A Strange Way to Communicate

This evening, I attended the year-end Thanksgiving Service at my church. I was still feeling sour & depressed since the start of this day, largely because I just felt so broke, so aimless, so useless & so helpless at home.

These 4 months of being unemployed has been taking its toil on me, in all aspects of my life – physically, emotionally, mentally & spiritually. Right up till the point that I can’t even explain what in the world is happening to & inside of me! I have reached the point where the term ‘stress’ isn’t a big inflicting word to me.

Of course, a huge part of what I’m feeling is due to the stress of being without a job & living day after day through the consequences of being without one. Yet I feel that I have somehow passed beyond the stage of feeling just stressed… & stepped into the realm of depression or psychological & emotional breakdown.

If what I guessed about myself is right, I’m still glad & thankful that I’m still able to think right & make sense of whatever I do each & every day… even though my mind just silently screams out in agony, every once in awhile. I have been doing whatever I can to distract myself from focusing on these thoughts, but sometimes, there’s just no escaping it.

Being the human that I am, much of my hope has been lost & there’s nobody that I know who could really identify with my silent cries of hurt, pain & suffering. Believe me, it can be quite a traumatic experience, especially since this is my first time going through this. It’s not just the struggles of finding a job, but the struggles of coming to terms with the traumatic experience of how I was thrown out from my previous company. I just feel so ‘stained’ from the experience & that was also a first-time & first-hand experience for me.

As the months went on, my hurts & agony increased with each passing day… & it’s really scary to see how week after week can just pass like that. It’s like my life is passing me by & I’m stuck where I am, not knowing how to move on. And now with my Dad’s recent termination of his short-term employment contract, as the eldest son in the family, I’m really at a lost of what to do & how to hold on. My Mum feels so pressurized coz she’s the only one supporting my whole family & whenever I think about the condominium that I’m living in, I sometimes get uptight & unhappy about the monthly maintenance fees that my family has to pay.

I’m really in need for someone to just step into my life & show the path out of this ‘tunnel of darkness’ & towards the warm, welcoming ‘light’. But there is no one who is able to pull me out of this stinking & ‘sinking quicksand’. I have prayed, cried, done my regular QT, gone to church, serve in Youth Ministry & even helped needy people when I’m also in need to employment & financial assistance. I have tried many ways to spend whatever little money that I grudgingly accept from my parents, in terms of meals & transport, as well as highly restricting my amount spent on entertainment (i.e. movies, VCD rental & computer games).

Just short of having stopped giving my monthly church tiding (as I struggle to meet my daily basic needs with those few ten dollar notes that I have), I have really been doing whatever I can to help myself, as I keep in search of God’s next pre-planned job for me. But to no avail… & I don’t seem to be able to hear from God either. So here I am… everyday crying out in my heart for Him to help me out of this situation & to the job that He has planned for me… Just clinging onto whatever bit of hope that remains in my life-form, as I earnestly try to wrestle free from the depths of this dark ‘dungeon’ that I’m ‘locked up’ in.

With all these being a brief summary of what I’m going through… & these being just my words in a desperate attempt to jot down this bad time that I’m going through… believe me, the actual agony that is tearing up inside… is really quite difficult to accurately describe.

Needless to say, of course my mood at church this evening was screwed-up too. I’m not sure if my expression said anything to those who looked & spoke with me, but I was definitely feeling very grudging about my current situation & at several instances, just wrestling to keep my emotions & words in check, to prevent an angry & frustrated outburst.

My psychological state has progressed till the point that today my mind finally gave in & I began to doubt whether God is even listening, caring about all my pain & struggles & most importantly, whether He even intends to stretch in His hand to help me…

It’s really strange how God works in my life. He very seldom gives me answers straightaway & sometimes I just feel so left alone to fend for myself. At least that’s honesty how I feel at times. But tonight reinforced how God occasionally uses the people around me to speak to me. And the even stranger thing is that these people don’t necessary need to speak to me! Just by noticing them or having some bit of knowledge about them & their situation, God just pricks my heart about something that He probably wants to open my eyes to see.

This is how it happened –

As Rebecca & I approached the church sanctuary entrance, we saw Uncle Eddie serving as an usher at the door & giving out a piece of paper to everyone. He was the only usher & it kind-of surprised me, coz I haven’t seen him serve as an usher before in church. Somehow my gaze was just fixed on Uncle Eddie as we moved one by one into the sanctuary, after receiving a piece of paper from him.

It’s strange, but Uncle Eddie holds a special place in my heart. In fact, sometimes I still wonder how both of us even met & got to know each other.

It happened last year, when I was looking for a job after graduation & I had really no idea what kind of job I’m searching for… & NIE had rejected my application several times after several attempts.

Somehow one day, I got a chance to speak with Pastor Bess & I briefly shared about this issue of mine. She immediately recommended me to talk to Uncle Eddie, coz he previously used to organize this career planning workshop for any interested church members.

At that time, I didn’t know who Uncle Eddie is & who he even looks like. I can’t recall whether it was via e-mail or SMS, but finally I had arranged an appointment to meet with Uncle Eddie.

The venue to meet was at his office – Workforce Development Agency (WDA). I met him at about 6pm that day & we had a casual ‘get-to-know’ session at his company boardroom. The subsequent meet up, it was at the Cheers café, below his office block.

What’s interesting about Uncle Eddie’s method of career counseling is that he gives the participant a lot of ‘homework’ to do! I remember that there was once when I had like 6 or 7 MS Word documents to type my responses & I took very long to do them. But nonetheless, it was a fruitful time to exploring & discovering about myself. It’s just strange that I had several ambitions as I grew up, but in the end, I ended up with a business degree, which put me in a perplex situation of what kind of jobs this degree would ‘open doors’ for me.

This career counseling program ended abruptly after a few sessions, coz I found a temp job at StarHub & both of us were very busy at work. But despite this program being called off by underlying mutual realization & agreement, I have not forgotten about my experience when interacting & learning from Uncle Eddie.

Uncle Eddie is a very unique person. A man in his 40s, with a wife & two kids (I think), he is still a very dedicated man when it comes to serving the Lord. Furthermore, he has been suffering from leukemia (blood disorder) for many years, with the need to go for regular chemotherapy (at that time) & the doctors couldn’t tell him how long he could live.

I really cannot imagine how it would be like, if I was the one going through such a grueling trial & suffering, but that is precisely why I just hold a silent admiration towards Uncle Eddie. With his medical illness, hectic working schedule, regular chemotherapy, spending time with his wife & kids, managing family issues & struggling with the uncertainty of his life span, he still takes time & JOY to serve in church in whatever ways that he can.

This willingness to come along a total stranger & what’s more half his age, to help me out… is a very classic example of his dedication to make a difference in the lives of others that God places in his life. Some of us would probably just help a blind man across the road, or maybe even to his destination & that’s it. And there are some who won’t even want to be near these disabled or old people.

Uncle Eddie, on the other hand, is committing to several sessions (I think he had planned for 7 sessions to complete this career guidance program) with a total stranger! And these sessions are like 2 - 3 weeks apart, so we are talking about several months of commitment with someone whom he doesn’t even know!

Let’s not forget that he’s medically unwell, needs to go for the hospital regularly & has a whole family to support & look after at the same time. In addition, I’m sure that there might be some side-effects of the use of medicinal drugs &/or chemotherapy.

You’ve really got to believe me - I have never seen a man so full with joy & with such a loud hearty laughter! He’s in the midst of such agonizing ordeals in his life, for years on end… & he’s still finds such joy serving & helping others!

There was a period of time, when Uncle Eddie took the time & effort to leave his home very early each Sunday morning, to travel by public transport all the way to a friend’s house (at the far end of Singapore) & bring him to attend church! Sunday after Sunday, he would do that. Such a sincere person with a giving heart! Let’s not forget that he has a wife & kids… whether they tag along with him, or they go to church by themselves.

I don’t think many knew about this till one Sunday, when Pastor Keith shared this heart-warming news & encouragement to the church congregation. I still remembered that my heart just felt so warm & encouraged by his sincere & dedicated spirit. And most importantly… coz he did that for me too… =)

So that’s why, when I saw him standing at the door of the sanctuary, serving as the only usher for this year-end Thanksgiving Service, I felt my thoughts & emotions stirring within me. In fact, whenever I see him around on church on Sundays, I would remember what he has done for me.

Perhaps this was a confirmation about God’s prompting to me, coz when Rebecca & I sat down inside the sanctuary with her mother, I turned to my left sometime later to realize that Uncle Eddie & family are seated just one or two seats away from me!

In my mind, I was thinking – “Wow… God… What are You trying to tell me?” Then I realized that God was trying to tell me –

(1) Isn’t it easy to be happy & serve cheerfully when things are going well for you? Where do I come in? Where is your need for Me?

(2) If a Christian is happy & living his life happily, coz everything is going well & smoothly for him, than what difference is there between him & a non-Christian?

(3) Which would impact non-Christians the most, a Christian who is happy when all things are well, or a Christian who continues to be joyful in the Lord when things are not going well?

These thoughts just bombarded my mind over a few seconds & although this time I wasn’t looking at Uncle Eddie, the picture of him appeared in my mind - A very classic example of a person who remains joyful in the Lord, serving Him & shines forth his faith & joy to others around him.

I remember one of the things that he told me during one of my career counseling sessions. He told me that I have to learn how to be excited about my job! In short, not just in terms of my job, but I need to learn how to be excited about my life… & what I do! I think that is something that many people disregard or ignore.

And it dawned upon me, that more often than not, it is those who are going through a bad patch in life that really learn how to serve & live joyfully in the Lord. And I think that is what God wanted to tell me this evening…

In these 25 years of my life, I know & have come to experience some painful struggles… & sometimes it may be just human to think, “Aiyah… it’s so easy to just say such words… but actually living it out is a very thing.”

This is indeed a very, very true thought & emotion… but I guess that’s why God allows us to go through these trials, so that He can continually work in us… precisely so we can come out DIFFERENT. Praise the name of our God! =)