How

Mary said to the angel, "How can this be, since i am a virgin?"
(Luke 1:34)
remember the angel's answer? "Nothing will be impossible with God" (v.37)
How is never a problem with God. when he puts something in your heart to do, he goes to work behind the scenes to ensure that it happens. in the meantime, we are to remain faithful to him and focused on the vision.

If you dare to dream, God dare to give.

Freedom!

last weekend marked another breakthrough in the youth service programming team. i am so proud of my team who worked super hard in the weeks of preparations.
it started with Stomp- "examination in progress, silence please". clangs and bangs from peter, ruiz, yihui, yushan and jeremy. it was really entertaining and fun to watch yushan hit the metal bin. aloy, huiy and their mm team did a super nice ipod clip playing the different songs from various radio stations. most would still remember the classical piece done by yaoguo, so soothing. daixuan and qianjin sang their hearts out to the tunes of fly me to the moon and huang jin jia. qianjin really memorize the chinese lyrics like mad man! *claps claps* few would have known that our musios can dance too! :) the dance was so entertaining and fun to watch. the whole music team did "Smooth" and many were wowed by the instrumental solos. how can we forget about beatboxing by jason and drum sparring by walz and lee. these images are still fresh in my memory as i blogged.
many many thanks to Philo and gang for the invite cards and the publicity clip. the things on the invite cards are all assembled together for the photoshoot! woww~
thanks to Eevoon, Carmen, Yong kang and their team of ushers, we have seen both services fullhouse. yay~
the list goes on.... our Media team! :D Thanks for the full mobilisation of volunteers. you guys came for rounds of practices and rehearsals to take care of the details and all.
there are just so many people i wanna thank for making the services a great success. Thank You, all of you :)

some smses of encouragements...

"service was awesome. esp the performances. seamless. really can see the effort ur team put in. my visitors and leaders enjoyed it. thanks for the hardwork."

"well done, team, for the relevant and awesome service todat. keep up the great work! better stuff to come in 09! =)"

"just want to let u know dat i think minops really did a great job on freedom. i was talking to my leaders n we all were saying how much it blew not only our visitors but even our people's expectation. and u know how hard it is to impress the old birds. i think u guys really outdone urself. this ess was the best i've seen! just want to affirm u and ur team doing a fantastic job! rmb, the best is yet to be! may God anoint u even more!"

here's the lady behind the successful project- Veron! she is the project IC of Freedom and she worked very hard right from the start to the day itself, she danced and keyboarded.

taking pics with the nice props and decor! :) many thanks to Yiyou and her team.

Freedom Team! 3 cheers for our Savior! :D

Lord, amen, the best is yet to be. Grant my team and i your wisdom and strength to serve you. Onwards!

opportunities

our tendency is to pray for miracles. but in most situations, it is more appropriate to pray for opportunities. instead of praying "God, pls change that person.", pray "God give me an opportunity to build character into that person..."
it is looking for opportunities to work alongside God.

yesterday, after i read the above lines, i asked God to give me an opportunity to encourage a person, and He did :) its an exciting partnership.

Waiting is a fruitful thing

Nehemiah also had his desert experience. this was a man with immerse leadership ability who awake everyday to do a job that tapped little or none of these skills. can you relate? do you wake up everyday to circumstances that have absolutely remotely to do with the vision you sense God is developing in you?

this really blew my mind off. and i must really thank God that day in and out of HP can get really routinely dull. yet, i have learnt new administrative skills that can help me to be more efficient in my ministry work. very often, whenever i step into the office i'll always have this question, what is your plan for me here, churning out reports and tabulating data for analysis... i want to have a changed perspective. i know i am learning something new, that can be useful for the future.

the need often seems so urgent it seems foolish to wait. but God is sovereign. keep that in mind.

more to this life

i am so excited to start my reading on visioneering by andy stanley. it was once mentioned that reading books on vision or thinking about vision is quite a dangerous act to do at night. it can give you sleepless nights and keep your eyes wide open, and your heart bubbling with excitement.
just only from the introduction is a short abstract that i would like to share with the readers of this blog:

vision will prioritize your values. a clear vision has the power to bring what's important to the surface of your schedule and lifestyle. a clear vision makes it easy to weed out of your life those things that stand in the way of achieving what matters most.
without vision, good things will hinder you from achieving the best things.
without vision, there is no relational, financial or moral compass. consequently, they often make foolish decisions.

the above para kinda "jumped" out at me when my eyes went through them. rightaway i was reminded of the current sermon series going on- priority living. vision and priority go hand in hand. His agenda must be my first priority. i am bought at a price, the price that no one else can ever paid.

before "oyazumi nasai", Eph 2:10, "For we are His workmanship..."

Happy Bday, Lee

4 days more and i'll be running the 5km fun run at the great eastern women run event. i'm so not prepared for it :( for this week, i shall be more disciplined in my diet. *veggies, fruits, veggies, fruits, veggies, fruits....*
on a cheery side, i got to know a new friend last weekend, she's angeline and also a dancer. during our convo, i found that she learnt 7 years of ballet and she stays very near me!
its fun hanging around my people during the Freedom rehearsal on sat night. i was hovering between asia room where aloy and huiy were doing some filming and nexus stage where clangs and bangs could be heard. its really exciting and i look forward to Freedom services this weekend :)
i shall claim this verse in this week's prayer:
Haggai 2:9 "the glory of the present house is greater than the glory of the former house... and in this place i will grant peace..."

ladies special

stew

its been so long since i really look forward to lunch time at work. whats for today's lunch? the signature dish of chef evelyn teo - chicken stew! last night roy and i popped by gourmet chef''s home and found shirls, pris and eve having a fun time watching the tv. for the first few minutes, while eve frantically looked for the house keys, we were much entertained and amused at the laughter sounds from shirls and pris. it was a great time spent! anyway, back to the stew. i wanna say a big big Thank You to dearie eve for the chicken stew! :) she's such an encourager and big blessing in my life. Thanks eve! *hugs*

when boys meet girls

this is my mpc class. we are soon approaching the end of the entire course. it has been fun learning together and doing discussion sessions during the classes too. our final class will be on "Wedding Planner" and we all have our own homework to prepare for that last class... :)

so grateful

a recent incident has reminded me about my obedience to God. principles that were taught to me during my high school days like: obey even when we do not understand yet... trusting that God has a better plan... were refreshed in my mind. i struggled for awhile to fully know in my mind and heart that God has a better plan and i ought to trust Him fully. i must say that in this learning, true obedience is when we are faced with struggling between two choices. we struggle because of our carnal self in our desires battling with the grid of God's Word in our minds.
on the eve of last weekend, we had made up our minds and the weekend's mpc lesson and sermon served as an affirmation of God's faithfulness and His promise of providence in our lives.
i want to thank our leaders for always guiding us and giving us their love and trust. we are really blessed that we can go to them should we have any questions or situations in our relationship. afterall, a relationship grows most in a community.
friends who have been encouraging in us and praying for us, we appreciate you alot.
God, continue to be the leader in our together :)

TGIF

Thank God Its Friday! :D Fridays always have the happy magical feeling at work. when you walk towards the office lift, your steps feel alittle lighter than usual. when you enter your work area, its much easier to greet your colleagues with a smile & "good morning!". i'm one of the fortunate ones who has a radio in our tiny work space & usually DJ will go something like, "...today's friday & weekend will be here soon..." when the clock strikes noontime, you know that there are only a few more hours left to knock off. not sure about the rest of the world, but when the time has come for me to exit office, most of the times, the most tempting thing for me is to go back to sleep. haha! well, so far, there has only been once that i went back home for a friday dinner. other than that, i'll brace myself up for dinner+shopping+movie+chillout or occasionally events in Nexus. there are different views of people on how to spend fridays. some would think that to have maximum fun is to party till wee hours, some would just head straight to their pillows (perhaps due to OTs on a friday, poor thing). i guess TGIF can be spend with meaningful people doing meaningful things :) i look forward to later.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

i've been pondering on a verse in my quiet time this week.

Isaiah 22:22 "i will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shut no one can open."

once again, TGIF

yes

011008
12:01am
do you remember what i told you the last time we were here?
"can i ask you a question?"
*a brown box appeared*

"yes"

God is faithful. remembering Romans 8:32...

a gift from heaven

i want to shout many many thanks to God for blessing me with a new handphone - samsung i780! :D i am totally thrilled, excited and happy about this gift. as we are on a save and scrap campaign, roy and i prayed together for a new phone for me a month plus ago. it was really tempting to buy it 3 weeks ago when i saw the hp deal at a pricing. however, i decided to wait and not spend the money on it. till last sunday, we casually walked past PS Starhub and was given the samsung promo flyer. the phone that i wanted was on sale for zero dollar without any trade-in. i know this is it. haha. debbie accompanied me yesterday to get the new phone. i was prepared to pay for the sim card charge, but later realised that the sim card charge was wavied off, as part of the promo deal! wahhhhh... God is really kind to me! deb and i went to makan at ajisen. roy joined later, great company, great hp. hoho! i'm quite a noob, as roy helped me with the contact list transfer. thanks roy and deb!

many faces of win

newflash all over singapore today: F1.
i managed to catch the entire F1 race on tv last night. its interesting how locals get all hyped up abt F1. it brought back old memories like the hype of how Hello Kitty was once THAT popular that people formed long queues in the morning outside Macdonalds. well, in recent days, news were quite gloomy due to the $ falling and spoilt milk. F1 race was quite a happy thingy.
i, seriously, am not a F1 fan. my knowledge of it only started, much thanks to the publicity and information on papers. the only faint memory was me playing Daytona in arcade during my sec sch days. it was thrilling, i remember.
though a 2 hour race, 61 laps, it sounded boring to me initially. however, after the first mishap happened to Piquet, i realised a F1 race can be very unpredictable. i watched on with much anticipation. after the race, one scene that still stay in my mind was the fuel line attached to Massa's Ferrari while he drove off when flashed green by automatic digi-light. in less than a sec, one of his crew fumbled forward but thankfully, managed to stand up quickly.
the importance of teamwork struck me. in many situations, when things get urgent or busy, how do we respond to our team players? and when mishaps happen, do we start to pin-point fingers? or we pull together as a united front to face the problem and handle the mishap with care? when the mishap happened, i could almost imagine the many thoughts that flew past Massa's mind- what happened just now? did i clearly see the green light? is one of my team members hurt? how many cars have drove past me? am i the last one in line?
winning is just a one moment glory, but it also came with many months of toil and hardwork together as a team to put the vehicle together, device strategy plans on pitstops and functions. the win belongs to everyone in the team, who work hard together towards the goal.
well, i do not know much about Massa' team after the race, but i believe that the one of the beautiful wins belongs to you who still believe in the best of one another that we have worked hard for it and therefore, celebrate the hardwork together as a team.

joy in little things

soon, weekend's here again. before i put on my partying shoes, i want to thank God for the joy i found in little things this week. i started my week with a goal: to find joy in little things around me.
i had another yummy home-cooked food at my darling aunt jane's house on monday evening. she is currently trying the tai tai life at home and getting her hands on new recipes too. her double boiled soup rocks. after a long day of work and meeting on wed, i had a good train ride with my 3 girls, voon philo jia. we were chatting while philo is on her drawing sketch. after a dinner with nicole and zinc, i trained home with my shepherd. i always wish serangoon station dont come so soon. another happy thing was that i bought 2 bags at a good price in a spree. cant wait to get my hands on them.
i really wanna give thanks because i know its a personal breakthrough for me. i dont want to be drown into the routine life of work, but i want to find joy in little things around me. experiencing small victories like this always give me the "yes!" feeling.
recently i've been feeling girly or maybe the girly feeling suddenly struck me.
haircare, facial care, nailcare, contact lens...
better stop snacking, hit the pool or road soon...
on a side note, i cant wait for sunday night too. (^^)

the Sim family

red roses, 8- course dinner, red velvet curtain.
yesterday annie got married to craigven at intercontinental hotel. annie is my eldest cousin in the sim family. my mum was the 4th daughter in the sim family.
ever since mum passed away years back, we seldom visit them except for big events like cny and weddings, most of them live in the west side of the island, particularly clementi.
whenever i see my cousins and relatives, it is a nostalgic feeling. i have fond memories with them when i was young. mum's eldest sister is also my godmother and i was babysitted by her during my first 2 years while my mum returned to workforce. during primary school holidays, mei and i would packed our clothes and stuffs in our tiny disney luggage bags and spent close to a week at my godmother's house. we played together with our cousins from morning to evening. sometimes, there might be movie treats from my xiao yi.
the sim family is a closely knitted family. since young, i always long to go together with them on family overseas trips, but because dad work shiftwork, we were always not able to join them for it. all i could gathered from their experiences were looking at the photo albums of the various countries they been to. through these years, our relationships are that of a distant relative type. each time whenever i go to visit them, i'll feel abit out of place or "mo sheng".
it was the same for last night too. yet, i went ahead to enjoy the dinner and also to initiate catch ups with them. God is good and i enjoyed my night. caught up with my cousins who were mostly just a few years younger than me. also met some long- distance relatives from malaysia too, when i only met them when i was a baby? well, afterall, my grandparents had 10 children. *gasp*
we will gather again coming dec for annie's brother, zhen hong's wedding. am looking forward to it. deep down, i hope to know them more once again as i know God is guiding me and has his plans for me to be in the sim family.

from left: mei, shuz, nicole, ada, nowell, serene (cousins)

live to praise Him

another sep birthday, mr phua! :)
happy birthday bao! we went to eat at ministry of food during the weekend and the desserts there are thumbs up! good! :D drop by a visit to try their red bean cum green tea ice cream dessert! others desserts are nice too. sharing the same birthdate as bao is seng too- happy birthday seng!
a big shout-out to my one of my long time girlfriends, evelyn- happy birthday too! enjoy your holiday trip k! :)

During the weekend, roy and i went for our mpc breakout session. i was pretty looking forward to it, wondering how will it be like. together with us, Joo, Gavin and Pearlyn, we went to our hosts' humble home at tampines. david and alice, our hosts from the family group, are married for 7 years with 3 lovely preschool boys. they met when they were serving in the adults group and now they are leading a cg in the tampines area.

upon reaching their place, we sat down in the living room. just like typical Hope setting, we quickly settled down in a circle seating. it is also the couple's first time to host the mpc breakout session, thus, the initial start was alittle raw, as we do not really know one another well. alice came along with drinks and snacks to warm up the session. well, this session is supposed to be a Q&A kind of session. we can ask anything about relationship, marriage and family and share our experiences. our conversation ranged from financial planning to staying with in-laws, from goals in a marriage to handling kids. there was one thing i was particularly very excited and convicted about. during the conversation, i actually had a question to ask the couple about church planting, little did i realise roy also had the same question in mind. it was then, a question about the couple's goal and direction for the family was asked. david replied that they have plans to move to toronto in 2 years time. i was delighted to hear that because honestly speaking, as i see their family, it is a comfortable place to be in and their 3 kids are young. yet, something greater has captured their hearts to do. i was very encouraged by their desire. after the whole time, roy and i talked more about this and we both agreed that it is so important for God's vision to lead the family. david and alice are one of the many families we have who are inspiring in their lives. i look forward to our second session together.

anyway, a thought i had today: time waits for no man. i want to learn as much as i can and apply the learnings. yesterday's ulm teaching was quite a long one. we listened to john c maxwell's Lifting others up. okays, all my thoughts are in a web. need to sort out first. till then :)

roy and i went to fetch his parents at airport yesterday. we headed out earlier just to spend some time talking and relaxing. believe it or not, now i begin to understand more whenever books/ instructors mentioned about communication between couple. as familiarity sets in, its often hard to find time to really talk during the routine- daily- stuffs. unknowingly, we might just find ourselves, yes talking, but content of the conversation is mainly about informing each other of schedules and other meetings or just exchanging information for ministry needs. halfway through a current book i am reading now, i began to take a deeper look into our conversation life.

i really appreciate each time roy initiated a walk or just ask about my day and how am i doing in my life. i appreciate that he gave me an airtime. its not just about finding out my schedule or other meetings only, but he hopes to know me more. i appreciated last night alot, its just less than an hour, but it was fruitful. we talked about our ministries, work and the recent things we learnt. one of which that i am encouraged by was on outreach: church planting derives from a constant life of outreach. it kinda blew my mind when he said that. how can i say i wanna go plant a church when my outreach life is dead? or not frequent or not consistent?

as he went on to share, this thought was stuck in my mind and i prayed a prayer to thank God for his life and being an example to me. recently, God also helped to inch his friendship with a friend closer. what blew me off also was the deeds that coupled with what roy believes.

the little steps of obedience not only build up our treasures in heaven, but more importantly, it builds up the character of a person.

She has a king charles

mei is also born in the month of september. we celebrated at 2 chefs, a zi cha place somewhere in commonwealth last sunday. 4 full tables, it felt like a mini wedding? haha. it was indeed a surprise for mei as she didnt expect that many people. well, a greater surprise in store still... we kind of need to stall time so we took pictures. thanks Junming and Merv.

its really great time of catching up with these sisters.

only on mei's birthday, she is taller than everyone of them!
mei's cg

mei wondered what's the present...

this is such a cute pic! of course, the cutest is the sweet little thing in es' arms!

Dear meimei,

happy birthday! i decided to write my birthday greetings here. every year i kinda run out of ideas in term of cards and gifts... hehe. so this year's on my blog.

so much for an intro. haha. i just want to thank you for all your love and care for me. sometimes, you seems stern or strict in facial expression, but actually you have a tofu heart. your way of encouragement has a unique style- you say only a few words and thats it. haha. and you leave the person to ponder on the words. in this year to come, i pray that God will continue to deepen your conviction about things you are passionate for Him. Trust in his timing for the things you do.

i pray for a verse for you, Luke 8:8 "still, other seed fell on good soil. it came up and yielded a crop, a hundred times more than what was sown."

what kind of fruit we produce in life depends on what type of soil is in our hearts :)

Love you, Jie

Happy Birthday, Jus

as always, september is a very fruitful month, a few of us celebrated Justin's Birthday last wed at sushi tei. we had our fill and lots of fun with jus's cam. we took many pictures, here're some of them, enjoy :)

SIM Convocation

29 August 2008 was my Uni Convocation. took a halfday leave to attend the 3 hours event. it was quite a long wait in the hall. dozed off a few times. hehe. dad and aunt jane were invited to see me receiving my cert on the stage. its a good time to catch up with schoolmates too.

took a pic with dad before the ceremony starts
dewen came too!

i love both of them alot

he's winston. we did most of the group projects together, great pal he is. *winks* heys, must invite me to your wedding k? ;p

a serious one

my marketing project mates, Diana and Kelly.