So many questions we have about life. More questions than answers. Will our lives truly be less than exciting should we have all the answers? Are questions meant to be lived out rather than answered? Without questions there will be no drive to explore, to discover what life has in stored for us. Questions keep us on our edge. Questions also unsettle us. Questions question our sanity. Perhaps in living out the questions we will find our answers. The question is, how. How do we live out our questions? Perhaps the answer is just to simply be.

November 22nd.

SHALLOW AND PROFOUND

Oswald Chambers

"Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." 1 Corinthians 10:31

Beware of allowing yourself to think that the shallow concerns of life are not ordained of God; they are as much of God as the profound. It is not your devotion to God that makes you refuse to be shallow, but your wish to impress other people with the fact that you are not shallow, which is a sure sign that you are a spiritual prig. Be careful of the production of contempt in yourself, it always comes along this line, and causes you to go about as a walking rebuke to other people because they are more shallow than you are. Beware of posing as a profound person; God became a Baby.

To be shallow is not a sign of being wicked, nor is shallowness a sign that there are no deeps: the ocean has a shore. The shallow amenities of life, eating and drinking, walking and talking, are all ordained by God. These are the things in which Our Lord lived. He lived in them as the Son of God, and He said that "the disciple is not above his Master." Our safeguard is in the shallow things. We have to live the surface common-sense life in a common-sense way; when the deeper things come, God gives them to us apart from the shallow concerns. Never show the deeps to anyone but God. We are so abominably serious, so desperately interested in our own characters, that we refuse to behave like Christians in the shallow concerns of life.

Determinedly take no one seriously but God, and the first person you find you have to leave severely alone as being the greatest fraud you have ever known, is yourself.

On the front page of Home dated October 18, 2006 bears the news of a passing of Ms Mary Matthew.

The former executive director of the Samaritans of Singapore succumbed to lung cancer on Sunday. Ms Mary Matthew’s passing is a great loss to many whom she had counselled. She had started a programme, Healing Bridge, in 2003, to counsel those who had lost someone to suicide, and had over the years given hope to those who were struggling with the loss. She understood "the fragility of those left behind." She simply let them grieve and held their hands throughout the grieving period. Her counsellees found hope and strength through her.

Miss Mary Matthew is a Christian.

How salty are we in this world, that we make others thirsty for the hope and strength Jesus has given us?

qing ai di bao gui ye su

你爱，何等的甘甜

wo di xin shen shen bei ni xi ying

ai ni shi wo di xi le

yi sheng ai ni

yi sheng jing bai ni

yi sheng ai ni

yi sheng rong yao ni

yi sheng feng xian

yi sheng bu huei tou

yi sheng ai ni

gen shui ni

Very often we judge others using ourselves as a yardstick, our own human holiness, righteousness. Oswald Chambers draws to mind that this is a warped perspective, that it is a denial of the "reality of the natural life," in that we are not holy or righteous; we are not above anyone in our sinful nature. Pride says, "I have a right to myself," "I am better than you!" But pride did not save us. Pride was man’s downfall. Love saved us. His love. Read on.

~~~~~~~

Oswald Chambers

I cannot save and sanctify myself; I cannot make atonement for sin; I cannot redeem the world; I cannot right what is wrong, purify what is impure, or make holy what is unholy. That is all the sovereign work of God. Do I have faith in what Jesus Christ has done? He has made the perfect atonement for sin. Am I in the habit of constantly realizing it? The greatest need we have is not to do things, but to believe things. The redemption of Christ is not an experience, it is the great act of God which He has performed through Christ, and I have to build my faith on it. If I construct my faith on my own experience, I produce the most unscriptural kind of life— an isolated life, with my eyes focused solely on my own holiness. Beware of that human holiness that is not based on the atonement of the Lord. It has no value for anything except a life of isolation— it is useless to God and a nuisance to man. Measure every kind of experience you have by our Lord Himself. We cannot do anything pleasing to God unless we deliberately build on the foundation of the atonement by the Cross of Christ.

The atonement of Jesus must be exhibited in practical, unassuming ways in my life. Every time I obey, the absolute deity of God is on my side, so that the grace of God and my natural obedience are in perfect agreement. Obedience means that I have completely placed my trust in the atonement, and my obedience is immediately met by the delight of the supernatural grace of God.

Beware of the human holiness that denies the reality of the natural life— it is a fraud. Continually bring yourself to the trial or test of the atonement and ask, "Where is the discernment of the atonement in this, and in that?"

Isn’t it humiliating to be told that we must come to Jesus! Think of the things about which we will not come to Jesus Christ. If you want to know how real you are, test yourself by these words— "Come to Me . . . ." In every dimension in which you are not real, you will argue or evade the issue altogether rather than come; you will go through sorrow rather than come; and you will do anything rather than come the last lap of the race of seemingly unspeakable foolishness and say, "Just as I am, I come." As long as you have even the least bit of spiritual disrespect, it will always reveal itself in the fact that you are expecting God to tell you to do something very big, and yet all He is telling you to do is to "Come . . . ."

"Come to Me . . . ." When you hear those words, you will know that something must happen in you before you can come. The Holy Spirit will show you what you have to do, and it will involve anything that will uproot whatever is preventing you from getting through to Jesus. And you will never get any further until you are willing to do that very thing. The Holy Spirit will search out that one immovable stronghold within you, but He cannot budge it unless you are willing to let Him do so.

How often have you come to God with your requests and gone away thinking, "I’ve really received what I wanted this time!" And yet you go away with nothing, while all the time God has stood with His hands outstretched not only to take you but also for you to take Him. Just think of the invincible, unconquerable, and untiring patience of Jesus, who lovingly says, "Come to Me. . . ."

Oswald Chambers

I love my class. I am really blessed to be their teacher. Each bright mind, each adoring face, each innocent heart, each cheeky personality, each hardworking character touches me on a daily basis. I want to give to them as much as I can with the rest of the time I have with them. Each of them is a blessing to me.

Thank you kids! You are God’s gift to me this year. Happy Children’s Day! May you all grow up to be a greater blessing to people you meet. I LOVE YOU 3G!

I am back to using 6100! My student stared in disblief! "Cher, this phone got no video, no camera, no bluetooth you know!" "I know!" I said with a grin. My less-than-one-year-old V3(NUS) died on me. Actually it’s the screen that blacked out. I remember my brother said that flip phones tend to expire prematuredly. So my kind tuition kid lent me her Nokia 6100. It kinda simplified my life using a gadget for the sole purpose it was created for. I.e. calling and texting.

Surprisingly, and refreshingly, I no longer surf the net for the coolest phone to buy, or the coolest accessory to add to the existing phone. Instead, I found myself in a state of contentment. When I first saw this phone, I was transitting in HK airport. It was the coolest Nokia phone then. The sleekest and it’s got colour too! And it cost a hefty S$1000!! My student is willing to let me have hers for $30! I am taking it of course! It was afterall my dream phone years back!

A simple phone definitely has simplified my phone usage, and thus simplified my need for the coolest, smallest, fastest gadget.

Simplicity is sweet!