Perseverance Unlimited

Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday. What is YOUR plan for tomorrow?

What I know it is a day of fasting and abstinence from meat. A day of obligation. The start of Lenten season. Some people do 40-day fast in this season of preparation for Easter. What about YOU?

As for ME, I do plan to only have one full meal a day. Will it be heavy lunch but no dinner? Or should it be heavy breakfast, no lunch and moderate/light dinner? Perhaps the latter. I still have a day to consider my fasting/abstinence plan. Maybe I should follow my puppies' diet of rice and fish only. They seem happy eating that day-in day-out. I know that the road to happiness is to be contented with what we have. Enough is good and sufficient is grace from God.

Planning is great, as always. But will I be persevering in this 40-day plan of fasting/abstinence? How many times we plan great things, with full of desire and passion, but end up limping because of lack of perseverance? Today when I opened my copy of The Light (daily readings), it struck me that the Church is preparing God's people for the season of Lent which will start tomorrow.

"Blessed is anyone who perseveres when trials come. Such a person is of proven worth and will win the prize of life, the crown that the Lord has promised to those who love him."
~ James 1:12 ~

Indeed, it is also written some down the chapter that,

"Everyone is put to the test by being attracted and seduced by that person's own wrong desire."
~ James 1:14 ~

During Lenten season, we're still living our normal lives. The difference is this season is with the knowledge that we must remember the road that Jesus took in order to redeem us from our sins; in order to save us, He died the scandalous death. Are we going to just sit here and do nothing about it? Or instead, are we going to wait for His resurrection at Easter by dying daily to our sins and carry our daily crosses, yet remain joyful with trials and cling onto the Rock when tempted to go astray? We can be easily tempted because of our own desire. Sometimes, passion and desire can blind us.

James wrote that "by His own choice He gave birth to us by the message of truth so that we should be a sort of first-fruits of all His creations" (James 1:18) as the end of today's reading. God has given us, by His choice, His message of truth. As we are all children of the Father of all light, we receive His truth and hence should be the salt of the earth, light of the world (cf. Matthew 5:13, 14).

You can decide how you want to lead your life. Pray more? Pray less? Your decision.

May the grace and love of God be with you all on the 3rd day of CNY. May perseverance in prayers be your strength when in darkness and may the light of Jesus be the direction of your lives.

God bless!

Puppies vs. Fireworks

This picture is pretty self-explanatory, but I'd like to add an anecdote to it.

Instead of A puppy, currently I am dealing with FOUR puppies (Panda, Betsy, Baby Gal and Toodoo). Though born of stray mother, we had been looking after them in terms of food and play and shelter since last month. And I finally gotten the sole responsibility of ensuring they get enough of the minimum three criteria this week. Thank God they all are somehow toilet-trained naturally. Only poop and pee on soil/grassy ground.

In conjunction with Chinese New Year celebration, fireworks have been colouring the night sky since the day my housemates left for their respective hometowns. The puppies, I believe, had been enduring the crazily loud (as defined in the puppy's world) firecrackers and fireworks since CNY eve. I've been observing their behaviour since then, and noticed that they displayed fear and disorientation regularly when there is a release of fireworks into the night air.

As the current co-owner of the puppies, I'm highly concerned of their well-being. A search on Google brought me to a website about fear aggression in dog or puppy. Now, this part of the article explained why they all disappeared after breakfast this morning, causing me to fret over it the whole day as I had to go out for the whole day. When I arrived home just now, only Panda was at home, in some sort of fear though. I finally found the other three and their mother a few houses from mine.

Some puppy dogs react and get extremely frightened and panic at the sound of lightening, thunder, or fireworks and there is no real reason they should. Some cases will cause fear aggression in the dog. These types of fears have caused many dogs to even run away from their homes in panic and disoriented, and unfortunately in some cases some have even been hit by a car due to running out into the road, and others have had difficulty finding their way home etc.

Whereas this part of the article explains why I find my puppies retreating to under the car, and not responsive when I called after them at times, to the extend of backing off when I went near one of them, and running from home.

When a puppy is scared it becomes very evident in the way he begins to behave and the way he looks. Some puppies start walking form one side of the room to the other, looking for somewhere to hide and if there is an open door, some will run out without giving any warning to the owner.

Pray that either the firecrackers and fireworks will stop soon, or that my puppies will grow out of the fear.

P/S: I have no idea why I'm naming them what I named them (especially Baby Gal and Toodoo), except for Panda, which has two black patches over his eyes. Basically they are rarely responsive towards the name given though. By next week, all will leave home to their foster families. Shall snap some pics and upload them soon!