Eyes wide open

Photo by  Mink Mingle  on  Unsplash In 2020, I listened to 955 artists. My top song, which is 8 minutes 15 seconds long (Josh Yeoh's Here in the Waiting ), was streamed 86 times, making for 709 minutes 30 seconds streaming this song alone, or nearly half a day. And that's just one song by one artist, out of the 955 others. A few weeks ago I came across the idea of studying songs  in the Bible, producing what we'd call a biblical theology of song . I hate how academic that sounds, because enjoying a song is usually a natural, fluid, emotional process. But I realised that by surveying songs in the Bible—asking why, and in what circumstances, they are sung—I learned a lot about how to appreciate a song. Songs have been sung from ancient times, for much richer purposes than solely entertainment.  #1 Expressing beliefs and emotions Songs in the Bible are sung to express beliefs and emotions in a way that prose can't. Some of the most well-known songs in the...

This year, like many other people, I couldn't go home for Christmas. It was my first Christmas away from home. The winter is also cold and snow-less where I am, which is the worst weather combination. I'm thankful though that a family at church invited me over to have lunch with their family on Christmas Day.  Experiencing this rather sombre Christmas, coming at the end of an awful year that still hasn't ceased to be awful, I've got to peel away the candy wrapper of my childhood Christmasses and notice how little of the night of Jesus's birth matched the tinseled festivities we've grown familiar with.  There was a lot of pain beyond Mary's labour that night long ago, which even marshmallows in hot chocolate would not have remedied. This variance between the darkness of that night and the joy it still rightly inspires, gives Christmas a deep, meaningful glow that we've had the opportunity to reclaim this year.  The first Christmas was away from home I...

(Expanded from my eulogy at his funeral—celebrating the life of David Ho Lim Cheng and his return to his Maker)  My yea yea was nothing short of an excellent man. He was defined by a few unchanging values. Some of those values were all-important: for example, that all of life is lived to God's glory, that you use your might not to serve your own interests but to serve God and others, and finally,  that you never stop serving, not even in old age.  These were the values that yea yea held to strongly, and it determined how he spent his days.  There were also those values that yea yea held to quite strongly but which were perhaps less serious: for example, you never give up an opportunity to eat oh chien , however many there are in front of you, you always bring your granddaughters to KFC when your son drops them off at your house, and, as became evident in the last few weeks, you never decline tau fu fah , not even if you are semi-conscious and bedridden. Yea yea lived...

I was recalling some things I read in C.S. Lewis's autobiography Surprised by Joy  (an excellent read). I came across his account of journeying with literature while exploring religion, and he wrote about a curious distinction between the more religious and less religious writers. I'm not sure how strongly people would agree with his observation, but in any case, that was his personal experience in figuring out what he thought of Christianity. One thing I think is for sure though, is that his observation probably doesn't hold up for art in the past few decades.  Here is what he said:  “All the books were beginning to turn against me. Indeed, I must have been blind as a bat not to have seen it long before, the ludicrous contradiction between my theory of life and my actual experiences as a reader. George MacDonald had done more to me than any other writer; of course it was a pity that he had that bee in his bonnet about Christianity. He was good in spite of it. Chesterton ...

Been away for a while because of revision and other commitments! I half-knew I wouldn't keep up the Stay-At-Home posts with any regularity. But hopefully this week I'll find some time to continue more regularly! Staying at home has been good and comfortable, thankfully! Since my last post I've submitted my dissertation, which is such a relief.  I'm writing today because I'm just so excited to share from John 14, a chapter of John's account of Jesus's life, which I read again today. How timely is Jesus's repeated words, “ Do not let your hearts be troubled. ” Without further ado, diiiveee innn if you'd like to know more about this chapter, even if you've never read the Bible before! You can read the chapter itself here . John 14 begins with Jesus’ words: “Do not let your hearts be troubled.” Near the end of the chapter, Jesus says again, “Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” In the shaky world we live in, wracked with...

Taylor Swift’s song Lover is one of the most beautiful pop songs I’ve ever heard. It’s a picture of two people who know each other, dance the evenings away, sit quietly and share secret moments that only they understand. This bond, lived out in the pastel-coloured rooms of their house, are the images of love we know now. “This is our place, we make the rules. … Have I known you twenty seconds or twenty years? … This is our place, we make the call. … I’ve loved you three summers now, honey, but I want ‘em all.” Love is now familiarly known as this bond. However it came about, whatever the two do together, and whatever one has done for the other, this bond—lifelong and rich—is love. But as I waded through childhood, teenage life, and then bumbled into adulthood, I was disappointed again and again by this framing of love. I’d had my share of seeking that feeling at the end of a 90s rom-com. A bit more soberly, I'd had my share in high school of longing for someone who would unde...

Current situation: In my room, as usual, just got back from Sainsbury's Eddington; happy to see that people have stopped hoarding I’ve been chugging along with my dissertation, which is due in about a month’s time. I’m more than halfway through, which is great, but I expect I’ll have to leave lots of time after I complete my draft for editing, because my writing process looks like: wing it, edit later . I’ve gotten more used to being at home all day though—found two excellent Netflix documentaries ( Inside Bill’s Brain: Decoding Bill Gates ; Pandemic ) and have been having good laughs watching Friends . My brain has been quite worn out at the end of each day because of mind-bending discrimination law arguments I’ve been trying to untangle and express in my dissertation, and so I haven’t written any more stay-at-home blog posts since my #2. But I decided to start again today.  For the next few posts I’ve decided to write about particularly vulnerable people this Covid–19 sea...