The Truth about Everbright
Before Jesus
My pastor (or pastor-to-be back then) once said that stuck in my mind,
because it so aptly reflected my whole life for over 20 years. He said
this (though I was told later that someone else said it before him, so
he wasn’t the first, but I digress…):
“We often think that the opposite of love must be hatred. Hating someone is the worst you can do to someone to declare that you don’t love them and quite the opposite. But I suggest that perhaps the greatest enemy of love nowadays is not hatred, but INDIFFERENCE…”
How true, and how well I knew this to be true in my life. Since a certain time very young in my life, I’ve come to a point where I realized that there doesn’t seem to be anything or anyone that that I cared for, or even wanted to attempt to care for. I began to adopt a very utilitarian view of people, things and relationships. People and things only exist out of need for each other. So parents give birth to children only in the hope that the latter can support them in old age, or out of fear that there won’t be any to do so if they don’t. Friends only remain friends because of what they have in common in hobbies, interest, and whatever else other benefits they that they gain from their “friendship”. Love is about 2 persons trying to be happy from the relationship they share.
If cynicism were looking for a personification, I would probably be a very possible candidate. I found no reason at all why people should care for each other at all. Deep, deep down inside, our motivations will always be selfish. I was one the terrible (I thought it was a gift back then actually) people who could look at coldly look at what’s happened in natural disasters and wars and say “well, too bad for them.”. Of course, it’s quite obvious that there are so called acts of “self-sacrifice” or “altruism” where it seems that people do things not out of selfish motives, but these are just moments of stupidity where people will eventually regret if they do survive the moment. Deep down, people do things only because it would benefit them.
It didn’t matter to me whether or not God existed. Even if he did, it didn’t matter to me. So long he didn’t bother me (which he more than did, as you will read about later!), we’re fine. My mum was (and still is) a Taoist (despite that the fact that she thought she was Buddhist), and since young, I’ve followed her along in all forms of worships to all kinds of gods, ancestors and the like. It’s amazing how many people of the olden become gods once they die. Confucius was one of those that I remembered most, partly because my mum sometimes laments at my “ungratefulness” towards the old man (or god) by turning to Christianity after he has blessed me with all my good grades. Actually I never did believe in them deep down. I was only there bowing to the old man and the others, because I needed to stay on the good side of my mum.
I had Christian “friends”, and knew about Jesus, because they told me about him. However I thought he was just like the gods that my mum chose to believe in. Both are psychological crutches that people hold on to in order to be able to carry on in life. I didn’t need Jesus, and he didn’t bother me, so that’s fine with me. People can choose to believe what they want, so long it helps them get by.
So there I was then, completely cynical, and indifferent to people and relationships. My childhood dream was quite different from a lot of people: I wanted to earn enough money, and then find an island where I become a hermit, and die there. Some people think it’s a joke whenever I have a chance (and courage) to share this, but I knew I was dead serious about it. I may want to be a doctor, or an engineer, but that’s only because that’s what brings me closer to my REAL dream.
Having nothing else to look forward to, I plunged myself into the pursuit of academic excellence, like so many others in Singapore, and did exceedingly well. My mum, of course, thought that Confucius was helping me out there, but I thought she was wrong (though I wisely chose not to tell that to her face). I’d achieved everything through my own hard-work (which was possible, since I was not distracted by so many other things like other people), and my own talents.
Of course, I do help people, and in fact people liked me, because I’ve always appeared helpful. But deep down, I knew that there was more pride involved in my acts rather than a sincere desire to help. Helping people gave me a secure sense that I was still better than they are.
School vacations were often meaningless, where I would just find whatever that would “fill up the time”. Because this may fall into the hands of people who may be stumbled, I shall not describe the details of what exactly I went into. Trust me, you won’t want to know.
I was moving on excellently towards fulfilling my childhood dream, and although along the way, I would sometimes question the sanity of it, but still I persevered, pushed on by my cynicism that this was the only possible way and pride that I could do it. And then something happened during one vacation in my university years which changed all that…
Encountering Jesus
As I mentioned, I had Christian “friends” who tried (“well-meaning”
I believed) to share about Jesus and what he has done for me on the cross,
and why I should accept him as Lord and Savior, but I held firmly to my
own beliefs about people and the way the world works. They tried to get
me to go to Bible studies and stuff. I went for some of these, but more
to stay on their good side, and humor them. After all, it doesn’t
make sense to sour relationships by turning them down always. I may need
their help some time along the way. Besides, it helps to know a bit of
what they believe in, so that at least I won’t appear so ignorant
when I talk to them. So I was living out fully what I firmly believed
about people even with them.
But deep down, there was always something strange about these “friends”
that I couldn’t quite understand. They quite obviously had very
different beliefs about God, people and relationships from me, and that
had something to do with this book called the Bible, which they think
it’s God Word. I understood I could never understand how they could
base their whole lives on a book with finite number of pages (some had
more of course, because they are in large print, but still finite). And
then, there’s the Jesus that the book with finite pages talks about,
the person that these people are so caught up with. I’ve know about
him, but quite honestly, how could a man who died 2000 years ago be relevant
to me, except as history that I read about?
The other strange thing about these people is how they actually related to people, according to what they believed about Jesus and the Bible. Although it is quite obvious to them that I had a different belief and worldview from them, they never did outcast me, and try as I could, I could see no other reason why they should not do so, except the one that they kept telling me about: Jesus loves you and wants you back as God’s child. They also surprised me by how open they were with their sharing of their struggles, both with life and with their faith. That was something completely alien to me. I had never known any other gathering of people where people shared as personally their struggles as them. That to me was something foolish. You never know how people may use what you shared against you.
But still I remained skeptical, convinced that this would all fall apart when they find out how terrible people really are. Yet strangely, a part of me yearned so much to be part of them, though I would always be able to dismiss it as foolishness, something like the foolish acts of altruism and self-sacrifice that people sometimes lapse into, only that in their case, it seems to be prolonged. This remained so till that particular week…
It was school vacations during my third year at university. As per what I normally do during vacations, I drifted from gatherings to gatherings, parties to parties, occasionally punctuated by empty gaps where I would have time to ponder on the meaninglessness of life and all. That vacation was particularly bad, because my ponderings became very depressing. I think it was also partly because of the consideration that I would soon graduate and move on to another stage of my life. The uncertainties frightened me. I was too used to being in control of everything in my life, that I found it hard to cope with the unknown that would come soon. On looking back, I realized that that was perhaps part of God’s amazing plan to save me…
I received an invitation from my Christian “friends” to their annual camp. Since I had nothing else at hand (don’t you just marvel at how perfectly God plans things?), I thought why not. So I went.
It was the first “Christian camp” that I went to. It was very different from other camps that went to, where we usually enjoy ourselves with games, games and more games. We had games of course, but that seem be secondary to (what else do you expect for Christian camps?) Bible studies and talks, and discussing how what they learnt related to their lives. I recalled that my (now) pastor gave three talks about the “Big Picture of life”. The first 2 were about “Lost as a Christian” and “Lost in the Bible”, which didn’t mean a lot to me then. It was the third talk that struck me so hard that it hurt. He talked about being “Lost in life”, where we may think we are very clear about where we are heading to in life, but when we have time to search deep down, we realized that we don’t really know better, and are too proud to admit that it is true. This is because we’ve ignored God, and refused to look to him for directions, when he has clearly shown us where to look in Jesus’s death on the cross and his resurrection.
I thought for a moment that he was psychic, because it seemed to me that he was speaking directly to me, and where I was in life then. In one talk, he summed up over 20 years of my life! I have had been occasions before, when things which didn’t make sense to begin with suddenly became very clear when some new information is revealed. But nothing, absolutely nothing could ever match what I came to know that very day.
In that one moment, all that I’ve known about Jesus suddenly became clear. Despite that fact that I seemed to be very clear about my life and where it was going, I was in fact lost, and too proud to admit that my life was in fact messed up. I could always blame so many things for how I’d turn out, like people I’ve met, and how God made me the way I am. That was how I managed justify all the inconsistencies in my beliefs and actions in the past. I couldn’t do that anymore. I knew with such clarity what my problem was: I was a sinner who had always refused God’s offer to save me from my wretchedness, even though I could (not before trying!) blame no-one for how I turned out. There was only one person I knew who could help me. His name was Jesus Christ.
But I was still too proud to admit it. Despite the amazing revelation of who I truly was, I still tried to run away. I told no one of the experience I had, and tried to reason my way out of this. After all, I had been depressed before, and it was quite easy for someone who happened to be saying something related to get to me. That’s how brainwashing works, isn’t it? How can someone as brilliant as I am (notice how proud I still was?) allow this to side-track me from my dreams?
I couldn’t sleep that night, which was something unusual. Someone who didn’t care about anyone or anything at all will never have insomnia, because he has no cares to worry over. There are sleepless nights, which are by choice, or temporary sleeplessness due to an upcoming examination, but this was different. I struggled with Jesus, to get him out of my mind. He can be VERY persistent when he sets his mind to!
I failed. Something in me tells me that I need to find out more about Jesus. It could be the most important thing I’ll ever do. I called up my friend who invited me and the leader of the cell group the next morning, and we met up. For the first time in my life, I shared about the reality of my life with 2 people whom I hardly knew well, but whom I thought would understand what I was talking about
And they did. So on 7 December 2000, I gave up and finally admitted to God that I was a lost sinner, and needed Jesus as Lord and Savior of my life.
And as the advertisement caption for a certain local travel agency went: life will never be the same again.
After Jesus
I started attending Bible studies regularly, with that Christian group.
It was difficult at first, because there was a lot that I was confused
about the Bible and Jesus (despite the fact that I thought I knew it all!).
As I study more about what the Bible says abut Jesus, I begin to understand
more and more what I couldn’t comprehend before, about the Bible,
Jesus and Christians.
The Bible is not just some book with finite number of pages. Yes, physically it is a book with pages, but the most important thing about it is what it tells us about God and his plan for us, and how Jesus is at the very center of this plan. It is not just a fictitious story as some think it is, because the things that we read about has real correspondences with what we know in history, geography, science and so many other fields of study, which we trust to inform us about the world we live in. So Christianity has real basis, and is not just some psychological crutch where there is no real object of faith, but just faith itself.
Although the Bible is written so long ago, it is relevant to us today, because it speaks about a problem that has always existed: people, across times and ages, have rejected God and his rightful rule over the world and their lives, and have therefore sinned against him, and are lost about life and its meaning. This works out in so many different areas of our lives, like never-ending wars, corruption of power, the dichotomy between what we do wrong and what we know to be right. The only way out of this is God’s way: by accepting his Son’s death to pay for our wrongs against God, and repenting of how we’ve lived previously, and living a new life of trust in Jesus. Jesus’ death is not just some inspiring event in history. It is for all of us and what we’ve done against God, so that we can live lives as we should.
I’ve also come to understand what being a Christian is really about. We are Christians because of what we’ve come to understand about what Jesus has done for us on the cross. It is not a psychological crutch, because Jesus is real, his death on the cross for us is real, and his resurrection is real. There is real hope, because Jesus is not dead, but alive and will come again finally for us. That’s what gives us hope to persevere in living out the Christian lives, genuinely caring for others, and wanting others to come to know Jesus, while we wait for Jesus’ coming.
The Bible tells me that I am indeed right about the how people, relationships and the world is like, that it IS a terrible world that seems to be without hope. It also tells me why this is so: it is a world where God is ignored. But most importantly, it tells me that there despite all these, there IS a way out of this: by believing in Jesus’ death on the cross to pay for our sin of rebelling against God in our lives, and to repent by living a life of trusting in the real person of Jesus.
It’s been almost three years since I’ve begun this journey. Over this time, I’ve come to know more about myself and the so many areas in my life that God is changing according to what I understand from the Bible. I’ve struggled with these, and it hasn’t been easy. Even now, there are still struggles that I continue to face, but I will not give up this for anything else, because life without God is no life at all. I should know. I’ve been there. I’ll never give it up for anything else. And I’m not alone in this. God is with me, in Spirit and through the family of Christians that He has given me, and we will persevere till we see Jesus again.
-- Ever
Bright
14 Aug 05
Testimonies:s:
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