My testimony

I was borne a Buddhist leading a faithful and righteous life because I'm afraid of death and going to hell. I knew that death is inevitable and I really hope that there is God and heaven exist. Since young, the only religion that I practiced is Buddhism and Christianity is just another class of religion (something like branded goods).

My exposure to Christianity started during my secondary school at the age of 12/13 when I was invited by my form teacher to a Youth for Christ group. This was when I was shared on the true knowledge of Christianity: Sin and Jesus Christ.

At that age, I believe that all religion preaches the truth that the religion believes in.

I've got no doubts that whatever I've heard of about Buddhism and Christianity was the truth that was shared to me.

Though I was young, my mind was driven by logic as Mathematics was my best subject then. It was very clear to me then that whatever that was taught about Christianity provides no allowance for the route to heaven. Buddhism never tell me that Christian cannot go to heaven as they still got other live to work on to reach heaven. This current live also doesn't guarantee my ticket to heaven. Christianity however tells me that my choice is my only chance to Heaven or to eternal Hell with no return at all.

While Christianity is the only wise choice logically, it was a great struggle for me. Back in home, I've heard lots of conversation between my parents about their view of Christianity. Their view of Christianity was indeed very bad and I've heard of Christian doing lots of stupid things through their stubborn faith that eventually cost a life. I knew for sure that if I were to be a Christian, there will be hell in my family.

I love my mom and dad and the thought that becoming a Christian will destroy my relationship with them is very frightening. It was OK for me to go to hell after death as long as my parents still love me. But then a fearful thought came to my mind, i.e my parents will go to hell after death because we are not Christian. I do not want this to happen. I can't bear to see my parents going to hell. I want to be a Christian and I want my parents to be Christian too.

I think I said the sinner's prayer secretly and prayed for my parents. Though my choice was clear, I was still very confuse.

Year by year passes and my religion has been a struggle. When I fill up forms that asked for religion, I always struggled between Buddhism and Christian. When the form is one that my parents may have chance to see it, I'll put down Buddhism to play safe. Sometimes, I either tell people that I'm a Christian who does not go to church, or I believe in Jesus Christ but not in Christianity.

Believe in Jesus Christ but not in Christianity??? Yes, this was true for me for a very long time as I grew older. As I understand more about the world, Christians becomes those people whom I do not wish to be associated with. But at the same time, I could not deny Jesus Christ. Buddhism to me is just a teaching but not a religion and all other religion are just man made.

Therefore, I embrace all knowledge that teaches me to be good, but ironically, I believe in Jesus Christ but do not read the bible or attempt to learn about Christianity. Most of the teachings that I embraced comes from Buddhism. To me, these teachings make me a better person.

I grew in wisdom and advanced in career. Every problem that I faced has a solution. I've got very good sense of black & white, good & bad. Of course, I'll always choose the white and good. But I'm human and as long as I can justify to myself, I can also accept things that are bad. There's a saying "男人不坏，女人不爱", so long as it does not harm others.

There will always be a limit as to how much a man can do, especially when it comes to relationship. A setback in relationship is a wakening call to me. No matter how wise I am or how righteous I am, there are many things that I don't have control over.

There is no one on in the world whom you can trust fully, not even yourselves. In life, one will have to face situation to forgo righteous to solve a problem. Wise people who do not believe in God will eventually have to forgo righteousness and still able to justify that the act does not "harm" anyone.

I became enlightened at that very moment in my struggle. I made a firm decision to start to go to Church because only God has the ruler to measure every act in the world. I was skeptical about Christians, but I've forgotten that Christians are not God.

There are many Christians in the world who offers bad testimony through their way of life, but it is very clear to me that God's word is the only truth that I've been seeking in my life. Pastor Ong's sharing of God's word is very enlightening during the period that I was struggling. The only way I can really digest the words from God is by going to Church. Reading bible by myself does not bring much understanding.

Ever since I've made my commitment to attend church and study the words of God, my view of what I see in the world and people has changed totally. I appreciate the problems that I see in the world with much more in-depth understanding.

My worries are lesser because I can leave most of them to God. Still learning how to leave all my worries to God though. Many miracles start to happen in my life when I started praying. I experience many prayers being answered on things that I've totally no controls over. Every time when I need God badly, the prayers are always answered. I cannot attribute that to luck or coincidence as luck and coincidence is not there all the time. However, I also acknowledge that there may be possibilities the story of Job may happen in my life, but I know that God is in control and he love us and will not harm us.

I have always been ready for baptism, but I've always thought that Baptism is just a ritual and can do without. To appreciate the words of God and to lead a life that is Christ like is more important.

The baptism preparation class has taught me otherwise. Going through baptism gives the ownership of my life to God and not to Sin (Freed from SIN). I've previously misunderstood “Freed from SIN” with "Free from SIN" as being the same. Now I've fully appreciate what is "Freed from SIN" and today I'm really excited to be baptized.

Baptism

Me & my wife was scheduled for baptism this year on 4th Apr. This is a special occasion as it's an easter day and it's 1 day after my birthday. So it's easy to remember.

I've been praying to God for this day since I restarted my Christian walk. What appears like an impossible task is now made possible by God. When my wife agreed to go through baptism, I was really excited as I've personnally not heard her saying the sinner's prayer.

God has done wonders in our live and it's hard not to acknowledge his existence.

On 3rd of April it started raining at night and the rain did not stop in the morning on the 4th. Not only that, it becomes heavier when we leave the house. I know that the church has been praying for good weather for this day and I believe firmly that rain will stop though there's no sign of stopping so far.

The baptism service was scheduled at 9:30am at Changi Beach starting with songs and giving testimony by each individuals going for baptism and finally the baptism ceremony in the sea. There are 3 of us.

We had to bring Beckham to in-law's place first before proceeding to Changi Beach. Due to the weather, we were a little late. On the way to Changi Beach, rain was very heavy but as we reached Changi Beach, it was drizzling as we see sign of God's work at hand.

The church member were singing in the pavilion due to the rain. William gave his testimony, followed by Joyce and finally it was my turn. I've prepared my script in English but looking at the audience who are mainly elderly who does not understand English, I decided to speak in Mandarin. Thank God that I'm able to deliver my speech in Mandarin despite the fact that I didn't prepare for it and what I've spoken is not too far out from what I've written. Initially I thought I can translate to Mandarin while reading my script in English in realtime. But after a while, I recognised that it's impossible for me, so I decided give an impromptu speech without reading the script.

While giving my speech, it's still a little drizzling. After my speech, we proceed to the beach for the baptism ceremony and the sky was clear without any rain. With the rain stopped, church members can walk towards the beach to witness our ceremony.

It was a great day of sharing, to witness the act of God and to know that he is in control.

Beckham lost again???

I've been away for a long time. It's not that there's no more miracles in my life, but rather discipline to blog is very hard to cultivate for me :p

Just as I was preparing my mind to start blogging again this year, Beckham started the CNY by giving me a story to share.

On the 1st day of CNY, we went house visiting as usual. Every year, from my wife side, all will gather in 1 house for dinner. It is the house of her cousin and they stayed in a penthouse with a very open space outside the house. This is usually the last stop for the day.

Beckham likes to go there because he has a large space to run about and there are many people. However this year most of the attentions was put on our twins (I'll share about my twins in later posts).

Though Beckham may wonder away sometimes, most of the time, he will follow where I go. As I'm taking this for granted, towards the end of the night when most of the relatives have left, I suddenly feel that sometime was missing.

I looked around and Beckham was not in sight. I alerted Joyce, we searched the house and then we confirmed that Beckham was really gone. I was trying to recall when was the last time I saw him and it seems like quite long ago. My heart sank as I was trying to think how we can find him back again. The house was opened all the while and Beckham could have went into the lift without anyone noticing.

We started our search by going to the ground floor and see if we can find Beckham. I can see the anxiety on Joyce's face. I started to pray but I am not sure if God will help me again as this was the 2nd time Beckham has gone missing. Many thoughts came to my mind as I'm strategizing. Guilt, fear, anxiety, etc.

After some search around the swimming pool, I told Joyce to search the common area while I try my luck on the block at each level.

So I make my way to the block and went to the top floor. My plan was to go down the staircase floor by floor to search for Beckham. When I reached the house that Beckham went missing, I found that the door to the staircase was left opened. I went to the staircase and shouted for Beckham, but no response.

So I went down the staircase to every floor and went to the lift lobby at every floor hoping that I find Beckham there. I shouted his name at almost every floor just in case he went into one of the household and hoping that he can hear me and respond back. However, there was no luck.

When I reached the ground floor, I was so relived to see Beckham sitting behind the railings. Apparently, he seems to have gone down the staircase from 14 floor all the way to the ground floor and squeeze into the railing and then got himself stuck there (probably he didn't know that he can squeeze himself out again). Then all the can do is to just sit there crying. I can see a small pool of water on the floor. When I shouted for his name, he didn't even respond back to ask for help :p Aiyo... this dog of mine :p He must be very anxious waiting there for help and I wonder how long he has been there waiting alone :(

Though my faith was small and weak, through this little faith that I put my trust in God and prayed, he still answer. He is so Good.

Lesson from Michael Jackson

It's been one and a half weeks that MJ has died and today is his burial day. What can we learn from the life of this person?

I'm not here to judge him as I don't have total truth of him. However, based on various account of his life, his childhood is indeed very pitiful.

The lesson that I've learnt is that when something bad happen in one's life, the way you respond is very important. Responding in a proper way will strengthen you and responding in an improper way will destroy you. When there's damage in one's life, it has to be dealt with and get it resolved internally, otherwise it will continue to haunt you even though you thought you can forget about it or ignore it.

God always want us to respond well and get healing from all these damages rather than to run away from it or to use human effort to resolve it. There has been many accounts of people trying to resolve their damage by themselves and they thought that they have it under control, but they fail to see how it has impact in their life negatively in some cases. There are also many accounts of healing through God and how individuals are being released from the bondage of these damages.

God brings miracle through his healing and grace.

Surprise

I'm actually very surprise that news about my blog has been spreading. Almost everyone who mentioned about the blog send regards to Beckham :p

Some even scolded me for what has happened to him :p Indeed, I deserved to be scolded if not for God's intervention.

Anyway, this blog is not meant to talk about Beckham, so don't expect too much of his story.

Miracles usually occurs in crisis and it's really stressful to be in crisis.

However, since I'm in this topic talking about Beckham, I'll just share what we are doing with him right now.

Beckham sleeps with us in the same room. Usually I'll put him on the bed beside my pillow. One third of the bed is reserved for him on my left, I sleep in the middle and my wife on the other side.

Then in the middle of the night, he will usually jump down from the bed to take his supper. Then after that he'll have problem getting up the bed. So he will go to my wife side of the bed standing up and tapping on the edge of the bed so that she will wake up and carry him to the bed and he will walk over our bodies to reach to his pillow. He doesn't come to disturb me to carry him up cos I'm in the middle of the bed and will probably can't hear him :p

So lately, I'm thinking if we should get him a ladder for him to climb up to the bed himself. But instead of getting some sort of ladder, we are now trying make use of a platform at the side of the bed and training him to jump to the platform first, then to the bed. But apparently, he is a slow learner and still could not get up to the bed himself :p

Well, it's just 2 nights since we started this exercise... will see how things goes.

Court Case

I bought a pot for my mother-in-law and she complained that there's some problem with the pot.

So on 13 Nov at around 11:30am, I brought the pot to the service center for report. To my disappointment, no one was there. I guessed they had gone for early lunch. I do not want to stay there, but I do not know where to go.

Then I thought I might as well go back to my old office where I've not gone back for quite a few months as it was not too far from there.

I've moved to new office in Bukit Merah Central since Mar, but once a few month, while I'll go back to Peminpin to check if there's any mail for me.

I was shocked that there's 3 letters to me from IRAS. It was a court summon which was scheduled on 12 Dec 2008. The letter was sent on 5 Nov 2008. The reason being that I've not file income tax return for my company for the past 5 years (starting year 2003).

It's a long story. This income tax thing has been my nightmare since I took over the full operation of this company in year 2004.

To avoid going to court, I've got deadline up till 8 Dec 2008 to submit the income tax return for 2003 - 2006 and pay a penalty totaling to $2550 :(

To cut story short, this period has been very stressful for me as I've not been keeping proper record and doing my accounts. Thank God, I came back to office that day and not few days later, I managed to get things settled on 9 Dec 2008. I've gone to banks many time to request for lost bank statement, got someone to do my accounts for me, find an auditor, digged out past records, account for the descrepancies, etc. Everything was very very rush and not to mention the amount of money I'll need to spend during this period :p

Thank God again that the project that I talked about in the previous post was finally closed after spending about 9 months on it. Otherwise, I don't know how I can take the stress.

God did not fail me again

I started to write my first program when I was 12 years old. At my current age, I could be classified as an expert in the aspect of programming. There is nothing that others can do but I can't, it's just a matter of how long I'll take to learn the new technology. After I've learnt the technology, things that can be done by anyone, I am confident to say that I can do it too.

Having boasted, I finally met a situation this year which is the toughest test for my ego so far.

Early this year, I took up a project which I estimated to complete in 50 days, but after half a year, I'm still working on this project with the same amount of money committed. The customer has done this project by themselves and they came to us to redo the same thing using different technology.

This project is a test of my ego cos the customer will always compare what I've done with what their programmer has done before. Because of the delay (which is not totally our fault), the customer has lost faith in us and always seems to condemn me that our program is not performing as good as their old system.

Initially, there was indeed performance issue which I've resolved using different design and performance was exceptable until customer was testing with other set of data and find that performance was very bad. We pushed the blame to the hardware that customer is using and the network.

We maintained that we have already optimized our program and there's no way to improved further and to prove our point, we arranged to do testing with the same set of data for our program and their existing program.

Initially, the result doesn't tell much as it seems like we were right that our program is not that bad.

However on 21 Aug, the final test result from our customer showed that the performance of our program was much worse as compared to their existing program. It took our program around half an hour to respond and their program just take barely a minute.

Our program is supposed to be more flexible with a different design to handle the flexibility, thus under certain condition, performance will be bad.

I was very stressed and loss at that time. I wrote a very depressing email to my working partners to express my depression. I could do something to change the design so as to achieve better performance (at least on par with customer's program) but that will require lots of time as I've already been working on this project for 5 months. Worst still, customer will lose faith in us and our reputation will go down to the drain. Time is really not at our side. I admitted total defeat this time and I felt very sorry to pull them down too.

However, I assured my working partner that I'm not giving up despite all the stress. I just want them to prepare for the worst.

God has been helping me so far in my work. In my line, there's always unpredictable events to handle and so far I managed to find solutions to whatever problems that I faced even at areas where I've got no knowledge about. God has never failed me.

I have faith that God will bring me through this although I don't see how is it possible. I even have 2nd thought that God may fail me just this once because of my ego. However, it is with this tiny faith that God will not see me die that kept me thinking and not giving up. Within 4 hours, I found a break through which could be a solution to our problem. Within 2 days, I experimented and make minor change to a big program but improve the respond time from half an hour to 10 seconds.

It's simply amazing as now we have a faster respond time, more flexibility, more functionalities and better design. We were on the verge of losing the battle terribly. But somehow the whole event was overturned and we finally won the war. I would not have done it without the tiny faith that I held on strongly to.