What it is made up of.

Hey Caleb, you really will make a great pastor! You can deliver such great speeches!


You really should become an inspirational speaker like Nick Vujicic or Dave Pelzer! Many many many people will get moved by your speeches and skill. 


What skill?

People close to me say I'm generally a very good speaker. But am I? Answer to self: No. I am not a good speaker. One of the probable reasons is because of the 'speech' that I gave to my class a few weeks ago and a bit of the ability to share sermons with friends in my own words. But even though I am that good, it's just not me.  People say I make a good pastor, it's just not me; people say I make a good inspirational speaker, it's just not me. Really. It's not.

But how come you can deliver such great speeches that can earn great respect? If it's not you, then who is it? It cant possibly be anyone else right?


What my 'speeches' are made up of are not just my knowledge or wisdom or anything. It's not. It's made up of the Holy Spirit speaking through me to the audience. You see, during camp last year I received a 'mission' from God: Rise up and become a leader. Having this post as a monitor now I feel that God is trying to tell me to spread His love around to those people that need it. I feel that influencing other people around me and spreading God's love like a contagious disease is the basic things that I need to do as a monitor or even as a normal student as well. The challenge will come when the class cell that we have been praying quite a bit about starts.

That, is what it is made up of. It's not a confession though, it's glorifying God.

What should I do?

Note that I am not talking about a specific group of people, but rather all audiences.

At the top, there's only one way to go -- down.

Many times I think to myself: It's only a piece of cake to reach out to other people, and although the feeling of getting outcasted because of that is bad, but it's not that bad.

This is a totally different story altogether. Please note that I have intentionally censored the names of everyone involved in this incident.

Now there's this person in my class that I've brought to church a few months back, let's call him A. But after coming to church I feel that his personality was going down the drain. Never mind about that, because now he is turning into a better person. Again it is not always that yi fan feng shun, as I think there is now an outcasting atmosphere around, and someone also said, "It's because to him, you're the only guy that actually still cares about him."

It's because to him, you're the only guy that actually still cares.


How devestating that is! I'm not dealing with a friend only, I'm dealing with an outcast. There also are some people that I feel want me to give up on A and outcast him too, let's just call them the rest of the alphabet (B to Z, although there arent that many people but i dont want to give the number of people). Somehow I find that I resemble Jake, I'm trying to help outcasts but in the end I'm going to get outcasted myself too. People say that I'm too soft hearted, saying that I give too much grace and letting this become very vulnerable to getting taken advantage of. Based on this I think somehow or another getting outcasted is now inevitable. I know, I have been chosen first for some project grouping, and I have moved to A's group and therefore becoming a 'traitor'. That is my fault. But think about it, if someone can say "It's because to him, you're the only guy that still cares", and if i don't care about him, no one else ever will.

"Whatever he is now, he deserves it. We have given him enough grace. You need to teach him a lesson and not give in to his stupid demands."


Grace - that's giving to someone who doesnt deserve it. We all deserve to die in hell even for the slightest wrong we do, like telling very little white lie. You, me, everyone. No one is perfect. But it is by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, we have been saved, through faith. In other words there's never enough grace given or to be given. Imagine there's this man that owes his boss millions of dollars, and he begged his boss to give him some time to repay the debt, and the boss, taking pity on the man, cancelled the debt. Now this man was also the boss of another guy who owed him only ten dollars, and that guy also begged him to give him some time and he will be able to repay the debt. But the man took him to court and sued him and ordered everything of his to be sold because he could not repay the debt at that time. News spread to the boss, and the boss called the man up to his office and said "I cancelled your debt because you begged me to, shouldnt you give grace to your employee just as I had given to you?" In his anger the boss ordered everything the man had to be sold until he could be able to repay the debt. Think about it. Shouldn't we give grace beyond all boundaries because Jesus has done that for us too?

That, is just from my point of view. It just doesn't have to be like this over some small matter.

What do I do, where do I go from here?

My week

This week has passed by unreasonably fast. It just feels like a second since it's Monday and now's Friday night. On Tuesday was the Sec 1 RSP orientation, and frankly speaking I think my group was the most unprepared for the music presentation. Besides that I found out that my classroom key and my class pass had mysteriously disappeared into thin air. At home I was panicking to find the items and at that time I just felt that my whole life had collapsed on top of me. Just like that, when I was starting to feel that I was beginning to do a good job being the class monitor. The two most important class documents went missing, all in one day, literally.

Then it hit me.

Ask and it will be given to you; Seek and you will find; Knock on the door and it will be opened to you. 

I have actually forgotten about this Bible verse for a really long time, and I was starting to take my problems into my own hands. This week I felt spiritually dry, as I didn't really get a lot of chances to do QT in school just before morning assembly. I started to pray. And pray. And pray. And pray. And pray. The words just seemed to float in my mind: God, please help me find my class key and pass. The words never stopped playing in my head, for the whole time, until I went to sleep.

Faith, that was all I needed.

The next day upon reaching school I knew I would get scolded by Mr Li and probably other teachers as well. I actually thought I was going to get into trouble. Big trouble. However it seemed that God answered my prayers in this very morning. It turned out that I had forgotten that I lent the key to Hudson for the Secondary 1 RSP orientation 'treasure hunt'. The pass appeared in the sense that Marcus revealed to me that he had put it into Wayne's pencil case just the day before after using it. Through this I really grew stronger in my faith.

Yesterday's homework was comparable to Mount Everest. Math, Chinese, Home Economics and the printed version of the assignment blog post all by the next day. I slept at 1am. :(

Today VS played a friendly tennis match against TKGS , to be specific it was the VS U-14 against TKGS U-16, meaning that VS's junior division playing against TKGS senior division. And we won! Actually i couldnt believe that i was selected to play, and I won my doubles match with Ejaz (sp). A few other VS people also won their matches too.

Time to go and do my opw stuff...
caleby

Are you prepared?

Hello. Since i'm on this page now might as well share some stuff. It's really been a very discouraging/disappointing week due to some personal reasons.

About 15 mins ago I was scrolling through facebook and came across this new movie called To save a life. I find it a really meaningful message from the creators of "Facing the Giants" and "Fireproof". It's a really inspirational message about how we spread God's love to the people around, especially the "lower caste" in our school community. Here's a little on the plot summary.

Jake has everything in high school. Friends, fame, basketball, and even the girl of his dreams. His friend, Roger has nothing. They used to be best friends but the social circle of high school separated both of them. One day Roger kills himself, and Jake regrets because of his death. He makes the decision to reach out to other outcasts in school to make up for what he did not do. However he has to choose between two parties, his friends, or the people he wants to reach out to.

"At some point, you've got to ask yourself, what you want your life to be about."

Surely the time will come when you have to ask yourself, "What do I want my life to be about?" I've asked myself this question many times, and many times I come up with many different answers. Now asking myself this question again I know what I want my life to be about. It's about our reflection of God's image and His love. If we do not spread God's love and reach out to those that really need it, no one will.

How far would you go, how much would you risk, how hard would you fight, to save a life?


Guys, let's think about it for a sec. It's a really tough business reaching out to the outcasts. Most of the time we have to choose between two parties, friends, or people who need God's love desperately. I'm ready to make that sacrifice to spread God's love to other people, no matter what the world thinks of me. I am prepared.

Are you?

A Point.

"What's the point of having a leader when no one submits to authority?"


It's really a great discouragement. A very big one indeed. I don't have a lot of time to write this so this post will be significantly shorter than usual.

It's like God wants me to be a leader but this kind of things happen. No one submits to authority. Here's an extract of what happened today in class, copied over from my assignment blog (which takes up 50% of English CA1 marks)

It was just a normal Monday, with Character Education lessons primarily. Now this Character Education lessons played a very very huge role in what happened today. Before the lessons the CMC (Class Management Commitee) wanted to address the class about admin matters. Being the monitor I was made the first line of outgoing communication. However almost no one wanted to pay attention and were doing their own things, with only about 3 people responding. It's really discouraging. I asked myself this question: What's the entire point of having a leader when no one submits to authority? My answer is that there is no point. Might as well give up my position to someone that can probably do my job better than me and also get the class to submit to. I was alone then, reflecting on what I had been doing for the past 2 weeks as a monitor. Reflection. It's something that I like doing, knowing how I can improve myself through past mistakes. But that's besides the point. Soon after the teachers screened a video of Nick Vujicic. Nick Vujicic. I remember the time he came to my church a few years ago. He's a really great speaker. I haven't really heard of him much till today. God really spoke to me through that video of his. When they screened the video (I don't know if you've felt it) I felt the presence of God fill this room, and if you were observing me well you might have seen that I started to tear up. Yes, you're right. I'm not ashamed to say this. I nearly cried. I was just at about breaking point. I really got touched by God and I dare say that this is my second divine encounter with Him (For my first you can always go to my other blog, calebyds.blogspot.com to find out more.). It's just like God is telling me, "Nick has no arms nor legs, just a 'chicken wing', and I have helped him overcome this huge barrier of living a normal person's life. What great things I can do with you to help you overcome this very minute barrier!" 



Jesus, take my life, use me for the expansion of your Kingdom. Use me to be living testimony unto the World today. Lord, I surrender everything I am to You. Take my life. It's all for You.

Something special

2nd post of 2010 :) it's really a stressful year alr. On saturday i shared my testimony about camp during service. Now i have random church people coming up to me saying "hi, nice testimony :)" but that's besides the point anyway... TOday got detention by chinese teacher over something really really amusing and stupid -.-

A thing that i've learnt during this 1st 2 weeks of the year is something really significant, learning more about how God works in people's lives. Here's a little example, cos i cant really say it out without having no chance of miscommunication.



In December was the ELEVATE camp, which i apparently forgot to write my reflections on :S. From then onwards i had that desire to reach out to the pre-believers around me, cos as i have said many times, they need us more than we need them. At around the same period of time, Matthias was also spoken to by God during an evangelistical course. He asked God, " God, if this is your will, give me a sign to say that yes, it is your will" That sign referred to someone asking him if he wants to start evangelism (i assume that person does not refer to anyone from the same course). When i reached home from camp i wanted to ask around who would be willing to evangelise with me, and God told me Matthias. It's a really amazing way how we have come this close since this year only, and how God played that really vital role to bring us together, both by having someone to work with for me and confirming Matthias's calling.

Now we are trying to work out a class cell and the admin of it, hoping that many prebelievers will receive salvation and also that cell members can have a good relationship with God, and have a genuine encounter with Him.

Caleby

Reflect 2009

Hi. It's been a pretty long time i havent posted. new year's here and it's back to January again. It's about time for some reflections on how 2009 has been for me.

First off, i would like to say that like many other years, I've done things i dont regret, and also things that i will. My first resolution this year is not to get angry or concerned over small issues. In the past year by doing so i have inevitably endangered many of my friendships. that's something that i really regret doing.

Also the year 2009 has been a year of change, where i went to sec 1, got into the awesome MEGALIFE service and joined the music ministry. It's also the first time i stepped foot in a school (vs) that doesnt allow handphones to be (even) on during sch hrs. it's really been a really really great year growing both spiritually mentally and also psychologically. This year is the year that i started quality QT. By doing so i can hear God trying to speak to me more and also how he does it. Personally for me God speaks to me in a unique way. When He wants me to do a certain something (like for example stepping out of my comfort zone and reaching out to others), He gets things to happen (like being close to a person in need of friends and moral support) and prompts me to do it, usually standing up against the oppposition to do so.

Looking back at the previous posts on the Superlife Ministry blog, i cam across this post that reall spoke to me how important it is to come to church for the right reason and the right mindset. Check it out:



From Cornerstone Chuch; From the Pastor's Heart

David Ryser shared an amazing testimony which i'd like to reproduce for you. it's really something for us to ponder over. this is his story:

"A number of years ago, i had the privilege of teaching at a School of Ministry. my students were hungry for God, and i was constantly searching for ways to challenge them to fall more in love with Jesus and to become voices for revival in the Church. i came across a quote attributed most often to Rev Sam Pascoe. Its a short version of the history of Christianity, and it goes like this:

Christianity started in Palestine as a fellowship; it moved to Greece and became a philosophy; it moved to Italy and became an instituion; it moved to Europe and became a culture; it came to America and became an enterprise. 

some of the students were only 18 or 19 years old and i wanted them to understand and appreciate the import of the last line, so i clarified it by adding: An enterprise. that's a business.

after a few moments, Martha, the youngest student in the class, raised her hand. i could not imagine what her question might be i thought the little explanation was self-explanatory. Martha asked a simple question, "A business? but isn't the church supposed to be a Body?"

i could not envision where this line of questioning was going, and the only response i could think of was, "Yes."

she continued, "But when a body becames a business, isn't that a prostitute?" 

the room went dead silent. for several seconds no one moved or spoke. we were stunned, afraid to make a sound because the presence of God had flooded into the room, and we knew we were on holy ground. all i could think in those sacred moments was, "wow, i wish i'd thought of that." i didn't dare express that thought aloud. God had taken over the class. Martha's question changed my life.

for six months, i thought about her question at least once every day. 'when a body becomes a business, isn't that a prostitute?' there's only one answer to her question. the answer is "yes". the Church, tragically, is full of people who do not love God. how can we love Him when we dont even know Him? and i mean really know Him. the root of this condition originates in how most of us came to God. most of us came to Him because of what we were told He would do for us. we were promised that He would bless us in life and take us to heaven after death. we married Him for His money, and we dont care if He lives or dies as long as we can get His stuff. we have made the Kingdom of God into a business, merchandising His anointing. this should not be. we're commanded to love God, and we are called to be the Bride of Christ - that's pretty intimate stuff. we're supposed to be His lovers. How can we love someone we dont even know? and even if we do know someone, is that a guarantee that we truly love them? are we lovers or prostitutes? think about this." 


This post really spoke to me as to the importance of having the right mindset and attitude to coming to church. But why do we come to church? Friends? Fun? Kill time? The right attitude is to come to church to encounter God and have a deeper relationship with Him. Also remember my friends, Christianity isnt a religion, it's a relationship. Just like our dads, for example. There's a close relationship point there. It's almost impossible to walk into a room and not acknowledging your dad who's inside it. Similarly it's the same with God. We have a relationship with Him, either we grow closer, or we backslide. There's no status quo, it's either up or down. We dont come to church because we like it, not for enlightenment, not for pure head knowledge. Those are all wrong mindsets and attitudes. We come to church to experience God and hear His Word, and also to have a divine encounter with Him, thus making our relationship closer. That's what it's all about. There are many Christians around who go to church for the wrong reasons, that is enterprise thus making the Church a prostitute, not a Body. Think about it. Do you go to church for the right reasons?
caleby