Weblog

Friday, 16 October 2009

  • Truth Seeker

    "So you lied to them?"

    "Only verbally. Besides, they were the lies they wanted to hear. Elphaba, where I come from, we believe all sorts of things that aren't true. We call it - history! A man's called a traitor - or liberator. A rich man's a thief - or philantropist. Is one a crusader - or ruthless invader? It's all in which label is able to persist. There are precious few at ease with moral ambiguities, so we act as though they don't exist"
    Elphaba and the Wizard from the song "Wonderful". 

    I just came back from watching Wicked the Musical, and I can say that was the best $110 I've ever spent. I highly recommend it to everyone.

    One of the many things I took away from this great production was to seek the TRUTH. Not fabricated, manipulated, fantastical truth; but the real, hard truth. Does such a thing exist? Many people would argue to the contrary.

    However, to quote Lecrae from his song "Truth":
    "Man, see some folks say, 'All truth is relative, it just depends on what you believe.' You know, 'hey man, ain't no way to know for sure who God is or what's really true." But that means you believe your own statement; that there's no way to know what's really true. You're saying that that statement is true. You're killing yourself. If what's true for you is true for you and what's true for me is true for me, what if my truth says yours is a lie? Is it still true? Come on man!"

    Or myself from an entry a couple of months back :P
    "Truth is relative? There are two guys standing on the road. One believes and sees that a truck is driving towards them, the other guy also sees but does not believe that it's a truck but rather a butterfly. The former jumps out of the way to safety while the latter gets owned."

    I believe that there is a such thing as absolute truth, and I believe that truth is Jesus. To quote the man-God himself, "I am the way, the truth and the life" (John 14:6).

    I'm sure I wasn't the only one in the crowd who felt frustration towards the citizens of Emerald City for being manipulated and blindly persecuting Elphaba the "Wicked" Witch of the West.

    So really consider, "what is the truth"? This does not just apply to non-Christians, but also to Christians. Is what the pastor saying supported by the Bible? Is my Bible really 100% inerrant? Do not be closed minded, but prayerfully, wisely and open-mindedly seek the truth. Although it should be noted that an overly sceptical mind can cause or be caused by pride and hatred. Perhaps the best example to follow is that of the noble Bereans in Acts 17:11, who "received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true".

Saturday, 01 August 2009

  • Today my soccer team was subject to some disgraceful behaviour by the opposing team. It was in retrospect, a sign of things to come, but there was no official referee provided for this match, and thus each team had to provide in turn a referee for each half.

    There were fouls committed against us, such as my teammate getting pushed in the head as he went up for a header, and I can't rule out the possibility that we may have commited fouls at times (although honestly, I did not see one). But the referees weren't trained, and so that was understandable. However, the thing that filled me to the brim with rage was the fact that the opposition was accusing us of being cheats and unfair. Not so subtly either, with foul words intermixed in their accusations against us and the makeshift referee. Now we're a church team, and I can attest to the fact that we stress the need to play fair and to be, within reason, courteous to the referee and other players, and that most of us adhere to this rule the majority of the time, with this game being no different. So as you can imagine I was burning with rage and honestly extremely close to just snapping and punching them in the face and starting a fight. I was honestly BURNING for a fight.

    However the thing that held me back and in the end chased away my desire to fight was - Jesus. He commanded us to love our neighbours as ourselves (Matthew 22:39) and also to love our enemies and do good to them! (Luke 6:35)

    "If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even 'sinners' love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even 'sinners' do that. And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even 'sinners' lend to 'sinners,' expecting to be repaid in full. But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful."
    Luke 6:32-36

    He also provided us an incredible example to follow on the cross. Where he proceeded to suffer all the beatings, rejections and ultimately die for us - sinners, enemies and false accusers. When I reflected on Jesus' love, my desire to fight started to disappear till it all went away.

    We ended up losing 1-0. But there was no fight, with hands shaken at the end.

    Just to point out, this change of mind I had was none to my own credit. It was all God. I can honestly say, and my friends from early high school can testify, that if it wasn't for the Holy Spirit changing me, I would have retaliated at least verbally, and probably physically as well.

    All the glory to God :)

    On a less serious (or still serious?) note, I got hit where a man not ought to get hit TWICE today.

    So other lessons learnt today were:
    - An official referee is extremely important in a soccer match against people you don't know.
    - Turn to the side or something when jumping to defend against clearances.

Wednesday, 08 July 2009

  • The Magic Number

    If any of you have ever asked me something along the lines of: "are you comfortable with your height?" "do you ever wish you were taller?" "why are you so short?" You would have probably heard this from me.

    As you may know, I am 165cm tall, making me more than half a head shorter than the average 1995 Australian man. But you know what? So are these guys:

    1) Diego Armando Maradona

    He's arguably the greatest soccer player to have ever touched a ball, and probably my greatest sporting role model. For his sake, I wish Argentina wins the World Cup in 2010.

    2) Earl Boykins

    A couple of years back this man was the shortest guy in the NBA, at one point averaging 15.2 ppg against players who, if he headbutted them, would hurt their nipple (HAHA). He's now raking in his millions in Europe.

    Earl-BoykinsWeb

    3) Aaron Lennon

    The English International has what some might call the unfortunate title of the shortest player in the English Premier League, however he's also an inspirational member of the exclusive CLXV club. Tearing it down the right wing like yours truly.

    aaron-lennon-footb_1120140c

    These three guys were a huge encouragement to me during the past 5 years as I became more and more comfortable with my height. Now I am at a point where I am honestly 100% comfortable and grateful with it. I see the fact that during the time when I was most depressed about my height, the shortest guys in the best leagues in the world of my two favourite sports shared the same magical height with me, was a personal encouragement from God - that even though I am short, I still have the potential to reach the pinnacle of my sport.

Thursday, 02 July 2009

  • Left-handedness

     Ok so here's my belated entry about why it is good to be left-handed.

    1) Left-handers have an innate advantage in sport.

    First of all, left-handers constitute approximately 10% of the population, however they are over-represented in elite sport. A study by Grouios et al (2000) found that in interactive or confrontational hand sports (e.g. tennis, boxing, volleyball, judo, karate, basketball) the proportion of left-handers significantly increase, although handedness has no effect on non-interactive or non-confrontational sports such as diving, swimming, synchronised swimming :)

    Why is this the case? Well it is probably due to the fact that people train with right-handers most of the time, and when you come up against a left-hander, they're like "wat the hell".

    Just going off the top of my head, here's a list of some famous left-handed sportsmen:
    - Rafael Nadal
    - Derek Fisher
    - Ryoma Echizen (Prince of Tennis) haha

    ~
    Ok so there's my reasons, or "reason" rather, as to why it is good to be left-handed. Haha got anticlimax? I could have added that left-handers have brains with superior nonverbal, spatial, holistic and emotional functions, are more creative and possibly more intelligent, but I don't currently have the knowledge to comment on this, nor the time to do adequate research.

    Personally, other reasons why I love being left-handed is that there is a sheer wealth of left-handed role models and also, it makes me feel special :)

    Just know this. Barack Obama and Link are left-handed :)

    wakerlink

     

Saturday, 20 June 2009

  • I am Perfect.

    Long time since I last posted. Main reason is that I started journalling privately, and it's been good...but sometimes you want to write something that other people can read. This is one of those times :)

    I remember when I was in late high school, I had a lot of insecurities and complaints about myself. Two of which was the fact that I was left handed and the fact that my height of 165cm is quite significantly shorter than the average guy.

    Well before we start, the main reason why insecurities and complaints about self image is stupid is because:

    1) God looks at the heart, not the outward appearance (1 Samuel 16:7)
    2) God does not make mistakes.

    But after my exams (finish on 25th June), I will start to post some other (less important but still encouraging^^) reasons as to why having preference to the sinister hand and having to look up all the time to make eye-contact is good.

    Stay tuned!