Egyptians Sink To New Depths, God Gets Gobs of Glory (Exodus 13-14)

Last Monday, charity tickets for Lee Chin & Friends, part of the Raffles Girls' School Alumni Tribute Series, meant the sitting through a truly disappointing unsatisfying main course by Siow Lee Chin. In the audience there was one lady right in the middle of the stall seats who had either excellent cellphone reception or a very persistent phone alarm, the rabid pained scribbling of notes and then, the walking out citing severe emotional distress. Later at a comfort food supper for frayed nerves, descriptors such as "screechy", "scratchy", "thin tone", "faulty intonation" surfaced repeatedly. G summed up the performance as "very schoolgirl". Lee Chin seems to have been battling these problems for about a decade. Two reliably frank Inkpot reviews in 1998 and 2000 complain of the same thinness and screechiness and intonation problems.

Back in 1998, Isaak Koh referred to Lee Chin playing a Strad (or was it the Guadagnini?) and suggested that the Italian instrument was responding adversely to the tropical climate. He also kindly proposed that the acoustics of the Victoria Concert Hall were in issue. And for good measure, thought that Siow's failure to direct the soundboard of the violin towards the audience resulted in the loudness of the instrument wavering as she moved with the music. Suffice to say that Vadim Rapin, when he performed in the same hall, in the same era, with a Ruby Strad (I think) didn't have these issues. Granted this time, she was probably playing the Deconet.

Perhaps this time, the acoustics of the large cavernous Esplanade Concert Hall were to blame for the thinness of sound? Previous experiences with the un-"critically acclaimed": Ang Shao Wen in private recital and Chua Lik Wuk in violin and piano recital with Lim Yan in the Esplanade Recital Studio had been by contrast vastly delightful.

But then, assuming the recording below is as-is, surely the state-of-the-art Esplanade could not do worse than the Ganz Hall in Chicago. Gallia Kastner on violin playing Pablo Sarasate's Zigeunerweissen on a copy of the "ex-Soldat" Guarneri del Gesu violin by Peter Seman (2008), didn't have projection problems in a former banquet hall.

Regardless, an audience, whether subject to evergreen crowd-pleasing classics, new world wonders or stock showpieces, should feel secure in the hands of the violinist. They should be able to sit back and relax with their choice of tasty beverage, and not have to bite their nails and wonder what the next note might bring.

Our lives in the hands of the living God should be in a far better situation than our ears in the hands of the best violinist the world has ever known. Afterall, the late greats, Szeryng, Oistrakh, Heifetz, Kreisler, Siedel, Elman, Perlman, Rabin, Menuhin, were never completely consistent and the still living seem far more mastered by their instruments than masters of them.

Well, all very easy to say snuggled safe in Singapore where the biggest news any local has been aware of for a fortnight concerns the sloppily-drafted constitution of a women's group, an AGM, an EGM and media-goaded fights between "the old committee" and "the new committee". Hardly the sort of life-threatening situation Israel faced after they hastily exited Egypt while, after a night of horror, the Egyptians buried their dead firstborns.

So there they were, 600,000 Israelite men and many more women and children and others (Exodus 12:37-38), rich with plunder (Exodus 12:35-36), accompanied by very much livestock, both flocks and herds (Exodus 12:38), hosts of the LORD (Exodus 12:51, 14:19) macho-ly armed for battle (Exodus 13:18), the fresh air of freedom in their nostrils, striding purposefully towards the Promised Land. They were led by the LORD himself, in a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night (Exodus 13:21-22). God spared them an early fight with the Philistines and led them over uncontested lands. Perhaps they had been singing "I Will Follow Him" in rounds for the Nth time when Moses was told to make a sharp right (Exodus 14:1-2) and they ended up in a scary cul-de-sac, hemmed in by the wilderness on one side, the Red Sea on another. About 3,000,000 pairs of eyes might have stared down an obliviously cheery little voice singing "there isn't an ocean too deeeep" as the entire military force of Egypt darkened the horizon. Pharaoh had decided that Egypt was not going to face financial ruin just because of some night terrors, nevermind that these were all too real (Exodus 14:5). His heart had been hardened (Exodus 14:4) and he had come for the ex-slaves with everything he could muster: his chariot, his horsemen and his army, plus 600 extra chosen chariots and, for good measure, all the other chariots of Egypt with officers over all of them (Exodus 14:6,7,9). A bunch of civilians (with women and children) on foot whose idea of a fight was fisticuffs in the sand (cf Exodus 2:13) vs the most highly-trained professional army in the ancient world on horseback and in chariots? Sure, some pre-alpha Command and Conquer programmers might possibly have coded MASSIVE FAIL right about here.

But only very recently, Moses had drilled into them the eternal festivals/rituals/markers that were to commemorate their successful escape from Egypt under the strong hand of the LORD - the changing of the Hebrew new year and the Passover (Exodus 12:1-13, 24-27, 43-49), the Feast of the Unleavened Bread (Exodus 12:14-20, 13:3-10) and the Consecration of the Firstborn (Exodus 13:1-2, 11-16). The institution of such festivals and rituals was as good as God's specific promise to them that they would be rescued successfully and settle somewhere where they could celebrate these things and spend many hours recounting the rescue story to their children and grandchildren and they to their grandchildren etc for all generations.

Could God fulfil his promise of rescue? Had they not just witnessed God's finger - the ten plagues on Egypt? Had it not already been rather obvious that the LORD was in control over everything in the universe, everything anyone could think of and everything no one hadn't half a brain to think of?

Would God fulfil his promise of rescue? Hadn't everything God had said through Moses so far come true? Didn't old Jacob's mummy with/without its sarcophagus (cf. Genesis 50:26) that they had packed away in their luggage (Exodus 13:19) demonstrate that God had kept/was in the process of keeping his word - because already the multitude of refugees meant that Abraham's descendants were growing to be as numerous as the stars in the heavens (cf Genesis 15:5), and though they were sojourners and servants in a land that was not theirs, they were coming out with great possessions (cf Genesis 15:13-14) and being brought to the land God swore to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (cf Genesis 50:24)?

Well, whatever. The Israelites took one look at the heaving horses and without hesitation accused God of being an incompetent guide. No, wait. That's too mild. They accused God of being completely untrustworthy, a liar, an evil being bent on their destruction. (Exodus 14:11-12). They'd known better than to have put their faith in him. Why, didn't they say to Moses "Leave us alone, don't rescue us, we're perfectly jolly being slaves to our oppressors" (Exodus 14:12)?

Which part of I AM the LORD, trust and obey, there's no better way didn't they understand? Well, probably most of that "I AM the LORD" bit which led to the lack of the "trust and obey" bit. If God's attributes, namely his eternal power and his divine nature could be clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made (Romans 1:20) then all men have always been without excuse in claiming not to know God and so not worshipping him. So God's direct communication with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and lately Israel through Moses would have been quite a concession. The faithful Hebrew midwives way back at the start of the story (Exodus 1) didn't even need that much to fear God instead of Pharaoh. Still, the Israelites did not really know the LORD in all his might and power and God-ness. Not only did they not think him trustworthy, or his character only good all the time, they failed to grasp that as the supreme and ultimate being in the world, if he'd wanted them dead, they would have had already been six feet under or mummified or tipped into a common slave grave, regardless of geographical location.

Actually, God would have been quite justified in doing just that to the Israelites. Afterall, the punishment for sin has always been death. So why didn't a voice boom out of the clouds:

Attention! Attention! Due to disbelief, the way through the Red Sea has been cancelled.*

Good bye.

The psalmist tells us the reason God withheld his hand from decimating them inspite of their dastardly distrust and disobedience:

Our fathers, when they were in Egypt,
did not consider your wondrous works;
they did not remember the abundance of your steadfast love,
but rebelled by the sea, at the Red Sea.
Yet he saved them for his name’s sake,
that he might make known his mighty power.
He rebuked the Red Sea, and it became dry,
and he led them through the deep as through a desert.
So he saved them from the hand of the foe
and redeemed them from the power of the enemy.
And the waters covered their adversaries;
not one of them was left.
Then they believed his words;
they sang his praise. (Psalm 106:7-12)

He was concerned for his own name. One can't tell everyone that one is saving one's people from the Egypt and bringing them to the land promised to their forefathers and then either cause a giant heavenly piano to fall on the lot of them or inflict fatal trauma to their nervous systems with a heavenly violin screech or less supernaturally, allow them to be killed by Pharaoh & Co, no matter how much they deserved it. God had a reputation to keep.

A mass slaughter would not have impacted the fulfilment of his promises to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, for God could easily have recreated the entire people, ver 2.0 - even greater and mightier, through Moses the Recently Faithful alone. He suggests as much later in Numbers 14:12. But this mercy in desisting from killing them would give him more glory in the eyes of the world.

We are usually rather quick to explain how the Israelite's lack of trust at the Red Sea might have to do with their socio-economic background, their poor upbringing, their tiredness... well, basically, it was really all rather reasonable. But perhaps our excuse-mongering should warn us of our own lack of understanding of God and what he requires of us.

God has always been concerned with his glory and he has always required the world to give him due honour - in worship, in trust, in obedience. God has worked to achieve this in direct, bare, supernatural ways, eg. the ten plagues, to demonstrate his great power, that there is no god like the LORD; he has also works by the great withholding of his great power. So, briefly, we see, at least:

• the glory of God's care - in not allowing his people to be tempted beyond what he knows they can bear (Exodus 13:17 cf. 1 Corinthians 10:13);
• the glory of God's power in the helplessness of his people - he can do what we think is impossible, when we can't contribute anything, even our faith;
• the glory of God's steadfastness in face of the fickleness of his people - God doesn't need to wait for a proper response before acting to save in his infinite mercy;
• the glory of God's trustworthiness that justifies the faith that his people put in him;
  
• the glory of God's in his judgement of his enemies. God does not subscribe to uttering politically-correct contentless PR phrases when speaking of his enemies. He boasts openly of the decimation of his enemies by his hand because this shows the powerful and just God he is (Psalm 9:16). When God carries out judgement, he isn't terribly sorry about it; it's part of his glory and his fame. And so we too should not be ashamed of this. The God of the OT is the same God of the NT, so just as the LORD was given glory when the Egyptians realised what the sort of LORD they were dealing with ("Let us flee from before Israel, for the LORD fights for them against the Egyptians." (Exodus 14:25)), we are told in 2 Thessalonians 1 that the saints will glorify God when "the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might";
• the glory of God's mysteries making sense (to us eventually)

A massive picture of God and still only a glimmer of the whole. And as Vizzini might have said,"And that's not all! Wait till I get going!" The Bible's just getting started! It'll probably take us literally all eternity to even try to absorb this. We can't even respond rightly to the little that we know despite repeated exhortation and careful explanation. How myopic we are to think that the seashore showdown is all about us and how God will fight for us oppressed people suffering under a psycho parent/teacher/boss, or that the Exodus is the biblical basis for sociopolitical liberation. It has never been primarily about us but about God and what he will do to display his glory and how we are to uphold his glory by trusting and obeying his word.

Being "still" never meant not doing anything, "letting go and letting God". If stoning had been the proper response, the Israelites and their descendants would have been rooted to that same seashore to this day. Being still wasn't about being on a pleasure cruise. It was about not working to save oneself (cf Exodus 14:13 - see the salvation that God will work for you today; also Psalm 37:7, Psalm 46:10, Zechariah 2:13) but, again, about trusting that God would do his will and obeying him: trusting that God's words were true, trusting that God could and would make good his promises and then putting feet to faith by obeying his commands. The writer of Hebrews generously records that by faith the people crossed the Red Sea as on dry land (faith at least that God could and would wall up the sea on both sides while the lot of them passed through!), but the Egyptians, when they attempted to do the same, were drowned (Hebrews 11:29). The Egyptians could not benefit from the promises made to the Israelites because they were not counted as God's people.

And this sea-crossing was only a little foreshadow of God calling his people out of a damned existence in slavery to Satan and sin into his glorious realm. God has already won the victory over the prince and principalities of this world. We need only depend on his victory and obey his commandments while still on this earth.

Too often, our failure to trust God (so that we either try on our own strength to save ourselves or improve on our godliness or think we need neither salvation nor godliness) stems from a dim view of God himself.

Perhaps we think him not quite omniscient - sulking around church buildings and "holy places" but otherwise quite clueless about the happenings in the world. At Beerfest Asia, a former full-time Christian ministry worker was recounting how she came upon a young father having a surreptitious fag in a quiet corner. He was later red-faced and very apologetic that she had witnessed this. She suggested that actually, this was a matter of his conscience and if his conscience was so convicting him that he was sinning against God, then it was between him and God, who, btw, could see him even in his little dark corner. God did not need Christian-worker gossip to keep him updated on the latest news.

Perhaps we think that God, like everyone else we interact with, can only see the masks we put on in the morning. Nevermind our impure motives for doing this or that, as long as we couch it in Christian terms, as long as influential church members or highly-regarded Christians are our friends and endorse our actions, we think ourselves in the clear and, actually, since our own hype is so powerful, rather mature and godly.

Perhaps we think God doesn't really care about his own name or his glory so much so that there will be a judgement day at the end of history for all humans who have ever existed and live our lives intent on glorifying ourselves.

Or perhaps we manage to recognise that God is sovereign and then surmise that he, therefore, must be responsible for taunting us with suffering and trials, not trusting that God has the good of his people at heart and is concerned with refining us through difficulties so that our faith may be proved genuine.

Or perhaps we do realise that God is concerned for his glory and his name but needs the latest in human thinking to reach out to more people, to make hardened criminals and booze-soaked celebreties weep, to build a kingdom for himself. But God can take care of his own name and kingdom, thank you very much. He only asks that you walk in his ways, not the ways of the world that has thrown up yet another foolproof (more like fool-enticing) method for growing the church. (See Tony Payne's little article on Being Biblical Or Doing What Works?.)

Or perhaps again we think that God needs a bit of help in justice and enforcement department and resort to sinful means to dealing with those we consider his enemies, forgetting that the LORD works in his own time and has a far better clear-eyed grasp of the actual situation that we Coke-bottled ones.

Or perhaps yet again we think God's commandments unreasonable, illogical and really against decent common-sense. We know better than to follow them completely and so make convenient exceptions.

...I want you to know, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptised into Moses in the cloud and in the sea... Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness. (1 Corinthians 10:1-5)

These things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did (1 Corinthians 10:6). Therefore, flee from idolatry (1 Corinthians 10:14). Therefore, do all things to the glory of God (1 Corinthians 10:31).


*Dale Ralph Davis, God Gets Gobs of Glory

Prive Bakery Cafe
2 Keppel Bay Vista
GF Marina @ Keppel Bay
Tel: 6776 0777

Boat Asia 2009
Marina @ Keppel Bay
An Audi iceberg, a helicopter, the requisite Heineken, Paulaner, Grey Goose waterholes, powerboats, catamarans, luxury yachts, and our favourite, sailing yachts. We went for a spin in RSYC's little J-24(?) keelboat. The salty sea wind, the sunset as we were sailing back, aroused the appetite for more of the same please.

Beerfest Asia 2009
Behind the Singapore Flyer
We got there late enough to hear the end of Hell's Belles - the female AC/DC tribute and almost be run over by their Harley-riding supporters. Frank fellow-imbiber: "Good thing we got complimentary tickets. Otherwise we would have paid S$37.50 each for this noise." At Kelong Seafood, the chips were fat and hot and crunchy and the fresh Fijian tuna lightly pan-seared was very good with a squirt of balsamic vinegar. The satay ladies were well-dressed but lacked experience in counting out and transferring the sticks of very tasty meat to styrofoam cups and then scooping the gravy in. Somewhere apparently the wiseonesthatbe determined that beer is actually "cooling" and therefore good for drinking on hot nights. Good then that the beers were fairly cheap starting from S$3 a pint/bottle. Eschewed the usual Fosters, Vic Bitters, Chimay, Duvel, Hoegaarden, Stella, Carlsberg, Erdinger, Grolsch, San Miguel, Sol, Corona crowd for Flying Dog Brewery offerings. I blame my Ralph Steadman fandom from his Oddbins days for leading me to them light sweet brews.

At midnight, we found out that the folk who were supposed to test our free breath had gone home early. :-(

Current Read/Think-through of Exodus

• Convalescent Food, Lemon Poppyseed Yoghurt Cakelets and Exodus and the People of God
• Not the Physiology of Taste x Exodus 1
• Moses the Non-Rescuer and Exodus 2 - 4
• Rescue Plans Hit Brick Wall. Israelites Draw Short Straw. (Exodus 5 - 7:7)
• God Shows Hand, Gives Egyptians the Finger (Exodus 7 - 10)
• Easter Bunny Spared, Goose Cooked, Lamb Slaughtered, Israelites Painted Town Red, Dough Failed to Rise to Occasion (Exodus 12)
• Egyptians Sink To New Depths, God Gets Gobs of Glory (Exodus 13-14)
• Hallelujahs for the Hell-bound, Verses for Vengeance, Jumping for Judgement By Beach Boy & Co (Exodus 15:1-21)

The Arts and the Christian

Most people who've been living in Singapore for the past few months would not have been able to miss the excitement surrounding the inaugural Singapore Theatre Festival, yet another installment of WOMAD, the Singapore Biennale and perhaps even the upcoming ArtSingapore, da:ns Festival and Sotheby's biannual (not biennale!) auction of Southeast-Asian art.

Some artists are disillusioned with the art world, victims, perhaps, of bad experiences with critics who were convinced that interpretation of any piece of art is inherently subjective, that meaning is assigned not by the artist but by the viewer and so felt free to ascribe their own, sometimes diametrically opposite, meaning to their artwork. But for all their/our mistrust, there is something that still draws us to see the great masters and inspires us to sculpt and mould raw material with our hands; that reels us into listening to wonderful music; that makes us itch to feel the intimate tremble of a good violin under our chins; that incites us to bop to a mean bassline and admire a beautiful pas de deux; that hushes an entire theatre audience; that gives actors a stage high, feeding off the energy from a crowd that understands and enjoys our craft.

At the National Library Building branch of Hans, we were talking about the Christian's interaction with the arts. Assuming Rand Miller's (yes, the Myst guy) generalist definition of "art" as a "work (something produced through effort) created by a craftsman with the intent to communicate truth", what should the relationship between the arts and the Christian look like?

Should Christians be involved in and even enjoy art?
It could be possible, though I am not entirely sure about this, to see the creative process of doing art is part of our God-ordained creational nature: just as God created the universe out of nothing, so we reflect that creational nature by taking the raw materials that the Lord has created and moulding it into a work of art (or what we hope will have some aesthetic value (if that can be measured objectively)!). Just as God brought order to the chaos that was before this world, so we, on a much more human level, through art, bring some order to our fallen chaotic world (then again, so does the periodic table).

It is also possible that art reminds us of God's beauty: creative works that we find beautiful recall the beauty of God's creative power and cause us to reflect on the glory of God. In fact, we also marvel at the goodness of God for putting in us the ability to appreciate and even find enjoyment in literature, poetry, painting, sculpture and dance.

However, the eagerness to avoid the charge of idolatry has made many Christians suspicious of art. Ever since icons and statues in churches were destroyed in the name of God during the Reformation, Protestants have had an uneasy relationship with the visual arts. There is no space here for discussion of those iconoclastic practices but the warnings against the making of idols from Leviticus and Deuteronomy onwards seemed to be less a complete ban on drawing, painting or sculpture per se, for elsewhere within Scripture, such creative work was expressly instructed by God in relation to the building of physical tabernacles or temples. God also tells his people to sing, dance, and play instruments as ways of expressing their relationship with him. Rather, the warning was against idolatry, specifically expressed in such forms.

In Exodus 31, God tells Moses that he has given a chap named Bezalel the Spirit of God, with ability and intelligence, with knowledge and all craftsmanship, to devise artistic designs, to work in gold, silver and bronze, in cutting stones for setting and in carving wood, for work in every craft. If God is the creator of the entire universe, then all craftsmanship and artistic ability is a gift of God just as our lifebreath is.

However, we live in a fallen world as sinful beings, and we must be aware that there are proper and improper ways of exercising our God-given gifts; we must remember that the terrible incident of the Golden Calf came far too soon after God gifted workmen for the building of his tabernacle.

Some emerging church leaders claim that they, being far more enlightened than the Reformers ever were, will work to reverse centuries senseless repression of talent by the Reformers by encouraging Christian artists to fill the walls of church buildings with their works and promoting the performance arts.

But it is profoundly atheistic to encourage art for arts' sake. A Christian knows that all art, and indeed everything in life, must be done for God's sake, for that is the purpose of all creation. "Whatever you do, do all to the glory of God," says Paul in 1 Corinthians 10:31. And there is no such thing as a solitary Christian, for when a Christian is saved, he is welcomed into a community, a church, the body of Christ. Therefore, all creative work, and in fact, all things must also be done for edification and building up of the body (1 Corinthians 14:26 in the specific context of communal worship). All that a member of the body does must be done in love for the whole.

In any case, it is virtually impossible to be part of a community and not be confronted by the art of that culture. A Christian must not ignore secular culture but think and evaluate it according to God's word.

What should a Christian's artwork look like?
Does this mean that all Christian artistic endeavour must necessarily be evangelistic or pietistic?

Heavens! No, if that means kitschy figurines, plastic flowers and gaudy (not Gaudí, although some would think Gaudí as gaudy) depictions of Bible stories!

Inevitable Evangelism I
Yet, behind every work of art a worldview, is a commitment to either the truth or to a lie. Every art piece, every performance represents the inner thoughts and beliefs of the artist, and it either breathes a spirit of commitment to the true God revealed in the Scriptures, or attests an allegiance to an idol. In any artwork, the Christian inevitably presents his uniquely counterculturally Christian interpretation of the world.

Inevitable Evangelism II
Besides, as Christians, that which underlies our interest and involvement in the arts is not, after all, secular. Neither is that which underlies our interest and involvement in anything else in our lives (our work, our hobbies, our family or friends). As God's people, we are committed to using our lives to work for the redemption of all things in Christ. So we are purposeful in our involvements.

Egads, one might say. That's all a bit utilitarian innit?

But we remember that there will come a time when Christ will return to judge the world and he will punish those who do not know the true and living God or trust in the gospel of his Son (2 Thessalonians 1:6-10). Says C.S. Lewis:

It is hardly possible for [us] to think too often or too deeply about [the glory] of our neighbour. . . It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization — these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit — immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. ("The Weight of Glory")

When we think about those who will encounter our works, the audiences at our performances, we must keep before our eyes the fate of those who are perishing; the eternal destinations of unsaved sinners.

Importance of the Arts in Evangelism
Powerful Evangelism
The arts are potentially powerful vehicles for influencing entire cultures for good or for evil. There is something about the arts that reach out and break through to the hearts and minds of some people who might otherwise be unmoved, and that is where skilled Christian artists ought to be speaking the truth about the ultimate reality.

Dispensible Method of Evangelism
Yet, we know that in his sovereignty, God will work in any way that he wishes. Ultimately, it is not our skills in our chosen field of art that must be cultivated and nurtured but our passion for the lost, knowing that those whom we encounter are not mere mortals but will be immortal. And unless they repent and turn back to God, that immortality will be lived out in eternal hell and the terrible gnashing of teeth.

So C.S. Lewis makes the point about his own specialisation:

The Christian will take literature a little less seriously than the cultured Pagan...The Christian knows from the outset that the salvation of a single soul is more important than the production or preservation of all the epics and tragedies in the world. ("Christian Reflections")

Remembrance of Things Past and The Way Forward

Apologies to Proust and Ford and people who don't like long rambly posts.

Out in the nave, the murmurings crescendo-ed, soaring up to the stone vaulted canopy of our English cathedral. The burgeoning audience arrived anticipating a performance of Handel's Ombra Mai Fu. But away from the crowd, a great chill froze my heart in the quiet transept: my trembling hands held the neck of my violin, broken off horrendously, the edges of the fragmented parts like sharpened stakes; irreparable damage to a friend's Strad. In the midst of a nightmare conscious that it was a nightmare, I waited for the sharp sunny edge of reality to cut through the greyness, I willed it to spike through so I could stumble, blurryeyed, to check on the violins in storage. Back in this world, latches were hastily flicked and dusty cases flung open to reveal that the neck of the Chinese one had indeed come off horribly (suffice to say that I popped into Gramercy and everyone took one look at the remains and laughed) from humidity and disuse. But I never liked it anyway. (The more favoured Czech was still quite alright.)

England
Dreams of England are rare these days, which makes waking life much less painful (and also I suppose, waking life now rests in Christ). But years before, happy nights were spent in smelly old Barbours, strolling the familiar shiny wet cobblestoned streets, trailing steamy breath, chatting and noshing on hot pasty, visiting as we always did the grocer's for brown bags of shiny apples, the baker's to ask after his lovely macarons and the quaint tilted bookstore with dusty Bach scores in the back to have a browse and a quick word with the old lady who ran it. Sometimes, it'd be summer and the air would be delicately warm for long hikes across the moors or punting in the sweet river or lazy games of crocker on the lawn and scones, clotted cream, pots of jam and cups of tea after. It took us at least a year to ease off the crushing yearning, though we still felt as Rupert Brooke (though not quite in the same context): "there's some corner of a foreign field that is forever England". (Am glad that someone else on the blogosphere still dreams of England as well!)

Perhaps it was the casual gift of Galaxy bars "to remind you of England", perhaps it was someone wanting to return to England where you could play games and have a barbie in the open without conspicious sweat and being surrounded by a cloud of mozzies, perhaps it was the offer of Müller Corners, perhaps it was the Toad in the Hole and the Spotted Dick, perhaps it was the revisiting of old haunts that stirred and churned the memory...

Old Haunts

Tiong Bahru: The Art Deco and rounded stairwells and ventilation holes replicated in the "upgraded" hawker centre. Brilliant.

People's Park: BestFriend and I used to accompany his girlfriend, a sometime model and fulltime LaSalle student, here to gather haberdashery, sequins, buttons, trimmings, assorted odds and ends for her fashion design course. Years after, latenight postgrad dinners were spent in the cheap hawker center downstairs in a cloud of cigarette smoke, debating the finer points of some obscure part of the course (as only postgrads do) over long meals of cze char. And still after, nice folks from CYC brought me here to select fabric for work shirts. Now refurbished, the mangy cats and singletwearing pipesmoking oldmen have been relegated to the sidelines.

Ghim Moh: Whole generations of junior college students have been fuelled by, and have pontang-ed from lessons to paktor over, the char kway teow, prawn mee and roasted duck here.

Even the Holland Village cobbler has moved on.

Old Friends and Acquaintances
Refurbished old haunts aside, it's been a nostalgic sort of month in other ways: heart-pounding chance meetings with former stalkers, impromptu but inevitable reunions at weddings, almost-forgotten friends popping by Singapore for a visit and pleasantly-surprising long-distance calls from voices from the past...

The thing about meeting people from your past is that you see, reflected in their comments and questions, younger images of yourself ossified at separate fossil layers, stratified in history. And, whether as a symptom of a relationship-obsessed society or because nonbelievers haven't much more to be interested in, the comments and queries inevitably focus on marital status and whom one is seeing at the moment (regardless of marital status), for example: primaryschoolmates think you are still that "self-sufficient kooky genius" and so must never have gone on a date; secondaryschoolmates think you're the uncommitted easilybored cheeky joker who must have married one of your secondary school sweethearts and seen somepeople on the side; juniorcollegemates are shocked that you and stable RuggedOutdoorsyPerson could ever have broken up; universitymates tell you that they've just got their own pad and a cockerspaniel and ask if you will leave hot and stinky Singapore and come and live with them and work things out; postgraduatemates tell you that they've seen AmbitiousHighFlyer in the media the other day and ask if you would both go over for dinner next weekend or a different group assumes that as soon as AmbitiousHighFlyer II returns from Hong Kong, the blacktie wedding invites will arrive in their mailboxes in due course and offer to do the harpsicord and viola at the reception. As the dimwitted tout whispered,"See I sell you cheap Mr. Mozart's skull when 'ee was 5. Eef you want, I have also 'ees skull when 'ee was 10 and 18". A very outofbody experience.

Driving home after, it is late and vehicular and human traffic and red lights are scarce, so it is easy to steer with one hand and prop your head up with the other and view the past through rose-tinted glasses and wonder how different things would have turned out, if only, at the appropriate fork in the road, different decisions had been taken. Later, still under cover of night, lying under the stars, it is too easy to dwell on regrets, to wallow in self-recriminations and to mourn a time long past.

What does God tell us to do with history?

Godly Remembering
There are many instances in the Bible where God commanded his people to remember history: particularly, what God had done in history. One major example is the Exodus event. The Israelites were to remember the day that they were brought out of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, and the strong hand the LORD who brought them out from that place (Exodus 13:3). Remembering their past was so important that God instructed the Israelites to incorporate mnemonic devices in their lives: the eating of unleavened bread should be to them as a sign on their hand and as a memorial between their eyes, that the law of the LORD may be in their mouth. For with a strong hand the LORD brought them out of Egypt (Exodus 13); the keeping of the Sabbath should remind them that they were slaves in the land of Egypt, and that the LORD their God brought them out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm (Deuteronomy 5:15).

These practices were also to function as methods of transmitting these corporate memories, this national history, from one generation to the next: "no leaven shall be seen with you in all your territory. You shall tell your son on that day,'It is because of what the LORD did for me when I came out of Egypt.'" (Exodus 13:7-8).

Why was remembering of such importance?

For Relationship
The works of God in the past, and his character shown through those works, told his people who he was, how they should relate to him and what to expect of him. So, for example, they were not to fear other nations they were to dispossess no matter how great they looked, because they were to remember what the LORD their God had done to Pharaoh and to all Egypt, the great trials that their eyes saw, the signs, the wonders, the mighty hand, and the outstretched arm, by which the LORD their God had brought them out. So would the LORD their God do to all the peoples of whom they were afraid (Deuteronomy 7:17-18). The people would know how to relate to God and what to expect of him: trustworthiness and faithfulness, backed up by awesome power. That's how relationships work out: products of a history of interactions and revelations and dealings with each other over a period of time given the parties thereto a pattern within which to relate. (Which is why, conversely, it is difficult to have any sort of relationship with someone with the retentive memory of a goldfish (urbanlegendly, 3 seconds).)

For Survival
Remembering past events is also how we learn to interact with the world and survive in it. Someone who gets zapped once by a wet socket is likely to end his days in a great sizzle if he doesn't remember that wet sockets are dangerous things to touch. So also remembering whom God was and his awful judgement on those who did not obey him was important for the Israelites if they wanted to live: warns Moses,"if you forget the LORD your God and go after other gods and serve them and worship them, I solemnly warn you today that you shall surely perish. Like the nations that the LORD makes to perish before you, so shall you perish, because you would not obey the voice of the LORD your God" (Deuteronomy 8:19-20).

For Living in the Present and in the Future
Remember, says Paul to the Ephesians, "that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ" (Ephesians 2:12-13). And if this is so, then they are to live, Jews and Gentiles, as one people in Christ.

So it is right, and it is commanded, that we remember the work of God in the history of the world and in our personal histories, for such memories tell us who he is and how to relate to him now. We learn from the punishment of the disobedient in the past to know how to live now. We learn from the faithfulness of God in the past to know for sure that he will fulfil his promises in the future.

Sinful Nostalgia
But there is a certain sort of (selective) remembering, a certain type of nostalgia that God warns us against: that which falsifies the past, that tells half-truths about history.

So the Israelites, very quickly forgetting the terrible slavery that they experienced in Egypt grumbled on route to the Promised Land: "Oh that we had meat to eat! We remember the fish we ate in Egypt that cost nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic. But now our strength is dried up, and there is nothing at all but this manna to look at" (Numbers 11:4-6).

So we are sometimes tempted to think how good the days were before we were converted to Christianity: the lovely freedom to do whatever we wanted, to marry and divorce anyone we chose, to cheat and steal if we wanted, to lie on a whim, to spend our money completely on ourselves. But we forget, dangerously, that in that state, we were dead in our transgressions, we were slaves to Satan, we were on the way to an eternity of dreadful crying and gnashing of teeth. And we can be sure that the anger of the LORD blazes hotly against such self-deluding wistfulness (Numbers 11:10).

Racing Forward
"One thing I do," says Paul,"forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 3:13-14). We are to be like athletes, running the race, pressing on, straining forward to take hold of the prize that awaits at the finishing line. Action words.

There is no place in the Christian life to be weighed down by the remembered guilt of past sins. But this is not a mere talkshow platitude and positive thinking. When we turn back to God, we take hold of the blessing of the substitionary death of Christ on the cross in our place. Because our sins have been paid for by Jesus, God tells us that he himself shall remember them no more. We trust that God's words are true and that Christ's blood is sufficient to pay for our past wrongs, no matter how terrible they were. We have faith that God has forgiven them as he promised.

There is no place in the Christian life to grow fat and complacent in the "successes" of the past. There must be no coasting on past achievements. Don't think that we have it all wrapped up. Don't think that we have arrived. Don't think we know it all. Don't think that we have triumphed over this or that specific sin. Don't think that our years of experience as a Christian, our office within the church as a minister, an elder, a deacon, a DG leader, a 1-to-1 discipler means that we are "sorted" for life.

Paul tells us in Philippians 3 that the mature Christian realises that his work is never completed, that he cannot let down his guard against sin until he has crossed the finish line, and attained the resurrection from the dead. With the Bible as our directional guide, our map, we are to put all our energy in persevering to the end. Christian believers, forgiven sinners as we are, have to work out our salvation for which Christ has taken hold of us, by striving to become like Christ in our character, and by working for Christ in the world.

So a few weeks ago, when it was a toss-up between (1) free tickets to Zouk's "Very Brit" with all that nostalgic Britpop, synthpop, new wave, Topman/Topshop/Warehouse clubbing gear, alt punk 'ttitude; and (2) having a not-dancey, non-alcoholic DG social, the choice was clear not because we were holy-moleys but because...well...I guess, right remembering helps you to make choices in the here and now for the eternal future.

And of course they don't sell a pint of the club's nastiest for just a quid over here. ;-)

Attack on Rach 2 and Christian Weakness

Blackmailed into attending Fat Albert's attack on the Rach 2 at the Esplanade. He had the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory Orchestra with him. A complete flop. If this had just been a dress rehearsal, it would have been alarming enough to make some conductors throw a tantrum or throw in the towel or something more dramatically breakable. But this was the real thing. And although much of the cost was subsidised by the profits of legalised gambling, people still had to put down good money for the tickets.

In the first movement alone, the strings completely lost each other, the piccolo lau hong-ed, the brass came in hesitantly (and so were obviously out-of-tune as well, a common problem that should have been fixed way earlier), there was a dischordant juncture when every instrument lost every other, and when the whole orchestra did get together, they all lost control and proceeded to completely drown out the piano so you wouldn't have guessed that this was a piano concerto.

Was told off for complaining about the squeaky violins "since not everyone first tucks a Strad under their chin" (it was a Strad of ill-repute), but I think it's an unhappy matter of technique rather than the China-made stuff. Unlike complaining companions, had no problem with Albert Tiu's silk robin-meets-Rasputin outfit (soloists should be allowed their affections as long as they don't interfere with performance) but his stamping on the pedal was at times louder than his own ivory work! A piano teacher would have smacked him over the head. His encore pieces were much better though.

Anyway, Fat Albert's credentials read something like this:
"Award-winning pianist Albert Tiu has won major international piano competitions, including the first prize in the UNISA International Piano Competition in South Africa and the Juilliard William Petschek Award, which resulted in his highly-acclaimed New York debut recital in Alice Tully Hall."

During the not-so-mangled Brahms, I imagined, as Isobel Lin suggested in the March 2005 issue of The Briefing, what the apostle Paul's blurb would say if he were speaking at a conference today:

a blurb of pseudo-humility could read some like this:
"Paul is a Hebrew and an Israelite and knows the Scriptures thoroughly. He is one of Abraham's descendants and an inheritor of the Promise. After his dramatic conversion, Paul was personally appointed as an apostle by Jesus Christ. He is a faithful servant of Christ and more than anyone else has worked harder, been in prison more frequently, been flogged severely, been exposed to death again and again, been stoned, shipwrecked, been in danger, gone without sleep, food, water. He worries daily over the numerous churches he has fathered all over Asia and has received many surpassingly great visions and inexpressible revelations from God that he is not permitted to tell. What Paul is permitted to tell however, he has written down prolifically and is the author of 13 out of the 21 New Testament epistles. Paul is also arguably one of the most intelligent men of all time."

But in fact, Paul's description of himself in 2 Corinthians 11 – 13 (with some interjection from Luke in Acts 20) might read more like this:
"Paul is a fool. He is a poor speaker: once, while he was talking on and on, a member of his audience sunk into a deep sleep, fell out the window and died. Paul is also a wimp: when guards went to arrest him in Damscus, he ran away and escaped shamefully in a smelly fish basket. Paul is perpetually stressed out by ministry. He is weak and continues to be led into sin and burns inwardly. Satan's messenger torments him and God refuses to answer his prayers for deliverance. Paul's church-plants aren't too sure about his authenticity and faithfulness. Some think he's a complete failure."

Isobel's proposition is all too true: We can live with the idea of a crucified Master, but we're not so keen on having our own lived marked by suffering, shame and weakness. Yet weakness, although it hinders our ability to minister, teaches us to rely not on our own strength but on Christ's power.

Far too many people feel they have to hide their struggles and weaknesses from other members of the church. When leaders realise that their DGs are dying slow deaths or that morale is low in their ministries, are reactions:

• self-centredly defensive: blaming members of their DGs or ministries for being ungodly and discouraging to others?
• self-centredly concealing: pretending that nothing is wrong and when asked about the progress of their groups say, "Ok lor"?
• self-centredly worrying about their scorecard: ashamed of admitting that yet another of their groups has "failed", afraid of what people would think of their leadership and pastoral skills?
• God-centredly reliant: prayerfully dependant on God to work all things for the good of those who love him and trusting that in this apparent weakness, God is guarding them against conceit and teaching them to rely on Christ?

When a sister struggles with depression and doesn't always make it to bible study, doesn't have the energy to turn up for SUM duty, can't bear making an appearance at service, do we:

• see her as weak and ungodly, unmatured and lacking in self-control? or
  
• see God's power at work, sustaining her daily, yearly as she clings by what appears to be the thinnest of threads to God?

When a brother toils under the weight of a specific sin and keeps finding himself teetering at the edge of the same temptation over and over again, do we:

• grumble at his weakness and his inability to learn from past experience, and suspect that he is not entirely serious about his own godliness? or
  
• see God's power at work, keeping him from being tempted more than he can bear, sustaining him as he continues to struggle and not give in to the harassment of Satan?

This doesn't purport to be some legalistic either-or checklist. Rather, like the rest of the Bible, these passages present to us the right perspective on life: not a self-centred but God-centred. Those who do not know God view apparent weakness in this world as self-centredly about us being weak; in reality, apparent weakness in this world is about the almighty God working in us to sustain us and to keep us in Christ. Like the rest of the Christian life, it is a matter of focus. In our weakness, we are not to focus on ourselves and how weak we are. In the weakness of others, we are not to focus on how weak that person is. In all our weakness, we are to focus on God who keeps us Christian through it all.

So Paul gladly boasts in his weakness not because it is anything to be proud of per se. Paul joyfully boasts in his weakness because through it Christ's power is shown to be at work in him, dwelling in him, to the glory of God.

In our study of 1 Peter 1:3-9 this week, we are shown another dimension of the God-centred perspective of suffering and grief in all kinds of trials (don't think these are limited just to persecution for being Christian but anything be it physical, emotional, spiritual that attempts to take away our complete trust in God and stop us from being Christian):

• suffering is temporary and only for this life: we have a hope for a life to come after death when there will be no more suffering and no more grief and no more trials and where we can enjoy living in a right relationship with God without a struggle;
• there is a purpose in suffering: you do not suffer because God is playing with you;
• coming through suffering proves that your faith is genuine; and
• coming through suffering will result in praise, glory and honour to God (can't be to Man because this is never descriptive of humans) when Jesus comes again, when the whole world will see how God has, through your faith, trustworthily kept you shielded from falling away(v5).
  

Le Poulet and Wong Kar Wai

Was listening to Itzhak Perlman noodling up and down show-off Paganini's 24 Caprices while preparing the bird for dinner. Big mistake. So distracted by the incongruity of Perlman's usual tone-colour, Auer-like vibrato and rubato struggling to impart warmth to what were basically violin exercises (think Dinu Lipatti trying to romanticise Hanon's exercises for keyboard), that completely forgot that I was trying out a new roasting technique on Mademoiselle Poulet.

Nevertheless the chicken dinner with button mushrooms, caramelised onions and gravy made from the roasting pan deglazed with half-drunk red wine went really well with the Wong Kar Wai-Su Lizhen marathon in Cantonese. Lost loves, missed chances, unrequited longing, destructive tenacity of memory, transciency of connection, failed synchronicity, inevitable isolation, postmodern urban alienation, beautiful mis-en-scene, sumptuous sets, lush cinematography, rich stylised framing, and vivid colours somehow needed the accompanying non-interference of simple honest food.