People often say "Do your best and let God will do the rest." I don't like it. It's almost similar to the notion that "God helps those who help themselves." I think that's an utterly pagan statement. Much of it still highlights our dependence on our own human efforts.


Here's a piece of ancient wisdom.

Do your best, prepare for the worst - then trust God to bring victory.

         Proverbs 21:31



I like that. Do or die, we're believing for victory.


In Deo speramus


In God we trust




G

It's amazing what gems you can come across on the Internet.  Over the past week (thanks mostly to friends), I've found:

my favourite reason to pull whatever little hair I have out of frustration.

my favourite Star Wars spoof.

my favourite Star Wars-based game.

my favourite piece of celebrity gossip that makes me go 'ewwww...'.

and of course,

my favourite Malaysian blogger, who just so happens to be the director of my (current) favourite movie.

j

I've been following the discussion on the previous post which kinda ignited me out of my blog drought to post something that i've always been wanting to tell. The idea of our vocation and the pursuing our discipline in God's world. Yeah, i believe that's what we often need to remind ourselves. That this is God's world. Things are not what they seemed at times. And the book of Revelation have much to say about that in terms of the meaning its symbols are conveying. I use present tense there because the words within the pages of the book are still at work. Back to the discussion.

J highlights the struggle in being good at his discipline and at the same time having to "bend to rules" at times to do what needs to be done. Most would know that that is rather necessary for the journalistic world. That's probably why people perceive reporters as cynical and inhumane at times. Of course, the same could be said for other kinds of job eg. the corporate world which I'm rather apprehensive to enter into.

One commented on the call to honour God in the light of these circumstances. That we should stick with our boundaries and not compromise. For in the end, we will be vindicated. God honours us when we do the right thing.

As I thought through the tension between to two - being excellent in your discipline and at the same time refusing the temptation to compromise so that we get the job done, I imagine myself being in those kind of situations. Actually, more like remembering WHEN I was in those scenarios. Situations like trying not to copy your senior's answer when doing your assignments, even though as hard as you tried there's not a hint of a chance which you would know how to do and the lecturer simply would not tell you how. Or when I have to hold the joss-stick and bow to some idol during my grandparents' funeral for the sake of honoring my family. I heard some reminders from people during that time, in sermons and in testimony, that it is outright wrong and you dishonor God that way. (which I believe now it's actually stupid by the way) I have not been in the working world yet, when the floodgates will open as far as testimony vs persecution decisions go. I haven't experienced the zenith of what Jack Bauer or David Palmer went through, where the stakes are much higher.

But I do know the pressure to perform when it counts. Failure sucks. In the light of my values and belief, I struggle not to be flaky. Where is the place of a Christian in this world? There is a sense that much is to be expected of us, especially in the church. Sometimes even beyond us.

Like j, I understand, at least a little, of what it means to get your hands dirty in your discipline. I've known enough situations in which God remained silent even when I tried to do the right thing. In the end, my family think I'm a wreck for not measuring up. I also believe, like name, (whoever you are) that we should honor God and should not compromise. Between these tensions, I'm strucked by a higher call which Tom Wright puts it so well:

You may not be able change the way the discipline currently works. You may be given time and opportunity to do it. But that's not really necessary in your vocation. Your task, prayerfully, is to find the symbolic ways of doing things differently. Planting flags in hostile soil. Setting up signposts which say that there is a different way to be human. And when people are puzzled at what you're doing, your task is to find ways of telling the story of the return of the human race from exile, by way of explanation. If you were to shape your world in following Christ, it isn't enough to say that being a Christian and being a professional or an academic is simply high moral standards (though it is), using every opportunity to talk to your students about Jesus (though it is), pray with and for them, being fair in your grading and honest in your speaking. That is all non-negotiable. But you are called to do something much much more.

You're called prayerfully, to discern where in your discipline the human project is showing signs of exile. And humbly and boldly to act symbolically in which to declare that the powers have been defeated. The powers don't like that by the way. Do this only with prayer. That the kingdom has come in Jesus the Jewish Messiah. That the new way of being human has been unveiled. And prepare to tell the stories which explains what the symbols are all about.


And in all these you are to declare that Jesus is Lord and Caesar is not, as the New Testament did. That Jesus is Lord, and Marx and Freud and Niesche aren't. That Jesus is Lord, and neither modernity nor postmodernity are.


We are called to stand in the gap where the human project are showing signs of exile, signs of brokenness from God and plant symbols to tell the story. Where human beings feel a sense of emptiness and a void which cannot be filled. By all that, I don't mean by just saying a few nice prayers about them or trying to appear to be a nice Christian who talks about Jesus all the time. There is wisdom in all that. Wisdom is not being smart in solving problems; wisdom is having a God-discerning heart, which enables you to act symbolically in planting God's kingdom in every situation that comes our way. That's very hard and as sinners, we require much grace and much prayer to do that. Especially for me, for I struggle greatly in trying to do well in my discipline and trying to do the so-called "right" thing.

I believed we're called to much more than being the best at what we do OR being morally upright. We're called to do things differently. We're called to be human. Image-bearers of the One we're following. Planting symbols of faith, hope and love in our disciplines. And telling the stories behind them.

"Stay alert. This is hazardous work I'm assigning you. You're going to be like sheep running through a wolf pack, so don't call attention to yourselves. Be as cunning as a snake, inoffensive as a dove. "Don't be naive. Some people will impugn your motives, others will smear your reputation--just because you believe in me. Don't be upset when they haul you before the civil authorities. Without knowing it, they've done you--and me--a favor, given you a platform for preaching the kingdom news! And don't worry about what you'll say or how you'll say it. The right words will be there; the Spirit of your Father will supply the words."

                                                                                          Matthew 10

I love this discussion. Keep it coming.

By the way, I'm considering being a fitness instructor.

G

After two days of basic journalism training, and countless sessions of hearing some of my office's best reporters talk to a group of young freshies like us, I realised something.  It's not the gospel truth, just one man's own opinion.  But I think it's pretty spot on.

Journalism is a lot like prostitution.

Let me explain.  I had the privilege of hearing some of my esteemed seniors, many of whom have been working in the newspaper industry for over 10 years, share their experiences and lessons learnt.  And one of the major things covered was how they got their best, most cutting-edge stories.  And there was a common thread among all their examples that can be summarized like this: short of killing someone, you must be willing to do anything and everything to get your story.

You should have heard what some of them have actually done.  One actually paid an ambulance to bring him near a plane crash.  Another posed as a Malaysian Red Crescent worker during the Highland Towers collapse, carrying bodies and all, just so he could get near the bodies to take pictures and interview helpers.  Another drank for eight hours to get a little scoop.  Another has flirted incessantly with men to pump useful information out.  One even rushed into a house of a convicted murderer, and begged him for a story, with all his gang members surrounding him waiting to take him outside and beat the living curiosity out of him.

All of them got their story.  All of them said it was this attitude of shamelessness that brought them the stories.  And all of them are probably at the top of the journalism heap.

Woah.  So, this is my question, asked if I put my Christian thinking cap on: should I follow them?

The weird thing is, I think I am not above doing what they have done.  Ask me this when I first entered my job in March last year, and I would have stared back wide-eyed, gaped in horror, and said something to the effect of "Omigosh, I would never do anything like that!".  Now? Well, let's just say, I've done my part in signing, as my pastor in Melbourne put it, "a social contract for mutual grazing."

But I know if I ask any practicing Christian, they would probably say: Don't.  It's against all Christian values, it's just not right, it's following the world's systems.  And I totally understand it.  But it's hard to argue with how it has made some of my colleagues among the more respected, skilled journalists in their profession.

And this is what makes me frustrated when it comes to a Christian in a workplace.  It feels so much like a game of give-and-take.  I can give myself to obeying some set of Christian moral ethics, but the sad truth is, if I'm not willing to go beyond it, I'll come up short as a journalist.  Yet, if I go all out to excel in my job, I'll shortchange myself as a supposed influential representative of a greater cause. 

Of course, the easy answer is: get out, and just go into something less compromising.  But if every Christian did that, then no wonder people call this faith irrelevant and constraining.

Oh well.  I know it's a question that will be asked every single day, and every single day will yield a different answer, of which every answer will not be either really right or really wrong.  But, hopefully, I can come to understand one day that maybe I can actually be a Christian and - horror of horrors - a really excellent reporter at the same time.

If not, then I guess I might have to resort to becoming a journalism prostitute.  Oh my.

j.