The 2-Year Mark

Today is a very special day in three ways.

It's the first day of Spring!

I read somewhere that Nature doesn't go by human calendars. There is certainly truth there, because our garden started blooming a few weeks ago. So that was probably when Spring really started.

Today is also a special day for our friends Siyong & Fuxiang. They are migrating to NZ to start a new life.

All the best, guys, and remember: God is with you wherever you are in the world. :-)

This Friday marks the 2nd anniversary of our arrival in Melbourne.

We have completed our minimum 2-year residency and are now free to apply for our Resident Return Visa (Subclass 155). The RRV allows us to return to Aus as PRs after travelling overseas. It's a requirement because our original visas expire this Oct.

I look back on our 2 years here and say "Wow..."

2 years of adventure, of scraping the bottom and finding that the only way is up, of discovering - as Paul so eloquently puts it in Philippians 4:11-13* - the beauty of contentment in all circumstances.

I have often said, and say again, that I would not do anything differently if I could. Except maybe choose a different shipper and ship everything instead of wasting time deciding what to keep and what to throw!

But I digress.

The point is: so much of what I am today is because of what I have gone through in the past 2 years, what we as a family have gone through.

My close friends know what I mean.

They reckon I'm different from when I was in Sg.

I think when you've had almost every security blanket pulled out from under your feet, you are forced to wake up and face facts.

You learn to broaden your mind.

You learn to be more accepting of people and to cut them some slack, including yourself.

You learn to speak up and ask for what you need.

You learn who your friends really are.

Beth's school principal shared a most insightful note in last week's newsletter.

The real challenge to a person's integrity and character, he says, is not adversity but prosperity.

This is because adversity limits your options and forces you to focus on survival. You quickly learn to cut out the extraneous stuff.

But when you're past all that and you have more options because, say, your resources have increased, you have new challenges.

Some of these come in the guise of new consumer "needs" that may be dictated by the norms of society.

How will you respond to these new demands on your resources?
Will your spending increase to match your prosperity, thus making you no better off than before?
Will you end up in debt because you start to chase illusions and live beyond your means?

I guess the message is that you have to be ready to be prosperous. In a sense, you have to be the right sort of person for prosperity to do its greatest good through you.

We're obviously a long way from there, but I'd like to think we're working on it.

That way, if and when we ever get "there", we'll be worthy, ready and able to put that prosperity to work.

Not just for the good of our family, but for the greater good of the community in which we are planted.

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.
(Phil. 4:3-4)

*I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength.