Being United means

While preparing for the sharing for the EOTC today, my mind can't stop thinking on unity. I realized that God is emphasizing the right foundation of unity that I would need to address the audience. Whatever that I prepared, I managed to share and speak from experience as well. God really moved all of us to really think on it deeper from different angles. Some coaches also talked on it. The State Commissioner also talked on it. Even our state theme is on unity. Reflecting back, I actually written an article on the Tower of Babel some time ago. Now, that same message being used to encourage BB Companies to come as one.

Now, being UNITED also means being

Understanding
Needs and roles of
Individuals
To
Excel
Definitely

True Love

True love? What is love in the first place? Isn't it just a feeling or expression? Some people say true love is blind... you only see the person's strengths, not the weaknesses. Some people say true love is sacrificial. To some extent, it is true... that is what parents do - loving their children with everything that they have.

Love is more than just a feeling alone.. that is a fact that all married couple, especially those with children will tell you. It is an expression of commitment. It is when two families, from different backgrounds and personalities get together. Two worlds apart coming together, forming new family, bonding to even a closer intimacy.

Love is being sacrificial to another person whom you call significant other. Sharing and devoting yourself totally to him or her in totality, providing for each other, supporting each other, trashing out differences, making every effort, in sickness or in health, in poverty or riches, a meaning life that is in response to God's love. We love because He first loved us. So, when we devote ourselves to our significant others, we are responding to God's commitment to us through the church.

The Bible

What is a Bible? Many would just answer, "It is just a book read by the Christians. Some non-Christians also read it out of curiosity. Some would just want to discover the truth behind Christianity or just to find out who is the God behind the Bible"

Bible is the best seller of the world. It has been translated to about 3200 languages worldwide!! Now isn't that amazing?!

Well... Bible is simply Basic Information Before Leaving Earth. We all know that we are just temporary citizens on earth and that we have an eternal home in heaven. So, we are to read the Basic Information Before Leaving Earth to our eternal home. Just like we would find out more about a place where we are going to visit : the culture, the weather, the people, the laws, we need to find out more about heaven and paradise, about God, about our Creator before we go up to meet him face to face.

A disciple? A worker? A Christian?

Last Sunday was one of the best sermons that I've heard. The speaker spoke on some basic distinctions that make us Christians. I recalled once there was a pastor raised a thought-provoking question to his congregation. He asked,"Who among you here are disciples of Christ?". No one raised his/her hands. He smiled as if he had expected this.

"Who then are the workers of Christ?" A few hands went up, and these are the full time workers and some leaders of the church.

"Let me ask another question. Who are Christians?" This time round, all church members raised their hands. He was relieved and said, "When I asked who are the disciples and the workers of Christ, none of you dared to raised your hand. Don't you all realize that all these three questions mean the same?"

Indeed, when we say we are the children of God, we are also saying we are the disciples of Christ. We are His workers. So a Christian is also a disciple.

FOCUS

In our lives, in order that we have continuous learning, we need to have FOCUS. These are the elements that will help to push us to move out of our comfort zone. Time and tide waits for no man, they say ... and I say even the sun will grow dark and gray at the times we least thought of.

Friends - one of the most important priorities that we all have as human beings. Maslow listed this as our security needs. Let's face the fact : as normal human beings, we need to feel belong to certain social groups or circle of friends. We need to build our self esteem among our acquaintances even. Out of the numerous strangers and acquaintances we have made, there will be those who will stick closer than a brother in times of adversary.

Opportunities - the most rarest yet the most anticipated element is perhaps opportunity. The most used keyword to describe the competitiveness of the 21st century is NETWORKING. With the proper networking setup, we will be somebody in our society. Networking here refers to people that come into our lives to help us to succeed.. to some these are the angels who will help earn their 1st millions!! One golden principle : never underestimate the people around us for blessings always come in the form that we least expect of.

Credibility - as we witness the advancement of human technology, we also witness how people misuse or even abuse the power and authority given to them. These are the people who belong to White Collar circle. As such, we need to build our credibility among our circle of contacts, more so if we are in the professional field. It is difficult to stand up for what is right, but it is a fact that we need to make our voice heard in the places where wrong seems right.

Unity - the power of unity lies in the collective effort of everyone involved, yet not many of us realise this. Weaker animals know that if they stand together, they could even fight off a roaring lion!! It takes time to build trust or even to earn the trust and respect of one another. However, once we have it, it becomes part of us. United we stand, divided we fall. Being united is one way to manipulate crises into opportunities.

Stability - a house can only be strong if the foundations are solid and stable. This is similar to our lives. Our foundations of beliefs, value system, principles of life and worldview must be strong and stable. We cannot afford to let our mind be bombarded with trashes, unrelated info, unidentified or unfiltered resources. The world is progressing in technology but are we really safe ? What an irony.. we are advanced in the physical infra-structure but not advanced in our moral. So, unless we have an ANCHOR in our lives, our lives will be tossed by the waves of the world.

To recap, we need Friends, Opportunities, Credibility, Unity and Stability.

Beggar's Chicken

When my colleague asked my to join her to eat the special dish, I thought there is such dish in Malaysia? And the answer is yes!! The only problem is distance.. it is about 1.5 hours drive from Kuala Lumpur. And the roads leading there can be misleading sometimes. But, fortunately we found our way there.. in fact, we were the earliest to reach there.

Dinner serving time was 6pm, but we arrived there 5.35pm. Generally, it was a well thought dinner fellowship. For the first time, she joined me and my other colleagues. Spending three hours there was really worth it and we were actually the last crowd to leave.

For those who want to try the special dish, follow this link http://beggar-chicken.spaces.live.com/

ANTS ... Lifelong Learning

Was just browsing through some photos, especially from the recent ANTS. Really miss my squad members and some of the Officers. It seemed like the experience is still very much fresh in the mind. The camp was no doubt one of the best that I ever organised before. Not so much on the activities but more on the coaching and learning experience that we each had. Initially all that we could think of was to have it intra-state, but it turned out to be inter-state event. Fortunate enough that we had enough coaches and observers for a small group of learners.

Now that they are back to their individual companies to serve and contribute, we as Coaches could only hope that they will be of better help to the Companies and will continue to grow and mature as they learn to be more effective leaders. After all ANTS not just an acroynm for
Advanced NCO Training School, it also means Active NCOs To Strive for the better running of BB Coy!!