“Wah!! Uncle, you old already lah”
“1 more till the big 3..0 bradder!”
“Don’t worry, you still have many good years ahead”
“Uncle!! I’ve already ordered 2 knee caps for you in advance”
I’m quickly moving out of the 20’s zone! One year left before I get more interesting ‘sms’es from my funny friends.
Yeah, my birthday came and went on the 12th of December. It was actually a pretty quiet affair back in my place because all I wanted to do was have a nice rest and a good time continuing my preparation for a short sermon for church the coming weekend. Besides that, my Aussie mate was coming down in the afternoon to stay in our place before he started his teaching ministry at the week-long Annual Bible Camp for the youths starting on Sunday afternoon.
My employers have an interesting practice of giving all birthday boys and girls a holiday, so there was I trying to sleep in a little that morning, although my bio-clock woke me up at 6:45am. Headed out slightly later for my favourite holiday meal spot, Zealand Café (Gurney Drive) for Bak Kut Teh and some lovely fish noodles for ‘brunch’. To top the morning off, Laura trained little Jojo to sing “Happy Birthday to you!” and he capped of his performance with a super tight hug and 3 wet kisses.
Came back home, started my laptop and logged on to my Facebook (with my E-Sword kept in the background..hehe). Wow.. to my surprise I saw my “Wall” inundated with birthday greetings! Call it the Facebook phenomenon, or attribute it to annoying alerts, but I really felt remembered by my family and friends. I was also flooded with e-mails, smses and calls from loved ones throughout the day. Honestly, if I didn’t feel ‘the love’, I think I would have been a 100% certified emotionless brick.
Coincidentally, 12 December seems to be a pretty popular date where people chose to pop into this world. Since I’m a twin, I by default have Adrian, sharing the same birthday as me. However, I also discovered within that day that I had 2 new additions to my already long list.
Not in chronological fashion:
1) Adrian Low
2) Rachael Yong (now Rachael Low – my sister in law)
3) Joseph Lim (from Burmah Road)
4) Adrian Kam
5) Aunty Ruth Jeveraj
6) Uncle Phuah (many of you won’t remember him, I do)
7) Hong Siah (Laura’s cousin’s hubby) * New Addition
8 ) Brian Norris (Former PFS mate) * New Addition
9) Alan Low (yes.. yes.. we already know)
Pretty amazing huh? HEHE!! Yeah I thought so too.
Birthdays have a way in making me reflect on my life and count my blessings. The first thing I counted was the birthday wishes I received throughout the day and it exceeded 100 by about 8pm that night. Sure I didn’t want to make a statistic out of my friends but I was just ‘counting my blessings, one by one’. It’s wonderful to know that you’re remembered and loved!
The Lord however then drew my thoughts to some important points about ‘love’, which is also ‘charity’ (for those of you who use the King James Version). I had been studying 1 Peter 4 for the entire week and I found myself pondering on verse 8.
And above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins. (1 Peter 4:8)
The apostle Peter was reminding believers that a hallmark of a believer in Christ was ‘love’, fervent love amongst each other. It’s sometimes easy to love people whom we are comfortable with or who are basically loveable. However, the real test of genuine love is ‘do we’ and ‘can we’ love the less loveable or the people whom we deem terribly undeserving of any love at all.
Imagine if the Lord Jesus picked and chose whom He wanted to love and whom He wanted to forgive when He gave up His life for us? If He did, then the love He displayed on the cross of Calvary would have been a farce and it would immediately dissolve the value of the amazing love of God for us sinful men, who are invited to put their believe and trust in Him.
The love that was demonstrated to us by Christ was ‘agape’ love. Unconditional love, a love that had no strings attached, a love that looked beyond all barriers of our human frailties and failures, obviously… the perfect love!
The second part of the verse says that ‘charity shall cover the multitude of sins’. This verse was not saying that our love could deal with the penalty of sin because only Christ’s sacrifice could only do that. We are being taught here that with real love, we will be able to look beyond the failures of others, forgive one another, support each other in the difficult times and not hold grudges that so hinder relationships from growing.
The lessons I gathered from that day have led me to draw some points about our relationships with others. Surely, all of us want to feel loved and cared for, with some of us having the great privilege of having lovely friends and family. However, we are called to love without boundaries, to love without looking at color, queer mannerisms, attitudes and ‘lovableness’ (found in the dictionary). Our hearts must be enlarged to allow others into our lives so that they too can be enriched, ministered to and blessed.
One thing I’m doing during this birthday season is to examine my heart to see where I’ve slackened in the area of practicing ‘fervent and deep love’. “Oh Lord may thou aid me in this area of weakness for I look to You for grace and strength!“.
And yes, after being reminded by so many people that I’m indeed nearing the big 3..0 mark, I know that birthdays are appointments that we all can’t avoid. Actually, I’m hardly the person who gets stressed out over these reminders ..and one who still can’t fully comprehend why so many ladies guard their year of birth from others with their lives. HEHE!! So well, while there’s still time, lets live our lives to its fullest for the glory of God, even as we see the Day approaching!
God bless you all!!
Run! Alan! Run! 