a moment of inspiration

One Thing to be Sure of

2012-01-09T22:47:00.000-08:00

My daughter turned 3 last month. It has been 3 years of roller-coaster ride; from worrying about the various illnesses that she had during her first year, agonizing over her heart defect, to the pure joy of hearing her laughter and seeing her proud face after she had mastered new things.

Watching her grow, I realized not to take anything for granted. Every “simple” movement and activities, from walking to talking, we learned it a while ago. Someone must have invested a lot of time and effort to teach us those things we are performing automatically now. Ideally, that someone is (are) your parents.

I am thankful to be here now, to be able to work and provide for my family, to be able to write this entry. That means someone, in this case my parents, never give up on me, even during my troubled times. Believe me, among their children, I am the one who gave them most head (and heart) aches. No matter how many bad grades I brought home, they still encouraged me to do my best, to aim for good school. I used to rebel, I thought that was solely for their own ambition. Now I realized, even if there were some traces of parental ambition, I should be thankful that they still believed in me enough to still push me to do my best.

Imagine if they just gave up and told me that it would be a waste of money to continue my education. I will be happy at that time. Economically, it would make sense for my parents. It would be money better spend elsewhere, right?

Most of us do not think that way though. We love our children so much to give up. In fact, several prominent child psychologists stated that the most important goal of parenthood is to never give up trying to help your child.

I like the word “trying”, for I will admit readily that I am pretty clueless on how to best educate my child. However, I sure will try my best. The result is secondary. What is primary is love. Here is my resolution: no matter how hard or frustrating it is sometimes, I will never give up helping my daughter. Anything that she needs I will try so hard to provide or help her to attain them! I want to assure her of one thing that she will always have: my love.

Is my resolution novel? Not really. I have the best role model: God our Father. Unlike me, he sure knows what he is doing. One thing is the same: even though sometimes the result of his caring is not what we expected, but we can always be sure of one thing: His love!

To him be the glory and honor forever!

Voluntary Ignorance

2011-12-27T23:49:00.000-08:00

If you have visited a shopping center in Jakarta lately, and like me, you park your car yourselves, have you ever wondered why the parking management arbitrarily sealed off certain areas even on hectic weekends, wasting our time and burning unnecessary fuels because of the wait?

My theory is that if we give the parking attendants a signal that we want to park there, they will happily remove the cones, expecting us to give them tips. The concept is nonsensical for me. Why should I give them tips on top of the hourly parking fees that I am paying? It is just another example of everyday corruptions in this graft-ridden country.

To tell you the truth, sometimes I am tempted to do just that, pay a little more for the convenience. However, if I do that, haven’t I just supported corruption? Maybe that is one of the major causes that allow corruption and many other sins to persist: voluntary ignorance for the sake of convenience.

A Cheap Date

2009-05-30T18:26:00.000-07:00

Last week, our 5 months old daughter went into the hospital because the medicine did not have any effects on her dysentry. Needless to say, it was a very tiring time mentally for my wife and I. We just heard the week before that she has a heart problem, and now this? However, we agree that everything will work out for the best and we just try to do our part the best that we could.

We were so preocuppied of holding things together that I was unaware how my wife and I haven't had any personal time for a long time already. And one night, when our daughter was asleep in the hospital, we sat together on the bench outside of her room and just enjoyed each other's presence. After some time, we realized that God has just given us a chance to date each other at that moment :) It was a cheap date. We only had a bottle of mineral water and a bag of chips... we are easy to please huh?

I thank God for reminding me how much I love my wife, and also for reminding me that when you love someone, you just enjoy his/her presence and almost nothing else matters. If only we can apply it into our relationship with God. Just enjoy his presence, nothing else matter. The place does not matter, neither does the words, our clothes, our bodily position, nor the time of day. No pretense, no excuses... just us and God.

The Replacement

2009-05-20T15:50:00.000-07:00

I have been on emotional roller coaster ever since my daughter was diagnosed with a heart problem two days ago. A part of me want to run away for a few days clear my head and emotions... but no, I won't do that. Running away means that when I come back, the problem would still be there. A part of me wants to take the problem heads on. However, there are some things that cannot be forced upon and will have to wait.

One of those things that will have to wait is the treatment of my daughter (some heart doctor says it's a "treatment" other says it's a "surgery"... Treatment sounds nicer so let's use that, shall we?). One of her veins near the heart are leaking and needs to be blocked, however, the diameter of her veins is 5mm and the ring (blocker) sizes are 3mm and 8 mm, so, we will have to wait until she is older and her veins is getting bigger. We just need to hope that there will be no incidents during our wait.

Yesterday, as I was praying, another emotion came into me. If it was up to me, I really don't want my infant daughter to go through all this. An emotion of tremendous love for my daughter and my whole being was literally screaming to God, if I can take the pain for her, I would take it. Not that I would be braver, at least I am bigger, and compared to her, I am the one who deserve to suffer. (she has no sin, and I.... go figure)

With that thought, the realization of God's grace came into me. If I, who are human, can love my daughter this much, then God's love is a million times more than my love to my daughter. If I can say that I want to replace my daughter if possible... Jesus is taking all of our sins upon the Cross so that we can be saved. And what's crazy, I want to replace my lovable, cute, adorable, beautiful and sinless daughter (you get the idea), Jesus wants to replace ME? This hard headed and cold hearted sinner??? Are you kidding me?

No kidding, that's how big his love is!

Just a Thought

2009-05-02T16:02:00.000-07:00

A miracle happens, I start to exercise regularly!! Don't worry it is not an apocalyptic sign :)Since I got bored easily, I tried to rotate my activities during the week.

One of those activities was swimming. I went swimming yesterday at 6 AM. No, you did not misread it. 6 AM!! I am so proud of myself. I swam for around 30 minutes then stopped because amazingly, by 6.30 the pool was already too crowded for my standard.

It was amazing that so many people are so serious in keeping their physical health. What would it be like if we are also that serious in keeping our spiritual health??

Just a thought...

Recovering from being Manipulated

2008-12-06T15:52:00.000-08:00

Picture a person that has these criterias: charming, persuasive, knowledgeable, social, and very, very kind. This person has helped you without asking, flatter your quality, and usually, this person can tell others about his/her good deeds without appearing that he/she was showing off.

I Love You My Father

2008-11-29T15:41:00.000-08:00

Lately, my parents in law commented that my wife has been more attentive to them. My wife admits that it might be true due to her own experience of becoming a parent herself. She realizes how much parents can love their child and she then realizes how much her parents have loved her all this time.

You know, it is the same thing with our Father in Heaven. Should we realize how much he has loved us, if we want to take the time to enjoy his love, we couldn't help but love him back.

I love you My Father.

His Will becomes Ours

2008-11-26T04:09:00.001-08:00

I have been married to my wife for two years. From my point of view, my marriage is the greatest blessing that God has ever given to me. Not only my parents no longer bug me about setlling down (haha) but he has also given me a lover and a best friend in life.

The thing about how the closer you are to one person the more you become alike to him/her is really true. It is amazing how we started to think the same way, wanting the same thing at the same time… it is just sweet. And we just trust each other in things, we trust that one will always look out for the other and will always want the best for both of us.

The same thing applies with God. The closer we are to him, the more his will becomes our will. The more we are with him, the more we trust his ways, that he wants the best for us.

Oh my Jesus, my lover, how I want the sweetness of you.

Perfect Evening

2008-11-25T22:04:00.001-08:00

For the last couple of months I have been working like crazy. No, I did not go overtime, I still have my family to think about, however, when I am in the office, there is almost no breathing room at all.

I have one bad tendency though, when I am that busy, usually my whole body tensed all the time. I think psychologically, it is difficult for me to let go even when I am "relaxing." As a result, my energy level has been deterioriating for the last couple of weeks. Finally, yesterday was the culmination.

Last night, I went to the hospital because of extreme tiredness and I started to vomit. I felt bad because my wife is 9 months pregnant. There is NO WAY that I am going to get sick now. I was so frustrated at my "weak" self, that I had given my wife something to worry about at this time.

So, we went to the hospital, straight to the emergency room. The experience itself was so freaky. The nurse did not seem to master the art of giving IVs. There were air bubbles in the IV, which can give you heart attack. She almost put the needle through my vein when my wife screamed that there were still some bubbles left. Okay.... that freaked me out....

Furthermore, when a medicine was administered through the IV, suddenly I almost blacked out. I tried to scream but no voice came out.... AAAARRRRRGH!!!

After that, I was just too tense that even the IV hurted. So I asked them to remove the needle and just requested another type of medication. So we just waited for the lab result to come. Nothing serious. So we went home.

To make the evening perfect, at 11.30 pm in the evening, my phone rang, and it was the hospital. They forgot to charge us for the lab work and the guy just senselessly asked me to go back to the hospital to pay! I was gritting my teeth so that no words that I would be sorry about later came out. I refused to go back there but tried to cooperate by asking how much did I owe and can the bill be delivered to my house instead so that I can arrange the payment

Again the guy senselessly said that they do not have anybody to deliver it EVER! So, they would prefer to have an unfit patient drove all the way back on midnight? And he did not even have the amount prepared! Okaaaaaayyy..... I told him to have someone else call me in the morning because clearly, there is no use trying to cooperate with this guy.

So that was my evening, and today, I am at home recovering...

In the midst of all of that.... God is still good :) Yeah, I am foolishly in love with my God. So what? :)

Are We Paying Attention?

2008-10-05T00:41:00.000-07:00

One thing I miss from the States is the creative TV ads

Do you remember a Jack in the Box advertisement featuring "Meaty Cheesy Boys"?

Or the Taco Bell Chihuahua?

Or the Geico Chipmunks?

One thing about those advertisements, they are designed to catch our attention first. In the midst of this modern world, where many things cry for our attention, only the laudests and most eccentrics caught our attention.

Remember Jesus being caught, beaten, tried, flogged and crucified?

That should get our attention.

Or as God said to St. Catherine: "My Son is treated in this way by love, in order that the ignorant man should be unable to resist being drawn to Me".

Yes, it could be the case that we are so ignorant that the Cross is really needed so that God and His Love can really got our attention.

The question is, how long will we choose to stay ignorant? Or will we, after turning our brief attention to the Cross, finally choose to respond to His Love?

God is waiting lovingly for our answer.....

Choose Good, Choose God

2008-10-04T15:49:00.000-07:00

For the past few weeks I have been watching "Supernatural" on DVDs. I am at the second season now.

Watching the potrayals of evil creatures in Supernatural make me wish that the evil spirits do look like them. Seriously. Then it will be easy to discern which is good and which is evil :) I joked with my wife that all evil creatures in the series were so obvious in their appearance and behavior. It was as if they were announcing to everybody: "Look at us!!! Look at us!!! We are evil!!! YEEAAAAAAAH"

Life might be easier if evil solely chose that kind of appearance. Unfortunately, our everyday evils are not like that. Our everyday evils appear in the form of: misprioritization, white lies, ignorance, self-justification, pride and other even subtler forms. Though subtler, they are more dangerous and harder to freed ourselves from when we are trapped in their snares.

On the other side of the coin, we often choose what is obviously evil, so no, life might not be easier should evil do choose to be obvious!

Bottom line: choose good! Choose God! :)

Snap Out!

2008-07-31T14:49:00.000-07:00

Anyone who follows tennis would notice that Roger Federer is currently struggling. His last demise came in Cincinnati Masters when he lost to a relatively mediocre professional named Ivo Karlovic.

Federer has been dominant in men's tennis for years. He is the obvious heir to Pete Sampras, another dominant player before Federer's era. Until recently, it is very clear that sooner or later, he will break every record that Sampras has ever made.

The prediction is not that clear anymore now.

Recently, every time I saw Federer played, there was something different. The swagger wasn't there, the enjoyment wasn't there, his movement, and his strategy were all different. It was as if I were watching a different player altogether.

I would go out on a limb here and guess that it came down to one factor: CONFIDENCE. When the losses began to mount this year, somehow Federer lost something important. Something that was unseen and can't be taught by anyone. He lost his confidence that he can beat just any tennis player on this earth on any given day.

His technique is still exquisite. I am still jealous of his beautiful strokes, his smooth movement, footwork, and balance. In short, he is still a beautiful player to watch.

However, when this one factor is missing, or even decreasing, suddenly everything become different. On important points, you suddenly has doubt whether your tactics will still work. You has doubts on where to serve, and how to follow up on your serve, whether you want to pounce on your opponent's backhand just as you have done so many times before, or whether you want to give him/her a surprise by going to the forehand, et cetera, et cetera.

Those doubts really can kill you as a player. And it is similar to our faith in God. Losing faith can kill us spiritually.

When we are happy and our faith is strong, it is as if we can do no wrong. We are so sure that God is with us no matter what. But what if when we have crisis in our faith?

Suddenly we can't do anything right. We are so afraid to move on into anything. Every choice that goes through our head seems irrational. We want to listen to God, but we just can't.... we lost our connection....

I hope Federer will snap out of his slump. And I surely hope if you are currently in crisis of faith, you will also snap out of it soon. I know. It is exhausting to be in it.

The only thing that we can do when we are in our slump was just to plod on. We have to be firm in our belief that our Omnipotent Father is with us no matter what. Believe me, if Federer can get out of his slump, he will be an even stronger player (scary thought), and so also, if we can get out of our slump, we will get out of it stronger than ever for our Father "will not let you be tried beyond your strength" (1Cor 10:13)

Evangelium Vitae

2008-07-29T20:30:00.000-07:00

I just started reading "Evangelium Vitae" by John Paul II when his words hit me squarely:

"the joy which accompanies the Birth of the Messiah is thus seen to be the foundation and fulfilment of joy at every child born into the world (cf. Jn 16:21)."

Roughly speaking: There is (should be) a similar joy every time a new baby is born with the joy that is felt at the birth of Christ.

In fact, the late Fr. Gerald Fisher from St. Peter Catholic Church, Stevens Point, Wisconsin was also inspired by these words and this inspiration was behind the construction of "The Joyful Mother Sculpture"

Come to think of it, yes. Every time a human was born, we are celebrating the birth of a member of the body of Christ. We are made that valuable out of God's love that makes us, mere humans, as his body! How great is that!

Let's give praise and thanksgiving to God for our lives, no matter where we are and what we are called for. Let us bring the ultimate joy that is the love of God to others, just as Jesus did and still does.

Responsibility

2008-07-29T16:33:00.000-07:00

My wife says that I have a way in my questioning that can intimidate people, especially if they have "wronged" me in some ways. I used to laugh at the idea. After all, I am just a big lovable teddy bear, right?? Well, I guess sometimes my wife can be more objective than me after all. I do intimidate people sometimes with the way I question them.

The last instance was yesterday. I was looking for my design book. I remembered that two of the assistants in my office was borrowing it when they were designing posters for an event two months ago. I thought I just asked in plain, normal tone and language. However, my question suddenly put them on the defensive. They just started blaming each other without even looking for the book in their desk first.

Whoa... what happened there? I was just asking.. no need for all that rancor.

And the bad thing was, their reaction was what set me off. I don't care about the book as much as I care about their attitude. If the book was lost, I can buy it again no matter how expensive it was. However, if their attitude was that way, then I begin to question their integrity.

By questioning their attitude, I am questioning my own attitude, too. Do I also have that tendency? Maybe I am not blaming people but there are so many other things that I can blame every time I make a mistake. The weather, the company, the system, et cetera et cetera.

If taking responsibility for our own faults is very difficult, how about taking responsibility for others? Our instinct just screamed "NOOO IT IS NOT MY FAULT" every time something bad happens. It is our instinct to protect ourselves. If we who loves ourselves wouldn't take responsibility for our faults then who would? Who loves us even more than we love ourselves?

I tell you who: Jesus.

Wasn't it him who take upon the Cross for our sins almost two thousand years ago?

He is certainly not a black sheep that can be blamed for all our sins. He is our savior. He take upon the cross with his own free will. And through that, he has given an example of love for you and me!

An example of love! By taking responsibility for our sins!

That means we are to follow his example. And the first step would be to actually learn how to take responsibility for our own actions, no matter how difficult it is. Just imagine, aren't you more willing to forgive and help someone who has taken responsibility of his/her faults bravely? I think the same is with God. Yes he has forgiven us. But in order for us to be able to accept his forgiveness, we have to be able to forgive ourselves. How can we forgive ourselves if we always pointing blame to others while inwardly we know that we are at fault?

Yes it is hard to take that responsibility, however know this, often we are the ones who make it hard on ourselves. We forget that no matter what, our Eldest Brother is with us. He has carried the heaviest part of our Cross. Please, stop burdening ourselves unnecessarily by keep blaming others and by that, adding even more spiritual burden on ourselves. Rather, accept God's love and forgiveness every day. Take responsibility for your actions.

I Love You Lord

2008-07-15T14:35:00.000-07:00

I love you Lord,
And I lift my voice
To worship You
Oh my soul, rejoice!

Take joy my King
In what You hear
Let it be a sweet, sweet sound
In Your ears

I love this song because the way every word touches my soul. Though the words are simple, I can ponder on this song all day long.

Have I use every bit of my voice, every bit of my life, to worship him?
Have I really known him that well that my soul rejoice every time I feel him?
Has he taken joy in what I say, what I do, and what I think?
Has my life become sweet to him, like he has been sweet to me?

I Am Proud Of...

2008-07-07T06:40:00.000-07:00

I am proud of....
... my wife
... my parents
... my siblings
... my expected child
... my friends
... my talents
... my commitment
... my integrity
... my house that shelter us
... my job
... my car
... my relationships
... everything else that I have in this world

"No one can receive anything except what has been given him from heaven." (John 3:27)

Father in Heaven..... I thank you, for without you, I will have nothing to be proud of. In fact, all I have is actually yours, you gave them to me. So let the source of my pride be you my Father. I am proud of YOU. I am proud of YOU: MY FATHER... ABBA

Humility

2008-07-04T16:23:00.000-07:00

I had a talk with a friend of mine several months ago. He is a former Catholic who became a Protestant about eight years ago. Although I am sad every time I hear that happening, I might be one of the indifferent Catholics who would still be happy for the person, as long as s/he can find God, the Spirit, and His fruits wherever s/he is.

The thing that is weird about my friend is that he kept switching churches like television channels. I found that weird because in my experience the fruit when you are walking with the Holy Spirit is contentment. I am not saying that we should not look for improvements in our relationship with God where ever we are. However, when we feel that you cannot commit into any community or worse, any church, then I begin to question, who are we serving: God or ourselves?

Usually we are switching because we are unsatisfied with something. We are unwilling to take it, we are unwilling to make a change or change ourselves, therefore, the easy way out is to convert to another church with a belief system, culture, tradition and people that is more like us.

I find that ideology a bit self-centered. By doing that, we are claiming that the only thing matters the most is ourselves. God is working to please us, to satisfy us, and therefore, we should look for places that pleases us the most. No church, community, places, nor people should tie us...

You know, we can be somewhat biblical about that ideology, but it just does not feel right. God does not teach us to be self-centered. God can place us anywhere. There is a reason why we are in any situation, and sometimes, excruciating situation is really a chance for us to check on our intentions, on our humility, on our persistence, on our love of God no matter what.

Another one of my dear friends always said this to me: we are being placed in this situation to do great things. And I am a firm believer in that. I don't condone blind loyalty, but I do condone to find our calling: to do great things no matter what. And from that conversation, I found what is the main foundation to find our true calling, so that we don't keep wandering in the desert:

Humility.

From Addiction into Better Addiction

2008-06-21T17:04:00.000-07:00

Most people who have been in touch with me know that I have an extremely heavy addiction to caffeine. I have been drinking coffee since I was a fourteen years old boy trying to pass the exams by pulling all nighters. I am 31 years old now, so it has been seventeen years of dependence to coffee.

My families and friends have tried to talk me into quitting, or reducing, my caffeine intake. My usual portion was four mugs of thick, black coffee with little sprinkle sugar every day. I usually just brushed them off by laughing heartily. I knew I was addicted, but I just did not want to quit my addiction. I loved my addiction. Having a mug full of coffee beside me while I was working or doing anything that needed concentration was like my security blanket.

I knew that I would have to quit someday, really. In fact I had tried quitting/reducing several times before with no result because my willpower in this case were too weak. Once I tried to reduce my coffee into one cup a day, and I succeeded, however, I also drank eight cups of black tea on the side. When my toilet started to smell like tea (go figure), I realized that it was not working.

Seriously, I still had an intention to quit… one day. I just didn’t like the idea of being dependent on anything or anyone but God. I didn’t like the idea that I have another security blanket but the Holy Spirit. So, it’s just a matter when I would like to quit and a big HOW.

Here’s how:

My health state has been on a roller coaster ride for the past two weeks. First, I was rushed to the emergency room with a food poisoning. Soon after I had recovered, I caught the flu.

My first reaction when I started feeling the flu symptoms was my usual “Why God… why” tantrum. However, I tried to be positive and do my best to recover, which requires a discipline to actually rest from work. Yes, it is very, very hard to take a break from work, especially because I consider myself as a knowledge worker who can just work from anywhere without the necessity of office documents nor equipments. However, I will have to manage a training program next week and I know I could not afford to run it while recovering. So I really had to recover this week.

Thank God that for the most part, I have recovered from the flu.

You know what else I thank God about? I am actually free of my caffeine addiction!!

Don’t get me wrong, I had caught various illnesses that requires me to stop drinking coffee for a while before. However, after I recovered, usually I started to drink my usual intake again. This time, somehow I just did not.

Why this time?

Honestly, I don’t know.

I think all would agree that I had a strong willpower with regards to quitting coffee. After all, I have resisted the sweet temptation of quitting all these years. So, what gives this time?

It was totally God’s perfect power and timing.

I have relied on my willpower and my timing, obviously that did not work. What finally worked was God’s willpower and God’s timing. I just responded. That’s the beauty of it. I could not claim anything as my own effort. It was totally God’s.

We know God’s work by its fruit. The difference between my own effort and God’s effort is immense. Every time I tried to quit with my own power, I was miserable. The world seemed bleak and I just did not want to deal with the headache and drowsiness that comes with the cravings.

This time, I was doing it joyfully, and you know, I was excited about it. Yes, there were cravings, headaches, and drowsiness. However, somehow this time I believed that they would pass.

And you know what? They did.

These past few days I realized that even though I still have cravings, they are not accompanied with headaches nor drowsiness. My cravings was for the enjoyment, not for the addiction.

And the fruit of this whole experience is a tremendous sense of joy. A newfound freedom. It is as if I am a slave who have just been told that I am free to do as I will. I no longer worry about not having enough caffeine. I no longer feel the need of having a mug full of coffee all the time. Don’t get me wrong, I still love coffee. I realized that by not addicted, I love coffee even more. Weird, isn’t it? When I drink coffee now, my enjoyment is multiplied. It is as if God is enjoying it with me. I no longer just enjoying His creation, I am enjoying Him.

I still have a tremendous craving, only that my craving now is more focused to the One who are supposed to be my addiction: God. Yes, I only want to addicted to God. Addicted to my Lover!

Love in Little things

2008-06-14T06:01:00.000-07:00

Book currently read: Love in the Little Things by Mike Aquilina

I am recommending it, especially for all who already have, or planning to have, families of their own. The book is so good, romantic, and cute... I couldn't help but smiling when I read the tales of how Mike start to date his wife. I couldn't help but share the stories of how he patiently listened to his daughter explaining about Barbie's pants to a visiting priest... really, it is so cute.

Why I like it so much? Because I think every family can relate to his stories because of their simplicity. It makes me realize how blessed my family are and it makes me couldn't help but love my family even more!!

Thank You Bernie

2008-05-10T22:00:00.000-07:00

Another thought aboout being a role model....

I just realized how beautiful it can be. Having to be role models for Bernie will actually push us to grow also: spiritually, mentally, and emotionally. My God it is beautiful. Bernie is already an active participant in true love. True love makes the participants grow together, out of the love for each other. Having Bernie makes us want to grow, to be better, out of love for each other.

Thank you Bernie.

Thank you Lord.

Shortcuts

2008-05-10T20:53:00.001-07:00

I anticipate that one of the hardest thing of being a parent is to be a role model for my kid. If I expect my kid to be responsible, then my wife and I should show our responsibility. If I expect my kid to be loving, we should be loving first.

Yes it will be hard, because like it or not, most children will take example from their parents. Just as most people will also take example from their leaders. Hence why, just like parents, one of the hardest duties for leaders is to be role model to the people they lead.

This is one of the reasons why Indonesia is such a mess. We are in crisis for role models. Our leaders are corrupt, they never fulfil their promises, nor are they ashamed to make policies and decisions that blatantly show their greed and detachedness from the people.

As a result, Indonesians, the most charming people in the world according to our past propaganda, show little care for each other. Each of us is an egomaniacs, we want things to go our way, regardless of the cost to others. For an obvious example, just try to watch one hour on Jakarta's rush hour traffic. Many people just don't care if others are having heart attack because of the way they use the street (many are not necessarily driving a car or riding a motorcycle). Many just don't follow the rules anymore. Worst of all, is that many people of power, who are supposed to be role models, are using their powers to avoid the "commoners traffic". They are above commoners. Why should they be in traffic even if they are just going home from work? Just have your bodyguards, entourage, and policemen to force others to make way for you.

It is a disgusting shortcut to everyday problem and yes, we have too many people who are supposed to be role models taking shortcuts in life. I surely want to protect my kid from this shortcut attitude. You want a better traffic? Then we'd better start to work together for it. You want a better life? Work for it. No shortcuts!

Entitlement

2008-05-10T03:14:00.000-07:00

Being an expecting father, I am starting to make preparations. One of them is how we will raise our Bernie (yes, we have a name already).

Because the cost of labor in Indonesia is very cheap, many families have multiple servants and babysitters. I won't argue against having them. In fact, we do have our own guard/house cleaners, even though he does not cook nor clean our private rooms. We like our privacy! We are considering however, whether to have a part-time nanny after Bernie have been born because both of us will still be working.

One thing for sure, I don't want Bernie to grow up spoiled and relying on the nanny or any servants to help him/her do stuff. It is not just the matter of teaching the child to be independent. I want to teach my child to be responsible from the very beginning. If you make a mess, then you have to clean it yourself. If you are the one going to school, you have to learn how to prepare your uniform, books, et cetera.

I have seen many children from families who have servants and nannies, and most of them have the sense of "entitlement". They wake up and called for their nannies/servants to prepare their school uniforms, clean up their rooms, and so forth. I don't like this trend at all. It teach them to be irresponsible. I make a mess and someone else will clean it up for me, because I am entitled to get help!

No Sir, thank you, no child of mine will grow up that way.

I Feel Cheesy

2008-05-10T03:11:00.000-07:00

We've got heartbeats Ladies and Gentlemen!!!!

Those cheesy movies are right. It feels like a miracle .

Too Much Information

2008-05-02T16:18:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I went through a heart-stopping moments when I read a text message from my wife:

"I am positive for rubella"

My God!

Being a guy in information age, of course I immediately googled "rubella in pregnancy". The result was disheartening:

Rubella, or German measles, is most dangerous to your baby if you catch it during the first 16 weeks of pregnancy. Rubella can cause miscarriage, stillbirth or birth defects in unborn babies, such as deafness, brain damage, heart defects and cataracts. This is called congenital rubella syndrome and it is transmitted to the baby through the placenta. Rubella is now rare as people were either vaccinated at school or as part of the childhood vaccine MMR.
Taken from: http://www.nhsdirect.nhs.uk/articles/article.aspx?articleId=1104#

After I read the info, my legs felt like spaghettis... However, I know my wife would also have googled the same thing. So, bravely (though not faithfully) I texted her back:

"Let's not make any assumptions for now, we are not sure what the lab result really means. Meanwhile, just pray to God that his will be done."

Thank God that my fingers did not also turn into spaghettis :)

I have to admit though, at that time, I texted her out of reason, not out of faith. I was just trying to calm her down, and let me do the panic part :) As it turned out, what the lab test meant was that my wife had contacted rubella before and therefore, is IMMUNE to rubella now.

Praise God!

And of course I felt so stupid worrying for no reasons at all... you know, sometimes too much information can kill ya! Seriously, I think there is a threshold where we have just enough information for our well-being, however after you passed that threshold, our well-being started to go down due to too much information.

Am I making any sense at all?

Well, to put it into perspective, I think in this age where we can get so much information about everything, many, many things that we wouldn't have known before can worry us. That is why faith in God who are all loving, all powerful and all purposeful, is more important than ever! Imagine if we have no faith in God, then, we can be worn down due to all these worrying infos, most of them might be unnecessary...

I am learning this especially during our pregnancy. Yes my wife and I can control some of the things, such as our behaviors and habits. However, we have no other intelligent choice but to give everything else up to God and have faith that everything will work for good for everyone who loves him and who are called according to his purpose.

AMEN!

Pregnant :)

2008-04-27T04:22:00.000-07:00

We are pregnant!!!

Thank you Lord!!

Going Ballistic

2008-03-14T15:02:00.000-07:00

Flash News Report: Being unable to sleep for three days can actually drive you nuts!!

Nothing new about that, except now I guess the dog which had been yelping almost non stop for three nights in a row has stopped.

The first day, I just laughed about it...

Second day, I sigh and tried to sleep...

Third day, I stormed out of my room, opened my front door violently without any care that I am still wearing my underpants, walked to my neighbor's gate, called him and told him to take care of his dog.

I passed several people in that short trip: my house sitter, a street vendor, several construction workers... all watched the scene in amazement, probably reading my violent body language, and waiting to see a fight...

No fight though, the dog owner apologized and promised to take care of it... sorry to disappoint you guys...

In any case, that makes me wonder:

Why haven't I done it earlier, when I am still cool ? That will give me two nights of uninterrupted sleep!
Why haven't anyone else complained? Seriously the dog was downright yelping,
Why did the dog yelped? Due to neglect? Please pet owners, if you decide to have pets then be responsible for them!

Thank God that despite losing my mind somewhat, I still had a bit of control over what I said at that time. Thank God that the owner did not do anything to worsen the situation... so I guess my guardian angels worked overtime yesterday :P

Let Me Feel You Once Again

2008-02-24T03:42:00.000-08:00

I hate to admit it, but I am currently dry spiritually.

Why do I hate to admit it? Maybe it is because of my pride. I always like to convey the image that everything in my life is A-OK. If I have to admit that something negative is going on in my life, I somehow feel like a failure.

If this makes people think that I am very insecure, so be it. It is how it is.

The good thing is that God was gracious enough to make me finally realize that I am spiritually dry. Actually, this has been going on for a while. I just either did not realize or just did not want to admit it. Maybe the later would be more accurate. I have noticed that I become short-tempered lately. I am just easily annoyed nowadays. I also worry a lot. I am worried about my work, about my new business ventures, about my family, about my future, about whether or not we will have children…. (ouch, the last one is a big one)

I hope with this realization, somehow I can turn back to you my Lord, my Lover and my God. I love you Jesus. I need you more than anything in my life. I am sorry if I chose to walk through my life alone lately. I have learned my lesson. Never before I felt this lonely. Yes, I have people around me, but I am spiritually lonely. It hurts… it really really hurts to realize this…. I know you will never leave me, but let me just say it… please don’t leave me like this. Let me feel you once again

Set Her Free

2008-01-11T14:36:00.000-08:00

My wife is currently recovering from Hepatitis....

She was diagnosed with it last month, during my previous trip to South Kalimantan (not during the recent trip to East Kalimantan I just mentioned). I wanted to get back but I was in the middle of nowhere. No airports nearby and the flights are not that many anyway. The experience of not able to do anything for someone whom I love so much right then devastated me psychologically.

It just made me think, if I, this weak soul, can love another this much, how much does our Father in Heaven love us?

If I was devastated for not being able to do anything for someone I love, how much did Mother Mary suffer when she could not do anything but pray when she saw Jesus being tried, scourged, and crucified?

I was reminded of a text from one song: "If you really love her, you gotta set her free".

In this context, it applies.... true love is when we can set someone free from our worries and entrust them in God's love. When I am being hard headed in worrying about them, I am actually saying that I am not willing to entrust them in God's love, I am entrusting them in MY LOVE that is limited....

When I prevent another to get better things than I can offer just because it makes me feel good and responsible... it is actually egoistical isn't it?

East Kalimantan, Environment, and Tractor Tyres

2008-01-11T13:44:00.000-08:00

This past week, I had the opportunity to go around East Kalimantan, using the time to broaden my personal and professional perspectives.

The trip was very tiring though. It was three towns in three days, using both small planes and car trips to go around. We hung out until midnight, just because our hosts are "sungkan" (tried to please us), while my body and mind were screaming for us to get to bed already... and yes I am getting old...

The experience underlines again on how rich Indonesia is, if only someone wants to manage it right, with long-term perspectives. Currently, the area is rich because the government is selling land-use concessions for their own benefit so that big companies can build mining operations and destroy the environment.

Seriously, I was shocked to hear that even companies who claimed that they are "green" are burying their used tractor tires undereath the top soil...

When we asked, the reps said, it does nothing to the environment..

Yeah right... maybe after 12 kegs of beer I will start to believe ya dude!!!

Hypocrites!

My Parents

2008-01-06T04:39:00.000-08:00

Ever since I got married in 2006, I seldom go out nor spend quality time with my parents anymore. It is ironic because one of the reasons why I went back to Indonesia was so that I could be with them more. Nowadays, we mostly meet for meals every now and then.

Today was the first time in a long while when my wife and I actually hang out with them more than having meals together. I have to be honest, I am joyful to be able to do that again. The hectic pace of our lives has somehow prevent us to spend more time together.

Hopefully, there will be more days like today....

First Week on the Job in 2008

2008-01-04T14:59:00.000-08:00

Just spent the first week of 2008 having a lot of meetings with my clients. I learned something during the meeting: I often clash with people who are so afraid of their boss. Somehow I just couldn't stand making decision based on the phrase "My boss wants..." It is ok if the decision is good, but if you know.... YOU KNOW IN YOUR HEART AND YOUR OWN REASONING MIND that you have a better idea, then you should at least try to talk to your boss about it... oh dude!!!

However, trying to understand my client's position, I finally just drew out the choices and the risks involved if we follow the boss' ideas... And if they understand the risks and ready to take steps to mitigate it, then we can do it. See how nice I am?? LOL

The trouble is that the feodalist culture of my clients prevents me to go after the boss... After the initial phase, I seldom meet the boss myself, I have to go through his managers who are assigned to my project teams... hmm... Maybe the boss couldn't stand to meet me, the rebellious consultant eh?? Hahaha...

Weird thing is that everytime I meet the boss during the initial phase, he seemed to agree with our method.

Freakin feodalistic & bureaucratic culture.....

Yaaaaay

2007-09-02T15:58:00.000-07:00

Today, I heard a very good news from my parents, the news was: the church in my parish had finally put on air conditioning!!!

Yes, I am a spoiled city boy. However, try to empathize with me. Ever since I got married, I seldom visited the church in my own parish. I usually go to my old parish because they have air conditioning. This is impractical in itself, since it takes 15-20 minutes drive to reach my old parish from my house whereas my supposed parish church is only 5 minutes away from my house

We do this because the heat and noise are unbearable, except if we attend the 6 am Mass. However, we usually could not muster enough willpower to wake up that early on Sunday. After 6 am Mass, you can basically forget getting any comfort. The church is unfortunately located at a very busy shopping district. From 8 am until late at night, the street will be very busy, noisy, and polluted.

If you do not understand what I mean, please try to search about Jakarta’s traffic condition. The public transportation (read: buses and bajaj) are both air and noise pollution makers. There are no regulation for smog check and no limitation for honking the horns. You can basically honk your horn anywhere and anytime you like. Indonesia’s tropical climate does not help the case either.

So, imagine having to concentrate in a Mass with all the polution, noise and heat. Yes, I was spoiled by American standard. And yes, I wish I have reached the kind of love for God where anything that is happening in this world cannot interfere with my concentration. Unfortunately, I haven’t. So sue me.

The point is, while I am happy to hear the news, in fact, I will try to go to 5 pm Mass later today, I am sad at the same time to think about how our quality of live have deteriorated to such condition where we could not enjoy even fair air quality. Indonesia is a bad example in keeping the orders and quality of life, which is sad, because we have such a beautiful country, if only we can manage it.

Please Bribe Me... Pleaaaseeeee... Puhleeezeeee?!?!?!?

2007-07-14T02:20:00.000-07:00

Help me God for I am still a very weak human being, far from the perfection like that of the Father in Heaven....

Being in a challenging environment has a potential to bring out the worst in you. I have been blessed to have the opportunity to be in one by being in Jakarta, Indonesia.

Needless to say, traffic was very bad. Not only one suddenly become egomaniac once he/she is on the road, but the law was also inconsistent at best. The law enforcement agents are easily bribed, and the mentality has been fostered in years, that now, most of them invite bribery. They often intentionally make strange gestures, planting hard-to-understand road signs, allowing us to blatantly break the common-sense traffic law (such as crossing the red light), and then whenever they feel like it, they then stop us saying that we are in violation of anything....

Today, I got into this unfortunate situation.

Against common sense, I argued with the police, I know he was the one who invited all the cars to cross the red light. I know it is common to do so. Every time I passed this intersection, there is always one or two police waving their arms telling the cars to disregard the traffic light and follow their gestures instead. I know this was the case also today because I am not the only one who crossed the traffic light.. there are many other cars as well, and he somehow plucked me.

Needless to say, he was pissed that such miscreant as myself dared to argue with him, the gods of the road. After all, he is above the law isn't he? So he took away my license and wrote me a ticket. At that point, I decided that I don't care...

However, it was very odd that on the first chance he offered me to settle it with him, I took that offer. Good job fugu. Why don't you just take your self-worth, and flush it down the toilet before you drive this morning? That would have felt better.

Help me God that next time, I would never ever take such offer anymore. I definitely do not want to contribute in this country's "please-bribe-me-sir" mentality.

I remembered hearing a presentation from a homeschooling expert that one of the toughest job of being a homeschooling parent is to be consistent between your beliefs, words, and actions.

I could not agree more.

Money is Thicker than Blood

2007-07-13T17:04:00.000-07:00

I have just finished reading "Krakatoa" by Simon Winchester. Funny that though I count myself as a new generation Indonesian, meaning, I have no attachment whatsoever to the "Old Batavia", I could not help but feeling nostalgic by his description of how Old Batavia was.

I have never got a "proper" Indonesian history during my formal education years due to the much propagandized history books then. It is always fun to read history from the view of a (hopefully) neutral person. In the propagandized books, the Dutch are always pictured as sadistic, sly, bloodsucking colonizers. Maybe some of the facts are true. Why try to rule a land thousand miles apart from your country if you can not get some benefits from the land? Purely social intentions? Nah I don't think so.

The irony is that... if not because of the greed of Indonesian people themselves at that time, the Dutch wouldn't have ruled Indonesia at all... and Portuguese were just too lazy to rule any distant countries and would easily be discouraged by several minor uprisings.

Here is what I am talking about: When the Dutch first arrived in Banten, they tried to build a small fort to protect their local interests. The Portuguese, being the first Europeans to establish themselves there, obviously did not like it at all. So, they prepared to attack the newly built fort.

Realizing their weak position, the Dutch General tried in vain to contact nearest colonies to ask for reinforcement. The other colonies simply said no... they were not that stupid to oppose the Portuguesans who have much larger firepower in the area. So, the Dutch was in a very precarious situation.

However, the Portuguese army never arrived because they were halted by the local minor sultan who feel that he would "deserve" whatever spoils the Portuguesans would have gotten from their obvious upcoming victory. The Portuguese basically said "screw you" to this slob, however did nothing but wait until this lazy slob got tired from blocking the road and let them attack the fort anyway.

It turned out, the big dog, the Sultan of Banten, heard of this news and got pissed at this sultan for trying to do such things. The Sultan of Banten felt that if anyone DESERVED to get a piece of the spoils, he would be THE ONE, since it was HIS area after all...

So, screw this minor sultan. The Sultan of Banten definitely doesn't really like the bloodsucking Portuguese and would like more allies to strenghten his fat grip on the area, so he made a pact with the Dutch: He would protect them from any dangers, while the Dutch would give him a share of whatever riches they got at that time.

This sudden change of situation scared the Portuguese away. They definitely did not want to piss the Sultanese of Banten. That would be suicidal at that time. So, they retreated and the Dutch miraculously got away from their predicament unscatched.

Everyone happy? Not really... The big dog, the Sultan of Banten, still pissed at this minor sultan, quickly deposed him from power...

The rest is history. That is the beginning of 350 years of colonization by the Dutch....

You see, money was thicker than blood even then... It was deemed as more important than our land, our own people. Screw them as long as I got money. Now I realized that the mentality had been there centuries ago.....

My gosh...

Asian Cup Follies

2007-07-13T15:44:00.000-07:00

I wish I could just take a one-month vacation, avoiding Asian Cup. I have to pass THAT stadium every time I am going home from work... darn it.. no choice....

Speaking of Asian Cup, here is Indonesia's tally of hosting it so far:

1st Day: hundreds of fans almost rioted because they were cheated out of tickets - officials says it was not their fault as the printed tickets hadn't come from their malaysian vendors
2nd day: ticket problem solved, and everything seemed to be under control... except that on the 85th minute, the stadium light went out, leaving the pitch in darkness... NICE!!! Candlelight football anybody? Again, it was nobody's fault.

Isn't it nice to work in this country... it is never your fault... things simply go away unnoticed...

I am afraid to think of what will happen the third day... will a volcano rise from the stadium ground?

Whatever happens, it will be nobody's fault....

Illegal Logging

2007-06-30T04:39:00.000-07:00

Just read an article in an Indonesian newspaper this morning on how the authorities successfully busted an illegal logging business... Well done!!

However, I could not help but wondering why they decided to destroy the logs. The logs were ready to use. A log is a log, and I can think of better uses for those logs rather than destroying them.

Why should they destroy them? The trees already fallen, and the logs produced from the trees would be better of be used rather than burned. When the illegal logs are burned rather than used, then we will cut even more trees just to use "legal" logs. Sell them to contractors and use the money for the poor or to build undeveloped areas... there are many of those in Indonesia..

I don't know, maybe my thinking is too bottom-line oriented?

Spinning Out of Control

2007-06-28T14:54:00.000-07:00

Lately, I have been very busy with work. I really hesitate to write and publish this on my blog because it will sound as if I was proud of my conditions. Believe me, many people will say that they are overworked with pride... we are odd that way :)

To tell you the truth, I am a bit worried about my life right now. Yes I take pride on my work. I really love what I am doing. However, it is really hard to have an internal brake mechanism to tell myself to stop.

My wife has been really supportive. Thank God that I have a wife who have an experience as a programmer, so at least she can always find something to do with her computer, whether it is playing a game, downloading an upgrade to a program, or even reformatting :), so that she can always accompany me when I am working at home, and she does not complain much.

Yes, I work at home a lot. I tried not to spend too much time at the office, though lately, I sometimes spend as much as 13 hours at the office working straight. At the request of my beloved wife, I tried to come home as early as possible most of the time, and then continue my work at home. She prefers that I work at home because she wants to have an opportunity to at least see me.

Yeah... what a quality time!!! Good job Indra :P

Every time I reflected on why my life seemed to be spinning this way, I always defended myself that it is really a temporary condition. My division has been short of manpower lately, especially for my expertise, so that I have to do a workload designed for three people. However, I could not help but wonder, why am I keep getting into the same condition no matter where I work?

I hope I will find a way to get out of this cycle.. I do not want to get used to this. Furthermore, I don't want my SUPERIORS to GET USED TO THIS so it becomes EXPECTED from me.

Please pray for me so that I can find a way...

For YOU Alone are the Holy One!
AIS

So What Gitu Loh

2007-03-02T13:09:00.000-08:00

Alright, so I lied.... no post on remote management (ooooh... I can hear a distant sound of disappointment, yeah right).

Not in the mood :P

Spiritually, again I am experiencing a dry phase. Reflecting back to my previous dry phases, I have to thank God that I think my spiritual journey all this time is not futile. Right now I know that I am spiritually dry, however, in a "pathological" Christian way of thinking (yeah, maybe the non-Christians will think that we are pathological.. haha), at the same time, I know that I am not (to think about it, we cannot be "dry" since the Living Water is everywhere).

That is why I am less worried about my dry period. I know that God has enough grace to guide me (and my wife in this case) through this phase. So, the Indonesian way to express of my attitude is: "So what gitu loh!!"

I am glad that I am having this attitude. Previously, even the temptation to immerse myself in the worriness from being in dry phases can be pretty annoying. Now.... hmm... no time for self-pity, and I don't think God wants us to wail in self-pity. Too many people are doing this already :P I think it is time to dare to be different.. haha

Seriously, I am glad that family and work life have been keeping me busy. Because an idle mind is dangerous... an idle mind can just wander everywhere, in my experience, especially when one is in dry phase.

So if you are in such dry phase: repeat after me: So what gitu loh!!

Believe me: we are always immersed in his love no matter what, no matter how we feel.

Jesus once said: "If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you would say to this mulberry tree, 'Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it would obey you."

Now I don't recommend you try that to a tree in front of your house unless you want to be sent into a mental asylum or want a group from greenpeace to demonstrate in front of your house. However, it is very true that we are always immersed in his love no matter what, no matter how we feel, if only we keep our faith, no matter how little it is and how we feel at time of dryness.

2007-02-08T16:58:00.000-08:00

Due to the weather instability today, several of my office mates and myself decided to work remotely today.

We met at Plaza Senayan and worked there for 5 hours... and may I say it was one of the most fun and satisfying work experience I've ever had in Indonesia...

I miss the US where I can work remotely and not deal with the traffic all the time. Not to mention the time flexibility...

This brings me to another one of my visions: set up a remote management system!! That would be really nice!!

Hmm... maybe several posts of plus and minuses of remote management is coming... if I am in the mood...

Very Indonesian

2007-02-06T15:58:00.000-08:00

Jakarta's Governor Sutiyoso yesterday discussed the possibility of moving Indonesian Capital City into West Java (specifically Bogor), which of course would cost a lot of money (yeaaah... more power to you to suck up people's taxes, gifts, and public funds)

This underlines the Indonesian mentality on environment maintenance: Just trash the place until it is unusable, take no responsibility, and then leave to find another place to trash!!

No wonder it is hard to build this country...

Lost Virginity

2007-02-04T20:00:00.000-08:00

Time to celebrate, I am no longer "flood-virgin".....

For the past three days, Jakarta has been dealing with flood. Thank God our residences are safe, electricity, water, and phones are still up.

However, on Friday, I was trapped for about 6 hours in the middle of the road because of the flood. I was lucky that I was able to avoid the flood by driving to high ground. And then, the wait began...

I got home on Friday evening, unable to reach my office at all.

Still thinking about office and my darn work?? Look, there are about a hundred thousand people who temporarily and permanently lose their residences due to this flood, and I am thinking about work???

Idiotic... maybe it is the effect of losing my virginity :P

Bakmi Orpa

2006-11-19T15:34:00.000-08:00

Located at Jalan Tiang Bendera, Jakarta Pusat, Bakmi Orpa has been around for three generations. It runs as a very profitable family business. Its menu consisted almost exclusively of noodle soup. This is a picture of its Wonton Noodle Soup.

I have been to this place since I was a kid. It remains one of my favorite noodle places because of its tasty dishes and the nostalgic feeling. The most amazing thing is that many of the patrons are still the same as when I was a little child, which means that they are very, very loyal and maybe eat there almost every weekend. Some of the patrons are the "second generation patrons", which means that like myself, they have eaten there ever since they were children also.

Too bad it is very pricey for this kind of food (at least Rp. 30,000 for a bowl of noodle soup), so we can not come here very often.

Let Me Love Her the Way You Love Her

2006-11-19T09:24:00.000-08:00

As promised, I am sharing some events from my family life, which has been the greatest blessing in my life so far :)

The message of Fr. Ignatius about living abundantly always echos in our minds. "Seek the best for others while expecting none." It really works. I admit that I had my moments of impatience. Everyone who knows me well has realized that I am inherently impatient. It is the "thorn inside my flesh".

The realization that I have this thorn worried me on the first week of our marriage. I talked about it honestly with Vira, my wife. She said she is worried about her own "thorns" as well.

We have "total honesty" policy in our relationship. It really works. By knowing each other's pasts, quirks, fears and happiness, we become stronger. The first month of our marriage has made me realized what a beautiful thing it is to have a partner. I don't know, maybe this is the feeling that Adam felt when he first met Eve.

I really hope that I can do better than Adam in relying on God when it comes to loving an protecting my family. To share the prayer I say every day: "God, let me love Vira the way she deserves to be loved as your child, let me love her the way you love her". I know with my own strength this will be impossible. For if I am relying on my own strength then I will be trying "to be as God", just as Adam and Eve did. However, with God, I know this marriage will work, no matter how fallible we are as humans.

Please friends, continue to pray for us. Thank you.

To Him be all glory forever and ever!

Adrianus Indra Setiadi

When Sacrifice becomes Joy

2006-11-11T01:45:00.000-08:00

"The essence of tenderness is found in the tendency to make one’s own the feelings and mental states of another person" - Karol Wojtyla "Love and Responsibility" (quoted in "Men, Women, and Tenderness" by Edward P. Sri)

What an insight by a wise person, and I totally agree that in a true loving relationships (I will take marital relationship as an example here), God will mold the will of two persons so that they beocome one. This is an invitation to live in tenderness.

I remembered that in 2004, I wrote:

Let me try to give an illustration: a married couple who continue to feel like they are making a huge sacrifice by marrying each other will be in trouble shortly. Bitterness will happen because each feels that he/she is making so much sacrifice trying to satisfy the other.

However, if they truly love each other, and love really works, their will soon will become one. What the husband wills, the wife wills it, too. Maybe not every time. However, each trust the other enough to know that when they have different wills, they are still looking out for the other's best interests. After all, becoming one body is what marriage is all about.
(Making Sacrifices for God - August 4, 2004)

I haven't been married then, but I remembered contemplating that if I claim to love God but yet, continually saying that I am making sacrifices for the sake of loving him, then maybe I would survive only for a short moment. For if I continually feel that I am making sacrifices, I will soon be burned out and what is left will be a sense of bitterness because of the thoughts of things that I was not able to do because I love God.

However, this is not what true love is all about. Now I can actually say it in marriage context (because I am actually married now.. hahaha).

One of the goals (or tenets) of marriage is to become one. This is not an easy task to do. That is why we need the grace and miracle from God. Some couples are fighting hard to make their marriage work, but maybe what they are lacking is prayer and reliance in God. I feel that it takes two saints to make a Godly marriage. It is against wordly instinct to actually trying not only to empathize with other's feelings and mental states, but actually also making them your own and taking responsibilitis for it. In other words, it takes an altruistic love.

Who can guide us toward loving altruistically but God himself who is the source of this perfect love. We certainly cannot do it ourselves! When we rely on God then, our "sacrifices" suddenly becomes our joy because we suddenly have the ability, or passion, to make the other's feelings and mental states ours. Maybe it will not require any effort at all.. just as how the Spirit often works! We suddenly just will the same thing...

This is even more amazing in terms of our relationship with God. Saint Paul has testified that
"No longer I, but it is Christ who lives in me" Galatia 2:20

My take in this is that God also wants us to have this loving relationship with him. God does not want us to continue where we are, that is, we keep feeling that we have to make sacrifices in order to be close to him.

When we truly love someone, the sacrifices suddenly becomes joy, because by making this sacrifices in humility, we also being taught of the others' frame of thought, wills, desires, and mental states. God wants us to lead us into this state both in relationship with him and in relationship with others, especially our spouse.

I will give you some sharings from my marital life soon after this. I think this blog is too long already :)

To him be all glory and honor forever and ever!

Adrianus Indra Setiadi

Our Grand Calling

2006-10-29T07:41:00.000-08:00

Sometimes, it is just hard to believe that by just living our lives regularly (by “regularly” I mean trying to be good people), it is one of our greatest offering to God. Maybe the reason it is so hard to believe is because of how simple it seems.

Yes, it is simple, we are the ones who complicate things by requiring ourselves to have some “grand” calling. Hey, to be responsible for our lives, to be thankful to what God has given to us are grand! Maybe the problem is not how “little” we have done. Maybe the problem is how big our pride is.

The thing that I love about the work of the Holy Spirit is that he makes us more human. God rarely crosses the laws of nature that he has created himself unless it is necessary to make us believe (even the parting of the seas has geographical explanation). When the Holy Spirit comes into our lives, he always make our lives more human, that is, yes he gives us spiritual gifts, and often times, we pour out these gifts into our public ministries. However, we are often forgetting that these gifts are also to be used to enhance the wholeness of our lives. After all, we are called to be spiritual.

Our pride often gets in the way to make our whole lives spiritual by making this great barrier between ministry life and personal life. There should be no barriers at all. Ministry should be our lives and our personal lives are also our ministries. As the Church Fathers may have said: no prayers of ours are “private prayers”. When we pray, the Saints, the Angels, even the whole Church also pray with us. So are our lives if we dedicate them to be spiritual, then our lives are prayers to God, and we are never alone.

It is so simple isn’t it? It is so simple that our greatest enemies are our minds that cannot accept the simplicity of God’s will. It is so simple that it is difficult to be faithful to it. However, again Jesus reminds us to be “faithful to the small matters, then he will give us the master’s joy.” (Mt. 25:21)

A Fatherly Advice

2006-10-28T07:22:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Vira and I visited our parents (from my side). We were chatting about family life and planning and my dad gave us a very good advice:

"Don't worry too much about your finances, having kids, being responsible and such... it will come by itself. Once you have kids, you somehow become ready mentally and financially, as long as you have faith that God's blessings will be sufficient for you (in his own words: rejeki sih somehow bakal dateng aja lah). As long as you keep your good hearts you will be alright."

Hmm.. he was not by any means religious (well, he does go to daily Mass, just to accompany my Mom because he loves her that much)... however in my experience, by God's grace he always lives his life according to God's teaching.

And somehow his words is not unlike Jesus' teaching in Matthew 6:25, "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about life, what you will eat (or drink), or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you more important than they? Can you by worrying add a single moment to your life-span?"

Thank you Lord, for blessing us with four excellent parents!

More Self Reflection

2006-10-28T07:14:00.000-07:00

If on our ministries we are preaching love to others, but we are so caught up with ministries that

We are forgetting to love and care for the people who need/miss us the most (families, old friends, and such....
Once people are out of our ministries we no longer care about them

What does that make us?

Hypo...tes

Back to Basic

2006-10-27T09:04:00.000-07:00

Jesus teaches us that we should appreciate and be faithful to little things. He who is faithful to little things then he will also be faithful to large things. Jesus also teaches us to have simplicity and purity of heart like a child’s.

It is ironic how as our ministries get bigger we (be honest, please!!) often forget these little things. How we have become “too busy” to appreciate a slow weekend. How we have become “too occupied” to remember a friend’s birthday, or how some forms of ministry have become “too simple” for us to take on.

Be careful… for this lack of awareness to simple things may be the downfall of our ministries. When things get tough in our ministries, it is always good to go back to the basic of our faith, which is so simple, that is: to love God our Father with all our heart and to love our neighbors as Jesus loves them.

It is so simple, and we are the ones who make it so complicated sometimes.

It is true that we can not avoid our ministries from getting bigger. It is true that we have to “tend to the flock” (oooh… that sounds so grandiose… doesn’t it?) However it is definitely UNTRUE that we should then ignore the simple, little things around us. It is definitely NOT OK that we are pushing ourselves and our fellow ministers to the limit, up to the point where they do not have enough time to tend for their families and friends (imagine, if each person is responsible in tending his/her family and friends, then maybe it will be a great new era).

What happens sometimes is that we are pulling people from their daily responsibilities, we are encouraging them to make their ministries as refuges. GOD is their refuge, not ministries. God does not teach us to run away from our responsibilities. Please, spare me the Bible verses where Jesus instruct his disciples to leave their families, or where Jesus instruct the young man to forget burying his father. Taken out of context, those are really, really dangerous.

I do not suggest that everyone ceases to do their capacities as servants or ministers now. It is still our responsibilities. However, please, if you have felt that your priorities are not right lately, get it right! Our families are great blessings! Our families are our church also! Look into each of our group (especially for those who have become large in size), and see whether our groups are still appreciative of little things, or have we measure success in different ways now?

The measure of success should still be the same: That everyone in the group experience the blanket of God’s love when they come, whether it comes from us, the music, the sharings, the sermons, or whether it comes from God himself. That is the true measure of success. It is not how complete our band is, the number of people who come, how on fire we feel when we preach the Gospel. And the measure of success is definitely not the number of days we are unavailable to our families due to our “ministrial obligations”.

The measure of success for ourselves is when we still remember the little thing that make us start our ministries, that is: LOVE….

Sometimes people do not need a fiery sermon
What they need is a simple “how are you doing”
And they do not need a heavenly music to blanket them
What they need is a simple hug that says we care

Many times, our families are “the people”
Many times, we choose to ignore them
Many times, we feel that something isn’t right
And we ignore the feeling saying,
“I am sacrificing for God”

Open our eyes,
Definitely open our hearts:
God our Father, Creator of this universe
Does not need our sacrifice

What he wants from us is simplicity
A humble heart that says “I love you Lord”
In every little ways that we do
Imagine if every people care to do their little ways
What a wonderful world it will be

So will we start anew?

Temptations from God

2006-10-26T16:11:00.000-07:00

For many, as they chose to become closer to God, it becomes more challenging. It seems that the closer we are, the more impulsive we become into sinning. We often attribute it as “temptations from God”.

However, God does not tempt anyone. What he does is that he send his Holy Spirit to enlighten us. The result of this enlightenment is that we become more aware of ourselves. Not only do we become aware of our better selves, we also become more aware of our darker selves. Sometimes this awareness frighten us.

I used to joke around that “what we do not know cannot hurt us”. However, it was just that, a joke. What we do not know can hurt us so much. Sometimes, it is our ignorance that hurt us so much. Just think about the holes in our ozone layer. It resulted from many ignorant generations (including ours!).

As is the case with sin. Our ignorance to sins has numbed us to the point that sometimes we are up to the point where we do not even realize when they are happening in front of us. This is what the Spirit intends to make right in us. It enlighten us wholly so that we can be mindful to what is actually happening within and around us.

Again, many people are frightened with this awareness. The response to this fright can be either positive or negative. It can lead into repentance, or it can lead into denial. Due to pride, we can be too afraid to be exposed further because we have lied to ourselves for so long that everything that we have done up to this point is “OK”.

The point is, sometimes we do not attribute it as the works of the Spirit. We attribute it as the “temptations from God”, that we become afraid, afraid that he will tempt us further, afraid that he will test us to the point where we are on the verge of breaking down. Yes, it does come from God. However, it is not temptation nor is it a test. He just exposes us as we are, so that we can move on, so that we realize that our lives need repair, and only he can repair them.

So, do not be afraid when it seems as we become closer to God, the more impulsive we become into sinning. It is just an enlightenment from God. It is one of the “make or break” points. God wants to turn us into something beautiful, and the enemy is always trying to make us turn back, that he will try to do everything to make us too afraid to move on.

Filling Our Love Tanks Up

2006-10-23T19:20:00.000-07:00

Many married couples has advised us that Vira and I need to be mindful when we "run out of love"... to keep committed even then.

Maybe we are naive but our question always: how can we "run out of love"?

I will proudly admit that we are very clingy to each other. We express our love to each other honestly and people has seen that we become more radiant when we are around each other.

And we would like to keep it that way...

The only way we can keep it that way is to become poor in front of God in terms of our relationship. To admit that our love alone is not sufficient to fill in the love tanks. We need to rely on God's love which is always new everyday.

The key is relying on God's love. Human love will soon run out of its ways.

I will admit also that I have no idea on how to keep the love tanks full. Yes I have read many books on marriage. But still... I have no idea... the only sure thing I know is to treat my lovely wife as Jesus would treat her. I always pray to God that he would let me love my wife the way Jesus loves her, the way she deserves to be loved because she is a daughter of God.

With human strength, it will be impossible. With God, nothing is impossible. We will keep doing whatever it is that we are doing right now, and always come to Jesus to fill our marriage with merriness :)

Beginner's Anxiety?

2006-10-22T20:19:00.000-07:00

How's Married Life.....

2006-10-22T20:00:00.000-07:00

It is a blast... my wife is really the second greatest blessing from God in my life...
(the first one is Jesus... who died on the cross so that we can have life)

It is a blast because we always realize the presence of God in the midst of our family.

Oh... it is a wonderful feeling to be able to say/write "our family"....

My dearest wife has also started her blog... check it out....

We Have the Choice!

2006-09-19T12:54:00.000-07:00

In case you have not noticed there is so much furor over Pope Benedict’s lecture several days ago.

Now, as a Catholic, I might be biased to support the Pope. I will definitely be biased to support the teaching of Christianity. However who and what I want to support is not the matter here.... That is why I will admit shamelessly that I have not read the Pope’s lecture in entirety before I write this.

What matter is our human nature.

It is the nature of our brains to automatically simplify things. It is the mechanism so that we can live normally in this world without overanalyzing everything that we have seen, heard, or read (after all, our brain capacity is limited). Selective listening and selective reading are two of the tools that our brains use to simplify our experiences.

However, through human weaknesses, through sin, or through our past wounds, we are tempted to forget this nature and then quickly make judgments based on things that have been simplified. These oversimplified judgments then lead to irrational thoughts and behaviors.

What then, am I trying to say here?

I am just trying to say that this furor might well be reactions over past and present wounds inflicted by Christians and Moslems to each other for centuries. This wound might be so deep, that any miniscule issues will trigger overreactions. Therefore, this present furor might just be a channel to let some frustrations over the injustices that have been inflicted by “Christian countries” over the past view years out.

Again, I am just trying to understand some of the perspectives of our Moslem brothers and sisters. I am not trying to support anyone or give reasons to any violence. However, perspectives are perspectives. They are “the truth” to the ones who hold them, and we will hold on to “this truth” until someone refute it.

Now I am going to give my opinion on our calling as Christians

It is the work of our faith to refute the perspective by living our faith. It is the work of our faith to start the reconciliation by giving everyone who meets us an encounter with Jesus. Yes, we can not make anyone happy no matter what we do, and we should not be afraid to hold on to what we believe is right. We should not act based on fear. Reconciliation that is based on fear is not reconciliation at all because the wound will still not be healed and the anger will just be buried underneath waiting for something to give it a chance to erupt again.

We as a Church has made many mistakes in the past to our brothers and sisters from different faiths. By the grace of God, the Church has been able to admit and withstand all the consequences. Not only have we admitted and endured, we also have learned from our mistakes. Just like a person grow from his/her past experiences by the grace of God, so also is the Church, and we are growing with the Church, in the Church, as the Church.

Maybe some of us are viewing some people as our enemies, I hope we can turn to God to get our heart and mind reconciled. They are humans, created and loved by the same God. The same sun rises and sets for these persons as well as us. If we wait for the other side to “get their acts right” first before we can reconcile, then forever we will be living in enmity. If we are complaining that “the other side” is always reactive, then I can say that maybe we are reactive. We just apply a different kind of reactivity, that is, passive reactivity: waiting for someone to act first and react accordingly. This is not freedom at all.

Be proactive in making things right with our neighbors. Be proactive in striving for peace. As we say every Sunday: “Glory to God in the highest and peace to his people on earth.” We as a church is the agent of peace. Let us continue the work of true reconciliation. Not only between religions, but also between God and humanity. Yes! We have this choice!

Let Me Count the Ways

2006-09-18T02:22:00.000-07:00

Why do I love the Gospel.... let me count the ways....

I love the Gospel for its literary beauty;
I love the Gospel for no matter how many times you read it, you can always find something new about God;
I love the Gospel for it is the Word of God made alive;
I love the Gospel for it is the story of Jesus’ life;
I love the Gospel for the life of Jesus is the message of love itself;
I love the Gospel for it reveals Jesus my true lover;
I love the Gospel for it is the sweet whisper from my true lover;
I love the Gospel for it is Jesus himself;
And through the Gospel, I meet Jesus, my lover.

Freebies

2006-09-15T23:34:00.000-07:00

About two weeks ago, I found out that someone at the office had used my USB flash drive to transfer almost 1 GB worth of audio files and forgot to delete them... no wonder my flash drive is almost full.

I was pretty bewildered at first. Yes, I did lend my flash drive to many people for quick file transfers. However, who in their right mind would do it for such mundane purpose?

It turns out that my snobbery was just a surprised reaction. The songs have become a blessing for me, for I really enjoyed them :) However, if there is some lesson learned: use flash drive for file transfers only, not for back-up if possible, and definitely not for storage. I was sickened to my stomach when thinking that if due to someone acting irresponsibly, some of my important files could have been corrupted or deleted.

So, anyone want to give me 1 GB worth of audio files again?

The End in Mind

2006-09-15T10:25:00.000-07:00

Do you not know that the runners in the stadium all run in the race, but only one wins the prize?Run so as to win. Every athlete exercises discipline in every way. They do it to win a perishable crown, but we an imperishable one. Thus I do not run aimlessly; I do not fight as if I were shadowboxing. No, I drive my body and train it, for fear that, after having preached to others, I myself should be disqualified.
1 Cor 9:24-27

For what purpose do we live for?
In what way do we try to improve ourselves?
When we are trying to improve ourselves, what do we have as the end in mind?

Those are the three questions that I feel would be proper for us to ask ourselves every now and then. For as St. Paul said, we do not want to run aimlessly. Often times, our effort to improve ourselves is just for the sake of vanity and pride. We want to get better at something so that we can win others’ admiration. We want to get better just so that we can live effectively, so that we can be happy. We... we... we... us... us... us... I... I... I.

Another question is happy for what? Happy because we can live effectively in this world which we know, would not last forever?

We want to have a worthy purpose. What purpose is worthier than to achieve Heaven and to win as many souls as possible so that the Kingdom of God can actually start on earth for these souls! This is our true joy, the knowledge that we can be, if not already are, united with God; the hope for everlasting love and grace; the vision of everybody experiencing this precious and induplicable love from God that we know are worthy to be pursued!

Becoming the Good News

2006-09-15T09:29:00.000-07:00

“Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel” 1 Cor 9:16

Woe to us if we do not preach the Gospel!
Woe to us if we do not reflect the Good News!
Woe to us if the gifts that are given by God become futile!
Woe to us if we are unable to love and receive love!

"For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. " Rom 8:38-39

Nothing can separate us from God unless we let them. We become united with God through Sacraments. The Sacraments helps us to be one with Christ. When we are one with Christ, we are called to be like him. Then we truly are united with God.

The essence of Christ’s life is to preach the Gospel, that is: to bring the Good News. The TRUE Good News, that is, not only does he preach the Gospel, but he lives the Gospel and becoming the Good News himself.

Have we become good news for our neighbors?

Visitation

2006-09-15T09:00:00.000-07:00

God really knows how to soothe my heart and mind during these hectic wedding preparation process...

Somehow 5 of my old friends from the US can come to Indonesia at the same timing. Needless to say, it was refreshing to see all of them, especially Chanuka, who are very dear to my heart.

Thank you Lord

Do It Anyway

2006-09-12T16:07:00.000-07:00

Whoa, there is really no coincidence with God... just after I have written my previous entry, God gave me the answer in my friend's blog Here goes:

Do It Anyway

By Mother Theresa

People are often unreasonable,
illogical and self-centered;
Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind,
people may accuse you of selfish ulterior motives;
Be kind anyway.

If you are successful,
you will win some false friends and true enemies;
Succeed anyway.

If you are honest and frank,
people may cheat you;
Be honest anyway.

What you spend years building,
someone could destroy overnight;
Build anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness,
they may be jealous;
Be happy anyway.

The good you do today,
people will often forget tomorrow;
Do good anyway.

Give the world the best you have,
and it may never be enough;
Give the world the best you've got anyway.

You see, in the final analysis,
it is between you and God;
It was never between you and them anyway.

Thank you Tasia, for posting such a nice thought from a holy woman :). Really, our God is awesome. This time, just when I have a little crisis in faith, I got the answer right away. Praise God :)

Being Too Nice???

2006-09-12T15:31:00.000-07:00

What is the definition of “being too nice”?

I have this kind of feedback from others, that sometimes, I can be “too nice”. I always have the same question: how can they say that? Based on what fact? Does “being too nice” have a definition?

People usually say something vague like: Be nice, but don’t let someone step over you.

My response to that: What is the definition of someone stepping over me? Has someone ever step all over me? If I don’t feel that way, does that negate the “stepping over” part?

In response to the feedback, I have tried to change, but sometimes, I do not like the way I acted when I am just “nice”. What happens to a plain, old kindness? Do we live in a world where that does not exist anymore? Do we live in such world where even when we want to perform an act of kindness, we have to worry about “being too nice?”

How sad.

If I can help someone then I will say yes. If I really cannot, or if my conscience is saying no then I will say no. I do not like to base my judgement to do something good based on fear for something that has not even happenned yet. For me, that is being a slave of fear.

Or is it a concept that I just has not understood yet because I am just too naive?

Get Over It!

2006-09-12T15:07:00.000-07:00

Why do I dread being rejected so much? Why is it as if something inside me is being hurt when someone refuses to help me?

My boss in the US once told me that when someone reject you, you lose nothing. You got nothing before and you have nothing now... I thought it was a good advice to overcome the fear of approaching people or meeting with new people

Why am I still feeling like this now? Is it because it was an opportunity lost? Or was it my ego that being hurt?

Get over it!

Close Encounter of the Day

2006-09-12T13:49:00.000-07:00

During my trip to the office, a cyclist suddenly just decided to stop on the middle of the road to watch something that caught his eye.... I braked like crazy, a bike behind me braked furiously, and the cyclist did not even realize that he almost died. He just stared blankly and ignorantly into whatever it was that he was staring at....

Saving lives is tiring, especially ignorant ones :P

One (or Two) Very Good Reason Why I Want the Wedding Party to be Over and Done with

2006-09-12T12:52:00.000-07:00

I need a quality sleep and my personal time without being bothered by ridiculous, vain matters........ zzzzzzzzZZZZZZZ

Posts Rush

2006-09-12T12:40:00.000-07:00

Whoa, why does this sudden rush of posting occur?

Let's just say that I miss my blog, I miss having time to think and write, and I am really worried that my writing skill deteriorate over time if this continues on.

On Being Just

2006-09-12T12:37:00.000-07:00

Brothers and sisters: How can any one of you with a case against another dare to bring it to the unjust for judgment instead of to the holy ones?
1 Cor 6:1

Every day (or almost every day), we say “Our Father” in which we say, “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us”.

When we judge others who have sinned against us (or even when we are judging others for the sake of “morality”) let us consider how we would like to be forgiven when we are sinning. No matter how just we think we are, we are still unjust in front of God.

But are we to be doormats then?

I hope no one thinks that way. I am all for upholding our “conscience”. However, by relying on my conscience, I puts the responsibility on myself to sharpen my conscience, to keep knowing God more and more, so that the Spirit may speak ever more clearly to my conscience. Again, no matter how just we are, we are still unjust compared to God.

Therefore, sharpening our conscience is a way to rely on God so that we can be just to others. Praying to God so that he gives the best for people who have sinned against us never hurts, too. Praying for people who have sinned against us gives us the opportunity to practice all the fruits of the Holy Spirit, and who knows, by practicing it in one way, the fruits can really be one with our lives and conscience.

A Little Bit of Control Freaks, aren’t We?

2006-09-12T09:36:00.000-07:00

Another chapter of our wedding preparation: receiving the printed invitations.
It turned out that the card maker is not that organized after all. Some of the invitations look like they were cut manually, while some others have different color tones betwen the right and left pages.

Are you kidding me?

(Trying so hard to stay calm)

..... breathe......

So, last night Vira, my future in-laws, and myself were busy opening all the invitations to choose which ones to be sent back for re-printing.. there were 700 of them (we did not even finish them last night for it was too late already)....

And there will be 700 more to come.....

(So looking forward for it.... NOT!!!)

Oh.. oh... oh... can I spend another evening or two checking hundreds of invitations please.. .huh? huh? Can I? Can I????

The Three Purposes of Marriage

2006-09-11T18:51:00.000-07:00

Living together – meaning that the couple is to face everything together.
Living in abundance – meaning that each has to be committed in giving his/her best to the other while requiring none
Living in sacrament – meaning that the husband and wife are the ones who gives sacrament to each other

These three purposes completes each other. The husband and wife give sacrament to each other so that Jesus is present in the marriage. Without his presence, doing purpose number two would have been impossible. No human can love altruistically like that.

A husband and wife is to support each other spiritually, reminding each other to rely on God to bless their marriage.

Source: Indra and Vira’s Canonical Counseling with Fr. Ignatius, September 2nd, 2006

Update is Coming

2006-09-06T20:15:00.000-07:00

Oops, haven't updated my blog for a while...
I promise an update is coming soon :)

When Nature Calls

2006-08-07T21:14:00.000-07:00

My condition has been up and down for the past five days. I am trying to fight a cold by taking a lot of vitamin C and keeping myself reasonably active. It was working well (or so I thought) until I coughed violently this afternoon at work.

Actually I had asked my boss whether I could leave earlier today so that I could get enough rest before I teach a class tomorrow. After a while, I thought that I would be able to make it through the day anyway.

However after that coughing episode, everyone asked me to leave at once… forget working… LOL

Sometimes you just can’t fight nature.

Let God Do the Rest

2006-08-05T11:20:00.000-07:00

"The friend who suffers alone insults the other" - Jean de Rotrou

Reading this quote, I am reminded of my past, and maybe still my current, tendency of having too much ego to ask for someone's help unless I really could not take it anymore. I do not know how/when did this "Superman" tendency come from. All I know is that I thought that this tendency was good, because it showed resilience. I used to worship resilience, I took pride on my fighting spirit.

Well as usual, too much of something is never good, except if that "something" is God :)

In my ministries and workplace, I found so many friends who also have this tendency. Maybe these are the fighters' trait. In ministries and in my workplace, the idealism runs high, that if we do our best and let God do the rest, nothing is impossible.

Well, have we ever thought that maybe "letting God do the rest" means letting others help us? When we are not willing to accept help from anyone but the "Big Boss", it is PRIDE. Sometimes we insanely avoid asking for help to nurture our pride. We are afraid because if it turns out that when others, especially those who are at or below our level, actually can help us solve our problems, we feel inferior to them. We somehow feel dependent, and this tough world has created us to be fighters who loathe to be dependent to others. We worship independence to this extent. We stubbornly help for the sky to open and Divine help to come. We are waiting that kind of help because of course... our problems are too big for any other humans to overcome...

Here are some of the reasons that often come out from our mouth:

Oh, I don't think you would care
I don't want to burden you too much
I just need some time alone and then I can solve it myself

Granted there are times that these reasons are valid. All I am saying is that when we are facing problems, whether it is big or small, we can bring blessings for others by requesting and accepting their help. Imagine how worthy we feel when someone close to us, someone noteworthy, is actually asking for our help! We feel useful, we feel trustworthy, and best of all, we feel that we can be channels of God's love to this person by supporting him/her. Now, wouldn't we want our closest families and friends to feel the same thing?

When we are refusing our friends' help, we are actually demeaning their trustworthiness, loyalty, and capability. We are actually hurting them when all of a sudden, they see that our problems have become unbearable, and they hadn't had any clue before because we did not tell them. So please ask ourselves, if we are currently refusing help, are we refusing it due to our inner calling, or are we refusing it just because of pride?

"It is not good for a man to be alone" - God

Gross >_<

2006-07-31T05:28:00.000-07:00

I had the unfortunate and unpleasant experience to watch two people getting lashed on MetroTV uncensored. Those two were caught having sex out of marriage in Aceh, Indonesia. Since Aceh is one of the Indonesian areas that practices Syariah law, and according to that law, the punishment for infidelity was to be lashed in public, those two were sentenced accordingly.

The scene grossed me out for several things:

It shows that some Indonesian TV stations do not have ethics at all. Metro TV actually showed the offenders' squirming faces when they were executed. Gross!! Gross!! Gross!!
People, including young children, actually watched and cheered the execution live! It was as if I was watching a medieval movie...

Congratulations for setting our country back hundreds of years....

My Dream Job

2006-07-31T03:02:00.000-07:00

Can't sleep,
Keep thinking about the undone tasks at the office,
Have been dreaming about miniscule, nonsensical things about my work for several days now,
Even my fiancee is catching up on that too,
She starts to have dreams about my job.

I guess that makes it my (or our?) dream job...

The Image of God in Me

2006-07-30T16:00:00.000-07:00

What is the image of God in me?
When I was asked this question, the first image that came into my mind was the image of fire. No, not something grandeour like a “Holy Fire” or “Tongues of Fire” or something like those. Just fire.

When I reflected on this image, I thought that it was a nice representation of God from my intellect. Fire is a consuming and purifying entity. At a more practical level, fire gives warmth to one who are nearby. Fire also give light. God’s love is also like that. God’s love is burning so strongly. His love is enlightening. His love gives warmth to the one who accepts him. His love consumes us and purifies us.

However, fire can also be scary. When I started to think about a big bonfire, it can be frightening because it can burn anything or anyone who does not play by its rules. It is hard to be one with fire and not get burned (unless of course, you are into black magic or something).

This reflection shows me why it is hard for me to get even closer to God. I have this weariness that I will get burned because I often does not live by his rules. I might know about his mercy, his unliminted love, and everything else about God that Christianity teaches. However, as long as the dominant image is a fire, it will be hard for me to be closer to him. I can not be united with fire! Therefore, my image of God is not complete yet

Maybe this is the essence of my relationship with God. I have to continue to accept him until I know him as a Person. Until all fear subsides, replaced by trust and intimacy. Oh God, how I long for the day, when I get to be united with you in your love!

Stop Playing the Victim!

2006-07-21T19:21:00.000-07:00

"I know that darkness is all around us, but so does God, don't give up on grace." -- Father Tomas on "Point Pleasant" a Fox TV series
"Where sins abound, so is the grace of God"-- Rom 5:20

Yeah.. yeah... lately, "Point Pleasant" is my new favorite show to watch while torturing mysel... errr.. exercising. At first, I thought it was a rather cheesy teenage version of the end of the world. It still somehow is.

However, it gets better with every episode. In the 3rd episode, the battle of good and evil begins. It begins with the statement I quoted above. The priest, Father Tomas, came to Christina, who is a daughter of Satan and a regular human being.

Father Tomas shared his experience while he got a chance to pray with Christina. He said that at first, he thought that as a Priest, it was his duty to perform the ritual necessary to destroy Christina. However, as they prayed together, he never felt any closer to God in his life. He then went on to say that it is true that the presence of evil is strong in her. However, where the evil is strong, the love of God is even stronger. That is why he experienced such closeness to God when they prayed together, even though at that time, the presence of evil continued to threaten him.

Somehow, hearing the priest said those words made me realize my current state in Indonesia. I have had tougher struggle in my spiritual life and emotional life ever since I moved here. Again, luckily God gives me a partner in Vira so that we have each other as our sanity check :).

As most people who live, or have lived in Indonesia can testify, this country is extraordinarily corrupt, and somehow you can always feel the tension in the air. It is as if the mass is ready to explode any time (I do not mean suicide bomber.. thank God), a simple manifestation is in how Indonesians drive and react to traffic. Furthermore, the newspapers have happily become fear mongers. They continually reported all wrong things about this country: the natural disasters, the corruption, the failures; simply because fear sells. As a result, if one is not careful, it is easy to be affected by the overall atmosphere of this country. One can be dragged down into spiritual abyss and it would be easy to think that the natural disasters happening to this country as God's punishment. Yeah.. God is very easy to blame, isn't he?

The statement of Fr. Tomas in the series is a very timely consolation for me. Yes, it is very easy to just sway into the culture of fear. Yes, it is very easy to think that this world is all evil. Yes, sometimes the events of this world just want us to pull the blanket over our heads and sleep. Who cares! Every idiots in this world could just kill each other, rip each other off... and let them defend themselves to God when the time comes. Meanwhile... we are the victim here! We are the victim of the situation! Who in their right minds would not cower imagining what is next to expect: nuclear war? riots? tsunami? volcano eruptions? attack from monkeys from Uranus? You name it.

But no! That is definitely not what we are called to do! We are Christians for God's sake! We are called to make this world a better place. Maybe only a few of us have the heroic blood in us, have the courage to be crucified, to be stoned to death, to be confined to jail for decades for doing what we think is right. However, we are called to live on... live on and do our duties, no matter how miniscule we think they are.

Albert Schweitzer, a Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1952 once said that the sum of the small deeds, our deeds when we are living our daily lives and performing our duties is greater than any great deeds that is performed by "superheroes" combined. Yes we need those inspiring heroes. We need those people to lead us with their views. However, without the people's decision to follow their views and values, those would stay that way: just a bunch of nice, idealistic views and values

And guess what? We are not alone! When fear and darkness seem to engulf us, the presence of God is blanketing us from all those. The more the world gives us reason to cower under our blanket, the greater is God's grace to give us strength to make this world a better place. Stop playing the victim and stand up... be a change agent!

In the series, after Christina have had the conversation with Fr. Tomas, she started to stand up for herself. She also stopped acting as a scared teenager who was a victim of the situation, a victim of nature. She started to confront the enemy, who wanted to use her as an instrument to destroy humanity.

Well, unfortunately, the series has been discontinued by Fox. What a bummer! Oh well...

Chicken Feet and Intestine

2006-07-12T06:11:00.000-07:00

Today one of my co-workers brought some snacks to the office. I surely can resist the chicken feet chips (literally), but when it comes to the intestine chips (also quite literally)… my resistance ended there.

Good bye diet…
Hello gluttony….
Thank you for playing weight watchers…
So long willpower…

Well in my defense I did exercise tonight (40 minutes on stepper!!! Huahuahua… welcome sexy butt!!!)

Sure enough here comes my punishment: having to listen to my parents chatting about heart attack, strokes and the likes… AAARRRRGGHH

Why should all the good food be dangerous? Not fair!

Now where’s that recipe book for veggie again?

Our First Dinner at OUR House

2006-06-10T09:16:00.000-07:00

Tonight, Vira and I had our first dinner at our own house. Though we do not live there yet (not until we are married), we want to try to get a sense of what it would be like to live in that house. One of the purposes is so that we will know if there are still some necessities/utensils that we have not gotten yet.

I should say, though it was only a simple dinner while trying out our new microwave and utensils, it was pretty touching for me. To imagine that my life has gotten this far. Now, I am ready to get married and own a house. To imagine that I will spend a big part of my life at this house with this woman. Suddenly, these realities hit me tonight, and it was a good feeling :). Maybe this is the kind of feeling that "adulthood" rituals bring in certain tribes. This is one of my own adulthood ritual. I feel that I am entering another phase in my life, another step to get ready for married life.

I hope I will never take anything that happens in my marriage for granted, anything in my life. I hope I will always remember tonight, this strong feeling that I have when we first shared dinner at OUR house.

Boasting on Christ's Work

2006-06-09T17:15:00.000-07:00

"Boast not of Christ's work in you, unless you can show the Spirit's work in you." - J.C. Ryle

I found this short quotation on Holy Spirit Interactive, a Catholic website that I often visited for my daily Mass readings and reflections, because the timing of the website is similar to timing in Indonesia (meaning: when it is Saturday in Indonesia, the reading there is also for Saturday).

I thought about this quotation for a while, for in Indonesian culture, boasting is a taboo. Even in Christianity, boasting is kind of a "taboo" (at least in my understanding), then, how can this person (Ryle), recommend for us to boast when we can show the Spirit's works in us? Wouldn't it be a mixed message?

After reflecting for a while I reasoned that it would not necessarily be a mixed message. We actually can boast, and should boast. The question is how to boast properly. Here is what I got:

When the Spirit's works in us is authentic, when he overshadows us, his work boasts for itself: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. When these fruits are manifested in us, we almost have no choice but to boast about his work through our lives. Wouldn't it be beautiful, to be able to boast about him oh so naturally?

PRH

2006-06-09T09:40:00.000-07:00

I have the opportunity to attend Personal and Human Relations (PRH) workshop Session 1: Who Am I, which will be held until next Tuesday (no it is not a typo, it is really PRH, not PHR).

I feel really spiritually enriched by this workshop. Even though I struggled a bit with the room temperature, which is very hot, I am blessed that this training is based on solid psychological foundation with a solid Christianity aspect. The workshop invites me to reach unto our inner selves, which is not easy to do, but once I get used to it, I feel that it is very worth it.

Which is one of the reason why I am updating my blog again after a very long while. The training gives me the longing to write again, since writing is one of my inner self's yearnings. It always feel natural for me to write when expressing myself. Also, with a new, improved, and faster computer, this make updating my blog easier :) Coincidentally, the inquiring method of PRH is also writing. Cool.

This is really a new experience for me to have some kind of a "retreat" in a group counseling setting. Unlike New Life Seminar, where in my experience, where the method is having the total faith to let the Spirit do the work to renew our lives, this workshop is making us as an active partner of the Spirit in doing the work.

Today was the second day out of six. I am excited for the rest, for I feel refreshed already. I am pretty surprised on how detail my soul recorded the events that shaped my personality. Oh and by the way, this workshop is guided by a Nun from the CB order (Carolus Borromeus), in a very Catholic setting.

One cool fact: it is being paid for by my company, and accounted for my required yearly self-development.

Blaming Others

2006-06-09T08:28:00.000-07:00

I found out that I have a tendency to blame others for my obvious mistake, even in simple things, especially when the "others" are people who depend on me for a living (my fiancee's servant in this case).

I just hit my fiancee's fence with my car (yeah what a way to win over my in-laws' hearts). It was pretty hard. The servant was standing there without saying anything. I was pretty pissed at her for that. Thank God I have pretty good self control to realize that maybe my expectation was unreasonable. After all, I always managed to get out of there easily, so she did not expect that she had to look out for the possibility that I have a brain-dead moment.

She did not even scream when I hit the fence, which I found very amusing now. She just stood there as if nothing happened. Oh well... :)

Well, at least the fence was fine, my bumper got dented a bit. It is just a car..... it is just a car (my new self-hypnosis mantra)

On Human Experience

2006-05-13T15:16:00.000-07:00

This is in response to Mr. Arif B. on one of my recent posts:

Arif B. said...
It is easy to fall into this duality of good and bad. If anything appears to be "good" or "bad," it is because they are imagined. It is the mind that constructs this illusion. What is imagined absolutely never exists in the way it is imagined.A caterpillar ate through one nice green leaf. Good or bad?A hungry tiger chased a deer, killed and ate it. Good? Bad?A tree was struck by a lighting bolt one thunderous evening, killing the tree plus some birds nesting on its branch. Bad or good?Hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana. Thousands died or lost their home. Bad? Good?

Such profound insight Mr. Arif. I prefer a simpler approach to help me classify whether something is good, bad, or neutral.

I believe that a judgment whether something good or bad is not based on imagination, for human experience consist of 3 parts: fact (reason), emotion, and moral.

I agree with you that a fact in itself, without emotion nor moral, is just that: a fact. However, for the people involved (directly and indirectly), it might be a different story; for example, I don't care about the nice green leaf, it is just a fact for me, but maybe the gardener cares, so it becomes something "bad" for him/her). Then comes morality: agreed human statutes based on natural instinct and universal principles, this will be another discussion at another time lah ya :)

In principle, I would like to reason that "good" and "bad" are not just in human illusion. Simply: what one experience is what one experience. How one deal with it is his/her choice :) Hope this can satiate your musings.

The Fruit of Grace

2006-05-09T01:32:00.000-07:00

"Triplex autem est fructus gratiae, qui numquam potest reperiri, nisi in eo qui est in gratia. Primus est remissio culpae, secundus est plenitudo iustitiae, et tertius est perpetuatio vitae beatae."

"Moreover threefold is the fruit of grace, which one can never discover, except in him who is in grace. The first is the remission of fault [culpae], the second is the fullness of justice, and the third is the perpetuation of blessed life." - St. Bonaventure in 'Conferences of the Seven Gifts of the Holy Spirit'

A Challenge from God

2006-05-09T00:39:00.000-07:00

"We urge you brothers and sisters, not to take the grace of God in vain" (2 Cor 6:1)

Since everything we accept comes from the grace of God, therefore, nothing should be in vain. Yeah, right. Imagine applying this in our lives. It is easy to recognize his grace in good things. How about when bad things happen? Can we recognize his grace? Can we still make it fruitful? OK, forget about bad things for a moment. What have we done to ensure that the good things that he has given us become fruitful?

It is a challenge from God for sure :) Yeah, it is easy to understand but difficult to apply. Things that come easily lose their worth. Likewise, if salvation comes that easily, then it loses its worth too.

Puzzled by Puzzle

2006-05-08T22:25:00.000-07:00

Vira and I are currently working on a jigzaw puzzle. Yeah... I know what is in your mind... we are the coolest, hottest, most entertaining couple!!!

(narcissistic mode off)

It is funny how I find out that I actually enjoy being at home this much (of course having the right company helps).

"You get to a point in your life where the endless partying doesn't do it for you anymore" - an unnamed guy in "Will and Grace"

Personal Mission Statement

2006-05-08T22:23:00.000-07:00

Love is the most important thing in my life. I have experienced how it feels to be loved by God directly and through others. I want everyone I meet to experience God’s love through myself and what I do.

The fruit of love is service. I view my life purpose as a blessing to others through service. I want my actions and career to improve the quality of life of others.
In my family, I want to be a loving father to my children, and a loving husband to my wife. I will be there for them. I will cherish them as the most beautiful and wonderful thing that ever happened to me. I want my children to have a positive image of this world through our family life. As a parent, I will be the facilitator for this to happen.

In my workplace, I want others to experience work as a blessing. It is a beautiful thing to be able to produce something, either it is something tangible, or intangible. I want to make work situation as such so that everyone can view and feel it as a blessing, even when that means I have to step out of my comfort zone. I want to share my experience and expertise

Spiritually, I want to continue in my relationship with God. I want to be able to see him in others. I want to continue to serve in my church community. I want everyone I meet to realize that they are loved by God. I want to continue to work in my little ways to bring peace among God’s children.

In all, I want to keep improving as a human being, and I do not want to develop alone. I want to walk together with my brothers and sisters in this world to make our lives as blessings.

I Love My Fiancee

2006-05-07T23:51:00.000-07:00

I love my fiancee very very much...

Nuff said...

Reaping What We Sow

2006-05-03T04:49:00.000-07:00

These past few days, there had been mass labor demonstrations in Jakarta. It is getting pretty ridiculous. I am now stuck at the office, hungry, sleepy, tired, and still stressing out because I need to rest for my activities at the office tomorrow.

Might as well stay over at the office eh?

Please pray for us Indonesians, although, we might be reaping what we have sown for decades.

"Senjata Makan Tuan"

2006-04-07T21:02:00.000-07:00

Car alarms can really be counterproductive. I have realized this ever since Chanuka, Om Robby, and myself were stranded on Noodle Planet’s parking lot several years ago just because his keyless remote battery ran out. That is the reason why I never really like the idea of having alarm installed in my car. However, almost every new car now comes with alarm included.

My keyless remote has been acting weird since several months ago. I never thought that it was due to the battery power though because I only have trouble in similar areas that is: near any kind of transmitter antennas or mass electrical generator, and in front of my fiancees house. In any other places, I never had any trouble.

Last night my fiancee and I were very tired, so I decided to go home earlier than usual. We kissed good night and then I tried to disengage the alarm. First click.. no response... oh well... what else is new? Second click... still no response... third click.. fourth... fifth..... After tenth click, I began to realize there was something else that went wrong with my remote.

I went back inside the house and tried to think of a solution. We finally tried to open all of Vira’s keyless remote to try to search for a similar battery, just in case the problem was from the battery. After several tries, we finally found one, and HALLELUJAH.. it worked...

The amazing thing is this:
It was the best time to have this kind of trouble. Since it is still in the early evening, we have enough time to look for a solution
It was the best place to have this trouble. It was at my fiancee’s home, rather than the office, the mall, or someplace else.
My fiancee is in the car rental business and therefore, there were many remotes that we could tinker with.
We found the solution relatively fast (20 minutes)

Thank you God! You are gentle and amazing!

God is Good

2006-04-04T13:57:00.000-07:00

Hahaha.. this was taken during December 2005. I just want to show how fun my co-workers are.

It is really a blessing from God to have co-workers such as them. Oh yes, we have our spat at times, but I have to tell you: thus far, this is the best work environment I have ever had.

So yes, I feel that I have it all in Indonesia... a kind and beautiful fiancee... a loving family... my dream job... and great work environment.

God is good!

Cured!

2006-04-04T08:06:00.000-07:00

Here's how:
My fiancee decided to try to massage me first.... with her elbow!!!!

She prayed, started to massage me, and suddenly, there was a silent crack

Neck pain gone.... Thank you God!

Pain in the Neck

2006-04-04T02:06:00.000-07:00

For the past two days I am dealing with a pain in the neck...

(really)

(literally)

Need a good massage therapist or chiropractor......

Admonition from God

2006-03-31T17:10:00.000-08:00

I got an admonition from God a couple of days ago:
"Be faithful on little things then you can be faithful on the bigger things"

Yeah.... been too busy focusing on the bigger things in life and ministries: marriage, prayer meetings, articles, projects at work, and so forth, that I start to lose passion in the little things in my spiritual life such as giving small prayer of gratitude to God throughout the day, or even my daily prayer. I am still doing the routines, but the routines were just for the sake of.... routines. Worst of all, I realized it but did not even want to summon the will to fight it.

Talking about being lukewarm: there it was

Thank you God for the warning

For God's Sake... Take a Break!

2006-03-31T08:23:00.000-08:00

"Jesus, tired from the journey, sat down there at the well." (John 4:6)

Man, I like this verse!! It really depicts Jesus' limitation as a human being. He who is omnipotent chose to be limited for our sake.

I like the fact that even Jesus have enough sense to take a rest whenever he feel tired.

Often times, as faithful Christians, we can be ridden with guilt when we feel that we need rest. We feel that we are being idle, we feel that we are neglecting our families, works, or ministries. Furthermore, there is this sick pride that we have on being busy. The busier we are, the more important we feel.

Let me tell you: taking a break and pausing is a good exercise in wisdom, humility, and above all faith!!!

Often, when Jesus was taking a break, there were still a great multitude of people waiting to talk to him, to be healed, to be fed, and so forth. However, he is wise enough to know when he needs a break. He has a great faith in the wisdom and love of his Father. His Father also love the people as much as he does. And his Father will take care of the people.

In our case: God loves the people, our families, more than we can ever love them! Sometimes we are unable to take a break not because we have a great devotion to our families and ministries. It is pride!!! We are only the extension of God's loving hands, serving the people. However, it is God who heals them, who comforts them, and who fed them. Not us. The world had been going around before we exist and it will still go around without us.

Then again, why serve?

We are the one who needs to serve. Jesus knows this. That is why he gave us the parable of the three servants who were given some talents to invest. Does the master needs the result? No. He was rich already, and he would still be rich even if he lost the talents altogether. However, the work that the servants did was a proof of their faithfulness to their master, their integrity to their jobs, and a proof of their love to the master. Give the master his due, and he will give to us even more than we can ever imagine.

Remember that God is the wisest and the most compassionate Father and Master that we can ever have. He knows when we need rest. He knows when we were "broke" and need more time to give his due. He understand. He does not put undue burdens on us. He does not care about the offering. He cares about our hearts, our humility, our passion, and our love.

What is the use of having thousands of "good" deeds if they cause us to love less? The Father does not want a grudging-hardworking children (see the older brother of the prodigal son). Rather, he wants us to have wisdom and faith that he will bless us in our limitations. He is the one who start loving us first, and he will be the one who finishes the work!

Chi Lee Woeng vs. Kwee Ceng

2006-03-31T08:19:00.000-08:00

In response to Mario’s inquiry about Ciliwung... here goes:

The Battle of Chi Lee Woeng (Ciliwung) vs. Kwee Ceng (Guo Jing)

Kwee Ceng: I told you not to show your face again in this town!!!
Chi Lee Woeng: You have no reason to drive me out!!
Kwee Ceng: Of course I do: YOU STINK!!!
Chi Lee Woeng: So I am... what do you expect?? People have been using me as their organic recycling center (you get the idea) for years!!!
Kwee Ceng: I guess there is no other options but finding out who is the strongest then!!

The battle began....
Kwee Ceng tried to overwhelm Chi with his 18 Dragon Paws
Chi Lee Woeng answered by throwing his ultimate technique: The Overflooding Stinky Water....
Kwee Ceng could not stand the putrid smell and threw-up
Chi Lee Woeng won the battle... it was a short one....

Conclusion: I’ve been working too much... in desperate need of entertainment...
Hmm... the flying pink elephants are interesting!!! I guess I will fly with them.

Weird Dream

2006-03-30T15:06:00.000-08:00

Got a weird dream last night:

I was at a restaurant with my fiancee and my family.... and our waiter was Clint Eastwood!!! What the??? I don't even like the guy that much.... (no dislike, neutral feeling... really) I like his movies even less....

I remembered saying something cliche to him: Go ahead..... Make my day!!

Freudians will say: The meticulous but yet fabulous representation of Mr. Eastwood is a concrete proof that a miniscule stimulant can reside in our musings. Therefore the dreams itself represent the irrepressible desire to overcompensate blah blah blah

Jungians will say: The uniformity of conformity to the representation in the dream is not yet a representation of a sense of disenfranchisement and blah blah blah

Conclusion: I need to take a shower.....

My Poker Face

2006-03-30T05:29:00.000-08:00

The Prodigal Bible

2006-03-30T03:11:00.000-08:00

Actually this news is kinda out-of-date....

I got an e mail 3 weeks ago from one of my friends in San Diego:

"We found your bible"

Let me tell you about this bible. This bible has a sentimental value for me because it was given by my late grandmother. She was baptized about two years before she passed away. The bible was a baptismal gift. The irony was that she was illiterate. Therefore, she gave the bible to me.

For me, it was a remembrance of my late grandmother and of God's grace in calling her into the Communion with the Church before she passed away (Church teaching: when someone is baptized, all of his/her previous sins are forgiven). It is a remembrance of how God really loves my grandmother and he wants her to be in union with him in heaven.

Unfortunately this bible has a knack of getting lost.

Example number one: The bible was lost in 1999

Example number two: The bible was lost in 2004

Fortunately, this bible also has a knack of being miraculously found:

Example number one: The bible was found in my new car in 2000

Example number two: After two years, the bible was found in San Diego Newman Center (trust me, I have tried frantically to find it there for many, many times.

So, thank God it has been found again. Now I need a volunteer to deliver it to me in Jakarta.... anyone?? :P

Contentment on the Unknown

2006-03-01T06:32:00.000-08:00

Sometimes being too cerebral can go against us in spiritual life. We can take pride in our reasoning capacity that we forget that no matter how astonishing our brain capacity might be, we still have our limits. When we are dealing with God who is omnipotent, we run the risk of limiting him in order to fit him with our thinking capacity. It would be like me trying to fit in into a no. 30 jeans... (no, my waist is not omnipotent by the way... thank you)

Yes, I have been in many situations where often times, my heart just can't be content by accepting that some things about God just can't be explained. Sometimes I feel challenged by these situation (which can be good, because it teased me into learning about God more), however, there are still limits to my understanding no matter how knowledgeable I am.

This is when I have to start to be careful because it is very easy in this situation for pride to interfere with my spiritual life. I can worry too much on understanding about God that my worriness actually brings my spiritual life down. It takes wisdom and obedience to know and understand when God is trying to tell us something, and it takes humility to be content with our limitations as humans

Lethargic

2006-02-27T17:59:00.000-08:00

Somehow I have been very lethargic for the past two days. Maybe the pressure at work finally gets to me... maybe it is because I have been trying to cut back on caffeine, or maybe a mixture of both? I don't know....

What I do know is that one has to know his/her limits. Sometimes realizing our limits is a sign of maturity. It is a sign of our admittance that we are humans after all, we are not God, and we really need to rely on God because there are many things that we really can not control.

Unfortunately, many societies have twisted the meaning of knowing one's limitations. Many societies regard it as a sign of weakness, as tanking on life. I admit that I sometimes take a very improper pride that I have been working beyond my limit. Maybe doing that every once in a while would still be okay. However, when people start to expect that standard from us every time, then we are in trouble. When the pride start to kick in, then we really are in trouble!

Oh well... maybe it is time to sit back and relax after all.. realizing that only God has no limit, and we all have and should accept them as blessings from God, as a reminder that we are still humans after all.

New Resolutions

2006-02-26T21:27:00.000-08:00

Here are my new resolutions... hopefully I can keep them:

Reading spiritual books at least 10 pages daily
Daily reading of the Bible
Getting back to my morning prayer (been neglecting that lately)
Giving more attention and love to people around me (namely my family, fiancee, and friends)

Please pray for me so that at least I can keep these four resolutions. Then if these went well, I will add more :)

Me and My Fiancee

2006-02-26T07:11:00.000-08:00

This is my most romantic moment with my fiancee :P