Thanks But No Tanks

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Rings by educesar

Yet another friend got married today. Seems like 7 July 2007 is a memorable date for marriages because the date is easy to remember... 07/07/07. Some of us in cell group were talking about marriage and we were joking that one of the guys in my cell group should target to get married by 2012, if he wants a memorable date with this kind of pattern; 12/12/12 :)

My Friends' Wedding, My Joy
Anyway, maybe am getting on in years and one by one, my friends are getting married. Somehow, I enjoy attending my friends' weddings, because I really feel happy for them that they have finally found their life partners. As my friends walk down the aisle, I really find myself grinning from ear to ear with joy... dunno why I am so happy but then I really rejoice at seeing them settling down. (Picture "Everybody's Happy! 5 by woodsy)

Simple, Memorable Wedding
Today's wedding also went very well; it is simple yet memorable... It's so romantic that as the bride walked down the aisle, the groom was singing a this beautiful song and I must say he got a good voice :) At first, I thought they were playing a CD but then later realised that he was singing. They also had a music team comprising someone playing the piano, someone playing the violin and someone the guitar... it was really romantic :) And I can see that both husband and wife love the Lord very much.

Light Hearted Moments
There were also light-hearted moments when the pastor shared about their love story, as written by them. The bride wrote about how she met her husband-to-be at the church choir and how his big eyes, wonderful voice and big heart captivated her. In fact, she was even so forthcoming that that day, she went over to him to compliment his character and mentioned how she hope her children will be like him, woah, a brave first move. Then the pastor read the love story written by the groom, a wonderful love story of a male frog living in the well and his partner frog.

Then, when the bride and groom gave their thank you speech, they started off with an apology. Now that really got me wondering why they are apologising when everything seem to go so well. Then later, I realised that they were "apologising" to the people who wrote love letters to them, for disappointing them. That really made everyone laugh :)

(Picture "Cute Frog" by Elcadia)

One Thing I Don't Like about Weddings Though
It's always a sweet sweet feeling going for friends' wedding but one thing I really worry is the socializing after the wedding. Met my uni social work friends after the wedding ceremony but then somehow I had very little to say to them. Then, there was this tall "classy" "ang-moh pai" girl who was also my classmate, but then she seem to treat me as invisible. Anyway, really felt uncomfortable after a while and so left the church to meet my board gaming kakis :)

Thanks for the Gift but No Thanks
Met up with my board gaming kakis (friends who I have known since JC and their partners) for a simple evening. But then I am kind of saddened that it did not really go very well.

We were coming out to celebrate a friend's birthday but then it ended up with a few being upset. It all started with a bit of disappointment because the task of buying the gift seem to have landed on a friend of mine and I must really apologise to this friend for also forgetting to help buy the gift. We had earlier agreed to go to town to buy the gift but then somehow it slipped my mind.

Then, I think it became a little more disappointing because most people were late and some did not reply to SMSes. Finally, when the birthday boy came, we realised he did not like the gift we bought for him. We had bought him a PSP game knowing he likes Transformers. However, it seems like he has bought games the day before and did not like the Transformers game. So, we suggested returning to the shop to choose a new game. But then after looking through, he did not managed to find any he wanted. In fact, I am kind of surprised that he later asked us to take back the present for ourselves or even donate to The Salvation Army. In the end, we bought him dinner at Fish and Co and soon parted ways. I felt kind of awkward throughout the whole dinner and also after that and somehow felt bad that things have to turn out this way. I think everyone must have felt upset. Why like that ah?

Anyway, after we parted ways with some friends, some of us did adjourn to a nearby Mac to play my Ninja burger game... can be kind of fun but then can be quite confusing too. Think I bought the wrong game :(

But I want to thank this couple friend of mine who stayed with me to play my ninja burger game and also for blessing me with a little scroll with ways to manage stress, ending with a verse from Romans 8:31 "If God is for us, who can be against us?"

I Still Thank God for Blessing Cell
Cell discussion yesterday did not go as well as I expected although I still thank God for blessing it. It was amazing how much I learnt from the few hours of reading the bible on Thursday evening and how everything came together nicely, so much so, I worked out my discussion thread and was confident that it will turn out well. But, to the contrary, at several points in time, it seems that I was engaged in monologue and whenever I asked questions, many remained silent and in the end, I had to answer most of my questions.

I think I have learnt that I should not ask too many bible study questions because some of them may not have read their readings that week, so they can't answer. Instead, I should ask more life application questions, although I am still clueless how. Although it did not turn out as well as I envisaged it to be, I really thank God for a few things:

• For speaking to me when I prepared for cell and how surprisingly everything that week - my staff devotion, the devotion on friday's HQ meeting, the devotional guide in my 40 days of fast guide and the net research on the movie "Chariots of Fire", based on a true story of Eric Liddell - all clicked together nicely. It was as if God was speaking to me about the message of how God will honour those who honour Him as a message to bring to cell, despite the cell guide was on another topic.
• For supportive cell members who helped me by making the effort to take part in the discussion and for another cell member who went through so much to prepare her home for cell group, including going to buy drinks, cleaning the house, preparing a cute welcome sign on her door, and her mum also cooked red bean soup for us.
• For the discussion somewhat taking off towards the end as we discussed how we can sustain ourselves in our Christian walk or the "race"
• For my former cell leader's affirmation on how she was impressed with my preparation and how I took everyone through the bible passages, almost like a bible study session. She did however cautioned me to not rely too much on rhema word.
  But this somehow brought to my attention something: I am amazed how God worked through me because I could never have seen myself as being "knowledgeable" in the word. In fact, I would expect to be the very last person in the world to be "knowledgeable" in God's word but then, it seems that, by God's grace, I gave my former cell leader the impression that I was "knowledgeable" yesterday. But ultimately, it is not about how I appear but mainly, I reminded myself it is how much God has ministered to others through me. And also, it seems that God has been speaking to me, even though it is not the direct "speaking from the heavens" kind. This was what I desired but it did not become this clear to me until my former cell leader spoke about this.
  
• For the devotion I attended at HQ meeting yesterday because I had never thought that I would be sharing about it in cell group yesterday when we talked about sustaining ourselves in the race. Surprisingly, the topic covered at the HQ devotion was on Nehemiah and I did not intend to cover it for cell group discussion. I did look for ways in the bible which taught us how to sustain the race, but then they were all the usual stuff talking about discipline etc. But eventually towards the end of the discussion, I sensed that it seemed to have been a heavy discussion and the last thing I wanted was to slap them something else which is more "head" knowledge and something that everyone knows in their head already. It is just at this point that the sharing I heard in the morning came in handy. It was as if God knew that I would run into some difficulty about the topic and sent me the sharing in the morning.
  
• For the attendance yesterday
• For God blessed one of the members in my group, who has been irregular, and how she has came to cell yesterday
• For the relief when I saw someone, who usually looked very bored when I led cell, seem to nod his head in agreement when I shared about what I have learnt from the passage
  

Yes, I felt that it was a rather dry cell group discussion and pretty much of the discussion focused on the "head" rather on the heart. But I pray that God deposited lessons in each and everyone's heart so that it would minister to them somewhat, no matter immediately or in the near future.