The Cross and the pen

Last year, Abisha had a minor accident which hurt her eye. It didn't look good and we rushed to the eye doctor. Thankfully, it was a superficial injury which the doc said would heal quickly. And since we were at the doctor’s, I got my eyes checked as well. After seeing my eye through a fancy looking machine, I was surprised when the doctor said I need to wear glasses. Of course my eyes did hurt sometimes when I sit in front of the screen for a long time, but glasses now? Anyway, he made me read the letters on the screen, as he kept changing the lenses. And voila, for a certain lens, the words and numbers looked surprisingly clearer than before. This bewildered me. I really haven't felt the need for glasses for more than 3 decades, do I need it now? I could read, drive, and recognise people in the distance without them.   I put off getting the new specs for a few months, but eventually, Abisha got one for me. It was time for me to try them on. On one side, I was excited like a ...

  Believer, beware! Satan is out to get your soul. Last week, the newspapers in India had a full-page advertisement. “Netflix is dropping its price!” It’s cheaper to have thousands of hours of delectable entertainment at your fingertips now! A few years ago, 4G internet rolled out in India for very affordable rates. Technology has now advanced to fibre connections for home use and very soon 5G technology for our mobiles. Because of the pandemic, almost every individual has a smartphone including school children. Why should you and I be concerned about this? Isn’t fast, cheap internet a boon for us, our families and the nation? Narrating another perspective here. Our chief enemy is Satan. He is a master strategist who uses every trick up his sleeve to make us fall. He uses the world and our flesh to trap us, and as the accuser, he will be ready to accuse us when we slip. He is using the infrastructure of internet & our devices (which we pay for and maintain) to deliver to...

Confession: I used to be an addict to the TV series the big bang theory. Note : I do NOT recommend this sitcom or anything similar to it. They can puncture our values and belief system drastically. The two main characters in this series are a theoretical physicist & an applied physicist. I asked myself, what does a theoretical physicist do, and how is it different from the work of an applied physicist?   In simple terms, a theoretical physicist works completely in a lab, a highly controlled environment, and relies heavily on data, empirical formulae while trying to push the boundaries of science. In short, everything is done inside a petri dish.   An applied physicist, on the other hand, lives closer to the real world. His job is to bring, what is experimented in the lab feasible in the real world, again using experiments. It’s the engineers(workmen trained in applied science) who make it as a useful product for the layman. I realized that this can be an analogy to the l...

  I would be very surprised if you don’t hear about an acquaintance, relative, friend, etc. passing away almost on a daily basis. Today, I heard about two people and the way they finished their innings on the earth. Two very different people, from very different places. I know one of them quite well and don’t know the other at all. Yet, their going away stories remains with me and I believe will remain with me for a long time.   He was a good family friend of ours. We knew him for a long time. He was greatly skilled in his line of work. He was a towering figure, not just in stature but also in his influence. I loved his humility most about him. Updates kept pouring in these last 10 days about his health condition. He personally updated us almost every day. He shared how he has been admitted to the hospital and then we learned how his levels were dropping, then he got better…. I wish the messages ended there. The next day he dipped again. That was the last message we got from h...

  Every time my phone pings, invariably it’s the message of one more person testing positive, or someone’s situation has become worse, and maybe once a day, somebody has died. The news of someone’s recovery is dwarfed by all the other news that makes you feel depressed. No beds, no oxygen cylinders, no ambulances, no doctors, nurses, etc. I open the news feed, Twitter, etc. and I get to visualize this great tragedy - ambulances, crying relatives…. sometimes you wish you were born in a different period in history. मैं अपने देश को देखता हूं और रोता हूं। मुझे मेरे घुटनों पर लाया गया है | मेरे खुदा तुम कहाँ हो? I look at my nation and weep…. I have been brought to my knees. My God where are you?   How do I find my footing in a time like this? What if the next phone call is the message of someone very close struggling to breathe? What if, this night, I start developing symptoms?   Where can I put my hope? What can I hold on to during a time like this?   My friend, I know ...

I am an Indian. In a country which has 33 crore Gods(almost 1 God for every 4 people) to say that I follow only one person as my Lord, is claiming something very exclusive. I am not a follower of Christ because: I have Christian sounding name I was born in a family where my parents are also Christians I go to church I celebrate Christian festivals such as Christmas(Actually I make it a point not to celebrate these festivals) I follow the rituals such as lent which are commonly associated with Christianity I must acknowledge at this point, that in my pursuit of finding the answers for the deeper questions of life, I found it in Jesus and I have not actively tried or experimented with other worldviews and religions.  For many people, one of the key goals of their life is to be good. I was not very different. To be good, I did a lot of work that would be considered good. I volunteered. I stopped using foul language. I stopped cheating in tests in school, stopped...