At the end of a week that didn't seem like it would ever end, there was Pulau Tioman. The Paya Beach Resort bit of Tioman Island wasn't spectacularly pretty. Its kampung feel was slightly on the more rundown side of charmingly rustic.
The sand on its beach was dark yellow and rough, but the water clear enough to gaze at corals and fishes while sitting on the railings and chatting at the jetty.
Tioman time is relative, said the Chinese cze char resto owner as he brought out more complimentary Tsingtao beer for the FIFAWorld Cup 2010 Germany vs Serbia match, 大家都走得很慢.
And it seemed that lazy hot childhoods were spent fishing with a bit of bread, a hook and a line,
or fooling around on a surfboard and waving goodbye to divers going out to sea (sometimes, the goodbye is forever, as we found out from the boatman while idling off Pulau Labas, waiting for people who had gone on their second dive to emerge from underwater tunnels. A few days ago, a girl died after falling from the upper deck of a boat on the way back from a snorkelling trip. Last year, a Japanese woman was killed by a boat's propeller as she was surfacing from a dive - the dive master had come up first and put up the sausage but there were three divers from the group who had yet to surface (this report tells a different story). There was another fatal incident involving falling from a boat that had been rocked by a strong wave at the jetty, a lifejacket and another running propeller...)
or over an old checkers board with plastic bottle caps.
The free breakfast was decent enough. The sausages that were more starch than meat were fed to the many cats moseying around for a free bite.
Lunches of Special King Beefs (Ramli burgers with two beef patties wrapped in egg) at Sunrise Cafe barely lasted us till dinner.
For dinner, there was the choice of edible cze char to the right of the jetty
or good barbecued seafood, and buckets of duty-free beer to wash down satay and otah at the resort.
And we had plenty of time to check out the snacks while waiting for the 11.00am ferry that finally arrived at 2.00pm after being stopped by the marine police for a spot-check.
It was good to be in the midst of people reading good books - the Good Book (someone started reading from Genesis and was at the Book of Esther by the time we got to Tanjong Gemuk), Mark Ashton's Christian Youth Ministry (that got passed round a bit), a book on finishing the Christian race well, and spontaneously gossiping the gospel (no pulpit nagging repeatedly quoting The Great Commission necessary). A bit of rest after two weeks of little sleep, dealing (not successfully) with my own irritation at people not bothering to be organised enough or selfless enough to make the most of gospel opportunities and even sabotaging such times, frustration at energy and time expended on things for the tummy and not eternal things etc etc
Truly God is is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it (1 Corinthians 10:13).
Until the end of the age, there will exist that tension between human responsibility and God's sovereignty; we must do all we can to preach salvation, yet we must never put our confidence in our work or make idols of our schemes. As David Jackman puts it,"...our business is growing...but only God gives the increase..."
coach from DFS Orchard, Singapore to Tanjung Gemuk, Malaysia (via various bus operators)
purchase ferry tickets from Tanjung Gemuk to Pulau Tioman
And don't forget to pay your Tioman Island Marine Park fee. Keep the receipt at all times in case the ubiquitous marine police pull you over for a spot-check.
At Paya Beach Resort, snorkel gear can be rented from this bald dude, and diving equipment from the Dive Cove and say hi to Funny while you're there.
I be liking this mask.
So much more to see!
*all photos by iPhone 3GS + Tiltshift or Crossprocess or Swankolab + PSMobile. Interestingly, one of my photos will hanging around the Schlechtriem Brothers Gallery in Berlin Mitte as part of the chosen 144 (not thousand) in the EYE'EM Award 2010.
One never quite acknowledges the presence of an idol in one's life until one rises in the morning to worship it, only to find it has been taken away in the night.
Humans were made for worship and so everyone worships something, even those who claim to be atheists. The sorrow and mourning with which one greets the disappearance of that which we worship and the resultant emptiness in our lives betray the identity of that god (some material thing, or a relationship, or a person, or even a talent or trait that we die die must have).
Surely it is useless to give one's all for a false god, a god who either promises much or whom we think promises much but cannot deliver. On the threshold of the Promised Land, the Book of Deuteronomy tells us that Moses reminded the Israelites of the faithfulness of God: how he had made a seemingly impossible promise to Abraham and Sarah, who were barren in their old age, that he would give them descendants more numerous than the stars in the sky (Genesis 22, Genesis 26) and how this had indeed been fulfilled (cf Deuteronomy 10:22). This was but a snapshot, a sample, of the overarching faithfulness of God who would go on to promise through various prophets (as recorded for us in the Old Testament) that he had seen the suffering and pain and death in this fallen world caused by the sin of man and that he could and was more than willing to save anyone who would avail himself/herself to his rescue. This rescue, the prophets said, would come through an anointed king who was God himself (Psalm 2), the Son of Man who would come to judge the world (Daniel 7), and also through a suffering servant of God (Isaiah 53).
When Jesus arrived, he proved to be able to do the things only God could do - not just healing the sick, lame, deaf, blind and casting out demons without any mumbo-jumbo, but also raising the dead, creating food and controlling "nature" (Mark 1:18-8:26). He acknowledged Peter's confession that he was the Christ, the promised anointed divine king, he said he was the Son of Man too but was also adamant that he was the suffering servant of God (Mark 8:27-31). All the promises of God, then, were focused in on one man, Jesus.
Our trust in God is no blind faith, since he has ensured sufficient evidence of his past acts of faithfulness and truthfulness. Jesus has shown that he is the cumulative fulfilment of God's promises and indeed that he is God himself.
The first commandment given to Moses was "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me" (Exodus 20:2-3). A commandment to be obeyed, yet also a plain statement of fact (cf Deuteronomy 4:32-35). There is no other god to be worshipped besides the LORD.
So Jesus' commandment to those who would trust in him as Christ and Son of Man and Suffering Servant to "deny himself, take up his cross and follow me" (Mark 8:34) is also something to be obeyed, yet the first part also stems from a plain statement of fact: if God is God, there is no other to be worshipped and no other who can interpret reality and tell us of what is to come. Therefore, it is obvious that we must deny all attempts to interpret reality, all attempts to mold Jesus into the nice, hippie saviour we can be comfortable telling our friends about, all attempts to ascribe to God what he has never promised, all attempts to place importance on anything other than God and what God deems important (as expounded in Jesus' words and the gospel (Mark 8:35,38)).
All such delusional attempts will end in failure. Setting one's mind on anything but the things of God as revealed in Scripture has the stink of Satan about it (Mark 8:33). So unsurprisingly, the idolater will does this will lose his life and his soul and be rejected by Jesus when he comes again to judge the living and the dead (Mark 8:34-38).
But sadly, this doesn't stop us professing believers in Christ from wallowing, at times, in this carcinogenic sludge. Sure, one has the niggling feeling at times that perhaps one could be worshipping something other than the One True God (we speak of idols of the non-shiny kind of course, gold leaf being rather vulgar and crass these days cf a certain calf sculpture at the foot of Mount Sinai circa approximately 1,300 B.C.), but with a bit of stonewalling and a lot of dressing up with godly motives and reasons, the conscience soon had its naggy mouth taped over and we were free to enjoy the apparent pleasures offered by the aforementioned god. and the real extent of that cancer's hold on us.
In the cold light of day, our idolatry is starkly stupid. Did our idols create us that in their absence we perish? Would God have us waste our tears over the death of a folly, the removal of a trap of Satan? Do we forget that Moses said to the adulterous Israelites when the writing was still fresh on the covenantal stone:
Go down, for your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. They have turned aside quickly out of the way that I commanded them. They have made for themselves a golden calf and have worshiped it and sacrificed to it and said, 'These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!'" And the LORD said to Moses, "I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people. Now therefore let me alone, that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them, in order that I may make a great nation of you. (Exodus 32:7-10)
Our worship of other gods is insulting to the One True God, and he who created us could have rightly destroyed us.
But if we are reading or typing this then he has not. Because in his immense grace and patience, God elects instead to forcibly remove the tumour, bit by bit. Yet we dare blame him for this and threaten to renounce our heavenly citizenship unless he reinstate the same, or even plead for him to take away our lifebreath now that we have no more reason to live.
Scripture about God disciplining us is "a word of encouragement" because it addresses us as God's children:
And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons?
"My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives." (Hebrews 12:5)
We are not to respond to God's discipline with resentment but instead be comforted(!) that God does this because he loves us:
My son, do not despise the LORD’s discipline or be weary of his reproof, for the LORD reproves him whom he loves, as a father the son in whom he delights. (Proverbs 3:11-12)
Moses reminded the Israelites of the same thing in Deuteronomy:
Know then in your heart that, as a man disciplines his son, the LORD your God disciplines you. (Deuteronomy 8:5)
God's discipline is in fact further evidence of God's faithfulness, for what God who promised to rescue will allow his sheep to stray into the mouths of wolves:
I know, O LORD, that your rules are righteous, and that in faithfulness you have afflicted me. (Psalms 119:75)
The right response to discipline is not to chaff but to repent:
Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent. (Revelation 3:19)
We repent not by gritting our teeth and chanting "all things work for the good of those who love him" or "this is the best of all possible worlds", but by turning back to God.
Perhaps the dichotomy of mind and heart as is popular in many Christian circles which say that head knowledge must then become heart knowledge must be addressed. While the acknowledgement of mere factual information about God never saved anyone since even the demons acknowledge there is one God and shudder (James 2:19), disobedience and thus idolatry come from error and unbelief in the mind - not comprehending the goodness and faithfulness of God, not trusting that God is God, or that his words are true.
When we find ourselves in sin, or by the grace of God, disciplined for our idolatry, then we must take heed to examine again God's Word and the record of his deeds throughout the whole of human history. Obedience and trust in God isn't quite a matter of applying what we have learnt in bible study; rather it is deepening a relationship with a stable, dependable Father whose ways are not as capricious as humans whose moods vary according to the amount of sleep they've had the previous night, how well they have been fed, the ambient temperature of their environment and how boring the present company.
Thanks to Billy and Cindy Foote who kindly sent me their Not a god CD before mp3s were readily downloadable from the web:
You Are God Alone
You are not a god created by human hands You are not a god dependent on any mortal man You are not a god in need of anything we can give By Your plan that's just the way it is
You are God alone, from before time began You were on your throne, You were God alone And right now, in the the good times and bad You are on Your throne, You are God alone
You're Unchangeable, You're Unshakeable You're Unstoppable, that's what You are
You're the only God whose power none can contend You're the only God whose name and praise will never end You're the only God who's worthy of everything we can give You are God that's just the way it is
Despite the terrible overnighter on Saturday, immense thanks to God for the rest of the weekend which has been nothing but a series of booster shots of encouragement, at just the right time, to keep on keeping on in the truth: She-Of-The-Straight-Fringe who, living alone in a foreign land, braves steep slopes, crazy river-crossings and assorted exotic irritants like scabies to bring help to remote villagers; the new and sleep-deprived father who is happy to share the burden of nightly feeds and nappy-changing with his tired wife; the quiet chap who, for love and not just duty, visits his nan every week; fellow-travellers with whom one can discuss travel plans and who walk alongside for as far as God graciously permits; the old uni friend who is giving up his full-time job to tent-make and build bridges for the gospel; the ex-DG-mate who spoke of the chain of faithful men and women in her life who put her on the path of eternal life and is absolutely eager to point her flatmate to the same road; the pariah in certain social circles who is more concerned with the eternal welfare of others than wallowing in self-pity... And last week, the mate who, early-morning appointment notwithstanding, was willing, with great patience, to discuss into the wee hours the ways and means of responding biblically to a certain situation.
The encouragement is not that any these people make me feel better about myself, but that the way that their minds, hearts and lives are growing more and more to reflect the glory of Christ shouts of what a great God we have; it reminds me of the wonderful truth of the gospel, the urgency to keep at the work Christ entrusted to us, the frail human love whose beauty is but a pale shadow of the mind-blowingly more wonderful love of God, the real and demonstrable work of the Spirit in the lives of God's children and how worthwhile it is to run with perseverance and joy the race that is before us.
Totally thank God for them and for his work in them. :-)
Cuba Libre Block B Clarke Quay The Foundry #01-13 Tel: 6338 8982
Bontá Italian Restaurant & Bar 207 River Valley Road #01-61 UE Square River Wing Tel: 6333 8875
Was reminded by the end of Boon Yong's sermon this weekend of the real import of those two terms that are so often bandied around in Christian circles as to almost lose their meaning altogether: "encourage" and conversely, "discourage" (and their various forms).
Encouragement In weekend church conversation or weekly DG sharing, we say we were "encouraged" by something when that thing made us feel good, especially good about ourselves. Perhaps someone affirmed our self-worth by complimenting our physical appearance or dress sense or our skill in bible reading or discipline in quiet time.
But God is not on about self-worth. He does not see this selfish joy as "encouragement". What, then, does he want us to be encouraged by? What are we to encourage each other to do and why should we give each other such encouragement?
Biblically, encouragement is God-centred not me-centred. Encouragement is to:
continue to have faith in God and act out this faith by obedience to his revealed word (Joshua in Deuteronomy 1:38, 3:28)
remain true to the Lord (Acts 11:23)
persevere in the Lord and live a life pleasing to him (1 Thessalonians 4:18)
live the Christian life courageously (1 Thessalonians 5:14)
grow in knowledge and understanding of Christ (Colossians 2:2)
be assured of our future and our salvation (2 Thessalonians 2:16)
We are encouraged to do this by:
God (Romans 15:5)
God's grace (2 Thessalonians 2:16-17)
the Holy Spirit (Acts 9:31)
the Scriptures (Romans 15:4)
each other's faith (Romans 1:12)
being united in Christ (Philippians 2:1)
the faithful lives of fellow Christians and how God is working out their salvation in their lives (Ephesians 6:22, Colossians 4:8) - either by meeting with each other (Romans 1:11-12) or by letters (Paul's letters)
reminding each other of the coming judgment (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18)
mutual interpretation and learning of God's word (1 Corinthians 14:31)
And the reason for encouraging each other is because of:
the dreadful reality of the coming judgment, when we all have to account to God for all we have done in this life (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18)
we are not in darkness. We are in the light because we have knowledge of God. And because we know we will be saved on the last day, we should live our lives as saved people not as people who are ignorant of God and who will perish on that day (1 Thessalonians 5:1-11)
Discouragement And so discouragement would conversely be:
doubt that God is there or that his words are accurate reflections of reality (Deuteronomy 1:21, 31:8; Joshua 1:9, 8:1, 10:25; 1 Chronicles 28:20; 2 Chronicles 20:15,17),
and so be turned away from persevering in God,
to be put off from living a life pleasing to him,
to forget the reality of judgment and
to continue to live life one's own way.
Many things could discourage us:
feeling spiritually-dry or as Ravi Zacharias would say, "not feeling my faith"
a tough personal situation: losing a job, being diagnosed with a terminal disease, the death of a loved one, the betrayal of a friend, unrequited love, being stumbled by another Christian; or
the lives of our fellow Christians: a Christian leader in a homosexual relationship, a close Christian friend who starts going out with a non-Christian boyfriend/girlfriend, church politics, people leaving the DG or church.
What is important if we are discouraged is not to fall away from the faith and seek out worldly comfort that will not satisfy. (Eg, if you are discouraged in your faith because the person you love does not return you feelings, and you feel that God can’t be there or blame God for doing this to you, don’t do all sorts of desperate things (changing your fashion sense, your hairstyle, your personality, your values) to win that person. In the scheme of things, that person can mean nothing to you compared to your relationship with God, who loved you so much that he sent his Son to die for you and Jesus Christ who chose to die for your sins and the Holy Spirit who, with the Father and the Son, is in close fellowship with you every day of your life, till your last breath on earth. Look to God who is eternal, who is constant, who loves perfectly and gives you every good gift in Christ and all troubles do pale in comparison. And read his love letter, the Bible.)
