Heaven

For morning devotion @ flag raising...

Dear colleagues and students,

I don’t know about you but when I go on holidays, no words can describe the excitement and joy that fills my heart, especially when I board the airplane and wait in eager anticipation to the moment I land in another country. More so, if I have never been to that country before, I will be imagining in my mind what it would be like and might even look up google images for some ideas of what to expect from that country I’m going to.

I flew from Amsterdam to Rome last year and there was a moment when I looked down from the window and saw a humongous stretch of white mountains. They were mountains covered with snow – Switzerland. I was completely awestruck and there was no words that could describe how my heart was filled with joy and excitement as I beheld the beauty of nature before my eyes for that good 5 to 10 minutes.

Perhaps, for those of you who have not yet had such experiences, you might be more able to relate to a moment when your parents nodded their heads in agreement to buy you the toy or the iphone you were longing so much to have. After months of proving you had been a good boy, after months of doing everything to please your parents, they finally saw that you “deserved” to get a reward. How happy you must have been! You probably could not wait for them to finally buy you your reward and lay your hands on your dream reward.

I guess with these human experiences that we have once experienced of excitement, joy, eager anticipation, forming expectations because of uncertainties, of happiness and longing, we can catch a glimpse of what Heaven is like. Beyond what our minds can ever imagine, and far beyond any human experiences we have and will ever have on this earth, in this lifetime, lies the joy and peace that is eternal, that lasts forever without end. There will be no more disappointment of having to take an airplane back to Singapore after an exhilarating holiday, preparing for the new school term. But as I have said, the joy and peace and excitement of Heaven is so great that there is nothing else on earth and in this lifetime that we can ever find, which can ever match up to this Heaven. Because it is when we have finally arrived in Heaven that we are forever in union with God, our Father and our Creator, who made us so that at the end of our lives, we may return to Him.

Yet, we know in our hearts the way to be humans, good human people. We know because our conscience is always at work (if we listen to it that is). To arrive at the unexplainable, indescribable joy and peace of the eternal life that awaits us in Heaven, we have to listen more to our conscience and let it guide our every thought, word and deed, everyday, choosing at all times to do good and to resist all temptations to do bad. If we do not guard ourselves and our hearts, then bad influences will seep into our hearts to stain it more and more. May we have the wisdom to choose always what is good and stand firm against what is bad.

God bless us all. 

24 August 2011, Wednesday

7.00am