A very present help in times of trouble

Ps 46:1 "God is my refuge and my strength, a very present help in times of trouble"

When I read this, it felt that God was speaking to me directly about my situation in the office. God has helped me in the past and will help me in the future but more than that he is also my helper in the present. Everyday in the office there I faced new and difficult challenges. Some of them really test my patience and my staying power. Many times, I felt like it would be easier to just throw in the letter and stay at home like my husband. Nobody to return you documents you have drafted (and redrafted) with remarks in red ink all over, no one to ask you to 'explain' why you had overlooked certain things and made you feel like you have done a big mistake that would put your job on the line, nobody to make hurtful comments about you, nobody to do things to you that tend to humiliate you (signing in/signing out/barring you from the internet) and the list goes on. However to her credit and as a testimony to God who answers prayers, my boss has changed much over the years I have worked with her. Indeed she had lost a lot of her hardness and unreasonableness and what I call 'scolding zeal'. As my relationship with her improved so the scoldings also became more manageable. It is not to say that they ceased all together, it is just that I responded better.

Anyway this verse really encouraged me. I kept praying over it and meditating on it all day long. God is my present help. He is not just my past help or my future help, he has promised to give me help NOW and TODAY!

There was a particular paper I dreaded doing. I kept putting it off day after day as I knew that it would be difficult to write. However when I read this verse, I knew that God will certainly be more than able to help me write it. So write I did....in 3 days or so I finished a 9 page paper with over 8 attachments! Finally what I kept putting off was crystallized into words! Praise God!

However boss wanted me to put all that I had written in the 9 page paper in a pictorial format. Now how could I possibly do that? She said that I had used too many words! I told her that I wanted a comprehensive paper. I prayed and prayed. God, you are my present help in times of trouble. Help me Lord!

While praying during lunch time, I saw the whole picture! God gave me the pictorial format! I was able to put it in a one-page diagram and I must say it looked very impressive....Thank you Lord!

Invasion of the young people

Well, over the past months, our youngest daughter had her Uni friends stayed over at the house. At one time, I had to gingerly stepped over sleeping bodies all over my living room! There were young people sleeping on the floor, on the sofa, 3 to a bed in the bedrooms....I think if the kitchen floor had wood panelling, some of them might even sleep there too! Anyway, I was glad to get to know Amanda's friends. These bunch of boys and girls conversed mainly in Mandarin. Thanks to them my youngest daughter could speak Mandarin fluently. What we could not achieve with all the tuition teachers when she was young was achieved with her spending a year and a half at the University up north! God had given my youngest daughter a special grace to adapt and to pick up languages with ease.

Anyway, at least 2 young men and a young lady stayed for a slightly longer period than the others. One of them had started working in the No. 1 Japanese boutique, Uniclo and needed a place to stay. Being the kind hearted folks we were, we agreed to Amanda's proposal to let him stay for a nominal sum. The other stayed for about 2 weeks as he had was from Penang and needed a place to stay temporarily. Like Amanda, he had to repeat some foundation year papers at President College. The other girl opted to re-sit 4 papers. Many of my daughter's classmates did not get the required CGPA for dentistry or medicine but they were a determined lot. Re-sitting the papers in another college was the best option in order to ensure a place in the private medical universities for the courses they wanted!

Seeing them in the house, talking to them and watching them interact with each other made me recall the question I was asked during the supermum contest on board the Virgo "Do you think you could have been a better mum with more children?". I answered that its not the quantity but the quality that matters. But seriously looking at the young men and young women playing cards, cluedo, monopoly and badminton with each other, hearing their light and easy banter and seeing them giving Samuel other options of leisure rather than his computer....I really wonder....would it have been different for my son if he had a brother to play with?