# 2010
Looking back this year I want to share with you 3 things that has impacted me this year. Death, meaning and the definition of victory.

Death. This year thankfully by far as been one of relatively good health. Having experienced two funeral's this year, I think it is always fitting to appreciate health because health will always fail us. Though wealth can retard the failure of health, the reality of death will eventually befall even the healthiest and the wealthiest. Perhaps death is God's way of making us reflect on the finite and certainly helps me puts into perspective the fragility of life. It never fails to set me thinking, when will it be my turn. It was C.S Lewis who once profoundly said, you don't have a soul, you are a soul, you have a body. We all know that our bodies will experience a physical death, but I suppose there is one thing worse than a physical death, and that is a meaningless life, a wasted life, a life that Christ knows not of. The train of thought naturally leads me to my next point: Meaning.

In this secular first world country that we live in, I have learnt that life can be categorized into in a handful of key words: education, recreation, work, family, assets. It was earlier this year that I found myself asking, what kind of footprints would I leave behind, should I not live to wake for another tomorrow. And I do suppose God hears our innermost thoughts because it was the very next day I received a message from a man at that point whom I had only met once, inviting me to go on a ministry trip with him to the Philippines, which I eventually did in very short notice. Someone had once said to me that we should all go for a yearly mission trip for an annual reality check. He was right. The trip couldn't have found itself at a better moment for God to give me reality check. I have learnt that the greatest satisfaction in life is found not in worldly pursuits, money, philosophy or even the deepest knowledge of theology. I have found that there is no greater meaning and satisfaction in this life than 
knowing that our every action and decision made are part of a greater economy of things, not the economy of this world but in God's economy. We can only find meaning in life by spending time with God, doing things for the creator, not the created. When true meaning has found its place in life, then the definition of victory and success becomes a very different thing. I am at this moment in the midst of wedding preparations, purchasing a new flat, preparing a two week honeymoon itinerary in Switzerland and deadLes to meet at work, all mixed with different degrees of complications, some reasonable, some unreasonable, some attainable, some short of a miracle. Despite my circumstances I still want to thank God for the manifold providence that He has provided thus far especially in area of finance and even the possibility of marriage itself. Details I shall leave for another time because the context of things require quite a bit of explanation. Through the past year of wedding preparations there's been many ups a
nd downs, but perhaps more downs than ups. I just want to close by sharing a few words from a little known evangelist from the 19th century that has encouraged me through these times. These are the words of FB Meyer.

We make a mistake in trying always to clear ourselves. We should be wiser to go straight on, humbly doing the next thing, and leaving God to vindicate us. There may come hours in our lives when we shall be misunderstood, slandered and falsely accused. At such times it is very difficult not to act on the policy of the men around us in the world. They at once appeal to law and force and public opinion. But the believer takes his case into a higher court and lays it before his God.

When you are neglected or snubbed or insulted, and you're able to thank God for the experience, accepting it as allowed by him for your spiritual development — that is victory.

When you're seeking to serve him faithfully and you find yourself criticized severely for the way you do it, and you accept the criticism patiently for his sake — that is victory.

When you are slandered and your motives are shelved and you do not complain but receive it in love and as a measure of the filLg up of that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ — that is victory.

Such a victory can only be won in the yielding of self to Christ. "Thanks be to God who causes me to triumph through our Lord Jesus Christ!"

It was Paul Washer who struck me a while ago with this. Christ is not just what all we need, Christ is all we have.