Have A Blessed New Year

Have a blessed new year everyone! 2008 has not been the best year for most people, but thank God you're alive! I can sense that 2009 wikk be a great year for many peoples. Make your resolution and stick to it! And if you have not found that one thing that makes you happy and completes you, I pray you will find it this year. to all a HAPPY NEWYEAR! I'm in Malaysia right now, will post all about my trip when I get back.

Merry Christmas!!!!

Yays, it's Christmax time! Yays, look at all the bright lights! Yay, Ben finally returned me my battery! Jokes aside, I had a wonderful time at orchard road these few days, all the bright lights, Carolers, dances, drama really shout out: HEY!!! IT'S CHRISTMAS, PEACE ON EARTH GOODWILL TO MEN!!!! CHRIST IS BORN!!!!!!
I especially like one musical I watched on the 20th telling the birth of Jesus Christ in a not-so-conventional way. It was hilarious, touching and wonderful, I can't believe they're not getting paid for it! They used secular songs to convey the christmas story too. I can't remember which church it was but bravo to them! Anyways, I could really feel the Spirit of the living God moving through Orchard Road and I believe many people were touched by the many performances.
with all that said
PEACE ON EARTH GOOD WILL TO MEN

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!

God Answers Prayers

This is actually quite personal but I feel like sharing it with everyone. Quite sometime ago I was reading an article in Reader's Digest about an orphan boy. Because of the prison-like treatment of the orphanage he was in, even after he was adopted he suffered from a psychological condition that prevented him from loving his adoptive parents or anyone else. However, after years of persevering love and hardwork on the parents' side, the boy was able to grow up well and say to his parents "I love you".

No, the boy isn't me and that is not why I'm posting. After reading that article, I reflected on how many children around the world also does not receive the proper loving childhood that they need and this mars them badly through the rest of their lives. My heart really went out to all of them and I was filled with an indescribable sorrow and love for all the suffering children of the world. So I got down on my knees and prayed, pray that God will help them, pray that He will give them the love that they need andbring them out of their suffering.

You might say "Hey, who do you think you are? You think your one prayer can help the children of the world?". Well guess what, I'm sure I'm not alone and even if I am, my ONE prayer does count, because I pray to my eternal Loving Father in heaven. Last Saturday I was at YCK CC for my piano lesson when I approached the news stand where the elderly folks would gather to read the news. There was only one available paper which was the "World" section of The Straits Times. Guess what the first page I turned to read? It went something along "Terrorist Vow to Stop Recruiting Children". It was very elating, God was answering my prayer!I didn't read in detail tho cause I was going to be late for piano but I got the gist of the entire thing.

Now you may say "Hey that would have happened even if you didn't pray for it, besides that's not the WHOLE world," Well, what if it DIDN'T happen? In any case I'm just glad my prayer had contributed to that. And I know it's not the whole world but it IS a start. Next time you feel sad about an event that's happening around the world, don't hesitate to pray for it. YOUR PRAYER IN CHRIST MAKES A DIFFERENCE.

Luke 13:34
"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!

The Scarlet Scarred Hands

I know that I may be superficial to say this since I wrote this poem, but this is simply beautiful

.

In the beginning they were there

hands that formed the the skies so vast

Hands too big for us to comprehend

became flesh to be scarred for us

.

Behold the scarlet scarred hands

nailed upon the cruel cross

Hands that made the very men

that would bring His death across

That our broken hearts He would come to glean

His scarlet hands have made ours clean

.

Come see the scars in His hands and feet

He is not dead nor does he sleep

Behold His hands reach out in love

they come to comfort, indeed to serve.

.

Until now I still stand amazed

How could God's hands fit into mine?

That He is mine to love and hold

The scarlet scarred hands put all sins behind

It's raining cat's and dogs!!!

Yays!! I met up with Darylene, Jordon and Shamien today to visit the furry critters of SPCA looking for a nice Bila bilabong to addopt. Not really we went there for a Student Leader project to help out as volunteers. We were first greeted by the glam-mama Ms Sebastian and told how we were to help out. So anyways we found out that were to escort several sec 1s around the kennels and catteries. So of we went to brave the perils of excessive fur and saliva. all the cats were either veeeeeeeery hyper or veeeeeeeery lazy, one of them scratched me! Oww...A lap catA towel cat....Just a moment ago he was playing "prey and predator" with the towel, guess who won? And now their fweeeens ain't it sweet?:DObviously an "old" man like me couldn't keep up with the hyper cats so I only took pics of the "garfields" man I'm sooo tempted to throw a piece of this pop art I made into the cattery and watch what happens next:D.BUNNY!!! HE'LL BITE YOUR NECK OFF!!!A beautiful but not so modest husky who's a major culprit of crotch sniffing. It even went under my friend's skirt on a separate visit He's a male by the way Yet another beautiful husky, this one's a bitch(seriously, maybe I should have used the term "female dog") An ever exubarant and bright-eyed cock spaniel.

It has been a great visit. I think my pants have some kind of dog pheromone in it, almost every dog I went close too was all over my pants, biting and otherwise, which left me in a ticklish dillema. Thank God I wore long pants. Do bear in mind that all these animals are the result of irresponsible pet ownership. Personally I care more for the well-being of humans rather than animals but bear in mind that these little critters are creations of our one God too so cwe must love and care for them. On behalf of the SPCA I would like to give 2 messages "Do not buy a pet on impulse" and "To you, he might just be a pet but to him, you're EVERYTHING"

Give Me Your Love

This is the Poem I wrote in Surabaya,

Give me Your love

to love those unlovable

Give me Your love

to reach out to the lost

So sweet Your love

that enables the unable

I need Your love

to tell them You've paid their cost.

Missions Surabaya Reflection

Shalom! I'm finally back from Surabaya. It has been such a fruitful trip, it was a pleasure doing the Lord's work. To start of, this mission trip is actually a medical mission in which we will give free consultation and medication to the people living in the slum area. Rest assured, our team is made up of fully qualified Singaporean doctors(whose names I will not mention) from hospitals like TTK and Mount. E.. In any case this is an outline of the 3-day trip. PS I will not disclose any names(except me and my mother of course) and location of the medical centre due to publicity issues. Day1: Arrived at the vicinity at around 9am after landing in Surabaya. Okay! I'm here! But frankly speaking I had no idea what they're goonna ask me to do hm...The makeshift medical centre is actually inside a local secondary school.On that day, they were giving out free haircuts on the second floor, sweet!This is the registration and this is where we measure the patients' blood pressure and temperature. Why's the woman glaring at me like that?.....After that the patients are off to the health talk. As they say, prvention is better than cure.Look it's me!! haha I found out that I was going to be an usher and to call the next patient. Pleeeease dun call me a nurse-__-" A doctor hre examining a patientAnd then it's off to the apotechary.medicine! of course they dun leave just like that, for those who are willing, we send them for counselling.Then for those are willing we pray for them. Sigh one disturbing fact was that, women were breatfeeding all over the place!! At first I thought the babies were just biting their moms' clothing, wait a minute! That ain't clothing!!! At around 4.30pm we ended all operations. There were alot of flop ups on the first day, at the beginning, all the patients were holding on to their cards so the ushers(me) had to run around searching for the right patients.... So frustrating.... Yeah then we got smarter and took away all their cards and everything went MUCH better. So this proves that even(especially) when you are doing work for God you have to have good management and planning skills, God won't appear and clear up all your messes for you just like that. My greates ordeal was the first day, as the crowds died down, there came an old lady decked in a green kebaya. I sesed there was something not quite right about her, when she touched my arm, my arm, my nose mulfunctioned, She smelt as if she hadn't bathed in months! But I know that the Lord calls me to love these people. So no matter how hard it was, I guided her to the psychiatry doctor(she was mentally handicapped) and I hoped that we were able to touch her. In any case I felt quite guilty that night, you know why? Just look at the next pictureYES!! THAT was my hotel! I felt really guilty when I thought of how those village peoplee had to call that slum their home... So that night I reflected on all that has transpired that day... and I wrote a poem down which I will publish in another post. Day 2: alright so we made a few adjustments to the consultation room. now it's muuuch spacier and the system was sooo much more efficient.the ushers' corner this bottle of disinfecting gel was FULL when we arrived. the patient's card.
After the crowds died down, I went from Usher, to Pharmacist, to GARBAGE TRAMPLER, and after that I'm STILL out of job!

There was a very sad scne on that day tho, one female patient was paralyzed with AIDS. She was carried to the back curtains so I did not see her. It was very sad. Otherwise everything was quite similar to the first day. Except for a few incidents that transpired. Question, when a big guy takes control of your post in a way you don't like, what do you do? a) Stand up to him and tell him to the face b) suffer under his system c) run off to a beauty spa. guess which choice my mum took? Then that night, there was an EXCEPTIONALLY sinful dinner. We went to a portuguese(did I spell that right?) diner that night where the rib eye steak costs FIVE DOLLARS!!!!! yumyum. haha even the others said that my mom was giving me a wrong example of what missions should be like. haha I was telling them "hey all those books on missionary I read never involved any buffet breakfast and eating medium well rib eye with dessert!"the doctors and Irelaxing after a hard day of work. the sinful delights we had bought for the children in the orphanage my mom helped to raise.

Day 3, The last day was ironically the most efficient day as the system was already firmly set.ALRIGHT! Let the multitudes come!me being a makeshift interpreter.my mom giving the health talkA fellow usher and I prescribing the patients to the specialist doctors. For lunch me and my mom did something quite sinful, we sneaked of to Shangri-La hotel to have a buffet lunch and only after that went to the orphanage to pick up some sick children:P.the staff and children from my mom's orphanage.one of the children and I.

Well, had the best beginners, missions that I could ask for. There was one other thing. Throughout the second and third day, the media tried to video us but we denied them access no matter how persistent they were. I just hope the people of the village dun suffer anymore because of them. Anyways I truly enjoyed serving God. I can't wait to go for the next missions. If you are a follower of Christ and you haven't went for a mission trip, I highly recommend you to go for one. Well for now, it's home sweet home for me:D The view I took from the plane.

In Surabaya

haha finally got a chance to use a computer. I'm blogging from Surabaya nowXD. Helped alot of people, more than 800! The trip has been VERY enriching so far. Can't wait to get home and post more about it. Gotta go now.

Missions Surabaya

I'm blogging from inside Changi Airport lol. In any case, I'm going on my first mission trip to Surabaya. It is with my mother and her friend's church group and It's basically a medical mission and we will be helping out at a clinic to medicate the people in the rural area. It is a dangerous place and the persecution is very likely, so dear brothers and sister, please pray for me. That we may serve God well and that many people will be saved, physically and spiritually. Well I think my plane's going to leave me if I take any longer, so until next time. I'll come back with lots of pics.

Shepherd of my soul...

This song truly encapsulates the meaning of God being our Shepherd I love it. This is where I drew inspiration for my name AGS.thx pinoy4you!

Time of testimony

Last Thursday, the PM guys went to Ben's house for an outing. To start of, we watched "Bruce Almighty" but the point of the outing came much later. Oh yeah not forgetting the pop-corn incident, sorry Ben, I'll buy your mom a new pot! In any case at around 6pm I asked the guys to share their testimonies about their past, how they met Christ and how Christ changed them. This was the higlight of the outing. A lot of dark pasts were uncovered and laid in the open, a lot of dirty secrets were told. Of course I'm not gonna mention any of them here but I realized something while this was going on. None of us had a very happy childhood and what more, many of us went through nearly the same secrets and mistakes! I really do not think this is by coincidence. I believe that many of the things that a guy in the concrete jungle has to face is not faced by him alone. I could really identify with my friend's experiences and I'm sure they could also identify with each other.

Then I wondered "How could anyone ever use the term 'You Think You Understand Me? You Think You Know What I'm Going Through? Well You Don't!'" It sounds like a cheesy line from a chinese soap opera but many people still think this way. Indeed no one can understand another person fully, only God can do that, but ironically, how could a person not understand someone when he is going through nearly the same thing? When a friend seeks to counsel or comfort you next time, try to listten to him/her and correcting some points first before blowing your friend off.

Every person living in the same place has to wade through the same pile of crap.

Brastagi/Lake Toba/Medan Trip

Woohoo! I had a trip back to my home town recently. It's amazing how much more you see of it once you've grown up. Thank God it didn't rain the ENTIRE week I was there! Here is my fuzzy recollection of the series of events...

Day1: Arrived in Medan International Airport. It turns out that I would be staying in a villa that belonged to my relative. It also turns out that my relative owns a huge farm and is a major vegetable exporter to Singapore, Japan, etc! When I arrived at the villa my jaw dropped. It was HUGE. The Living room, or maybe I should call it the lounge?The SECOND Living RoomThey have 3 dining tables, THREE!This is just one of the FIVE bedrooms there.

It's great to have rich relatives, but I'm content with my small condominium haha, did I mention they have also have a large backyard full of different types of orange trees? I didn't take a full view of the garden but I took a picture of the orange tree.

This is the view from their backyard, their BACKYARD!!! Imagine getting up everymorning seeing this!!!!!

Moving on, we went to the soon to be Pearl of Lake Toba Resort which will be completed end of next year(I think). anyways, eventho it's not completed yet, you can see how great it will be already. Here are a few snapshots of the place

The lamppost is NOT why I took this picture!! me and my brother The Cafe there

Chilling out. The two women at the front are my mom' friends. The woman in black and whte stripes is my mom.

There are other facilities, some still being built, such as golf course, farm, etc. Btw, here are some interesting facts about Lake Toba: 1 It is large enough to hold 3 Singapores. 2 There's even an Island in the middle of the Lake.

Day2: We went to Brastagi which is a mountain near Lake Toba. Uncle Rio(the relative in whose villa I'm staying, He's not as old as his name would suggest) kindly brought us to his farm. Usually it would be strictly off limits but since we're relatives, he's giving us a special privilege, yay! He even let us pick some of his fruits and veges, yum! Btw Uncle Rio has SEVERAL farms these are pictures not just from one of them.Cucumbers! We got to harvest some of the cucumber, wash and eat directly! They were soo sweeet:D Citrus! Tomatoes!
Paprika!Me Picking the Paprika Shades of my shirt! The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few indoorOutdoor
They have an interesting technique to reduce usage of pesticides on crops in the farm. They will grow bright flowers such as the marigolds above along side the hothouses. Apparently, pests will be more attracted to the flowers and stay on them rather than the crops. The flowers are then sprayed with pesticide to kill the pests. Thus the crops need less pesticide Aww...Ain't it cute and the next moment it's DEAD MUAHAHAHA!!! Just kidding:DSeedlings Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously.

When we got back for dinner in the villa IT WAS GREAT! The freshly harvested vegetables were quickly cooked and they were soooooo different from the veges we have here. For once in my life there were more vegetables than meat served on the table, and I enjoyed it more!!!
Day3: Okay so we have seen where the vegetables are planted, but where are they processed and packaged? Well that is what I found out on this day. Uncle Rio brought us to the packaging site. Here is where YOUR vegetables are picked for qualityBusy at workWhere your veges come inProcessed

Then packaged in these. Workers are required to pass through this water gate to ensure hygieneThis is where water from the factory is disposed. The water has to pass through 3 pools before disposed into outside. To ensure that the water is clean before disposal, they breed fishes in the third pond.

That's Uncle Rio explaining everything to us(I bet he's younger than you expected haha)

After that we went to a famous fruit market in Brastagi. I've been here before long, long ago when I was a wee child, ahh good times. It's so different how much more I see, now that I'm 15 though the market itself has not changed abit.
But what surprises me the most in Brastagi is the number of churches there! Nearly every kilometer we traveled had churches. Granted these churches are quite small and aren't as fanciful as the ones we have in Singapore. Later I learnt that long ago the Batak people(inhabitants of Brastagi) were canibals. Missionary after missionary came to give them the gospel, many of them ended up on the dinner table(assuming they HAD tables) but one day, the Batak people aactually sat down and listened to the message of the persistent missionaries. That was when God did his work in the Batak people's lives and changed them to be what they are now. YES that IS a church I know that some of these shots are not very good but give me some credit! I took it from inside a moving car!

Oh yeah one last Highlight off the trip was going to a restaurant at the edge of the Lake and have some scrumptious fish. We had fried goldfish! Not the chubby little goldfishes you find in aquariums but the more slender ones that somewhat resemble a koi. We got to see them catch the fish, beat it, scale it, slice it and gut it, All while the fish was alive!(actually it was already half dead) Wohoo! NC16 action! haha. It was goooooooooooood but I don't think you can get any tour guide to bring you here, it is a restaurant only locals would know. I was to busy watching the fishes get battered to take any pictures so sorry.

Day4-6

We left Brastagi and returned to my hometown! Medan! I missed it sooooooooooooooo much. The good thing about Medan is that no matter how long you've been away, you can still find everything nearly the same. All your favourite eateries you went to when you were a child. It's so great. Original Christian CDs are also waaaaaaay cheaper than in Singapore. One could cost about 50000Rp-75000Rp. 6000Rp is S$1 you do the math and yes they ARE ORIGINAL. I even got too see my old house!!! Too bad I couldn't enter, someone else is living there now. It's soooooooooo nostalgic. I can't believe someoneelse is now sleeping in my room... Well that's all for now the trip was very enriching and so nostalgic. I love my hometown no matter how bad some people may picture it to be.