It's The Thought That Matters

WARNING: Potentially long read. Only attempt to do so if you have at least 10 minutes of free time or so to read a product of an insufficiently-educated mind. Anyway, after almost a year-long hiatus or so, I'm finally back to contribute something that I've always wanted to talk about but never had much to say up until today as a result of attending a particularly "interesting" event. Now as most of you would know, I'm not really the most pious or devout Christian friend that you have or maybe even had and although I try to live by the teachings of Christ, I must admit with regret that I refuse to submit to the ways of Christ in countless occasions. In this I have no one else to blame except myself for the lack of faith and submission but let's leave that issue for another. What I wanted to talk about today is the matter of Christian leaders, please pardon the redundancy, especially those with immense influence and power. It should be known, though, that this also applies to leaders of all religions other than Christianity as the only reason why I chose to talk on the people of my belief is the simple fact that I've had first-hand experience with them although not exactly face-to-face kind of encounter per se. If you, my dear friend, have at least read a thing or two in the last 5 years, you would have heard of a certain influential and important Christian leader in Singapore who was involved in a fiasco of which he embezzled his own church's funds which was then paraded for the rest of his congregation to see, in the form of his wife's face. Or maybe some of you, my Christian friends who attend your own respective churches, may feel like the church's growth is being restricted by the reluctance of her leaders to accept the inevitable change. Mind the fact that I do not only mean pastors, bishops or reverends. When the word "leader" is used in the church, it means a person which we all look up to as a role model regardless of age. Yesterday, I signed up for and attended a conference which I thought would prove to be useful later in my future profession, for those of you who still don't know I'm taking a nursing course, and was told that the conference would be conducted with elements of Christianity in it. Truth to be told, I was really excited to be around people of vast experience and knowledge who also shared the same belief as I do which explained why I immediately got onto the bandwagon without a moment's hesitation. All was well at the start of the event, worship was lively, people were shaking hands all over the place, food was good up to the point where a video presentation was aired on the screen. That's where my opinion of the whole thing went sideways.

Call me over-thinking, unreasonable or judgmental, I'm not really bothered as I still stand by my opinion. The video which was played for the audience to see gave me the impression that they were not giving honour where it is due, or rather they had the wrong priority. If someone so inexperienced or immature like me could have that impression, what about the seasoned veterans who were out there? I cannot see how it could go unnoticed unless their minds are losing their edge, please pardon the pun. Anyway, as the conference went on, I began to pick up other vibes that the visitors, sorry if I did not mention this earlier but there was a group of foreign Christians who came to present their cases, were trying to imply that their leader did miracles in curing the local sick people there. It became so ridiculous to the point where one of them declared that Ebola was exterminated in Congo as a result of their leader's prayer. Look, please do not get me wrong. I'm not saying that prayer is useless or a hoax but to say that a virus which is so widely spread in that country could suddenly be eradicated with the prayers of a single man in the span of 10 days, I think it'll be much easier for me to convince Galileo that the world is indeed flat.

Hitherto, some or maybe even most of you may not have seen my point. What I'm trying to put out on the table here is how are people like this getting away with what they do. In my honest and humble opinion, I feel that no one in this world, except for God Himself, should be given access to unopposed power. Some of us read, most of us were told and everyone sees that power indeed corrupts. Let me remind you of a common occurrence in all our lives which we can definitely relate to. We were all students in school before and in all schools, class monitors, prefects and librarians were appointed. Some of us who are more privileged became part of the coveted prefectorial body. I do hope that you see where I am getting at now. I mean to say that people with power, tend to abuse them. It's already happening in children, what more adults? Ask yourself if you were a prefect or otherwise, your friend who was one. Who were the students who carried their illegal stuff to school and placed it in their prefects' room. As a matter of fact, even prefects who warned their friends when the next spot-check would be are considered to be abusing the power that was bestowed to them. Back to the original discussion, the same happens with leaders that have power beyond measure. They start having exorbitant demands which progressively becomes harder to meet to the point where if it's not fulfilled, he or she blasphemes that the demand was made in conjunction with God's will. Up till now, I have yet to see a statement in a Bible which calls for a temple of worship with the dimensions of the Chinese Bird Nest Stadium. Or what about the case of certain pastors in America, who have their private airfields and planes? Are they then any better than a politician whom we so widely ridicule? A much older and similar example of this would be the life of King Saul where he rose to the throne under God's approval and subsequently lost it because he was so drunk on his newly-acquired power and influence, he thought that it was God who needed him and not the other way around.

Another one of my two-cents would be that these leaders manage to do whatever they like because no one dared to question their motives. Those who do would have most likely been kicked out or even shunned by others belonging to the majority who are blinded by the pompous claims of miraculous deeds by their larger-than-life leader. What most of us, especially Asians, don't realise is that we tend to follow without questioning where we're going. This could be attributed to the way we were brought up while we were children which was to do whatever we were told no matter how questionable the instructions were. As a result, we carry this behaviour into adulthood and even up till today, a majority of us remain the same because we're afraid that by challenging the authority, we would be burdened by the responsibility of having it which we always assume that we're never ready for. Please do not misunderstand what I'm saying here. I'm not implying that we must pounce at every opportunity to challenge our elders but rather to implore that we take a minute or so to process what we're told to do or believe. Faith without reason is fanaticism and the perfect example of a fanatic is none other than Herr Hitler himself.

The last thing that I have on my mind is that we tend to forget that God works through us, not solely by the gifts we were given. We are so amazed by the extraordinary feats of the leaders we respect so much so we forget that it is only by God's grace and will that such miracles could happen. I shall try to explain this in the simplest way possible. As cliche as it sounds, we are only human and leaders are no different. Being human, we can never escape the reality of having flaws but in the case of being a leader, especially an influential and powerful one, pride becomes our fatal downfall. Pride, or ego as we call it, can never be satisfied. It continues to feed and grow so insidiously that by the time it presents itself, we're already too late. How will pride grow you ask? Put yourself in the shoes of a pastor whom God has blessed with the power of healing for example. After a few successful sessions of healing, even the most humble person will start to have a sliver of thought that he or she was chosen of such a benevolent task because of their own capability. When this happens, we begin to forget that the Lord giveth and the Lord also taketh away. Once again, we return to the example of King Saul. He thought that it was due to his own intelligence and strength that wars were won. Consequently, he was stripped of God's anointing and then thrown to the Amonites to be killed. I can only hope that we always keep in mind that we can only be successful because of His guidance and blessing. God gave us our skills so that we can serve in areas that were designated to us when the time is right.

In the end, all that has been said will only just be my opinions. It is up to you readers to think on what I've talked on and to separate what's right from wrong. I might have made some crucial mistakes in my explanations or examples and I hope that if that is true, you would correct me so that I too may learn. For now, I wish you all a nice and fruitful week ahead and may God continue to bless all of you as you live your lives.