The quest for Perfection

is a lonely jog along a never-ending road.

Moving forward, but never arriving at the destination.

Leaving no room for companionship.

Ever accelerating to stay ahead of the pack.

Exhausting, but never fatal.

Then I turn around, only to find that I have been running on a treadmill. With 15 pounds of weight heaped upon my shoulders.

random facts about the Other

Let's just say that I have quite an "interesting" job. One that many are dying for. Or not. So as my team is winding down from the peak season of intensive classes, I spend more time doing, well, nothing. To elaborate a little more, that translates into me spending more time just looking at people eating.

Anyway, the past week had been a guy's week, with mostly, if not all, male students. And I observed some fun facts about this other creation of God.

1. Guys put everything (did I say EVERYTHING?) in their pockets. Even a whole bottle of water! Wow! How does one do that? It's a miracle!

2. Be it 4 or 40, guys like tugging at pigtails! So I saw this middle-age man tugging at his female classmate's ponytail. Ah, good old days... Just like back in kindergarten.

3. Guys love candies! So we serve Mountain Trail Mix (a mixture of all kinds of nuts, raisins, and M'n'Ms) at our hospitality room. And at the end of everyday for the past week, all that was left, or rather all that was missing from the Trail Mix bowl was M'n'Ms! Hmm... I wonder what happened...

God sure had a sense of humour when He created these fascinatingly queer (or queerly fascinating) creatures!

You Are God Alone

You are not a god created by human hands
You are not a god dependant on any mortal man
You are not a god in need of anything we can give
By Your plan, that's just the way it is

You are God alone from before time began
You were on Your throne, You are God alone
And right now, in the good times and bad
You are on Your throne, You are God alone

You're the only God whose power none can contend
You're the only God whose name and praise will never end
You're the only God who's worthy of everything we can give
You are God, and that's just the way it is

Unchangeable
Unshakable
Unstoppable
That's what You are

Storm in the Silence

There was silence. That awkward silence that I had dreaded. It somehow seemed like the silence had stripped me naked and exposed all that I had been trying so hard to masquerade. Then she'll hear my anxious gasps for air and the deep pounding of my heart, like a hammer on hollow wood. She'll read my mind like an open book- the very thing that I hhad been trying anxiously to hide. Because it was screaming "Get me outta here!" I was sure she heard that scream, because the silence, like a megaphone, had amplified it a thousandfold.

So I desperately operated my innate search engine to locate the right words to say. Wheels were turning and pages were flipping in search of those words that had never existed. And never will. I heard myself said, "I am sure the LORD let things happen for a reason. I am sure He has a better plan in store." That was a lie. That was just the default response for a situation like this. It is not that He does not have a better plan, but it's just that, right at that very moment, I was not so sure about it.

A million questions popped up in my mind. Like the game in which you whack the bobbing heads with a club, I tried to strike each of these questions down, and confine them to the dungeon of my mind. But they were raving to get out, pushing and stampeding their way out. In the process, hurting me from the inside out. And the pain that was caused translated into tears that flowed freely down my cheeks.

"The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away;

may the name of the LORD be praised."

Job 1:21b

Been thinking...

How effortlessly we point our fingers at those who nailed Jesus to the cross! The Romans who had to do what was politically correct then, and the Jews who had no room for the message of grace.

But what if Jesus comes now? Will our generation nail him to the cross just as they did? How will we respond to Him?

I can imagine those of us who will oppose His politically incorrect ways. I can imagine the skeptics in our midst who will sneer and jeer at the incomprehensible concept of grace. We have already crucified Him in our own ways. Like Bethlehem, we are too occupied to make room for the King.

What happens if Jesus comes today? I don't know. I don't wanna know. I am glad He came when he did, because it's always easier to look from the outside.