90,000 Christians to fast and pray

About 90,000 Christians from 500 churches nationwide will be participating in this year’s 40-Day Fast and Pray Rally. Themed “Turn to Our Father in Heaven”, it is a call for all Christians to remember to turn to the Lord in an age where evil and violence seem to be norm of society – The Star

Finally received the prayer booklet on Sunday. The fast is going to be from the 22nd of July till the 30th of August. Since a week back, I’ve have been thinking about how I should fast this year. Two years ago, it was a ‘non-meat’ fast; last year it was a ‘skip breakfast and lunch’ fast; so based on the progressive trend, this year should be a full fast, right”?

Well…

After fasting for a couple of occasions this year, somehow the idea of fasting from food doesn’t quite cause me to yearn for it as much anymore *like, not challenging ar*. Furthermore, with this, it was difficult to really commit to the purpose of fasting whole-heartedly. At the back of my head, the statement “Kill two birds with one stone” keeps popping up every now and then. I keep on thinking, 'The call to fast is so timely, can lose weight at the same time'. *ARGGGGHHHH!!!*. So how?

*open up prayer booklet*

Fasting brings a sacrificial dimension to prayer. Biblical fasting is most often the abstaining from food for a spiritual purpose; and there are various ways to fast. Some people also fast from non-food items.

• Partial food fast refers to giving up either a meal or two or a type of food over a period of time
• Full food fast refers to giving up all food except water and/or juices over a period of time
• Absolute food fast is refraining from both food and drink, but should only be done for 3 days
• Non food fasts include giving up something (for e.g. television) that interferes with your spiritual life

Hmm...

Did some serious soul-searching after the sermon on Sunday and after reading a friend's entry - Addictions. The question lead to two conclusions - for me, more difficult than abstaining from food is (1) to abstain from television (2) to abstain from manga and anime *brrr.. sooooo scary*.

Little by little the TV has slowly took a foothold and I realize now that I’m addicted to serials (TVB or Korean) and reality shows. It causes my daily timetable to revolve around the show times of these programs and at the end of the day, does absolutely NOTHING to my brain after the idiot box is turned off. So, no more TV serials and reality shows for forty days. Instead now in replacement, I'll go out with some friends; or go to the gym; or go home, do some reading and some praying *nods*.

Ditto goes to manga and anime. Being in between projects and back at the main office at the moment, I really should focus on expanding the knowledge of my field instead of downloading all these stuff to pass my time. So, will resist downloading and work on getting the standard SAP template up. Err... I had a plan to document down standard SAP configurations so it can be used as a Blueprint template for projects to come. Then my clients can select which ones they want to retain and add whatever they want to add *sorry, thoughts side-tracked a bit*.

So, for 40 days I’m going to give up TV serials, reality shows, manga and anime cause it’ll distract me from prayer and spiritual pursuits. Lord, give me strength *sigh*. Hey... don't judge, k? Maybe to some of you, it might be a piece of cake to abstain from these items. But, it's gonna be really tough for meeeeeeee....