"If you believe, you will see the glory of God" (John 11)

It wasn't one of my better sermons. But I thank the Lord for his mercy, so unworthy a servant I could preach on Resurrection Sunday. Getting to the church was another milestone, a record of sorts. For the first time, my travel time exceeded one and a half hours. To be exact, I took 100 minutes to reach the church after taking bus 67 then MRT from Kallang to Tanah Merah and another bus, no. 24 to the destination. I was huffing and puffing and rested for 5 minutes until I was taken to the sanctuary on the 4th floor.

Two Days without Light

I have a small measure of what it meant to be without light for 2 days. On the 3rd day, the Lord rose from the dead to see the light of day again. For the past 2 days I have been trying to prepare for the Resurrection Sunday sermon but thus far nothing seems to gel and there is still no message.

1/4 of 2013 is about Gone

Soon I will have to think about my quarterly report of my preaching and teaching ministry. One thing which is unusual for this quarter is that I was not able to go a church more than once in 3 months since I have been preaching almost non-stop. When I went back to Sabah a fortnight ago I did not preach and attended services at 2 SIB churches, one a daughter church planted by my home-church and then at my home-church itself before I flew back to Singapore. If there is such a thing as an itinerant preaching ministry I am in the thick of it, preaching from Sunday to Sunday, from one church to another.

Celibacy and Women's Ministry

I am not preaching tomorrow on Good Friday. It will be a rest day for me after completing 9 hours on lectures from Tuesday, Wednesday and today on New Testament on the Pastoral Epistles. I am thankful to the Lord for giving me a great bunch of students. Over 20 students take my class on John's Gospel and they have been so attentive and appreciative of what we are doing in class. Likewise in today's NT 2 class, the atmosphere was surreal. We discussed the issue of celibacy in general and priestly celibacy in particular. As usual once we reached 1 Tim 2, there was bound to be a discussion on women's ministry in church.

Iraq 10 years On

The mother of all battles was fought over Iraq by the US-led invasion 10 years ago. But the Iraq war would turn out to be the mother of all mistakes in the first half of the 21st century. When Saddam Hussein was hanged I wrote a blogpost condemning the barbaric execution and the injustice of it all, especially perpetrated by a superpower who boasts in the rule of law that guarantees a fair trial. If there is such a thing victor's justice, Saddam's hurried trial, condemnation and hasty execution was it.

Strangers & Aliens in Sabah

I praise you Lord for you have comforted me and have not let my enemies rejoice over me. Lord, they have banished me from my land as a bird that is banished from its nest (1QH iv 8-9). Now I dwell in a land of plenty and peace but to me it is a wilderness for I am a foreigner and an alien far away from my people and my land. Twice within a month I have gone back to my land of birth. Instead of peace there was war on terrorism in the East, not far from my hometown of Sandakan.

Global Citizen & Local Resident

It is undeniable that our present decisions affect our future in a real way. For instance, if one signs a 25-year mortgage, one is tied down for a quarter of a century paying off one's debt to the bank. Unless one sells his house and downgrades, and alas very few are freed from being indebted throughout the duration of his or her working life. As a servant of God, Paul the apostle counselled Timothy not to be tied down with civilian affairs or things that concern this life in the world. How often we are so engrossed in the affairs of saving our lives in this world without realizing that we are losing our lives for eternity. It's the trick of the devil - beware the worldliness of the devil!

5 Years On

I have 5 days to reflect on my 5 years in Singapore. I am back in Sabah to spend time with fellow Sabahans and friends to pray for Sabah. Malaysia has come a long way. Where in the world can you get your passport renewed under 90 minutes? When I looked at the pages of my old passport I saw my life of 5 years went past like a dream. 95% of my time was spent in Singapore. after that in Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, HongKong and New Zealand where I spent the last few weeks of 2012 with my son. He is now gainfully employed. I do not know what the next 5 years will bring. My most immediate goal is to return to Singapore but whether I will be still in Singapore in 5 years' time only God knows.

7 Tongues in the 7 Letters to the 7 Cities

Today I led a Chapel's service lasting 27 minutes with my Family Group. In fact, it was not me but all my FG members; worship was led by Steph, slides in both English and Mandarin by Cheng-Cheng, Pst Kiko was our narrator and he gave the benediction at the end and Jessica from Indonesia was our pianist. We read the 7 prophecies sent to the 7 churches to our respective cities - Beijing, Berlin, New Dehli, Yangon, Manila, Kota Kinabalu and Singapore, read out in our respective languages.