035: Jesus Heals Rally - The Review

This one's been waiting awhile to get out. For context, read post 032: Healing from Heaven.

I was a little hesitant at first. This was after all my first "faith healing" experience. Now lest you think I'm a greenhorn in matters of the spiritual realm, let me just say I'm quite well versed in the mumbo-jumbo hocus-pocus what-have-yous! Now I've seen Trances, been to Bomohs and Pawangs, witnessed Seances up close and personal. Heck, I've even seen an exorcism! But this whole thing was quite different.

JUST LIKE OLD TIMES
For one, when we got there close to 8pm, the place was bustling. Cars everywhere. People everywhere. The Old Ruby Cinema had come to life once again. It's like going to the movies! We walked in and at the main entrance, there were a bunch of folks just out there shaking hands and generally, just greeting the masses. The old refreshment booth had become some kind of info centre. Which is too bad, cos some popcorn woulda been a novelty at a gig like this!

Inside was a totally different ballgame altogether! Singing had begun and that was like some kinda mini concert. And they were pretty good too. And the whole proceeding was projected on the big screen, with lyrics no less! Anyway, I noticed one important thing - there were cute chicks in this joint! Now this is a surprise for me, simply for the fact that I have always had this mindset of the kind of people I would expect to see in a church. But no, the crowd came from all walks of life, young and old, trendy and nerdy, and so on. And of course there were some sickly people. I even spotted a few in wheelchairs. This was, after all a healing rally.

The singing went on for about 30 minutes and that time the things were starting to cook. People were really into it, singing and some even dancing. Then Pastor Jean Lim came out to speak. She started praying or something and soon she was calling out for people with asthma and other respiratory ailments. People went upfront in droves and praying. And then it happened! Textbook charismatic Christianity, right before my very eyes!

CHARISMATA
People were falling all over the hall as prayer were being said. It was weird. I had heard of this phenomenon and it's generally referred to as "falling under the Holy Spirit". The bible tells of how St. Paul (a.k.a. Saul) who had lived a life persecuting Christians, took an about-turn when Jesus paid him a visit. Now, this guy Paul had gone round killing and arresting Christians just cos he couldn't stand them. And then one day the spirit of Jesus came to him, fell him to the ground, made him temporarily blind and pretty much told him to stop his nonsense! Of course this experience changed him completely and St. Paul went on to become a central figure in the Christian faith.

Meanwhile, at DUMC, the atmosphere was feverish, to say the least. People were falling all over. Fortunately everybody was pretty helpful, catching the fallen and helping settle them on to the ground. Then Jean Lim came down from the stage and started praying, touching people on the foreheads and more people fell. Her hands were shaking as though she had no control over them. Others around me were going ballistic with their prayers, spewing all kinds of giberish! This was what the bible refers to as "speaking in tongues".Charismata happening right before my very eyes! I had always been skeptical about this whole thing but you had to be there to see it for yourself! The first thought that came to mind; maybe these people were faking it, but then I thought to myself, "Why on earth would they do that?". I was hoping to see some stigmata (yes, like the movie) but alas, no such luck! That would have been cool.

TESTIMONIALS
Things calmed down a little after that. And Jean Lim began speaking. Some people came up on stage to give testimonies of their healings at previous such rallies. There was even a video show. People were talking about how they got healed from cancer. How their back pains and arthritis and gout mysteriously disappeared. How they almost died and them came back! Towards the end of the night things progressed pretty much the was it had gone - praying, falling, talking.

Somewhere in between, there was this little kid who went up front to give a testimony. I think she probably had some speech impedimence or something but she braved the crowd and went up to take the mike. I couldn't make out what she was saying cos it was quite noisy and disorienting. And she wasn't all that loud. But at that moment, I felt such a deep sorrow in my heart looking at her and yet felt really moved by her courage to want to go up onstage to give thanks to God! That was, to me faith-in-action!

All in all, it was quite an experience. Seeing all those people around me so fervent and so faithful, it almost made me believe that they could indeed find healing here. There was this infectious euphoria going round. I read somewhere that CS Lewis explains how joy is not to be mistaken for happiness or pleasure and at that moment I felt like these guys were experiencing joy!

THE QUESTION OF FAITH
Despite having been there, I now have more questions than ever before. Did people actually get healed? If they did, was it psychosomatic, mind-over-matter or was it truly Jesus' healing upon them? And what's with the falling? Were they faking it or were they pushed? Or were they so "into it" that just the lightest touch made them fall? And as for speaking in tongues, is it something subconscious and uncontrollable? Or can anyone speak it?

Some people have pointed out that Faith Healing can be a dangerous thing. What if you don't get healed? What does that do to your faith? Some folks think that faith healing gives false hope. But for those who actually find peace in the hope that they would be healed, then this hope is as real as it gets. In the end, I think whatever decision you take on your own healing, it's probably important that you don't regret that decision. A friend asked me, "If you needed chemothreapy for cancer and doctors give you only a slim chance that you would make it, would you take a chance with the doctors or would you take a chance with God?"

Well, I don't know God as much as I'd like to, but I do know that chemo can cause you so much pain that you wish you were dead.

a freudian spit generated @ 7:59 PM | |

 
034: Happy Deepavali

It occurred to me today that while I have quite a few Indian friends, I actually only know one who is Hindu. And the only other person I know who worships at Hindu Temples, celebrates Chinese New Year instead of Deepavali. Weird.

But Happy Deepavali all the same to all of you who are enjoying the day off as much as I am.

a freudian spit generated @ 1:15 AM | |

 
033: Live It Up

I logged on last Saturday, ready to give you my "reviews" on the Jesus Heals Rally. But I had wandered off to PPS instead and learned of the passing of Johan Ismail. Now, I did not know Johan and I had only begun to read his blog lately. But the news had a profound effect on me - partly because of Joe's youth (found out today that he's only a year older than I am) and also partly due to the abruptness of his death.

LIFE'S SHORT
It led me to ponder upon our mortality. If you think about it, we have very little control over our lives. Today you could have your whole future ahead of you, bright and shining. And yet, you could keel over and die the very next day. Whatever you may have achieved for yourself would be totally meaningless - your career, your wealth, your house, your collection of cars. It's all trivial, these material things! In the end, all that's left behind when you're gone is just a memory. And to those whom you leave behind, a memory is all they'll ever have to cherish. Unless you're filthy rich and you leave a big fat inheritance, but that's something else altogether.

That memory is important. It speaks volumes to me how I should live my life now. It tells me the kinds of memory I want to leave for my family, for my siblings, my wife, my children and my friends. When I'm dead and gone, I would like to be remembered as a filial son, a good brother, a loving husband and father, a loyal friend and an all-round nice guy! In essence, live well to die well.

IN MEMORIAM
It'll be pretty tragic when you're dead and all people can think about is how they'll trample on your grave while breaking out the champagne. Even worse, people could be coming up to your kids and telling them what an asshole their father was. And you siblings can't think of anything nice to say about you except that you made them look good in front of your parents!

I never knew Johan Ismail. But judging by the tributes that have been given him on PPS, I take it that he had indeed left a lasting impression on quite a few people. And for that reason alone, his life was not in vain.

LIVE A LITTLE
Over the last few days, I took time off this blog to live a little. To spend some time with family and friends. And to do all the little things that I sometimes take for granted - like dinners together, taking the day off for family, talking and listening...

We were never designed to live forever. Our time on earth is just a temporary stop-over. But we never have to go quietly into the night. Some people come into our lives like a falling star. Whoooosh* and it's all over. But damn! What a sight it was!!!

a freudian spit generated @ 9:27 PM | |

 
032: Healing from Heaven

I get the strangest emails, I swear! Here's something of interest, a faith-healing event.

JESUS HEALS RALLY
Come Receive Your Salvation, Healing & Miracle!
15 - 17th October 2003, Damansara Utama Methodist Church

As a child growing up in a small town, I remember hearing about miracle healings that took place whenever some Mat Salleh faith-healer was in town. And these guys were supposed to have been able to heal any sickness you might have. You know the drill; the deaf shall hear, the blind shall see and the lame shall walk again! And our neighbourhood would be abuzz with all kinds of talk. Aunties next door will go, "Yah, they heal you but after that you have to become a Christian!" Some were intrigued and some others were frightened by the prospect of having someone put his hands into your guts and pulling out a tumour!

MIND OVER MATTER?
But faith-healing is for real. There have been many documented cases of mysterious healing which science has yet to be able to explain. The medical fraternity is divided as to what actually happens when someone gets healed, miraculously. The skeptics attribute it to the "Placebo Effect" which basically explains that when the mind believes in the healing, the body gets healed! What the mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve.

On the other hand, some doctors are just stumped by the whole thing. Perhaps our own blogging doctors (or doctors-to-be) can shed some light on this one?

QUACK, QUACK, QUACK
Back in the 80s, another form of faith-healing was all the rage - Psychic Surgery. A lot of this happened in the Philippines where some faith healers performed open surgery on their patients with just their bare hands. These were shown on TV as well, whereby the doctors would just pull out all kinds of body parts from a patient! These were debunked, of course! Turns out that it was all just sleight-of-hands.

But here's something to think about: I remember one year a neighbour's niece had some sort of condition in her eyes which supposedly made her quite blind. She was not really pitch-black blind, but blind enough to be considered legally blind. Anyway, rumours had it that her family whisked her away to a healing rally in the local town hall, the priest put his hand over her eyes and tears streamed down her face. Then, lo and behold, she could see again!!! Weird! But then, just as mysteriously as she had been healed, one day the whole family just upped and left. And I never saw them again after that. I wondered if the neighbourhood drove them away with their suspicious whispers and back talk!! Maybe people then were afraid of such things.

IS IT BLIND FAITH?
Some people call it blind faith to believe that Jesus or any God for that matter can heal you. But the fact remains that some people DO ACTUALLY get healed. Well, looks like we have an opportunity to check it out for ourselves this Wednesday, Thursday and Friday at DUMC, which by the way, is nowhere near Damansara Utama! (Why on earth would you call yourself Damansara Utama Methodist Church, anyway??) I'm not sure if it's open to Christians only or if its opened to peoples of all beliefs - perhaps someone can clarify in the comments below. And by the way, if I see any blood or anybody's entrails being removed - I'm outta there faster than you can say "Jesus Heals"!

Found another link to click on. This one's about the Jesus Heals Rally.

a freudian spit generated @ 3:03 PM | |

 
031: Any Comments?

I've been thinking about changing my comment whatchamacallit thingamagic. Currently I'm on BackBlog which really sucks since I only get a 400 character maximum. Which means, you can't leave a long-ass comment without having to drop a series of comments.

On the other hand Haloscan, allows comments up to 3,000 characters. Which is really sweet if you had lots of stuff to say! :)

Being the tech-idiot that I am, I have no idea how to migrate to Haloscan without losing all the comments you have put down. Is there any way at all? Or do I have to manually cut and paste every single comment all over again? I'd really hate to lose any of your comments - some of them are real gems! Can anybody advise?

a freudian spit generated @ 1:03 PM | |

 
030: A Church in Your Living Room!

I think I receive some of the weirdest e-mails ever. This particular one was referred to me by someone who feels that I should go to church.

Anyways, the link leads you to the City Harvest Church in Singapore. You might ask, "so how the heck are you gonna haul your ass off to Singapore for the Sunday service?" Well, folks, this one really stumped me! Click on the website and you'll find a button on the right that says "Watch Live Services" which I assume, will allow us to actually witness the proceedings of the services, when they're actually on!

Astounding! I am so impressed and I can't wait till they come on. Are there any local churches this cool? I expect that some old-school religionists will probably frown on the good people at City Harvest Church. In any case I hope you don't. As far as I'm concerned, if God is indeed omnipresent, then he oughta be present on the internet as well! Anyway services are on:

Fridays - 8:00 pm
Saturdays - 4:30pm and 7:30pm,
Sundays - 10:00am, 1:00pm and 3:30pm.

So, it looks like I might go to church this weekend. And I can wear anything I like. Perhaps you'll join me too!

a freudian spit generated @ 7:28 PM | |

 
029: At My Funeral

Here's a song off of my playlist. One of my favourite tunes from one of my favourite bands, the Crash Test Dummies. In case you've never heard of them, they're the guys who did that crazy song, "Mmm mmm mmm mmm" back in the early 90s, when I was still a strappin' young lad in college. Yes, folks. I am old. And my days are numbered.

AT MY FUNERAL - Crash Test Dummies

I'm still young, but I know my days are numbered
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven and so on
But a time will come when these numbers have all ended
And all I've ever seen will be forgotten

Won't you come
To my funeral when my days are done
Life's not long
And so I hope when I am finally dead and gone
That you'll gather round when I am lowered into the ground

When my coffin is sealed and I'm safely 6 feet under
Perhaps my friends will see fit then to judge me
Oh when they pause to consider all my blunders
I hope they won't be too quick to begrudge me

Chorus

If I should die before I wake up
I pray that the Lord my soul will take but
My body, my body - that's your job

Well I can't be sure where I'm headed after death
To heaven, hell, or beyond to that Great Vast
But if I can I would like to meet my Maker
There's one or two things I'd sure like to ask

Chorus

Do you ever wonder what happens when you die? Where do you go, when you finally go? And will your friends and family grief? Or will they just be glad you're gone? Does your life on earth now effect another person so much that he or she will give a glowing eulogy of you when you're all dead and gone? Or do you just piss people off so much that they wanna piss on your grave?

A Christian friend once told me, "begin with the end in mind", supposedly from the bible** but I have no idea (Irene, perhaps you can point us there?) where. In any case, it's supposed to mean that there's something waiting in the afterlife. Good or bad depends on how we live our life now. Most people of religion believe that this life is temporal, sort of a cosmic stepping stone to get you to that Great Big Destination in the sky. Say what you like, whether you choose to believe it or not, you gotta admit that it does give you a flicker of hope. And perhaps, the anticipation of "finishing well" leads you to live well. Now, what's so wrong about that? Live well, I say! And love like there's no tomorrow.

That Brad Roberts is a funny guy. Plus, he's got a really weird baritone voice. Go here for a sample. Or better yet, buy the damn album. I promise it's fun!

**UPDATED 9:49am, 10 October 2003
I'm such a dope. "Begin With The End In Mind" is not from the bible - it's actually Habit No. 2 from Stephen Covey's 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. My mind is a convoluted mess. Forgive me people because to err is human, to forgive divine! :)

a freudian spit generated @ 2:40 PM | |

 
028: God Spoke

I received this in my email most recently. It's an advertising campaign for God. The concept is quite... erm... cute, for lack of a better word. Since I'm to damn lazy to do up some visuals, you'll just have to imagine them. These were stark white words posted on black billboards. No graphics, photos, nothing! They're supposed to be God speaking to us. Enjoy:

“Tell the kids I love them." - God
“Let's meet at My house Sunday before the game." - God
“C'mon over and bring the kids." - God
“What part of 'Thou Shalt Not...' didn't you understand?" - God
“We need to talk." - God
“Keep using my name in vain, I'll make rush hour longer." - God
“Loved the wedding, invite me to the marriage." - God
“That "Love Thy Neighbor" thing...I meant it." - God
“I love you and you and you and you and..." - God
“Will the road you're on get you to My place?" - God
“Follow Me." - God
“Big bang theory, you've got to be kidding." - God
“My way is the highway." - God
“Need directions?" - God
“You think it's hot here?" - God
“Have you read my #1 best seller? There will be a test." - God
“Do you have any idea where you're going?" - God
“Don't make Me come down there." - God

Anyways, the email says these appeared in a billboard in Arizona, but I recalled seeing these in Singapore and Hong Kong a coupla years back. In fact there was even a website, god.org or something but it doesn't seem to exist anymore. Too bad. The campaign was supposedly done by Ogilvy & Mather in Singapore and they won some awards for it, but there was something dubious about their win! Apparently, these guys swiped the idea off an existing campaign in US.

Anyways, this campaign was commissioned by a bunch of churches in Singapore - I suppose, to ask the brethren back to the church. These were everywhere, on billboards, postcards, magazines and even TV. But unfortunately it got banned. Spoilsports! But that's the way it is - if it's about God, chances are, it will be censored!

Anyway, here's a good one that I saw in Singapore:

“What do I have to do to get your attention? Take out an ad?" - God

I think God should be allowed to advertise. If we can advertise Cigarettes and Beer and Gaming, we ought to be able to advertise Religion - for that matter Lawyers and Doctors too!


a freudian spit generated @ 4:57 PM | |

 
027: It's About Time!

Aiz's blog on John Titor really got me going. If you never caught that blog, John Titor is supposedly a visitor from the future, a time-traveller, no less! And he basically came back in time, to our time, and started posting photos of his time-machine and operational manuals. Along the way, he also let's us in on what's to happen in the near future. Hooboy! But you gotta admit - all of this feels a little like that Kevin Spacey movie, K-Pax. Which, by the way is a really great movie although you might wanna get anal with me and tell me that the subject matter isn't quite the same!

IT'S ALL RELATIVE
Anyway, the concept of time-travel was pretty much devised by Albert Einstein. He didn't actually say it out right but his Special Theory of Relativity suggest the possibility of moving ahead of time. In a gist, ol' Fuzzy Hair explains that if we can travel and accellerate to the speed of light, time will slow down around us. Theoretically, this means we can travel into the future! Of course, this idea drives everybody wild and time-travel fiction was born.

And thanks to Einstein, our generation has been witnesses to some of the fun-est celluloid adventures ever - Terminator, Back to the Future, TimeCop, Minority Report, Twelve Monkeys, Time Machine, Quantum Leap, bla bla bla!

THE PARADOX
One of the most interesting concepts in the argument of time-travel is the paradoxes we face when we actually go back and forth in time. The Grandfather Paradox suggests that if you travel back in time, shoot your grandpa before he met your granny, then that single event of your gramp's murder would start a chain reaction causing your parents not to be born, thereby causing you not to exist. Now if you didn't exist, then you wouldn't have had the chance to travel back in time to shoot the old guy. Now here's where things start to go crazy. Consider this, if you didn't managed to get born, and you didn't go back to time - your gramps woulda met, had your dad who would eventually have you. And since you get born, you, being the butthead that you are, will inadvertantly go back in time to kill your gramps! Thereby causing an endless loop of events.

Other theories even suggest that if you went back to shoot your granddad, or kick him in the nuts so that your dad never gets born, you will fail. The gun will jam or something will go wrong. Deep stuff, this! In the movie Time Machine, Guy Pearce (great actor in a shitty movie) creates a time machine when his wife dies - so that he could go back in time to prevent her death. He ends up going back endlessly because she dies everytime, one way or another. It is then revealed to him that her death was the only reason he made the machine. No death, no machine. So she must die. So what is a man to do under such circumstances? Easy. Go to the future and screw some future-chick instead of wallowing in self-pity. Hahah!

BACK TO SEE JESUS
Some time back, I read about (not actually read) Michael Moorcock's novella "Behold the Man" which gives yet another explanation to the time-travel paradox. The protagonist is a guy named Karl Glogauer who's so impressed with Jesus that he goes back in time to meet the Messiah. However, when he gets there he finds Jesus far, far less than what he expected. He ends up assuming the identity of Jesus, living out the life of the Jesus he had read in the Bible. Ultimately, Karl get crucified and thus sealing the temporal loop of this paradox. Does anybody wanna donate this book for... erm... research?

Much as I like the idea of time-travel, I'm not convinced that it's possible. The consequences would be catastrophic. We'd erase our own existence, like it never happened. And for that reason alone, nature itself would prevent this. Or if you believe in God, then you'd believe that there's no way He'd ever put up with this shit. Still, it would be really cool if John Titor was for real. The things I'd do if I could go back!!!


a freudian spit generated @ 2:49 AM | |