made.good.again

I’ll be a 10-year-old Christian come 25th Nov 2005!

Am eternally grateful for "Ade-plus-line" who was patient enough to put up with a pesky / ‘membabi’ little 14-year-old girl then, telling me stories like David and Goliath (and even acting it out), lending me ChickTracts, buying me my first Bible with "dirty Bible clean Christian, clean Bible dirty Christian" handwritten behind the cover. Am sure she also prayed really hard for me (with the hope that I’d stop being so irritating when I become a Christian haha)… iloveyouade!

*****

Looking back over the past almost-ten-years, across the ups and downs of life, the growing up, the joys, the hurts…

A powerful realization struck.

I HAVE NEVER BEEN WITHOUT HOPE.

Sure, there have been times of wondering about the how’s and why’s and WHEN’s (esp)… but circumstances have never been hopeless. In fact I can always look forward to better days, just in His definitions of what better days mean.

Jeremiah 29:11 - "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

Having interviewed over a hundred end-stage-cancer patients for my medical research thesis on the topic of HOPE, the verdict is that hopelessness is the best predictor of depression, suicide, and a preference for hastened death.

Probing a little deeper into the suicidal mind…

It is not that they like the idea of dying. They just see no other way of escaping hopelessness.

*****

The idea of "a hope that is certain" sounds like an oxymoron to most people, that hope is no longer hope if there is a certainty about it.

But for us who trust in Him, we do not hope ON, but hope IN.

We do not hope ON circumstances and outcomes. We hope IN a Person who has unchangingly unwaveringly planned our future and is so in control of it.

Now if only we’d allow Him to be in control of us and the choices we make…

Nothing is more practical than finding GOD, that is, than

FALLING IN LOVE

in a quite absolute, final way.

What you are in love with,

What seizes your imagination,

will affect everything…

It will decide

What will get you out of bed in the morning,

What you do with your evenings,

How you spend your weekends,

What you read, who you know,

What breaks your heart,

And what amazes you with joy and gratitude.

Fall in love,
Stay in love,
And it will decide everything.

                                              ~ San Pedro de Agrippe ~

******

Mary or Martha?

Teach me to sit at your feet, adoring, loving You, as Mary did. For I know a lover will outdo a servant anytime…

Yay, no classes tomorrow. Am so happy to get a long day of uninterrupted time spent with Nicholas. He’s so knowledgeable, even the seniors in med school and doctors think highly of him. Actually I wouldn’t have met him if not for their recommendation.

Feel a bit guilty that I haven’t spent much time with him over the past few weeks because I’d been out and about with friends and just been kept busy with other things. Afterall he’s been so faithful, always helping me especially in preparing for exams, since my 4th year in med school. It’s a good thing he doesn’t complain, but I guess it’s alright because he’s got Simon to keep him company too.

But maybe we’ve been apart for too long. I feel a deep sense of responsibility to look him up again. It’s definitely not just a short-term thing. It is about sowing into my future. I guess I see him very much involved in my life still, even in the next 5 years to come.

Textbook of Clinical Examination by Nicholas Talley and Simon O’Connor. I really need to study for my finals.

Braised, falling-off-the-bones veal osso bucco in rich roasted garlic and onion Napolitan sauce, on spagghetini number 3, sprinkled with rosemary and oregano. Lightly boiled and salted juicy broccolis by the side.

Ahh.. I’m such a good cook.

No red wine. I had water (also known as skyjuice in M’sia - highclassname).

Ambience? A studious one - half-eating, half-reading an article.

TimTams for dessert. Yay!

For reservations, call: 1800-PENNY-IS-SUCH-A-GOOD-COOK

I can’t believe I’ve contracted the viral illness - acute coryza. For the past few days I had pyrexia and chills, rhinorrhoea, injected pharynx, cough and expectoration of sputum, accompanied by lethargy, malaise, myalgia and even some arthralgia. It has really disrupted my functional capacity, and there is no medication that can cure it, only symptom relief.

In other words, I’ve got the common cold.

*****

Doesn’t the unknown scare us sometimes. The unfamiliar is always disproportionately magnified, because we feel insecure when we don’t know. Ignorance is bliss except when it’s not.

When catastrophe strikes, and the future feels like a string of incomprehensible medical lingo… God knows exactly what it is. So trust Him. Put your life in His hands.

"For His ways are higher than our ways, and His thoughts than our thoughts." Isaiah 55:8-9

And He knows the solution: rest, and drink more fluids.

Isn’t it amazingly paradoxical how REST can be the most powerful position and posture sometimes, and yet we always think of what we should DO.

Isaiah 30:15 - "in repentance and rest is our salvation, in quietness and trust is our strength."

Be still, and know that He is God (Ps 46:10)

And let us drink deep from Him, and we will be like trees planted by streams of living water, bearing fruit in due season, and our leaves never withering. (Psalm 1)

REST AND DRINK LOTSA FLUIDS…

it was a God-designed weekend, it was perfect. i feel safe. tucked, secure in the eye of the storm.

You have turned my mourning into dancing, You have turned my sorrow into joy.
It is true that He is mindful of me, I am in His thoughts, always. He hears me through the peals of thunder and rush of the storm, because He inclines His ears to me.

Servanthood.

He is teaching me. There is a greater purpose beyond. If we don’t leave the past behind, we will not fully live in the present and greater future that He has in store for us.

Be still, and know that He is God. Behold His magnificent glory.

I hear Him.

I am understanding more and more why I’d go to ocf every Friday, six years altogether now. Sometimes I think it’s for the simple reason that for the few hours on the Friday night, people make time and take time off the mid-semester-busy-schedule to come together to enjoy one another, be it in a word of encouragement or a concerned ‘how-was-your-week, or a let-me-say-a-prayer-for-you… my favourite is the run-from-afar-hug that says it all. I think all these years, the love and attention that’ve been showered upon me have helped curb the low-self-esteem and insecurity and attention-seeking-behaviours… Hehe… (plus where else do you find such gracious people who laugh at the lamest of jokes)…

And although everyone is a Work-In-Progress and might offend/hurt at times, I think that’s precisely the beauty of it. Afterall Jesus came for the sick and needy (quoting YinHun from last night). I suppose people want to see the evidence for most things nowadays. For me I know that God is near each time I experience the love and care displayed through the OCFers, each time I see the faith expressed, and the perseverance because of the hope that they hold in their hearts.

I love how OCF leaders Love Until Christ Is Evidently Near, that it’s not all talk but lotsa actions as well as they serve us.

*****
John 13:34-35:

³⁴"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. ³⁵By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."

Once upon a time there was a village boy, Chris, who lived with his mother. They lived happily ever after.

Har har no wonder I’m a science student. Will surely not get past 1st year in creative writing. Okay will try again… a creative-writing-piece-by-a-science-student:

Once upon a time there was a village boy named Chris who lived with his mother. He loves his mother very much because she loves him very much. Chris loves the stories that his mother would read to him and his mother likes to read him stories. Chris is also very obedient because his mother likes obedient children. Chris is a good student in class too and makes his mother proud. Every evening he will sit with his mother at the fireplace sipping away at the tea that his mother would specially make (because his mother likes to make the special tea).

Soon, Chris grew up and moved to the city to work. But every weekend he will visit his mother (because his mother loves to be visited). And his mother would make the special tea that they share together, and they would chat about life and just laugh and talk together.

Chris was very sad as his mother aged and soon passed on. He missed his mother, and would make the special tea that his mother taught him each time he thought about her.

The tea turned out to be very special indeed, and was passed on for many years till now…

He called it Chris-and-the-mum tea… (in Malaysia they changed it to teh kekwa and has lost its original meaning)…

*****

Love is about wanting to do the exact thing that pleases the other

It’s been a record-breaking day…

After having ‘perfected’ my scrubbing / sterile techniques (ie wash hands, dry with sterile towel, putting on green gowns) on Monday, I was in the operating theatre again today, which means I had to go through the rituals again. It was perfect, did it without a glitch. A smile of satisfaction spread across my face. Ahhh I’m good!

It was an operation for carpal tunnel syndrome so had to sit down for the operation. Someone wheeled the stool towards me so I could sit and the next thing I knew my sterile gloved hands were on the seat, holding on to it as I sat down (it’s such a natural thing to do!). Oooooooooooohhhhhhhh NOoooooooooooo the medical student touched the unsterile stool with the sterile gloves! Of course everyone looked at me as I sheepishly had someone help me re-glove again.

So near yet so far… Urggh…

It probably sounds as though my current life revolves around putting on surgical gowns with the perfect technique these few days. I can’t believe it’s so hard! I don’t usually feel stupid easily (it’s a healthy sense of self esteem)… but this thing is making me feel a bit like that!

As if to help confirm that, was putting in drips in the afternoon and I missed two out of two!

Reflected over what’s happened, and it really comes down to practicing, just like most things in live. Much of my character and heart are still being moulded to be more like Him and it’s an everyday practice to practise.

I refuse to let the everyday circumstances tell me who/what I am, but rather I look at Christ and find myself again. I know the direction I’m headed - I’m headed for success =)

*****

Newsflash on the Currant Affairs: hundreds of oats in the muesli drowned after being dragged down by a very strong Currant…

profound statement of the day: jokes are the only things that seem to get lamer with practice…(esp mine)…

Three days in a row of having a lack of sleep is having an effect on me, started out with i’m-patient and now impatient.

Spoke to one of the SurgicalPatients (SP) on the wards this morning:
Me: (chirpy voice) Good morning, Mr SP! My name’s Penny, I’m a medical student on the ward. Can I have a chat with you about why you’re in hospital…etc..
SP: Yeahh.. yeahh.. sure…
Me: (arranges chair next to his bed, takes out notepad…) So… can you tell me why you’re in hospital…
SP: I don’t know.
Me: Did you have pain? problems with your bowel?
SP: I don’t know. Can’t remember.
Me: Did you remember that you had an operation?
SP: I don’t know.
Me: (giving up)… Are you feeling ok this morning?
SP: I don’t know.. I guess…
Me: (says in nice tone) Alright, thanks then Mr SP. Thanks for your help (white lie).

Differential Diagnoses:
1. Delirious patient
2. Reluctant patient
3. ILTPMS syndrome (I-Like-To-Provoke-Medical-Students Syndrome)

Keywords for the week: Grace and Patience (conclusion by antiricegirl). Lots and lots of them. At least God has been gracious and patient with me too!!