I DON'T PLAY MUSIC, I'M NOT A MUSICIAN. But I serve to direct them...

Yesterday we had a great jam session on the seasonal christmas songs we planned to dish out in the coming weeks. Since we've got a drummer and a bassist (instead of me having to play Jill-of-all-trades), we've been rocking pretty hard as a band. Yesterday, we rocked so hard that I think our amplified pop-ped. And I got so frustrated; we were having a great time practicing and now this could set us back somehow.

I was taking it out and whinging about how hard it will be for get the amplifier fixed or get quotes on a new one since I'm not exactly a musician by trade or know the lingo especially in this foreign language. And for a time before I questioned, "why doesn't *insert name* just step up and help me?" And, anyone of the band members would probably have been more qualified on language or on musical skills and knowledge!

Then I read a worship article by John Pape, a worship leader's leader and was convicted by this," ... a worship leader is a spiritual leader... a spiritual leader is someone who is called by God with God given capacities and God given responsibility to serve a specific group of God's people directing them in God's purpose for that group to bring glory to god."

One word. Oooops!

Audio: Bard Millard's Hymned No.1 album and Redemption Songs by Jars of Clay.
Biblio: When Men Think Private Thoughts by George Macdowell.
Cerebrio: I want to be able to comprehend ...what is the width and length and depth and height..to know the love of Christ.

ONE FISH, TWO FISH, RED FISH, BLUE FISH

In my house, there is a fish. It's not actually mine. It's my flatmate's. In his penthouse of a tank (all relative to the size), there is just him. When Fish - and that is his name - first joined our household, he had other fish friends. But, they couldn't withstand the craziness of the people that made up this household. So, there was only Fish.

I don't take any responsibility for Fish. Sometimes, SF would forget to feed Fish. Sometimes, SF would forget Fish existed in the house altogether. Soon, I started to think if Fish got sad and lonely because not only did his mistress forget him, he had no friends to hang out with either.

So, I made Fish an imaginary Friend. I drew Friend and stuck it by one of Fish's floor to ceiling windows. Friend is pretty much my impression of what Fish looks like on paper, except Friend must be huge from the magnification of glass and water inside. Now, there was Fish and Friend.

Not to long after that, Fish started to leave us memos. He wanted to remind us that he existed and he validated his existence in our household by being the useful memo-middle-fish. He was the carrier-pigeon, or maybe carrier-fish between me and SF. His first messages said this:

Fish said, "Thank you for my Friend"
Sharon says, "When did Fish get a friend?"

Sometime later he said this:

Fish says, "SF won't join homechurch tonight. She's out. But I told her I would take notes on her behalf."

I wonder how offended he might have been at that particular session and whether he would relay the message accurately, cause we were expounding on Jesus' miracle of feeding 5000 people with loaves of bread and fish. At church, we decided that The Book of John had to be culturally relevant so we always replaced "bread" with "rice" and "wine" with "tea". Unfortunately, the Japanese do eat a lot of fish. Sorry Fish.

Audio: Don't Let Me Down by Stereophonics.
Biblio: Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller.
Cerebrio: My God is an amazing, un-understandable, indescribable God. Thank you God... for so many many things.

WORKING OUT TRUST ISSUES WITH GOD

It's been one of those days when you get to thinking about timing; your timing and God's timing and when things should happen.

There's always been quite a bit to consider regarding moving and in the blink of an eye, even more time has past since I considered when that would start.

It could happen quickly, in January. My visa will expire then and will it make sense to renew it? It could happen in March or April, if I'm required to be back a little earlier. Or, it could happen in June, if things were on a roll. But which would be the most ideal time to move back to Singapore?

Audio: Lifesong album by Casting Crown
Biblio: Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller.
Cerebrio: Working out trust issues with God.

IT'S OFFICIAL

It's official then.

I'm finally making my way back to China after almost 11 years. At 15 (I think it was), I went to Beijing in an exchange program. This time I'm going south.

22nd December 2005 : Hong Kong
27th December 2005: Shanghai
1st January 2006: Shanghai - Hang Zhou
4th January 2006: Osaka

Young Life CLUB debuts its ministry to Japan tonight too. God, you rock! So do we!

Audio: California by Phantom Planet.
Biblio: Blue Like Jazz Donald Miller
Cerebrio: It's official then, aye?

AND ALL THE ANGELS WENT HOORAH!

One of the big issues I've been having this week is all the talk of marriage swimming around me. In the last seven days, my very good and oldest friend Janine got engaged (And all the angels went HOORAH!), my colleagues from my very first job is getting married next week and one of my church mates here are discussing marriage details in advance of the engagement.

I'm very happy that Janine is getting married (And all the angels went HOORAH!). Esctatic even. She deserves all the good things that God gives her. Now just one of our old trio is left, but I don't think I am jealous. What it does though, is make me prematurely anxious about my future, or to be more specific, anxious about the person I am involved in.

I don't want to put any pressure on the relationships I have now. I don't want to feel I have to do the aisle walk soon. I did that with one not so long and it went awry as fast as you can say Boo! So, only when the relationship is ready for it and not pressured by the those around me.

Because, it's so easy for me to get caught up in the excitement and start off with the wrong mental picture especially when things are new and afresh.

Audio: The Blues by Switchfoot's Nothing Is Sound album.
Biblio: The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini.
Cerebrio: Destroying speculations ... and taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ... 2 Cor 10:5