One year ago today

* Disclaimer: This post deals with the issue of death. *

I was walking through Lim Chu Kang cemetery alone on a cloudy afternoon.

(I don't often do this, just so you know.)

Sometimes I need to get away from people to clear my mind. 

I'd usually go for a late night roller-blade down Punggol Waterway. There are few people after sundown anyway.

Sometimes I feel I need to go even further to get away from things. 

That's when I'd go and spend a day at the Chinese Gardens.

But there are some times that I really need to get as far away from civilization as I possibly can. These are the times I am questioning the very core of my existence, and need to sort these issues out before no one but God.

It is times like this that I go to the cemetery at Lim Chu Kang.

I arrived at a lonely flower shop under a make-shift tent and purchase a small bouquet of flowers. I wasn't sure which grave I would leave it on, but I was sure I'll know when I see it.

I walked past row after row of graves as I climbed a small hill.

"Gone, But Not Forgotten"

This line was written on so many graves. It was a nice line.

When all is stripped away, when life is reduced to a single line on your tombstone, what really matters?

Yeah... we think about life more when we see death.

It was beginning to rain, and the rain got stronger and stronger.

Lightning flashed and I was a little concerned because I was on a hill and all around me was flat ground.

I put away my umbrella and headed for the relative safety of lower ground.

It was very different walking through this cemetery in the day.

The first time I had done it was at night; It was strangely peaceful then, walking between rows of crosses. I guess it would have been scary if I was here looking for ghosts. But I was here looking for God, and there was nothing but peace; Even when I saw the dark figure standing by the road in front of me that turned out to be an out of place bush.

Now I could see everything from far. And I could also see everything around me clearly.

And that was when I noticed a white fragment on the grass by the road.

I walked towards it and could not believe what i saw.

I also could not believe that I did not feel anything initially.

It was a human jawbone. 

Well... half of it.

I stood there at the side of the road just staring at it. 

Slowly, feelings began to well up in me.

It's not the kind of happy or sad feelings you get when you watch a movie.

This was the kind of feeling you get when you see the outcome of someone's entire life reduced to dust and bone.

No grave, no name, nothing.

It's overwhelming.

"Forgotten, But Not Gone"

There in the rain and on my knees I mourned.

I mourned for whoever this person once was.

And i was confronted with the hard truth.

Our graves, our final resting places... they are but metaphors.

"Rest in peace" is just a nice way for us to think of death.

When we die, it's not that we rest in a grave.

We're gone.

What then remains of the work of our hands? What have we achieved in this life that endures after we pass on?

Little. Close to nothing.

What then is the meaning in life?

I guess that's when I began to see things in the eternal perspective. 

Because anything we do that is of eternal significance is meaningful.

And the Kingdom of God is eternal. So anything I do with my life that furthers this kingdom is meaningful to me in terms of my existence, and is also significant in the eternal perspective. I have made a mark and my life was not in vain.

This dead person made his or her mark on me. 

If this moment inspires me to do great things for the kingdom of God in future, then this very moment was of eternal significance, and this person's death and bones being left behind were for a greater purpose than anyone could have ever imagined. 

I hope and pray that every part of my life can be used for matters of eternal significance.

I lay my bouquet of flowers down by the jawbone and paid my last respects. 

I got up, took a final bow, and left.

As I walked out of the cemetery, I hoped and prayed even as all the distractions got back into my life, that I would never lose sight of the eternal perspective.



It's been a year since that day.


It's been a meaningful year.