As we head into 2010....

I was at my physio earlier today, waiting, as people tend to do in aptly named waiting rooms, for the last checkup of 2009. Emotional state: a little demoralized and frustrated. The foot hadn't improved much since the last time I'd seen her, and it still pained quite a bit. What was I going to do in the new year, I wondered grumpily.

The answer came not in a booming voice, but on the wall that I found myself facing while doing some exercises later in my session. While leaning against the walls with my legs bent at a ninety degree angle, and squeezing the plastic ball between my knees, there was nothing else to do but stare at the wall straight in front of me (especially as my physico makes me do keep that stance for a few minutes.. She's sadistic like that.)(No seriously, you give it a go.)

Then I saw this poster that had undoubtedly been there the whole year, but which hadn't caught my eye previously. It was one of those cheesey cliches, with capital letters in some sort of serif font emblazoned across a poetic scene of water and mountain. But as I read it again and again, I thought, heck, that's a much better way to end off my blog for the year than my previous post:

There is no need to fear an unknown future, when you serve a known God.

2010, bring it on!

It's been a long year, I realized,

when I walked out of the video store empty-handed, because I suddenly realized I didn't have the emotional capacity to commit to someone's troubles and turmoils for two hours, albeit fictional.

Time for a holiday, methinks.

On that note, I'm going AWOL for a while, so I'll see you on the fresh side of 2010.

Famous last words: Just love Jesus!

Ciao

Epiphany!

I just had an epiphany about where I currently am in my walk with Jesus.

I have been a Christian now since December 2003, and for about 5/6 years my big struggle every year has been (somewhat inevitably, considering that I'm studying a BA) whether what the Bible says about God was a random made-up theory, or really the real deal.

In the last few years, I realized even as I was going through the annual existential crisis, somewhere I had a deep assurance that I had gone through these questions before, and that the answers were ones that convinced me again and again that Jesus is God.

Without knowing it, the name of the game has changed slightly. My epiphany is that from this point on, the questions surrounding the truthfulness of Christianity will be of lesser importance and create lesser turmoil inside me - instead, the question of satisfaction and meaning and joy will be where my biggest struggles will take place.

Rejoice in the Lord, ALWAYS!

I've blogged about joy before (see 'I've got joy joy joy joy down in my heart'), but I have to again tonight.

I just came back from a heartfelt and lank encouraging sermon on Philippians 4:4-7 and the speaker, John S was a great example of someone who is himself joyful in the Lord. It was so great to hear a reminder that we are the people of a happy God, and that we are commanded to be joyful, because I feel that I've lost that joy in Jesus over the past few months, and that my Christian walk has become a bit of an ambivalent experience- neither here, nor there.

But, John S said, maybe it's because we've lost our focus. Maybe it's because we've stopped looking at God, and instead have turned our gaze to the mirror- to ourselves. Highly plausible, I thought to myself. If so, I need to turn my vision again to God.



PS Blogspot tells me that this is my 200th post! Yeehah :) I feel like I won something, even though I don't know if this really counts as an achievement :)

PPS On the other hand, Google Analytics keeps me humble. Apparently I've had a 100% decrease in visitors in the last month, and I've had zippo, zilch, null, nada visitors to this site. heehee :)

Snapshots from an art exhibition and a chance encounter

Snapshot 1: The art exhibition

Princess Sarah and I went to an art exhibition opening tonight. Lots of fun. Different, crazy shocking, cute, interesting art pieces. Could use the same adjectives to describe the people. Anyway. While we were there, she asked how my QTs were going. It was a relief to confess to someone that they weren't, and they hadn't been for a while.

'Oh', she said.

Oh well, I thought.

She didn't say anything further, 'cause she knows when to rebuke and when not to.

We carried on walking for a bit, then I asked her what she was thinking. 'Well', she answered, 'I was thinking that God wants me to tell you to just talk to Him 'cause He misses you. But then I thought it might sound a bit lame'.

Sarah's great like that.


Snapshot 2: A chance encounter

We left after a while, as we felt like escaping into town and seeing what was happening there. After finally parking (after circling more than a few times), we got out and started walking. Then we got stopped by someone asking for money. And lo and behold, it was E and his wife Z from the night shelter, hiding out from the wind in a doorway. Obviously, I couldn't just walk past as I know them reasonably well, so I asked them how things were going, and what they'd been up to... And their story was heartbreaking. Not knowing what to say at the end of all this, I feebly said 'I hope eveerything works out for you', at which point Z said 'But it will. It always does. 'Cause He [pointing upwards] always looks out for us. Even when.. There was a stage where I didn't want to listen to Him, 'cause I got so tired of messing up the whole time. I got so tired of saying sorry to Him, 'cause there was so much to say sorry for.'

After greeting, Sarah and I decided to leave our plans and just head home. This encounter was just a little bit too much on top of a very full day. And as we were walking back, Sarah asked me what Z had meant - and for some reason I understood perfectly.

BFF - Best Friend Forever

I like the simple life, but simple life evidently doesn't like me, and the last few days have been like scenes out of a soap opera: Misunderstandings, childhood friends, phonecalls, farewells, BFFs, quarrels, breakthroughs, smses sent to the wrong person, mascara, boyfriends, gmail chats, grouchy sisters, fiances, tears, pregnancies, new friends, and sushi.

Sushi is the only thing that kept me sane. Raw fish does that.

Jokes :) But in a wonderfully peaceful and uneventful day yesterday, I came to a remarkable epiphany: Relationships are complicated.

Let me repeat that for those of you who struggle with long sentences: Relationships. Are. Complicated.

On that thought, I visited Princess Sarah yesterday, and needing some advice, I told her about just one little dilemma that had been resolved amongst me and two very close friends, but used Person A/B/C etc instead of their names (which in itself got rather complicated, 'cause at one point, up to Person F was involved!). At the end, she just looked at me, and said "This just shows how the world needs Jesus. He's the only one who can be the Best Friend you need, because He's always constant, always there, never changes.

And I thought 'Wow.'

But we were both tired after my long verbal ramblings, so we carried on sitting on the Woolworths crate thing we'd found inside Woolworths.

The end.