World of Seven - My Writings - Happy Birthday Letter (ala Paul's Letters)

Written: 26 April 2006

Paul, the author of most of the New Testaments books, has a unique way in writing his letters to the early churches. The `textual signatures' are clearly identifiable in the opening and closing part of his letters.

Paul always starts his letters by writing: `From Paul, the apostle / servant of Christ Jesus. To <Church / Person Name>. Grace and peace to you from God...'. The first part of this kind of greetings is actually the style of writing letters at that time: From <sender(s)>, to <recipient(s)>. This is quite different from today's letter writing style where we put our name at the bottom of our letters. The second part of the greetings: `Grace and peace...' is Paul's style.

In the other end of his letters, Paul always close it with another set of greetings, usually to personal recipients, and again, the term `Grace' is repeated. (2 Thessalonians 3:17-18: I, Paul, write this greeting in my own hand, which is the distinguishing mark in all my letters. This is how I write. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.)

And of course, the main thing is still the contents, which are mainly in form of exhortations: Paul's encouraging messages, advices, or even rebukes to the early churches to point them back to God.

Motivated by such letters style, I adopt it to create this `interesting' happy birthday letter (at least the first few recipients of this birthday letter said that they are impressed). It is bilingual, and even augmented with chapter sectioning and verse identifiers. You can use it as your own birthday greeting letter too. Of course you need to personalize the content as much as you can. Here, I provide the generic template which you can re-use. I believe that, if you write the letter carefully, somehow your friend will be quite impressed :). No need to mention me as the original author as I also 'copy' Paul's idea.

Actually, you can modify this for other occasions, not only for birthdays. For example, you can use this kind of letter to greet your family or your friend far away, etc. To make it more `impressive', give your letter a title: `Jakarta 1', `Singapore 2', etc as in the Bible :).

Let's make your friend's birthday a meaningful one by sending this kind of letters.

Ucapan Selamat Ulang Tahun
untuk
<Nama Temanmu>

Happy Birthday Greeting
to
<Your Friend's Name>

1. Salam

¹Dari <namamu>, pengikut Kristus Yesus. ²Kepada sahabatku, <panggilan lainya>, <nama temanmu>. ³Saya turut mengucap syukur kepada Allah atas ulang tahun mu yang ke-<XX> yang jatuh pada tanggal <hari ultahnya> ini. ⁴<XX> tahun, atau seperempat abad, yang penuh syukur. (Terinspirasi dari: Pembukaan surat-surat Paulus)

1. Greeting

¹From <your name>, the follower of Christ Jesus, ²To my friend, <his / her other titles>, <your friend's name>. ³I praise the Lord for your <XX>^nd birthday today, <the birth date>. ⁴<XX> years, or a quarter of century, full of praises. (Inspired by: The opening of Paul's letters)

2. Tentang Hari Ulang Tahun

¹Bagi saya pribadi, yang bisa saja berbeda dengan tata nilaimu, hari ulang tahun bukan cuma hari bahagia, tetapi juga adalah waktu yang diberikan Tuhan untuk evaluasi dan refleksi. ²Sebuah kairos untuk merenungkan masa lalu, sekarang, dan masa depan. ³Mensyukuri segala berkat Tuhan yang sudah saya terima di masa lalu. ⁴Merenungkan posisi saya sekarang dan mencari kehendak Tuhan kemana saya harus melangkah. ⁵Lalu menyerahkan harapan, ambisi, mimpi-mimpi kita kepada Tuhan. ⁶Mempersilahkan Dia menuliskan rencanaNya didalam kehidupan kita. ⁷Sehingga, bila hari ini kamu mendengar suara Tuhan berbicara padamu, jangan keraskan hatimu. (Ibrani 3:15)

2. About Birthday

¹For me personally, which of course can be different with your values, birthday is not just a happy day, but also the time that God give us for evaluation and reflection. ²A cairos to think about past, present, and future. ³Giving praise to the Lord for every blessings that I have received in the past. ⁴Evaluate my present position and asking Him where should I go next? ⁵And then I will let my hope, ambition, dreams, back to God. ⁶Let Him write His plan to our life. ⁷Therefore, if you hear His voice speaking to you today, don’t harden your heart. (Hebrew 3:15)

3. Harapan-Harapan (Matius 7:11)

¹Secara pribadi, saya berharap <harapanmu untuk temanmu> ²Saya juga mendoakan cita-citamu yang mungkin kamu punya untuk masa depanmu. ³Semoga apa yang kamu cita-citakan tersebut sesuai dengan kehendak Tuhan.

⁴Saya mendoakan juga untuk pergumulan atau tantangan yang mungkin sedang atau akan kamu hadapi, baik yang sudah saya ketahui dari cerita-ceritamu maupun yang tidak saya ketahui. ⁵Tetaplah berjuang, semoga Tuhan menjawab pergumulan imanmu dengan memberikan jalan keluar yang terbaik untuk penyelesaian masalah-masalah tersebut. (1 Korintus 10:13)

⁶Saya melihat kamu sebagai seseorang yang mempunyai iman yang kuat, dan saya memuji Tuhan untuk itu. ⁷Tetap peliharalah iman tersebut dengan saat teduh rutin, rajin membaca kitab suci (1 Timotius 4:13), dan menjaga hubungan pribadi dengan Tuhan.⁸Jangan lupa untuk melaksanakan janji-janji iman yang pernah kamu buat, ⁹dan jadilah selalu garam dan terang dimanapun kau berada. (Matius 5:13-14)

3. Wishes (Matthew 7:11)

¹Personally, I hope that <your hopes for your friend>. ²I also pray for your dreams for your future. ³Hopefully whatever that you dreamt of are aligned with God’s will. (James 5:16)

⁴I also pray for your current and perhaps future struggles or difficulties, those that I know directly from your stories and those that I’m not aware of. ⁵Keep on persevering, hopefully God will reward your faith struggles by giving you the best solutions for those problems. (1 Corinthians 10:13)

⁶I see you as someone with strong faith, and I praise the Lord for that. ⁷Please keep your faith with consistent quiet times, reading scriptures (1 Timothy 4:13), and maintaining personal relationship with God. ⁸Don’t forget to fulfill any commitments that you have made before God, ⁹and always be salt and light wherever you are. (Matthew 5:13-14)

4. Salam Penutup

¹Kembali kuucapkan: selamat ulang tahun. ²Kasih karunia Yesus Kristus Tuhan kita menyertai kamu di hari yang berbahagia ini dan juga di hari-hari mendatang (2 Timotius 4:22), ³sehingga kamu juga bisa menjadi berkat bagi orang-orang lain disekitarmu (Kejadian 12:3). Amin.

4. Final Greeting

¹Again I greet you: happy birthday. ²Let the grace of Jesus Christ our Lord be with you in this happy day and remains in the subsequent days (2 Timothy 4:22), ³so that you too can be a blessings for others (Genesis 12:3). Amen.