About Christianity

i was a competitive runner during my school days. not that i am not in school now, well the time before my university days. so, every year i would try to win at least a medal for myself. most of the people know, runners have many injuries. well, most sports-person will have quite a few injuries. me too, i have no exception.

i injured myself back in high school, around 13 years old i guess. so, i did rest a bit, but i continued to run with injuries, and joining competitions. and the result is, i most probably cannot go into competitive running again. both my knees and ankles are quite damaged. hahax, i asked for it.

well, actually, i thought that in our life, sins are like injuries. just like everyone gets injured, everyone will sin. it is natural. not that we can help it. but even if we cannot help it, we don't go round sinning just because of that. because, you don't go round getting yourself injured for nothing right? the only difference probably would be, sin is pleasurable at that moment, while injuries only give you pain. in that case, injuries is better since the pain would warn you to stay away. sin gives you pleasure, and instead of chasing you away from death like what pain did to us, it instead invite us closer to death.

like injuries, if you don't treat them, they will get worse. maybe an infection if it is an open wound, or maybe affect you in many other ways. such as if i have a knee problem and i don't take care of it, i can be sure walking will be a problem. if an injury is there, usually we treat it. do we do the same for sin? if we sin and know we are wrong, do we treat it? do we correct our behavior? i can admit now, i don't correct myself always. and yes there are a list of sins i know i deliberately commit. i am not proud of it. well, since you are here, you can listen to the rest of this 'moral lesson' that i don't do it myself. maybe you would do it, if you think what i say is correct. haax. what am i saying?

so sin, like injury, will get worse if we leave it, or maybe if we continue to sin. like if i have an injury and i continue to run instead of rest, i am very sure the condition will get worse. if we sin, and we don't correct it, our sins will pile up and we will get more and more entangled in that web of death. maybe from envy, it goes on to jealousy, and then it goes on to plotting something bad, and the action of carrying it out. you see? i mean, i don't think envy is a sin, but this is an example of what could happen if we don't keep ourselves in check. once you reach jealousy, well i guess that is a sin.

what about old injuries? they do act up sometimes right? the cold weather? or maybe if you strain a little more in a particular spot, say the knees, the pain comes again. it is on and off. sometimes it is serious sometimes it is not. is sin like that? i guess so. even if we repent of our sins, sometimes we do commit the same sin again. afterall, the things we do are roughly the same. lying, gossip, watch porn?, looking down on others...etc.

even when we repent, sometimes we fell for the same sin again. it is not gone. but unlike injuries of which we have no control over, for sin, we can. through our willpower, discipline, and more importantly, God's grace and the strength He gives us. He can give you a lot of strength, but if you do not have the willpower to go against it or the discipline to want to avoid it, it is of no use. it is just like a swordsman giving up his sword. he being strong doesn't mean he will win, because he doesn't want to fight.

well, since we all sin, might as well gain something from it right? we do that with injuries. broken bones which healed become stronger. muscles which got torn down (though that is not an injury) will be replaced by better ones. injuries makes us aware of our actions and what we should do to prevent our body from getting damaged. they are the warnings to tell us to be careful with our bodies.

sin, in a way too, can be like that. but of course we need the help of God. we all do things we regret. and most of the time it is a sin we commit. lying about an important fact. backstabbing others. lusting about people of the opposite sex (and in that way we do not respect that person). refusing to lend a helping hand to someone in need. saying hurtful things to others. we regret them. and sometimes the guilt is very strong. at this time, since it is already over, and we cannot take back our words, all we can do is to improve the situation or prevent the 'next time' from happening again.

apologizing may not help, but in many other cases, it does. trying to make up may not help, and may make us like a hypocrite, but if we don't, then the relationship might really be gone. the guilt is there. and the next time we want to commit the same sin again, we have this pain in us to remind us to take care of our conscience. but of course, we have to remember that pain, and the consequences, if not, there will be no lesson learnt.

like injuries, sin is normal. it is normal, but it is no good. all we can do is to avoid it as much as we can, like any sane person would want to avoid injuries as much as possible. sin is no good, but if it is over then the only thing we can do is to reduce the impact. like how people wear knee guard to reduce the pain, we can try to make up. and then, we learn our lesson and repent, so that the next time, we will not feel pain again. lastly, like pain, sin is something we can do without. so, prevent it from happening before everything is too late. and of course, you cannot do it alone. ask God for help.

'It is true I cannot understand you. But it is because I cannot understand the pain, that I can give you support. It is because I don’t know the suffering, that I can encourage you. If I truly know and truly understand, then, maybe I could not even utter a single word.'

i like this phrase a lot. as usual, for the n-th time, it came from a story. how i wish i can come up with such beautiful lines. well, these lines were said by a man to a woman he loved, to the woman whose pain he could not understand.

have you ever have the feeling of asking people to shut up? sometimes do you get the urge to slam at people and shout at them and say, 'Don't talk about things you cannot even begin to understand.' all people have problems in their lives, big or small. what is small to you may be big to others, what is big to you may be small to others. there are different kinds of big problems as well. one person may grow up in a very poor family. the other may grow up in an abusive home (well i don't really call that a home anymore). the third may grow up alone, without family.

because of our characters, which i believe are given by God, which is also moulded by the environment we are in, we make different choices in the same situation. there arises different opinions. makes sense?

and of course, people make decisions that benefits them. nobody in their right mind will make decisions to harm themselves unless for a very special reason. even people who take drugs, i guess (since i never try before) they want to escape from reality or just for curiosity sake. to them, their benefits are escape from pain or satisfying their curiosity. that, is the benefit they derived from it.

because humans are logical beings, we make decisions that we deemed as the best for us. however, what we think is best for us may not be that way as others see it. back to the example, person A takes drugs because he wants to escape from reality and the pain, but person B might not see it that way. he might see going for counselling to be a better option.

this is a small example. bigger, more common examples would be abortion, euthanasia...etc. i am not going to talk about that now in this post. this is not the point of it anyway.

sometimes we see people doing things as wrong, whether it is very obvious or not, and sometimes we slammed the people straight in their faces. scold them, criticize them, whatever. or maybe we didn't do this ourselves. but people do this to us. i am excluding your parents and your teachers punishing you because you are naughty, ok? lol.

and when that happens, sometimes we tend to or actually shout back, or get shouted back, 'what do you know?' or 'don't talk about things you cannot even begin to understand!' when people threw this words at us, or when we throw it out at others, what is the emotion we are feeling? i can say, almost 100%, it is anger.

for simplicity sake, we assume we are the one shouting at others. so, we feel angry. why? because there is this joker, who didn't even understand our pain, didn't even understand our situation, didn't even understand a single thing, came and condemned us. this person, who did not even go through the pain himself, actually scolded us. he who did not know anything has no right to say anything. that is what i always thought. really.

but why? that is in contradiction with the very first paragraph of this post right? the reason i said that is because the first thing people do is to condemn. maybe people are like that. maybe we ourselves are like that. how many of us, before we say something, even bother to understand the person right in front of us?

the fact that a person is smiling happily doesn't mean he has no troubles. people don't usually wear their feelings on their faces. there is no need to tell the world you are in trouble. people are not interested. we wear a mask we called 'smiles'. naturally, as if we are born with that talent, we can switch to that mask whenever we are with people. we are so gifted at that we don't really consciously tell ourselves to keep the mask on. it is as easy as breathing, as walking, as eating.

so, when we see the person standing in front of us, do we understand him/her? how much do we know about him? when we condemn, or scold, or criticize, why do we do that? yes we know he might be wrong, from our perspective. so? why do we condemn? is it because we care for the person in front and want him to turn from his ways? or is it because of that self-righteousness inside of us that we allow ourselves to be the judge over him?

if it is the latter, i guess it would be better for us to shut up. because we accomplish nothing. nothing at all. so what if we declare judgement on the others, when we are not even supposed to do that in the first place? does it help? no.

if it is the former, that we want to help, then maybe, or we should, get the situation right first. yes, he may be wrong. but how do you feel if someone who don't know a thing come and tell you what to do? you wouldn't like it, and you would reject it. i know i would. but if you show you care, you show that you want to help, and instead of condemning him, you gently tell him what is wrong, or by practical efforts show that you really want to help, then, wouldn't it be a much better choice to make? wouldn't the result have a higher chance of turning out to be more positive?

different people have different capacity of stress and pain, sorrow and despair. maybe the person who suffered, he had already suffered more than you can ever bear. maybe he suffered a pain greater than you imagined, such that if it were you who were the one going through it, you might already have long been gone, or made a much worse choice.

because we have not gone through it, we have no way to understand the person in front of us. but also, like the man said, it is because we have not gone through it, that we can see things objectively, that we can encourage, that we can help. because we still have that hope, because we still have that energy to move. because we can, and able to pull the person up to a place where there is light. of course, a person who went through the same pain and came out of it would be a much better person to help.

the above 2 paragraphs seems like a contradiction right? i guess i will explain it later.

all that i said just now, they were of course somehow extreme. we don't usually meet people who despair. but we do meet people who are in pain most of the time, whether we are aware or not. but it comes down to the mentality of us when we face others.

i will now explain the contradiction. if we don't have a mentality of wanting to help, then we should shut up. like i say, we might not take the pain if it were us. so instead of condemning, it would be better for us to walk away.

if we want to sincerely help, then, we would have to make use of the hope and strength we have to pull the person up to where there is light. of course, give the person the right hope, not the wrong kind of hope. i made a post about that on the blog post 'hope is cruel'. go see that if you want to.

we understand nothing. and from there, depending on your mentality, for the same situation, we could greatly affect people in 2 very different ways. if one day, i am asked, 'what do you know?', i hope i can come up with a reply as beautiful as the one made by that man who has the love for the woman.

a teenage boy was jumping off the top of the building. and as he fell another person jump out of the building too, to save him. the following conversation was also something i could not forget:

'why did you save me?'

'because if you die, everyone will be very sad.'

'in this city, who would be sad for someone like me, who don't even know his real name?'

'i will be sad for you, is that not enough?'

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is that familiar? again, this is taken from a story. one reason i love stories other than the fact it provides an escape to the reality we live in, is that authors, they really know how to write beautiful stories sometimes. which is also one of my goals, to write a beautiful story.

for the benefit to those who did not know about this particular story, the person who jumped out of the building to save that boy was his king. the king had jumped out to save his own man.

in our lives, we will make friends. some are temporary, some are longer. some are good friends. some are not.

there are those of us who make many friends. be it your looks, talents, characters etc, you have made friends wherever you go. some of us don't. wherever we go, people don't like us.

if there is a reason why you are an outcast, most probably the reason lies with you. the problem lying with you does not mean you are wrong. maybe the whole group is wrong. maybe you are wrong. well i am not here to talk about that. but what i can say is, most probably you will need to correct yourself to fit in. but if the group you are trying to fit in is up to no good, i suggest you remain an outcast.

because i don't like to talk to strangers, i made friends slower than most people. sometimes it happens that people all have friends and formed their own cliques, of course i am still alone. well i asked for it.

anyway, if you are alone, sometimes you looked at other people and you envy them. i guess friends are like shoes. you walk on the road you called life, or the chessboard you called life (which is of course not true, look at the post titled 'micromouse'. i explained that in detail), and sometimes it is hard to walk. with shoes, walking is easier. sometimes you feel you can keep on walking. without shoes, you get blisters, it is painful. it is hard and painful to walk, but it is not impossible to walk.

to those of you who don't have friends, be it because of others' prejudice or your own fault (at least correct it if you know it is your own fault), we sometimes imagine things. maybe if we die today, how many of the people we know (with the exception of our family) will cry for us? how many will be sad for us?

even if the whole world does not know you, even if the whole world does not feel sad for you, even if the whole world could do without you (erm for this it is almost true for everyone?), there is one who would feel sad for us. you guessed it. this is a christian blog. no matter how the topic spins, it always comes back to the same point.

yeapx, Jesus, our Lord, our King, our Friend will be sad for us. maybe i shall quote a Bible verse (first time i do that in this blog!). Isaiah 63:9: In all their distress he too was distressed, and the angel of his presence saved them. In his love and mercy he redeemed them; he lifted them up and carried them all the days of old.

Like the story, we have a King who feels sad for us, who cares for us. our King is not a King who rules over us like slaves. our King knows us. maybe if you think you have no friend in this world, always remember you still have a Friend who knows everything about you. even if you have a whole lot of friends to make people jealous, there are things which we don't tell them. we all have a side we don't want people to know.

our Friend, He knows everything, whether you tell Him or not. maybe one day when you are sad, you can confide in Him, since He already knows everything and there is nothing you can hide from Him. lying would be pointless anyway, and i cannot imagine lying to God. maybe He would answer you during your confiding, or maybe He would choose to listen to you first. either way, He is always there for you. you just need to call Him. of course He is not your genie.

to those who don't have friends, to those who are lonely, to those who will be alone in the future, maybe life would be really hard to walk. really really hard. maybe one day we will be really sad. sad to the point where we don't wish to live. feeling pain to the point we wish we could give up anything to be free from it. i thought, if at that point, my King said to me, 'I will be sad for you, is that not enough?', i thought, i might be able to go on. He is not a King who only knows how to talk, He will provide a way out. please don't hope that you will be declared innocent if you murder a person.

when we walk the road we called life, it is great to have friends. if however, we don't have, just do remember you have a Friend who is your King. i don't know about you, but if it is me, i think it is more than enough when He feels sad for me. the Bible already said, He do feel sad for you.

chinese teacher left behind students and ran away on his own during the sichuan earthquake. what do you think of this statement which was in the news? what is the first impression you have?

let me see..... he don't deserve to live. he is heartless. he is a coward. he ought to die. he is not fit to live. a rotten man. are these the thoughts that came into your mind? if it is, see, you made another mistake. because, who are you to condemn him?

let me say first, i read the headlines, and not the article. but what i am saying is not related to that. that is not important, because, i am going to address the issue of humans judging one another too quickly. no, i am not defending him. i am not judging him.

so he ran, leaving behind his students and leaving them to die. he got slammed, he got flamed and he got condemned. maybe you think he deserved it, because if he just stayed, he might have saved some lives. some of you more noble people may have sacrificed your lives to save that few kids, or as many as you can. afterall, they are children with a bright future. fair? it seemed so.

how about we look from another perspective? his perspective.

what if his parents had not yet died? what if he has a family to support? here, i am assuming his parents are still around and he has a family to take care of. please note, in china, the women do not work, or seldom work after they got married. traditional thinking. the man brings in the bread. in china, you only have a kid. his parents most likely only have him as the only child.

now... the situation in front of you. an earthquake. someone got to die. you either save the kids and risk dying, or you leave them to die and get a higher chance of survival. obviously, he chose the second one. are you condemning him again? think about it again. if he die, who is going to take care of his parents? if he die, who is going to take care of his family? would you save a few kids and let your family suffer, or risk getting condemned and slammed and insulted and flamed but able to live on for the sake of your family? so what if your name got written down in the newspaper as a crisis hero who died but your living family suffered? if you die, that's the end of you.

no, i am not saying the reason why he ran is because of that. he might have other reasons. or he might just like you say, a coward who care for nothing else but for his survival. what i want to say, people do things for different reasons. who are we to judge him? if i have a family, i would rather get condemn and live, than to die a crisis hero. planning to slam me? you better not do it on my website.

same for other things. sometimes people do things that are 'evil' or 'bad'. we are quick to judge. we hear one side of the story and we jump to conclusions. always being full of ourselves, always think other people are no good. but what if, we are in the same situation as them, what would we do? 'i would definately save the children.' is that what you think? no. unless you go through the whole thing yourself, you are not fit to comment on anything. yes. not fit. because no one can talk about what they do not understand. it makes us an even worse hypocrites than we are right now. we may think we will save the kids, but when the real thing came, what would you do? what would you do?

i am not saying you are also another coward who will run away. who knows? you might be a hero. you might be a coward. you might stay. you might run. whatever you do, who are others to judge? everyone has different purposes in life. who are we to judge others?

so, the next time something like that happens, big or small, in war or peace, in any kind of situation, do not judge. of course, i am saying this as a person who has not undergo any tragedies in life. maybe, if something bad happen to me, like someone come and kill off my loved ones, i would condemn him too. because we always talk about things we don't understand. always.

but there is this statement (from memory) from a character in a game (True Tears) i played, which is translated as :

it is true i cannot understand you. but it is because i cannot understand the pain, that i can give you support. it is because i don't know the suffering, that i can encourage you. if i truely know and truely understand, then, maybe i could not even utter a single word.

what i want to say is, encourage people, and not judge them. i am saying this from the point of a person who never experienced a single tragedy in life, which is why i am able to say it. this post is kind of contradicting, eh?

my little sister was helping my mum to cook dinner when she accidentally scalded herself. of course, it was painful. even an adult would find it painful. so my mum put some toothpaste on her palm and spread it on the injured area. of course, as we all know, it was still painful. so my little sister was sitting on the sofa alone crying, silently. my mum told her not to think about the pain, but to focus on other things. of course, it didn't work.

then i told my little sister that i would watch her favorite anime with her. she started watching anime by the age of 5, under my influence. i sat beside her and watched with her. and then soon she focused so much on the anime that she forgot her pain. and soon after the pain had subsided more or less.

moral of the story? in life we too sometimes have pains in our life. not that we want it, it just came to us sometimes. or maybe sometimes we asked for it. regardless, it is still pain. what can we do? we can focus on Jesus and take comfort that He is there looking after us. but what if even though we know we should focus on Him instead of the pain, yet is like my little sister who cannot bring herself away from the pain? then we need someone else to encourage us. of course, if there is no one to do that for us, then we have to deal with it and look to the Lord ourselves.

but if we see another person in pain, would we extend a helping hand? turn his / her attention away and help him / her to focus on the right things instead of the pain? if it is within our helping range, we should do it. of course, even now when saying that i feel like i am a hypocrite, because when the time comes, i might not do it. the person in pain may be my hated person (even though i should not hate anyone), or that it is too troublesome. but then, when we are in pain, don't we all hope for someone to comfort us and point us to that light of hope?