Chapter 4: Putting on our Shoes

Shoes

Main take away:

All girls need a good pair of shoes. As girls, most of us are somehow innately attracted to shoes and this fetish sometimes gives a spiritual and emotional high allowing us to feel on to of the world. Shoes and women are like men and soccer and without shoes we feel displaced. So just like without God in our lives, life wouldn’t be the same. We need our shoes for the fashion aspect that it caters for but we also need shoes to keep our feet protected from the dirt and harmful object that decorate the ground. We need good shoe that fits to provide us with the comfort in our life’s journey and though we have a choice to go barefoot, wearing a pair of good shoes creates a remarkable difference to the comfort and ability to do more things in life.

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I used to have a lot of trouble understanding what it meant to have a relationship with God. To my teenager self, I thought: it’s not as if I can pick up the phone and call God up for a chat, right? Wrong.

Now that I’m older I’ve learnt that God is a 24-hour surveillance camera and a 24-hour hotline, completely free of charge. All we need to do is make contact with him, saying “Hi!” to the surveillance camera and thanking God for watching over us and keeping us safe, or calling up the God Hotline to say “Help!” There’s nothing to stop us from doing this – it’s free! Didn’t they say the best things in life are free?

So how did I get the “wakeup call” to finally get to know God?

Growing up, my parents were devout Christians who were active in church and did their best to teach me about God. But to my younger self, stuff like “…” & “…” didn’t really make sense, and sometimes it was pretty puzzling. I felt as if they wanted me to get to know their God, but what I really needed was to get to know my God – to come to an understanding of God that made sense to me.

After many years of trying to get the hint, and some blessed souls I met along the way (like Mike Reyes, who you’ll read about later on), I finally got the “wakeup call”!

I think choosing to know God is a lot like shopping for shoes.

I’ve realized that when we buy shoes, we all look at the cut, the size, or how broad it is (if we have broad feet). Then we take out the cash and the leap of faith that the shoes won’t give us blisters or sore feet when we wear them out. The key here is that we had to take that leap of faith, not knowing how things with those shoes would turn out. But if things don’t turn out well, we tend to chuck those shoes aside or neglect those shoes.

Likewise, choosing to get to know God requires us to take a leap of faith, not really knowing how things would turn out. I think there are definitely moments when our faith will be tested, but if our first instinct is the same as with shoes that don’t fit, we end up chucking our relationship with God aside, or neglecting God.

That’s when we stop getting to know God, and that’s when we stop wearing those shoes that don’t fit.

Let’s go back to talking about shoes! What happens after throwing that pair of shoes away? I think a lot of us go out and get new ones. But how do we know that the new shoes will fit us great? We have to reflect and think back on the pair that didn’t fit and ask what the problem was. Was it too narrow? Was the material too stiff? We’ve got to get to know what works and what doesn’t so we can keep making more informed choices.

Now how does all this relate to forming a relationship with God? Well, what happens when there’s something we don’t understand about God? If we don’t replace our lack of understanding with some new answers, then we are basically continuing to wear shoes that hurt, shoes that don’t fit, and shoes we don’t like. But I think if we can replace ill-fitting shoes with better fitting shoes, then we should also be able to replace a lack of understanding with a better understanding. How? By going “shopping” for answers, to get to know what works and what doesn’t so we can make informed choices in our relationship with God.

I think that when we know what helps and what doesn’t help our relationship with God, then we can communicate with our parents what makes sense to us as we try to understand God.

Maybe at this point you’re thinking, “what difference does it make whether I have a relationship with God or not?”

The night before a party that my girlfriends and I were really looking forward to, there was a mega shoe sale with incredible discounts. It was a sale not to be missed, and we were there in a heartbeat! It was also all we could talk about the next day.

“Did you see that pair of strappy platforms with the carved wooden heel? Oh my gosh I was so tempted to buy them but I realized I already had another pair like that.”

“Yes! I saw those, they were so pretty but I got distracted by the silver pumps with the satin bow at the back. I just had to get them!”

I think there’s something uplifting about putting on a great pair of shoes: our posture changes, our mood changes, and even our height changes and our legs look longer. It’s as if shoes have some higher power that is sent from above.

We season our shoes, we polish our shoes, we protect our shoes in shoeboxes and shoe bags, we spend time gawking at shoes – we practically have a relationship with our shoes that just seems crazy to most men who don’t love shoes like we ladies do. And I have realized that the same goes when it comes to our relationship with God – our relationship with God is unfathomable to people who don’t have the same relationship with God.

Let’s compare what it’s like to wear shoes, and what it’s like not to wear shoes: suddenly, we are that much more vulnerable to all these dangers around us. The day after the shoe sale, we all turned up at the party in our new shoes. After a few hours of dancing and mingling, our feet started to hurt. So a few of my girlfriends took off their shoes thinking they could party in comfort. Being barefoot made them completely vulnerable: their toes were easily stepped on because there was nothing to protect their feet. When someone dropped a glass and it shattered on the dance floor, they were at high risk of getting cut by glass. And on our way out of the club, one of them came close to stepping on a cigarette butt left smoldering on the sidewalk. After all the danger their feet were exposed to, they decided it was a silly choice to go barefoot. They realized they should have kept their shoes on even if it hurt, because it wasn't worth getting stepped on, stepping on glass or cigarette butts.

Even though we could technically keep a lookout for these dangers and try to avoid them on our own, we are not all knowing. It’s hard to always keep tabs on the exact moment danger is going to strike or know exactly when danger is lurking.

I think the lesson here is that its better to wear shoes than not wear shoes at all. Likewise, having a relationship with God is very different from a life of not knowing God.

Shoes – like a relationship with God – offer us a layer of protection.

I’ve noticed that when we walk, our feet are always in contact with a surface, so they're most susceptible to wear and tear. And as we walk life's journey, I think we're bound to walk a rough road at some point, or get cut by foreign objects at some point – so shoes, like God, keep us protected as we go along.

A few years ago, my friend Tim was posted to Mumbai by the Singapore Tourism Board to promote Singapore in India. However, on the very night of the Mumbai shootings, he and his team randomly decided not to have their usual dinner in the Hotel and instead go out for dinner. It was a very close shave. The hotel they were staying at was the very hotel where the shootings occurred.

Was it divine intervention by a higher power, or pure coincidence?

Another time, my parents hadn’t visited my brother and I in Canada in years. As much as they wanted to, the Christmas period was too expensive to take a flight out, so they planned a holiday to Phuket instead. A few days before leaving for Phuket, my mom spent some time talking to God. She was then prompted to check her e-mail, even though it wasn’t even the address she usually checked, and she received a promotional email selling tickets to Canada at half the price! They decided to forgo their Phuket trip and head for Canada.

As it turned out, it wasn’t just a chance to go to Canada. It was the chance to escape the Tsunami that hit Phuket. ‘Coincidentally’, the beachside hotel that was worst hit was also the hotel my family had intended to stay at. If it were not for the ‘coincidence’, I might be writing this book as a tribute to my parents.

Was it divine intervention by a higher power, or pure coincidence?

I know some of us must be thinking, “But I’ve lived without a relationship with God all my life, and nothing really horrible has happened, so what’s the big deal?” Or likewise, “I’ve gone barefoot before, but nothing major has happened!”

But for all we know, we might have been blessed in ways we are not even aware of, like running a marathon thinking it was all accomplished on our own, but forgetting that we were blessed with legs that could run and the chance to own shoes that made the journey so much smoother.

Or maybe some of us might acknowledge that a higher power exists, but have never really established a relationship with God. I think it’s a pity when this happens. It's like having a good pair of shoes but never putting it on – sounds ridiculous but that's exactly what I did once: my ex-boyfriend’s mom bought me a pair of Calvin Klein heels as a gift. They were made of white suede and were incredibly comfortable. Yet I never dared to wear them out because I did not want to damage them. So I left them untouched in my wardrobe for years even though they were the best pair of shoes I owned. I am kicking myself just thinking about it!

Many years later I retrieved the shoes from my wardrobe, but they had yellowed and aged to the point where I could not wear them out anymore. That was then I realized I really wasted a good pair of shoes.

Looking back, I realized how silly I was for taking for granted the good things I was given in life. And I think we shouldn’t forget that all these good things in life are received through our relationship with God. Some of us might find this hard to relate to, but maybe it’s because their relationship with God isn’t completely comfortable yet.

Let’s think back to the party I talked about in the beginning of the chapter. Why did my girlfriends still take off their shoes halfway through the party? The shoes were uncomfortable. They didn't fit right. The thing is, as much as any shoe can provide physical protection, it has to fit our feet well. If the shoes don’t fit right, we’re bound to take them off and go barefoot.

Sometimes picking the right shoe match boils down to what we need the shoe for. We need boots in the winter, but definitely not at the beach! Imagine if the sand at the beach gets into our boots – that would be so uncomfortable, and definitely not what we need the shoe for. I think that when our shoes feel right, they help us accomplish more – just as when our relationship with God feels right, God can help us accomplish more.

It’s like the 100m race: if we ran the race barefoot, we would run pretty slowly and our feet would definitely be sore by the end of the race. Wearing some running shoes can help us run faster and definitely keep our feet protected.

But if we wore track shoes with spikes, they would give us a better grip and help launch us forward, meaning we can clock a much better timing. Those track shoes with spikes offer better comfort and are more appropriate to the activity or occasion at hand.

Or when we go shopping, it would feel fabulous to go in heels, but only if they fit our feet well enough for us to stay comfortable. Otherwise, it’s probably best to go shopping in flats because they’re easy to change out of (so we can try more shoes!), and we can shop for a longer time because our feet wouldn’t hurt.

Shoes are a really important part of the entire package, even if it’s not the first thing we would notice. They help protect us. They help us outperform ourselves, whether in height (like heels) or in speed (like sports shoes). It’s as if we are tapping on some higher power for better performance and better protection. That higher power is God, and you can call him anytime. Just clasp your hands together and close your eyes!

Notes to parents:

The shoes that work for you don't necessarily work for us. Likewise, the way you understand God might not make sense to us, or resonate with us. 

It would be great if you could help us find our own meaning in our walk with God, so that it doesn't feel like hand-me-down shoes: seasoned and comfortable to you, but possibly the wrong cut or design to suit us in terms of our age or our personal style.

 Imposing too many restrictions and attributing it to God is a lot like making us wear a shoe that is way too thick and padded: it offers great protection but it offers no ventilation or space to feel comfortable. If a shoe is that uncomfortable then we are more likely to take it off than keep it on, which is liken to rejecting God completely. This leaves us with no protection, or no God at all, defeating the purpose of teaching us about God to begin with

Please take note of your actions and behaviour because to us girls we need someone to exemplify the good of God. We need to see ‘God’s character in you before we will want to accept it in our lives. We are quick to judge just like the world we live in. So please be a good testimony for God in order to help us comprehend instead of rejecting God.