Baileys (Haha jokes. Don't you think our collection is pretty though?)



A small tps of spirulina (smells and tastes like rotted liver but it’s SUPER good for you)

Put banana, yoghurt, mango, spirulina, kiwifruit, and berries in that order cos it blends pretty that way.

I left out the mango and kiwifruit for this one

Tadah~

It usually isn’t that pretty. I cheat one, added the sliced lemon and wand for presentation-- tips I learnt from working in the hospitality industry. Huitein would be so proud of me!

I’ve packed my smoothie to class quite a few times, and I always get people asking me “What is that?!” in a disgusted tone and a scrunched up face. To be fair, it does look a bit like Barney’s vomit, but it is oh so yummylicious! Try it :)

Shopaholic

This is what happens when you have too many clothes :(

But I'm putting 90% of the blame on the China-made rack :P

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My new buy today!!

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I don't usually buy shoes with "toe cleavage" (as sarah kee calls them) cos they're just a bit too sexy. But couldn't resist these, sigh~

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One day I'll blog about my fave shop where I got these, my Hush Puppies, Ecco shoes, Witchery and Cue clothes from!