PC World

We live in a politically correct (PC) world.

It is right to be sensitive and use words that are polite and more refined.

For instance, we don’t call a mental patient “retarded” at all.
It was made more sensitive by calling them “Intellectually handicapped.”
But then “handicapped” too is not such a good description.
Now it is truly more correct to call them “mentally challenged.”

We use to call people on wheelchair – “disabled”.
Are they really "disabled" as if they are not able to do anything?
Surely not. So the more empowering term would be to call them “physically challenged.”

Although this is politically correct – it is the good kind of politically correctness.
When it is the good kind of politically correctness – it is being right and polite.

But the negative kind of politically correctness is one whereby because we don’t want to offend anyone, and we fail to call a spade a spade – and if a child did wrong, we don't tell them that it is wrong. And we don't call a sin is a sin.

So what is PC?
PC is being unable to speak the hard truth for fear of offending another person even though that person has digressed and committed some offences (and against God's word).

If we want to be a man or woman of God, we need to speak the truth for what it is and out of love.

I was reading 1 Kings 13 and the man of God spoke the hard truth to Jeroboam, the new king of Israel after God tore the kingdom into two from Solomon's son Rehoboam.
God had blessed Jeroboam with Israel but instead of keeping God's laws faithfully, Jeroboam built altars to worship two golden calves (1 Kgs 12:28).
And he told the people "Here are your gods."
This is almost exactly Aaron's words to the Israelites after building the golden calf "These are your gods." (Ex 32:4).

Even when the hard truth was told to King Jeroboam and the word of God given by the man of God was fulfilled (the altar split up [1 Kgs 13:3,5] and his hands was healed [13:6]), Jeroboam did not change his evil ways (13:33).

Another prophet was to speak the hard truth into his life.
Jeroboam's son became ill and he asked his wife to disguise herself and to see the prophet Ahijah who had earlier prophesied that he would be king over the divided northern kingdom. It turns out that she actually don't need to disguise herself because the prophet now could not see (14:4). Ironically though he could not see naturally, he could see spiritually and told Jeroboam's wife the dreadful fate of their son and his kingdom.

If we aspire to be man and woman of God, we need to be sensitive with our words but at the same time, there is no place for PC and we need to speak God's truth in love.
For God's word and His truth is useful for "teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness" (2 Tim 3:16).
If we fail to speak God's truth, there will be no righteousness developed.

Instead of being politically correct – we need to be spiritually correct and be humble to be corrected.

Worshiping With Tobymac: Alive & Transported

Just bought this CD / DVD by Tobymac.

Wow... What a Worship.
Full of youthful energy.

I was caught in worshiping the Lord with them.
I particularly love "In The Light" and "Made To Love."

Check it out ....

Rend Our Hearts

Joel 2:13 Rend your heart and not your garments

In biblical times, when people repent, they will rend their garments.
Take for example King Ahab.
Even king Ahab, whose wife was the wicked Jezebel, when he was repentant, what did he do?

1 Kings 21:27 When Ahab heard these words, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and fasted. He lay in sackcloth and went around meekly.
^{1Ki 21:28} Then the word of the LORD came to Elijah the Tishbite:
^{1Ki 21:29} “Have you noticed how Ahab has humbled himself before me?
Because he has humbled himself, I will not bring this disaster in his day.

Now in Joel, the prophet tells us don’t just rend or tear our garments.

What is the point of rending our garments and not our hearts?

The garments are what is on our outside.
We are to Rend our hearts - our inner most heart.
That is what God is calling us to do.

The rending of garment is just a symbolism of what we are doing on the inside.
If we don't rend our heart but just rend our garment - it is but a ritual.

Business News

Good news for those who would like to bring some funds over to NZ.
Recently kiwi$ fell to their lowest level.

S$ to NZ$1
highest (Feb 26) 1.14174
lowest (Aug 8) 0.989608

MR to NZ$1
highest (Feb 27) 2.6111
lowest (Aug 8) 2.33496

US$ to NZ$1
highest (Feb 27) 0.817501
lowest (Aug 8) 0.705
(Source: http://www.x-rates.com/d/NZD/table.html)

When we arrived here in Auckland in 2002, the rate was S$0.90 = NZ$1.
Kiwi $ had strengthened to as high S$1.20+ but is now just under S$1.

Good news to those who are looking to buy a house too.

Here is an excerpt from today's (11 Aug) NZ Herald:
"The value of our homes has slipped backwards for the first time in more than seven years.

New figures out today show house values fell 2.2 per cent in the year to July - the first national drop since the price dip of 1997-2001.

.... Auckland property values fell 3.6 per cent from a year ago"

7 Good Years & 7 Bad Years of Joseph? (Gen 41)
(Not necessarily in literal 7 year cycle for us now though.
Except that the word "seven" appeared in the paper's report?)

Testimony 1 - God Speaks Through Dreams

A Singaporean couple shared with me that they had wanted to convert S$ to NZ$ to park some of their funds on Deposit in NZ$ since it will yield a very attractive return of over 8% for 6 months.
We after all are called to be good stewards of whatever God puts into our hands.

Then his wife had a dream that they should hold on to that.
They didn't understand why God gave them this direction.
She had the dream a few days before my blog of 7 Aug 08.
When he read the blog about the NZ$ currency depreciating against other currencies, he then understood why God had spoken to her in the dream to give them direction and to protect their savings.
It is a confirmation for them.

Isn't God great?
God speaks to us in dreams and vision (Joel 2:28; Acts 2:17).
(They are not old though ... :) )

I praise God too for using this blog to be blessing.
It is also like a confirmation of what this blog hopes to accomplish.


Testimony 2 - God's Word & Confirmation

I had finished a series of messages from Galatians and was wondering what to preach next for Sunday 10 Aug.
I woke up last Thurs with Hosea and Joel in my mind even though I was not reading these books recently at all.

I sensed a direction to preach from Joel which is a prophetic book with quite strong words.
Is this really God's word for the congregation?

We had prayer time before our service and the Holy Spirit just fall upon one of the pray-ers who wept and prayed a sorrowful prayer with the words "Wake Up."

The words "Wake Up" was a point in the message even though this pray-er didn't know about the message.

What a confirmation.

This pray-er also shared with me that he had seen a vision for the first time or one of the few times - and it was during the prayer time.

God wants to reveal Himself to us.

Are we hungry for Him?

08-08-08 : Beijing Olympics Starts at 8pm - What's In A Number?

Numbers have always been important.
Why so?
Besides being a measurement tool, it also rich in symbolism.

To the Chinese, the number "8" symbolizes striking it rich and success.

For Christians, the number that is close to our heart is "7".
"7" symbolizes completeness.

God completed His creation and rested on the 7th day.
Noah took 7 of every kind of clean animals (Gen 7:2).
Joseph interpreted the dream with the 7 years of abundance and 7 years of famine (Gen 41:29).
The walls of Jericho fell after the Israelites marched around it for 7 days (Joshua 6; Heb 11:30).
There were 7 priests carrying 7 trumpets (Jos 6:8).
7 deacons were chosen in Acts 6:3.
Book of Revelation mentions 7 churches, 7 seals, 7 angels, 7 plagues, 7 bowls.

"6" is just before "7" and is incomplete.

"666" is a parody or a copy or imitation of the complete "7".

What does this make of the number "8"?

Good Years & Bad Years

I was reminded of an earlier message I shared how I had sensed that the property market in NZ was over-bought, 2-3 years before it actually happened. The property market has now turned in the first half of 2008.

On 22 Jun 08, I shared during the Sunday message that it seems that the worst of the NZ economy and property market is not yet here - perhaps in 2010.

That week itself, two finance companies defaulted on their payments - St Laurence and Dorchester (on 24 and 25 Jun). On Thursday that week 26 Jun, Westpac released the report stating that consumer confidence was at its lowest since 1991, 17 years ago.

As there are more sellers of residential properties now and many are not prepared to sell below their expected sale price, many have become accidental landlords. The traditional thinking is that there is always a strong support for NZ residential properties since there is a sizeable rental market. Today there is a report in the NZ Herald that even rentals are under pressure.

The easing of interest rate will help house owners in servicing mortgages.
But this means that the kiwi $ will be under pressure - and so has declined against other currencies.
Ultimately it will mean higher prices for our imports - and we won't be getting cheap TVs and computers as we are getting now.
(Side thought - do we buy the computer now, or wait for a newer model but at more expensive price later or better still - start saving for the bad years?)

The downturn in the property market has a multiplier impact on other businesses e.g. real estate agents, anything to do with houses e.g. contractors, carpets, household appliances and even restaurants. (today I just heard of a company that does concrete jobs going under). All these hit the stock market. Unemployment is up slightly.

What do Christians do in the midst of all these news?
What did Joseph do?
More to come ....

(Disclaimer: These are my personal views and observations and does not constitute financial advice. Readers are advised to seek their own independent financial advice)

Whose House?

I was reading 1 Kings 6 & 7.

At the end of 1 Kings 6, v38 tells us that Solomon took 7 years to build the temple.
The next verse in 1 Kings 7:1, we learn that Solomon took 13 years to construct his palace.
The author of 1 Kings was deliberately contrasting the building of the temple and the palace.

How about the size of the temple versus the size of the palace?
The size of the temple is 60 x 20 x 30 cubits or 90 x 30 x 45 feet (1 Kings 6:2).
The size of the palace is 100 x 50 x 30 cubits or 150 x 75 x 45 feet (1 Kings 7:2).

Solomon built for himself a larger palace and took a longer time to construct his palace.
What does this tell us about Solomon's priorities?

It reminds us to ask this question of ourselves:
Where are we placing our priorities?

Are we taking our ministry to build the temple and the church seriously?

Info For Election

There are 2 votes during the election.

1. The Electorate Candidate vote – we all vote for the preferred candidate in our electorate.
2. The Party Vote – vote for our preferred party. This is the MMP (Mixed Member Proportional) system

The Party votes will decide how many seats each party gets in Parliament.

That is why Party vote is very key.

This means that some Party members on the Party list can get into Parliament even though they may not be elected into Parliament by the electorate.

That is why Party candidates want to be ranked high in their Party list – especially those of smaller parties.

Let us vote for those who stand for what we believe ...

Kiwi Party - A Party With Christian Values

I attended one of the Kiwi Party’s meeting and have personally met with Larry Baldock, who is the leader of this party.

Larry clarified with me that they are not a Christian party – but a party with Judeo-Christian values.

They would like to attract more voters who subscribe to Christian values but may not be Christians.

NZ under the Labour Party has passed legislation like these:

• Legalization of Prostitution (making a sin legal)
• Civil Union
• Anti-smacking Law (failing to distinguish discipline from abuse)
  • Example of this law gone wrong – A granddad tipped a bean bag so as to get his grandson to move on and to turn down the volume of the TV and who also refused to turn off the TV when asked to. Police arrested the grandfather after the boy rang 111. He was convicted and held in a prison cell for 2 nights.
  • There are more cases.

The National Party record is more conservative with the MPs skewing the other side of Labour in the Moral issues.
However, as a party, they do not openly subscribe to Christian values.

The Kiwi Party openly subscribes to Christian values and seeks to do this:

• Repeal the Anti-smacking Law
• Criminalize those seeking services of prostitutes and those living off the proceeds of prostitution of others
• Return drinking age to 20
• No home detention and parole for more serious crimes
• Victim rights before Criminal rights

You would be able to read more of their policies on their website at http://thekiwiparty.org.nz/web/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=98&Itemid=50

They will be releasing more of their policies this Sat 9 Aug (9:15am – 6pm) at their National Conference in Auckland, Ellerslie Events Centre, Greenlane East. It is a free Conference and you can sign up to attend the Conference at their website.

I have heard some of them speak and they can be inspiring.

Let us vote responsibly by knowing what each party stands for ....