About Christianity

In the city I'm not used to that's full of dirt,
I can't laugh the same and I walked with my head down
People pass by in a quick pace
I ask "has their dreams come true?" But I'm still struggling

I want to try living in the present
rather than returning to my childhood
It's my nature to be a coward

If I go to a sunny spot and stretch my arms out,
I wonder if I can go beyond the sky
that's what I thought
---

how many of you here do not dare to dream again? not because of anything, but because you are scared of failure. can you think of any time of your life when you are like that? i can. i thought, this is natural.

when we were younger (even though i am still very young) we dared to dream. impossibility seemed to be a concept meant for weaklings and failures. and then maybe we tried and tried. failed once. we got up. failed the second time. we got up again. the third time, we forced ourselves to get up again.

and then, as we tried to overcome the wall that we can never get over (at that time, maybe), we realized in the end, that maybe we are just only a weakling we used to say of others. and as time passed by, as we come once more to the wall we failed to climb, and we looked up, we thought, 'maybe, no more. i am tired. enough. i am really very, very tired.'

i think, as long as we are humans, we would have met with this kind of situation.

in a place where we are not comfortable with, we walked, with our heads down, unable to laugh. maybe we can laugh in front of others, but that would be a mask. because in the end, we would not be able to really laugh. because we know best ourselves we are not able to have a genuine laugh or a smile.

some of us could not lift up our heads. why? maybe it is because of the burden of failure. maybe because we dare not look at a place far far away, and say to ourselves, 'hey! i want to go over there!' so we walk with our heads down, not daring to dream about the future, seeing only the present, carrying our past failures with us. and then, we walked, following the others. where to? we don't know. anywhere. as long as the current state we are in doesn't fall off. anything better is a bonus.

and as we walk, we see people. those living in a city would know, the city is a busy place. tokyo, singapore, new york, london... people are rushing here and there. rush to work, rush for meals, rush to get home, rush to play. everybody is in a rush. and maybe once again we asked ourselves, 'has their dreams come true?' maybe. maybe not. who knows? everybody is rushing, as if there is something they must do. as if that is essential to their dreams. maybe it is. maybe it is not. again, who knows?

but, no matter what we think, that is still the life of others. we are still, walking with our heads bowed, walking with our failures on our shoulders, staring at the ground that is the present, not looking ahead which is the future. we are still struggling. for all we know, we are at a contradiction.

we just want to maintain the current state. but at the same time we envy those who has more. but even when we envy them, we cannot be like them. because we do not dare to dream. and if we do not have dreams, how can we work towards our goal? we want a better life, but we don't want to fail again. so we asked for no improvements in our life, yet at the same time we envy those with a better life. contradicting, isn't it?

maybe, you want to say, 'what do you know?' or maybe, you want to say to me, 'you cannot imagine what kind of feeling that is.' but, like i said before, as long as we are humans, we would have gone through this stage before. and me, like the rest of humanity, at one point of time or another, had already gave up dreaming. and maybe, slowly, unintentionally, we had replaced our dreams with envy.

we want to try living in the present, like all of us are doing now. we don't want to go back to our childhood, because we are cowards. (again, see the opening of this post.) we don't want to go back and see once more the faraway place we used to look at. we don't want to remind ourselves of the place we wanted to go to. because we are cowards, and we are scared.

and sometimes, life do give us second chances, if we are lucky. maybe, the rainy days are over. the sun comes out once again. finally? maybe not. because we had given up on seeing the sun once again. maybe the rain was there for too long, long enough to make us forget the warmth of the sun, the brightness of the sun.

and when once more the sun comes up and once more we have a new hope, as we stretched out our hands, do we dare to dream? do we dare to dream that we can soar beyond the sky? the sun is up, and we have our past failures to learn from. we have already gone through the worst, what can be worse, right?

i cannot say for sure you will definately conquer the wall this time and fly up to the sky. it depends on your goal and your ability, as well as God. but, if we stay at the ground for too long, when one day we want to fly up, we would find ourselves not able to do so. the weather is nice, and the hope is bright, wouldn't it be a waste if we let the opportunity slip off? maybe we cannot fly as high up as we want. maybe, we cannot fly for as long as we want. but, anything is better than the ground, right?

so if today the dark clouds are no more, and the sun comes out... lift up your head and look to that faraway place, and stretch out your hands once more so you can fly over to that faraway place. because this city of dirt, this gloomy place, is really not fit for human living.

'the process of falling down is actually much more scarier than the state of being fallen.'

the above is really what i thought. it did not come from any story, not that i know of. it is just, this idea popped into my mind.

every human started from nothing. and from nothing we work our way up, whether with or without help from other humans, but definately with help from God. and then we climb up as high as possible, and maybe along the way we see all the others slowly falling off one by one. of course along the way, we will meet more and more capable people who are still climbing.

all that goes up must come down. it is the common sense law of the people. it did not apply in physics and in the law of gravity only, it also applies to us humans' successes. i guess one cannot keep on climbing up without failure. students try to study to aim for the top, workers try to get promoted, bosses try to expand their business...etc. everyone is working, and for every success there are many other failures.

i recently made a post about trusting God in all things, that He will give you peace if you trust Him. i think that's what i wrote. i am too lazy to go back and check. there is another situation i did not say, which is the reason why i am writing this now.

sometimes as we all know, failure is not immediate. sometimes it is a gradual process. how to say... it is like seeing yourself beginning to fail, to fall away, while you yourself cannot do anything about it. you begin to see other people succeed, and you yourself losing more and more things from your failure. so maybe you would want to say, you trusted God, and still you see yourself falling.

maybe if you are just given one big blow and you fell straight from the top, things might get better. because even in that state, it is still better than to see yourself losing and failing little by little. because the reason why falling is so scary is, you have no idea how much more you are going to lose. you have no idea how much more screwed or messed up your life is going to be. and the worst thing is, there is no one around who can help you. did i just accurately described what some of you felt at a certain point of time or another? if you haven't met with this kind of situation before, don't worry. your turn will come.

you would want peace, and maybe you did feel peace for that day after assurance from God. but after that, you find yourself getting hit in the face once more by failure. it is this impending doom you cannot avoid no matter how hard you try. so, how do you have peace? i seriously have no idea. because i am just 21, i don't have much experience. i don't have much failures to learn my lessons from. i only know someone who has more experience than anyone, more wise than anyone, and more capable than anyone. and He is God.

if i have to say something to console you (even if it totally doesn't work on myself), maybe i would tell another real life story.

i worked in quite a few places, and met quite a few people. all the people have a different story to tell. this is a story (or rather a comment) told by my superior, a middle-aged man who did not have much opportunities left compared to a younger person.

he said, 'when i was young, i tried very hard to climb up the ladder. i climbed and climbed, and when finally i reached the top, i realized the ladder leaned on the wrong wall.'

do you get what he meant? he is one of those who succeeded in what he did. but after getting success, he realized that what he got was not what he wanted. i thought, among all the stories told by my fellow colleagues, his was the most i could learn from.

failure, something not accepted by most of the people. and something almost condemned by the rest. nobody associates with losers, because they cannot gain anything from losers. but maybe, the act of falling down slowly but surely is God's own way to tell us not to be proud when we succeed next time, that for all those who fail, we are to show them compassion, because we know how it feels like. or maybe, we fail because He knew our ladder leaned on the wrong wall, and in His love and concern for us, He is dragging us down now so that we won't waste any more time climbing the ladder which we will later regret.

if this is any consolation to you who failed, then i think this post is not in vain. i hope, to those who fail, you will gain success one day, but still be humble and show compassion to those who fail. and most importantly, be grateful to God for the time He dragged you down.

of course, all these are my opinions. i have no idea what God is thinking when you failed, because i am not Him. i can only merely guess... you yourself should know the reason why you fail...

have you ever played micromouse before? it is a game where a small robot mouse (micromouse) navigate around the maze and then once it discovers the 'cheese' which is the center of the maze and its optimal route, it goes back to the starting point again and tries to get to the cheese in the shortest possible time. for more information, please go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micromouse for more details about the game.

when i was in high school, i represented my school to compete in the inter-school micromouse competition. i was the second in-charge of my team. preparation is usually split into 2 major areas - the algorithms and the calculations. for the algorithms, a person has to set the programme to instruct the mouse what to do if it came to a crossroad. for example, if the mouse comes to a crossroad in the maze where there are more than 1 paths to choose from, the algorithm programmed into it will instruct it where to go. algorithms will contain different instructions as to where to turn at different parts of the map. your mouse's speed of exploration of the maze depends on the algorithm.

as for the calculations, well the mouse has wheels, of course. so during my time, one revolution of the wheel contains 424 steps. my job as the 2IC is to make sure the mouse don't crash when it runs. for example, when a mouse do a right turn, the right wheel will move lesser than the left wheel. my role is to calculate to as accurately as possible how many steps to take for a right and left turn for both sets of wheels. it is tedious, as a tiny error in the number of steps, no matter how small it is, shows itself when the mouse is running and turning at high speeds.

what am i trying to say?

i think, we are like the mouse in the maze. the cheese is our final goal. and when we are born we start our journey towards the cheese. the problem is, if we are the mouse, then life must be the maze. some of us get lost in life, some of us hit the wall wherever we go. some of us crash, and some of us go in circles before we get to the cheese.

a lot of people don't like the idea that God has a plan for our lives and we are to follow it. it is almost like saying we are puppets, with no free will. i used to think like that too. i used to hate the fact that i, a human with intelligence, is unable to control my life. but if you look at it from another point of view, it might be a little different. God's plan is like the algorithm, only that it is the perfect algorithm. He knows the maze perfectly well (we don't know the maze until the day of the competition, after all the programming had been done) and knows which set of algorithm is for us. in fact, all our plans are customized, don't you think so?

what about trials? why do we face so much nonsense in life? why can't we have a peaceful life? i want a peaceful life too. but trails are like the calculations. without them, we will crash into every turn we encounter. just like how the calculations have to be very precise, the trails are there and they fit into our lives such that we would need them in the future. i am sure you learn things from well, the mess you had gone through? only after the trails are inserted into our experiences, like how the calculations are inserted into the programming, then we can run faster, run longer and will not crash at every single turn. we get to the cheese faster, the cheese meant for us to take when we are born.

i had a friend, who was a christian, but became a fallen christian. he rejected God. he believed there is a God, and that God will send him to hell if he rejected Him. he knew all these, and he believe it. but he still rejected Him. why? because he is very disappointed with God. i remembered once he told me, 'When i die, i am going to ask God, 'are you done playing with my life?'' if you are a christian, you may think he is a fool. or maybe he really is. but the fact was he was very disappointed. everyone runs into problems, some big some small. if you are still keeping your faith, congratulations. it is either your problem are small or you are given enough strength to cope.

like i said, we are just like the mouse in the maze. the problem is, if we depend on ourselves, we get lost. sometimes we see the cheese, but we cannot get it. because the way is blocked. sometimes we ended up going one big round. it might look like a darn big round, but it might well be the shortest route available. who knows? the other shorter routes might end up having a dead end.

God gave us the algorithm and the calculations. all we need to do is follow. of course we have a choice of following or not. if we follow, does it mean we are puppets? i don't think so. because we are getting help from Him when we follow Him. think of it this way: if you are lost in a city and you ask for directions, and the man you asked told you to walk straight, turn right, walk straight and finally turn left. you have 2 choices: follow or don't follow. if you don't follow, does it mean you are in control of your life? if you follow, does it mean you are a puppet?

like the maze, our life is full of bends and turns. we cannot really see what is ahead of us. who knows, walk another step, and there appears a crossroad. walk a few more, there appears another turn. this is the very nature of the maze. life, like maze, is never straight. even if there is a straight line, how long can it go? eventually, to get to the cheese, we need to make turns, need to come to crossroads. but the problem now is, we don't know the maze, because we are inside it. God knows the maze. but He does not want us to know the maze. He wants us to follow Him faithfully. if we do that, He will guide us to the cheese.

many of us, at one time or another, feel lost. we walk and walk, and we follow instructions. we take the trails. but that's all we do. it goes on and on. it doesn't really feel like we are nearing our goal. we are still on the outside of the maze, far away from the cheese. when can we get to it? maybe, preparation is not yet done. or maybe, the time is not right. we see many opportunities past by, and yet we did not get hold of any of it. we are frustrated. but what if, we are on one end of the maze, and the correct entrace is at the other end, one full square perimeter away? we are being guided, told faithfully to follow the algorithm (the plan for our lives), and told to go through every turn (the trials) we encounter, and go one big circle. along the way, we may, like the mouse come to many openings that seemed to lead inside the maze to the cheese (opportunities), but the algorithm says no. go forwards, follow the circle to the other end. after one long time, we are still outside, and seem to travel in one big circle. not accomplishing anything, not getting anything, while the others all go ahead and take the cheese.

how many of us are like that? i think, all of us. some were like that in the past, some are like that now, some will be like that in the future. maybe, my friend saw so many opportunities go by, or maybe there were just too many turns to take. follow the plan, it don't seem to lead us anywhere. follow our own plan, use our own intelligence, we crash into the wall. why? you experienced that before? no matter what happens, everything is in a mess. you are disappointed with everything, with everyone, with God.

but we are just a mouse. we need an algorithm, we need calculations. it is not enough to have only an algorithm, nor is it enough only to have the precise calculations at the turns. both need to come together. people have different sufferings, many are worse than mine. many went through tragedies. maybe because i have not went through such drastic turns, that's why i am not yet disappointed. that's why i can see it more objectively. that's why i am more willing to accept what God showed me.

we are the mouse. to get to the cheese, we need help. the plan and the trails are not meant to make us puppets, nor is it meant to play with our lives. they are neccessary to get to the cheese. when we are lost, when we feel like not moving ahead, when we don't know what to do, always ask God for help. He can see the maze, we can't. follow Him faithfully, and you will get your cheese. just like asking a stranger for directions, remember, following directions does not mean you have no free will. you know you will crash into the wall on your own. and that, is not free will. unless you said to yourself, i want to crash into the walls.