The Reason I Live is Christ

Pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching; persevere in these things, for as you do this you will ensure salvation both for yourself and for those who hear you. (1 Tim 4:16)

Thursday, September 29
Do You DO-TA?

I wonder if it is of any good to me or just silently harming me. I have the game Frozen Throne since 2003 and because of A levels and my busy schedule, I stopped playing computer games all together... When DOTA (defence of the ancients-- a player-modified custom map in Frozen Throne) first came to be, I felt it was stupid & pointless so I didn't bother to try it, let alone be good in it...

However, as the months passed, the game gains its popularity until almost every guy friend I know who is a gamer is playing it...I started playing it when my friends in MCC kept playing it during out nights off. At first, I thought it's a good platform to socialise and to have a common topic of discussion and of course to have lots of fun...

But pressure began to build up when my skills in the game started to receive critism. It's hard to keep up when I'm not nautrally gifted at gaming in general and I hardly have any experience in playing e game. So most of the time i become e "free frag" of e game... So there's this urge to wanna be better and improve...Like most games, it isn't bad unlss you are so addicted to it that it burns hours of your precious time away, prevents you from doing other more productive and meaningful things. It gets pretty bad if it makes you skip meals, stops you from doing your chores or neglects your responsibilities. Worst! it robs you of rest!

I don't visit lan shops often so I was shocked when my friend told me of guys bringing their girlfriends to lanshops and the girl will sit behind and watch him play. whether it's voluntary or not, or if she has any interest in e game, i dunno...But i thought if that's the case, she will be playin.. So if it was due to compromising for the other party, then don't u agree it is TERRIBLE?

No, I'm in no position to judge the thousands worldwide who are addicted to e game. I'm just commenting on what i tot of it and about somethings I observed... I mean at the end of the day of playing, so what? Is there anything of value to gain from it? Worse if it had affected my relationship with God. Like other things in this world, too much of something is never good... Except things from God of cos... =)

(this post was written on monday, now all my friends are changing to play World of Warcraft... Nah too ex for me)

-=P3ng=- | 9:39 pm

Sunday, September 25
Trainee Days Are Finally Over!

The occasion has passed! Just like that, my life as a trainee has finally come to an end... and the 2nd half of my life in e army is about to begin... Life is expected to change, and there's much hope that it'll be for e better in many areas. Stress will be in another form and the experience might very much be what I needed for future ministries. I'm 80-90 % staying back as an instructor and my presentation and conduct of lessons will be put to the test.. Anyway no worries because the next batch will be coming in in dec... TOo bad can't help out in LOST camp.. haiz..

Last week had been an experience for me... Being the last I/C for the course was slack but a great challenge by itself mainly cos no one bothers to listen, everyone in holiday mood. I'm thankful God brought me through it all.. I must testify that God's grace had been poured upon me, so much beyond what I can ever comprehend.. Why had God been so good I can never know but He is good and I will proclaim this goodness to everyone! God had been so kind that in every prayer I gave thanks to God for His grace and understood my own unworthiness to receive all these. From simple things like blessed weather to tough situations where God guided me. If i had wrote everything down, it could easily exceed a page long! Praise God!

-=P3ng=- | 3:47 pm

Sunday, September 18
He who sees a fellow brother sin and keep silent has commited a greater sin

Let's face the harsh realities of the world. It is one thing to say that you'll live for God, leaving your life of unrightousness behind and obeying God's commands, and acutally living it out everyday in every situation...

I was being put to the test last fri only finding myself to be nothing different from the non-believers, a mere hypocrite.. How horrible!

The situation: We finished washing our vehicles and are returning our vehicle stores(hammers, flags, machine gun pinner, and many many other tools) to the main store of the camp. Upon accounting the stores, we found we were missing one mg pinner lock-pin (it's smth like a small metal stick that we use to secure the pinner to the vehicle) and upon further questioning we might have to pay $120 for one. (that's ridiculous I know, ask me why the army like that i dunno) Then, because the store only got 1 storeman (who is a private) who is counting the stores we layed outside the store, while some of our guys are bringing in the stores to put them on the shelves, one of my friend went in and came out with 1 lock-pin.. Then with the help of other friends we were like checking the pinners again and one exclaimed hey! where got lost a lock-pin, all have what... then oh ok all settle bring them into the store... Oh God, at the pt in time i knew what it all meant.. and my friends grew bolder and all our missing stuff "strangely" appeared... I just went one side and stayed away, maybe because i want to take myself away from this act of stealing and just be an onlooker. I can't take nothing has ever happen, yet I can't find any courage to do anything. Being silent is the easiest and just treat nothing happen. But I knew clearly what God commands are, what the truth is. I knew God's judement on sin, I knew men's sinful nature, I knew the devil's lies to our hearts saying this is ok.. I knew, but I couldn't act. How could I? All 25 ppl will hate me. They'll talk about me behind their backs, curse me, label me as religious freak, a not flexible person, a follow the law person, a person who just puts up an act.. I'm not prepared..I don't want to go through that feeling of being alone with God against the whole world...no not again.. It's just too horrible... God , forgive me...

But still, what's all this knowledge for if nothing is done, if nothing has changed? Did Jesus really came down to die for nothing? Did He came down and suffer and die on the cross FOR NOTHING? He came be give a solution to our sins and spare us from judgement.

God, forgive me for I've failed to stand up for You... Help me O Lord to find this courage...Help me to remember what truly matters to me and help me to see things in the correct light, holding on to what the truth that You have revealed to me...
Amen

-=P3ng=- | 9:34 pm

My Reflection

*was on my way to go upstairs back to bunk when i pass by the window of this very dark room and it showed a reflection of me and thoughts began pouring out as all of a sudden time seemed to come to a still...

Who is this person in the reflection
In an army uniform, with a kevlar helmet under his right arm
Who is this person in the reflection
Who wore combat boots and had grease stained hands

Wait, this is a boy
whose face is without wrinkles nor does it show any signs of being on this world for decades
Wait, this is a teen
whose life is suppose to be studying and hanging out with friends

Why is this boy asked to fight, made to train
He runs around with rifles and shoot bullets that hurt
Why is this boy trained to fight, trained to kill
He goes around in armoured tanks and fire bombs that cause great destruction

Is this the same boy who I saw last year
The one who was struggling to study, to pass his A levels
The one who struggled to balance his school, social and spiritual life
The one who plays computer games, goes kayaking and enjoys friendship

Who am I, I really wonder
Am i dreaming or is any of this for real?
All the pains and sufferings I've been through
Why do they all seem so clouded in my memory

Who is the boy that I see
Standing there staring back at me.
Is he really... me?

-=P3ng=- | 9:14 pm

Sunday, September 11
Army Half Marathon ...WCG

2 topics of interest for today.

1, 12km is harder than usual if u had to run up shears' bridge and squeeze your way through hundreds of ppl who are walking. basically the whole path to run was CLOGGED with PPL! it only cleared a bit after the 1st 1 to 2 km when i manage to over take to the portion where most of the people are jogging. Running this reminded me of a character that i always have.. At the start we were like ok, let's run, sure no prob. Only when I realise I'm not as fit and start to face difficulty then i began to turn to God. God isn't a rescuer that is there only when u need Him or a genie that gives you things when u want them. He is my King, our King. We are but dust brought to life by His breath.

The run went well, I finished it, then stayed around e area slacking because i was too tired to go church from there.

2, WCG (world cyber games) I only realised that Singapore is the host of the WCG this year! How grand and cool is that! I went to take a look in suntec at the competition but was quite boring cos i was alone (Why didn't I know k3nny will surely be there. He was there the whole afternoon but i didn't see him, oh well...) Cant wait to see how the pros play... Serious gamers... Well, I'm just a noob..

-=P3ng=- | 8:26 pm

Saturday, September 10
A Birthday To Remember

Ring, ring.... An alarm went off and within mintues the glaring ceiling lights were piercing thru my eyelids, forcing me to out of my dream back into reality.. Getting out of bed, my body automatically moved itself around to get rdy to fall in within 10mins. It's also 2nd nature to me, waking up changing into Long 4 SBO helmet attire...

1st ever bday that I woke up at 3am! who will do that willingly? Not me! I was greeted with birthday msgs mainly from my OAC friends =) and dazz who was abt to sleep when I woke uP! Anyway the day began as we went to draw our mortar sets and prep our store tonner and mortar vehicles. This time I'm thankful for 1 thing- I'm in Ammo party instead of Store! haha for once i need to be overly stressed trying to account for e store items...After that we set off at 5, going to draw our mortar bombs in e Ammo tonner. (we just slept even though e tonner was bumping here and there along e road)

Upon reaching e live firing site, the place was already set up by e store party (thank God again I'm not inside! =p ) Anyway, there was some safety briefing and off we went zooming our vehicles into the deployment site.. we deployed, layed to zero line, camo net up, etc... wasn't as bad as before.. thank God there were no screw ups! My 1st appointment was a loader and i loaded 4 bombs.. I tot by now I would get used to the explosion.. but no, everytime it fires, I'll instinctively would wanna close my eyes and turn away.. That's a prob cos the Vehicle commander is suppose to look at the barrel to see if the bomb flies off and that was my next mission appointment! Anyway things went well till the 2nd mission rehearsal. It was Bravo vehicle that came zooming in but didn't pulled the brakes well and collided into my vehicle (it wasn;t serious but that was enough to get the course commander to heat up and scream at us to restart e missioN! )

Then another present from my friend came when he layed the mortar wrongly (laying a mortar is smth like aiming the mortar to e target) Since he was the reference mortar, all other vehicles were wrong too and end up we gotta restart the mission... It wouldn't be that bad if the weather was a bit kinder but the sorching heat was really killing most of us... that spending another minute out in the open patch is torturing.. And I'm expected to stay clear minded (I'm delta vehicle commander), shout fire dicipline, fill the commander form, get my vehicle to give reading to director, get my 2I/C to prep e bomb, get my layer to lay the mortar for firing, get orders from my officer, remind ppl to put on ear muffs when i'm abt to fire, and well the list goes on! Rising to the occasion is not possible without God's help. Thank GOD!

Then came night fall when the highlight was firing the illum bombs.. They are bombs that after firing will explode in e air and glow and slowly parachute down... a million candlelight power! as they lit up e sky, i guess it was God's birthday candles for me =) once in a lifetime! it also signified the end of our last impt mission for our mortar commander course.. The morale was super high as everyone rushed thru cleaning arms preparing to book out this morn..

Well, reaching back bunk e next morn at 3am i got friends telling me oh, happy belated bday! haha how interesting.. the nicest thing was switching on my hp.. (i was out ever since 3am rem?) 19 new msgs received! haha whoa!

ok this post is quite disorganised and some terms u won't understand but I'm like still quite blur sleeping only a few hours here and there.. not fully awake yet..

-=P3ng=- | 2:52 pm