Grasped by His strong hand

Light in darkness

                                                    Aurora in the Yukon , Canada.

I could not fathom it but I knew something was not okay with me emotionally when I returned back from US in 2012. Initially I thought it was just jet lag and fatigue but as the months went by and the low feelings persisted on, I realized it was more than that.

I couldn't quite place my finger on the feeling. It felt as if  every now and then, I was  tele-ported somewhere often - to another continent, to another age, and  to heaven's shore. Turning a physical corner in driving or walking felt as though I was turning a corner into another age and era. Falling asleep also felt like I was going into another time zone. At times, I woke up in the night sobbing and not knowing why. I struggled with those difficult feelings.

In the midst of all this, I did wonder if it was time for me to go home to heaven? Was Father God sending me signals to prepare to go home to Him?  I even consulted a therapist and among some of the things he did was to check if I was suicidal then. No, I said, no I am not suicidal.

Then this vision came. The sketch above done during my quiet time does not do justice to the vision I saw. I saw God's huge strong hand grasping my weak hand. My feet were sinking in miry clay but His strong hand's grasped lifted me up and out of the miry clay. All outside was pitch cold darkness but God's hand holding my hand was bathed in a wonderful shaft of warm yellow light. I saw warm light in the cold darkness.

The poem I wrote next to my sketch

The strength of your hand's grasp, 
Holding my hand, 
Lifts me up and out of the sticky miry clay
I am no longer sinking low 
but you lift me up


It is never how hard I hold on to Him that matters. It is how hard He holds on to me that really matters. In that season of my weakness, I realized it was all about Him and not about me or whatever limited strength I had.


Then the lyrics of Matt Redman's song became so meaningful to me.

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death
Your perfect love is casting out fear
And even when I'm caught in the middle of the storms of this life
I won't turn back
I know you are near

And I will fear no evil
For my God is with me
And if my God is with me
Whom then shall I fear?
Whom then shall I fear?

(Chorus:)
Oh no, You never let go
Through the calm and through the storm
Oh no, You never let go
In every high and every low
Oh no, You never let go
Lord, You never let go of me

And I can see a light that is coming for the heart that holds on
A glorious light beyond all compare
And there will be an end to these troubles
But until that day comes
We'll live to know You here on the earth


YOU NEVER LET GO LYRICS - MATT REDMAN

I am glad that dark confusing season is over. I am even more glad I have gone through it, knowing God was there with me and it was His strength that held me and not my limited strength.

Favour of God

I should have written this post much earlier but school was just too hectic with all the major upgrading we were doing, so this post is long.... overdue.

I heard from the news and read that 80% of Venice was flooded on 11 November 2012. Our dilemna? We were due in Venice on the 13th November 2012. We heard it was the worse ever floods. We  viewed the YouTube movies that showed people moving their luggage in waist high water. I asked Jason if we could go somewhere in Italy first before going to Venice so that hopefully that would give buy some time for the floods to  recede. He said we had booked all our flights and  hotels for 7 days in Italy and cancellation was difficult.

Well, since we couldn't change, we got prepared. I bought 3 pairs of Phua Chu Kang boots just in case we had to walk through the floods.We repacked our luggage. So off we went!

The weather in Venice when we arrived on the 13th November noon? And the weather after that?
We had sunny blue skies without clouds and not a drop of rain for the 7 days we were in Italy! Miracle! God's grace. God's love. Favour!!! Thank you, Papa God. Muaach!!!

Sue Ann in gondala against sunny blue skies.
Not a cloud in my eyes,
Got the sun in my eye

.

It was also our 30th wedding anniversary
when we arrived on the 13th Nov 2012

To top it, we visited many places near and In Venice.I loved Rialto market and Rialto bridge.

Red hot peppers that looked like Christmas baubles.

Burano with her colourful houses.

Burano with her lovely laces

In August, I visited Furano and had a great feast with our eyes and tummy.  Guess where it is? Then we visited Murano glassworks and had an art feast.  Now Burano... Sigh..! What a lovely play of places that had names ending in ano.

Burano's yummlicious food.

Since I didn't get a chance to wear my heavy Phua Chu Kang boots lugged all the way from KL, I just had to pose in St Marks square where small sections will flood when the tide comes in. Btw, we left our 3 pairs of boots in the hotel for the next guests and next major flood.

Me with my Phua Chu Kang signature yellow boots
in St Marks square where it floods
when the tide comes in

Florence was a dream come true! I had read and taught about the multi-tiered houses on the bridge at Arno river in Florence about 10 years ago. Now I got to see the bridge and the houses and to walk on the bridge.

Jason with the 4 tiered house on the bridge
 on the Arno River in Florence

Which true physicists can resist not going to Pisa and see and climb the leaning Tower of Pisa? Pisa is just an easy hour ++ journey by train from Florence.

Propping the Leaning Tower of Pisa?

We took the cab to the highest point in Florence and viewed the city below. You can still see the multi tiered houses on the bridge. The statute of David is there to keep you company and you can walk down the stairs right past the fort and back into quaint Florence inner city again.

At the highest point in Florence.
Can you see the tiered house bridge
over the river in the distant background

Statute of David

Both Florence and Milan are shopping havens. Ladies - I advice you strongly - check out all the prices of the branded Italian stuff you have dreamed about while you are in KL.  aWhen you compare the prices in Italy, you realize it is very worthwhile to shop in Italy and you will  buy, buy, buy like I did......! Haha!

Cake from Sue Jan's church

We felt truly blessed by the favour of God's love. Thank you Papa God!! Receive our grateful thanks!

Mulu Pinnacles Miri 9-13 August 2012

Mulu Pinnacles, Miri, Sarawak. 9-13^th August 2012.

This is a most memorable trip for all 10 of us and probably the most challenging adventure we have ever taken. It is even more difficult than climbing Mount Kinabalu!

Have I told you lately that I love you?

The silent retreat I attended with Hai Bee helped me tune out the busyness of life. It cut down the noise and unneccasary sounds until I could hear what my heart was saying and my heart  said clearly...."Have I told you lately that I love you? And I do .. with all my heart. Sometimes in the busyness of life, I forget that I love you but I do .. with all my heart and all my soul - Papa God, knowing you is the best thing that ever is in my life".

The roses I sketched out in my silent retreat on my lined exercise book as I sought to tell God.................. I loved Him in my limited way.

Morning sunrise walks with Him and Hai Bee. We start about 6.35 am while it is still dark and we catch the sunrise of His love. Swathed in the cool mists of your love , Bathed in the warm sunlight of your love.  That first morning walk, I didn't even think to bring my camera so I sketched it out again.

I wasn't the only one inspired to sketch or to write poetry here. We were all captivated by the beauty of this sacred space up in the mountains. It beckons me to come away to retreat with my beloved.

And when I went to Taiwan for a few days, the same atmosphere prevailed - I was going away with my beloved, both Jason and my Lord. At Wulai, I was just so captivated by the 80m Wulai falls. The sound of the waterfalls just outside my room window and my balcony all night long is so theraputic to my soul.

Listen to the sounds of the waterfall in the video.

Pure therapy. I am so refreshed. Psalm 42:

Simple things, natural things make me happy. This fossil shell in Yeliu Geo Park reminds me how the imprint of a leaf or flower has been caught aeons ago on the fossil shell.  I am convinced we were imprinted on God's hand before eternity began and He loved us long before we were even aware He loved us.

Have I told you lately that I loved you? 

Pumpkins breakthrough!

Each morning, I usually serve my husband Jason a slice of steamed or baked pumpkin. The doctor  advised that pumpkin is good for him some years ago so we began putting that into his morning breakfast quite regularly. So we have bought many varieties of pumpkins - from the very expensive Japanese and Korean pumpkins costing some RM70+ and above to the very cheap local variety about RM5+ for each pumpkin.

During those season where we bought the expensive pumpkins, we just thought it would be good if we could grow the expensive variety and not have to pay through our nose for it. So we sowed some pumpkins seeds and lo and behold, the seeds sprouted and became healthy looking plants. In fact they looked so healthy and the leaves were so abundant, so green and fresh that I used to comment to Rodziah my maid that if only we could eat the leaves, we may not need to buy vegetables. But Rodziah advised me against eating the luscious leaves saying they could cause us to be gatal.

But we got discouraged when all the pumpkins sprouted was leaves and leaves alone. Then we stopped planting them. Later we tried again with local varieties. This time we saw leaves and lovely, pretty happy yellow flowers. And we thought there was some hope of eating our own homegrown fruits. But the flowers never pollinated though I tried to pollinate some manually. And so we gave up planting again. But Lydia Seoh encouraged. Her pumpkin plant produced one fruit hiden up on the tree and she gave it to us. And so we tried again and just let the plants grow.

Then one day I got really excited when I saw 3 small pumpkins form. To my horror, a few days later I saw the squirrell eat the fruits and also my neighbour lop off the branch with the small fruit. Aiyoh - I was so heartbroken. Then I saw more fruits again. Wah! I summoned my maid to tie newspapers to prevent the tupai from eating them and she did. But the fruits did not stay and dropped off. Sadness...

But I thought of the verse. "I have chosen you and have ordained that you should bear fruit and your fruit should remain." So I spoke to Papa God about this verse which was the first verse I actually memorized when I became a Christian.

Now a few weeks later, we found the fruits that remained - 3 fruits now that are sizable in the sunnier part of our back garden. Happiness. Looking at the pumpkin fruits is now looking at our anak - we check closely how big they have grown.

                                                                    Hidden pumpkin

                                                                        Ripening soon

High up on the tree.

We can't wait to bring the first fruit that ripen to Pastor Swan and family. The pumpkins fruits have helped us understand different levels of breakthroughs - from only leaves to flowers to fruits that didn't remain and now finally to fruits that remain.

The pumpkins have helped us understand the meaning of perseverance with things that dissappoint us again and again. May our lives be like the pumpkins and we finally bear fruit that remain and delight God and others despite going through many failures and dissapointments.

Kindness of strangers in a strange land - Scotland

This happened many years ago on my first trip to UK in 1996. We stayed in a lovely cottage called Bryan's cottage in the Lakes District. Byran's cottage was quite drab from the outside but it was so very beautiful and English from the inside.

From there we ventured to the surrounding areas and drove up to Scotland. We travelled to the town Dumfries where the famous poet Robert Burns lived.  Robert Burns is known as the Ploughman Poet of Scotland and is the author of the famous Auld Lang Syne as well as many other famous poems.

Here in Dumfries, I experienced the kindness of strangers several times. We were travelling around in a big van - big enough to put all the luggage of 10 travellers.We had quite some difficulty finding parking for our outsized vehicle. I remembered after we had found a good parking lot, we happily strolled off to venture. But a middle aged lady called me back to our van and pointed to a card on her dashboard. She told me we would have to get those parking cards to put into our van but I did not quite understand her because this was in the good old days before they had introduced the parking coupon system in Malaysia. After some lengthy explaination which yours truly,truly did not comprehend, she took her parking coupon and placed it on the dashboard and told us we had some 40 minutes before it expired. We thanked her for her kindness and patience.  Finally we understood she was trying to prevent us from getting a summons!

At another part of Dumfries, we again had difficulty parking the van. After circling the block several times in vain, we noticed a man near a basement parking that stated "For Unloading Only." He had seen us going round and round the block and he motioned for us to park in the basement with his kind permission. How thankful and grateful we were that total strangers took notice of our plight and went out of their way to help us.

These acts of kindness from strangers in Dumfries (who did not know us from Adam)  impressed upon me that we Malaysians needed to develop a different lifestyle; one which accomodates strangers. We needed ( very much) to learn to go out of our way to be hospitable and kind, especially to those who are foreigners in our country. So after that trip, I made some kind of mental resolution. I would try to help foreign visitors to Malaysia, at least help with stuff connected to transport. Easier said than done!



I thought making mental resultions to help strangers was good enough. But when I actually came down to trying to help others, I had to struggle with inner feelings of self consciousness and self accusations of being  kay poh chee etc etc.   But constant struggles like these are good - finally the struggles strengthen the inner resolve that I must help a stranger no matter what I feel on the inside. Once that decision is made to help strangers, opportunites to help others will display themselves and become slightly more evident to our eyes, ears or heart.



Fast forward many years. A few weeks ago, I happened to hear a lady ask someone in a shop in Bangsar whether she could call a taxi to the shop. I knew this person was most likely not a local because she was not dressed in working clothes. I also knew that the chances of her getting a taxi in that remote part of Bangsar was really, quite remote. So having had resolved years ago to help strangers and having had many chances to practice that resolution, it now came quite naturally to me to ask her if she needed a lift somewhere. I could drop her to some civilized part of Bangsar where she could easily hail a cab. She happily took on my offer. But when I proceeded to leave the shop, she still had to pay for some bills via the credit card and it took some time to process it. So I got a bit impatient and asked her if it was going to take long. I mentioned in passing I needed to go back to school.

She said "No, - just a few more minutes." Later she asked me which school I was heading to. I mentioned Convent Sentul. Imagine my surprise when she excitely told me she was an ex-student of Convent Sentul! What a coincidence!! She quickly hopped into my car and had so many questions to ask about her beloved ex-school.



To cut a long story short, during the car ride, I realized she was on holiday and was teaching at some local universities while being on holiday here. She expressed her desire to visit the school and instead of dropping her off in Bangsar, I took her to school. I also invited her to Convent Sentul to do a motivational talk for the Form 3 and 5 while she was still back here in Malaysia.

And so that was how the motivational talk by Ms Jenoah Joseph from the University of Stirling, Scotland  and Ms Yong Lai Peng ( her classmate) from United Nations came into being. Jenoah shared with our students how she had to study in a home without proper electrical supply and how her dad had to come on his motorbike to take their heavy school bags so that they could walk home back to Segambut from Sentul!  It's still a long walk - I assure you!

Ms Yong shared on how her parents were vegetable sellers in the Selayang pasar borong and how she had to struggle to succeed. I really enjoyed their session in particular the Q&A session. It was very beautiful to see how two girls from 2 different races bond together while they were in Convent Sentul and how they are still such fast friends despite the distance and the time that has lapsed between them both.

Hearing  real life stories motivated my girls that they could succeed despite whatever odds were stacked against them! Jenoah and Ms Yong reminded the girls that they should come back to Convent Sentul after they have left the school so that they could motivate the next batch of students and continue the legacy of giving back to the school.

So through this strange coincidence. God reminds me of the benefits of helping strangers. As I have been helped, now I am able to help.

The almond flowers

The almond flower is special to me. Why so, some of you may ask? To many of you, the almond is just a pretty flower. Not so to me.

You see, the almond tree is the first to wake from winter's deep slumber.It is the first tree to blossom in spring. It blossoms while other trees are still bare and devoid of leaves and blooms. One of the prettiest sights I have seen is the almond tree, almost completely adorned in flowers with a few sprigs of green leaves. In fact often there are more flowers than there are leaves which is not the usual scenario for most trees.

I have seen the almond tree in blossom even against winter's snow. To me the almond flower represents God's readiness to perform His word in my life and to execute every promise He has made.      In Jeremiah 1: 11, The LORD asked me, "Jeremiah, what do you see?" I answered, "A branch of an  tree." "You are right," the LORD said, "and I am watching to see that my words come true."  The tree in the conversation between Jeremiah and the Lord is the almond tree. As ready as the almond tree is to bloom even right after winter, that is how ready God is to perform the promises He has made to us. That gives me hope even in winter's gloom that God is waiting for me to pray for He awaits me, ready to answer my prayer.


I have several fond memories of how God awaits me - that long before I pray, He has prepared the scenario to answer my prayer. In Him I live and move and have my being.

One fond memory is of an encounter with Don Moen, that famous Hosanna integrity singer. There was a time many years ago, Don Moen visited Malaysia. And that night, I sat in the MCA concert hall almost at the last few rows to attend the worship concert. He was so far away that I could hardly see his face. But the next morning saw me at a song and music workshop where he was like, maybe 6 feet away from my seat. Right after the workshop ended, the people crowded round him to request for photos with him. I too wanted a photo with him since he was so near. But I had not brought any camera nor did I know anyone in the crowd. Hardly had I even begin to reflect on how nice it would be if I could get a photo with him, I heard a voice calling me from the front. "Teacher,!!Go stand next to him and I take a photo for you"  One of my ex- students had seen me in the crowd and being younger and more techno savvy ( at this time many years back - I confess I was not at all techno savvy and did not carry a camera with me anywhere) quickly saw the rare chance for me to get a photo with Don Moen.

I had always wondered in my heart and also aloud to God. Did I pray first or you prepared the answer to my prayer long even before I thought to pray? I remained very convinced after many such encounters with God that He has heard my cries long and prepared the answers long before the prayers have even arisen in my heart and on my mouth.

Another such encounter was when I needed to make a decision to accept my promotion letter from a regular non portfolio teacher to the post of Penolong Kanan Tadbir and Curriculum some 6 years ago. Believe me, I was not so interested in the offer!

I had just come back from Singapore from a conference in early December on a Friday and the minute I crossed the causeway, my phone rang non stop. Badariah, one of my beloved teachers informed me we had to prepare the students  for a presentation with Dr. Craig Barret, the then Intel CEO and other education officials in Putrjaya  that immediate Monday. All the way from Johor to KL,my phone was peppered with calls as we prepared the  teachers and students via the phone line. When the presentation was over on Monday,  I prepared myself for some highly needed rest.

Two days later, on Wednesday, I recieved a strange call from my school clerk questioning me why I had asked for transfer to another school. I assured her I had not asked for any transfer and probrably there was some mistakes with the ministry.She insisted I come back to school to look at the letter and when I did, I was quite bewildered by it! I was to report to SMK Seksyen 5, Wangsa Maju the next week. Huh??

I put two and two together and decided that I would have to see Datuk Noor Rezan, the then Director of Education for KL to understand what was happening. She told me she wanted me to assume the PK1 post and she had done it ( without consulting me) knowing I was not willing to move anywhere from my beloved SMK Padang Tembak on my own accord. I was still in shock as I disliked very much adminstrative work which I found to be extremely boring and very stifling. I asked for a week to think over the offer.

Strange what comes to our minds and heart when we set aside time to reflect on what God have to say to us during crisis and decision making times. Some words spoke by Vernon Falls almost 20 years ago came to mind. He had said to me back then when Sue Jan was a new born that " God will put you into adminstration" I had always dismissed those words because I thought the dull adminstrative work was in MAJOR CONFLICT with my creative and spontaneous nature. Why on earth should I remember these words now? These words were not what I wanted to hear then.

Another thing that came to my mind was Ms Seah Jiak Choo's words at the Singapore's conference. Ms Seah, the then DG Education of Singapore (at 57 years of age)was and still  is an avid marathon runner and a mountain climber.

All her messages in that conference had been geared either on marathon running or mountain climbing save for the very last message which was on fishing. And she had ended her final address by saying " Some of you will be called to launch out into the deep soon after this conference - into areas you don't usually go to. Some of you will be called to become adminstrators" I thought these words were very very good but for other people like for example Hai Bee who was due to become a HM soon back then but personally for me, these words were not significant. "Oh God, why is it that in this time of reflection these words of Ms Seah comes to my memory. "You know the answer now. I recognized the words I recollect as that of God's spirit causing His chosen words to alight on me when I waited on Him.

Today after 5 years of answering that call as PK1 and almost one year as Pengetua, I looked back and know without a doubt, that God has prepared His answers for us long before we pray.