Outright Profiteering

If you have been reading the papers lately, you should be aware of the latest headline i.e. the massive earthquake which struck China. I will not go into the details like the name of the tectonic plate which caused the earthquake, the size of the earthquake on the Ritcher Scale, or the number of casualties. These facts are easily avaliable if you want to search for them.

I am just disturbed by the "wolf in sheep clothing" gesture of local and overseas financial institutions (FIs). If you are aware, these FIs have pledged to provide free remittance services to China for disaster relief. To the ordinary and naive mortals, this is a great humanitarian gesture. But wait.. THINK AGAIN...

Do you really believe that these FIs will remit each sum of cash instantly as and when they recieve it from you? Of course NO! They will want to consolidate all the cash first and in the meanwhile decide to hold the cash for say one month period. Then during this one month, invest the money in some financial instruments and EARN interests!!!! When they have accumulated enough cash and earned sufficient interests to cover their costs, then they will remit ONLY the principal amount to China; minus the interests earned of course!!!!!!!

To those folks working in these FIs, wipe that smirk off your face if you think your bank is doing a good deed. DUH...

Paradoxical Question.

Today is a really slow and boring day at work. For the 3rd consecutive week, my boss has taken the sunday off AGAIN.;p Office is slow. Basically, i have nothing much on hand to do. Waiting to knock off at 530pm.

So here i am day-dreaming if you must say. Well a few random thoughts came to my mind. Firstly, i recall a few months ago, i posted an interesting question to a christian friend. I said, "Hey Jackie, you do know that P&G (the biggest manufacturer of soap, shower foam, toothpaste i.e. toiletries in general) actually tithe to a Satanic church in U.S.A; so would you still buy products from them?"

Then my friend replied:" Does it matter where P&G tithes? Abba is the creator of all things on Earth. The natural and raw ingredients for the shower foam, soap, shampoo etc all came from Abba, not P&G leh. Does it matter?"

This is a subjective issue for you to judge. :p

Revelations at work

Today marks the 17th day in my new office. I still recall from my previous job's orientation where my ex- manager told the rookies: "If you are keeping count of the number of days in this job, chee you must really hate the job." Opps, please do not get me wrong. I do not hate my new job. I am merely informing you my progress in my new job.

Firstly, all my life i always thought that the NRIC number of SG citizens will begin with the letter "S" i.e. S1234567Z. But i am surprised to learn that for babies born after year 2000, their NRIC number begins with letter "T"!!! haha.

Anyway it's quite nice to know that 50% of my cc colleagues are christians. My big boss from the cc is also a christian. Moreover im pleasantly surprised that the chairman and vice chairman of my resident committee are also christians. The bible speaks of submitting to your bosses just as Abba wants us to submit to earthly authorities and pay taxes. When i have this revelation and i know that my bosses are also believers, i no longer see my job as just a mortal job, but i am also serving Abba through this channel.

For the first time, i have malay and indian colleagues to work with. Previously since JC onwards, all my classmates, project mates, colleagues in my 1st job are chinese. I must say i have very natural good vibes and get along very well with my malay and indian colleagues. They have been most helpful in dispensing advices and answering my queries.

Well, to be quite honest, the portfolios that i inherit now are in a terrible shape because of inefficient, lazy and maybe irresponsible predecessors. Did you know that before i assumed my current office, at least 6 ACMs have resigned?. There are improper documentaions, loss of documents here and there. When i meet the members of these committees, they were initially quite skeptical about me. They all wonder how long i will stay in the job. I could sense their sense of disappointment and they felt let down. Deep inside me, i feel that PA owes them too much already. It's time they deserve a good PA officer to put things in order and regain their morale. Bearing this in mind, i no longer see servicing my committees as a chore but more of a moral obligation to ensure the members willl not be let down again. Of course, this also creates an additional level of self-imposed pressure i guess?

In terms of job training, i must say there is barely any coaching at all. Everything is on your own and learnt on the job. High role ambiguity is how i would describe my current situation now. The mentor assigned to me is not so perfect. This person will promise to teach me something only to forget clean slate about it. I have to ask my fellow colleagues of my same pay grade to help/coach/teach me. I mean perhaps my mentor has a lot of work to do and he/she has no time for me. So yeah i understand yeah. Anyway, i will just have to exercise a lot of initiative to ask other colleagues to teach me.

Ok.. i shall end here in the meanwhile.

Vibes in the New office

The vibes in the office of a community centre is sure different from a corporate office. When i am too busy to have lunch, my colleagues will gently remind me to go lunch. When i need help, i just yell across the office and someone will willingly answer and help me ( i repay the favour as well). When i stay late in the office, my Boss will affectionately ask why i am still in the office because he knows everybody's working shift. When i have been diligently working in my desk all day long with no moment to rest or eat my meals, my colleagues will helpfully announce to the whole office, "Andrew has been very hardworking today. Keep it up and remember to eat your meals"

We shall see if these vibes exist in the long run. ;p. In this new job, i will need a lot of Abba's favours; be it in soliciting help and favours from my RC members for events; getting their replies on financial quotations etc or getting information from them to compile reports for submission to PA HQ. You see it's not like i can simply chase them like how a superior chases his understudy for undone work. RC members work on purely voluntary basis while officers like me are paid. We have to be doubly patient with the RC members and be courteous to them AT ALL TIMES. Of course, the same respect and courtesy is reciprocated back to me from the RC members (as least from the RC assigned to me).

In addition, there is no structured on-the-job training. Every thing is taught on the job and when the need arises for this work to be done ; then the coaching is provided by my superior. By the way, this coming Saturday 10th May, i am joining my RC committee in a mothers' Day dinner. It will be a good chance to networK with the residents and get to know some important people.

Ok.. thats my update for now.

Desperation

Not too long ago, a good sister friend of mine shared with me her love story. Her bf(who is now currently her husband) and her dated for a while before her bf dropped the bombshell: He was going to leave SG to a faraway land to pursue his graduate school. She was devastated and yearned so much to dump everything in SG to follow her beloved bf. However, Abba through His mysterious means created circumstances to stop her from leaving SG in a heat of moment. At that point in time, she sure must hate Abba. Nonetheless, as the time passed, she no longer felt the urge to be with her bf and even grew accustomed to living on her own in SG without him being around. Finally, about a year later, the time and circumstances were right and she said, a year later she felt the overwhelming peace (not desperation) to go to this faraway land to join her bf.

You may question is there a difference if she joined her bf immediately then or one year later? In my humble opinion, i think there is a difference. If she flew over immediately, she is going with a heart of desperation i.e. a heart of "I can't live without him every second of my life". This would be bad. She would probably be utterly possessive and would cling on to her bf like crazy. How was her bf ever going to study with a peace of mind? Conflicts would probably arise leading to quarrels, fights and disputes. In such a scenario, Jesus would be missing in their relationship.

Abba only gave her the desire and obligating circumstances to join her bf after one year. Note that, i stressed she grew accustomed to living a life without her bf in SG and she spent more time in the word and in the presence of Abba. This time round, she flew over with a steady heart, a steady heart which has Jesus in it, where she knows she can find favour, recognition and love from Jesus. Such is a stable and secure woman who will not be possessive of her bf and her bf also knows for certain that he can leave her alone at times to focus at his studies. He would know that she is an independent lady.

Hence, more often than not, when you get an overwhelming, burning passion for something, or when you become too overly zealous in it, perhaps it is probably not from Abba. You are probably not prepped and ready for it yet.

You see barely into the 2nd day of my new job, i suffered a panic attack. Perhaps i was overwhelmed by the tonnes of portfolios i have to take-over from my predecessor; perhaps i was empowered by a sense of guilt that my new job requires me to work on Sundays on alternate months; perhaps i was tormented by the fact that the kids at the kids ministry would miss me. All these emotions accumulated into a single desire : I want to serve full time in my kids ministry. So i sent an sms to my ministry full time leader and enquired if the ministry was still hiring. But surprising i heard no reply!! Usually, my ministry leader would reply sms-es promptly. Anyway by the 3rd day of work, things got better at work. It seems i wasn't overwhelmed by work already. In fact a thought came to my mind to take things in my stride and take it easy; learn on the job, pick up things slowly one by one.

Yesterday i was chatting with that good sister friend again. I spoke to her about my desperation and my desire to want to serve full time in the kids ministry. Then yeah she alerted me and shared with me the story you read above.

In her opinion, there is a good reason why Abba placed me in this current job. Serving in this job is as equally important as serving say full time in the kids' ministry. Because we will still be serving Abba. Imagine if all christians would just want to serve full time in the churches? Then who is going to manage your savings, take care of you in hospitals, mow the lawn for you, fix the plumbing system, uphold law & order, defend the country, plan your estate taxes etc? Sure i mean non believers can also serve in these positions but Abba has a plan for each of us for believers and unbelievers. Perhaps, I am not ready to serve full time in my kids ministry yet because there are still importants skills & knowledge which i should learn and pick up from my new current job. If i would to hastily rush in to serve full time, i would not be equipping myself fully to serve the kids.

Another sister of mine Val had a slightly different opinion though. She felt that i should stay in this current job because in my new job^, i am able to make a impact and possibly help many people. The kids in the kids ministry will always be well looked after but what about the people outside the church? They need me..

Hmm.. yeah thats my current predicament for now. I think i will stay on and preservere in this new job until further notice from Abba...

^I am now working as an assistant constituency manager under Peoples' Association.

Value of the Book

It is said that for those in the artistic and writing professions, the only time when your master pieces will increase several folds in monetary value is when you pass away. Of course, there is also the issue of whether did you die as a famous known celebrity in your professional circle versus an unknown loner. But in general, a painter's/writer's works increase in value only upon their death because it is assumed no one can replicate the same works anymore.

This reasoning sets me thinking. Did the value of the bible increase sharply after Jesus's death on the Cross? Did the value of the bible escalate to it's peak at Jesus's resurrection? Perhaps the Bible is the only "literal" creation to date where the Authors i.e. Abba and Jesus are still alive today and her value is appreciating perpetually.

Why do i say the Bible's value is appreciating all the time? You see here is the subtle difference. The mortal secular master pieces of art/writings usually communicate a fixed range of specific meanings; for instance a master painting or great literature work will only invoke a fix basket of emotions/interpretations/motifs such as e.g. grief, nostalgia etc regardless of how many different angles u view the masterpiece. But in the bible, the fresh daily revelations that hit you in the face is ever constantly evolving; a same phrase in the scriptures speaks differently to you in different predicaments daily as it is interpreted by your own holy spirit. The bible is the vassal which Abba speaks to you!!!