Gala Concert at Macleans

Last night we enjoyed a pleasant evening listening to music performances by the students of Macleans College in Auckland. Our children Tim and Lydia sang in the school choir. It was nice that the Snowballs and the Aikens could come too. Our friend Moses annan also came.

We had different groups come and perform like the orchestra, stage band, school choir, barbershop chorus, barbershop quartet, and so on. We listened to Tschaikovsky, Mozart, Mendelssohn, Chopin, and other composers so ably performed by the children.

The choir sang three pieces:

Thank God

We received this email from Philip’s brother’s wife this morning with the subject ‘Thank God.’ It describes the days leading up to her husbands surgery and how thankful they are to the Lord.

We thank God for helping us go through this difficult time. We also thank all of you who supported us in prayer and for your encouragement.

Two weeks back Surendar had severe pain in his abdomen, and the pain was spreading to the chest area, his back and so on. He was treating himself with Gelusil (antacid), soda, garlic pearls etc, because he had eaten a heavy meal for lunch that day and thought that the pain was some gastric pain due to indigestion. It was a Saturday and nephew Naveen was there after our weekly Bible study and offered to take him to Vadamalaiyan Hospital. He refused saying that the pain will go away after sometime. So Naveen went home.

Even after midnight, the pain did not subside.

Prisy and Lydia sing ‘Go Tell It on The Mountain’

You can click to hear my daughters sing this old Negro Spiritual.

Because I felt that the words “Now when I was a seeker, I sought both night and day / I asked the Lord to help me and He showed me the way / He made me a watchman upon the city wall / And though I am a Christian, I am the least of all” was vague, I wrote another set of verses.

Great-niece Anna Sruthi

Today is my niece Kavitha’s birthday. If she felt that the events of the terror attack of 2001 had taken the joy out of her birthday for good, she was wrong because today, she received the best birthday present one can hope for–a baby daughter. Imagine that!

Behold my great-niece Anna Sruthi.

Dignifying a question

Al Mohler writes about an elderly pastor who died two days ago:

. . . My indebtedness to Dr. Kennedy is very personal. I was a young Southern Baptist who as a teenager had serious questions about the big issues of the Christian faith . . . He was kind to a Baptist teenager, introducing me to Francis Schaeffer and dignifying my questions. He clearly enjoyed talking theology and he was the first person I had ever met who demonstrated this joy. He was kind. I was hooked. In no small way my own calling as a theologian can be traced to Dr. Kennedy’s influence. . .

I do not know anything about this good pastor of Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church. The only reason I have quoted Al Mohler’s words is because the words ‘dignifying my questions’ caught my eye.

This immediately reminded me of our son Tim who these days is excited about his new-found interest in the things of God. He asks questions and comments about theological matters with a depth that deserves our full attention. However, if we are careless, we could miss them altogether because of the way he words them. He has only just begun reading Christian books and so lacks adequate theological vocabulary to clothe his sentences with the dignity they merit. It is up to us to dignify his words until he learns to do this for himself.

Family Photo

Every year, around the time of our wedding anniversary, we take a family photo. This is the latest one taken around our 21st anniversary. I was rather pleased with my Mother-Theresa look, pleasant and kind. All the others think that they look better in real life. I do not wish to comment on that. The only allowance I can make is that Philip’s ear contrasted against Lydia’s sweater looks odder than usual.