Is it that important to be right?
February 10, 2010
Somewhere along our lives, someone has told us that we’re wrong. At times, we may agree… More often than not, we don’t…
Why do people find it so important to be right?
What do you gain from being right?
When you are right, you feel justified, vindicated… But at what cost? As I reflect and think about friends that came and go… One thing everyone had in common, they were right. Perhaps they felt betrayed (maybe they were), and therefore had the right to leave a place or dump their friends. Again, my question, at what cost?
The opportunity cost of being right sometimes doesn’t add up (oh if dear economics can be applied to such a context). You can be right… At the cost of everything you’ve ever lived for.
Someone told you off.
Your loved one cheats on you.
The colleagues at work backstab you.
You have every right to be angry, to punch that person in the face, to leave your lover, to bring and gun to work - to tow every single of those monsters down. Yes?
We all know how such stories end. How many lives have been ruined because someone just had to be right? How many families have broken up because both parents felt the need to be right? So then, what’s your cost of being right?
We can be totally right, but absolutely wrong at the same time.
Yassy mentioned: “Your leaders always tell you the truth about yourself even though they have nothing to gain from it.”
Many times when I’m being discipled a spirit of self-righteousness rises up inside of me and starts to justify all that I’ve done. Over time, I’ve learnt to shut that voice up… Because being right then will only costs me my destiny, my sonship. If we feed that spirit, it will only grow into pride.
I take a look at our world, at how evil people can be… The monstrosities and treachery we come up with… If God decided to wipe us all out, burn us out in an apocolypse, I dare say, it’s the right thing to do. Yet, “for God so loved the world, He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life”.
God doesn’t do what’s right, He does what matters to us. And I’m thankful that He’s been gracious to me.
I stand with my Pastors.
When there’s nothing left to feel good about yourself…
December 22, 2009
Sometimes when I feel low, I feel like spending time by myself. I tell myself I need time to sort it out… I need time to seek God and find the answer.
But for most of the time I always find God pushing me in times like these to love others even more. It’s when I love others that I keep my mind of myself.
What you focus on grows. If you focus on your problems, your problems will grow.
If you make the dreams of others come true, yours will come true too.
Christmas. Others. Lives.
It was one of those dreams… I actually woke up with a smile.
“that when I waked/I cried to dream again.” - Caliban
But I believe, life is sweeter than dreams. Life with God, is still bigger than your biggest dream!
Whoaaaaaaaaa today feels like a long day indeed.
On my way home I got so tired my thoughts started to reverberate off the walls of my mind.
I got on to the bus bus bus bus bus bus bus.
Sat the elevator up up up up up up up.
Opened the door door door door door door door.
I think I seriously need to rest rest rest rest rest rest rest.
We will breakthrough through through through through through through through this weekend.
Ouch, head hurts, throbbing.
I finally read through Be A People’s Person by John Maxwell. Ha ha it was a gift from Yassy quite awhile back. Thanks Yassy! I felt my mindset changing. I felt encouraged to change.
In God there is never a moment of hopelessness. There is always an answer and solution to breakthrough. Our God has enabled us to overcome.
About army, LAB is finally over for us. I hope there is no more OT. AHHHHHHHHHHHHH ARMY. MING JIAN IS GOING INTO THE ARMY. Ha ha how is C10 going to be with everyone being gone from Monday to Friday? We need a team in C1!
Many ideas floating in my head and spirit. Time to put it down on pen and paper. God will speak, He will guide me.
1/2 year soldier.
September 19, 2009
I’ve been in army for almost half a year now! I might have to be re-vocated in a few months time because they’re outsourcing my job to engineers now. I pray I’m still 8-5 after this. God’s still showing many truths from just surviving in the army environment.
Nowadays, there are so many thoughts swimming around my head. Wish I could just print them out of my head. Ha ha ha. No where to start, let’s just pull out the oldest “I should blog about this” thought that I have.
My WO was sharing how he loved being a PC and didn’t enjoy his work as much now being promoted. Rising up the ranks gave him less pleasure but more stress. I probably felt the same way in Scouting. That’s why I hid in BMT, I hid in OETI. I think I’m a pretty loud timer, but I hid it. I knew nothing stood at the end of being recognized here. No 3SG or 2LT rank would satisfy me. Politics are tiring. Fighting people is the most draining thing. Thank God I’m where I am today instead. Rising up in an organisation that you don’t believe in will only leave you tired and disillusioned.
Things are different in HOGC. My role model Pastors are exemplary in showing us a great place with no politics, and where rising up is so easy - in the love and encouragement given to us. Pastors always share how they love preaching to us because we’re the most responsive and best-est people to preach to. Pastors also loved knowing every single one of us. Back in Henderson and FTMS Pastors knew almost EVERY single person and their names. However, awhile back Pastors shared that even though they loved doing that the most they might have to spend more time flying around from now on. It’s also harder to know all 1000 of us now. Pastors still have the same love for people and genuinely want to know every single one of them. Still, they don’t look back in regret and yearning for the past.
If the church is healthy, it will grow. If an organisation is healthy, it will grow.
In order to grow sometimes we sometimes give up what we like doing more, in exchange for a job that is more macro-minded - as Pastor once shared with me, to have a macro picture and handling of our teams is important to grow. If we want to grow, we need to teach what we’re doing now to others, so that we’re freed up to handle greater things.
This hardly works in the army because not everyone believes in the system and organisation. One does what he likes, because the life and death of the organisation does not bother or prick their conscience.
I love what I’m doing now… But I need to start raising leaders so that we can all grow even more. I need to have more anointing so that the people will grow too! Members will become Team Leaders. Team Leaders will become Connect Group Leaders. And people will grow, grow, and grow!
God is my teacher. Army is the lesson.
Stand.
July 28, 2009
What happens when you feel that you are at your threshold, the tipping point, where any second you feel like breaking?
When your efforts have yet to show any result…
When the things you do just don’t seem right… Or they may even feel right but yet not be…
Don’t lose heart.
In the past, it was fighting PO. It’s easy fighting by myself. There’s no such thing as consequence too big or price too high. If I wanted to beat it, I could. There was no need for wisdom or planning - winning was a matter of sheer will. If my will was stronger than my mum’s, I won. I guess that’s why I didn’t mind being locked out of the house, or having my things confiscated… It was my battle, my fight, and no one else would get hurt even if I lost it all. I could fail my studies all I want, it’s my future to behold. It’s easy being a lone warrior. It’s easy to be a renegade.
Not anymore.
Now, when I stand before God, I stand for more than one person. My actions now affect them. I live for them now. I’m learning how to make the unpopular decisions. I’m learning how to accept the consequences of my words and actions. What happens when one of the guys makes the call to challenge his PO after I talk to him? His battle becomes mine as well. It’s his battle for sure, but I’m in it. Perhaps that’s why I was never a fan of sports, I couldn’t understand the idea of being totally in the game even though I’m not there.
Things change.
Pastor and Charleston went for the Real Man conference in Aussie. Sometimes, I wonder what it takes to be a real man. I think I have a glimpse now… Responsibility - Living for your family, and not just yourself. Everything has to hold in a balance, your balance. God’s balance.
I cannot afford to lose heart. I cannot afford to lose purity. I cannot afford to lose focus.
The weekend has been a crazy one. So many things happened, I was tested, and so were the guys. Some of them did well, some of them not so. I did well in some, not so in some as well. We don’t choose our challenges… They just come. When they do, and you’re under immense pressure, what do you do? Do you break? Do you run? Do you fight it?
Frankly, the call is ours to make. How we get to our destination is up to us. We just need to get there. It’s easy getting there yourself, it’s harder bringing everyone along with you. Harder, but not impossible.
Learning to be like a Shepherd.
We can only breakthrough, there’s no other option.
I used to be self-absorbed in my thinking. Then I shut off my inner thoughts because it was doing me harm. Now I’ll need to harness that thinking and keep it in control. To be intellectual yet spiritual. I need to start thinking again, because if I don’t, others won’t grow. It’s like a chinese gung-fu movie where you pick up a weapon that needs to be tamed - failure to do so will only bring disaster.
My insides have changed, and so has my writing.
Pastor Lia’s sermon came with divine timing - for everyone. If you were not there, you should have been - but that’s another story for me to explain in my thoughts to myself.
So this is me, working on my brain and spirituality at 3.40am in the morning. Till next time… More insight. Watch; pray.
This is me, attempting to find myself. This is me, for the first time, touching my destiny so clearly. This is me, Changing myself before I get to Change my world. This is me, living for You, and you. I haven’t lived life until now, and this writing is just a reminder to me:
I stand for a generation to come.
Twitter has killed blogging. Everything is so bite-sized, and fast. Micro-blogging is the new in thing. It is a representation of the media age that MTV youth embrace. I’ve been tweeting so much that I’m now at a lost for words after losing the word cap.
Army has been really fast-paced as well. Time passes fast when you have fun. I’m surrounded by relatively nice and an environment with little politics. I call this the cool-down zone, when God relaxes you in the areas of school/work/army while He pushes you to the boundaries in Leading and seeking Him.
When you’re not in the cool-down zone, you’re in the heated-up zone. That’s when God throws you into a place beyond your control - like Tekong. Your convictions are tested, your character is forged as well.
Recognize the seasons, do the right thing. The hardest thing is growing bigger than yourself.
Thoughts are slowly creeping in and around my head - it’s time to do some mind-keeping again. Maybe, it’s just because I’m getting older.
See. My sentences are appearing in short-bursts. I shall be coherent again. Can’t wait for my mind to birth an idea for IMAGINE 2009.
Ha ha when I think of the stayovers over the past week I keep laughing and smiling to myself. They’re just so funny…
I don’t get the feeling of leading the lost… I see in the future them rising up to run this race beside me. Leaders, worshippers, all sorts of people!
Going to miss Klemon when he enters the army.
I shall learn the value of hardwork this week.
Also, Ming Li is coming back to Singapore in 2 days! Wonder how ang-mog-nized my sister is now!
