Today my Dad came downstairs to hand me a classy chocolate bar. He said, in Cantonese, "Here, I'll treat you to eat this! It's some beautiful stuff!" To which, I grinned and replied, "Ooh, thank you!" Little did he know that two nights ago, at a forsaken hour, I had a craving. I crept upstairs, knowing that my parents were already sound asleep, and opened the cabinet door. I looked to and fro, but there was nary a morsel anywhere! That's when I looked up and saw the pristine white cardboard box labelled in gold lettering: "Lindt". With no qualm and no third person to stop me, I wrenched open that box, gingerly took a bar, and resumed my activities downstairs.

But now I think, this experience and my dad's love for me would have been more exhilarating, more sensual, if I hadn't done it before.

Be thou my vision,
Be thou my strength,
Be thou my voice,
Because, man, if you aren't, I really don't know where it's going to come from. =/

"The thing we are trying to get away from, God is calling us back towards." - from a bible study at Mark West



These days, I'm fond of drenching myself with fancy water bottles. Not only does it help get the soy-sauce stains out of the sofa seat, but it provides entertainment to everyone within a ten-metre radius. It's also amusing sitting there in a puddle of ice-cold water, as it wells up at my absorbent buttocks and drips to a reservoir at my feet.

I weigh 120 pounds: mothers commonly look at my bony wrists and tell me to eat more; I have a black-belt in Karate, but I've been bullied, pinched and chased my whole life. In grade 6, Dylan Zatylny angrily chased me for so long through the snow-dunes in our school's big field that I gave up any possibility of making it to a washroom.

I remember when I last sat in a puddle of ice-water, as it welled at my waterproof buttocks and soaked my feet. I couldn't row our canoe anymore; my body was shivering too much. The still-frame moment as I reached too far out of our boat and as the disbelief of my friend welled up on her face was only starting to register in my mind. As we were finally dragged to the shore of Crimson Lake, I hastened to stand up. The water which had collected inside my waterproof pants gushed out and overflowed my shoes. I glanced apologetically to my similarly drenched mentor, Kim, and trudged off to the showers. I would proceed to tip two more canoes in the next year. Right, so I should be used to being soaked.

When I met God on the campus of the University of Alberta, I didn't have much confidence in myself. I stuttered when I talked, and I spent many a night thinking how my conversations could have gone if only I had said this or that. But for some reason, God called me out of mediocrity and into leadership. He called me, slowly, out of an anxiety about how I looked to others, and into a place where I could accept myself as a person full of flaws and yet containing some strengths as well. I remember vividly the nerve-wracking time of leading my first bible study, of climbing up and down the stairs of our residence inviting random people to a bible study (stuttering the whole time, because I was nervous), of  being a gameshow helper in front of thirty people without a plan. I've no idea why I agreed to do so many things that scared me out of my wits, but I get the vague feeling it was good for me. By the end of four years, I had confidence in myself; I was comfortable with my surroundings.

I sense that the whole time, I'd been running away from my insecurities. I'm glad that I found a community that loved me and made me feel special in Edmonton.
Now, I feel that the whole process is repeating itself again. Once again I'm in unfamiliar territory. Once again, I feel that I am, in some ways, ineffective at talking to people. I feel like people ought to notice that the (co)president of IVCF-MRU lacks a compelling vision to draw people with. But though I'm back at the beginning, I've been armed with a new thought, a weapon unto itself. I now know that God is the provider of my strength; I want to pray more often for his Spirit to be with me, strengthening my hands and my voice. From the shores of Crimson Lake to the depth of 24-ounce puddles, I know that God has been at work in me.