It has been one month since I last enter any updates on my life. Time really flies by you, especially when everything comes to you at a fast speed, so fast that i can hardly breath. but yet it is in madness of rushing for assignments, papers, exam (that finished today!), the Lord is speaking clearly. The reading of many textbooks, many volumes of biography of Hudson Taylor and the bible, all these had ministered to me, refreshes me spiritually, emotionally and physically.
i think this one month, my prayer life has been challenge for i reading D.A. Carson's book titled, "A call to spiritual reformation." During the Good Friday and that weekend totally off from doing my assignments, as i felt that a burnt out is on its way to visit me. A burnt out that almost forced me out of ministry, out of school, and wanting to run away from everything that i know about, everything that i care about, everything that i love! It starts with a silence of prayer in my heart...to repent...
Burnt out is on its way, due to my lack of sleep, tiredness for i am working late nights to finish my assignments on time, catching up on lost time. I even told my close friend in college, that i just want to go for a holiday and take a break from school! at this moment, i realized that my heart is tired and badly wounded. Realized that everything demands my time, life still goes on even after my father's death! WOW! It was that bad, that my mind becomes a devil's playground, started to have negative thoughts, things like, "Ron, you are in a Christian College, yet no one asked you how are you coping with the lost of your father, no one loves you, no one, not even your closet friends even asked you out for coffee and chat with you. The church that you serve still demand from you, and did not asked you whether you need a break or not. The pastors that are suppose to be your shepherds, they are not even leading you." What lies!
"Ron, no one really loves you!" This is the ultimate pouch line for me that is constantly playing in my mind, slowly my heart is buying into the idea as well.
Yet later on the same week, I met up with my two pastors that i am attached to, we had a good time of talk and sharing, evaluating my ministry in the church. Realized that they really did care for me, they really love, but sometimes they know that i needed the space, yet they knew that i needed the time to work on my assignments. So therefore waiting patiently for me to open up when i needed to. Love express in silence is gold!
This month i took a different slant in terms of balancing my time, my lifestyle, my commitments, all of them i have re-prioritize them again. Spending time in prayer was the main focus for the past month, spending a lot of time praying, and to be re-charge through prayer. Reflecting and spending more time going for runs! And now i can run up to 5km without stopping, but at a very slow pace, of course! yeah!
Giving time to my mother was one of my greatest priority during this season! i really think that i have neglected her too much, cause i have been using almost all my free time during weekends working on my essays. I speak to my mother only when i am at home, seriously, i feel very sad and guilty, what kind of a son i am, saying that i am a Christian, focus so much on studies, yet did not spend time at home and even with her. Took her out on one of the Saturday, went out for shopping, she was overjoyed, despite of going at 7pm, talking to her and buying stuff for the home, just really make her day, then i realized how badly she needed to be with me as well, even though each time, she said, "Ron, go and study, mum understand it, you need to catch up."
What a mother, who is constantly thinking about her son, than her son thinking of her. What love! A love that can only be found in Naomi, a bible character, who asked her widowed daughter in law to remarry and settle down. What love was shown. O Lord, grant me thy love to response to my mother like Ruth. To love her back with the kind of love that is shown to me.
At mother's day, went out with my mum, elder brother, sister-in-law, my grandma and my mother's younger brother. I could see that my mother enjoyed the time we had, went to one of her favorite place for dinner at Bukit Timah, where it serves good curry fish head! =). But sadly the conversation on our journey to the makan place, my mum asked me, whether she should sell the house.
i told her, if you sell the house, where you going to stay? She said that stay with my elder brother, i said, good then. but she continues, i am going for holiday and not work, so that i can rest. but the rationale of not working does not work well with me. cause i believe that she will be so bored for she got so much time, too much time to kill that i think she will be bored to death. All she wanted is a holiday with the whole family at the end of it. i said good, will try to find time together, but no need to sell your home!
only when we reached home that night, only left with the two of us, then i found out why she asked the question about moving house and to get the money? She said, it was a test of love, a test who really love me in the family. I was like, WHAT! why do you doubt our love for you? i asked.
This is done, to test your love towards me.
My mother told me, love is not just showing love outwardly by doing things for people to see, but rather love very much starts from the heart and you have shown me that you loves me by asking me not to sell the house since a few years ago and today again. She said, "When you are at home, you do not talk to me much, for when we talk, we usually talk over meals or at night when i come back from work. You may be quiet at home, doing your own things, but one thing for sure, i need to know that you love me."
Love is not done for the world to know, but in the quietness, especially when in silence of prayers, love is not absent. God is not absent in this season of my life, for He knows, and that is what really matters for me. The silence hours of prayer of Jesus is done out of love, not for the world to see. For love is not absent in silence, but rather in silence, that could be the greatest manifestation of love itself and in its totality.
Thank you all for your silence prayers, your unknown love for me as you give me space to breathe! Really greatly appreciated it! I know that I am love by you all who read my blog, through your small acts, your unspoken friendship, and most important, your silence prayers!
O Lord, teach me to pray in silence and in love like You did. Amen...
