[Lisa writes]
I'm in between academic years at the moment, and enjoying the non-school work days. Outside of work-hours, I thought I'd take the time to work on my "other lives" and it's been good.
One of the things I've been catching up on is movies. We are somewhat movie-buffs, but would rather avoid the cinema crowd, preferring instead to watch dvds or vcds in the comfort of our own home. Joerg especially likes that he can make his favourite shot for both of us using his prized Rancilio from Brisbane! Well where do we get the movies from? We frequent the Video-ezy at King Albert Park most often... not to borrow movies, but for the stock of ex-rental sales there. We can usually find bargains at between $4.95 to $8.95 (vcds) but the challenge is to find a GOOD movie! I reckon part of the problem is that we've collected so many of them, that we're running out of options! Sometimes we can spend a good half-hour there trying to dig out something good, and unfortunately there are times when we leave empty-handed. Other times, we leave with 3 or 4 pretty good shows. And they're ours for the keeping!
There are a couple of nice ones which we watched recently which definitely are worth re-watching. One of them is Facing the Giants, an independent (non-Hollywood) flick about a coach who is struggling to bring up his football team to victory. In the process, he re-discovers God's power and work in his life, and eventually brings the team together again to greater heights. Although somewhat predictable, it was very real; we were still drawn in to the struggles faced by the coach, and encouraged by the faith-journey he experienced. It was particularly meaningful for Joerg as he's the soccer teacher-in-charge in his school. Really inspiring, and funny at times too. I think we'll be picking this up to watch every now and again. Here's a clip from the movie...
Actually, while I like inspirational movies, I do also really go for mindless violence, action, and psychological thrillers as well - yeah give me stuff like Kiss of the Dragon, The Mummy, Flightplan, Terminator 1, 2, 3, ... . However I'm starting to realise that there's only so much violence I can take. For example, I coudn't bear to watch all of Saw and Untraceable... all that torture - physical and psychological - just had me cringing and hiding behind pillows! Recently we also bought this movie called The Strangers which stars Liv Tyler... the hide-and-seek which the bad guys played with the victims seemed never-ending, and the part which I hate most, is that they (the bad guys) got away with it! I need a movie with an ending where at least some justice is done. So shows like P2, although with some torture and violence in it, at least was more bearable because the bad guy got his just desserts.
As of last week, we couldn't find anything at Video-ezy... looks like we'll have to survive on cable for a while, sigh!
Sunday 8 March 2009
Sunday 1 March 2009
New beginnings... a late report
[Lisa writes]
Well this is, to put it mildly, abit late. We returned to sunny Singapore last September, and the blog seemed to die a natural death as we headed into the next stage of our lives...
But I've been feeling a call to 'revive' it over the last few months, just never got round to it! What encouraged me to put my fingers to the keyboard was seeing the few visitors who stopped by to leave messages in our cbox, thanks folks! :)
Actually there is much to write about... where to begin?? If I put everything here, I'll be up til the next morning, at least! But I worry that if I spread out everything, I may forget what I wanted to share, and/or be too lazy to pick up where I left off! I reckon I'll do it in bits, at least to keep the suspense going, heh.
The few months after we came back were rather uneventful, just diving back into work and acclimatising to the weather. Have cut my hair 3 times so far, haha! Once I got started it just became, well let's see how short we can go! :P Funny but I don't miss the long hair at all, even though I've had it for the last 6 years.
I guess the most interesting thing that happened to us happened when we were at an early Christmas gathering with our old church friends last December. We got round to sharing about our faith-journey, and one of our friends mentioned the book "Destined to Reign" by Joseph Prince. Sounded like an intriguing read, and since Joerg and I both love to collect books (note, collecting books is one thing, getting round to reading them is another!), so the next chance we got, we picked it up at Trumpet Praise in Plaza Sing. By coincidence, my mum also passed us a set of CDs from his Grace and Favour seminar.
We spent the next couple of months reading, listening, analysing the messages we were hearing and reading. At first, we couldn't quite figure out what to make of it. Was this a new message? Is this a different gospel? How come we haven't heard it preached this way? Well after some long discussions with each other over dinner and bus/mrt journeys home, we realised that it's not a new gospel, or a different gospel, but it's back to what the message of the good news is essentially about. Somewhere along the way, our faith had turned into a matter of routine, without fully realising the love God has for us, and how Jesus made the difference between religion and a real relationship with God. It was liberating particularly for me, because I had believed - tacitly I think - that the blessings which people received from God were in proportion to the level of their involvement in God's work. Hence, if I was not experiencing so much of His blessings whether material, spiritual, or otherwise, then it's probably because I'm not serving God alot. Likewise, if someone else was experiencing God's blessings, then it's because they were being rewarded for their work! I seriously had believed that for awhile, based on what I was seeing in my church friends. But Prince turns that idea on its head, and reminds us that God desires to bless us anyway, and importantly, all He seeks out of us is to have faith in Him. As we believe, we are blessed! Simple as that. That's why we say it is His amazing grace- favour that is undeserved, that is not given because of our works for God, but just because we call Him Lord, and trust Him totally with our lives.
I won't say that this book changed our lives... I reckon only one Book really does. But it caused a paradigm shift in both me and Joerg - one of a few shifts that we've experienced so far this year! I confess I still struggle with some things, but I am more peaceful now knowing that God's blessing is not dependent on what I do/ don't do for Him, but just on believing on Him. It does indeed increase our love and passion to live for Him :) It really is good news!
Ok over the next few entries I'll share some of the other books that have helped us in our faith-journey this side of heaven, as well as the other paradigm-shift that's happened this year.
God bless you in your own journey!
Well this is, to put it mildly, abit late. We returned to sunny Singapore last September, and the blog seemed to die a natural death as we headed into the next stage of our lives...
But I've been feeling a call to 'revive' it over the last few months, just never got round to it! What encouraged me to put my fingers to the keyboard was seeing the few visitors who stopped by to leave messages in our cbox, thanks folks! :)
Actually there is much to write about... where to begin?? If I put everything here, I'll be up til the next morning, at least! But I worry that if I spread out everything, I may forget what I wanted to share, and/or be too lazy to pick up where I left off! I reckon I'll do it in bits, at least to keep the suspense going, heh.
The few months after we came back were rather uneventful, just diving back into work and acclimatising to the weather. Have cut my hair 3 times so far, haha! Once I got started it just became, well let's see how short we can go! :P Funny but I don't miss the long hair at all, even though I've had it for the last 6 years.
I guess the most interesting thing that happened to us happened when we were at an early Christmas gathering with our old church friends last December. We got round to sharing about our faith-journey, and one of our friends mentioned the book "Destined to Reign" by Joseph Prince. Sounded like an intriguing read, and since Joerg and I both love to collect books (note, collecting books is one thing, getting round to reading them is another!), so the next chance we got, we picked it up at Trumpet Praise in Plaza Sing. By coincidence, my mum also passed us a set of CDs from his Grace and Favour seminar.
We spent the next couple of months reading, listening, analysing the messages we were hearing and reading. At first, we couldn't quite figure out what to make of it. Was this a new message? Is this a different gospel? How come we haven't heard it preached this way? Well after some long discussions with each other over dinner and bus/mrt journeys home, we realised that it's not a new gospel, or a different gospel, but it's back to what the message of the good news is essentially about. Somewhere along the way, our faith had turned into a matter of routine, without fully realising the love God has for us, and how Jesus made the difference between religion and a real relationship with God. It was liberating particularly for me, because I had believed - tacitly I think - that the blessings which people received from God were in proportion to the level of their involvement in God's work. Hence, if I was not experiencing so much of His blessings whether material, spiritual, or otherwise, then it's probably because I'm not serving God alot. Likewise, if someone else was experiencing God's blessings, then it's because they were being rewarded for their work! I seriously had believed that for awhile, based on what I was seeing in my church friends. But Prince turns that idea on its head, and reminds us that God desires to bless us anyway, and importantly, all He seeks out of us is to have faith in Him. As we believe, we are blessed! Simple as that. That's why we say it is His amazing grace- favour that is undeserved, that is not given because of our works for God, but just because we call Him Lord, and trust Him totally with our lives.
I won't say that this book changed our lives... I reckon only one Book really does. But it caused a paradigm shift in both me and Joerg - one of a few shifts that we've experienced so far this year! I confess I still struggle with some things, but I am more peaceful now knowing that God's blessing is not dependent on what I do/ don't do for Him, but just on believing on Him. It does indeed increase our love and passion to live for Him :) It really is good news!
Ok over the next few entries I'll share some of the other books that have helped us in our faith-journey this side of heaven, as well as the other paradigm-shift that's happened this year.
God bless you in your own journey!
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