Wow... thank You Lord for Your faithfulness to me. :)

Actually, it's still not a very pleasant feeling, still, but looking at it through the eyes of Romans 8, that in all things You work for our good, it's actually very funny!

(Haha... think i'll be able to laugh about it in, say, a few decades later. :P)

'Cos this morning, when I prayed Lord, help me grow me in this area of not becoming frustrated, to be more self-controlled... in other words, to "do everything without arguing or complaining"... I knew You'd pop a surprise test on me, since that is usually how You work in Your ppl... You put them through tests.

And yes, I did get a test today. what happened today was that one of my colleagues asked me to send him some necessary data for some stuff. So I sent what I thought was enough. But my team leader, who was in the loop, scolded me privately via email that I needed to supply more data, and put it in the correct format.

So I apologised, and re-sent the data.

His first word in his reply: "Alamak..."

After that, he ended with, "Look... Get this done once and for all. Stop going through back and forth for these minor issues. It’s distracting and waste of time."

Felt quite... frustrated. With myself again. That i'd not met his expectations. And was starting to complain again to God about this...

And to make matters worse, as I tried to get the necessary data from my laptop, I accidentally spilt my cup of tea on my desk. Stunned...

Then a light dawned upon me.

Actually, God was answering my prayer this morning. And He was purposely putting me through this test to see how I would respond. Hee, thank God so much... to be honest, wanted to reply back to my team leader to explain... but this verse stopped me: "Do everything without arguing or complaining..."

As though my Lord were looking at me, with a raised eyebrow, and saying, "Mmm... remember what my Word says about this, my son?"

Whoa. Upon further thought, the fact is, I made a mistake, and it's my mistake... and he's stressed right now, and besides, this IS a very minor issue. And fact is, we all make mistakes from time to time despite our best efforts. So just learn from it and move on.

So in the end, just didn't reply or even complain... (I hope! :P) oh. wait. yeah, i was frustrated still, but didn't show it (i hope again!), until they all left the office for lunch, whereupon I threw my now-empty cup in frustration into the bin.

But! Now as I type this, I really want to thank God. 'cos this really must be a test from Him... and He will not test me beyond what I can bear... thank God so much that the tea spilt on the desk and NOT on my laptop (i really don't know what i would have done!), and that it was a very minor admin issue.

Hee! Thank God for this test... this reassures me a lot. So that's the first test... I hope I've passed it in His eyes... Tougher tests are to come, I know... but Jesus is faithful, the Bible tells me so! so i won't be afraid, i won't be dismayed, for Jesus cares for me! amen!

Ah. To be honest, I immediately hear many voices of other people telling me that you could have done this, done that, done better, and feel my spirit wilting, 'cos I feel condemned inside. But that's my natural tendency, to want to please as many people as possible.

Hmm. I'm still feeling confused. Find it hard to separate what I do from my inherent value as a person. But these words of a dear friend encourage me to find refuge in Him: "What a relief it is to know that when there are times you can't be all that the world wants you to be, but you can run to Him and throw yourself into His arms, just as you are."

Oh! Here's the actual words: "There are times when you just can't be the perfect person the world expects you to be, and it's just a sense of enormous relief, when you finally let go of the pretense you're struggling to put up, and bury yourself in His arms once again."

=) Different grammar, different arrangement... but same spirit I think. :)