On My First Visit to Church Service

I went for church service for the first time in my life today, at the Evangel Family Church near my place, at the kind invitation of Adela. She's a real kind soul, so God please bless her. More on why later.

Today's sermon was about generational blessings. Here's a short summary (ok how I summarize it won't be as powerful): The pastor got his message from Genesis, where God told Isaac not to go down to Egypt, as he had promised Abraham's descendants prosperity, and because Abraham kept the covenant with God, God will keep His covenant with Abraham. And therefore God made Isaac prosperous when Isaac sowed his seed and worked hard. In the same way, we are all blessed because of our parents, be it spiritual or physical parents, so we must honour our parents. This served as a good reminder for me to be good to my folks, but it also served up a dilemma.

Then we went onto the topic of not taking the easy way out. While there was a famine, God told Isaac not to go down to Egypt (which represented a quick fix) but instead stay on the land of his father Abraham, and Isaac kept to it. In the same way, in life we are tempted by a lot of easy ways out, and will be tempted to stray from doing what is right in order to make life a bit easier. But we should not, and I agree that it must be so.

Sort of ties in with what Jeremy was saying yesterday (read my previous post). So I was very happy that I learned a lot of wise knowledge from attending church service today.

After chatting wth Adela after church service and lunch, she told me that she had prayed for her close friends in Primary School (including me) by name every night since Primary School, I was very touched. I knew her well since P4, which means that she has been very kindly praying for me the last 13 years! A real kind soul made of gold really.

So I spent the rest of the day in a dilemma. Because I have not told my parents I've been attending CF bible studies all summer, because I did not tell them about my visit to the Church today, because I did not tell them how much I've learnt from studying the bible, and that I'm trying to be a better person all the time. Because I know that as Buddhists they will be disappointed or even angry that I went for CF and to Church, because they are extremely sensitive to it. I don't think it is anything to be ashamed of really, but in order not to upset my parents I am made to behave in a manner which seems like I am ashamed of it. There's just so many things in my head at the moment, and the people I want to share these with are all so busy with their own work. I paced around Century Square after tuition this afternoon waiting for an sms "how did your first day at church go?", but none came.

And so the rest of the day passed when I realized I do not have a friend who cares enough to remember me when they are busy...

Back to depression.