the winner takes it all

This is the title of a very famous song from ABBA, but it had a rather sad context. But I am not really writing about that. I want to share a bit more about my observation from the exciting summer Olympics.

One thing that I notice is that some sports are judged based on points given by a panel of judges. It's not like soccer, swimming, hockey or 100m run where you kinda know who is winning. In sports like Diving and Gymnastics, how much points given to the athlete is really up to the judges and most of the time we have little idea of point system. So it gets really exciting on the very last round to wait for the judges to give the amount of points given on that last routine, which can determine who wins the competition. Sometimes it is expected, sometimes it is a surprise. Someone will burst out of joy, the other one in tears.

These are some examples:

Viktoria Komova:

This Russian girl was one of the favorites to get the gold medal for all-round women in Gymnastics (especially since the world champion Jordyn Wieber did not qualify to the last round). But she was barely by 0.259 points (see results) by Gabrielle Douglas from the United Stats (who became the first women from African descent to win gold on Gymnastics). That is such a small difference, and I remember seeing Gabrielle doing her last routine on the floor exercise (which was pretty good), and Viktoria was staring at the results screen to wait and see how much the judges will give to Gabrielle. When Viktoria saw that Gabrielle got just enough points to surpass her, she started crying on the shoulders of her coach. I really felt bad for her, and this set a tone for the rest of the Olympics for her as she was not able to gain any other individual medal.

Tania Cagnotto
She is an Italian diver (3m springboard) participating on her 4th Olympics. I didn't really know her at start since my attention was on the Chinese divers that are really beast. But she was performing quite well, and I had the sensation that she would get bronze (yeah, the gold and silver were pretty much for the Chinese girls).

On the very last dive, Tania needed a 76.80 to get the bronze, but unfortunately the judges only gave her 76.50 (see results) so she was not able to get her first medal and resigned to cry on her coach's shoulders.

Qin Kai

One of the Chinese male diver who was a favorite for the 3m springboard. The Chinese divers started a bit weak in comparison to the Russian Zakharov. But near the end, Qin Kai and Zakharov were fighting head to head for the gold. Qin had finished his last dive, and was leading and just waiting for Zakharov to not sure more than 90.30. But the Russian guy did a spectacular dive of 100+ points, and Qin was left crying in the little pool (see results).


Anyways, getting a silver medal is usually not that joyful. Our company just had a soccer tournament, and I was playing for the QA (Quality Assurance) team, and we played the final against HR (Human Resources). The game was tough and we tied 1-1, and in penal shootouts we lost =(, and it was kinda sad. I guess the fact that our team is so much younger, and that they have a couple of girls, make it even more sad.

But the fact that athlete cannot leave any margin for error when competing for a gold. Any mis-step will lead to losing, and for these two sports it is really up to the judges to decide. Imagine how tough it will be if our salvation depends on our performance, and that a little margin of error will exclude us from eternity with God. That will be so scary. It is up to us, then we will probably fail. But we have a gracious God who is full of mercy and has given us access to Him through Jesus Christ. Our failures do have a cost, the life of our Lord Jesus Christ. Once you're in Christ, you're part of the winning team.

On a separate note, there is this article that compares the focus of an Olympic athlete with how to live out our faith: http://theresurgence.com/2012/09/01/8-olympic-observations-on-training-and-faith

Ownageness of the Dark Knight

** warning: there will be spoilers about "The Dark Knight Rises" movie in this post **

This summer I was really excited for the last Batman movie. I actually didn't watch the first two movies in theaters because I was in school so I was totally outside of the movies world, but got to watch them on DVD a few years after they were released. What got me excited was to watch the trailer for the  "The Dark Knight Rises" earlier this year (I was probably watching the Avengers haha) because I really like to watch the conclusion of a story.

So two weeks before the "The Dark Knight Rises" was released, I re-watched "Batman Begins" and "The Dark Knight" to refresh myself of the overall story line. It was actually quite an enjoyable exercise!

On the Saturday (one day after the release date), I went to watch last movie with a group of 18 people and I reserved the seats through the Empire Plus (cost $2 more but I don't have to go for lineup). And after watching it, I started to think more about the movie, and as I thought about it more, I realized how good it is, to the point that I wanted to re-watched it (which I did). I think this trilogy of Batman can become one of the best movie trilogies of all times.

I want to take this opportunity to express my thoughts regarding the "The Dark Knight Rises" and why I think its' so great.

Weak points
First, I will start with the weak points. I heard of criticism towards this movie, and I agreed with most of them. For sure this is not a perfect movie, but I think these weak points do not overshadow the greatness of the movie. Here are the two main weak areas:

• Too unrealistic: there are a fairly amount of exaggerated events like Bruce Wayne coming back from the Middle East to Gotham in a matter of hours after he climbed up the hole, or his back getting healed, or the terrorist group able to set up explosives so easily, etc. But if we are picky about loopholes, then most movies will fall short. In general, I don't think it was too far-fetched.
• Bane as a character: I really didn't like his muffled voice, but we don't get to know much about his motivation as a villain (other than his allegiance with Tania). It would have been nice to know a bit more about him, though there was already too many characters to focus on (Catwoman, Detective Gordon, Robin Blake, Tania).

Actually my greatest disappointment about the trilogy is that Katie Holmes didn't take the role of Rachel on the second movie.

Plot
Comparing to "The Dark Knight", the "The Dark Knight Rises" is slower in pace, and it feels less intense. I guess "The Dark Knight" did set up a very high standard (94% on rottentomatoes) and it is considered one of the best superhero movie ever, often described as an art masterpiece in the form of superhero film. There is not a single boring moment, hard to predict plot, and psychologically very engaging. One has to realize that "The Dark Knight Rises" is a different type of movie. First of all, the main villain is quite different. Having the Joker definitely spices up the movie to be action-packed, unpredictable, chaotic, and mentally really engaging. "The Dark Knight" focuses more on the battle between good and evil, whereas "The Dark Knight Rises" focuses more on the resurgence of the Batman as the symbol of hope for Gotham, hence there is less action and more stuff about Bruce Wayne's internal battles, and in how he gets owned but gets back up again.

Theme
The overall theme of the trilogy is the battle of good and evil. "Batman Begins" focuses on revenge, and "The Dark Knight" touches upon the corruption and promptness of evil in men. "The Dark Knight Rises" talks about rising up after failure, not giving up after defeat but coming back even stronger to own your enemies. Something that is encouraging since we will face many failures in life.

Character development
"Batman Begins" is cool because we get to see Bruce Wayne getting trained as a ninja and growing from an angry and directionless adolescent to a man who is committed to fight crime. In "The Dark Knight" he is consolidated as Gotham's superhero but finds the possibility of retiring and letting Harvey Dent be the Knight of Gotham, and pursue a personal life with Rachel. Even though we think the Joker lost the battle in "The Dark Knight", it was actually a total lost for Batman, his love interest (Rachel) died, the guy who he thought would represent the good side of Gotham turned into a bad guy (Harvey Two-Faces), and the symbol of hope that Batman represented now turned into the embodiment of evil (for killing Harvey) so that Gotham will not resigned in its fight against evil.

So "The Dark Knight Rises" focuses on the resurgence of the superhero who had given up pursuing a personal life and is content with letting the name of Batman embodied hatred from the people of Gotham, and is slowly rotting as a human being. But he gets back in the battle, but shortly is badly defeated by Bane to the point of almost death. But his life is spared only so that he can experience the desperation of seeing Gotham getting destroyed. And it is in the hole when we see Bruce Wayne battling his desperation and fear to climb the pit to save his city. He was not able to climb it in the first couple of times because he didn't really fear death so the fear of losing his city was not at its highest peak. It's until he gets rid of the rope and knowing that is all-or-nothing so he was afraid of dying (because dying means losing Gotham) then he was able to rise and rise.

The introduction of Catwoman was genius. Her character does complement Batman very well, and her existence sheds some light for Bruce Wayne.

Legacy
At "Batman Begins", Bruce Wayne wanted Batman to be the symbol of hope for Gotham in the fight against organized crime. It was to give courage to every citizen to stand firm in this battle. By the end of "The Dark Knight", this symbol of hope became the embodiment of hatred (since Joker turned Harvey into a bad guy, so Batman had to falsely become the responsible for killing Harvey in order to not cause people from Gotham to lose hope). This was an act of sacrifice he made for Gotham's sake, and it is very honorable but at the same time does not result in a long lasting solution.

But in "The Dark Knight Rises" after he comes back from the hole, he leads the counterattack to save Gotham, and he saves the city from the nuclear explosion by sacrificing himself. The difference from the previous movie is that he sacrificed himself ensuring that his legacy of hope in fighting against rime will be carried on by the people of Gotham (especially Robin). This is key because Batman was not meant to be there forever but was intended to encourage the city as a whole in this battle against evil. This was accomplished in "The Dark Knight Rises".

There was an interesting dialogue between Catwoman and Batman right before they were about to embark in battle, Catwoman tries to convince Batman to leave with her before the city gets destroyed since Batman has already given everything to Gotham, but Batman replies, "not yet, not everything". Perhaps leaving this legacy was what he had not done yet.

Overall, "The Dark Knight Rises" resolves the problems that Bruce Wayne inherited from "Batman Begins" and  "The Dark Knight"  by establishing Batman as a lasting symbol of hope for Gotham, giving his best on his service to Gotham (to follow his father's shoes) and developing a life for his own (maybe with Catwoman). I really enjoyed how this ended, definitely a very ownage trilogy and ending.

focusing on tradition

Just this past Sunday at Simply Church we looked at the passage in Mark 7 where the Pharisees were complaining that Jesus' disciples did not wash their hands (Jews perform a ceremonial hand washing before eating) before eating, condemning that they were eating with "unclean" hands. Then, Jesus rebukes the Jews that they had let go of God's commandments and are just holding onto tradition because the Jews were only focused on following the letter of the law instead of focusing on the purpose of the law which points back to a relationship with God.

This sort of problem is still prevalent now, and as Pastor Tim said that sometimes even going to church on Sunday might seem more of a tradition rather than an authentic desire to worship God. The danger is that attending church becomes another routine and it does not increase our adoration toward our mighty God. This escalates to other areas such as serving and participating in church events. I have personally seen ministries and serving done out of tradition rather than a given desire by God and this has often resulted in people getting burnt out and lack of fruits.

As an individual who is actively participating in many church events and ministries, I feel that it is easy to fall into the attitude of self-righteousness and condemn others who are not as active or who do not follow the traditions set by the church. This narrows my mind in the understanding that God can work outside of the domain set by traditions. (Please note that I am not stating that traditions are bad, they can be good things but when we focused on traditions above God, we are missing the point and leads to other sins).

In the recent Olympics, two Tunisian athletes Habiba Ghribi (silver on women's 3,000m steeple chase) and Oussama Mellouli (gold on men's 10k swim) won medals for their country and it was big because there aren't that many successful Tunisian athletes. Actually Ghribi's medal is huge because the women on Tunisia are fighting for equal rights. Unfortunately there are some extreme extreme religious groups that expressed that their medals should be taken away because both of them have broken certain religious rules (her sport wear is apparently too revealing, and the swimmer was drinking juice during fasting season).

dethroned kings

As I talked about top performers of the Olympics on previous posts, I personally really like to follow artistic gymnastics and track and field.

Somehow I got into the women's pole vault jump. Mainly because the Russian "queen" Yelena Isinbayeva is renown for her gold medals on Athens 2004 and Beijing 2008, and she was going for the 3rd straight gold (I don't think any track and field athlete has accomplished it). She is the holder of the world record, the only women to jump more than 5 meters, so I was fascinated and got attracted to follow pole vault jump.

I was watching the women's pole vault jump final which was roughly at the same time as women's soccer semifinal Canada vs USA (which was an exciting game, and 3 of my housemates were streaming in their own rooms) but I was so into pole vault jump. As I watched I realized that it takes great concentration and skills to perform a decent jump, it is a tough sport! So I was all-out cheering for Yelena, but unfortunately she was only able to jump up to 4.7m, 0.05m (5cm) less than her two opponents so she had to conform with the bronze medal.

But when asked whether she was sad about the bronze, she actually said that she was very happy and she wasn't bitter or frustrated but content. She actually thought of retirement, but now she is aiming to participate in Rio 2016 and I look forward to see her compete.

Another great athlete I admired from watching him in Beijing 2008 is the Chinese Chen Yibing, gold medalist on ring apparatus, and double gold medalist in Men's Team in gymnastics.

His dominance in the last 5-6 years in the ring is so intense that he is nicknamed "the lord of the rings". He was favorite to get the gold medal, and actually performed a great routine, but he was surprised by the excellent performance of the Brazilian Zanetti, so Chen got the silver medal.

After the results were announced, he congratulated Zanetti, and smiling showed his thanks to the fans who came. In an interview, he said he was quite happy for his performance and that he did what he could.

These two great athletes have won championships and gold medals so they don't really lose that often. But in London 2012 when many were expecting them to get gold, they actually were dethroned and had to conform with a medal of less value. But the attitude they had in finding satisfaction on their performance, no sense of regrets, admitting defeat and congratulating their opponents is truly admirable. In my eyes Chen Yibing is still the "lord of the rings" and Yelena Isinbayeva is still the "queen of the pole vault".

We don't get to win everyday, and we ought to find satisfaction in doing our best.

Discipline and Hard Work

Back to my thoughts regarding the Olympics, we often remember the great performance of the medalists, and specially those big winners like Usain Bolt and Michael Phelps. They had great  performance on Beijing 2008, and it is natural for everyone to put their attention of them for London 2012 expecting similar performances.

It is easy to get caught up on the winning and achievements that we often forget the long hours of training, hard work, and discipline that these athletes had to endure in order to perform to such levels. To add, there is the dealing with expectations and nervousness. The fact that Olympics athletes are there participating is already a big achievement since they had to go through rounds of elimination in order to get there.

But it is nice to witness the big achievements that some of the athletes can accomplish.

In a similar way, I sometimes dream about accomplishing big things for God in the ministry I am involved with, whether it is CCF committee, cell group leader, ministry leader, bible study leader, etc. There is an earnest desire to do it for the glory of God, but it is easy to get caught up in wanting to achieve the big things and get frustrated when we're not able to get there. Because it is easy to overlook the hard work and discipline that will prepare us for these big things.

A few good brothers gave me as a present (when I was 2nd year) the book "Spirit of the Disciplines" (by Dallas Willard), and in one instance it mentions that many Christians want to see big things happening in their lives, to imitate what Jesus did, and other prophets (like Moses). But one has to realize that it is not an everyday thing when we will witness these big victories, but that it takes also ardent training on our part so that we can be ready when God calls us for such big battles. Jesus waited until he was thirty before His ministry on earth, and Moses spent 40 years training before leading the Israel out of Egypt.

Hence, there should be more motivation on my part to practice spiritual discipline in studying more the Word of God, memorizing Scripture, praying unceasingly, fasting, frugality so that I can be better prepared when God calls me for His Kingdom work.

We see Usain Bolt running the 100m in 9.63s establishing a new Olympic record, and it was one of the most watched event in the Olympics. But there were tons of hours of hard training that he had to endure to get in the podium!

On a separate note, Guatemala never won a medal before. They had a boxer that reached the bronze medal match 20 years ago, but was not able to win. Until London 2012, when a Guatemalan athlete was able to win a silver medal on 20km walk by Erick Barrondo. Fruits of his hard work, and this is the celebration, Enhorabuena!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOG4t-3XAoA

Tribute to CLASH

This past weekend was  very joyful to witness a dear sister and brother being united as one in the Lord under the covenant of marriage. It was a bit emotional for me since I know both parties for at least 6 years and we have share good times serving together in CCF. I really appreciate the relationship I have with each of them.

Caring - for you genuinely care for your brothers and sisters
Loving - you love the things you do (ministry and school), above all you love God
Ardently hopeful - the hope you have in the Lord is of great worth
Royal - for you are a princess

Admirable - for you pursue what is honorable and noble
Supportive -  your support for the CCF  ministries was invaluable
Heart for God -a man who seeks the Lord's heart in prayer

I am confident that they will continue to glorify our great God. 

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church— for we are members of his body. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. - Ephesians 5:25-33

Staying as #1

It's been said that it is hard to reach the #1 rank, but it is even harder to remain as #1. Similarly, I have been failing to update this blog regularly, so I am hoping to make a comeback since the recent Olympics has filled me with thoughts and ideas.

Why is staying as #1 so hard? Well, because it is easy to get too relaxed, complacent, and maybe even prideful that will make you forsake training. Also, other competitors will look at you as the person to beat, so they will train with more motivation to surpass you.

Similarly, in my spiritual walk, it is hard to be in tune with God, read His Word, and dwell in prayer consistently. This is a daily battle for me, and when I think I am doing well, it actually opens many opportunities for temptations to pull me down. Living by the Spirit is a challenging thing. That's why "devotionals" are very important to keep my mind and heart align with God's so that my sight will not be blurred from His will.

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.  Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit." - Galatians 5:22-25

We are to live by the Spirit, and also to keep in step with the Spirit so that we will remain living offering ourselves to God. This can only be accomplished by getting to know God more, spending more time with Him, and learning more from Him, It definitely takes our effort and discipline to pursue it, but it is by God's grace that we are able to accomplish it.

In the Olympics, there is an athlete who is able to stay as #1 in his field - Usain Bolt.

What he has done is incredible, to win gold on 100m, 200m, 4x100m relay on both 2008 and 2012 Olympics. Only selective few like the legendary was able to defend gold successfully on more than one event in track and field.

He is considered the best sprinter of all time and currently holding the world record on 100m, 200m, and just recently the 4x100m relax. We'll see if he can keep this pace on 2016, but it will be a lot harder as he is aging and many young competitors are developing.

Another athlete that is worth mentioning who is able to dominate in his specialty is Michael Phelps who is the athlete with most Olympic medals in all history (22). Though his level dropped in this recent Olympics, what he has accomplished will not be easily surpassed.

Outside of the Olympics, it is worth noting that the Spain national soccer team accomplished a feat of winning the Euro 2008, World Cup 2010, and Euro 2012. Definitely, very had to remain as #1, but it is achievable by being focused on the goal and consistent hard work.