Charity work at Redhill

Dear Diary,

Arrrgghhh... today’s the 17th of Jan. I haven’t read the 1-year bible plan for yesterday and today! I may have to read them together with tomorrow’s one the next day since I will have to sleep right after typing this (as I have to wake up early for 8am church service tomorrow). So, the aim is to read Genesis 49 to Exodus 9 tomorrow. It is getting hard to keep up and it is not even one month yet! I must persevere though, haha...

I woke up early today and headed down to Redhill, somewhere at block 89, to meet up with the rest of the people who are part of the “Light of Hope” charity team. There were a couple of us and I was initially quite apprehensive if I could fit in as it was the first time I join them. However, I settled in pretty fast. The leader was just a year 2 sociology student from NUS. Yup, this initiative was set up by our church’s youth group but since my young adult’s cell is involved in this, I thought I will also join. I guess it was the correct decision. I joined a male full-time church worker / missionary and a young VJC year 2 female student, and off we went to visit 3 households in that 2 hours (10 – 12pm).

That block of flats houses many elderly. The first house we visited, that old lady spoke only Cantonese. Thank God that the church worker could speak Cantonese. I examined the lady’s legs, checked her medical history, social history, looked through her medications and reminded her on medication compliance. It was kinda funny because we were supposed to just go there and chat, and pass two tangerines plus a $10 NTUC voucher, haha... But it was yet another way to engage the people, yeah? Haha... Maybe I should bring along a pair of gloves, an aneroid sphygmomanometer, a stethoscope and a glucometer? I need sponsors! Haha... The second person we visited was a lady who speaks Hokkien. Well, everyone was kinda dependent on me because the lady understands Teochew too! The church worker and myself struggled to help each other communicate with her, haha... The VJC student is Teochew but she knows only English and Mandarin. Reminded me of myself during the college years when I didn’t know a single bit of dialect too. I did medication review also. Apparently she trusted Chinese “sinsehs” more than Western doctors. Oh well... but she was really friendly upon knowing I was medically trained.

The last flat we visited was an elderly couple. The student was telling me that this couple kept talking about supernatural stuff like ghosts and occults. True enough, the guy did and I sat there listening. Since they spoke in Mandarin, all three of us were engaging with them effectively. Ultimately, I took the risk and told them about God in Christ Jesus. After all, he claimed he was attended church for about 20 years in young adulthood and kissed the feet of the crucifix (ohhhh... ok...) He talked about his out-of-body experience and how he had a glimpse of hell... So I was employing Saint Paul’s tactics when he told the Greeks that he was going to tell them who is that unknown God they were worshipping (Acts 17:23). May God bring them back into His fold.

I did not join the rest for lunch at the hawker centre but proceeded home. Journeyed home with that team leader and had a great chat with her. Think I admire her because she loves the elderly and that requires patience, kindness, perseverance and a “filial piety” sort of character.

Okay, anyway... back to some exegesis... short one, I will make it snappy. Looking into 1 Corinthians 15, Saint Paul talked about a fundamental doctrine of the Christian faith: The resurrection of the Christ Jesus. In v.1 – 2, Paul spoke of the gospel teaching which he preached to the church in Corinth as something which the Corinth Christians were to receive, stand and be saved through it, provided they hold fast to it. I don’t know how you see that but I see it as an active phrase. Something which we need to hold fast and obey, or else it will be in vain. Saint Paul then inferred that he received these teachings (tradition) from the other apostles (v.3) whom Jesus appeared to when he was raised 3 days after his death. He went on to say that Christ appeared to Kepha (Saint Peter) and so on... (v.5 – 7). By the grace of God, Paul became the apostle for Christ despite being a former persecutor of the infant Church (v.9). And in v.11, he reminded that whether himself or the other apostles, they all consistently taught the same gospel (v.11).

In v.12, Saint Paul spoke about the hypocrisy if we confessed to be Christians but yet NOT believe in the resurrection of the dead. He continued to elaborate his point (v.13 – 19). In v.20, Paul declared the fundamental of our Christian faith which is that Christ is raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. It is implied that as Christ is the first to be raised, he won’t be the only one and the rest of those who are dead can hope to be resurrected too. Christ Jesus is the new Adam who will bring life to the world. We fast forward to v.26 and there we realise that the last enemy to be destroyed is Death itself. As Christians, we should be opponents of death and therefore to condone abortion and euthanasia is practically allying ourselves against God and with Death.

Then there was this verse on baptising the dead. In v.29, there was a brief mention of that. It is practised in the Church of the Latter-Day Saints of Jesus Christ (Mormons). However, most Christians do not practise that because the early Catholic Church did not practise that. It seems from the verse that it may be done only in some small communities outside of the apostolic church. As St Ignatius said (or was it another saint? Haha), “We should always be disposed to believe that that which appears white is really black, if the hierarchy of the Church so decides”. In v.30, Paul taught that a life of sacrifice is pointless if there is no resurrection. However, there is! Haha... so be prepared. Stop sinning for you will be accountable for them eventually (v.34). There were quite a lot of stuff he spoke about and he reminded us that our resurrection body (heavenly body) and our physical one (earthly body) are totally different (v.40). As the first Adam received life, the second Adam (Jesus Christ) gives life (v.45). Then in v.46, Paul apparently seemed to refute some teachings that taught that the Spirits came first before coming into the physical bodies (cf: Plato, Origen, the Gnostics). Instead, the physical body came first before the spirit. Paul continued to remind us that not everyone will be dead at the day of judgement (v.51).

Death will NOT have the ultimate victory (v.55) because of the resurrection of Christ (v.57). Death came into the world because of the sin of Adam and Eve. Then in v.58, Saint Paul tells us what have to be done till the second coming of Christ; Labour hard and not giving up. Okay, just to wrap up quickly... In 1 Corinthians chapter 16, Paul spoke about a collection for Christians in Jerusalem. We can see that the early church during Paul’s era had already shifted the “Sabbath” from Saturday (last day of the week) to Sunday (first day of the week) to coincide with the day of the resurrection of our Lord (v.2). Then he spoke about his travel plans... blah blah... ending off with an anathema (ouch!) in v.22. I suddenly realised that I don’t know what “Marana tha” meant! So I did an online search and presto... it means “O Lord, come!” (similar to the Apocalypse 22:20). It is an Aramaic statement. In fact, according to Wikipedia, Pope Silverius (7th century) declared that anyone who deceives a bishop is “anathema marana tha” which probably meant that the person is excluded from communion with the Church till Christ returns in His second coming! Geesshhh...

Okay, that’s all for the night. Good night!

God Bless,

Andrew