We were in a kind of seminar on relationships and love languages. VCF organised it and it ran for two Thursdays. During the course of the talk, a friend was kind of skeptical about the whole thing. Turns out he was in a relationship that turned sour. He was saying he gave his love to her, but she basically played him. So now he's made up his mind about girls based on this experience.
I was trying to tell him not all girls are like that but don't feel i got the message across. It got me thinking how things in our lives can change our outlook, and attitude. How a failed relationship can make someone made certain decisions that may not be the best or the most beneficial.
They say the first cut is the deepest and it must hurt to love someone so much and find out they don't feel the same way or are not as committed. The bible has practical ways of dealing with things like this. When Jesus was giving he sermon on the mount one of the hard things he said was love your neighbour as yourself. Bless those who curse you, do good to those who hurt you. Basically don't pay evil for evil. Its a high and lofty command but difficult to put into practice.
I remember when my little brother will get mad and pick a fight with me, usually he would hit me and run away and when i want to retaliate my mom would be like, don't you dare, he's just a kid. And i'm like what! no way he knows what he's doing. I didn't like that i should show restraint and let him go. I felt its not fair but the truth is he's a kid, and kids are stupid, they're dumb that usually makes me feel better to know that hey man, do whatever you want kid, cause i know better.
There is not point to hate, retaliation, it doesn't make us feel better. We were not designed as humans to take matters to our hands, we were designed to complain to God and let him handle things. There's no point in holding grudges or keeping unnecessary walls, because love conquers all. We should not let bad experiences change who we are suppose to be and rob someone else from being blessed by us. After all we are blessed to be a blessing.
~shalom~
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Thursday, September 27, 2007
bario
Where is Bario? Not sure, I only know they're famous for their rice, and its a highland area. Tried to search online but there is not much on the place. I only found a blog talking about it and the information doesn't seem to be updated. Well atleast they have an airport.
There's an opportunity for me and a few others to visit Bario, basically to transport musical equipment there, help the church there set up and teach them how to use it. I'm not teaching la, don't know so cannot teach. I've not decided if i would be joining them. The time is right since its right when we have the Raya holidays and its just for a few days only. But it would be nice to go and experience Bario rice.
Currently its an effort from my church, the other kids had to raise money by way of selling cookies and stuff. I also need some money lo so i've be asking my mom for permission to go. My dad is not in town at the moment. {Working so hard} Already got permission from pastor to go so by God's grace everything will go smoothly. Of course there will be lotsa pictures.
Where is Bario? Not sure, I only know they're famous for their rice, and its a highland area. Tried to search online but there is not much on the place. I only found a blog talking about it and the information doesn't seem to be updated. Well atleast they have an airport. There's an opportunity for me and a few others to visit Bario, basically to transport musical equipment there, help the church there set up and teach them how to use it. I'm not teaching la, don't know so cannot teach. I've not decided if i would be joining them. The time is right since its right when we have the Raya holidays and its just for a few days only. But it would be nice to go and experience Bario rice. Currently its an effort from my church, the other kids had to raise money by way of selling cookies and stuff. I also need some money lo so i've be asking my mom for permission to go. My dad is not in town at the moment. {Working so hard} Already got permission from pastor to go so by God's grace everything will go smoothly. Of course there will be lotsa pictures.
{update}
Thanks to jasmine for providing some information about Bario. (editted)
Bario is a highland where revival broke out in the 70s, and it has been a land richly blessed by God ever since. The weather there is cool and water for bathing is cooolllddd. It's about a 40 mins plane ride from Miri.
Population is small, about 2000. The churches are all up on the hilltops. When my dad was there they received VIP treatment. They had a group waiting for them at the airport, served them with bario delicious pineapple juice (mmmmm...).
Life there is very simply. They hunt for wild boars and make delicious food out of the wild plants in the jungle. Apart from the rice and pineapples, there is also a salt spring where you find salt. It's a miracle as well, you dont find salt by the spring. The salt is of highest quality, selling at RM15 per kg or per packet I think.Despite the small land, it's truly blessed by God. The Kelabits have produced very intelectual professionals. Their intercessors are very prophetic but they pray in Kelabit.
Thanks Jasmine.
~shalom~
There's an opportunity for me and a few others to visit Bario, basically to transport musical equipment there, help the church there set up and teach them how to use it. I'm not teaching la, don't know so cannot teach. I've not decided if i would be joining them. The time is right since its right when we have the Raya holidays and its just for a few days only. But it would be nice to go and experience Bario rice.
Currently its an effort from my church, the other kids had to raise money by way of selling cookies and stuff. I also need some money lo so i've be asking my mom for permission to go. My dad is not in town at the moment. {Working so hard} Already got permission from pastor to go so by God's grace everything will go smoothly. Of course there will be lotsa pictures.
Where is Bario? Not sure, I only know they're famous for their rice, and its a highland area. Tried to search online but there is not much on the place. I only found a blog talking about it and the information doesn't seem to be updated. Well atleast they have an airport. There's an opportunity for me and a few others to visit Bario, basically to transport musical equipment there, help the church there set up and teach them how to use it. I'm not teaching la, don't know so cannot teach. I've not decided if i would be joining them. The time is right since its right when we have the Raya holidays and its just for a few days only. But it would be nice to go and experience Bario rice. Currently its an effort from my church, the other kids had to raise money by way of selling cookies and stuff. I also need some money lo so i've be asking my mom for permission to go. My dad is not in town at the moment. {Working so hard} Already got permission from pastor to go so by God's grace everything will go smoothly. Of course there will be lotsa pictures.
{update}
Thanks to jasmine for providing some information about Bario. (editted)
Bario is a highland where revival broke out in the 70s, and it has been a land richly blessed by God ever since. The weather there is cool and water for bathing is cooolllddd. It's about a 40 mins plane ride from Miri.
Population is small, about 2000. The churches are all up on the hilltops. When my dad was there they received VIP treatment. They had a group waiting for them at the airport, served them with bario delicious pineapple juice (mmmmm...).
Life there is very simply. They hunt for wild boars and make delicious food out of the wild plants in the jungle. Apart from the rice and pineapples, there is also a salt spring where you find salt. It's a miracle as well, you dont find salt by the spring. The salt is of highest quality, selling at RM15 per kg or per packet I think.Despite the small land, it's truly blessed by God. The Kelabits have produced very intelectual professionals. Their intercessors are very prophetic but they pray in Kelabit.
Thanks Jasmine.
~shalom~
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
i want a mac
I mean don't we all want a mac? I know i do. I've been seriously considering the possibility of owning a mac, maybe replace my barely existing computer with a macbook. Why? Well a couple of reasons.
Macs are based on Unix. Unix is a very old operating system written in c. I'm doing a lot of c programming now so it would be easier for me to open a terminal and work straight with the vi editor or the upgraded vim editor.
But there are not many programs that run on a mac. True but there is the possibility of running windows on a mac on a separate partition so all the programs you want to run on windows can just run. There is also a VmWare solution where the windows installation can work on a virtual machine. Besides these there is a number of softwares being written for the mac.
Another thing i'm considering is the problem with viruses and spyware and all that rubbish. You simply don't get that on a mac its clean.
You've got to love macs for the visual effects and the customisable desktop.
However there are a few concerns. I watched steve jobs recent keynote on the new mac OS - leopard and it was really, really good. I'm thinking, why get a mac now and upgrade later when you can wait for leopard to come out and get it then. So this is another setback.
Macs are expensive. True, the macbook i have my eyes on costs about RM4199 but you can get a mac mini for less than 2k granted you need to buy your own keyboard, mouse and display. The new imac are a lot cheaper too except for the really big screen display models.
Hey linux is based on unix and its free why not get that instead. Ah linux, i installed ubuntu feisty fawn on my laptop and it was all good until i started to get problems with connection to the internet. I like linux, the fact that is freeware is enticing but its still not as user friendly. Of course linux would be the obvious solution since thats all we use in the labs maybe i'll give it another try.
The main problem still remains, i need new hardware, something with a dvd writer and better screens and graphics. Something that is stable and free from BSOD's something i would love to use for a long time coming. Do i really need a mac?
Oh btw heroes season 2 is out, not sure if people follow heroes anymore but thought you should know.
~shalom~
Monday, September 24, 2007
intricate webs
Today i was suppose to read for my test on Wednesday but i came across the book - weaving the web by internet pioneer Tim Berners-Lee and started to read. This is unusual activity for me, reading but the topic is one that i am fascinated in. I like the idea of the internet and this was more like an opportunity to learn and heed to my mom's advice in her email - study, study, study.
I won't go through all 14 chapters of the book only highlight some of the parts i find important. Tim was the son of two mathematicians. His parents were part of the team that built one of the first computers and from a young age he has been fascinated by the idea of links. You know like how your brain can transport you to a different time and link information together when you for example smell something. For me when i listen to in awe of you by hillsongs i'm immediately reminded of the time i used to borrow mike's cd player and play the song in my room over and over all night. That was way back in pleasant courts. What makes these memories possible are the cells in our brains that make the necessary connection, links.
He wanted to create something that would show this inherent relationship so he wrote a program called enquire that made links of documents and saved their relationships without using a database or a matrix. The links were both internal {within a document} and external {between documents}. For me the mere possibility of doing this is intriguing especially now that i'm learning about datastructures where we basically deal with different forms of sorting, storing, editing data in a way that is persistent. And the simplest form of storage would be an array but here i'm not sure what datastructure he used to achieve his feat.
The first web server he wrote ran on a NeXT machine. NeXT was the company Steve Jobs founded in 1985 when he resigned from Apple computers. The server name was info.cern.ch and was hosted in CERN {Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire} which lies along the French-Swiss border.
The idea of unversality was key to the internet. The system should not constrain the user.
ZIP Ccodes And URIs
ZIP codes consists of a 5digit number. The first three numbers designate a certain a certain geographic region - a town, or part of a city or county. The next two define a very specific part of that region - say a few square blocks in a city. This gets the mail to the local post office and carriers from there use street name or box numbers to finish the routing.
For URIs or Universal Resource Identifiers AKA URLs the slashes part are used in a URI to separate its parts. The first few letters tell the browser which protocol to use to look the document whether HTTP {HyperText Transfer Protocol} or FTP {File Transfer Protocol}. So for example in the address http://www.friendster.com/ogucci, the www.friendster.com part indentifiers the computer server where these documents exist, ogucci is a specified document, in this case my profile page.
The big difference between URIs and postal addresses is that the last part of of the URI can mean whatever the server wants it to mean. The client {your browser} never tries to figure out what it mean, it just asks for it. From this there lies and obvious chaotic situation where all kinds of documents will be served to client machines so there was a need for a common formatting standard for web documents hence HTML.
The philosophy rule of HTML {HyperText Markup Language} was that HTML should convey the structure of a hypertext document {A document with links, both internal and external} but not details of its presentation.
He revealed that HTML source codes were not intended to be viewed by the user and the idea of asking people to write angle brackets
From his story i saw an uncomfortable relationship between getting something, especially a relatively new idea accepted in its true form as a very difficult undertaking. A lot of compromises have to be made along the way that dilutes the pure idea and lives it with barebones. This is perhaps the most frustrating thing about software engineering and inventions in general.
One quote that stuck me that i'm glad i know now is this one by Phil Gross. "Things can get picked up quickly on the internet, but they can get dropped quickly, too".
Here is one man who had an idea, that changed the world. One that stayed with him all through his undergraduate years and eventually led him to his present position on the board of advisers for the World Wide Web Consortium that oversees the general direction the web is taking. I'm also reminded of Joshua Schachter of del.icio.us who had loads of bookmarks and needed a way to manage them and access them from any computer anywhere in the world so he built a system that is today solving the problem of many people myself included with the ability to share and discover new sites and links. It just goes to show the pattern in inventions - necessity.
It was nice to see the origins of our intricately connected world, right from the first computers, through the birth of Java and the browser was of 1995/1996 and how new MarkUp languages have been introduced from the basic HTML which is still in use today.
I've not finished reading the book yet. I've only done 9 of the 12 chapters and i intend on finishing the book tonight hopefully. I'm not sure if this is the right place to talk about my tech stuff but i want to make this blog more than just a personal blog.
~shalom~
I won't go through all 14 chapters of the book only highlight some of the parts i find important. Tim was the son of two mathematicians. His parents were part of the team that built one of the first computers and from a young age he has been fascinated by the idea of links. You know like how your brain can transport you to a different time and link information together when you for example smell something. For me when i listen to in awe of you by hillsongs i'm immediately reminded of the time i used to borrow mike's cd player and play the song in my room over and over all night. That was way back in pleasant courts. What makes these memories possible are the cells in our brains that make the necessary connection, links.
He wanted to create something that would show this inherent relationship so he wrote a program called enquire that made links of documents and saved their relationships without using a database or a matrix. The links were both internal {within a document} and external {between documents}. For me the mere possibility of doing this is intriguing especially now that i'm learning about datastructures where we basically deal with different forms of sorting, storing, editing data in a way that is persistent. And the simplest form of storage would be an array but here i'm not sure what datastructure he used to achieve his feat.
The first web server he wrote ran on a NeXT machine. NeXT was the company Steve Jobs founded in 1985 when he resigned from Apple computers. The server name was info.cern.ch and was hosted in CERN {Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire} which lies along the French-Swiss border.
The idea of unversality was key to the internet. The system should not constrain the user.
There was no central computer "controlling" the web, no single network on which
these protocols worked, not even an organisation anywhere that "ran" the web.
The web was not a physical "thing" that existed in a certain "place". It
was a "space" in which information could exist.
ZIP Ccodes And URIs
ZIP codes consists of a 5digit number. The first three numbers designate a certain a certain geographic region - a town, or part of a city or county. The next two define a very specific part of that region - say a few square blocks in a city. This gets the mail to the local post office and carriers from there use street name or box numbers to finish the routing.
For URIs or Universal Resource Identifiers AKA URLs the slashes part are used in a URI to separate its parts. The first few letters tell the browser which protocol to use to look the document whether HTTP {HyperText Transfer Protocol} or FTP {File Transfer Protocol}. So for example in the address http://www.friendster.com/ogucci, the www.friendster.com part indentifiers the computer server where these documents exist, ogucci is a specified document, in this case my profile page.
The big difference between URIs and postal addresses is that the last part of of the URI can mean whatever the server wants it to mean. The client {your browser} never tries to figure out what it mean, it just asks for it. From this there lies and obvious chaotic situation where all kinds of documents will be served to client machines so there was a need for a common formatting standard for web documents hence HTML.
The philosophy rule of HTML {HyperText Markup Language} was that HTML should convey the structure of a hypertext document {A document with links, both internal and external} but not details of its presentation.
He revealed that HTML source codes were not intended to be viewed by the user and the idea of asking people to write angle brackets
< b > for example was like asking someone to write a Microsoft word document in binary code format. His idea of a web browser was one that would both view and create internet content just as easy as it is to type a word document but few people shared this interest.From his story i saw an uncomfortable relationship between getting something, especially a relatively new idea accepted in its true form as a very difficult undertaking. A lot of compromises have to be made along the way that dilutes the pure idea and lives it with barebones. This is perhaps the most frustrating thing about software engineering and inventions in general.
One quote that stuck me that i'm glad i know now is this one by Phil Gross. "Things can get picked up quickly on the internet, but they can get dropped quickly, too".
Here is one man who had an idea, that changed the world. One that stayed with him all through his undergraduate years and eventually led him to his present position on the board of advisers for the World Wide Web Consortium that oversees the general direction the web is taking. I'm also reminded of Joshua Schachter of del.icio.us who had loads of bookmarks and needed a way to manage them and access them from any computer anywhere in the world so he built a system that is today solving the problem of many people myself included with the ability to share and discover new sites and links. It just goes to show the pattern in inventions - necessity.
It was nice to see the origins of our intricately connected world, right from the first computers, through the birth of Java and the browser was of 1995/1996 and how new MarkUp languages have been introduced from the basic HTML which is still in use today.
I've not finished reading the book yet. I've only done 9 of the 12 chapters and i intend on finishing the book tonight hopefully. I'm not sure if this is the right place to talk about my tech stuff but i want to make this blog more than just a personal blog.
~shalom~
Saturday, September 22, 2007
steam boat and birthdays
Ah another update. I'm starting to enjoy posting here more often. So what will it be today? Well i'm quite sad to announce that sin ying is leaving miri. She got her transfer back to KL where she loves to be. Afterall they say home is where the heart is.
She has been helping out in the music ministry at Calvary Charismatic Church, the church i attend and she's also in my lifegroup so it will not be the same with her gone.
Usually things like this calls for some kind of fellowship, food fellowship that is. And thats exactly what we did last Sunday, yeah last Sunday. It took almost a whole week for me to post it because the internet is crappy so uploading the pictures to flickr wasn't possible. Thats what you get for using free internet. But they're here now and we went for steamboat, yes the eat all you want, cook it yourself chinese tradition i have come to love, even though it is "vewy expenses". Oh well I don't know anyone who is leaving anytime soon so its ok laaaaaaaaaa.
We also took the opportunity to celebrate Samson jo... ah i forgot her name, was the first time i met her so yeah. Well we celebrated their birthdays la as a lifegroup.
So we went to Michael's. Sounds familiar.
Anyone remember the Sarawak Tribune? they were just next door
Ah the wonderful equipment that makes it happen
Where is everyone?
I see food but who's eating it.
Ah there they are.
I ate mostly meat, had a sore throat the next day but thank God it wasn't serious.
There's sin ying in the middle
It took ages before we got to this point. Everyone just kept eating
Wash it all down with a nice glass of tiger beer.
And soon this was all that was left
After all that food we settled down to good ol laughters
But sadly all good things must come to an end. We were the last to leave btw.
You know, i have the funniest parents. I got a call at 6 this morning and my dad was speaking and he said with a kind of weird surprised tone, are you still sleeping. I was kind of scared, didn't want to give him the impression that i sleep all day but come one la it 6 in the morning on a saturday. So i answered, no just woke up. The line wasn't too good so i didnt hear anything he said after that. Guess where i'm going to be once the library opens.
~shalom~
She has been helping out in the music ministry at Calvary Charismatic Church, the church i attend and she's also in my lifegroup so it will not be the same with her gone.
Usually things like this calls for some kind of fellowship, food fellowship that is. And thats exactly what we did last Sunday, yeah last Sunday. It took almost a whole week for me to post it because the internet is crappy so uploading the pictures to flickr wasn't possible. Thats what you get for using free internet. But they're here now and we went for steamboat, yes the eat all you want, cook it yourself chinese tradition i have come to love, even though it is "vewy expenses". Oh well I don't know anyone who is leaving anytime soon so its ok laaaaaaaaaa.
We also took the opportunity to celebrate Samson jo... ah i forgot her name, was the first time i met her so yeah. Well we celebrated their birthdays la as a lifegroup.
So we went to Michael's. Sounds familiar.
Anyone remember the Sarawak Tribune? they were just next door
Ah the wonderful equipment that makes it happen
Where is everyone?
I see food but who's eating it.
Ah there they are.
I ate mostly meat, had a sore throat the next day but thank God it wasn't serious.
There's sin ying in the middle
It took ages before we got to this point. Everyone just kept eating
Wash it all down with a nice glass of tiger beer.
And soon this was all that was left
After all that food we settled down to good ol laughters
But sadly all good things must come to an end. We were the last to leave btw.
You know, i have the funniest parents. I got a call at 6 this morning and my dad was speaking and he said with a kind of weird surprised tone, are you still sleeping. I was kind of scared, didn't want to give him the impression that i sleep all day but come one la it 6 in the morning on a saturday. So i answered, no just woke up. The line wasn't too good so i didnt hear anything he said after that. Guess where i'm going to be once the library opens.
~shalom~
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
oddities
A good thing happened today. This has happened to me too many times in the past i thought by now i would have learned my lesson. This morning when i went to the open lab i forgot to take out my pen drive. I didn't notice until i was in the library and noticed its not in my pocket. Heart racing, sh*t, i forgot my pen drive. :pray: please be there, please be there.
So i rushed down to G2 and thank God it was still there. There was a nice girl, well i didn't get to see her but i guess she's nice la since she didn't take my pendrive. She just kept it on the CPU. Sigh of relief.
Another sigh of relief or half sigh of relief since i just finished the 'tough test'. I'm sure i made alot of mistakes. I din't study trees and it came out. D'oh! Anyway its over. The next one is OS i just pray it won't be as confusing as the lecturer makes it. I think maybe i'll just record his lecture and listen to it when i want to sleep. Its so soothing that once i slept in class and he was just next to me. Can't help it la, you'll sleep to if its you.
This last one is kind of like an inside story so don't tell anyone ah. My housemate listens to high school musical alllllllll day long. Even at night! Its freaky. I mean doesn't he get tired of listening to the same songs over and over and over again? Not sure how old he is but man, thats some dedication.
Oh and one last thing. I got an email from my mom today, was quite surprised she took time to mail me, this is like lets see now... the second email i've gotten from her in three years. Thats got to be a record. Anyway, she was basically saying this study, study, study, study, study. She repeated it like 7 times, i kid you not. And the entire email was like three lines long. Its good to know she has not changed. I just replied with a happy face :) i don't think she would be interested to know my plans for the school break. lol I still miss her la.
:cries: I want my mummy. :sob: sob:
Ok la enough for now, i have a group meeting at 4 and presentation tomorrow.
~shalom~
So i rushed down to G2 and thank God it was still there. There was a nice girl, well i didn't get to see her but i guess she's nice la since she didn't take my pendrive. She just kept it on the CPU. Sigh of relief.
Another sigh of relief or half sigh of relief since i just finished the 'tough test'. I'm sure i made alot of mistakes. I din't study trees and it came out. D'oh! Anyway its over. The next one is OS i just pray it won't be as confusing as the lecturer makes it. I think maybe i'll just record his lecture and listen to it when i want to sleep. Its so soothing that once i slept in class and he was just next to me. Can't help it la, you'll sleep to if its you.
This last one is kind of like an inside story so don't tell anyone ah. My housemate listens to high school musical alllllllll day long. Even at night! Its freaky. I mean doesn't he get tired of listening to the same songs over and over and over again? Not sure how old he is but man, thats some dedication.
Oh and one last thing. I got an email from my mom today, was quite surprised she took time to mail me, this is like lets see now... the second email i've gotten from her in three years. Thats got to be a record. Anyway, she was basically saying this study, study, study, study, study. She repeated it like 7 times, i kid you not. And the entire email was like three lines long. Its good to know she has not changed. I just replied with a happy face :) i don't think she would be interested to know my plans for the school break. lol I still miss her la.
:cries: I want my mummy. :sob: sob:
Ok la enough for now, i have a group meeting at 4 and presentation tomorrow.
~shalom~
Sunday, September 16, 2007
About commitments
(source: flickr)
A thought just entered my mind and i would like to explore it more. What is a commitment? Here are a few definitions:
- committedness: the trait of sincere and steadfast fixity of purpose; "a man of energy and commitment"
- the act of binding yourself (intellectually or emotionally) to a course of action; "his long commitment to public service"; "they felt no loyalty to a losing team"
- an engagement by contract involving financial obligation; "his business commitments took him to London"
- a message that makes a pledge.
I like the second one more "the act of binding yourself (intellectually or emotionally) to a course of action..." Of course this could be expanded to cover a whole lot of things like commitment to a church, or to a person, to a friend, and so on. It could also be expanded to more relevant areas like studies, career, family well you get my point.
You can also look at it as a contract, a binding decision between two people or one that can be made by an individual. On the surface it may look like some kind of evil scheme to trap someone and make sure they are not free to do what they want. But the way i see it is more like a way to instill discipline, and to stay focused and purposeful.
So why do people bail and abandon ship when things get hard? Fear? Uncertainty? Doubt? collectively known as FUD. I think before you can be committed to something or an idea you must decide to accept the terms and conditions that comes with that commitment. I'm reminded of the marriage vow and how people take such a vow thats a vow between two people and God and each other so likely. I'm also reminded of the movie the pursuit of happyness and how the wife of the main character ditched him in such a desperate situation. I understand that he made a few bad decisions in his life but they have a vow that binds them, a commitment that holds them, a contract and she broke that. There's nothing like having someone you trust and rely on just desert you, take away your hopes and dreams and force you to reorder you life.
I'm also reminded of the commitment we have to God. And one he has to us. You mean God has a commitment to us? Like yeaaah! Look at the rainbow, in lamentations its says his mercies are new every morning, and he says nothing can separate us from his love. I've been saying this for a while now because i know its true and when you think of it, you'll discover its true. We have a commitment too to shine his light in the dark dark world that we live in and show the difference, share about who he is and bring honor to his name. And even though we fail in these areas he never really stops loving. And i don't believe that God hates sinners, he just hates the sin. How can he bring rain to both the righteous and wicked if he hates them. For while we were yet sinners Christ died for us, and He didn't do to show off to us how good he is and how bad we are for that would lower him to our level and that won't do, not one bit.
So what have I said? The commitments we make to people, to ourselves, to our family and ultimately to God help us in times when bailing seems like a very convenient option for through it we learn endurance and patience which are sterling virtues and in that we become different from everyone else.
What are you committed to?
~shalom~
Friday, September 14, 2007
plus one
First it was dominic, now Samson, next will be Candace by the end of the month. Birthdays are great, we're reminded that we're old. For Sam it was his transition from been a teenager to an adult eventhough he acts quite mature for his age and people like me? Well lets not go into that shall we.
Its nice to have friends close to you on this special day, especially when they go out of their way to surprise you and make you do silly things. Some people have a strange way of showing love, i mean whats with the bucket of water? I'm sure he appreciated it la. I'm too lazy+tired to post pictures. Not sure if i should. I think i can work something out hehe.
Come to think of it, i don't remember what happened when i turned 20. Oh wait i do, ah i had a surprise party too. :sigh: how times change.
Moving on.... Whats the thing you look back and wished you did while you were in secondary school, i mean you will only get to really enjoy it then after that its history. I'm thinking of going to the prom but not sure if i want to or not. Tables are not cheap and even though people like to brush it aside and so no la, hen gui. I know alot of people are going. So now i'm faced with this interesting position; to lah or not to lah, sorry. To go or not to go. Hmm.
~shalom~
Its nice to have friends close to you on this special day, especially when they go out of their way to surprise you and make you do silly things. Some people have a strange way of showing love, i mean whats with the bucket of water? I'm sure he appreciated it la. I'm too lazy+tired to post pictures. Not sure if i should. I think i can work something out hehe.
Come to think of it, i don't remember what happened when i turned 20. Oh wait i do, ah i had a surprise party too. :sigh: how times change.
Moving on.... Whats the thing you look back and wished you did while you were in secondary school, i mean you will only get to really enjoy it then after that its history. I'm thinking of going to the prom but not sure if i want to or not. Tables are not cheap and even though people like to brush it aside and so no la, hen gui. I know alot of people are going. So now i'm faced with this interesting position; to lah or not to lah, sorry. To go or not to go. Hmm.
~shalom~
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
I choose
Someone once told me human beings need to be reminded more than they need instruction. I find it to be very true. How many times we hear the same things over and over until finally you get it? How many times do we make the same mistakes over and over until we learn from it?
Usually i wash my clothes at home, in the toilet because there are only three working washing machines for the entire villa so its hard to get one that is free and every time when i open the tap i always forget to turn off the water supply to the shower and channel the water supply down to the bucket where i need it. So each time i open the tap and my mind thinks water will come down straight to the bucket below but i get a shock when the water comes from above. I get a little wet too. Anyway my point is, after a few times, i know that i need to adjust the tap before i use it.
Why do i do this? I mean blog here well this is part of it
Over the past few months its been like the ...its a mess sometimes part has just been playing out so much that i feel like i want the ...its a joy sometimes part.
Been thinking a whole lot, just reflecting and observing too and sometimes in the midst of it all i hear this voice asking, do you trust me. And i'm like sure i do, i mean i want to but help me when trust you more. Today in lifegroup we were singing that song, blessed be your name and got to the part ...you give and take away and it was like true you know. I know i say this so much but faith comes by hearing, and hearing ... the word of God. God is PURE GOOD. And nothing He does is for our harm even though we hurt and things happen but when we think of the way that he gave up for us, we just can't stop singing this song that we sing. So yeah though its hard and i dont want to keep things inside, i want to praise God again through this blog.
On a totally unrelated matter, recently i've been missing my mom so much. Dunno why ah, so long didnt get to see her and just hang out. Yeah i hang out with my mom. I miss making fun of her and just helping her out. It feels so nice. I guess because my sister went back and spent time with doing her internship i feel i also want. Haiya, what to do?
Finally, this week is test week, i pray i can do well as we look forward to exams in November. It has been a hard time in Curtin but God is faithful.
~shalom~
Usually i wash my clothes at home, in the toilet because there are only three working washing machines for the entire villa so its hard to get one that is free and every time when i open the tap i always forget to turn off the water supply to the shower and channel the water supply down to the bucket where i need it. So each time i open the tap and my mind thinks water will come down straight to the bucket below but i get a shock when the water comes from above. I get a little wet too. Anyway my point is, after a few times, i know that i need to adjust the tap before i use it.
Why do i do this? I mean blog here well this is part of it
My Offering is my way of saying, Lord this is my life, its a mess sometimes, its a joy sometimes but i want to bless you anyway because you deserve it. It is also my way to serve in the SHAPE that He has made me.If you have read the purpose driven life you know what SHAPE means. If you have not read it, i recommend it. I don't read a lot of books but i'm glad i read that one.
Over the past few months its been like the ...its a mess sometimes part has just been playing out so much that i feel like i want the ...its a joy sometimes part.
Been thinking a whole lot, just reflecting and observing too and sometimes in the midst of it all i hear this voice asking, do you trust me. And i'm like sure i do, i mean i want to but help me when trust you more. Today in lifegroup we were singing that song, blessed be your name and got to the part ...you give and take away and it was like true you know. I know i say this so much but faith comes by hearing, and hearing ... the word of God. God is PURE GOOD. And nothing He does is for our harm even though we hurt and things happen but when we think of the way that he gave up for us, we just can't stop singing this song that we sing. So yeah though its hard and i dont want to keep things inside, i want to praise God again through this blog.
On a totally unrelated matter, recently i've been missing my mom so much. Dunno why ah, so long didnt get to see her and just hang out. Yeah i hang out with my mom. I miss making fun of her and just helping her out. It feels so nice. I guess because my sister went back and spent time with doing her internship i feel i also want. Haiya, what to do?
Finally, this week is test week, i pray i can do well as we look forward to exams in November. It has been a hard time in Curtin but God is faithful.
~shalom~
Monday, September 10, 2007
curtin openday 2007
Yesterday we had the curtin open day. Its pretty much like Intifest only alot more fun. VCF made sushi, popiah, fruits, coconut drink, which took the thumbs of some people. Sorry to them. And we sold some books, handphone accessories, bookmarks and cds from Life Bookshop.
I was asked to help out but i didn't do much work :P. Felt bad when the soy sauce i professionally packed spilled inside the packs but Praise God we sold all the Japanese food. The coconut drink was a sellout too and with Jeffrey's help we sold off the last piece of Cheese cake way after the Chocolate cake was all gone.
There was alot of fruits still unsold. I think because of the sheer number of them, it has hard to sell. And besides most people don't like fruits. We have become an unhealthy generation.
I was suppose to come and man the booth by 2 but was late because church finished quite late but was very good. There was this Indian pastor whose name escapes me but he was very fibrant and energetic. He was talking about love {great timing!} but mostly about the love within the church not necessarily between two people. One thing he said that i find to be true is that the church was never intended to be an institution or an organisation. The church was intended to be a family. So when you come to church you were suppose to feel a sense of belonging. Naturally when things like these are said i like to look at my life and see if i'm on the good side or the bad side and things could be better. It also made me reflect on a lot of things...
After church we went to Frattinni's- they have 50% discount on pasta and pizza from 12 to 4 i think. So we ordered two pizzas and shared about ourselves. I ordered a noca latte {stupid me, who drinks coffee with Italian food anyway?}. I didn't feel it was worth it la, but it was nice to try. Pizzahut is way better. But i remember the chicken pasta i had at coffeebean. That was really good. Quite expensive but good.
Back to the openday, well nothing much was going on except for clubs selling mostly food so it was hard to spend the 10 bucks worth of coupon i bought. But i had beef Kebab from the Pakistani stand and the rest went to the cheese cake we were selling :P and honey dew. Oh and there was this sumo wrestling thing, very funny. And some guys had a stand where you can play with the nintendo wii.
There was fireworks and a lucky draw at the end. Unfortunately my number {1311} won nothing, no wii, no ipod, no nothing. At the end i was tired worn out but couldn't sleep. I think it was the coffee.
{pictures}
opening a Jap-resturant soon.
can you see my fingerprint on the glass?
I only took the coffee because it was hot.
father and son playing tennis on the wii
main stage, there was alot of nice performances here. I forgot to mention, the first curtin idol was held. My friend didnt win but she got to the finals. But i was late to see her sing. Oh and VCF did a performance which i thought was the best given that we were not allowed to sing anything with Jesus or God in it, don't want to 'offend' anyone they said.
our booth
i like this shot
I like this one, talk about best for last.
~shalom~
I was asked to help out but i didn't do much work :P. Felt bad when the soy sauce i professionally packed spilled inside the packs but Praise God we sold all the Japanese food. The coconut drink was a sellout too and with Jeffrey's help we sold off the last piece of Cheese cake way after the Chocolate cake was all gone.
There was alot of fruits still unsold. I think because of the sheer number of them, it has hard to sell. And besides most people don't like fruits. We have become an unhealthy generation.
I was suppose to come and man the booth by 2 but was late because church finished quite late but was very good. There was this Indian pastor whose name escapes me but he was very fibrant and energetic. He was talking about love {great timing!} but mostly about the love within the church not necessarily between two people. One thing he said that i find to be true is that the church was never intended to be an institution or an organisation. The church was intended to be a family. So when you come to church you were suppose to feel a sense of belonging. Naturally when things like these are said i like to look at my life and see if i'm on the good side or the bad side and things could be better. It also made me reflect on a lot of things...
After church we went to Frattinni's- they have 50% discount on pasta and pizza from 12 to 4 i think. So we ordered two pizzas and shared about ourselves. I ordered a noca latte {stupid me, who drinks coffee with Italian food anyway?}. I didn't feel it was worth it la, but it was nice to try. Pizzahut is way better. But i remember the chicken pasta i had at coffeebean. That was really good. Quite expensive but good.
Back to the openday, well nothing much was going on except for clubs selling mostly food so it was hard to spend the 10 bucks worth of coupon i bought. But i had beef Kebab from the Pakistani stand and the rest went to the cheese cake we were selling :P and honey dew. Oh and there was this sumo wrestling thing, very funny. And some guys had a stand where you can play with the nintendo wii.
There was fireworks and a lucky draw at the end. Unfortunately my number {1311} won nothing, no wii, no ipod, no nothing. At the end i was tired worn out but couldn't sleep. I think it was the coffee.
{pictures}
opening a Jap-resturant soon.
can you see my fingerprint on the glass?
I only took the coffee because it was hot.
father and son playing tennis on the wii
main stage, there was alot of nice performances here. I forgot to mention, the first curtin idol was held. My friend didnt win but she got to the finals. But i was late to see her sing. Oh and VCF did a performance which i thought was the best given that we were not allowed to sing anything with Jesus or God in it, don't want to 'offend' anyone they said.
our booth
i like this shot
I like this one, talk about best for last.
~shalom~
Thursday, September 06, 2007
hapiness by choice
Have you ever been in a situation where you are trying to make someone see the bright side of a situation or something and you try different things, rack your brain, think of scriptures even to make them change their mind or at least their perception and nothing works? Its like they want to stay in that state, like they enjoy it and the worst part is that they always come to you for help.
I can say it feels exhausting, its draining mentally and physically and its sucks. I'm not the most positive person in the world. I have my share of cynicism and pessimism but sometimes, sometimes you just want to tell people your mind.
But proverbs says its not right to unleash your anger, in fact i think the wise Solomon calls someone who does not have a tight rein on their anger bodoh! That means fool btw.
We all fall down, but we get up. We all get depressed and bad things happen and life sucks sometimes but we get back up and keep walking. We NEVER give up, we never lose sight of the final goal. Your light afflictions is nothing compared to the glory... For some reason i find that cynical. I mean image you think the whole world is falling and then someone calls it a light afflcition. Makes you look stupid.
Happiness is a choice, its a choice you make everyday as long as you live. You have a choice to look at the bright side, hold on to the promises and be encouraged. David encouraged himself in the Lord! My mom told me that and knowing who i am well God bless her.
I choose to be happy no matter what, i choose to live a good life, heck its the only one i've got. Life is too short so enjoy it, every moment.
~shalom~
I can say it feels exhausting, its draining mentally and physically and its sucks. I'm not the most positive person in the world. I have my share of cynicism and pessimism but sometimes, sometimes you just want to tell people your mind.
But proverbs says its not right to unleash your anger, in fact i think the wise Solomon calls someone who does not have a tight rein on their anger bodoh! That means fool btw.
We all fall down, but we get up. We all get depressed and bad things happen and life sucks sometimes but we get back up and keep walking. We NEVER give up, we never lose sight of the final goal. Your light afflictions is nothing compared to the glory... For some reason i find that cynical. I mean image you think the whole world is falling and then someone calls it a light afflcition. Makes you look stupid.
Happiness is a choice, its a choice you make everyday as long as you live. You have a choice to look at the bright side, hold on to the promises and be encouraged. David encouraged himself in the Lord! My mom told me that and knowing who i am well God bless her.
I choose to be happy no matter what, i choose to live a good life, heck its the only one i've got. Life is too short so enjoy it, every moment.
~shalom~
Sunday, September 02, 2007
testimonies for august '07
These monthly testimonies are a way for me to reflect on the month and give thanks for everything that has happened.
His Grace
I want to start by thanking God for His grace on my life. For some reason i did some thinking about how i ended up where I am and its nothing short of the grace of God just guiding, leading, correcting sometimes but all in love and I am very grateful for that. The steadfast love of the Lord never ceaseth, His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning, great is thy faithfulness.
I also want to thank God for the family of believers that we have. I must say if i wasn't a christian it would have been much difficult here but I just thank God that i can go to any church and still worship Him in freedom with other christians.
I called my mom yesterday and she was saying the same thing. God has been really faithful to my little ol family. Thank You Lord.
Flu hu
Thank God for His healing, was sick for a while but it only lasted a week or so and now i'm back to normal. Its been almost a month now and my mom is still asking me if i'm sick. How do mothers worry so much?
Free2Be
Amplified was very good. Actually it was one of the things i've been longing to see and thats young people really reaching out and living their lives for God. It was great just seeing the hunger in their hearts and to be a part of that is simply a privilege and i'm grateful for that.
Changes
Thank God for the changes in my life. For showing me parts of my life that i would not see any other way. For being tough but loving at the same time. Yeah.
VCF Life Camp
I thank God for the opportunity to go for the life camp. It was really a refreshing time for me. Thank God for everything that happened, for friends, for the activities and all. Thank God for VCF and what He's doing in all our lives.
Friends
I really thank God for friends, people I can rely on, talk to, make fun of, go makan together. :)
Malaysia
Its not very oftern I thank God for Malaysia but i want to thank God for this country for the freedom I have to not only exercise my faith but also to grow and meet incredible people i can call family. On this 50 years of freedom I pray that God will bless this nation and let the freedom be complete. Let those why hate peace never have rest and Let the name of Jesus continue to be glorified in this land. The earth belongs to the Lord, the world and all its people belong to Him.
There are so many things to thank God for, this list is in now way exhausted. Give thanks.
~shalom~
His Grace
I want to start by thanking God for His grace on my life. For some reason i did some thinking about how i ended up where I am and its nothing short of the grace of God just guiding, leading, correcting sometimes but all in love and I am very grateful for that. The steadfast love of the Lord never ceaseth, His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning, great is thy faithfulness.
I also want to thank God for the family of believers that we have. I must say if i wasn't a christian it would have been much difficult here but I just thank God that i can go to any church and still worship Him in freedom with other christians.
I called my mom yesterday and she was saying the same thing. God has been really faithful to my little ol family. Thank You Lord.
Flu hu
Thank God for His healing, was sick for a while but it only lasted a week or so and now i'm back to normal. Its been almost a month now and my mom is still asking me if i'm sick. How do mothers worry so much?
Free2Be
Amplified was very good. Actually it was one of the things i've been longing to see and thats young people really reaching out and living their lives for God. It was great just seeing the hunger in their hearts and to be a part of that is simply a privilege and i'm grateful for that.
Changes
Thank God for the changes in my life. For showing me parts of my life that i would not see any other way. For being tough but loving at the same time. Yeah.
VCF Life Camp
I thank God for the opportunity to go for the life camp. It was really a refreshing time for me. Thank God for everything that happened, for friends, for the activities and all. Thank God for VCF and what He's doing in all our lives.
Friends
I really thank God for friends, people I can rely on, talk to, make fun of, go makan together. :)
Malaysia
Its not very oftern I thank God for Malaysia but i want to thank God for this country for the freedom I have to not only exercise my faith but also to grow and meet incredible people i can call family. On this 50 years of freedom I pray that God will bless this nation and let the freedom be complete. Let those why hate peace never have rest and Let the name of Jesus continue to be glorified in this land. The earth belongs to the Lord, the world and all its people belong to Him.
There are so many things to thank God for, this list is in now way exhausted. Give thanks.
~shalom~
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