Time passes by...

Today is my birthday... I am in Doha coming home (cannot wait to get on that SQ flight). I choose today to honour a great friend on this blog site...

I was once a young boy traveling thousands of miles and settled in a foreign land. Sure! It was a scary thing but GOD blessed me with a friend. His name was Andrew. A boy who I met in my class 3C in St Stephen School. A boy who broke the teacher's rule and spoke to me in Cantonese. A boy who became my wing man for the last 35 years. Andrew passed away some weeks back. I remembered it so clearly... I was driving back after sending Chloe to her sailing class @NSC. I received a call on my mobile along PIE. Normally, I will not pick up the mobile without the headset but I felt a need to do so. The voice over the other end asked if I know someone by the name of Andrew Wong. Casually I replied "Sure... he is a great friend". There was a short silience and then the voice said "I am calling from the Jurong Police Station and we found his body in his car". I could not register what he said and asked him whether Andrew was ok plus how could I help. He replied very calmly "Basically he has passed away and we are trying to locate his wife or mother". My mind was blank and all I remember was tears rolled down my face. I told him that I need to calm myself down before calling him back as I could not even remember the name of Andrew's wife...

I said the eulogy at his funeral and tried to tell everyone there what a great friend Andrew was to me. Most people will say that we are buddys from very different background and using Singapore's way of judging one's life, I was supposed to be the successful one. Interestingly, I felt very differently. Andrew's success (one that I tried to mirror) is with GOD. He spent a huge part of his life doing GOD's work while I spent most of mine trying to ascertain riches on this earth. His riches are all stored in heaven. As we go through life together, Andrew and I had a great journey... in many ways, I lost a brother this January! But I am glad that he has gone to a place where he can be with GOD.

I have been in the choir for a few years now and believe The Servant Song is a best discription for Andrew's life.

Will let me be your servant;

Let me be as Christ to you.

Pray that I might have the grace

To let you be my servant, too.

We are pilgrims on a journey,

We are travelers on the road.

We are here to help each other

Walk the mile and bear the load.

I will hold the Christ-light for you,

In the night time of your fear.

I will hold my hand out to you;

Speak the peace you long to hear.

I will weep when you are weeping.

When you laugh, I'll laugh with you.

I will share your joy and sorrow,

'Til we've seen this journey through.

When we sing to God in heaven,

We shall find such harmony

Born of all we've known together

Of Christ's love and agony.

Andrew's life continues to inspire me even after he is gone from this earth. Someone once told me that we have no choice about our year of birth and death. However, we can make the choice to create meaning for that little dash in between those 2 years. For Andrew, it will be

1964 ---"A Life full of Christ"--- 2007