Symbiosis

Imagine space. Now imagine an object. Most of us can imagine space without objects but cannot imagine an object without space. Yet, the Big Bang theory tells us that the expanding universe is defined by the objects within it. In other words, in our reality, space is the distance between objects and that objects come first.

Symbiosis is not the interdependence between objects but their unity. God is both object and space and neither object nor space. The ancients call this state spirit. Spirit exists both as being as well as in objects. In other words, the evidence for God is everywhere.

...this page is work in progress. Keep coming back.

good and Devil

HAH! So you think I finish already. No way, hosay. Only half the story. The other half is the devil. When you ask a Christian where the devil comes from, he will tell you this story: how God made the angels, and Lucifer was the anointed one, most perfect and most beautiful. Then he - Lucifer, not God, so stupid - got too proud and wanted to be God also. So kena punish. Something like that. But, I tell you, I read the Bible backwards and forwards, inside and outside (look at cover, mah), still cannot find this story. This Ezekiel 28, actually for King of Tyre one. Never use the word devil, or satan or Lucifer at all. Christians will say, read between the lines. Aiyah, only paper between the lines. God want to say something, say to my face. Why must read between the lines?

And then, go back to story of Adam and Eve. Satan come and tempt Eve. You think never have God's permission? I think God send him, ok. You look, everywhere Satan appear, God knows already. Like in Job, God take bet with Satan, right? Conspiracy theory. Even Jesus says "This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God's glory so that God's Son may be glorified through it." So God makes you sick to glorify himself. Ok-lah, joke.

I tell you, from what I read in the Bible, everything the Devil do, God already knows and accept. So, why like this? I tell you. Use equation:

Good (Innocent) = Baby
Good >> Evil = Hero

In this world, there are only two kinds of people we all love (and I think God loves also): the baby and the hero. That's why Jesus bless all the meek and weary and mournful and so on. They are like babies, suffering and innocent. But if you want to grow up, know good and evil, then you must become hero. Where got hero never overcome evil, I ask you? Anywhere you find story about hero, surely fight with the devil. Don't need Bible. Any story in the world you look see got hero, hundred percent fight devil.

This is what Jesus means-lah. You must fight devil. Kick ass. You become hero, you are salt and light. You tell people only Christians go to heaven, other people go to hell, this kind of salt give me also I don't want. You tell me Jesus die for me, this kind of light who wants to see? You fight devil, become hero, everybody wants to be like you. Long long ago, during Roman times, Christians die eaten by lions. Not scared. Heroes, right? Like this only can convert Roman emperor. You think Roman emperor converted by preaching, meh?

This Jesus, big time hero. Not only protect the poor and weak, even his enemies, he protect. Other people, if you harm them, they harm you back ten times more. Jesus accept and ask God to forgive you. My kind of hero. You want to be Christian, be kick ass hero. Don't go around condemning other people, or pretend like you poor sinner like every one else. You already saved, got God on your side. Go kick some ass. Become hero. Then you are light of the world and salt of the earth.

No need to be so complicated. You already know, in this life, you want to be hero. To become hero, you must overcome evil-lah. No other way. Don't complain why the world so bad, or why the devil come and tempt you, or why life so difficult. You don't like, be like baby. Be innocent and humble. God loves you anyway. No need to fight. You want to fight, fight the devil. Don't fight other people, they struggling just like you. Don't know why we need Jesus to come tell us this.

So, I think this Satan, ha, poor thing, you know. Get kicked so much by God and all his heroes. So, I think, this Satan, only follow God's plan, right? Not his fault. Without him, how you can become hero? So actually, the devil good, right?

God and evil

You know, ha, this Bible, really interesting to read. Got so many stories - miracles, violence, murder, everything also got. But I tell you, God I don't understand. Really something else one.

Firstly, you got Adam and Eve, right? God tell them, "Don't eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil". I mean, if you don't want me to eat something, don't put it in the garden-lah. Crazy, right? Then send the snake to come and tempt us somemore. It's like asking a child not to jump from the cliff and then take him there to see how beautiful it is, and then leave him alone there. He going to jump or not? Surely jump. I mean, common sense what. You don't want me to do something, put it somewhere else-lah. Don't put in my face. Like, I am sure in heaven God got sit on beautiful golden throne. Of course cannot touch one, right? But in heaven, right? I am on earth. How to touch? Cannot, correct? So simple.

Or Job. Don't know why, God lets the Devil test Job. Just to bet. Hey, gambling bad, ok? First take away all his property and then kill all his children. And this is only the first test, ok. And then, not enough, put him in leprosy also. Wah, chia lat. Still not enough, send his wife and friends to test him somemore. OK, finally Job passes the test and got back more than he lost. But-hey, children already dead, ok? You think so easy to replace one child with another, meh? This God, like got no feelings one.

Got even worse things. Maybe not worse but pretty terrible also. Drown everyone in the Great Flood (except for Noah and his family and all the animals two by two). Then turn Lot's wife into a pillar of salt. Wah liao, look also cannot. Aiyah, city burning to hell and you cannot even turn around to look. Who can resist, I tell you? And then, ask Saul to kill all the children and women. Not only that even the cows and sheep, camels and donkeys, ok? And then, in Egypt, first God make the Pharoah hard hearted and then send ten plagues upon Egypt. Ten, ok? Plagues, ok? Not some small thing like common cold. Oi, Pharoah the one hard hearted, not Egyptian citizens. Why must plague everyone, I ask you?

But people are people, right? Where got perfect one? Sin all the time. So then finally, send his own son, HIS OWN SON some more, to come down and save us. So guess what happened. He get betrayed, beaten up, mocked, stabbed and hung on the cross. Crucified, ok? Nails on the hands and feet. Crown of thorns. Wah, tragic. This Jesus, when he is here, don't even have roof over his head. Not even recognised by the people he came to save. So, he come here, suffer and die. For what? To forgive our sins. Make me feel so guilty, right? My sins, punish me-lah. Why punish your own son?

Very strange, right? Adam commit sin, punish everyone. Jesus die, forgive everyone. Why not punish Adam for his sins, punish me for mine. Jesus, not guilty, no need to punish-lor. Where got meaning.

I tell you, ha, this God really something else. Sibeh tahan. So evil, right?

confessions of a conflicted christian #3

Blasphemy: Did Jesus exist?

It is difficult as a Christian to consider the possibility that Jesus might not have really existed [1,2]. But the story of Jesus is one that is almost designed not to be recorded in history. You might even say that Jesus seemed to have done everything he could not to be historically remembered. As noted before, he didn't write anything down (if he did, surely his apostles would have preserved it). His birth is as anonymous as it is possible to be. And of course, his death left no trace, since he was resurrected and rose to heaven physically.

Yet, as every Christian knows, Jesus said that "heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away." Just what did he mean? Clearly not what we humans understand - for if he meant by 'my words' what we call the Bible, why didn't he just write the gospel and be done with it? After all, God took the trouble to write the 10 commandments.

By almost any reasoning, he ought not to be even remembered, let alone revered - he was from humble beginnings, he ended his life as a criminal, his followers were uneducated and mostly disorganised, and he left precious little evidence that we can fall back on reliably as historical fact. His concept of saving us had little to do with what the Jews imagined and little to do with what we want when we pray to him. And yet, he exists, and is revered.

Are we Christians mad?

Apologia
And yet I count myself a believer. Certainly not on the basis of historical evidence. I believe because he told the truth and no one before or after has been able to improve on his truth. This is a strange testimony, because it amounts to saying that I believe in him because I believe him.
[I realise that my apologias are lame, to say the least. In a way, I have no direct answers to these blasphemies. So, I will go through all the blasphemies before giving my response - which, I might as well warn you, is not an intellectual rebuttal. I shall leave the reader to decide, when I do apologise, if it is intelligent - :) ]

Why?

I've always pondered over the oddness of the expulsion of Adam and Eve. They were expelled because they disobeyed God and ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Until then, I guess, they were innocent - not knowing the difference between good and evil. Does this mean then that they were incapable of evil? If so, was their disobedience 'evil' then, in a sense? It was obviously not 'good' or God wouldn't have punished them.

Also, I may be somewhat pedantic here, but the use of the word 'knowledge' is also intriguing. Is knowledge dangerous? Does God prefer us not to know? Historically, at least, in the early days of Christianity (esp. the Middle Ages), knowledge was considered dangerous and only churches and monasteries had libraries. Universities began in monasteries. The average Christian was 'forbidden' access to knowledge. There were many instances, even recently, of books being burned for heresy. Except that today, we mostly ban them.

We do say that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. And sometimes, we may argue that some arguments are wrong because they contain imperfect knowledge or are incomplete. But, all human knowledge are imperfect and incomplete. Descartes is famous for his (to me, rather comical and disastrous) attempt to found human knowledge on doubt. So, if we cannot know anything perfectly, are we better off keeping our state of innocence?

But knowledge is one of our greatest achievements. A child, almost as soon he or she is able to speak, asks, "Why?". We are naturally curious (about life, about one another*, about almost anything) and most parents encourage their children to study and to learn. Our ability to learn, to develop knowledge, is perhaps the single most important reason why we are where we are today - with our technology, science and great art.

There is a great lesson to be learnt in the story of Adam and Eve. As with much of the first part of Genesis, I see this story as myth. Myth is not necessarily just a story that is not true - even though that is how we see it today. For me, myth is a way of capturing certain truths. It is a way we little understand today (because we are so blinded by the concept of scientific truth). But I do know this: myths capture truths in a way that is both profound and memorable. And I see a profound truth in the story of Adam and Eve: about knowledge, good and evil, and the human condition. Read the story again.

_____________________________
*Isn't gossip simply irresistable?

confessions of a conflicted christian #2

Blasphemy: The Bible is man's work, not God's Word.
Well, in a physical way, that's true. Except for the 10 commandments, everything else in the Bible is acknowledged, even by Christians, to be written by men - from Moses for Genesis to David for Psalms to Paul for much of the New Testament.

The Bible as we know it today comprises 66 books written over several millenia. The first official collection of the Bible occured in the 4th Century AD and was amended again just a few decades later. The history of the Bible is long and varied:


Wikipedia puts it succinctly:

Many people who identify themselves as Christians, Muslims, or Jews regard the Bible as inspired by God yet written by a variety of imperfect men over thousands of years.

Note the phrase "written by a variety of imperfect men" - consider what that implies.

But Christians aren't saying that God physically wrote the Bible himself, simply that He guided every word. There are several problems with this claim:
1. We share the Old Testament with the Jews. If the Bible is really the Word of God and to be taken literally, as many Christian advocates will have you do, then this commonality with the Torah is a problem. Are we simply 'modern' Jews - i.e. Jews but slightly different? Or are we radically different? If so, how so? Simply saying that we believe in Jesus while Jews don't doesn't tell us anything. So what if Jesus is the son of God? Do we therefore throw away the Torah? If not, why not? What is the radical difference?
2. Jesus never wrote anything down. This ought to be a real shocker. If God really did come down as Jesus and if everything he wanted to tell us is in the Bible, why doesn't he just rewrite the Bible as it ought to be written? At least the Quran is a transcript of what Muhammad taught - word for word, in the original language that the Prophet used.
3. There are many books inspired by God. Even if we ignore the many holy books of the different religions, there are many, many books written by Christians since the beginning of Christianity that are professed to be inspiration from God. Of late, for example, there is the Gospel of Judas:













So, which ones do you believe? On the church's authority? Which church?
4. When Jesus came, many of his harshest comments were directed at the teachers of the Law. To quote Luke 20:46-47:

"Beware of the teachers of the law. They like to walk around in flowing robes and love to be greeted in the marketplaces and have the most important seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets. They devour widows' houses and for a show make lengthy prayers. Such men will be punished most severely."

Or Matthew 5:20:

"For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven."

So, what do you believe? And why? How can you be better than your pastor? How can you be more holy than your priest?

Apologia:
So, I have my doubts about the inerrancy of the Bible. And yet, it contains the story of Jesus. Can his story be made up? I may not believe the Bible and I do believe in Jesus. This will seem strange but I will explain more in future blogs.

what kind of love

what kind of love is this
that gave itself for me
i am the guilty one
yet i go free

what kind of love is this
a love i never knew
i didn't even know his name
what kind of love is this

When you read about the coming of Jesus in the Old Testament and imagine what you might have expected Jesus to be like, you would have imagined some great king, a warrior who will come and rule the world. As a Jew, you would have thought of the great Jewish kings like David or Solomon, or the deeds of Moses or Joseph (who rose to great power in Egypt). I have tried to put myself in the mind of a Jew then and I think, I too will probably reject Jesus as the promised saviour.

what kind of man is this
who died in agony
he who has done no wrong
was crucified for me

what kind of man is this
who laid aside his throne
that i might know the love of God
what kind of man is this

Jesus surprised us in the way the Word was fulfilled. He was born of humble beginnings, out of wedlock, a poor carpenter's son. When he rode into Jerusalem on a donkey, many Jews were probably offended. How could their saviour be this vagrant on a donkey? Was he mocking them? Indeed, Jesus said a lot to rebuke the Jews and their ways.

by grace i have been saved
it is a gift of God
a destiny to be his child
such is his love

no eyes has ever seen
no ears has ever heard
nor has the heart of man conceive
what kind of love is this

The greatest Christian I have ever known risked his own salvation out of his duty (love, respect, call it what you will) to his father. He was convicted of Christ but because his father objected, he delayed his baptism until his father died. Jesus suffered and died for us on the cross, but Jesus knew who he was and where he was going. Mr James Saw knew none of these things, only that he will be a Christian but not at the cost of upsetting his father. He resolved to do what no pastor will encourage you to do, and indeed, in the times that he lived in, many, many years ago, it is not uncommon to be threatened with eternal condemnation for various sins.

If I were to tell you that the Bible is man's work, not God's word. If I were to tell you that there is doubt that Jesus even existed. Or that if he did, he might have gotten married and had children. If I were to say that science disproves everything that is written in the Bible and that morality is simply an evolutionary trait for survival. And finally, if I were to then say that I firmly believe that God will save all who is good in his eyes and that you will get no special favours simply because you are a Christian. Will you still believe? And if so, what will you believe? And why?

Or will you simply call me a liar and believe anyway?

[Remember, Jesus surprised us all when he came. And he warned us many times to expect the unexpected.]

The fear of joy

Why are we afraid of joy? Life seems to be all about doing the right thing, working hard, making a living and so on. Is joy a luxury? Even when it comes to finding someone to love, it seems so hard. Half of every marriage in the Western world ends in divorce. In Singapore, it is one in four. In Singapore, we worry about grades - as a student, it is the grades of exams; as an adult, it is about making the grade (to get that promotion or even keeping the job we have). Joy seems a scarce commodity.

Beware the joy of the adrenalin rush. That is putting the cart before the horse. And what happens is that the horse cannot see where it is going. It is joy that should be giving us the rush, not the rush that gives us the adrenalin 'joy'. This kind of joy - the joy of the ferris wheel, the merry-go-round, or the rollercoaster (or whatever modern rush we invent) - is not good because it does not sustain you. And worse, it does not edify.

The right kind of joy are the joys you are born to seek: the joy of loving and the joy of learning. We love babies and babies are happiest when they get loving attention or when they are learning about their environment (which fortunately, they learn about through play). And this joy is wonderful because it makes life meaningful and worth living - it sustains and edifies you. Every one of us knows the power of love. Those of us lucky enough to receive it, from our parents, friends and lovers, know that it gives us strength to face the world and inspires us to make the most of our lives. Those of us who don't receive it are listless and careless and yearns for love, any kind of love. We may find ways around the lack of love in our lives but each adaptation makes us harder, more cynical and less generous. And if you will only acknowledge it, your life is centred around the seeking of this joy of love.

But there is also the joy of learning. Anything at all can be a learning opportunity, such is our capacity for this joy. For me, the greatest joy of learning is found in what is taught in school - in the arts and in science (which includes mathematics). It such a pity that the educational system is such an obstacle to this joy, so that only those with nothing to lose (especially those from places without formal education) can appreciate the joy of learning. Those of us, for whom education is a meal ticket, or a measure of our worth (see your sister, she has scored 9 A1's), we are frightened off learning. If only teachers in schools start their classes with this: "Listen to me, and I will tell you the secrets of the universe, how the stars came to be and of lands faraway. I will tell you of times of old, of kings and queens and the battles fought, of things you cannot see and of things that we cannot even imagine. I will tell you of futures to come, of impossible inventions and why we are the way we are today. I have so much to tell you that 1001 of us cannot finish telling you in 1001 years of 1001 nights."

Wouldn't you want to just sit down and listen? And learn? But this is what we are being taught - science and literature and history and geography and mathematics and more. And yet, where is the magic? Where is the learning? Why are the students not open mouthed and bright eyed?

This is my tribute (and hope) for a coffee shop, and here then are some gateways:

Breaching the physical

We have just been discussing the impact of email and handphones on our lives. What used to take days and were at the fringes of our normal lives - writing letters and using the telephone - are now accomplished in minutes, if not seconds. But the effect is that things that used to take up only a bit of your time now takes up much of your time even though they take less time to do.

All this has to do with the virtual world of the computer, of course. There was a time when we had this gloomy image of people in small dark rooms clicking away at their computer, sitting in a chair rigged with all kinds of sensory stimulants so that the computer experience is connected with all your senses. Well, Michael Crichton has just released his new book (coming out in November) about the future. . .wait for it, today:

"Could your loved one be missing some body parts? Are blondes becoming extinct? Is everyone at your dinner table of the same species? It's 2006: do you know who all your children are? Do you know humans and chimpanzees differ in only 400 genes? Do you want to design your own pet? Change the stripes on the fish in your aquarium? Or sell your eggs and sperm online for thousands of dollars? Did you know one fifth of all your genes are owned by someone else? Come to think of it, could you and your family be pursued cross country just because you happen to have certain genes in your body?

This is not just the world of the future-it's the world right now! Most of the events in this book have already happened. And the rest are just around the corner.

Get used to it. "

*gulp*

You know, we get so excited by the advances we make. We forget that the humble single living cell, which absorbs chemicals from its environment and grows and reproduces itself, and which then took billions of years to evolve into what we are today, is still beyond our technology. When nature rages, with tsunamis, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions (no, wait, even the humble forest fire), all we can do is to wait it out and run for shelter if we can.

The problem with the mind is that it can be so amazed by itself, it forgets the wonders of the physical world in which it resides. Permit me therefore to introduce to you ecological art:

Andy Goldsworthy

Joseph Beuys

Yutaka Kobayashi

Nohra Corredor

Grace and amazement

It would seem, going by the comments I have received, that there are two kinds of believers - those who believe because of proof, and those who believe because of faith. I don't know if I fall into either camp. I believe because it feels right. I believe because I am amazed by God's work.

Take for example the laws of science and chaos. By right, chaos should not exist. The basic laws of science can be counted on one hand (almost). The three laws of Newton are so simple they are almost ludicrous: things don't move unless you push them, when you push them they move faster the harder you push, and finally, they push back with an equal force. Most importantly, the laws of science are universal - there is no exception.

Arctic Lights (Aurora borealis)

Consider the weather. The snow in winter, rain in the tropics, typhoons and the arctic lights are all the result of 4 simple facts: the earth orbits around the sun, the earth rotates around its axis, the earth's rotation is tilted and the earth's surface has a land mass, a water mass and an atmosphere. Based simply on these facts and the various laws of physics, we get all the climates of the world. Not only this, the weather is so variable we cannot predict accurately when it might rain, or when typhoons might occur, or the amount of cloud cover for any particular day. This is because, despite the fact that nature follows the laws of science utterly, there is still chaos. Well, we now know that chaos is not chaos as we understand the concept but a higher form of order.

Fractals

I am simply amazed.

It seems to me that this is how God intends it. There exists several arguments that try to prove that God exists, of which perhaps the most famous and most frequently plagiarized and doctored is Thomas Aquinas' five proofs. None of these proofs are found in the Bible itself. In the Bible, God reveals himself and we (ok, not me or you, but the people in the Bible) are generally amazed. I found about 90 references to the word amaze or amazing or amazement in the NIV Bible at BibleGateway.com but I will suggest that if you simply open up the Bible on any page, you are likely to read about something in which God did something and the effect of that something is to amaze us. It is no accident that we talk about amazing grace and use the word so frequently in our worship.

Let me take this further. I think, in most of the important decisions in our lives, we decide emotionally. We select the career we most like, not the one we are most suited for. We marry the spouse we most love, not the one we are most compatible with. We eat the food we most enjoy, not the ones that are most good for us. We choose our friends because we like them not because we are most like them. Modern society will have us do this rationally - marry the one most compatible to you (there will be none), do the job you can do best (well, this is not always the one you like the most), and eat only the food that is good for you (and hate the very act to eating). I say not. We are meant to live our lives emotionally: to find happiness, to be touched by tragedy and sadness, to be angered by injustice, to be drawn to beauty and to be amazed by God.

Modern society separates logic from emotion and discards the latter as being unreliable. On the contrary, our emotions are our most important guide to what is right or wrong for us. We ignore them to our peril. Do not be misled by science - there is only so much we can figure out (and we still have not figured out the cure for the common cold). Treasure and listen to your emotions - they are your best guides to what is right or wrong. But listen carefully, don't do things impulsively. Use your head - God made you a logical and thinking being too. Life is a complete and unified thing - it is not either/or, it is both/and.

And yes, I believe because I am amazed.

God and the Big Bang

There are, in the Internet, several websites that debate the issue of creation according to the Bible versus the theory of evolution (which includes the Big Bang). I don't know, but it seems to me that if you look at how the Big Bang is supposed to work, it supports the notion that there is God.

The Big Bang Theory

Of course, when you come down to it, there is no absolute proof of God. Actually, there is no absolute proof of anything - for example, the existence of electrons cannot be proven, even though we can experience electric shocks and so on (electricity is the movement of electrons, remember?).

Consider the Big Bang, then. We do not know really what exists before the Big Bang. Was there something that can be banged, as it were? Or did the Big Bang create things (i.e. energy was converted into mass)? Or was it simply a pendulum thing - energy to mass and then mass to energy - from the Big Bang to the Big Black Hole and then back again. For the sake of argument then, let's ignore the question of what existed before the Big Bang and start just with the Big Bang. Just keep to what science is reasonably accepting as likely. The thing is, everything we have today, life on earth, the universe, all the laws of nature, etc. all unravelled from the Big Bang. God just made the Big Bang and that was it. The universe was created, the conditions evolved to create earth and then, over time, life and then you and I. God made the Big Bang and then sat back and everything else was made from that. You try it. Go bang something up and see if anything of any sense, value or even interest results.

What interests me is not that evolution disputes the theory of creationism but that the Bible had the sequence of events right - from nothing to day and night to the plants, then the fishes, then the birds, then animals and then man. In this, the Bible and the theory of evolution is in line. Note that not all theories of human evolution are in line with science - some said we were from a turtle, or some god/goddess vomitted us out, and what not. Only the Bible said that God made the earth and in this particular order.

Don't you think this is an incredible thing to do for a story that is over 5000 years old?

I look forward to the various discoveries of science that disprove (or prove) the Bible. It will help us know what to believe and what not to believe. It will also help us to understand how to read the Bible. Why are we afraid of the truth? If our God is the God of truth, then surely whatever truth we discover, we shall see the work of God in it. Let us be honest before God - that which we don't understand, let us confess our ignorance. It is far better than to attest to things we cannot possibly know.

The sound of magic

Most of us appreciate and marvel at the power of music - its ability to transcend words, culture and time. I too love music deeply. But what truly amazes me is sound itself.

I know I am speaking to science afficiondos here, so I will just touch on the main points. All sound, and I do want to emphasize ALL sound, can be reduced to simple sine waves. And, there are only about 20,000 of them that we can hear. The lowest frequency is about 20 Hz and the highest about 20 kHz - 20/20 just as in perfect eyesight (cool, huh?).

A Sine Wave

These 20 thousand sine waves combine in various ways to give us all, I repeat, ALL the sounds we hear. It doesn't matter what we use to make these sounds - as long as it can be made to vibrate the air accurately. One of the best materials for this is. . .paper! In fact, nearly all the loudspeakers in the world are made from this material.

A Complex Sound Wave

Just think, all the sounds, noise or music, that we love or hate, that irritate us or inspire us, that drive us to tears or to war, every tick, crick, crackle, whoosh and whisper are made from these 20 thousand sine waves. We can tell from the sound of it if the speaker is man or woman, angry or sad, young or old. We can differentiate between individuals, even when they speak together. We can tell the difference between several people saying the same thing and one person speaking loudly. Even with instruments, we can tell the difference between a group of violins and a single violin amplified. Some can tell the difference between a Steinway and a Yamaha grand piano (I can't). And yet, every Steinway, no, every piano sounds different.

The Sound Waves of Different Instruments

The quality of each sound depends on the material. For example, wood instruments sound different from the brasses because of the material from which they are made. The shape and size of the instrument also make a difference. No one instrument can faithfully reproduce the sound of another. Animals can't talk like us and yet we can tell if it's a cat or a bird, if it's angry or sad, and for some, what kind of cat or bird. And yet, as I said earlier, you can capture all these sounds and reproduce them with a piece of paper.

Now, how can you say there is no God?

Hearing the word of God...

The inspiration of God is a fearful thing. I have so many stories of people who followed what they think was the word of God and did what they thought was God's work which turned out differently from what you might expect.

This then is a guide for you who has heard His word:
1. God made the world and for the most part it is ordinary. We humans yearn for the extraordinary and often think that if it is extraordinary, it is God's work. In the ordinary, there is a wonderful simplicity and balance. Watch the imbalances, they may spin you away from God's path.
2. God is noted for taking his time. Throughout the Bible, from the time of Abraham to the Second Coming, God has been slower than we expected. Sometimes, his revelation is just part of our learning, not for our doing. I learnt this early in my Christian days. Readers will know of my conflicts and blasphemies. When I first realized these thoughts, I wanted to share them but it turned out that they are for my learning. Even now, I share these thoughts with caution - perhaps even now the time is not ripe (and we should not mislead others in our confusion.).
3. The first command is to love God and love one another - and that the two are the same. Too many times, those who have heard God's word throw caution to the winds and jump straight in, with dire consequences. To learn to depend on God does not mean that you stop taking care of yourself and all around you. Moses, and others, resisted God's calling. Still others, like Abraham, persuaded God from His 'intended' course. I think this too is part of His plan. God made us thinking creatures and I think he takes pleasure in our thoughts and our views. Relationship with God, in the Bible, is always a two-way thing. Jesus always asked us to ask from God and to plead with Him. Jesus himself tried to divert his own destiny. The church may teach obedience, but let that not be blind obedience.
4. There is a New Testament to the Old Testament. Jesus loved us in a way that best translates God's love. Be grounded in the love that Jesus taught rather than in the power and majesty of miracles. Worse still, miracles you may have imagined.
5. When Jesus came, he rebuked the most those who were teachers of the Law. In the hands (and minds) of man, the simplicity of God that frees us easily becomes the complication and ambitions that bind and blind us. The 10 commandments of Moses and the over 600 laws of deuteronomy were not only critiqued by Jesus but fulfilled by a single command. And that single command draws us back to what we already know. When God separated the sheep from the goats, the criteria was not the greatness of the deeds done but the dedication to the ordinary and everyday needs.

Matthew 11:28-30 "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

Walk with God but seek ye first His wisdom and His understanding. God seeks to bring rest to your souls, not to make you weary and burdened. Beware that which leads you from His rest.

The mountain and the city

We attended Chris Bowater's Worship Weekend yesterday. As usual, when there is singing, I had a good time. We ended with one of my favourite hymns:

O Lord my God, when I in awesome wonder,
Consider all the world Thy Hands hath made;
I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder,
Thy power throughout the universe displayed.
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, how great Thou art.
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, how great Thou art!

In his sermon, Chris talked about the event of the transfiguration of Jesus at the mountaintop. Moses and Elijah were there and the apostles who were there were so amazed, they fell on their faces. But then, Chris went on, they had to come back down. St Augustine talked about the City of God and the City of Man. If I may mix them up a bit, our lives have often been likened to a journey up a mountain. If so, then one of the fantastic views from the mountain is of the city from which we came. When we reach that mountain top, we (as Christians) will never climb back down again. Will we see the beauty of the city only from the mountaintop? If so, surely we will be remorseful and repent.

(PS: I think it is apt that the hymn above refers to the rolling thunder as one of the wonders of God. This rolling thunder often accompanies a natural force that wreaks havoc amongst us humans.)

The wonder of you

It occurs to me that there might be impressionable minds reading this, and I really ought not to be leading them astray. I don't mean to.

Life is so magical. Particularly in its ordinariness. God made the ordinary and I believe he is satisfied with it. We, on the other hand, seek the magical and the supernatural. And maybe we miss his magic, or worse are misled by conjury and illusion.

Sometimes, I say something out of wonderment, and often, there's so much more I couldn't say (and perhaps didn't see). And yet I share this incompleteness hoping that others may fill the gaps.

I hear you, and welcome your voice. Do not think your voice is lesser for any reason. For I believe in your power and your wisdom. Even if you don't.

i give you

I once loved a girl who loved another. I wrote this for her. This is dedicated to us who loved in vain:

i give you
the wrong kind of right love
repulsive intensity
nakedness frightening
cowering timidity
storms of moody passions
symptoms of a bleeding heart
i cannot love you
because i do

you give me
the right kind of wrong love
unflinching patience
concern enduringly
a sheltering calm
laughter to drive away my pain
balm from a receptive mind
you can love me
because you don't

Thank you to those who left their marks here...

In search of people, in praise of failure

Paul Twohill just got kicked off Singapore Idol. Xiaxue's entry on sex under 18 in stomp.com got kicked off too. I remember Maia from the last Idol, and to a lesser extent Olinda. They do not represent the average Singaporean but I think they personify what it means to be a Singaporean. More than the average Singaporean.

I don't know what it is I mean to say but I am reminded today how failure defines us more than our successes. It's as if we are not real or complete until we fail. Not that we should intentionally fail. Not at all. Quite the reverse, in fact. But. . .

I see failure in its positive and affirming light. I can't explain it but I celebrate and ache for those who fail. Isn't love the most sublime when you love me in my failure?

Know this ye who seek love...

There's this article in Today's paper on what teenagers should be allowed to do when it comes to sex. This Aussie (I think) expert recommended the middle path - don't disapprove completely but meet in the middle. I have this problem with sex education today - in Singapore or elsewhere: it only talks about sex.

Actually, I don't think knowledge about sex is the problem. It's the lack of understanding about love. So, here, people, is what you need to know but have never been told.

There are 4 stages to love:
1. attraction - like it or not, love begins with superficial attraction: looks, money, intelligence, empathy, etc. Whatever turns you on, it's not the whole person but something you notice and like. Many people think this is love. It is, but there's more.
2. discovery - that's when you get to know one another better. Some call this going steady. The problem is that for some, this is already commitment while to the partner, it may just be testing the water.
3. commitment - people, there's no commitment until he/she says so. Don't fall into the mistake of thinking there is just because everything is hunky dory. To some, commitment is going steady, to others it's engagement, to yet others it's marriage. There're different depths of commitment, so don't assume.
4. relationship - the kind of love that you see in old couples, holding hands and caring for one another after several decades comes from developing the relationship. It takes work and sacrifice.

The problem with teenage love is not that it is not true love but that it can be [true love]. Romeo and Juliet are teenagers. Mary was only 13 when she gave birth to Jesus. The problem with teenage love is that you are ready for love but your partner is unlikely to be. And, society would rather you wait - no, it is not just your parents but the whole of society. In teenage love, you are fighting the tide. Worse, you may actually be in agreement with the tide, deep inside.

But, you are lonely and you yearn for someone to love or who loves you. What can you do? For some, knowing your problem is enough. For the rest, I was post more later.

confessions of a conflicted christian #1

Blasphemy: That God loves Christians and non-Christians alike.
It is commonly held that the Jews were the chosen people of God in the Old Testament while Christians are chosen today by Christ to enter heaven. Most people find such a view offensive. I do too. Surely, if God is as righteous as he is claimed to be then he will reward all righteous people whether or not they are Christians/Jews. By the same token, if God is loving, surely he is not persuaded simply by those who are Christian but who show no such love for their fellowmen. At the same time, surely He is touched by those who are not Christians who have such love for their fellowmen.

I agree. As a matter of fact, I find several passages in the Bible that contradicts this doctrine that Jews are the chosen people of God and that Christians and only Christians have a place in heaven. For example, God so loved Nebuchadnezzar He not only gave over Judah to Babylon but also drove the king mad until he acknowledged God. In other words, God Himself converted Nebuchadnezzar the Babylonian king. Jonah, as another example, was sent to save Nineveh, which is Assyrian not Jewish (and indeed great enemies of the Jews). Elsewhere too in the Old Testament God showed concern and favour to those who are not Jews and did not bestow special treatment to the Jews as far as I can see.

The Jews are chosen simply to keep God's law - the Torah - nothing more, nothing less. There was a reward and a covenant that goes with that, but nothing about a special place for Jews and not for others. Christians are chosen, if indeed we are chosen, to spread the good news that Jesus brought. Jesus may have prepared a place for us, but our right of entry remains in question (at least to me). If all that is needed is to believe in Jesus, then there will have been no need for Revelations, in which nearly all mentioned churches were rebuked and found wanting.

I think God loves us all - Christians and non-Christians alike. We have no more claim to God than any of his other creatures. And heaven is available to all, Christians and non-Christians alike.

Apologia:
So why am I a Christian? Because I believe that Jesus taught the truth - that there is God, and that we ought to love one another. I find this truth so evident that it is a wonder we don't know it. It is as if Jesus knew the plan and came to remind us what we already know. I am a Christian because I believe Jesus, not because I think by believing Jesus I will go to heaven.

confessions of a conflicted christian

I wasn't a Christian for the longest time. As such, I share the bewilderment of non-Christians about the claims that Christians often make. It is not difficult to accept that there is a God and that good people go to heaven. Most people, of whatever religion, have a similar concept to this. But the idea, for example, that all you have to do is to claim Jesus as your saviour and you will have a place in heaven, or that only those who believe in Jesus have a claim to heaven, is simply too wild to accept. Here, therefore, I will reveal those doubts as I have them and discuss them as I see them. There are two parts to every entry: blasphemy and apologia.

The blasphemy deals with an idea that I think contradicts what we think Christians believe. Perhaps it contradicts Christian doctrine, but I hesitate to claim this. It certainly contradicts some commonly held beliefs about Christianity.

The apologia explains why I am still a Christian.

This thread then may be viewed as an ABC of Christianity - a confession, a blasphemy and an apology.

Knowing and doing...

I am reminded again of the ease of saying and the difficulty of doing. The difficulty lies in myself. Even though it is other people who stirs up the negativity in me. Is it just that I am growing old, as in over 50 and counting, or have I always been this way? I forget.

Xin wants to write books, and I remember Pessoa and my unfinished journal - the art of growing old.

It's nice how unconnected thoughts open new windows.

Three most important things in your life

Xin said yesterday that she expresses herself best through dance, and asked me if architecture is the same for me. I said no, architecture is to me realisation. To me, architecture helps me to realise what our world ought to be. It doesn't say very much about how I feel. So, to me:

My most important way of expressing myself is through love.
My most important way of realising myself is through architecture.
And my most important way of fulfilling myself is through singing.

This got us asking the family what their important things are. For Feeyoon, it's family, health and blessing. For Xin, it's love and balance. There's no third thing - this would break the balance. Cool, I thought. What are yours?