Good Friday, Writing Eastward

today, i heard that song being played, and i thought of you. i wish i could put those memories to death, and to some extent they have already been. but it is not that difficult for them to come clawing back through the sand, when by human reckoning, they aren't really many years away from the present.

do i resurrect them in this post, or do i speak of another resurrection.


sometimes i get a stirring of how the Israelites must have felt, waiting for the Messiah. conscious of their sin and exiled from the land which was meant to be the fulfilment of a promise to them, they heard rebuke after rebuke, reminding them of their unfaithfulness, and yet promise after promise, reminding them of God's eventual restoration. to live with such a history, with all the should-have-beens and could-have-beens, and to hear again and again that one day, someone would come to free them from this disgrace that they had brought upon themselves - what a wait that must have been. and then one day, to come across a man who seemed so ordinary, until he began to preach and to bring a glimpse of heaven to this dying, diseased world. here was a man who arrests all your attention, and you stare at him in amazement as he breaks and crumbles all the shackles of this world - the hopelessness of sicknesses, the disgrace of disease, the grief of death. a wild current of hope surges through your frame as you wonder for a moment, as you entertain the thought, as you try to shape the possibility in your head, that this might be, he might be the Messiah.


what is this marvellous thing that You have done, that You would come to set us free from sin.

how does one open one's mouth and say, this and this and this are the things on my mind.


each time i hear them talking about it, the twinge of disappointment and discontentment strikes again. i remind myself to count my blessings, and to think about what's eternal, but i cannot deny that it bites and weighs on me. then i think about her and how much more difficult it must be, and maybe the bitterness is assuaged for a while. but such neutralisations are at best temporary, and even this disturbed mind recognises the hollowness of such comparisons.

"but whatever gain i had, i counted as loss for the sake of Christ. indeed, i count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. for his sake i have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that i may gain Christ" phil 3:7-8

losing words, one can only cling to and wrap oneself with words from everywhere else. words that sustain, words that revive, words that bring peace to an unquiet soul.

"where else have we to go
when you alone have words of eternal life."

"Oh! would to God I may be enabled to feel enough sustained by an occasional, amicable intercourse, rare, brief, unengrossing and tranquil: quite tranquil!"


would to God i may be tranquil.


i would draw a donut and
thread it through. and
wear it round my neck.
i would come this close,
i would, to wearing
the heart on the sleeve.
except that none would know
what the donut means.

ash and ice

according to google, it is rodin's birthday today.




1 I lift up my eyes to the hills.
From where does my help come?
2 My help comes from the LORD,
who made heaven and earth.
3 He will not let your foot be moved;
he who keeps you will not slumber.
4Behold, he who keeps Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.

5 The LORD is your keeper;
the LORD is your shade on your right hand.
6 The sun shall not strike you by day,
nor the moon by night.

7 The LORD will keep you from all evil;
he will keep your life.
8 The LORD will keep
your going out and your coming in
from this time forth and forevermore

psalm 121:1-8

2003-2012

now and then, i think about what you would say in response to this. i remember bits and pieces of the things i'd learnt from you, the conversations we'd had and issues we'd wrangled with. i remember the many times you tried to help me to see a point, the hours you spent with me untangling all the messed-up thoughts and erroneous beliefs. it was life-to-life (one of the many things you emphasised), a life-to-life relationship of discipleship. and such imprints do not fade easily.

i miss something, but i don't know what i miss. perhaps this is the feeling ST had when she woke up that day, and said she needed to go home. perhaps this is how maids feel when they first start working for a new employer, and they run away from the home in a bid to escape to the embassy.

i know this will pass, and there'll be a settling down, and that on the whole i am glad to have left the place. but in the meantime, i still remember blk 80 and octopus and blk 162 and chai chee (oh god, chai chee) and st helier's and expo. and i remember white chairs and rattan chairs and sitting on carpeted floors and black curtains and brown doors. and hours and hours and hours and hours of words and words and words and words and words.

it's a stevens sort of pain.

open and stuff and close. and
let fall a few

it is good.

"As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today." Gen 50:20

i thank God that he is slowly melting away the bitterness that i have been carrying over my lot. not that i was really stewing in that bitterness or anything like that, but i guess there was always that feeling of unfairness and the "why are things so crap" kind of mindset.

reading this verse today, i felt like i was finally cutting myself away from those negative thoughts. if indeed i believe, as Joseph did, that God is sovereign over all and that he is the one who arranges all things in my life, i am not then complaining against the school administration but against him when i bemoan my posting. and why should i have any cause to feel hard done by, if it was God who did it? for surely no bad thing comes from him, but only good gifts such as a father would give his child.

the knowledge that none of this is beyond God's control has probably always been there, just perhaps overshadowed by the fear that they would judge me harshly if i did not perform well with these classes and brushed aside in favour of the well-meaning consolations of well-meaning colleagues. but i am tired of worrying about my grades, and consolations provide scant comfort when i have to step into class. these insecurities and temporary balms have to go if i am to move forward. i only pray that God will grant me the grace to live this out, and that i would, like Joseph, declare that God meant all this for good, for his own good plans. and surely that is enough reason to give thanks for it.

You are my RO.

"Far above the Ephel Duath in the West the night-sky was still dim and pale. There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."

Tolkien, Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King



You are my white star.