Respond to GRACE

Hihi. Thanks brothers and sisters for praying for me. I am not afraid lu!. :)

This will probably be my last entry before I come back for Christmas. :)

I was very touched by something that the pastor shared with us during sermon yesterday. Every year, the Norwegians will send a huge Christmas tree to London as a gift, to thank the people of UK for their help during the years 1940-1945.

It is such a sweet gesture. Nowadays, people often take grace for granted and seldom receive it with a grateful heart. It is so nice of the Norwegians to remember and remain grateful after so many years.

How about us Christian then? We have received God's wonderful grace - the gift of Jesus Christ. Have we forgotten? Are we still grateful to Him after so many years? And shouldn't we share this great news with our loved ones?

Dear God, pls protect me and give me peace...

hihi... writing to all of you to appeal for prayer support. :P

Have been feeling worried and scared over this for the past few weeks...

A friend of mine, who stayed in the same area as I do, encountered something horrible a few weeks ago. She was walking home one night when she was being approached by 3 gals. They asked her for 50 pence. My friend refused and they demanded to see her wallet. Ignoring them, my friend went inside a nearby Chinese canteen, hoping that they will go away. But they didn't. They waited outside the canteen for her. After half an hour, a staff of the canteen offered to help her ask the gals to let her off. So my friend left the canteen to walk home, while the canteen staff went over to the gals to talk to them. My friend were merely 100 metres away from the canteen when she heard the canteen staff shouted "RUN".. and to her horror, the 3 gals were chasing after her! She ran all the way to her home (on the 2nd storey) and the 3 gals followed her to her flat (but did not follow her up to the 2nd storey). Then they cursed and swore at her, asking her to "be careful" coz they knew where she was staying... luckily for my friend, she was actually going to move to another place to stay that following week and hence she was not worried...

I told my housemate about this and she said she encountered those gals on Halloween. She met them in the Chinese canteen and they asked for money. She refused to give them. They swore and cursed but did not do anything to my housemate...

I feel very scared coz the place where all these happened is only 2 minutes away from my house and I have to walk past that place everyday. I think it will be a very traumatic experience for me if I were to be approached by them... when I first heard about this, I wanted to cry..

Then I realise that I can only rely on God for protection. I have prayed about this; I trust that God has the power to protect me and if indeed this happens to me, God is in control and He will carry me through. Why do I still worry and have so much fear in my heart? Is Satan trying to intimidate me with these stories? I need to place my trust in God and God alone. I need to have the peace of heart and mind that He alone can give me.. I need to pass my burden to God and let Him carry it for me.

The verse (my favourite song :) ) came to mind: "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus". (Philippians 4:6-7)

Fear go away!!!! My God is an awesome God and He will be with me!

"Dear God, please take this fear away from my heart. Instead, fill my heart with joy and peace from you and praises for you. Watch over me and guide me steps . Deliver me from harm. And help me be strong. Your little daughter praying in Jesus' name. Amen."

At the beginning of time...

Finally attended a proper service today. Have been travelling quite a bit these few weeks and I am really looking forward to worshipping God this sun. :) Being in London made me realise how privileged I am to have Grace Church. I have yet to find a church in London that can offer me the kind of teaching and opportunity for growth that Grace Church provides. Nevertheless, I recognise that I should not ask "what a church can do for me", but instead, "what I can do for the church/for God". However, I really have not been able to find a church which I feel affiliated to. This is partly due to the fact that I have been church-hopping; but also because I really don't feel like getting too attached/involved, since I will only be here for 1 year...

Anyway, after church, Kenneth and I went to Greenwich. Greenwich, the place where time begins... Heard of GMT (Greenwich Mean Time)? Haha.. it's a funny feeling stepping with one foot on the eastern hemisphere and the other on the western hemisphere. It's a very nice place, but today was very cold and windy. My hands went numb with cold... nevertheless I must thank God for the sun coz it was raining the whole of last night and I thought I won't be able to enjoy the sun today... to my surprise, the sun came out the moment I stepped out of the house. :) God loves me so much!

There was an ice skating ring nearby and the place was lighted up at night. It was a pretty site.

And I also loved the Moon (You know, Cindy means Moon. :) I am as pretty and mysterious as the moon?! heehee...), hence, I took a few shots of it...

Let there be light!

Just a short update. :) My landlady finally came this week and had the bathroom light, toilet light and the light at the doorway repaired. Yay! We no longer had to bathe and go toilet in the dark. heehee... :)

It's already the 9th week of term. Next week will be the last week of School and I will be back in HK in 2 weeks' time! And I will be in Singapore for Christmas. I am soooooooooo excited. Can't wait for the holiday to come!

I went with Kenneth to catch Phantom of the Opera musical tonight. Very good show. Nice props, back drops, costumes. Good singing, though not fantastic. And I enjoyed it every much. Feel so blessed to be able to indulge in these little pleasures. :)

Actually there are 2 things that I wanna blog about for a while but didn't get to do it:
1) I heard from a speaker at the Lost in Translation seminar that France introduced philosophy in school to "counter" religion;
2) Where is God in modern church (in terms of architecture and interior design).
Let me make a note here and will write when I have more time. :)