Journeying with Jesus through Childhood to Adulthood
Malcolm, 1st Congregation
Malcolm
Psalm 139:13–14: “For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb, I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” My earliest recollection of my salvation experience was when I was in kindergarten. My godly grandmother Grace, read to me from ladybird books the story of Jesus. I knew in my heart and professed that I wanted Jesus to be my saviour. With childlike faith, I believed and placed my trust in Jesus.
I learnt that being a follower of Christ is not just having faith alone but being in a relationship with God. In my primary school years, I was quite chubby and suffered bullying in school which caused me to lose self-confidence and have low esteem. Despite this, I remember constantly crying out to Jesus for help. The hymn line that Jesus paid it all, child of weakness find in me my all in all was a comfort I held on to. I remember causing a stir with my English teacher in Pri 5 with my lived reality when I wrote for my English essay that my best friend was Jesus who walks and talks with me along life’s way.
I studied very hard and did well in my PSLE to move from a neighbourhood primary school to an elite secondary school. This sense of self-accomplishment inflated my pride, and with other influences, I became a poor reflection of Christ. I remember one episode where I tried to share Christ with my classmate who after patiently listening to me said, “Malcolm, if being a Christian is like you I certainly do not want to be one.” This reply shocked and hurt me but caused me to reflect more deeply on what being a follower of Christ meant. I repented and asked the Lord to change my heart.
Little did I know, that this change would entail a journey of personal suffering and loss. Galatians 2:20 says, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me, and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”
God was dealing with my self-dependency and self-centredness. Having again struggled with body image issues in secondary school and further bullying I decided to improve my self-confidence by joining the school rugby team. Initially not accepted because of my poor fitness the team decided to give me a second chance. I worked very hard at training and was finally included in the first 15. We played several matches and reached the finals. I was so excited and happy and invited my parents to attend the game. Sadly, I was not chosen to play in the finals and this shattered my dream. I felt great disappointment that I had let down my parents who had come to see me play. This was a deep emotional wound that I carried on in my life for several years.
To add to this, I performed poorly in my A-levels and saw the dream of wanting to be a doctor evaporate. It was at this lowest point in my life that I truly turned to the Lord and cried out to him and laid down all my dreams and ambitions in brokenness. Psalm 34:6: “This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles.” My grandma’s favourite verse Psalm 34:8 echoed in my heart, taste and see that the Lord is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him!
In full dependence, I asked the Lord for guidance in my life. Unsure whether the poor results I had at A-levels was the result of scholastic inability or a lack of discipline, I decided to try to resit my A-levels while serving national service. Despite all the odds, the Lord made a way for me and I resat my A-levels as a private candidate.
Truly it was His divine intervention that I managed to obtain much better grades, passed the medical interviews and gained admission into the faculty of Medicine. Thinking that my time of trials had passed, I was only to be shocked when i discovered I had failed two out of three subjects in my first year of medical school. I could not understand why God had brought me thus far only for me to fail. Jesus was asking me as Peter in John 21:15 “Do you love me more than these?” I laid all outcomes down and put my full trust and confidence in God and did not give up.
For three months with tears and the Bible next to me, I studied in the medical library and with the Holy Spirit’s guidance and leading, I learned how my brain made connections which enabled me to study better. The Lord granted me success and continuance and a deep conviction that the good shepherd leads me in all of life’s journey, by still waters and even deep dark valleys. for truly “He who has called me is faithful and will surely do it” 1 Thessalonians 5:24.
But the Lord is not done with me yet. Through the years, my relationship with him and understanding of who Christ became more like a formal religion rather than a deep personal walk with God. I had a sense of self-righteousness, was judgmental, and felt that the brand of conservative Christianity that I adhered to made me better than others. Through experiencing severe burnout in my career during Covid, the Lord drew me to himself and reminded me through RHC that I was a sinner just like everyone else, no better. His love and forgiveness for me through His humility and obedience by going to the cross and laying down His life for me, then resurrected in power gifting me with His holy spirit reminded and humbled me to the fact that I was only a sinner saved by grace reinforcing Romans 2:4 that God’s kindness leads us to repentance.
As the journey of Lent is from death to life, so likewise the old self apart from Christ must die daily to give birth to the new self. Through the power of the Spirit, I am reminded daily to deny myself, take up my cross, and follow him. As I live out my days here, I return to my childlike faith. My hope for me and all of you is John 6:40: that “everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and He will raise him up on the last day.” Looking forward to the day that I meet Jesus, Grandma, Dad and all of you.