With Me Always

I may sound like a broken record, but then truly, I still want to say "how fast time flies!" It is already November and soon it will be Christmas.

Today, as I was on my way to church in the train, listening to one of my favourite songs "Jiu Si Ai Ni" by David Tao, I suddenly found my mind wandering off, reflecting on several beautiful memories of this year and the goodness of God in my life, and I was overwhelmed. (Not sure if you remembered this song, I wrote down the lyrics before in my blog several weeks ago.) Yet even before the year has reached its end, I realised how much has changed within this short span of time, and how much I have received and am still receiving, and I just want to take this time to list a few.

It's been about a year since I was transferred over to this new group in my office, to work directly with my present boss. I could still remember I was quite apprehensive initially, as several of those in his team are "crazy" workers, they worked really late (as in till 12 midnight and even beyond) and during weekends as well. Those who knew me, know that as far as possible, I don't work on weekends, and I don't work overnight, at most twice a year, in extreme exceptional cases. Yet, throughout this year, the Lord has been so faithful, I did not have to compromise on my working principles, and in fact, I did enjoy working with my "new" boss, he is great! (Of course, can't let him know.)

It's been slightly more than a year that I am in a new care group in Church, initially, wondering how I can relate to them, as most of them are married with kids, and I, being single. Yet as time passes, I enjoyed their presence deeply, missed everyone of them whenever they are absent, they are very wonderful people, very dear to me indeed, and this is a great year that I got to know everyone of them much deeper, all thank to Papa God, for bringing every single one of them into my life, that they are great blessings to me. I can almost say they have become another of my extended family, thank You Papa God.

In fact, last year I still remembered, I was under extreme stress, that I could feel my health being affected, and I was troubled too for being so stressed, and with work, with finding my new flat, perhaps even with a new ministry, etc etc, feeling inadequate, frustrated, and at times unworthy. It was a year of learning to let go, learning to delegate my work, trusting my assistants more, and from there learning to rest, which I am still learning. But the strange thing is, as you learn to let go more, more responsibilities are added at the same time. Why? Yet, this year and the years to come is not like last year, and it will never be, new tasks and challenges no longer seem burdensome, but another opportunity for the Lord to prove His wonderful faithfulness towards me. And yes, thank you Lord for my healing!

As the year went on, learning to let go is hard, yet ever important, if not the most important, to me. As one who is self-willed, with extreme belief only in my own self and own achievement, this was a very difficult process, yet ever so critical. In the process, I felt that blessings come when one does not look for them, and they always catch you by surprise. (How I used to run after them!) To list a few, I got a new extreme long play mp3 player without my asking, at almost half the original price, to me, it was never something I thought of getting this year, since I already had a very good one, though that one has a very short battery life. And who is to know that this new player is to keep me "company" through several really long journeys which my previous mp3 player would definitely failed me. But God knows.

Even for the renovation of my flat, I believed I must have done the least supervision ever, I only attend to it on saturdays, and at times, before I went to work, and I have never taken any leave to attend to it! Come to think of it, that was amazing! The Lord is truly wonderful by blessing me with a good contractor that gave me worry-free work, and little supervision.

As the year drew near the end, when I was tired and felt drained, wanting to plan for a holiday, out of nowhere, I was given an opportunity for a trip to Italy, therefore with half the trip paid for, though it was never on my agenda to visit Italy, never before have I ever thought about it, yet it came as a wonderful great blessing to me. The Lord knows, and His blessing chases me down. I ponder again.

This is not the last, but to me one of the greatest of all blessings, all through this year at work, I was given opportunities to do the things I enjoy doing, and to do projects that I always dream of doing, yet never dare to believe that I would actually do them one day, and my dearest Lord sees the desire of my heart and gives them to me. Somehow, sometimes, I felt I was really born for such a time as this, that Someone loves me so much, that He has pre-arranged everything wonderful, beautiful for me to attend to, to enjoy life itself and most of all, to enjoy Him.

And as I was pondering on all these on the train, I was touched, almost to tears, with the image of the above painting in my mind, the beautiful song in the background, and I hope you too will spend a little time, in this last coming month of the year, to ponder on the goodness of the Lord in your life, surely He has blessed you, and you too are like the little girl in the painting, He leads you by your hand, and He never let go, all you need to do, just follow, He knows best! And yes, He loves you deeply, with a passion!