I applied for a teaching scholarship from Singapore’s Ministry of Education. An email arrived today to say that I have been shortlisted for interview next Tuesday! Hurray! Thank you, Lord! ^^
I had the opportunity to talk to many educators and educators-to-be, who shared their aspirations and spread their ‘educator’s propaganda’ to me. Jee I have never really dreamed of becoming a teacher, honestly didn’t think it would be much of an adventure. But with so many of such encounters, I can’t help but wonder if they were cues from Upstairs. :p
Well, all I know is that I prayed for $$ (jing-jing), hehe… and this scholarship seem like a likely answer.
Trust and obey, right? God put the adventure in me, surely He would provide the outlet too. ;)
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Happy Endings
I was watching the last episode of the comedy series The Nanny on Hallmark last night, and thought, too bad such a good show is coming to an end...*lump in the troat*
I guess we get that too often huh? Well at least I do. I hate endings; as much as I try to be optimistic, sometimes I'd rather be sentimental.
I figure endings are sad because it marks that something good is‘no more’, we want good times to continue forever. But sometimes continuing may give the opposite effect, e.g. turning a good story stale, or something bad comes and ruins it all. So, optimist (like me) will say, endings are good; they will be happy endings if we see them not as an end, but a beginning of something that is as good, or even better: The end of an acting role is the beginning of fresh opportunities, and the end of a decade (…for those who hate growing old…) is the beginning of another, along with its shares of sorrow and laughter.
And then there are those endings to which no amount of optimism can cure…can there be happy endings to those?
Those will become either the worst, or the best endings of all, and it all depends on whether we know the Master of All Endings And Happy Endings. Now that is something to hope for.
I guess we get that too often huh? Well at least I do. I hate endings; as much as I try to be optimistic, sometimes I'd rather be sentimental.
I figure endings are sad because it marks that something good is‘no more’, we want good times to continue forever. But sometimes continuing may give the opposite effect, e.g. turning a good story stale, or something bad comes and ruins it all. So, optimist (like me) will say, endings are good; they will be happy endings if we see them not as an end, but a beginning of something that is as good, or even better: The end of an acting role is the beginning of fresh opportunities, and the end of a decade (…for those who hate growing old…) is the beginning of another, along with its shares of sorrow and laughter.
And then there are those endings to which no amount of optimism can cure…can there be happy endings to those?
Those will become either the worst, or the best endings of all, and it all depends on whether we know the Master of All Endings And Happy Endings. Now that is something to hope for.
Friday, May 29, 2009
Learning to say 'NO'
Today I said the hardest 'no' I've ever said in 20 years--I've declined the offers of admission from University of Waterloo (UW), Canada.
It wasn't easy. Many tears of struggle came with this. But I've learned to appreciate such tears, because each tear means a blow to the nail that nails the old self to the cross, and with each tear shed I emerge a more mature, more joyful, more obedient disciple.
UW's offers of admission expires by 28th May 2009. I totally forgot (or rather successfully avoided thinking) about it until late last night. Happily for me it was still 28th in Canada until noon today local time. I could just give no response to UW at all, but that would be a lack of professional courtesy, and it also means burning the bridges.
I cried, because declining UW's offers felt like betraying a friend. They offered me everything I wanted (short of a scholarship! Haha..but thank God for that because otherwise I would already be headed there), and yet I'm saying 'no'. I even wrote in the admissions form that 'UW is my first choice!' It is true. UW was the choice of my heart.
But I knew in my head that UW was not the logical choice for 3 reasons: distance, finance, and the shear comparison of UW to National University of Singapore (NUS), to which I have also be offered admission. (I know...what have I to complain about, right?) NUS is closer to home, next door to my sister, has more flexible interdisciplinary programs which I prefer, offers better financial aid, and even has higher QS rankings! To any other, these and others would be indications of the Lord's blessings. But I couldn't help but think, 'Hey, the Lord could really be opening doors to UW, just that I missed the signs by rationalising!'
But no, NUS is God sent. UW wasn't even an option! The only trouble left was to convince my heart the same..that is where tears come in.
So I did what the Lord gave us instructions to do when in doubt: ask. In times like this I always like to listen to words spoken by the Lord Jesus Himself, so I flipped to the Gospels, and landed in Matthew 7. Ask, seek, and knock. Our Father gives good gifts! Then at an earlier passage: do not worry, 'does the Father not know? Seek ye first the Kingdom of God. Then to an even earlier passage: treasures in heaven. 'For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.'
By then the message was clear. i called UW the university of my heart. What it really represents was the treasure of my heart: the prestige of studying (literally) overseas in a western school. It was not the lost of what UW is and NUS is not that I mourned for, because that I could live with, but the lost of servitude to my pride.
The Bible said:
"No one can serve two masters...he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and [Pride]."
Matthew 6:24
Saying 'no' to UW wasn't saying 'no' to what is good, nor was it rejecting (betraying) UW that I have sincerely grown so fond of. Instead it was saying yes to trusting the Lord's guidance, it was choosing God as Master over Self and Pride, and it-felt-like-victory.
The Bible also said:
"The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness, how great is that darkness!"
Matthew 6:22-23
I asked to understand His purpose behind this, something that doubles as a confirmation that UW is not for me, and I got it! You see, He meant this to be a lesson to me. So now that my heart is won, my 'eyes are good', and my 'body full of light', I am filled with joy!
I still hope perhaps someday to go to UW, since I succeeded in not burning the bridges by preserving my reputation for good professional courtesy...ehem. And plus! NUS has exchange programs and summer programs to UW, much to my delight. So yeah, perhaps someday I will go, but only if the Lord thinks me fit for the treat. ;)
It wasn't easy. Many tears of struggle came with this. But I've learned to appreciate such tears, because each tear means a blow to the nail that nails the old self to the cross, and with each tear shed I emerge a more mature, more joyful, more obedient disciple.
UW's offers of admission expires by 28th May 2009. I totally forgot (or rather successfully avoided thinking) about it until late last night. Happily for me it was still 28th in Canada until noon today local time. I could just give no response to UW at all, but that would be a lack of professional courtesy, and it also means burning the bridges.
I cried, because declining UW's offers felt like betraying a friend. They offered me everything I wanted (short of a scholarship! Haha..but thank God for that because otherwise I would already be headed there), and yet I'm saying 'no'. I even wrote in the admissions form that 'UW is my first choice!' It is true. UW was the choice of my heart.
But I knew in my head that UW was not the logical choice for 3 reasons: distance, finance, and the shear comparison of UW to National University of Singapore (NUS), to which I have also be offered admission. (I know...what have I to complain about, right?) NUS is closer to home, next door to my sister, has more flexible interdisciplinary programs which I prefer, offers better financial aid, and even has higher QS rankings! To any other, these and others would be indications of the Lord's blessings. But I couldn't help but think, 'Hey, the Lord could really be opening doors to UW, just that I missed the signs by rationalising!'
But no, NUS is God sent. UW wasn't even an option! The only trouble left was to convince my heart the same..that is where tears come in.
So I did what the Lord gave us instructions to do when in doubt: ask. In times like this I always like to listen to words spoken by the Lord Jesus Himself, so I flipped to the Gospels, and landed in Matthew 7. Ask, seek, and knock. Our Father gives good gifts! Then at an earlier passage: do not worry, 'does the Father not know? Seek ye first the Kingdom of God. Then to an even earlier passage: treasures in heaven. 'For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.'
By then the message was clear. i called UW the university of my heart. What it really represents was the treasure of my heart: the prestige of studying (literally) overseas in a western school. It was not the lost of what UW is and NUS is not that I mourned for, because that I could live with, but the lost of servitude to my pride.
The Bible said:
"No one can serve two masters...he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and [Pride]."
Matthew 6:24
Saying 'no' to UW wasn't saying 'no' to what is good, nor was it rejecting (betraying) UW that I have sincerely grown so fond of. Instead it was saying yes to trusting the Lord's guidance, it was choosing God as Master over Self and Pride, and it-felt-like-victory.
The Bible also said:
"The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness, how great is that darkness!"
Matthew 6:22-23
I asked to understand His purpose behind this, something that doubles as a confirmation that UW is not for me, and I got it! You see, He meant this to be a lesson to me. So now that my heart is won, my 'eyes are good', and my 'body full of light', I am filled with joy!
I still hope perhaps someday to go to UW, since I succeeded in not burning the bridges by preserving my reputation for good professional courtesy...ehem. And plus! NUS has exchange programs and summer programs to UW, much to my delight. So yeah, perhaps someday I will go, but only if the Lord thinks me fit for the treat. ;)
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