I created this domain a few months ago because I wanted to separate my journal from my prominent Devil In The Skull blog that I have been running since 2012. This website will channel the personal life I have and owned, and I am proud to say that I live a good life that challenged me mentally and physically to be where I am today.

In the first post, I will reflect on my recent mission trip to Chiang Rai, Thailand and how the mission trip shaped my attitude as a Christian Singaporean. I am honoured to have this privilege to travel to Chiang Rai with support from my family and friends who respected my choice to decide on doing this first mission trip that took place between 20 to 28 May 2024. To my fellow friends who have contributed through prayers and/or fundraising, I wanted to thank you for your support and confidence in me and my team to go on the mission trip to Chiang Rai. Thank you for your faith in us that we can go out to Chiang Rai and create programmes for the beneficiaries to know who Christ is and share testimonies on how God moved us in ways that we did not expected.

Before I embarked on the mission trip, my knowledge of mission trip was just about missionaries going to provide support by doing concrete things like painting houses, build water systems and etc. Some mission trips were also related to faith-based, primarily sharing gospel (good news) to people on the streets, campuses and houses so that they can come to know who God is and what Christianity means. This is what most Christians and non-Christians are familiar with, especially living in the first-world countries like Singapore where the spread of good news is becoming more commercialised and accessible thanks to established churches and communities. Even livestreams are becoming more common on YouTube where anyone can just watch them and listen to sermons anytime, anywhere. However, the mission trip to Chiang Rai was different and I was amazed to be put in a position where I did not need to do the typical routines that I have done in past campus walks in Singapore Management University or during exchange in The Hong Kong Polytechnic University.

We were asked to provide more skills-based and life-sharing experiences to the people we were meeting in Chiang Rai. They were already Christians, but they needed something – they needed life stories to share, especially for young people to see how God works in people’s lives. They needed to be move miraculously and deeper than the spirituality aspect. They needed evidence that God is omnipresent (meaning being all around you and everywhere, 360 degrees). So how did we do that? By being authentic in our sharing and diving into our struggles when we were still in our teens and before we entered university. This means remembering what you did in your yesteryears like partying, chasing good grades, crying over failed relationships or getting bullied. This means being able to face your weaknesses and past, and taking these encounters into beautiful stories that evidently show that God does challenged you and He did them so that you can grow into who you are today.

I admit that sharing testimonies were hard. I see sharing testimonies as unveiling yourself and making yourself vulnerable. You are going to feel either shitty or overwhelmed, and most importantly – you are going to feel relieved that things happened and you have already made it. One such testimony I shared during my visit to Phaya Mengrai was how a newspaper article that my mother shared, led me to pursue computing as a potential field of study and career, and how this newspaper article had set in stone for me because I almost did not pursue computing. I shared about how playing computer games was seen negatively because I was addicted to them and they affected my primary school subjects which included at one point, failing my Chinese spelling (听写) because I disliked learning Chinese. Though the words that poured out from my mouth seem disoriented and interpretation between English and Thai got fuzzy due to limited words that were found in Thai dictionary for the computing terminologies (English is the lingua franca in the world of computing), I thanked God that He was present to guide me through sharing testimony in public especially this was my first time speaking vulnerably in front of strangers. I thanked God that the beneficiaries were very open to listening to us and likewise, trusting us to listen to their stories about their movement in the villages and how they shared the gospel with their loved ones.

We heard stories in other districts we visited in Chiang Rai where they were faced with opposition due to different beliefs and culture, and it took years for them to warm up and be opened to a faith that is different from their own. We also heard of Christians we met on the mission trip that they used their businesses to spread the gospel and opened up their worship place so that others may come to believe and see the wonders of God and Christianity. Sirinya Coffee Farm, located in Doi Chiang, was one such example of a family-run business that sells coffee beans locally instead of exporting them overseas, mainly as a form of outreach to share gospel to the community and to their business partners. The owners, Goh and Oil have been very kind to share with us about their coffee process, giving us the tour to their coffee farm warehouse and taking us to fishing and foraging. They told us about how they sustain their coffee farm and have faith in God by remembering the people He encountered in the Bible where He promised His ways were better and promisingly good, for He provides everything. They also shared that no matter which area you are in, whether you are in a workplace, church or any place, you have an opportunity to share the gospel. Every timing is a good timing.

I found myself strangely warmed when the owners shared that “when you have made enough money, you also do not need to worry about sharing the gospel” and instead you can focus on God’s grace. Like John Wesley’s encounter at Aldersgate, I was strangely warmed because I wondered what it means to made enough money. Living in Singapore as a Singapore Citizen, you have to think about the high cost of living, paying the taxes and knowing that part of your salary is going towards to the self-help group to uplift the low-income households and the less priviledged, and also the Central Provident Funds (CPF) savings that houses the money contributions that can be used for retirement, medical bills or buying a house. This sharing is a reminder to myself as a Christian of what it means to be enough. You can chase ambitions. You can plan and save for rainy weather, but always to have God be the centre of your life that He provides. Apart from the reminder about money is enough and gospel can be shared anytime and anywhere, my team and I got the chance to experience the worship session conducted in Lisu language which was heart warming for all of us despite not knowing the language. We were surprised by our heart opened to listening gospels in Lisu language and just able to belt out along with the people like we knew the songs. It truly shows that music breaks barrier and it is a universal language that anyone can understand and believe in.

Overall, I am fortunate to encounter who God is and how He works in Thailand, where it is estimated that 1% of the population in Thailand is Christians and Christianity is seen as a foreign religion compared to the majority religion (Buddhism). Being involved in the mission trip to Chiang Rai and experiencing the Christian community there in Chiang Rai reminded me of God’s goodness and His infinite love for people, and how He provides in different circumstances. There were many evidences that I saw as miracles and I am amazed that this is happening, especially when miracles are hard to come by. It is with this post that I crafted so that you can see beyond just being mere tourist and be part of my world, my eyes as I saw the mission trip unfold for the past one week. I am proud to be a Christian Singaporean where I have the chance to take part in activities that challenge my views and be open to new things happening around the world. On the other hand, in the city-state like Singapore, I do face what Our Daily Bread Singapore had coined as the “Singaporean First-World Christianity Mindset”. It is the issue where we are channeling this inward looking attitude on ourselves that we perceived as “lacking” and “discontent” when in reality, we are living too comfortably. We are living too comfortably to realise that our struggles are so minuet compared to what others are facing in everyday situations and in their lives. It isn’t everyday that you get to visit a village and live in a kampong (village) lifestyle, and also to be reminded that you aren’t going to see toilet papers around or elevators to use when you have heavy items at hand and your legs cannot carry you.

I admit that I carry this mindset and sometimes get caught up in it, and this is something that I am still working on. Going to Chiang Rai as my first mission trip is an experience. It is thinking beyond about me and learning how to serve others in a meaningful way that God intends for humans to do as a community. I hope this post enlightens you and to consider going for a mission trip to share what you know and to share the love for Christ to people who have yet to know who He is. For non-believers, I hope this post serves as an account on what Christians believe in and why and how mission trips are supposed to function. More importantly, how mission trips can be more than just sharing gospel like passing on skills and knowledge, and lessons from life experiences.

I will end my post with a link to my slides I have created for my team’s discussion on our visit to Sirinya Coffee Farm and the message behind what it means to be a community (yes, I conducted my lecture on what is church and community using bliblical knowledge from the New Testament).

Other highlights from the mission trip:

• Listening to testimony sharing by the people in Chiang Kham.
• Visited a technical college in Chiang Kham and shared testimonies and played game about Singapore (some ladies in our team even took an opportunity to meet up with the teacher on another day to share with her about the gospel and Christianity, coming to know who Christ is).
• Participating in TonCedar (entrepreneurship church)’s worship session known as the Living Room Church and know what it means to be part of khun (people)
• Visited a church in Phaya Mengrai and had dinner, shared testimonies and group discussion with the youths.
• Visited another group of youths at a church again in Phaya Mengrai and shared teen-related topics and testimonies and played game about Singapore.
• Conducted an outreach to elementary and high school students in Phaya Mengrai to put up a play about Samuel and his obedience to God (listening to God’s call) (I played as Hannah) as well as a dance to “This Little Light of Mine”.
• Tried Sirinya Coffee Farm’s coffee made using an anaerobic natural ‘mossto’ process (film yeast fermentation process method) and I highly recommend for its soft, “tea-ish” taste and yet giving the coffee characteristic.
• Team was given opportunity to played a traditional worship song for the Lisu people in Doi Chiang and we played “How Great Thou Art”.
• Visited Chiang Rai Saturday Night Market and witnessed the small clockwork performance by the Chiang Rai Clock Tower.