Nice Comfy Sofa

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Nice Comfy Sofa,
originally uploaded by kelvin and chia yen.

Finally photos of our new place is up on flikr! Simply click on the photos to view more

We are moving …. Again

Sorry everybody. I know we are making life rather troublesome for you all. Changing links on your blog etc etc. But we are moving again. I promise, this will be the last time or at least for the next few years. Will try to stick on this time round. Word press at the moment is really not for us. BLogger is more user friendly, or maybe we are used to it. But at least it will motivate us to have more entries. So yeah … do join us at our new site!

http://www.psalm117.blogspot.com

The Toys came Alive

CIMG4099,
originally uploaded by kelvin and chia yen.

I came to office and was greeted by a funny sight. My toys came alive. Piggy was trying to give a shot(Strawberry) at goal. Winnie looked more like she was surrendering but she was cheering.

Married life, Birthday Celebrations etc.

Many people have asked me how married life is. In fact on Monday, i was ‘flooded’ with emails, msn messages etc. with, how was your Birthday? and How is married life? I know Kelvin has blogged about this before but I should share too, from a wife’s point of view. Well, married life comes with responsibilities and sensitivities i think. Expectations I have of my husband went up 101%, and along came many other demands (both small and big) along the way. In that God has been really showing me really, the difference between realistic and idealistic. To learn not to be critical and notice the speck with a big plank of wood in my eyes. I am guilty of accusing and complaining but all these times, my dear husband has taken them with Grace and love. I learnt what generosity meant and is still learning day by day, what it takes to give and not consume. God showed me the power of contentment and having the joy in HIM overides it all. We may not be perfect people, we may not have a perfect relationship, but we have a perfect God whom i can place my entire Hopes and desires upon. HE won’t fail me.

Communication, a major aspect in any relationship has grown to the next level in marriage. I think we have grown to be more open, and transparent as we learn to accept each other and be willing to receive anything both positive and negative alike.

Here are some highlights so far:

Breakfast prepared so that i can sleep in a little more and still get yummy proper breakfast … the chef himself, still 1/2 awake.

* Click on photos to see other photos

My birthday celebration of a sumptious BBQ at the national park in which we did not go walk the trail because haha I felt that shopping was more important and convinced that we should come back another time with more friends so that hiking (or rather walking) would be more fun!

I think i am blessed to be continued in time to come.

Oh yes, apart from all these, something unrelated, i have th privilege to share my Birthday with someone in Judah one

 Happy Birthday too Bong, have a great year of discovering and walking in His purposes. You’ll be greatly used my Him brother!!!

 

How much do you want it?

This is Roger Federer kissing the Wimbledon Cup for the 5th time in the role! Wah, I was thinking to myself, would I want to train so hard just to get the title 5 times or many times more. Well, I guess in the sporting field, the only objective is to attain the trophies within a particular sport.

I was trying to draw parallels to our Christian walk. My ultimate goal is to be like Christ. And at the same time reaching the lost with the Gospel to bring eternal salvation to them. How much do I want to attain the crown of righteousness from God? If I do want it very much, then how hard am I training myself to get it?

Paul Said this: ^{1Co 9:24 Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. 1Co 9:25 Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last; but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. 1Co 9:26 Therefore I do not run like a man running aimlessly; I do not fight like a man beating the air. 1Co 9:27 No, I beat my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.}

I am learning to be a man training in God.

Breaking past 300, 350 and 500 …

The church is a living organism which God has desired to grow. I hang on to the word of God that says that the vehicle in which God will manifest His manifold wisdom is the church. Some of the leaders and myself had the privilege to hear Ps Shirley from Hope Singapore share some insights to Church growth. It was a short session, however provoking to my inner being. I was provoked against complacency, its not normal when growth doesn’t happen. What is needed to break past our faith Goals is the joining hands of every single person. The growth of our wineskin speaks of the growth of leaders and seeing more leaders rising up to look after His flock. A relevent community which encourages people to want to be involved and the growth of people who are willing to be part of this community, and to serve our living God.

Ps Shirley shared that the Hope Sg youths grew from 30 to a striving 700+ today came with hardwork and also a culture where it bacame a norm to serve God, to love God and to rise up and be shepherds and leaders over God’s flock. Rather than following the norms of the world, norm to pursue money, status and career, norm to care more about self than others’ needs, norm to sit and wait for people to take initiatives. Wow, that was exactly what i felt stirred earlier this year. We need to realise that rising up in the House of God is such a privilege and it can be our desire! There is nothing wrong with that, nothing to be shy about, such a culture of people loving God, serving God faithfully and fervantly is to be proud of, yet humbled because it is not US, but God who has use us!

Let’s take the ownership to build God’s church, wanna take up the challenge?

Unemployment Tips with Inside Hope!

This week’s issue of Inside Hope was really good! It talked about being that 4.5% of those unemployed in Australia. When, unemployment seems like an important issue but not important for us to forsake God or serve Him less.

I found that the time I had being at home or church office, I really learnt a lot about the Word of God! I had time to read more of the Bible and also dig deeper into some lessons while editing and preparing them.

Though I am not satisfied with the fact that I am currently unemployed, I’ll do what I can to find a job and also still keep at all that I can do for Christ! And also praying hard that I’ll be able to find a job soon. God bless you all!

Which is better

I have been debating to myself all through lunch. Blogspot or wordpress. WordPress just feels so inflexible and blogspot is much easier and ‘fool-proof’ I can’t seem to add images directly uploading from my pc. All photos seem to need to go through Flickr b4 its up. Would someone advise some easier methods in using wp? This is rather confusing.

Why the migration

We’ve decided some time ago to start a site where both of us can blog. Snippets of life, lessons learnt, reflections …. We chose wordpress because we have heard of its more elaborated functionality, basically can do more stuffs with it. This also meant more adapting, cracking of my not very IT in tuned mind, but who says life isn’t a challenge? Challenges in life often ‘kick’ us out of comfort zones, to grow and improve. This is exactly what is happening, such sophisticated (to some may be as simple as ABC) tools like the widgets, forces me to read and try to understand. Well, hope i’m getting there.

Marriage calls for adapting too. No longer staying out to anytime, anywhere (not that i am a late nite out birdie), no longer settling for instant noodles just because i don’t feel like cooking. All these are mere lil examples and i guess the bulk of adapting comes through understanding of one anothers’ needs, feelings, learning to work together much closer in ministry, and the hardest of all understanding and constant working out of expectations and communicating in such a deep level, a level where besides God, the husband comes next in line. All in all, this adapting has taught me thus far to cherish and to give; To learn to give thanks to God for the man He has given; To be humble enough to say sorry …

This journey will go on, and with God, i know this new phase we have embarked upon will teach and cause us to be better people. To learn to agree with the Holy Spirit, with each other and let our flesh die to self centredness and indifference.

Haha incase you felt the heaviness of the sharing, i would like to quanlify that marriage life so far has been great. Despite the adapting, i have to say, i love to wake up and know that someone’s next to me, and that with a slight mumble of ‘backache’ massages comes along. I love this man who has willingly made changes to his life, just so that he gets a ‘happy wife’ ; to know too that though there will be times of conflicts, you know you can work through and iron it and not have to think whether he is the one, because we have already said “i do”.

A Sad Match But a Great Tournament

Sadly, Queensland did not win today’s game, but at least they won the overall competition. These men play do play their heart out. Everytime I watch the game, I’ll still have hopes and little peeks of ideas that I can still have a chance to play that game.

I remember playing contact NRL once with my dear Auzzie counterparts at my first Oceania Convention in Sydney in 2002. Haha, what an experience it was! The highlight of the game for me was when I was knocked over real hard. But still I would say I had loads of fun playing it and I would still want to play more of it!