Doing the Accounts

I fly again on Sunday to another harrowing week of negotiations in Saigon, so it was good today to have some quiet time with God. And as the grey rumbled forth and the wind rattled roof tiles and the rain beat against windows, alone-time also for a snifter of whiskey for sorting out finances and bills while folks hepped it up on digJazz, Jazz Corner, WBGO and jazzfm.

Good to discover, belatedly, the bank account looking fairly healthy, thanks to a decent-ish bonus. Am grateful that this means financial support for the evangelistic parties and ministry events planned for the rest of the year can be given without too much worried balancing of books.

Two things I ask of you, O LORD;
do not refuse me before I die:

Keep falsehood and lies far from me;
give me neither poverty nor riches,
but give me only my daily bread.

Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you
and say,"Who is the LORD?"
Or I may become poor and steal,
and so dishonour the name of my God. (Proverbs 30:7-9)

Gourmet Cellar, Christie's and Losing Out in Life

Gourmet Cellar @ Watten Rise

chilled chillified baby octopus, sliced tomatoes

tender lamb medallions wrapped with potato

molten chocolate cake with vanilla ice-cream

Gourmet ah-beng waiters smelling of Marlbolo.

Gourmet mamak shop complete with industrial shelves, dreary fluorescent tubes and baby cockroaches.

Gourmet goes the heartlanders? The people have sung and it is the song of gourmet food.

Talking about proletariats, I sauntered into a Christie's jewellery and watches pre-auction viewing today in T-shirt, shorts and slippers. Met a wealthy lady there who was trying on some of the bling-bling auction pieces. In the short polite conversation that ensued, she basically bade me to enjoy the viewing because I would never have the money to buy them for myself. The person assisting her repeated what was said and sniggered loudly. Men in Armani suits turned from their own antique watch-shopping to look at us.

Instinctively, I recoiled from the jibe and, like any good Singaporean who has watched one TCS drama too many, wanted to resolve to work hard and show everyone how successful and powerful and wealthy I could be. You will see my face in the Tatler and my name in the Time's list of 100 Most Influential People in the World and weep, my friends.

But something rang false.

These instincts somehow addressed concerns which I had long since ceased to be concerned about: success; power; wealthy; the friends, service, comfort, honour and respect that all these could buy.

Some years ago, the path was open for me to follow in the well-heeled footsteps of my former bosses to the pages of society rags. I chose the other path for a simple reason: coming to know God as God, the most powerful person in the entire universe, turned my world around and changed my value system. If God was real, and his word in the Bible was real, then it would be mentally unsound to live as if none of this was real; it would be madness to live as if success and power and wealth and the friends, service, comfort, honour and respect that all these could buy was really what life was all about.

Reality is constructed by God. He tells us that life is really about is him, his Son, his plan for the world and his people. It would be insane to chase after illusions when real and eternal value was to be found in the gospel, in the salvation of people, in my relationship with God and with his people.

So I chose a job that would pay so so so much less and really not the sort of occupation to put me on the fast-track to ambassadorship. But it gave me time to spend with God, praying and reading his word in the Bible, and the time and energy to talk to people about the gospel and fellowship with God's family.

It was then that I realised what the fear (eg. 1 Peter 3:6) of living out the Christian life, living as strangers and aliens in this world, could be: it is the kiasu fear that by living rightly, we deprive ourselves of something, we miss out on what life has to offer, we short-change ourselves and basically lose out to other people.

Was I really missing out?

It was really (and continues to be) a choice between a dud investment and a sure-win investment.

Why put all my money on a dud investment which would not only give zero interest but also gobble up my principal, leaving me without a cent when there was a wonderful investment with not only a guarantee on the principal but a sure return infinite times of the principal?

My mind happily settled, went for some plebian health food:

beer-battered fish and fat hot chips anointed with salt and vinegar; and

[To protect the sensibilities of the delicate, this photo shall not be shown.]

fried mars bars.

And now for something completely different...

The horrible thing about having a job is the enormous chunk of your life it takes up. I hate how weekdays are effectively shot to bits and how I'm only left with 2 days a week to read the bible, write bible studies, meet up with people, Run Errands...do Christmas Shopping... Good time management aside, there’s only so much you can fit into a day.

Cantonese at Hua Ting was a great relief from the recent gout-inducing diet. We were sandwiched between clipped British-Singaporean accents in polo shirts and chinos discussing the effects of their latest social experiment on the plebians and a couple of Indonesian tai-tais resting from a successful shopping exercise. Good time to butt in and talk about the gospel...I've always wondered how far you can push social convention (especially in an Asian society) to fulfil your goal of telling people the good news. How much would come across so seow-on that you'll scare people away from hearing the gospel and from any other Christian thereonafter?

Spent a few hours at a quiet Christian bookshop running through their entire collection of CDs. It was difficult to find any as Christmas gifts. It isn't a matter of toe-ing the official evangelical partyline. Personally, much "Christian" music doesn't do anything for me.

Without mentioning names, there's the sort of "Christian" music that avoids mention of God or Jesus altogether and sings obliquely about love. I get bored with those at first listen. Alot of expressly secular music is groovier.

Then there's the sort of "Christian" music that's so vague you're not quite sure whether they're singing about their girlfriend/boyfriend, the married woman they just ran away with or mother earth. Those are really empty, like eating loads of rancid plain wafers which can't contain your hunger.

Some others sing of God, but seem to be making endless demands on him in song: bless us now, fill us now, prosper me now, reveal yourself to me now, speak to me now, all which makes me very pai se.

Then there are the songs with response lyrics: words that say how we want to dance and sing and sacrifice our lives to God. Which really sound almost like the sort of thing you hear from the human resource department at a really inspiring pep-talk session or a fiery stadium cheer in World Cup match. The reason for doing such cult-like things is rarely explained, so you could substitute the words "God" and "Jesus" with "[company name]" or "[name of favourite sports team]" and no one would be any the wiser. Because it's about all about over-the-top commitment and strong emotion, it doesn't help me when I don't feel like responding in this way (so I can't honestly sing the lyrics of the song, but I *can* honestly sing Linkin Park and Evanescence) and neither does it help anyone else in knowing what these people are responding to.

There're those which praise God for his power, mercy, love and goodness which would make a non-Christian go "Har? For what?" but which Christians (and Catholics, since the lyrics are usually vague in that regard) can enjoy; like some of the songs by the Coldplay-sounding Newsboys.

I liked some of the Casting Crowns songs for social Christian commentary. Good reminders about the practical day-to-day living out of the Christian life. Caedmon's Call did what I didn't think anyone would do and wrote a song on Romans 3 (there is no one who is righteous, no one who seeks God, no one who understands, so it is by faith that we are saved not by works so that no one can boast...)! Found out that Stuart Townend wrote rather good stuff like "In Christ Alone", "Beautiful Saviour" and "How Deep the Father's Love" that gives you the gospel and solid ground to stand on, then leads you to react in the appropriate manner.

A few years ago, Steve Camp wrote 107 Theses (a la Martin Luther) calling for a reformation of the contemporary christian music industry. Quite interesting though it isn't very well-written and many of the Scriptural references are out-of-context. Not quite sure what impact this has had on the industry (the impact of Luther's theses was powerful then due to your usual politics-uses-religion-as-convenient-weapon situation) but certainly something to think about.

Egad. Are emu offerings and Hwee's CD the only Christian music around worth putting in Christmas stockings?

New Job

Started my new job today.

The decision to take up this job offer was reached only after long and painful discussions with fellow brothers and sisters and prayer.

The main considerations in deciding to take up any job are:

1. to realise the place of work in the life of the Christian:

• we have a God who works (Genesis 2:2) and is working even to this day (John 5:16)
• work is not an evil in itself. It was part of God's good creation right from the beginning when he put Adam in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it (Genesis 2:15). It was a consequence of the Fall that everything fell with Adam so that work became painful toil (Genesis 3:17-19)
• work is the legitimate way to sustain us physically. "If a man will not work, he shall not eat." (2 Thess 3:10). People are to earn the bread they eat (2 Thess 3:12)
• work keeps people from being idlers and busybodies (2 Thess 3:11). Idleness seems to encourage ungodly behaviour (1 Tim 5:13)
• working for one's keep legitimises one's ministry in the way that the people to whom you are ministering know that you have no ulterior motive for ministering to them. You want nothing from them (not money, not a good hot meal, or a place to sleep)
• but we work just to eat. The real food is the food of eternal life. Jesus warns us, "Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you." (John 6:27).

2. to ensure that the work you are required to do in this particular job per se is not ungodly or won't stumble you in any way (eg. prostitution, gambling, even sales and marketing (where you may be pressured to lie to earn your living)(where you may be pressured to lie to earn your living).

3. to ensure that the job allows you time for God because there is no inherent merit in work or working hard.

4. to ensure that the job is in a place/country where there is a good bible-teaching church so that you can be encouraged weekly by faithful teaching and preaching from God's word and where you can have accountable fellowship with brothers and sisters who are travelling in the same direction and won't lead you down the wide and popular road of ungodliness or heretical teaching.

In my case, there were other more lucrative opportunities with well-known organisations abroad with monthly salaries starting at S$10,000. Ego-boosting opportunities with great pay, good hours, in a place with biblical churches and which would look impressive on my CV. Oppotunities which would not, on the surface, affect my godliness adversely.

Why did I take this low-paying local job with little prospects then? For the following reasons:

1. my responsibilities to my bible study group-not to up and leave without warning and without finding a bible-centred successor whom I'm confident can lead the group in godliness. Even when I find one, it will take time for relationships to form and for people to feel confident enough to be accountable and share with this person.
2. my responsibilities to the people I'm reading one-to-one with.
   
3. my responsibilities to the people I'm counselling.

There was still much discussion about God's sovereignty and human responsibility. The Bible tells us that God is sovereign and whatever humans do, God's will prevails in the end. In Ruth, we see how God works out his great salvation plan in the minute details of human history in the life of one family (Elimelech's) and in the lives of 3 people (Naomi, Ruth and Boaz). Yet, the Bible also tells us that we cannot live our lives fatalistically by sitting back and not doing anything. We will also be held accountable and responsible for our decisions and actions. So while I know that I'm not indispensible in God's plan to save his elect, yet, I must fulfil my responsibilities to them.

Many people shrieked at the wasted opportunity to pursue these other opportunities. Making this decision made me realise again what it means to trust in God. It means to live my life as if all that He has said in the Bible is real. And in light of that reality (that the things of this world are passing away and only the things of God are permanent), to make my decisions and to live for Him alone.