Pearls Before Swine - A favourite comic

Stephen Pastis, the creator of Pearls Before Swine comics depicts the foolishness of this world in his comics. All that is depicted through the lives of Pig (really dumb fella), Rat (this guy is a pusher who thinks he is always right), Goat (the wise one but he'd rather keep to himself) and a few other characters.

Depicted below is a comic about Pig and Rat. Rat always gets the better of Pig and Rat has always been exploiting Pig's naiveness. Here, Pig felt a sense of achievement when he believed that he had pulled a prank, something that he had never done before in his life.... or maybe he thought he did.


For more of Pearls Before Swine go to www.comics.com/comics/pearls/index.html

MYF through the generations

I was going through some of my photos and I would like to share some of these. These are pictures of MYFers taken down the generation. I joined MYF since 1992. The pics that I have are from various years since then. Youths change, MYF changes but God never changes. Amen to that! :)

MYF 1993 - Frasers Hill camp

1994 - MYF Sunday

1995 MYF Camp - Ria Apartments, Genting Highlands

1997 MYF Camp - Pangkor

1999 MYF Camp - Methodist Center, Port Dickson (Note Mandy in pic)

Will add more when I get the latest pictures of MYF (after 1999).

His plans are for me...

Yesterday evening, at about 6.30pm, I was driving off from my office and there was a very bad jam. As I was caught in this jam along Jalan Istana, and the cars were all moving slowly along the road, I saw the evening skyline and I was just dreaming and thinking away...

Then I heard the Lord spoke to me,"For I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." He reminded me about Jeremiah 29:11, and during that time, Jeremiah sent a letter to the exiles of Israel at Babylon, reminding them that God is in control and that even though the situation may seem bad, but He is still in control. The words kept ringing in my head.

I asked God,"Lord, why must I go through all these? You know that I don't like to go through things like that. It's tough, it's testing. It's the same thing, the same story and I am tired of it."

He reminded me again on Jeremiah 29:11.

He reminded me also that I have to take courage and step out in faith. Not just sit and complain. Jeremiah was a person who had a lot of fear in his heart as well and God moulded him. Fear God, not men, I am reminded. But it's easier said than done. Especially when the intimidator is directly in front of you. God says, "Take courage for I am with you."

"Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go" - Joshua 1:9

Last night, when I reached home, again, he reminded me again on Jeremiah 29:11. I am assured of His plans but I just do not know what they are. He has been faithful to both of us here, in every aspect of the way.

Both Elaine and I are constantly reminded so much about His love and His faithfulness, especially in the areas of our wedding, relationship and His providence to us. And we know that He is in control.

Whatever it is Lord, let those plans you have promised us be your plans for me and Elaine.

A new home, a new beginning

After staying in Apartment C, 6th floor for 4 months since the wedding, we are finally moving away from it and going to our new home in SRM. Moving out has been difficult, considering the amount of things that we have accumulated over the past 4 months, with our books and clothes contributing to the big bulk of the items.

Packing started a week ago and finally, after everything, we moved off on Sunday, 2nd October 2005. We had quite a number of people helping us, but the task of moving is definitely not as easy as it seems to be. No joke... dumping stuff into the van (it was overloaded with our stuff when it was completed) and then the cars as well were all filled to the brim. The loadings completed by about 3pm and that's when we pushed off to SRM.

We reached there OK, but then the guards in SRM gave us trouble.. as usual... but what the heck... they gave everyone trouble, including the furniture delivery people. My mom-in-law was really mad at them. We needed to unload stuff and it was only logical for us to get the van down to the parking lot and unload it directly into the lift from the van with a trolley. We managed to get down to the parking lot to unload it anyway. However, while we were unloading it, the lift went into this immobilized mode after 3 minutes of having its doors opened for too long. When it has been immobilized, it does not move at all. And again, that was very problematic. In the end, the van went out and we unloaded the rest of the stuff from the visitors parking instead. And when we came out from the parking lot, mom-in-law gave the guards an earful of abuse due to their inflexibility but the guards just could not care less...

Anyway, unloading finished at 4.30pm. We decided to just leave everything there and myself and Elaine went back to Apartment C to get the rest of our stuff. When we reached Apartment C, it was already 5.15pm, and it was indeed an empty apartment once again. I went in and just sat on the sofa (the sofa belongs there) and I just looked at everything and the view outside the window (which I could never miss and forget). Of course, the rattles and sounds of the trains that runs near our apartment was a sound that I will really miss and I just couldn't get enough of that when I was back there.

We cleaned up and collected our stuff before we left. I looked out of the window from our room and we could see the whole KL and the sun setting over the horizon.. the sky turning orange, gold and then dark, and the lights of the city shone in the darkness. The lights of cars, signboards and the cross outside our apartment that has always been what we look to before we sleep every nite.

And of course there is the hum of the air cond in our room, the sound of the car horns, the trains, the melody of the street musicians that I could hear and then in the morning, the sounds of the schools and its children. Waking up to all that sound and the rush out of the apartment, to be greeted with a friendly "Good Morning" from the guards downstairs.

Most of all, it was the place where we stayed after our wedding, the place that we started off, the place that we got to know people like David, Mandy, Pearly, Sam, Heng Boon, Erin and so many other MYFers much better, the place where we cooked together and cooked for many, the place where we had many meetings, talks, discussions and tears that fell together, the place where we laughed together and spent so many happy and joyful evenings together, the place that we went back to every evening, the place where our brothers and our family hung out with us, the place where we had a few of them staying with us during GRIP and most of all, the place that impacted us so much that we drew so much closer to God.

4 months and all these has been a very, very, very sweet 4 months that we started our journey together. We will treasure all that we experienced. I wish that we will get to stay there again. This time round, we don't have to move out after 4 months.

The new place in SRM is bigger, it's a blessing from God and it's a new beginning. Life will go on in SRM.

But then again, I will really miss Apartment C - because God enabled us to start off in His ground and His foundations and Apartment C meant a lot to us, to me especially.