What Makes Marriage Works

Yesterday, Pastor Benny Ho came over to preach, starting the first of the 4 part family life series.


I ( and I am sure many others ) was greatly blessed by his very interesting and useful sermon entitled What Makes Marriage Works.

I have to post the sermon points because I want to remember it clearly and do not want to be complacent in my marriage, which, according to pastor Benny is our 2nd most important decision after our faith. If we have a good marriage, we have a good life…

So here goes…

Preacher: Pastor Benny Ho

Date: 29 September 2013

Title: What Makes Marriage Works (Family Life Series 1/4)

Text: Ephesians 5:21-33

4 Observations

1) Marriage is built on the foundation of mutual submission (v21-22)

2) Submission is ultimately unto Christ NOT man (v22)

3) We are equal in standing, value, worth but not in function (Gal3:28) Man are wired to lead and woman are wired to follow

4) The bible focuses on responsibilities and not rights. Marriage is 100% each way and not 50% even if the other party is not doing their part. Because it is a covenant and not a contract. Ultimately it is unto the Lord. It is not just the coming of 2 worlds to become one. It is the forsaking of 2 worlds to form a new world.

Ephesians 5:31 Woman treat man as the head. Man treat woman as the body.

Man greatest need is to be honoured and respected. Woman greatest need is to be loved and feel secure. If we both do what the bible says our greatest needs are both being met.



Responsibilities of the wife (Ephesians 5:22-24)

Its counter cultural at that time of writing, so there is no cultural pressure/influence in the words being written

3 areas to watch

1) Attitude (1 Peter 3:1-6)

Continue to do what is right so that your partner can be won over. People respond to attitude. If your marriage is not in the ideal state, make sure our attitude is right with God (still)

2) Adaptability (Genesis 2:18)

3) Acceptance

Allow our pain to drive us to God but do not struggle in the place of desperation if life is in danger. Have acceptance first and work through problems.



Responsibilities of Husband (Ephesians 5:25-30)

1) Sacrificial love (V25)

Take dedicated time to romance our wife. Fill the tank. Guard our time with our time with our life

2) Sanctifying Love (v26)

We are responsible for our wives countenance (inner beauty/glow) when our wives are well inside spiritually, emotionally than it will reflect outwardly. Sanctify our wives with our prayers. Is our wives becoming more Christ like? Are our candles burning strongly for Christ after we come together?

3) Sustaining Love (v28)

Many marriages are not bad but they are no good also. God wants our marriage to have a sense of delight.

3 practical ways

1) Tell your wife “I love you” as often as we can. Wive can be forgetful so do remind them.

2) Do something nice for her regularly. Be as creative as you were while in courtship. You don’t do nice things because you feel romantic. You will feel romantic when you do nice things.

3) Choose to praise her continuously (proverbs 31:28-31) Affirmation is very important to our wife.



Conclusion: Meditate on the mystery of leaving of old world and cleaving with each other and fusing of a new world in the presence of God. In a wedding there are tears because of the leaving (children from parents) but there are also laughter because of the cleaving (husband and wife)

Spiritual parallel: Jesus leaving Heaven and cleave to us, His church and radiant bride.

12 magic words to keep our marriage going : I was wrong, I am sorry, Please forgive me, I love you.



After the sermon, I brought wifey down to respond to the alter call to recommit our marriage to Jesus once again. As we stood before His throne and prayed together, the tangible presence of the holy spirit envelops us and tears flowed freely.. bringing me back to the same place I stood 6 years ago where I held her hand and where our hearts were invisibly bounded by a vow that cannot be undone. Thank you Jesus for blessing me with Theresa, I will love her with all the love you have poured unto me so that her countenance will ever reflect your love, not mine.

Changing Our Tap

Last Saturday, I attempted to change my tap for the first time.


My tap has been leaking for quite awhile and the initial plan was to get someone in to change it for us but then I decided to give it a try to see if I can save a bit of cost.

So off I went to Alexandra to choose a tap which cost me $28 and on the advice of salesgirl also got a roll of white peat tape. (“You will need it, if not sure lou shui” she told me.. so I bought a roll)

When I reached home, I rolled up my sleeves and got to work. First I removed my old tap and to my horror, water started gushing out of the pipe !!!! man, I was so helpless then and tried all means to cover the pipe to no avail. Even suffering a few cuts in the ensuing struggle. It created a wet messy ponding on my kitchen floor which I later have to mop it up… throughout the whole ordeal, I was praying God help me and after a couple of minutes of immense struggle, was able to somehow turn my old tap back it to stop the self created fountain… phew! Man , how much water I have wasted…

After recovering from my shock, I gathered that I have to first turn off the main water supply before attempting such stunts so I went out to locate my unit’s water tap and turn it off. I then went back in and removed the old tap gingerly and put in the new one.

Initially the new tap doesn’t fit in well, so this is the part where the white tape was put to use and I just apply it until my new tap fits snugly unto the pipe. Finally, it was mission accomplished. A sense of accomplishment and satisfaction began to envelope me.

I know that to many men, changing of tap and DIY household maintenance is child’s play and chicken feed to them but I have never been a good handyman so this is a small victory for me.

A few lessons learnt here

1. Being no good in something doesn’t mean that I should avoid it completely. ( something similar was shared during last Friday’s leaders’ meeting by pastor Jeff, our attitude in ministry must be “I am not strong in this but I want to believe that God can work through me/ Either I am gifted or not gifted, there are some things (like outreach) which are our role, so we still have to do it/ We may have inclinations towards certain things which we are strong/passionate about but there are also areas which are important for us to undertake even if we are not gifted.



2. Be willing to roll up my sleeve and get dirty/messy. Many times, I do not take actions because I may be afraid of the mess I will get myself into. But again, like what Pastor Jeff shared, in ministry things will get messy. Mess is a sign of life so if we want to do things for God, we must be unafraid of mess.





3. Be observant and remember how the “experts” do things. Over the years, I have seen Mr. Zeng perform many repair works at our house. If only I were to observe carefully how they do things and remember it well, I would have known better than to leave my main water supply on while removing my old tap.



4. Be humble to listen to advice. When the salesgirl ask me to get the white tape, I followed instruction. Even basic ones.



Moving forward , I do hope to be a better handyman for my home as much as for the Kingdom of God.

Blessed Birthday Glenda and Gianna

On Wednesday, we had a early birthday celebration for Glen and Gigi at MacDonalds at Ridout.


Once again, wishing the girls a Great birthday and many many more blessed years ahead.

May they grow up joyfully, healthily and into strong godly women whose hearts will be ever flowing with the love of Jesus.

Real Faith that Last

Yesterday, Pastor Jeff concluded the last part of the book of Daniel.


Titled real Faith that Last from Daniel 6:1-28 , he once again emphasised that as Christians, we not only want to begin well but more importantly our aim is to finish well.

We need to have real faith that can withstand challenges like how Daniel did throughout his life as he outlast kings and kingdoms while holding on to his faith strongly.

And as demonstrated in Daniel Chapter 6, lasting faith can only be built upon when we have integrity, and when we are strongly convicted and fully committed.

To build integrity, we need accountability (someone who can ask us though questions like “how are you doing, REALLY?” )

To build conviction, we need consistency (it’s in the making of seemingly everyday small decisions that will strengthen our conviction when the real test comes)

To build commitment, we need faith ( faith to believe that God is faithful )

It is all too easy to fall away from the path God’s wants us to take. The temptations of the world, the selfishness of our flesh and our sinful desires of our heart is always pulling us further away from God.

It is indeed very sad to see one who used to be walking close with God fall away due to the many challenges encountered. However, the book of Daniel is a book of hope and encouragement illustrating once again that it is possible to finish the race well and more importantly, the promise that if God is for us, it really doesn’t matter who is against us.

For He is the living God,

And steadfast forever;

His kingdom is the one which shall not be destroyed,

And His dominion shall endure to the end.

27 He delivers and rescues,

And He works signs and wonders

In heaven and on earth,

Who has delivered Daniel from the power of the lions. Daniel 6:26-27

Sub District Gathering

On Saturday, we had a combined sub d gathering at Salvation Army Peacehaven at Bukit Timah. Thank God there is a direct bus from home all the way to the place. Before the gathering, I also had a meeting with Danny and the rest of the LGLs.


Liyin was way too early, so wifey went with her to the café below for some coffee. This is the way wifey support me in my ministry (arriving early together with me without complaints and helping out in little ways) and i am very thankful for that. After an hour of meeting, the rest of the members started to arrive. For ice breaker, we played a rather fun game of calling out the names of categories starting with the same letter of the alphabet.

For praise and worship, I played the guitar for Prisc. It has been quite some time since I played the guitar and it felt really good to be able  to help lead people into the presence of God.

After that, Danny let us listen to a sharing by Edmund Chen on the books of proverbs. I learnt that

Wisdom starts from God

Wisdom protects the heart

Wisdom uses word carefully

Wisdom values family

Wisdom chooses wise company

Wisdom shine as stars

We then had catered dinner and everybody mingled freely with the toodlers being the centre of attention, naturally.    After dinner, we did some clearing up before taking the bus home.  

My First F1 Experience

Last Friday, I had my first F1 experience. Even though the event is in its 6th year, this is the first time we witnessed it live.


Thanks to Mike who managed to get the passes for practice and passed a pair to me and wifey.

We nearly became too lazy to leave home after a rather heavy dinner of sushi and oyster mee sua but because we do not wish to waste the hard-to-come-by passes, we decided to go over and take a look.

It was a relatively long walk from city hall MRT to the Float @ Marina but because of the balmy night and carnival like atmosphere with lots of merry makers , we just soaked in the whole experience while walking and it did feel much more bearable.

As soon as we walked up the stairs of Bay Grandstand and saw the beautiful scene right before our eyes, our tiredness was gone and we felt glad that we decided to go over.


The practice lasted for about 3 hours and we left for home at about 10:45pm




On the Podium!





Leadership

“Leadership” is a topic that interest me no end. I can spend a lot of times reading about leadership theories, concepts and stories without ever getting bored.


My eyes lit up, my mouth widens and my heart pounds a wee bit faster whenever I come across leadership topics…

I believe that every one of us is a leader because at the very least, we have our own life to lead and decisions to make every moment.

For some, the leadership role gets more because they may be leading a family, a company, a life group or even a soccer team.

Knowing what leadership is about (leadership IS influence) and how to lead well is important because the stakes can be very high.

I am fortunate to have come across several leaders whom I think I can learn a lot from and one of them is Michael Raditya, Pastor Jeff and even my bro in law.

And from afar, Messrs Steven Gerard, Bill Hybels, Obama and Optimus Prime; o)

This year, I will be attending the Leadership Summit on the 1st/2nd November. I am excited by it and I know I can learn a lot from the speakers.

To end off, I would like to list down some important aspects of leadership which I came across very recently-

1. Character : Be a Piece of Rock

2. Charisma: the first impression can seal the deal

3. Commitment: it separates the doers from dreamers

4. Communication: without it, you travel alone

5. Competence: if you build it, they will come

6. Courage: One person with courage IS a majority

7. Discernment: Put an end to unsolved mysteries

8. Focus: the sharper it is, the sharper you are

9. Generosity: your candle loses nothing when you lights another

10. Initiative: You won’t leave home without it

11. Listening: to connect with heart, use your ears

12. Passion: take this life and love it

13. Positive attitude: If you believe you can, you can

14. Problem solving: You can’t let your problems be a problem

15. Relationship: if you get along , they’ll get along

16. Responsibility; it you won’t carry the ball you can’t lead the team

17. Security: Competence never compensates for insecurity

18. Self-discipline: the first person you lead is yourself

19. Servanthood: to get ahead, put others first

20. Teachability; to keep leading; keep learning

21. Vision: You can seize only what you can see

If we care about anything…if we care about our families, if we care about our churches, if we care about our businesses, if we care about our society…




…We Better Care About Leadership.”



-Bill Hybels

That's One Small Step for Dad, One Giant Leap for His Self Belief!

Last sat, wifey and myself woke up early at about 540 am to prepare ourselves to bring her dad out for a walk.

It has always been my father in law’s wish to walk from his home to his workplace SPD at Tiong Bahru and all along, we were not confident that that is something possible. ( in our mind, we were worried about the traffic, weather, and if we can cope )

Since it’s his birthday soon, we decided to let him try fulfilling this wish of his.

Thank God that the weather was perfect on that day. The late night storm which stopped in the morning made the air really cool and comfortable for our walk.

As dad took one small step at a time up the slope towards SGH

and than headed left along a walkway and across an overhead bridge

we finally reached his destination, together.

Like what Neil Armstrong proclaimed when he first set foot on the dusty surface of Moon on 21st July 1969 "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." I would like to believe that maybe somewhere deep within my father in law’s heart, his self belief grew a wee bit more with each action of  placing one foot ahead of the other and trudging doggedly through the 2 hours of walking

*after the walk, we had breakfast at Tiong Bahru Market and walked around a little bit more before heading home as the sky threatened to rain again. However, the weather continues to hold, so we brought him to have his long overdue haircut (barber threw in free shaving, eyebrow trimming and plucking of nostril hair for free as a complete birthday package… haha isn’t that nice? that would normally be a $68 package at Jean Yip)

At night, I brought wifey to Marina Square for dinner. It has changed so much since the last time we were there and there is now a wide array of dining choices at the entrance of the mall ( it is called Food Edition, I think) . Wifey also took the chance to have a picture taken in front of the oh-so-familiar One Raffles Link , her former stomping ground which apparently still holds a fair bit of nostalgia for her, awww...

We had a simple dinner at the foodcourt that night and then went across to stroll along the bay (saw a tourist playing with a gecko off a tree, how brave is that??) and then sat down at the amphitheatre, sharing a cup of corn and listening to a couple singing some songs before taking the bus back to rest.

A Selfie on the way home... giving Mr. Baey a run for his money. oops..

On Sunday, we had lunch with Eugene, Jac and Emmanuel, Judy and David at KFC after service.

you're not gonna have this egg tart unless you give me some kisses...muhahaha

Wifey had some fun time playing with Emmanuel before going over to Bugis with Liyin while I had a comcare meeting. In the evening, I went to join Matt and Mick for their soccer training. It was surprisingly tiring playing with the bunch of kiddos who seems to have boundless energy.

At night, we managed to book our air tickets to Bangkok from 22-28 Nov . Bringing wifey for a retreat during our wedding anniversary. Sweet!

Ride the Movies... Yes We Did !

Last Friday was a magical day… it was magical because wifey and I visited Universal Studio.

As mentioned in my earlier post, USS is a beautiful place and it makes one happy just by entering into its compound.

Even though we have visited the place previously for their Hollywood After Hours, this time round is a much different experience. The mascots were out in full force and roaming the area all ready to pose with you for a shot, the whole place and rides were accessible to us and everybody was just buzzing with excitement.

Really thankful we can get cheaper tickets at just $48 instead of the usual price which is about $70 ;o) ( thanksgiving point 1)

We left our house early on that day about 830am and went for our favourite breakfast at Ya Kun at Harbourfront. Wifey had a kaya toast set while I had a packet of nasi lemak.  At Ya Kun, we were also fiddling with the Canon DSLR camera which Mike has very kindly lent to us (thanksgiving point 2) . Because of this camera, the pictures we took are of really good quality as can be seen this post.

After breakfast, we proceeded to take the tram into Sentosa…whoa... excitement builds up ;o)  

 Once we reach the entrance of USS, we just have to take the below shot

And saw our first mascot PO!

Awesomeness

We first went to Madagascar and tried "A Crate Adventure" its a simple boat ride through a river where the characters will take turns to light up when the boat went past them. One thing good about this trip is that we did not really need to queue for very long for all the rides (Thanksgiving Point 3) After the ride, we went out and managed to catch some Madagascar characters to take pictures with. They were so colourful and cute and really makes the photos so cheery.

We walked on and then it’s into the Shrek 4D movie at Far Far Away Land. As we sat and watched, our chairs shooked, we were tickled by some hairy monster in the leg and got squirt by water according to the story unfolding in the big screen

The next place we went in was to catch the Donkey LIVE show. 

This is more for kiddos as we were asked to do some silly dance inside and the whole thing was over in a while.

Next up was one of my personal favourite! WATERWORLD. I have always wanted to watch this performance so I am really thrilled that we finally managed to be amongst the audience. Waterworld is a spectacular pyrotechnics and explosive show with lots of waterplay . Those sitting at the front has a high possibility of getting wet. Wifey was shocked by some of the explosions. Oops 

Next, we walked over to the Lost World. We decided to forgo Dino-soaring because it is too common and more for kids. Sky canopy was crowded, so we went to queue for rapid river. Halfway through, the staff announced that the ride was closed until further notice, so we left the queue and headed towards Sci Fi City . The sky started to drizzle at this point in time. I was quite worried that the rain will turn into a storm and spoil our excursion but thankfully it was a passing rain which cleared up in less than 20mins (Thanksgiving point 4)

Over at Sci Fi, we started off with the Accelerator which is quite a common ride. Something like those swirling teacups we see at Uncle Ringgo funfair… hehe. Once we tried the accelerator, we moved on to the highlight of USS which is the Transformer Ride. I expected to queue for a long time for this ride but somehow there was no queue at all and we managed to walk all the way in and into the carriage in minutes.

The transformer Ride really lived up to its billing as USS’s star attraction and it was really fun being rocked, sucked into a vacuum , shredded by razors etc…by Optimus Prime, Bumblebee and Megatron.

We were to come back again later for this ride …

Lunch time! And it was at Louis that we had this couple meal consisting of 2 slices of Pizza ( I chose Hawaiian and Pepperoni) , some drumlets, minestrone soup of the day an elmo muffin (cute!) and a tall draft sprite costing $38.

 Initially I thought we may have difficulty finishing up the food but my worries are unfounded as we polished up everything on the table..

After lunch, we stepped out and straight into the sesame street performance! These classic characters are really colourful .. some pictures we took with them

Following that, we decided to move on to take the rides which we did not managed to take earlier on . Spaghetti Chase was first… Along the way we bumped into more mascots

Ok now this Sky canopy ride nearly made wifey faint… once the carriage starts moving she murmured “ Oh dear, I am getting scared…” and as it moved faster and faster she kept repeating to herself “ I think I'm gonna faint , I think I'm gonna faint …. “ yup that’s my wife . The ride was over in 53 secs. That must be the longest 53 sec in wifey’s life and no, she did not faint.

After putting our heart back where it was supposed to be, we went for the rapid river. The one thing I dislike is that we have to put our stuffs in the locker which cost a whopping $4/Hr… but because of the precious camera , we couldn't afford to take the risk…

The ride itself was not as scary as we expected other than the last part where the door opened to a steep downward slope … the lady in front of us was soaked but we were relatively dry.

We moved on and wifey encouraged me to try the MUMMY which I did. This was by far the most scary ride and I am glad I tried it.

Next we took the treasure vehicle. After the thrill of the Mummy , this ride was at the other spectrum of excitement level.

We moved on and took the Transformer Ride again. To round up the fun filled day, we watch Lights, Camera, Actions directed by Steven Spielberg. This is like the small scale waterworld and it shows how they created a hurricane effect in just minutes. As we were standing in the very first row. We were a bit wet.

Our last couple of mascot of the day was fittingly Bumblebee and Prime which nicely summed up a very memorable day for me and I believe, wifey.

 

Autobots...roll out!

Final Thanksgiving point: The simple fact that I get to visit this beautiful place with my dearest wifey; something which doesn't seem very possible a few years back.

Thanks to my beautiful wifey, who made this day special

Thanks for the memories.. I hope to be back again

Flag Raising Ceremony

This morning, my bus went past New Town Primary School about 730 a.m. and while I look inside the assembly ground, there was no assembly being carried out (probably because of the rain earlier on)


However, I saw a couple of students standing in attention and carrying out the flag raising ceremony on their own.

They were primary school children, being drilled on the importance of carrying out their duties faithfully

1) Even in adverse weather conditions

2) When no one is around them



As I was looking, I wondered what is going through their young mind while doing flag raising ( can I just raise the flag quickly and get it over and done with since no one else is looking? Why do we still need to raise the flag since it’s raining? Can we do it later ? why me? )



What a privilege, what an honour if they know the significance of their actions and the symbolism of the flag and the fact that they are chosen for this. I hope they do.

Lesson Learnt

In my service unto God, there may be times when I have to do it by myself with nobody around, in adverse conditions.


What will be my feelings then ? do I get frustrated or will I be able to see it as a privilege because God has chosen me for that role.

Only if I can get the right perspective, then will I serve with joy, with pride because deep inside my heart I must remember that come rain or shine, the flag of Jesus has to be kept flying high

“War Weariness” No Excuse to Avoid Syria Strike

Last week, Syria carried out a chemical attack in the suburbs of Damascus killing 1,429 people, including at least 426 children.




In response to this, Obama contemplated military actions against Bashar al-Assad's regime. In his very own words, "This kind of attack is a challenge to the world," Obama said, in brief remarks to reporters at the White House.

"We cannot accept a world where women and children and innocent civilians are gassed on a terrible scale," he said, calling the attack a threat to US "national security interests."

However, he is facing strong opposition from his own country who are already weary from many years of long drawn wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

After this report, I thought about the times I am also facing “_____ weariness” in my own life. (fill in my own blank) . Just like the American citizen who are sick of seeing their country pouring national resources (capital, human) and suffering huge amount of losses along the way while helping other countries, some form of weariness from long drawn efforts while not seeing results is also happening in my life.

So what should I do? Give up ? persevere on ? look for new ways of doing it?

I think the most important is to ask myself if what I am doing is something God wants me to do. Once I have a definite answer to this question, than I have to do it, no matter how tough the road is.

Just like what Obama says “war weariness” is no excuse not to act when evil is so blatantly carried out, so _____ weariness is no excuse not to keep on doing, what is right. What is good.

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Galatians 6:9