when i was a child, i had already knew that i was a different person.
*
one of the best things that my parents did for me was math and chinese school. i was also forced to go to mandarin classes and art classes, but i must say that math and chinese classes had the lasting effect. the relentless training of going to agincourt on saturday mornings, photocopying my brother's kumon math sheets and brainchild math sheets (yea two for the price of one, the true chinese way), and the two brothers sitting down at the kitchen table while dad teaches the fundamentals of math, the frustration, impatience and anger clear in his threatening voice. the pain i have gone through. the reward? going to day school and realizing that i am two years ahead of the math curriculum. finishing all my math exercises in class like it was nothing, and then patrolling the classroom asking whether anyone needed any help. finishing EVERY single math test first in the class, earlier than the second person by an absolute landslide (though almost never with the highest mark). the reward was bragging rights. the pride.
as i got older, the field for math became more balanced, but soon my chinese stood out like a sore thumb. i found out that the language i spoke for my entire life, that i've been learning since i was born, was not known by at least half of my chinese friends. only VICTOR can read and write chinese. once again another opportunity to show his quality.
*
comon now, we all deal with some pride issues some time in our lives. what is the REAL issue here? things are a bit different now.
**
i first started reading the bible on my own accord somewhere around grade 7. and from my memory, the first christian book that i read was either mere christianity or case for christ, which was some time in high school. since then, my desire to learn more has been fed by a thirst to learn more about God, the world and christianity. my favourite subject had been apologetics (probably still is). this did not stop, and i would hope and believe that, only in its purest form, is still occuring today. recently i stopped myself, compelled to make a book list for myself and others of the books that i have read and plan to read, and find that my list numbered some 60 to 70 books of christian books alone over the past 5 to 8 years. granted that now i've had more affinity to buy books than to read them, it is still an impressive statistic about myself.
i think i got caught up in the buying and reading routine, and i was able to stop myself to ask next, what is the good in reading all of these books? why am i doing it now? yes, i still feel the same way as i did before, that the knowledge given me in these books are refreshing and increases my awareness and discernment. but do i remember everything that i read, and do i apply everything that i know? i know that i do not, but i love to read anyway. but if i do not apply what i have learned from reading, then why am i reading in the first place then? the image is clear again: walking the aisles of the classroom, calling out in a loud voice so that everyone could hear me, "anyone need help?".
matthew 6:2 says "so when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honoured by others."
pharisitic! the last thing that a christian needs to become. i hope that that is not something that i am becoming, and that the knowledge i learn from reading can be shared with people to help them grow in life.
**
***
there is more. i also have thought about what i will do after graduation. no matter what the end result is, i know that i love to read. engineering may not work out for me. i find very little of the work interesting, stimulating or anything that i can do for the rest of my life. i look to my roommates and it seems like they are looking to consulting. what is consulting? is consulting not telling or teaching someone something that they don't know? isn't that what my reading is all about? but i don't know whether i can get into consulting, especially if my engineering/technical knowledge is weak. i don't know whether i will need to just take some engineering job and suffer for a few years.
one of those rare times, i allowed my mind to venture. there were days that i wished i could do what i wanted to do. work for ravi zacharias. travel the world and lecture to all sorts of people about who Christ is, and do it with exceeding power in words and in knowledge. or work for focus on the family, and be one to help all sorts of people with their family problems. help them to face life's challenges. then tonight i remembered an idea i had a long time ago. what if i became a teacher? sure, becoming a teacher after getting an engineering degree is silly, but that's okay. a teacher, a person that shares knowledge in training for the next stage of life. could teach at a high school level and impact youth in their growth. or i could teach at a university level and impact adults in their final values (what would you teach?!). but all in all, i see the fabric of knowledge penetrate my past, my present, and my foreseen future.
this quest for knowledge will not stop. i want to keep going. as lazy as i may be sometimes, i want to learn more. i want to understand, and i want to help others understand. i hope and pray that this is God's will, God's purpose for.. me. because he made me a different person from everyone else.
***
****
2 tim 3:16-17 says "all scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that all God's people may be thoroughly equipped for every good work."
hebrews 4:12 says "for the word of God is alive and active. sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart"
the usefulness of scripture will only occur if the teaching, rebuking, correcting and training is applied, and taken into action. WORDS contain the power to divide soul and spirit, but nowhere in the bible does it say that words and knowledge will manifest the change in your life. we can easily ignore the power in a word, and then it is as if nothing as happened.
****
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
the problem of sleep
sleep is something that many people in my generation struggle with finding the right balance with. people stay up late to do work and study. people stay up late to party and have fun. people stay up late to talk about important stuff or to play settlers (!). whether they are legitimate or illegitimate reasons to imbalance a regular sleep routine is up for interpretation and not to be discussed here.
what is to be discussed here is why i am different from you. ever since i was a small little boy (those glorious days of freedom, innocence, and vast intelligence), i always slept a lot. my family would always call me the "lan fun ju", or "the sleepyhead" is a moderate translation. before i went to church or math/chinese school, i would always sleep in and be the last one to get out of bed in the entire family. but even if i were to be the last to get up, it was usually only by 30 minutes to an hour. i suppose my family gets tired of waiting for me and just wake me up to get the day started.
i remember there were days where i did get up on saturday morning to watch cartoons.. but i hardly remember how those days even happened, but it did happen for a few years. soon enough, church and math and chinese school came along, so i would have a reason to wake up early. this also occurred for a few years.. until i discovered instant messaging. ICQ was the big thing when i was in grade 7, and that was when i started to stay up past 11.. or 12. grade 7 was effective the start of the destruction of my sleep schedule, and all because of instant messaging. i sure got to talk a lot more with friends and got to know people a lot more.
when high school came, i tasted 430am. i tasted 530am. sometimes it was for school work, but sometimes it was for talking (there was this girl i kinda liked.. hehe), and other times it was just hanging out with the guys. but i still did not have too much difficulty getting up the next day for school. i had SOME difficulty obviously, but it wasn't so bad.. except for the one time that i slept in for my calculus exam and showed up some 30-45 minutes late.
by the time university came around.. staying up till 2 was regular practice, and there were plenty of new people to start talking to again. there were quite some late nights just from conversations or other fun activities. it's university. i also experienced my first full all nighter due to academics in first year. when second year came around, certain events happened which led to decreased motivation to go to school, and i began to skip classes. i must say that this was when my inborn sleepyhead traits since i was a kid began to emerge. not that it wasn't there when i was growing up, but it was clear here. in third year i had easily built the reputation of regularly skipping class, and now that i am in my final year, being in class is practically a bonus. let me say that 75% of the class skipping has to do with the problem of sleep. the other 25% is a mix between using the time to do work, finding the class unnecessary and the general lack of motivation to be in class (that's not a good reason, kids).
last night i slept somewhere between 1am and 2am, and i woke up the next morning at 2pm when herman knocked on my door, even after being woken up by derek at 10am. i wonder if i could have kept sleeping if herman didn't call. granted that last friday i slept at 3am and woke at 6am, and the saturday's sleep did not give me complete rest. but it is clear here. i have the tendency to sleep until my body cannot sleep anymore. until it rejects the sleep, like a cup that is too full of a liquid that it is overflowing.
so here is the problem of sleep. there are two perspectives of sleep that i know. one that sleep is important to our bodies, and that we should not deprive our bodies of the sleep that it needs. sleep is needed so that the body and mind can rest and repair itself. sleep is the body's medicine to almost anything. the other perspective is clear in the bible. proverbs 6:9-11 says "how long will you lie there, you sluggard? when will you get up from your sleep? a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest, and poverty will come on you like a thief and scarcity like an armed man." an unnamed person at my church said it succinctly: "sleeping in is for pansies." i realize that sleeping in is "a waste of time" and a lot of things can be done in the time that is slept away.
what then can be done of it? what to think of it? let me tell you, i REALLY cannot get up. when i am forcibly woken up when i am tired or in the middle of a sleep cycle, i CANNOT function, CANNOT interact, and WILL NOT treat a person like a person. this was evident on the day bily forced me up to go to waterloo mennonite brethren one sunday, and i was absolutely exhausted. i did not talk to anyone, and hated existence. at the first opportunity that i could, i jumped on a sofa at slc and napped for 3 full hours, leaving a very astonished phil chan wondering how that is possible. i did not even stay up super late the night before.
come midterm time now, where sleep is a valuable commodity, it makes me wonder what to do. nowadays, that the quality of my work and the retention of course material is not my main concern, but that i am actually able to wake up for my exam or my presentation. is sleep so important for my body, where nowadays i feel no physical burden pulling me down until the late hours of night? or am i truly the pansy of all pansies?
it is 2am now. i better go sleep.
what is to be discussed here is why i am different from you. ever since i was a small little boy (those glorious days of freedom, innocence, and vast intelligence), i always slept a lot. my family would always call me the "lan fun ju", or "the sleepyhead" is a moderate translation. before i went to church or math/chinese school, i would always sleep in and be the last one to get out of bed in the entire family. but even if i were to be the last to get up, it was usually only by 30 minutes to an hour. i suppose my family gets tired of waiting for me and just wake me up to get the day started.
i remember there were days where i did get up on saturday morning to watch cartoons.. but i hardly remember how those days even happened, but it did happen for a few years. soon enough, church and math and chinese school came along, so i would have a reason to wake up early. this also occurred for a few years.. until i discovered instant messaging. ICQ was the big thing when i was in grade 7, and that was when i started to stay up past 11.. or 12. grade 7 was effective the start of the destruction of my sleep schedule, and all because of instant messaging. i sure got to talk a lot more with friends and got to know people a lot more.
when high school came, i tasted 430am. i tasted 530am. sometimes it was for school work, but sometimes it was for talking (there was this girl i kinda liked.. hehe), and other times it was just hanging out with the guys. but i still did not have too much difficulty getting up the next day for school. i had SOME difficulty obviously, but it wasn't so bad.. except for the one time that i slept in for my calculus exam and showed up some 30-45 minutes late.
by the time university came around.. staying up till 2 was regular practice, and there were plenty of new people to start talking to again. there were quite some late nights just from conversations or other fun activities. it's university. i also experienced my first full all nighter due to academics in first year. when second year came around, certain events happened which led to decreased motivation to go to school, and i began to skip classes. i must say that this was when my inborn sleepyhead traits since i was a kid began to emerge. not that it wasn't there when i was growing up, but it was clear here. in third year i had easily built the reputation of regularly skipping class, and now that i am in my final year, being in class is practically a bonus. let me say that 75% of the class skipping has to do with the problem of sleep. the other 25% is a mix between using the time to do work, finding the class unnecessary and the general lack of motivation to be in class (that's not a good reason, kids).
last night i slept somewhere between 1am and 2am, and i woke up the next morning at 2pm when herman knocked on my door, even after being woken up by derek at 10am. i wonder if i could have kept sleeping if herman didn't call. granted that last friday i slept at 3am and woke at 6am, and the saturday's sleep did not give me complete rest. but it is clear here. i have the tendency to sleep until my body cannot sleep anymore. until it rejects the sleep, like a cup that is too full of a liquid that it is overflowing.
so here is the problem of sleep. there are two perspectives of sleep that i know. one that sleep is important to our bodies, and that we should not deprive our bodies of the sleep that it needs. sleep is needed so that the body and mind can rest and repair itself. sleep is the body's medicine to almost anything. the other perspective is clear in the bible. proverbs 6:9-11 says "how long will you lie there, you sluggard? when will you get up from your sleep? a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest, and poverty will come on you like a thief and scarcity like an armed man." an unnamed person at my church said it succinctly: "sleeping in is for pansies." i realize that sleeping in is "a waste of time" and a lot of things can be done in the time that is slept away.
what then can be done of it? what to think of it? let me tell you, i REALLY cannot get up. when i am forcibly woken up when i am tired or in the middle of a sleep cycle, i CANNOT function, CANNOT interact, and WILL NOT treat a person like a person. this was evident on the day bily forced me up to go to waterloo mennonite brethren one sunday, and i was absolutely exhausted. i did not talk to anyone, and hated existence. at the first opportunity that i could, i jumped on a sofa at slc and napped for 3 full hours, leaving a very astonished phil chan wondering how that is possible. i did not even stay up super late the night before.
come midterm time now, where sleep is a valuable commodity, it makes me wonder what to do. nowadays, that the quality of my work and the retention of course material is not my main concern, but that i am actually able to wake up for my exam or my presentation. is sleep so important for my body, where nowadays i feel no physical burden pulling me down until the late hours of night? or am i truly the pansy of all pansies?
it is 2am now. i better go sleep.
Monday, October 20, 2008
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