Qing Ming Festival

Qing Ming Festival is a traditional Chinese custom for paying respect to our forefathers at their tombs. It falls on the 5th term of the lunar calendar, usually in April.

This year's Qing Ming Festival started early April. 2 Sundays ago, I accompanied my parents to visit the Kong Meng San Monastry and offer my prayers to my ancestors at the columbarium. In the past few trips, my parents and relatives were surprised that I came along because of their misconceptions of Christians' resentment to honouring our forefathers. Even though I didn't participate in any of the rituals (offering joss sticks and incense papers to the forefathers), I am sure they appreciated my presence.

I believe God wants His people to honour our forefathers and parents. We need to know our roots so as to break the generational curses that flowed from our forefathers to our generations and beyond. May the Lord grant me revelation of the past generations' sins and bondages so as to deliver me and my family from these iniquities by the blood of Jesus Christ, who is our redeemer and saviour. Amen.

In the Name of Jesus, ...

I picked up Edmund Chan's book, "Growing Deep In God: Integrating Theology and Prayer", hoping to capture some spiritual nuggets of wisdom and stumble on the chapter on "Misconceptions About Prayers" (pp. 92 to 100).

In illustrating the mentality of treating God as the genie in a bottle, he talked about a little boy's fear of the dark when his mother asked his help to retrieve a broom in the back porch, and how his mother reassured him of Jesus' protection and omnipresence. Instead of trusting Jesus to protect him while retrieving the broom, the little boy prayed to Jesus to bring him the broom!

There were a few nights where my son would refuse to sleep and told me he was afraid of the dark and even ghosts. Despite reassuring him that Jesus is the head of this household and that ghosts would run away from Him, he would still be unsettled. I resorted to teaching him a Sunday School song "In the Name of Jesus" and after he sang that a few times, he was able go to sleep easily. That's the power of declaring Jesus' name!

For those with young children, try singing this tune to them before sleep in reassuring them of God's love and protection:

In the name of Jesus,
In the name of Jesus,
We have the victory

In the name of Jesus,
In the name of Jesus,
Demons will have to flee

When we stand on the name of Jesus,
Tell me who can stand before

In the mighty name of Jesus,
We have the victory.