Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Project Report #12 - Return of The Engine

Good morning people~! It's a beautiful Tuesday morning~! Woke this morning from an awful dream, but that's not going to spoil my day~! Later tonight, we'll be having a Bible Study in Harvest Generation Church. I'm really looking forward to what God has in store for us tonight. I feel so good on the inside today, I don't even know how to describe it. There's just such peace within in that everything will be alright in the end. So WooHoo~!

God is so good~! I’ve really been having a fantastic time going through this project ever since I received that fresh revelation from God that He is in control over everything. Due to the limitations of my human mind, I tend to succumb to fear when great problems arise, but God has always been faithful to comfort me and give me assurance that His hand is over my life. Now I just can’t stop smiling because God is just so good~!

Has my situation changed? Nope… Has financial aid come in? Hmmm… Not really… Has all my bills been settled? Most certainly NOT~! So what has changed that makes me so happy? Simple, my heart changed… Because of the healing that God has brought about inside of me, I now have the strength and the power to change the situation around me through Him~! In Christ alone I will build my trust~!

Just reflecting back on what has taken place in this project, God really has been so faithful to provide. The moment I got the intuition to buy another car was the moment I found out that a good friend was selling away his car, which so happen to be my dream project car since high-school, at a very good price. Was very excited~! I could finally afford the car I’ve been dreaming to have for more 6 years~! So I prayed to God saying that if this is really for me, He will make a way for me to sell off my current car.

As I was praying, I was also pushing the sale of my car out. I placed it on advertisements, I told some of my friends about it and did everything I could to make it known that my car was out for sale. But after 3 weeks of trying to push my car out, there was not even a single buyer who called in. I was beginning to get worried, I know it’s a dumb thing to worry but aren’t we all human?

It was actually the worst possible time to try to sell a car because it was towards the turn of a new year~! As more experienced car sales people would tell you, it is impossible to get a good sales deal at that time of the year. Some people began to even tell me to jut forget about trying to sell my car because it won’t happen. What they said somehow instilled doubt in me, I was beginning to question whether is ‘dream car’ really for me. So I turned to God in prayer again…

Every time I was in the car, I declared God’s promises over the car. I prayed and prayed really hard~! And one day, a new vocabulary was inspired into my prayer was “Lord… help me sell off this car and make it a blessing to someone… But if the new car is not for me, you shut the doors… Because the doors You shut, no man can open… but I will still praise You” I came to my senses that all these things are just perishable things, things that God gives us as just additions to the greatest gift He initially gave to us through Jesus, GRACE~!

You see, God has every right NOT to bless us. Who are we to actually ask anything from God? We’re talking about a guy who made the whole universe~! Who am I to demand anything from Him? But yet God says in the Bible to ask of Him, to seek Him first and His Kingdom, and all these things shall be added unto you. You see, I realized that I cannot ask anything from God unless it is Him who allows me to. It is like how can we simply just ask anything from the King of Malaysia unless he allows us to? A lesson learnt from this is that I should never take my freedom of asking from God for granted because I have no right to ask for anything from Him in the first place, but yet still He gave us all, out of His generous heart, the privilege to ask.

“Do not be anxious over anything, but bring everything to the Lord in prayer and supplication…”

God’s timing is never our timing because His thoughts are higher than our thoughts~! Just 5 days after I said that prayer, God brought to my attention that one of my close friends was in need to buy a used car. After a little discussion with her dad, the car was sold to her. What perfect timing, God really answered my prayers. I managed to sell the car the day after Christmas of 2006, on top of that, it became a blessing to someone who really needed a car~! God's timing is so perfect~!

I was really sad to let go of my previous car though, people who know me better would know that I really loved and treasured car. But I’m overjoyed to know that now it has become a blessing to someone else. All I can say is it can only be God who has orchestrated this~! It wasn’t me or whatever anyone did, it can only be God~!

Project report~! My engine will be arriving at the workshop later this evening. My foreman will tow my engine-less car to the shop by tomorrow. I’m gonna take half-day leave from work to see the initiation of the engine installation phase. Will take lots of pictures for all of you to have a look. Sponsors, I need your prayer support, do pray that everything will go on smoothly because installing an engine can lead to many complications. Pray that nothing will go wrong, that everything would be so perfect that it would even shock the mechanics themselves. Haha~! What a testimony~! Thanks sponsors~!

I wonder if all of you have heard that Subang Jaya is being over-run by an Indonesian. She is taking on Subang Jaya by storm with her outstanding talent in singing and passion for God~! Still can’t guess who she is? I’ll give you a clue, she’s from the BATAK clan of Indonesia, the clan which use to perform human sacrifices and dine on its meat. Haha~! She’s a good friend and a person whom I really loved playing the drums for, the one and only, ELSA MALONA a.k.a. PiSa a.k.a. Sasa a.k.a. Oi Indonesia….

I had the privilege of knowing her through A.Y.A. and Acts Church. I remember seeing her a lot of times on stage singing for worship and doing song presentations. Gosh, I don’t even remember how I first met her. I guess we never got close only until mid of 2005 because I was the only drummer who was willing to play for her song presentations. Haha~! All the other drummers didn’t seem to have the time to support her, so I stepped in to help her.

We started hanging out a lot together, the nights we would go for supper with our gang or just watch stupid movies which I end up regretting, there’s always something to do when she’s around. I was kinda lonely sometimes when I was serving in Acts because by the time I was done settling everything I needed to do, everyone else would have left without me. But Elsa would always, without fail, ask me to join her and her group of friends for lunch or dinner. Although she doesn’t know it, she gave me a sense of importance, in a sense that I was not forgotten or left behind.

With her ultimate slow-ness and blur-ness of mind, there was hardly ever a dull moment with her. We would laugh and laugh over senseless things that we joked about. She was very transparent to her friends and was never ashamed to share with us her past mistakes or embarrassing moments. Her never ending tales of the humorous mishaps of her life really brightened up the days when I felt down on the inside.

Even though I may be super tired after a long day, whenever she called me to play for her song presentations, I was always there. Not because of duty or anything, although I do playfully complain to her sometimes, but because I just love serving alongside her because of her character. She would take up a singing assignment even at busiest times of her studies, and she did it with all her heart. What I caught from her is her passion to do what she was gifted to do no matter what situations that may be happening around her.

To Elsa… We had fun together with our gang didn’t we? I will never forget the times we shared just hanging out and chilling, getting our minds off from our work and just having fun. You would always involve me in your outings and I really appreciate you for the fact that you actually thought about me even though it seemed like no one else did.

Sometimes when I see you at rehearsals, you may look totally pale from a long day at campus, you still never failed to give me a smile when I came in. Although I really don’t like the way you shout out my name so loud in public that the whole building could hear you, but above that you still were not too tired to acknowledge me every time I see you. This simplicity of heart that you have really inspires me.

Thank you so much for involving me in your song performances, even though I started off as your last choice of drummers. Haha~! But I became your favourite drummer in church at the end right? Though I may always just jokingly say that when you want to sing you always pull me in the ‘waters’ along with you, I really did enjoy the times we served together and I count it a great privilege for me to have been a drummer for your presentations.

I know you must have been quite heart-broken when I decided to move on to another ministry, I could really feel the depth of it through the SMS you sent me that night. I just want you to know that I have not forgotten you, I have not forgotten all the crazy times we had, and I do miss spending time with you and our group of friends. Those were really fun times.

Continue pursuing the dreams that God has placed in your heart. I know you have a heart for the homeless and the needy, don’t ever let that passion die~! The Lord will reward you for all that you’ve given up for the sake of others. Keep up the good work in your singing, I really don’t know when I’ll be able to play for you again, but I really hope that one day I’ll have that privilege to do so again.

Love the Lord with your heart, soul and strength, in all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your path straight. Build up your confidence, never look down on yourself and what you have, but in all things give thanks to Him. If you ever feel that you’re insignificant or feel that all that you’ve done didn’t matter to anyone, just look at my life, because it is my honor to declare that you’ve been such a blessing to me and have added so much value to my life. Press on, Elsa~!

This project is getting really exciting. For those of you who still can’t catch up, no worries. Take you time to read through each entry because this project blog is not just about me, but it’s about every single person involved in this project. Without them, this project would have never came to existence. Thank you all for reading, log on in the coming days to find out the progress of the engine installation phase. Have a great Tuesday and God Bless~!

1 comment:

elsa said...

I LOVE YOU TOOOO ARROOONNN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :) Haha... Miss you so much!! Must be because of how u praised me so much hihi... Thanks ya, i'm very very encouraged. You really don't know how it meant so much to me now! WE MUST HANG OUT one of these days ya?? Soon! I'll call you out. Coz i got new car. EVERYBODYYY!!! I got new car!! :)