Birth of Samuel

Today is the day old Steven died,
and the day new Samuel Steven was born. =D

My new identity (but I won't be changing IC very soon):
Name: Samuel Steven Setiawan, Jap
Biological B'day: 23 May 1987
Spiritual B'day: sometime end of January 2005
Water B'day: 2 Maret 2008 @ YWCA
Baptised by: Shuz & Debbie
Fellow Baptised: Kaelle, Erina
Witnessed by: Cong, Philo, Lays, Aloysius, DChuen, Xinyi, Yiyou, Raphael, Xiang, and others who witnessed me, Thanks lots!!!
First Feast at Botak Jones, AMK branch with Peter, Daniel, Cong, DChuen.

Some reasons why Ding Chuen suggested me to take the name of Samuel:
- he had a humble beginning
- he readily obeyed God's calling
- he was eager to grow

Initially I was not sure of taking the name Samuel (especially due to the overly used factor =/), until after chatting with Daniel Leow over dinner after the baptism, i started to think that Samuel is really who i deeply desire to be like. I won't realize his special characteristics if Daniel didn't speak to me. Samuel was the person who:
- rose 2 kings of Israel, Saul and David
- was a prophet ~ a spokesperson of God

Yea, basically these two things are the 'characteristics' that I want to grow towards to, following the example of Samuel and Jesus, to disciple people to be great leaders and to be God's voice/hand (in terms of drawing/things that I do) to reach out to His people. The characteristics that DingChuen gave are basically the things that I can identify with, from the first time I know God personally up till now. So the name Samuel actually fulfill both 'criteria' for a proper baptism name, haha..

Anyway, some meanings of the name Samuel:

Samuel
= Heard of God ('Shama', heard; 'El', god/El (a god)),
OR
possibly as a sentence "God has heard",
with "Shama" as the verb and "El" as the subject
OR (Shmu'el in Hebrew)
Name of God (from Shem, meaning name)
However, in some contexts, Shem can also mean son, and hence
Samuel ~> son of El or son of God (translating El)
OR
"His name is El"

Honestly I prefer the 2nd meaning, "God has heard", because the rest are abit too strong to either describe myself or to be my inspiration. =/

Welcome to this world, Samuel!

My verse of the day:
"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ,
he is a new creation;
the old has gone, the new has come!"
[ 2 Corinthians 5:17 ]