The Real "What if...?"

I was walking back to the office after lunch the other day, and I caught myself thinking - what if? 

What if I had never left my first job with the civil service? I remember I was balancing an offer to further my studies overseas (which would have meant staying with the civil service) against taking a job outside. I took the job. Could I have missed out on a better career staying where I was? 

Later on, I was working in a bank, and had done well enough to get a nice promotion to a regional role. I remember I was balancing staying on with this nice title, versus going to my current employer in a smaller role. I took the smaller role. Could I have missed out on a better career by staying?

Several years ago, I was sent to an overseas executive management course. For a couple of months, I was surrounded by CEOs and CEOs-to-be. The executive coach asked each of us in our individual coaching sessions - what next steps do you want to take, so you can be CEO? Now, I am humble and realistic enough to know - I have neither the inclination nor capability to be CEO! Still, what if I had decided otherwise and thrown myself into that pursuit? Could I have missed out here too?

I've now been with my present employer for many years. Could I have missed out on a better career by moving on, jumping from one job to another?

As I entertained all these questions of "could I have missed out on a better career" as they ambled through my mind, one bright ray shone through the fog. 

The really important questions are not "could I have been more important, more successful, more wealthy"?

The really important questions are: 

"Did I miss out on sharing the gospel with even one person by leaving/staying?"; and 

"Did I miss out on serving God in a more impactful way?"

These are the only things that actually matter in the end. They bring deep joy, unshakeable peace, and enduring value. I don't want to live my life, tearing through it at a 100 miles an hour, only to discover I've been furiously digging for answers to the wrong questions!

Dr William Wan, secretary-general of the Singapore Kindness Movement, recently wrote about something he read, by a 65-year-old who said "At this age, you'll realise life actually has no meaning... You wake up, go to work, get yelled at by your boss and tolerate colleagues, earn enough to pay bills and support your family, and once or twice a year, you go overseas for a short burst of happiness... And when you reach 65, it's too late, your entire life just went by and you missed it".

Dr Wan went on to write "So by all means, see the Pyramids of Giza, climb the Eiffel, walk the Great Wall or gaze over the Grand Canyon. But take a step further: What do you feel after that is done? What do you think of in the still of the night, when things grow quiet and thoughts turn inward? Action without introspection is a breathless journey that leaves you empty and unfulfilled. It is important not just to do, but to know what you're doing it for".

I have a friend who runs a school in Batam, out of a mostly abandoned block of old shopfronts. She has given her whole life to that school, and the children, and the villagers who live nearby. She lives from day to day, dependent on meager school fees, if they get paid at all, and the ad hoc generosity of a few people who support her work. 

She faces discouragement and opposition, often from the very people she is serving. She faces health issues just like the rest of us, except with less money. She daily bears the burden of leading not just the students, but their parents, and the school teachers.

When I last met her a month ago, I asked her, you have so many hopes for your school and your students and teachers. What about your own hopes and dreams? 

She thought for a moment, and then replied, with a tear in her eye, and a smile on her face, you know the song that goes "All my life, He has been faithful. All my life, He has been so so good?" Yes, it's like that!

My friend has far less comfort and lives in far greater uncertainty and danger. But she knows, and is able to confidently declare. All her life, He has been faithful. All her life, He has been so so good. 

How does she know? Because she has pursued the answers to the questions which really matter. 

"Am I sharing the gospel with even one person by leaving/staying?"  

"Am I serving God in the most impactful way?"

What about me? Do I have the same confidence in declaring that all my life has been so so good? O God, teach me to re-orient my life, and my thoughts, so that I'll always keep the right questions in mind as I live each day and make each decision of my life, big or small. I don't want to look back, tired out from my exertions over the wasted years, and realise that true life has passed me by.

Late last year, my daughter invited a friend to join us for our regular bread distribution work at the rental flats. We don't do this work with any charity organisation, so when I say "bread distribution" I don't mean a massive exercise to feed hundreds. Each of us just goes to a few homes, and spends quality time with our friends. The bread was just to open doors many years ago. Today, the doors are already open!

I remember it happened to be near Christmas time, so we brought some Christmas presents (a very nice box of fruits!) for our friends there, and just sat in their homes, played some Christmas-themed quizzes with prizes, laughed, caught up on their lives, and prayed for their needs.

After the evening was done, my wife asked my daughter how her friend found the experience. My daughter thought for a bit, and said, "It was really good for my friend to see. Daddy is such a man of God".

My heart was so full.

Just to set things straight - my daughter knows me well, so she knows all my faults: my selfishness, my temper and my meanness. I know myself that I have many many flaws. So when my daughter said what she said, I don't think she meant that I am great. I'm really not, and she knows that! 

I think all she has seen, is a person who God has used, despite all my messes. And that is just amazingly good. More good than I could have conjured with all my straining and effort.  

I wish that everyone I knew would experience this wonderful truth for themselves, just as I have! God can do that for anyone. Just as long as we say, "Speak Lord, Your servant is listening" (1 Sam 3). "Here I am Lord, send me." (Isa 6:8). We may have unclean and clumsy hands and lips, but He can make them clean and capable.

What if? 

What if we choose to today to say those words and let God move?

It. Will. Be. So so good! :)


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