Happy New Year? Happy New You!

HAPPY NEW YEAR? HAPPY NEW YOU!

I was listening to the radio one day and heard what I thought sounded like an old song. My daughters were quick to correct me - it was a new song. In fact, it was one of the current hits. Still I thought, “Doesn’t the riff sound, oh, so familiar?”

A few weeks later, it was reported that the singer of the “old” song was making public statements insinuating that the singer of the “new” song had copied her (guess it’s moot why she chose to say this only after the new song had become a hit)!

So, is there really anything new under the sun? I remember what someone once said to me - that God is the only one who creates; the rest of us re-create.

New things also weather and change. Sometimes it’s for the better (think wine, cultivated friendships, nurtured marriages), but more often, it’s for the worse. And so we hope and wish for the best, and wish ourselves and each other a “Happy New Year”.

There is another way to think about old vs new. It is to shift our gaze from what is external and search for what is within to find the source of potential “new-ness”. It comes only from having a new life. Forget make-overs. Forget divorce-to-restart-with-newflame. Forget even New Year resolutions. The new life begins… in you!

But wait! This is even better than any self-help or the “chi” you can muster. The good old verse in the Bible declares how, “anyone who believes in Christ is a new creation. The old is gone! The new has come!” (2 Corinthians 5:17). What mystery and hope! While we see decay around us, we know there is such a thing as an inward renewal. God alone, through the Holy Spirit, can transform us from the “inside out” and “from glory to glory”, if only we let Him.

So in this very first edition of READY, the new publication of Bethesda Frankel Estate Church, our theme is fittingly inspired by a phrase that Advisory Elder Dr. Ernest Chew, the Editor of our previous publication, would often say at the start of each year: “Happy New You!” I think this is very apt and I hope you will experience this for yourself by the time you have read all the articles.

No magazine is ever launched alone. I am grateful for everyone in the team – they put in more work than me! By now it is plain that even a new magazine cannot claim to be original. This “new wineskin” hopes to build on the strengths of READY’s predecessors, “SCOPE” and “The Frankelite”, both of which faithfully distilled our church community’s aspirations for over five decades. It is only fitting we put on record here our deep appreciation to Advisory Elder Ernest, and others like sister Tong Suit Chee (past Associate Editor), who quietly and diligently served for many years.

So…are you ready for READY?

Jimmy Tan

Editor