Anyone interested ?  Tickets are at $8 for adults and $4 for students.  Click on the image for link to website with more details.

Today, Joyce and I talked about how some people struggle with low self-esteem, and how this sadly drives some of them to do things that only serve to highlight their insecurities (like behave obnoxiously, and here I can’t resist thinking about an ex-boss … yes, I’m wicked), or towards self-destructive behaviour.

How do we measure our self-worth ?  Is the yardstick how much we earn, the jobs that we hold, the distinctions in our report card, the number of friends that we have, the praise that others lavish on us, or how good we or our partners look ?

In this connection I recall a conversation at a wedding dinner earlier this year.  A friend that I had not seen in a long time related her experiences while on a mission trip in Africa (can’t remember which part).  While on a long bus journey a polite African man chatted her up.  One of the conversation topics was about marriage conventions in Asia.  As they neared the destination, he asked if her parents would accept two head of cattle for her hand in marriage.  Two head of cattle - so that’s what she was worth !  She found a way to politely turn him down.

And then there’s the latest Israel-Lebanon conflict, with Hizbollah demanding (hundreds of) prisoners in exchange for the lives of two kidnapped Israeli soldiers.  Israel swiftly responded by bombing substantial parts of Lebanon back into the 19th century.  So the lives of these two unfortunate Israeli soldiers are worth the hundreds of prisoners that are demanded by Hizbollah, or the hundreds of Lebanese lives lost in the conflict.

But how should Christians measure their worth ?  On this point I recall a wonderful passage from Isaiah (43:4), in which God affirms our importance in His eyes -

Since you are precious and honoured in my sight,
and because I love you,
I will give men in exchange for you,
and people in exchange for your life. 

He ultimately demonstrated the how much He values us by giving the life of His son, Jesus, in exchange for ours.  This then, is how Christians ought to measure their worth.  Not by wealth, possessions, influence, position, partners, cattle or prisoners, but by the life of Jesus Christ.  Not many faiths can claim a God that gave His life up for mankind.  So by this yardstick, anything else offered by the world pales in comparision.

While reflecting on recent events my mind was impressed with the following thought : that we (as Christians) serve God, under God’s appointed leaders, and not the leaders themselves however charismatic (or uncharismatic) they may be; and that we also serve God’s people, and not our personal interests however important they may be.

But I couldn’t for the life of me think of a Biblical basis for the foregoing (logical though it seemed), and then the following passage came to mind -

What, after all, is Apollos ?  And what is Paul ?  Only servants, through whom you came to believe - as the Lord has assigned to each his task.  I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow.  So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow.  The man who plants and the man who waters have one purpose, and each will be rewarded according to his own labour.  For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, God’s building.

… So then, no more boasting about men !  All things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future - all you yours, and you are of Christ, and Christ is of God.

So then, men ought to regard us as servants of Christ and as those entrusted with the secret things of God.  Now it is required that those who have been given a trust must prove faithful …

1 Corinthians 3 : 5 - 4 : 2

Received a funny phone call from a member of the public today, asking if Hepatitis A injections were important.  Had to politely tell the woman that I wasn’t a doctor and that she should ask her family doctor for his opinion.  Where did she get my number from anyway ?

Reminds me of some of the funny calls I had received in my previous workplace, asking about pizza delivery and catering services (and of course, for free legal advice).

Thankfully, no calls with hot and heavy breathing at the other end, or offers to buy or sell NBC weapons.

Represented the New Organisation in the 185 km President’s Challenge Health Relay on early (0500 hours to be precise) Sunday morning (I ran only 10, not 185, km).  What was cool was the traffic police motorcade escorting us all the way from start to finish.  In any run, I can think of only three possible occasions when you would be escorted by a motorcade -

(1)  You are the President;

(2)  You are the first; or

(3)  You are the last.

I was, in this case, neither the President, nor the first or last runner.  So this was probably a once in a lifetime experience.

What happens when man decides that God is no longer relevant, or does not exist, or is dead ?  Interestingly, William Pfaff, a writer with the International Herald Tribune, in commenting on recent US foreign policy and the Middle East conflagration, concludes that life without God is intolerable and that its substitutes, secular "religions", have failed to deliver the promised solution to humanity’s problems.

22 July 2006

Whose Meaning of History ?

Underlying nearly everything said or written about history — in the West, at least — is a belief that history has a meaning. The thought is intolerable that it might not have a meaning, and that all the suffering and cruelty of existence is vain.

This is why modern Western thought has been obsessed with ideology, providing a secular substitute for the interpretation of human existence previously provided by biblical religion.

European thought concluded in the 18th and 19th centuries that it was unreasonable to believe that God exists, or that human existence is, in some meaningful way, connected to a divine intelligence.  

Thus, human reason took the place of God — a notion that produced the ephemeral existence of the Cult of Reason in revolutionary France. Though the cult disappeared, the belief did not. If we do not exist within a divine structure, which is the opinion of most intellectual leaders today, humans must find their own way to think about history and must themselves affirm a personal goal or system of values by which to live.

The alternative of a life without values — nihilism, absolute egoism, a stoic acceptance of the arbitrary — is difficult if not intolerable. Thus, a vague "scientific" atheism is undoubtedly the default belief of most people today who think about these things. This resembles a religion because it usually is linked to an equally vague faith in secular progress, supposedly to be produced by science.

There has been plenty of progress in science, technology and human organisation and institutions since the presumed death of God more than 200 years ago. But the years since have also given us ideological totalitarianism, the two world wars and many savage smaller wars, genocide in Europe, Africa and Asia, and the war "between civilisations" that George W Bush is now pleased to call the "long war" against global terror and tyranny.

This is the recent record of human progress through reason — although some would object that it is no worse than much that preceded it. But the Age of Reason was supposed to be better. Reason and science were supposed to move steadily toward solution of the great problems of history …

Copyright (C) 2006 by Tribune Media Services.  Click here for the full article.

Finally got myself a camera phone.  The K750i is admittedly dated, seeing how the K800i has just been released.  But it’s still one up on my former colleagues who have to carry no frills handphones from out of the ark, thanks to the Organisation’s security paranoia.

On the issue of the Organisation, a former colleague recently blogged about dumb clients.  Well, the other good thing about my new job, is that the clients here aren’t dumb.

And since I’m on the topic of work, here’s a picture of my workspace taken with the K750i.  (Yes, I’ve downgraded from a room to a cubicle, but I get a neat notebook which unfortunately also means that I check e-mail and do work from home, outside office hours).

Against my advice, my youngest sister is leaving on a trip for South Korea today.  She had been invited by IPOS to attend some exhibition where one of her D&T designs would be featured.  The problem is that she would not be travelling as part of a school group.

The night before the trip, important matters such as accommodation, transport to and from the airport, how much money to carry, etc. had yet to be settled, and my parents were blaming each other for not doing more to ensure that IPOS took care of my sister.  (And why should IPOS take this responsiblity upon itself, since it is not a school ?).  My parents were, of course, too polite to blame me for not doing more to help my sister with her travel plans, though I’m pretty sure that was on their minds.

I, on the other hand, had adopted a hands off approach because I want my sister to grow from this experience - my parents and I can’t forever be baby-sitting her - and because of my belief that teenagers should be treated like adults (maybe something I’ll reconsider when Jed becomes a teenager).  What I had underestimated is how young a 17 year old can be (and along with that, the naivety and immaturity of that age).

Guess my sister will have to sink or learn to swim.

Left my sister a note before going to work this morning (never let it be said that I don’t care), as I won’t get to see her before she flies off.

Dear Ruth,

From the outset I thought that going on the Korea trip is a bad idea.  But now that you are at the point of no return, I hope that you enjoy yourself and learn new things.

Korea will be the first time in your life that you will have to fend for yourself.  This is not a church retreat or school excursion.  There are no parents, pastors or teachers to take care of you.  In fact, as the older of the two girls that are not traveling with a school, you have a responsibility to take care of your traveling partner.

Mummy and Daddy blame IPOS for not organising a proper trip, and leaving the student (ie. you) to settle most of the administrative matters yourself.  Personally I don’t see it as their fault.  IPOS is not a church or school – it is not paid to be responsible for you or the other students.  (If this sounds mercenary, that unfortunately is what most of the world is like !)

Here are some travel tips which I hope will be useful, and which I hope you will (for once) take seriously :

Don’t forget to pack

• Passport
• Cash
• Calling card
• Photocopy of your passport
• Bible
• (NRIC is unnecessary and I suggest that you leave it at home)

How to avoid getting lost

• Keep a copy of the hotel address and phone no. with you at all times
• Upon reaching your hotel, get some tourist maps from the concierge and take note of your hotel’s location and the location of other prominent landmarks on the map
• Take down the phone nos of the other students and teachers staying in the same hotel
• Take down the phone no of the driver that will be driving you around in Korea
• Arrange to do a nightly “roll call” with the other students so that you can check that everyone is safely back at the hotel, at night

How to avoid getting cheated

• Familiarise yourself with the foreign currency
• Check that change that is returned to you is accurate
• Perform a conversion from foreign to local currency before you decide to buy anything

How to safekeep your belongings

• Although the usual practice is to pay for accommodation at the end of a trip, make payment for accommodation upon reaching the hotel (any additional costs can be settled at the end of the trip).  This will reduce the amount of cash that you have to carry with you all the time.
• Keep your valuables (passport and cash) in the hotel safe, if there is one, and carry lesser cash with you when you go out
• Divide your cash – don’t carry all your cash in one bag or pocket, so that if you ever lose some of your belongings, you would still have cash with you
• Carry your belongings with you at all times.  Don’t leave them unattended even for a moment.
• Make a police report if you lose anything, and keep a copy of the report for insurance claims.

How to keep yourself safe

• Lock your hotel door when sleeping
• Check before opening your hotel door
• Travel in pairs
• Avoid places which are dark or secluded

Apart from the above, what I can say is that you should exercise common sense in all situations.  And pray.  Have fun !