Saturday, January 6, 2007: lessons.
its been a long and tiring day today. but i dare say it was a pretty reflective one!
went cycling with glenna and jeannie in the morning at PASIR RIS PARK, 10 am. so yes, lazy me had to get up at 8 am to be on time. and already lacking sleep, i made my way down to pasir ris blurry-ly, looking for the two friends, who live like, at the most 20 mins away by public transport from the interchange. ): it took me a whole 1 hr and 20 mins. hais. public transport these days - time consuming + expensive. what to do! made our way down to PRP, and rented bikes. the uncle kindly gave us an hour free, "rent for 1 hour, give you another hour free!" but i suspect he forsaw that we could not last past an hour in the first place so he said he'd give us an hour free just to spite us. sigh. we really didnt last past an hour. i lasted 15-20 mins before i started complaining. it was quite bad! the seat was quite hard, so naturally, my butt started to ache. and i dont know how come the gears couldnt change; partially i didnt realise the gears were at the hardest level until really late after, so i pedalled most of the way with the heavy bike, and my legs were so sore that when i got off the bike 20 mins later my legs were wobbly. and i swear, my hands couldnt clench! i was THAT tired. oh well, i supposed that either means that:
1, i'm really unfit, OR
2, i did really hardcore exercise today!
and i do choose to believe in the latter. so anyways, after deciding that we should stop cycling, we returned the bike 1 hour after we rented it, just so we could make our $5 worth, and we went back to the comfort of our aircon at white sands. i guess we all couldnt stand the heat! i sure miss the weather back in perth! (: never rains, never too hot (except when it goes past 40), windy, just right. (:
we did the final part of discipleship after a good lunch, after we all regained our energy. we reflected on the past year, and i'm glad to say both jeannie and i learnt a whole lot from just being in perth for a year! and i'm pretty glad for the both of us that we have each other as support, that we have each other to guide each other in school, in the BH, over the weekends! (: she's really such a good accountability partner that i have! and i thank God for blessing me with her, so we can share our walks with each other! not to mention glenna, who's always been there to mentor the both of us, she's really been such a great help! arranging discipleship classes, providing us with transport (thats why she's our chauffeur!), being our accountability partner, being our friend, showing us ard, its been really great!
it just shows how much God has really provided and surrounded me with the right people and i'm glad that he has given me so much! (: now i hope i can do the same for the newcomers to perth, to share my story with them, so i can testify to His goodness and grace to them. i pray that these newcomers will have an awesome time in perth, learning about God's providence (:
cell tonight was quite deep, in a sense that what justin shared with us today was jam-packed with information. i have to admit, after such a gruelling and long day i was pretty tired and i was definitely zoning in and out of the whole of cell that i only caught bits and pieces! no excuses though, i should have paid more attention. but i guess partially cos we went through some of it the previous friday so i thought it wasnt really worth listening too, though now looking back i dont feel extremely proud of my decision, but i guess since its now in the past what to do, i guess i can learn from it!
closing prayer was open, and after maurice prayed i sensed that i should pray, and things were popping up in my brain, like what to pray for and stuff, but then i rejected those thoughts, thinking, what happens after i say those few points? the awkward pause with nothing to say; so i just prayed for it quietly. and then charlotte prayed, and she did touch those points that i thought of. and then after charlotte, again i felt the motioning to pray. but again i refused to and i just prayed inwardly. and then ian closed.
one thought just came to me then, about how much i talk about needing to be more obedient and listening out for God's voice and yet, do i actually do what He has revealed to me? i couldnt even do such a simple thing like pray boldly in front of my cell group. i felt really bad after, like why couldnt i pray? why didnt i pray? why do i always back out from God's instructions and hiding in my own comfort zone? why didnt i say something which God so obviously asked me to say, why couldnt i say it?
glenna reflected today that one thing she learnt in 2006 was to continually be willing to step out of her comfort zone so that we can do God's work. now thinking about it, i think i need to be able to step out of my comfort zone. perhaps i dont trust God enough, trust that His Holy Spirit will be able to interceed for me, when i dont have the words to continue to pray. i dont recognise enough that God is the one Almighty Lord, that only He has perfect timing, and He needs to use me (or rather, anyone) to speak of His goodness.
i think one more thing i need to learn is to trust God enough to lead me places, so that i dont have to be afraid to step out of my comfort zone. jeannie said something rather important today: she learnt this year that if God brought her to it, He will bring her through it. i guess that's what i need to learn to trust God for! that if God led me, i dont think there would be anything to difficult for me to overcome with His power!
so yes, i think today was a really big day of learning for me. of recognising what God has done for me in the past year, and of believing now, what God can do for me in this new year. so (: i need to learn to surrender to God's purpose. like i said, i thank God that He never fails, even when i do! and He always calls me back, so yeah, thank You so much my dear God! (: praise You!
a shout of praise.
12:59 AM
