Christian vs Christ-Follower - A Mac vs PC Parody

Here's something geeky to pass your time with...

So are you a Christian or Christ-Follower?

Before I forget...

Congratulations to Zexian and Kendice!
Your statuses has been upgraded liao!

It is a small, small world

I just found out Zexian's mother is my secondary school Chinese teacher. o_O

Now I wish I had known him earlier because he told me that had helped his mother type all the Chinese test papers.

My reaction was, "Singapore is too small! Must emigrate!" :p

Madam Tan has since retired.

Zexian made a call to his mother and she said that she still remembers me as an obedient boy (got meh?) with a very high PSLE score. (By the school's standard, that is. I must say I was a sucker for the new building)

For Active Discussion

Hi all,

I thought these videos are good for discussion.
Do you agree or disagree with the points raised?
Maybe some actually have fallacies?
Some points are rather extreme, though it is unfortunate that there are proponents who support them.

Update:
Managed to source the full length video of the 2 part documentary.
Hope you guys can take time to watch the whole thing as the previous 5 videos are but snippets.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQ8_bIji7gQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4xIi-TwY-Y

Baby-Capture: Joseph

Baby-Capture: Lil' Kim

Team Hoyt - Yet another inspiring story

Imagine completing these with your son.

• 206 Triathlons, 6 Ironman distances
  
• 20 Duathlons
  
• 64 Marathons, 24 straight Boston Marathons
  
• 7 18.6 Milers
  
• 78 Half Marathons
  
• 1 20K
  
• 34 10 Milers
  
• 27 Falmouth 7.1 milers, 1 Falmouth in the Fall
  
• 8 15K
  
• 204 10K
  
• 143 5 Milers
  
• 4 8K
  
• 15 4 Milers
  
• 92 5K
  
• 6 20 Milers
  
• 2 11K

Now imagine that the son is a spastic quadriplegic, cerebral palsy, non-speaking person.

Youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4B-r8KJhlE

Team Hoyt's website

Update:
Managed to find the title of the song, which is "I Can Only Imagine" (so duh~! right?) and it is by MercyMe.

And here's the lyrics:

I can only imagine what it will be like
When I walk by your side
I can only imagine what my eyes will see
When your face is before me
I can only imagine
I can only imagine

Surrounded by your glory

What will my heart feel?
Will I dance for you Jesus,
Or in awe of you be still?
Will I stand in your presence,
Or to my knees will I fall?
Will I sing Halelluja,
Will I be able to speak at all?
I can only imagine
I can only imagine

I can only imagine when that day comes
And I find myself standing in the Son
I can only imagine when all I will do
Is forever, forever worship you
I can only imagine
I can only imagine

Surrounded by your glory,
What will my heart feel?
Will I dance for you Jesus,
Or in awe of you be still?
Will I stand in your presence,
Or to my knees will I fall?
Will I sing Halelluja,

Will I be able to speak at all?
I can only imagine, yeah
I can only imagine
I can only imagine, yeah, yeah, yeah

Surrounded by your glory,
What will my heart feel?
Will I dance for you Jesus,
Or in awe of you be still?
Will I stand in your presence,
Or to my knees will I fall?
Will I sing Halelluja,
Will I be able to speak at all?
I can only imagine, yeah

I can only imagine, yeah, yeah
I can only imagine, Yeah
I can only imagine
I can only imagine, Ohh yeah

I can only imagine

I can only imagine when all I will do
is forever, forever worship you
I can only imagine

What is your greatest fear?

Hi y'all,

Thought I would share this since it came across my mind and it was twice quoted in Hollywood. (Coach Carter and Akeelah and The Bee)

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.

We ask ourselves,
Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?

Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.

Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking
so that other people won't feel insecure around you

We are all meant to shine, as children do.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.
It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone.

And as we let our own light shine,
we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear,
our presence automatically liberates others.

~Marianne Williamson,
A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of "A Course in Miracles", 1992
(commonly misattributed to Nelson Mandela, 1994 inauguration speech)

Free Hugs

Youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vr3x_RRJdd4

A simple action to make people feel better, accepted and loved.
It brings about an emotional healing.
All it takes is just a hug.
It is just so simple, yet so effective.
Priceless, yet free.
So abundant, yet so hard to come by.

The world just needs love to become a better place.

On a lighter note, who needs television when there are such beautiful things happening on the internet?

Photos: Take The City Walk

Dr Vivian Balakrishnan flags off the walk.

Click on image for the full album

---

Towards the end...

'Pack shop' time...

What's this?

Like not happy liddat...

But the truth is Zexian was really just rolling up the orange fence.
Morale of the story: things are not what they seem in a snapshot, so watch the video. (No video lah.)

More comic relief from the Old Testament

Take some scenes from a classic film, jumble them up, add some hip and happening music and you got a brand new trailer that the people today will lap up.

Caution: one bad word.

Baby Dedication @ The Sims

Some overdue pictures taken at The Sims.














Click here for the complete album.

Some personal history - And so they say it's a long story

Somehow it's rather hard for me to communicate some stuff verbally. Consequently I sort of "develop" a "natural" ability to tell a story in writing/blogging. (Ok, that's really because I can go through an editing process.)
Anyway, for any of you guys who might be interested in my past, this is my submission to yesterday.sg that managed to "see the light of day". One even commented that the entry made her want to cry. (Ok, I'm really showing off here, so indulge me. :p)

How My Parents Did it
Raising the kids, that is. Looking back, I must say that it was nothing short of amazing. Here’s an entry dedicated to Mum and Dad.

When I was young, my mum was a full-time domestic engineer. (Ok, that really means housewife). I think she started the “moonlighting” when I entered primary 1 in 1987, taking on different circuit chip related jobs as time went by. By the time she was confident that I would be ok on my own, she went on to do her shift work in the factory.

But the one thing that I remember most vividly then was her sitting at a corner of the kitchen of our old 3-room flat in Clementi, (the kitchen was huge then, you could do a lot of things there) clipping away wires that were jutting out of electronic chips which she would later solder with a electric soldering iron.

Sometimes, she would be seated at the same place, with a device that looks like a giant exercise wheel. There, she would wrap insulating tape round and round the device till the roll of tape is used up. Then, she would use a 10 cent pocket knife (the kind that flips out from a metal sheath) and make a quick motion through the gaps, cutting the tape into 5cm strips in the process.

Click here for the complete story >>

Above the Influence

Here's a great site about doing the right thing under peer pressure. I think it's a great website for youths to visit.

Be cool, be yourself, be ABOVE THE INFLUENCE.

There comes a point in your life when you realise you're not a kid anymore.

Suddenly you have to make decisions.
You have to make choices every day.

This is the time when you define yourself or you let others define you.

You quickly learn that there are two ways to go:
UNDER the influence or ABOVE the influence.

I am ABOVE the influence.

What if Terminator had to protect Jesus?

Just finished watching the National Geographic Channel. It premiered "The Gospel of Judas". The first thing that came to my mind was this video a colleague shared some time back.

What if Jesus Christ had someone to protect him from the crucification?

Watch this ridiculous parody as Terminator attempts to alter the course of history.

History of a Name: Hong Kah - The Aftermath

After a conversation about the history of Hong Kah, I posted an entry on yesterday.sg. Very quickly, I realised I got quite a bit of facts wrong, like the actual names and the time/era of the incidents.

Fortunately, the good people at the Singapore Heritage Group dug up the real facts in not one but two entries:

1. Shedding Light on Hong Kah
   
2. Shedding Light on Hong Kah: Part 2

Seems like the possibility of Hong Kah being because of Christianity is very high.

For Owen: Something Children Should Watch

Got this link from a friend and thought it is something worth sharing.
A great cartoon on the truth behind the story we tell ourselves about where our meat come from.
People should be informed.
And young people can make a difference when they act according to the information.

Joke: Multi-tasking

2 Guys were engaged in some senseless banter and the topic of praying and smoking popped up...

Guy 1: Hey buddy, is it ok to smoke and pray at the same time?

Guy 2: Hmm... Honestly I don't know. Why don't you ask Pastor?

Guy 1: (walks up to Pastor) Pastor, can I smoke while I pray?

Pastor: (shocked) Heavens! No! Praying time is holy! How can you desecrate it with your bad habit?

Guy 1: (returns to Guy 2) You heard it, Pastor said no.

Guy 2: Hmm... How about I ask it like this...
(walks to Pastor) Pastor, is ok to pray while I smoke?

Pastor: Yes! Any time is a good time to pray to the Lord! By all means you can pray while you smoke! I encourage it!

Some christian comic relief

"The only man another man can love is Jesus Christ."

As We Gather ... ...

As we gathered, things just got better! I am pretty comfortable with Joe, and Karen too. They are really friendly and nice people to have around.

Last saturday, we invited Joe, Karen and Zexian to our humble home for lunch. It's our first time cooking confinement food and they are our VIPs to trial the samples. The menu of the day was:

1. Mixed white and brown rice
2. Black chicken with black bean soup
3. Steamed cod fish with ginger
4. Stir-fried beef with kailan
5. Red dates tea

After a home-made breakfast, Florence and I went to the Cold Storage nearby to do some marketing. Florence did all the cooking while I did some housekeeping.

Joe and Karen managed to navigate their way to our place whereas my poor cell leader took the wrong LRT route initially and ended up touring the whole Seng Kang. By the time Zexian reached, we were all done with lunch.

We showed them around our house and our wedding photos. I also showed Joe and Karen some of my mission trips' photos. After lunch, Zexian ran 1km on our cross-trainer. We then proceed to celebrate Karen's birthday with a tiramisu cake from Breadtalk. We didn't have time for games even though Joe had intended for that earlier.

During our conversation, I found out that Joe and Karen have begin their search for their new house in Hougang. Do keep them in prayers that our Jehovah Jireh will lead them to their ideal purchase. They will be flying off to Maldives for their honeymoon. They have also shared about how they will manage their finances after their marriage. I realised that Joe is a planner and he keeps things in order.

Joe had made a reservation at this famous crabbie restaurant at Ang Mo Kio Avenue 3. We then set off for our dinner destination in 2 taxis. We've ordered a crab cooked with vermicelli soup, butter crab, chili crab, 10 buns and their specialty deep fried tofu. Never in my life have I eaten such monstrous crabs. Their claws were so huge and satisfying! Zexian said that the crabs were from Sri Lanka. Then I remembered the tsunami and suggested that those crabs may feast on dead bodies before. We wondered if there are crabs in heaven waiting for us. Well, only God knows the answer. While we were happily eating our crabs, it started to pour heavily. Thank God that the heavy rain stopped right after our meal. Joe and Karen demonstrated their generosity by paying for the sumptuous dinner. I felt bad that they actually splurged on us despite the fact that they are saving up for their wedding plans.

On the whole, it was a great gathering with great food, and of course, with great people.

The Trek on Saturday

What happened:

• We trekked from Dairy Farm Walk to Bukit Timah Visitors' Centre and then to MacRitchie Reservoir
• On the way, we came across a railway track. Then we went off track. In other words, we hor-landed. Of course that was all in good adventurous fun.
• Our lunch was 10 biscuits, with tuna spread and 2 apples.
• We spent about 6 hours trekking.
• We went up Jelutong Tower and the HSBC Treetop Trail.
• Each of us notice uniquely different things. I keep spotting iguanas, spiders and a toasted baby snake. While Xinzhan spotted very green waters, terrapins and a swimming iguana.
• We went to the prata shop at Upper Thomson Road after realizing that the Teochew Porridge stall had already closed for the day.
• Xinzhan had kambing soup with bread, banana prata and 2 cans of 100Plus. I had a mutton murtabak, a glass of iced milo and a can of 100Plus.
• I was rather quiet all the way while Xinzhan did most of the talking
• Dinner time was more interactive with more conversational topics. Like that sin scale where I concluded that if one were to follow it closely, he/she is better off unattached. I thought it would more likely cause more problems than what it attempts to prevent.

Retrospect:

• Yup, we are uniquely different. Even the things that grab our attention are different. In a way, we compliment each other by noticing what the other may have overlooked or taken for granted.
• I learnt about Xinzhan's struggle against alcohol, which had me fascinated, intrigued and impressed at the same time. Fascinated and intrigued by how a person can be dependent on a certain substance, impressed by how well he can hold his liquor. I realized that I probably will never grasp why such things occur. Maybe he's like Li Bai, the Chinese poet who is incredibly talented in a drunken state. Though I think I remembered he ended up in a rather sorry state...
• Another thing that came across was his thoughtfulness. Noticing a particular wildflower, the thought a friend's msn messenger icon came to his mind. Throughout the trek, I probably was just thinking about finishing the trek. I was also thinking about what kind of conversational topics we could talk about, but I'm quite creatively challenged at coming up with conversational pieces, so I came up with nothing spectacular.
• There are some things that are common too. We have this simplistic, "just do it" mentality. That's why we started the trek in the first place. No need to ask, "sure or not?"
  Life's an adventure! Leave the "how to do it" for later.
  Though, Xinzhan isn't convinced that he should take on the full marathon this year... Kenny Sia (kennysia.com) completed his first with only 2 weeks of training in 6hr 35min.
• It was a good outing. Nothing like a good challenging walk to tire ourselves out so that we can enjoy the rewards (read: food) twice as much. Our cellgroup should do it REGULARLY. Good for keeping fit.
• Testing our limits is also a good way to recognize our existence. I think it makes anyone rethink life.

Last but not least, photos.