I don't know when I grew up :(

Somehow, when I wasn't looking, I got old.

I got cynical, jaded, disillusioned.

And I'm not the only one.

Somewhere along the line, I think I began to get sick of 'young punks'.

It jumped up at me today. All of a sudden the low buzz of a normal IGNYTE service really got to me. I started seeing these groups of young kiddos (in my mind, I sometimes tend to speak like an ol' west-ern cawlboy) with all em' rootin' and tootin', and I don't know why, but I think I was actually starting to get annoyed.

I was getting annoyed at the short attention span; I was getting annoyed at the constant inane comments at every other statement; I was getting annoyed at the greater emphasis on people and situations than on God.

So I was busy getting all fumed up, when I walked over to Sister Kassey, happily sitting at the back on her laptop. And I asked her the important question:

"how do you deal with it?"

She smiled and just said "Love God, Love His people".

She said it like someone who knew the depth of that statement, of it's ramifications.

I remember when I was younger, I used to wonder why my oldest sister would seem to have such a low regard of my friends than I did. I wondered why I saw them as good friends, amazing people, yet my sister saw them as pretentious whiners who didn't know anything. When you compare the two, it becomes quite obvious: they were my friends, and I had a deep love for them.

You see, the Bible describes to us in the New Testament the difference between the Love and the Law. The Love brings Salvation, the Law brings Damnation. The Love brings grace, the Law brings punishment. The Love brings mercy, the Law brings judgement. And that was exactly what I was doing.

Without looking with love, I was looking through the Law; I was looking with eyes of judgement. I was judging them, yes, with the Law of God, but without the Love of God.

And when I started looking and removing that lens of judgement, I began to realise some really important things. Essentially, that I used to be just like that. I had an attention span so short it was basically measured in millimetres (I love sugar, on an unrelated note). I constantly made inane comments, mostly because I thought I was really amusing, and I was such a smartmouth I always had something to say to anything. And I used to put greater emphasis on the atmosphere of the service, on the people, than on the God of the people.

And more than that, I realised that as time passed, these things naturally faded. In time, they would probably experience it too. Yeh, them too wud sum day hang up ya'll boots, an put em' glory days behind yah. Used ta call me ol' Slick, cause I'd draw em' like I saw em', quick as a whip.



So to recap,
Law + Human Nature = Judgement + Hypocrisy
Law + Human Nature + Love of God = Understanding + Empathy

(note to self: western cowboy accents work better in person.)

So hello friends!

It has been a long, long time since I last posted on here and I do think it deserves an explanation.

I named it the Z2 effect.

It describes the crucial transition between secondary school life into JC/poly life (it's kinda in between secondary and tertiary, does that make it like, second-and-a-half-ary?). Some how, in the years before I've noticed some kind of change that happens to people when they go through that important year. For some reason, people seem to begin to change, harden, numb. Please note though, I'm not saying that the effect is due to the change in schools or seasons. What I'm saying is that this change in schools and seasons becomes the catalyst for greater change in relationships, in lifestyle that shakes and tests foundations from before.

And so I have to confess something of great importance:

I have not been okay.

Truth be told, I've been bleeding terrible.



Listen, I'm not going to blame it entirely on the change in school. But I think somewhere along the line I had begun to lose track of who God was and what God was doing! And that's pretty darn important!

As a result, I started neglecting this blog. You must understand the creative process that goes behind these posts first. Usually what happens is that in my daily living, I often come across thoughts about Christianity or about being a Christian that I note down. Then when I have some free time and I go back and reflect on these thoughts and pull and dig deeper into it, that's where the writing begins. It's from there that these posts are (I would say crafted but honestly, they do lack a certain smoothness about them) written.

In the past few months I've been letting my focus drift. And here's the thing, we tend to think about the things we focus upon. If you're chasing after a certain someone, you're gonna unconsciously think about that person. If you're starving and you begin to focus on your next meal, you're gonna start thinking about sinking your teeth into a Carl's Juniors thickburger. So when I let my focus drift away from God, I started thinking less about Him, about life with Him. And that led to less things and areas to think deeper about, and less posts. That and the fact that I also had less time to write.

But I want to change that. Bro Kah Fei's sermon as well as the prayers of quite a few leaders lately has been reminding me of this gift. Of wisdom, of thinking, of writing. And I thank God that His gifts and call are irrevocable (Romans 11:29)! Because that means that I can pick it right back up again.

So I told God that I desire to focus back on Him again, and that I want to give more of my time, avail more of my time to write, and to bless others with what He has blessed me with.

I know my God answers prayers. Expect to see more posts on here :)

(AND YES, I did read the comments on the tag board. I will blog about them. Long time coming, but they will be up sooner or later :) )