Lent and Easter 2011

Happy Easter 2011 :D

This is another memorable and meaningful Lent and Easter for me and that's why I would like to jot it down as a good reflection for me in the future. The season did not start very good for me actually. I skipped Ash Wednesday (which by right marks the beginning of Lent) :p Can't remember whether it was due to FYP, CA, or I was just simply lazy :p Anyway, no excuse is good enough for me to skip church anyway LOL. But still, not long after that, I skipped one Lenten Sunday Mass. Gosh! Haha... I skipped the Palm Sunday to because I was on holiday at home. Penitential Service for my parish fell on my birthday and of course I skipped it again. Haha.. It was raining that night and I was caught in the rain after having dinner. But even though it did not rain, I think I would not go also :p And due to exam, this is the first time that I did not attend Easter Vigil Mass. That means it was my first time attending Easter Sunday Mass. Lol.. Oh ya, there was no Stations of the Cross too at the Good Friday service which I attended.

Well this Lent was meaningful for me because the abstinence really helped me to fix my life. I realised how fat I am and the main reason was due to uncontrolled eating. Thus for Lent, I gave up all those junkies: no potato chips, no bubble tea, no Coffee Bean/Starbucks/Spinelli, and no fattening fried chicken from the canteen. On the second week, I felt that I gave up too many things and wanna pick just one instead. Thank God I managed to complete the whole abstinence for the whole season. Yay!! I just hope this can last as long as possible :D Since now is exam season, the temptation for drinking coffee to keep me awake and read notes is too huge! Lol. I hope I can resist it. To be honest I was sort of "addicted" to those 4 things.. Previously I could have them to as frequent as once a week.. That explains my ballooning stomach and acne flares.

So as a result, my face is much smoother (read: acne-free now). Haha.. About whether I slim down or not, I guess stopping those junk only help to prevent further gain of weight.. To lose those which had been put on, I need to do something about it XD And as a bonus, I could not access Restaurant City from home. So now I decide to quit playing it again. This is the 2nd time quitting so I guess I won't be hooked back anymore. Lol.. Just nice to give up a game. Can focus more on the study.

Moving on to a take home message from the Good Friday homily. I always think that when Jesus said "It is finished" before His death, it meant that he had finally finished his mission on this earth. But based on the real language in which the Bible was written, the word that Jesus mentioned meant "(Debt) fully paid". To me, this is a more powerful message since it signified that when He died, He fully paid/redeemed mankind from sin and death, which means He died to save me (and you), not merely to mark the completion of his mission. And it could be linked to a parable of the servant whose debt was pardoned by the master but he did not pardon another person who was indebted to him much less. Basically debt=sin.

That touched me because currently I had an issue with a seller in eBay. I am tempted to take a revenge :( But again, the Good Friday reminded me something more important than a few dollars. Oh gosh.. Will I succumb this time =x

Lastly I received this sms:

There's NO oil if olives are not SQUEEZED

There's NO wine if grapes are not PRESSED

There's NO perfume if flowers are not CRUSHED

So when there's PRESSURE in your life, GOD"s just bringing out the BEST in YOU.

As good as the thing means, I would actually argue: what happened to the olives, grapes, and the flowers then? They are destroyed right?

But another part of me would add another line:

There's NO salvation if Jesus was not CRUCIFIED

So yeah, thank God for this blessed and meaningful Easter. May yours be blessed and meaningful too :D