just minishorts.

You might have had these experiences before. But I wrote one yesterday, you know? The one about not-choosing to accept an invitation to a Church wedding?

I'll tell you two more, and you tell me what you think.

I have a friend, who's, well, I suppose you could call it 'devoutly' Taoist-Buddhist. Actually, she's quite the superstitious chick, and she's really into consulting mediums and all that. Now if you ask me, personally, I've got nothing against people who choose to pay money to go to a necromancer or someone with strong spiritual 'abilities' for life's advice. However, I personally think that's just playing with fire, because you never know what you'll invite, whether it's God's wrath, or whether it's the interest of an evil demonic being.

But never mind that, my friend, is like that, and she's into a magical fengshui branch kind of person. Every year, she does the usual rituals to cleanse herself, and also the other rituals required to 'change her luck', they call it 'gai-wan'. That sort of thing. Now I have to say that I respect her beliefs, and when she tells me that I should do things to 'improve my fortune', I usually say, 'Well, I don't feel comfortable doing all that, but thank you for the advise.'

That's my choice, and I was being honest with my response. Except, of course, she doesn't like my rejection very much. So well, we have a recurring argument and it gets quite funny, because my friend would automatically get on the offence.

'You hoh. Christian what lah. You think your God can do everything izzit?'
'Erm. Nothing to do with my religion lah. I just don't feel very comfortable with all the rituals and stuff.'
'What is this lah. Eh, some things you have to take into your own hands okay? You think your God will be there for you always meh? If you don't take the necessary steps to protect yourself, God also cannot save you.'
'Erm. Don't pull God into the picture can?'
'You everything also God, God lah. Did you know God spelt backwards is Dog? Eh, come back to earth can? Be NORMAL A BIT CAN?'
'Eh what's so abnormal about me? I just said I don't feel comfortable going to a medium. Don't talk like that will you?'
'You Christians, you're all the same. You always think we're pagans. That we worship Satan you want to say we go to hell and stuff.'
'Like what the… eh I never said that can?'
'Whatever lah. You don't say only, but your heart you think so.'
'Heh?'

And the argument goes on, and on, and on, and on… it never quite ends. And BEFORE Christians can bloody cry foul, I'll tell you another situation.

I've another friend who calls himself very devout. Now what happened to this person was, he went on a holiday to Bangkok just recently, and boy, did he have lots of stories to tell in our 'X'tian' circles.

'I tell you that Grand Palace is one freaky place.'
'Really?'
'For God's sake, those people at the tour agency, they ought to tell us that those places were all temples!'
'Erm, what's wrong with temples?'
'I don't know about the Thai lah. They're such a LOST country. The moment the plane lands, you see temples, temples, temples everywhere. No wonder they're struggling with all the problems. God is very griefed. You know? We went to the Grand Palace, and immediately when I got home, I felt terrible. Middle of the night, I could feel a creature creeping up on me… and I, well, I was terrified.'
'And.. and?'
'I even forgot about Jesus for a while because I was so petrified… but I focused, and I stared at the creature, it was dark you see… and I said out loud, "In the name of Jesus, I command you to go back from whereforth you came."… and the black shadow flew out of the window and disappeared like that.'
'Wow.'
'I just don't like Thailand very much now.'

And then his wife had to chip in. 'Its true, that night I couldn't sleep… I just couldn't stop feeling guilty and pained that I had griefed the Lord so much by visiting the Grand Palace. Fortunately, my hubby woke up and we prayed fervently. And I felt better immediately.'

'The problem with Thailand is they reject Jesus. Not only that, they set up so many things to worship Satan. It's so scary,' said the guy.

And his faithful wife, 'But one good thing came out of our holiday. We now understand the glory of the Lord so much better, and we know we need to sacrifice so much more to serve Him. So right now. We're planning to do some spiritual cleansing. Get rid of these things.. you know? All the stuff we bought from Thailand. I suspect those people did things to them. Put charms and all? You know?'

'OK. Well.'

'You should do the same too. I know your mom's still buddhist, but you might want to tell her to accept the Lord ASAP. You just need to get rid of that Kuanyin thingy in your house. You have to tell her the truth. And you know? If you have trouble doing it, we will help you.'

'We need to stay together in Christ, to battle the evil servants of Satan.'

'Right.'

Well. I told you I'm a lost cause.