when do we need God?
i remember having this thought a while back... i was telling God that when people are rich and happy they feel that they have things in control and do not need God... this is true when i speak to some of the people i know who have yet given their lives to Jesus.
i thought how nice it'd be if people can realise that these material things and financial stability doesn't fill them fully..
then the financial slowdown starts... the credit crunch creeps up and people are realising that they're out of control and in financial instability/need. but do they run to God to ask Him to be their provider? no...... they start to blame Him.
how sad it is... when you prosper, it is by your work and might and when you don't, you blame God for turning the markets down and taking away your chance at striking it rich.
but what do i really need God for during these times?
i think i really do need God to find rest. knowing that although things seem to be going haywire, there is still certainty. knowing that God will provide. i think such truths really allow me to find rest. and to experience these truths, you have to believe it.
{ Tuesday, December 16 }
as motherhood approaches, i find myself full of mixed feelings...
there're feelings of excitement of seeing my little boy and how he'd bring this little family so much joy as he grows....
but more so, there're feelings of apprehension. of course not of labour pains.. but of the responsibility of motherhood.
can't wait for pregnancy to be over because i'm just so tired now and the weight of the baby on me is killing me... and also coz i really wanna go shopping for nice clothings... and eat all my sashimi (of course, this is not gonna happen till i finish breastfeeding)... and go on my holidays (this is not gonna happen too till i finish breastfeeding)
so many things on my mind... uncertainties... which of course only God knows the answer...
will ethan be a good boy?
will he be healthy?
is he perfectly normal?
will i be a good mother?
will i be able to breastfeed successfully?
i must keep reminding myself that everything is in God's hands and that His plan is always perfect. i guess, this is a whole new level of trusting God.
nobody likes uncertainties... and nobody likes huge responsibilities...
i think i wrote abt these feelings before.. but as delivery approaches, it's becoming more and more real and i find myself having to really "will" myself to put my trust in God.
now i really know what trusting God really means. it means believing wholesale in what He says.
this of course will reflect on how we behave and react in situations.... then i thought abt my gals and some other people i know... i hope they learn to really trust God...
when God says He will be your judge... it means He will be your judge... He will vindicate you.. you don't have to seek revenge on your own
when God says He will provide... it means He will provide...
when God says He has ordained where you are... it means that you are exactly where God wants you to be whether you're happy or not.
when God says He is with you... it means He is with you whether or not you "feel" it.
when God says He hears all your prayers.. it means He hears all your prayers whether or not you think He has.
so that's faith... it's really regardless of what our minds think and what our hearts feel. it's a choice, really... nothing else.
i can tell you that slipping into depression is so easy for me now. because it's a natural thing for me to get into a spiral of thoughts of situations that can go awfully wrong. i can always say "oh, well, God made me that way didn't He? a natural pessimist..." but i tell you... i don't think that is true. even if we are prone to feel that way doesn't mean that our all-perfect Father made us like that. it just means that God has placed me in a situation where i can truly learn what trust is all about.
the same goes for you.
i'm sure we all receive this email which told of this story of a man who always chose to be happy everyday when he wakes up... then one day he got robbed and hurt and almost died. he was sent to hospital and he recovered miraculously. when interviewed, he said he had 2 choices, to choose to live or die.
i think that story makes some sense now. i used to think it was silly. you feel the way you feel. period. but now that it's so easy to slip into negative thinking, i realised that choosing to think otherwise... is really that, a choice.
and so it is with choosing to believe what the bible says.
choose well today.
{ Thursday, December 11 }
attended a friend's wedding not too long ago... and i must say that it's really painful to be listening to grammatically incorrect english, not to mention flat tone english.... he should have really replaced his emcee...
then my friends and i started to recall how we experienced reading or listening to people speaking really really bad english. it's so bad that we couldn't go on...
like my friend was talking abt this parent who wrote into his school to complain abt some pants issue, the parent could spell pants with like 101 permutations... like the pen, the pans... gosh...i can imagine reading such letters... i'd faint before i got past half a page.
i still remember once chatting with my friend over icq (ok, that's like dinosaur ages ago) asking if i could borrow a big plate. he said he doesn't have a big plate but a big bowel.... hmm... alright, given that e is situated right beside w on the key board, i assumed that it was a typing error. so i replied saying, no, i don't want a big bowl. i want a big plate. to which again he replied, i don't have a big plate, but i can lend you a big bowel.
sigh... sad... but such english is quite rampant in our society. like nowadays people would tell me, or write to me, it's such an exciting thing to born your own child.
right......
oh well... my english isn't all that good either... but at least i don't see myself making such mistakes.
what to do? now i can understand why bosses cannot stand emails or letters that are grammatically incorrect or those that have grave spelling errors in them.
thanks you...
i did that on purpose...
{ Tuesday, December 2 }