maryland summer '10

back from maryland with the cg. it was a one day road trip for 3 hours to eat crabs literally for 3 hours at an all you can eat place and just have one last day of fellowship with the crew. it was a blessed experience and just a wonderful time of bonding and laughing. thank God for the community he has so richly blessed me with. i'm sure the rest feel the same. thank God, thank God, thank God. <3 He is so good. i really love my cg with all my heart- each and every person is so special and blessed. i pray that we will continue to build each other up positively in God's love and spirit so we can just expand and grow into a God-loving ministry- to empower everyone everywhere with God, God, God! hehe. i know God will use us to do awesome things for him and with him. i'm excited to see what he has in store for us. i know that our friendships will be lifelong with God's blessing. it's so wonderful to just see all this building up and growing with each and every day of fellowship.

so tired from the trip, so will end with this..
O praise Him!
:) haha

fight the good fight.
persevere through the trials, attacks, persecution;
stay steadfast in faith and love
and know that above all,
God is sovereign.

James 1:2-4
1 Corinthians 15:58

God is so good, beyond measure.
to him be the glory forever and ever.
Amen.

no fear in love

lately i feel God challenging me to love my brothers and sisters as i love him and more than i love myself. it's such a daunting task in my mind.. just because of the fact that i've held on to many grudges.. but i know that part of loving God is loving his sons and daughters. which is why i've resolved to make amends- in due time. i need preparation though.. i don't think i'm strong enough to do it on my own. but i know if i ask, God will carry me through it. through prayer and petition God will hear me and prepare my heart. ahhh! it's a scary thought. but i know that i'll feel so much more at ease when it's done. one passage that really struck me was 1 John 4:19-21 when apostle John says:

"We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother."

when i came across that verse, i was taken aback and the weirdest feeling of dread overtook my whole body. i felt so burdened and heartbroken to think it was true. Am i a truly a liar because i may have trouble loving others? Do i fail to love God because i fail to love my neighbors? It was like God instilled in my heart the sorrow he was feeling because of my inability to love like he commanded.. and i've never felt so burdened. after reading that, i took some time to pray and resolved to reconcile with 2 people whose relationships i've been pushing to the back of my head as if they never existed. but God knows. i can't hide from it any more and i don't think i want to.. because i do love Him. and i don't want to be seen as a liar in his eyes.. sigh!

i shouldn't be scared.. "There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear... the one who fears is not made perfect in love" 1 John 4: 18. i know im far from perfect and so maybe so is my love, but through Him i strive to be. i know i should try to emulate Christ in the things i think and the things i do, but in this world it's so hard.. and as a flawed being it's even harder. but hopefully my love for God and my desire to make him happy will drive out my fear and banish my selfishness. and when i do, i know God will reward me in full. :) if he can love even the dirtiest and darkest of hearts, i can definitely love my neighbors.

love

2 Corinthians 12:9-10
"But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong."

<3 one of many and will never cease to amaze me

a different perspective for a change

"Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add color to my sunset sky."
-Rabindranath Tagore

doing all for God :)

"A man can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in his work. This too, I see, is from the hand of God, for without him, who can eat or find enjoyment? To the man who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge and happiness, but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and storing up wealth to hand it over to the one who pleases God. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind."

Ecclesiastes 2:24-26

stress-free during stress time

so it's already the end of this week and wow.. i can say that it's been a crazy couple of days. first with all the cramming, and second how all that cramming didn't pay off since our exam was pushed back to monday. it's weird.. i came into this semester worrying about my grades and how i would have to juggle my time, how many hours i would have to invest at the library and just grieved over how much sleep i would lose to my books. but after i turned to Christ- and He to me (January 24, 2010 hehe) my heart became so at ease. yeah i still worried and sometimes my burdens and stresses of school in general would overwhelm me with hopelessness, but after praying that i would just leave all my burdens at His feet, i truly feel at peace. the power of prayer is just amazing.. and i can only say i wish i had known earlier. i took my first pchem exam today and just before it started, i remember feeling so safe-that even though i am so inadequate and lack so much knowledge, God ables me. i took time to just close my eyes and pray for strength and wisdom and just the ability to get through the exam without any time issues (which is almost always my problem- any of my friends would know haha) and before i knew it, i was done with the exam. it was like God truly just filled me and amazingly, i even finished with 1o minutes to spare! i was in utter shock since that never ever happens to me and then i thought wow God, you truly are great. i remember even whispering "thank you" while finishing the last of the questions and just smiling. oh boy, if anyone saw or heard me oopsies hehe they probs think im psycho. i'm just grateful that God is really with me wherever i go and whatever i do.. He just empowers me and lifts me up when im struggling or lost or feel like i can't continue.. and when i can't focus on my studying or task at hand, i just read a passage from the Bible and ask for strength and He gives so freely. His Grace is like water- so free.

when i think about my last entry about God's lost sheep and how i feel challenged, i realize that God really answered my prayers. i prayed for discomfort in the sense that i didn't want to become too comfortable and stray away from Him and only now do i see that God really provided me with a challenge to keep me focused on Him. He really does answer prayers in ways that you would never expect but its refreshing and rewarding at the end. i prayed that He would be with me during this week and yes, He really was. :) Thank You.

exam week eek!

"I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you."
(Matthew 17:20-21)

stress, cramming, and crankiness for exam week... nothing will be impossible if i have faith. yesss! :)

lost sheep :)

wow. today has just been filled with so many blessings. the three of four people who i've been praying for came out to church all in one day. and today's sermon was so relevant to them that in the middle of it i remember just thinking wow.. God really does wonders. i feel like lately God has been presenting me with so many challenges to see whether or not im strong.. or more like willing. i feel like He's bringing me to all these people whom i would never stop and speak to let alone become close friends with and who are struggling somewhat with their spiritual lives. what He thinks i of all people can make of it-- i don't know. i was talking to a friend today who has ultimately stopped believing in God for two whole hours straight just about faith and the awe and wonders of God himself. i felt like it was God presenting me with such a huge challenge-- there i am sitting in front of this person who knows the Bible theology inside out while i'm still on the first pages of Genesis, who's been on mission trips while i've just gone to my first retreat, who's been a Bible study teacher, who's friends with pastors and is connected on deep levels, and there i am- such a newcomer and a new heart to Jesus. It was truly a daunting task. my mind was racing for the right things to say, my heart wanted him to be drawn close and captured by the stories of how God mediated my life. but at the same time i was thinking, what would God want me to say? as we talked i pulled out my Bible and just started reading him passages that i thought were relevant to him.. and as i was reading them i was thinking, will this even hit a note in his heart? do i just look like a fool trying to reel this person in? but in my heart, i knew it was right.. i was once told that if you are doing anything for God, it can never be wrong (jasmine :]) i shared the passage about the temptation of Jesus with him (Matthew 4:1-11) and another one in Hebrews 12:14-15. The latter says "...see to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many." i think that verse really fueled my heart to continue sharing my own little testimony (hehe) and regardless of my lack of Bible knowledge, i had the knowledge of my heart that i love God, which God has freely given to me. His grace is so great. His mercy is undeniable. His love overflows. at one point i was telling this person that i don't even know why i was doing this- that on a usual instance i would just say hi and bye and we would pass each other and go our own separate ways and live our own separate lives.. but something in me was truly being lit up like fire and i was burning for this person to know God again. it's such an amazing feeling to know that maybe you of all people can make this person change his life around. that this person, like me, can too be saved. maybe it hits me more on a personal level because i've been lost for so long.. just like these people that God continues to reveal to me. i know what it's like to be in that place.. that dark and scary road where everything is so pessmistic and gloomy, where life has no meaning or purpose. and i can't imagine going back there again. it took me so long to find light, and i think it's going to be equally hard if not harder to continue to reach out to people.. to bring them closer to experiencing God's greatness. but in the end, i know it will be rewarding.. like Jesus says, although i might toil and struggle, because i have faith, i will produce many crop and be fruitful. i'll end this entry with this passage i shared with another friend:

"See that you do not look down on one of these little ones. For i tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven. What do you think? If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine in the hills and go look for the one that wandered off? And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off. In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should be lost."
(Matthew 18:10-14)

in all the ways that i can, i will gather the lost and bring them home- and this is my promise to Him. :)

a new challenge

i may not have been realizing it, but lately i think i've been burning out. i'm more prone to straying, more easily distracted by worldly things, by time, school, people, sleep.. that i'm not even feeling that fervor for God anymore- like its in the far distance kind of locked away until another event happens that might be a key and open it. why is it that such things like retreats or formal events like outreaches have to be the only things that instill a deep burning fire in my heart for God and His word? why can't it be just a daily feeling- one that can overwhelm me and make me smile and feel so happy regardless of whatever i'm going through, whether it be exams or stress or problems with people?

i realize that i'm so weak.. and although i may think that i have so much power over my faith and my relationship with God, it doesn't work that way. Pastor Jae preached that your relationship with God is a two-way street, that once God takes you, you must equally continue to reciprocate that love and trust back to Him. and by that, i mean daily. and i realize that without prayer, there is no other way to communicate with God, thereby stalling and even weakening the relationship you have established with Him. It's so easy to just forget to pray before falling asleep or saying a quick prayer in the morning when you wake up.. time itself is sometimes such a huge challenge in every way- it limits how long you can talk with God. but i know i can't completely blame it on time-- it's myself who is also to blame. i let time take advantage of me because i don't manage it well. i let it pass and i complain so often that time flew by and that i got nothing done when instead it was my own actions that allowed that to occur. like this, i blame all the problems i'm having with God on other things when it's really me that's causing it. God's still there, reaching out for me, pursuing me and calling out to me, it's just that i've become deaf to His voice. In Matthew 13:14-15 Jesus says,

"You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving. For this people's heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them."

Like the verse says, i can only be healed if i can start hearing again- if i become undeafened by all the things that are distracting me from God. I need to be able to trust God enough to lay down all my doubts, worries, and sins down at His feet so that He can take care of it all and that way i would be free to be an able body to serve Him. it makes so much sense in that context, but ideas are so much easier heard than applied. i have to start taking responsibility of my own actions and stop blaming it on other things.. i have to stop being so selfish and be humble enough to admit to God that hey, it's my fault that i'm slipping away from You and i'm truly sorry for that. and i have to willing enough to ask, "will You pursue me?" my own selfishness even got me to think last week that i didn't need to go to prayer meeting because i didn't have anything to pray about. how selfish is that thought? that even if i don't have a specific prayer request, so many others out there do. and the least i can do is say a request on behalf of them. why do i stray so easily when i think that i won't? is it because i've been feeling comfortable of where i am and how far i've come? it's that comfort that's so dangerous.. it leads you to stray and get off track and in the midst of it, you still think you're faith is steady and perfect and that it doesn't need to change. i will pray for God to challenge me, to make me uncomfortable so that i won't be led into the same trap time and time again. maybe discomfort in some sense will help me to actually act differently and progress.

To end this post, here's a verse that seems to soothe me regardless of my anxieties and worries. It says,

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light." (Matthew 11:28-30)

:)

spread like fire

yesterday i traveled to harlem to attend an Outreach called Don't Walk By that tended to the homeless. it was an amazing experience to just go out there and see all these people who volunteered their time to just simply reach out to those who are so often ignored and deemed insignificant, those who are so inopportune that they have to collect bottles to make a living, sleep on cardboard boxes on others' steps, those who are so unfairly unentitled to showers or clean clothes or jackets in this cold weather. so many people from all different races and ages from all different places showed up just to help out- even from out of the country. there was no guarantee that we would even find homeless people since it was so cold outside, yet not even weather or the risk of catching a cold stopped them.. it was truly humbling to see that. a passage that pretty much summed up the true purpose of the event is in Luke 14:21 when Jesus says:

"...Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame."

it is these people that Jesus describes- the poor, the crippled, the blind, and lame- whom He truly loves. God loves the poor for they have nothing else but spirit.. and i think that's something that's truly admirable. these homeless still had the spirit and the faith to take my hand, hold it and say "God bless you." all i could do for them was embrace their hand for those few seconds, return the phrase and smile.. but i wanted to do so much more. there were not even too many homeless that came back to the church.. but for the few who made it back, i think God really showed them His grace through these volunteers. one deaf man cried because he was so touched that young people were trying to help him. of all people, they chose me, he probably was thinking. but i really think it was God who pursued these people and it is God who continues to pursue them. those whose hearts are open and soft and are ready to accept something so much bigger and better, i believe, will truly be saved. walking around the streets saying our prayers outloud and asking God to bless the neighborhood really instilled in me this great wave of encouragement and love.. and it was just God's presence that really fueled me throughout the day and allowed me to battle the weather and other circumstances. through it all, i must keep on reminding myself that it is not me who works, but it is Him who works through me.
and how i love being used :)

Vision 2010.

Blessed.

no other words can describe the feeling i have. no smile, no laughter, no tear can compare to my experience at Vision, to the messages i've learned. i've been a witness to God's love, to a living testimony and nothing could ever replace that- no exciting weekend at home, no vacation, nothing.

when i think about my actions and the reasons i had to keep myself from going, i feel so stupid and ashamed. what could be better than God? what else is there to look forward to than Him? What do i want more than to seek His face? To let my own uncomfort or my own wordly likings get in the way of finding God really disappoints me. and when i think about that, i realize that maybe i'm still so far away from where i want to me.. than i may not like where i am afterall.. because apparently i do stray and i do slip back to my past mentality. i know i'm only human and i know i've only just started to come to God.. but i would die to see myself back where i was. and sometimes it's so easy to go back. sleep, time, school, food, family, friends, the world itself is such a distraction, sometimes my own worst enemy. and to think that i have to constantly put up a battle and be on my guard for God overwhelms me. but the truth of the matter is i long to do it. i have this deep fervor for God and maybe that's why i cry so much when i talk to Him. or maybe my sinful heart just longs for forgiveness and its so dirty that it comes out through my tears. either way, i don't want to stay this way. and i know for sure that that is truth.

Like Dr. John Kim, i want to have a vision. or in his case, multiple visions. he's so Blessed in so many ways imaginable. it's so encouraging and simply amazing to see God's child, 77 years old, who still has Christ's love burning in his heart, or "His blood pumping through my heart" as he put it. it's just truly amazing. and wow.. i want to become a living testimony like that. and it will be so hard to face SO many obstacles along the way, to lose SO many things like Dr. Kim did.. but in the end you're gaining the one thing that matters in this life.. God's love. it's a scary thought to imagine my life flashing by my eyes.. to think of the battles i may have to face because i have declared that i want to be what God created me to be. but anything is better than having to waste my life trying to seek Him and failing because of my mere selfishness and stupidity. because then what is life?

so God, i pray that You would reveal Your own vision for me. so i can be so much more than what i am now.. so i can do so many more things than i am doing now. so that i can see bigger and better things to which i am blind to and so that i may one day see You.

preparing myself..

so in a few hours i'll be at the GCC Vision retreat in Princeton.. and i'm a little nervous but excited. i think the nerves have calmed down def. a lot since the beginning of the week when i started to contemplate whether or not i should go.. and now the time is here! hopefully i stay focused, my heart stays soft and open, and my eyes stay set on the sight of Him. and knowing God has heard my prayers, i know i won't be distracted by little things. most of all, i hope i grow in Him, closer than i've ever imagined or ever wished. but more than that, i hope i maintain that love- something that's not ephemeral, but something that stays with me.

ahhhh we'll see! see you saturday night!

a new place.. a great one

i really like where i am. i like where i stand, i like the way i feel, i like the way i love. i enjoy raising my hands in the air knowing that He's so close, knowing that i might be able to get that much closer. I like how i feel comforted when i close my eyes to sleep knowing that He has listened to my prayers. I like how i cry, because crying although embarrassing, shows that I do really care, that i may in fact have genuine feelings. And i fear for those people who are indifferent but most of all i fear for myself-- that maybe one day i might slip, i might stray off the path i'm supposed to be on and land on a deserted stretch of land that no body dares to go.

I feel myself caught in a dilemma and i dislike the feeling. i don't like it at all. this year's GCC retreat is coming up this weekend, and i'm stuck here debating whether or not i should attend. i was struggling for hours, thinking about the pro's and con's, basically analyzing- the thing i do best. but i think i've made my decision. and i realize if i had just listened to my heart rather than channeling all the pressures from my peers and expectations that i feel i'm supposed to live up to, i would have got to my answer fairly quickly. so here it is: i won't go. the reason is pretty simple yet so complex. so i listed the things that i like and a few that i don't like. here's the things that i want.

i want to grow more and more in Him. I want to experience all the joys and all the rewards there are in living, breathing His words and His visions. I want to know my place in the world. i want to serve, do something better with my life. but all these things i want i feel take time. and that's what i need.. i need time to grow, time for my heart to become soft and more loving. faith doesn't blossom overnight. it takes a long time for someone to trust, to believe 100% that God will provide for every little thing. it's a long road before sacrificing your all to serve. and by that i mean sacrificing materialistic things, things that you may not need but that you want. things that are better for others and not for yourself. i know this is true, and for some who don't choose to believe that it is in fact hard, they may not be as humble as they should be. and for these reasons, for the mere fact that it takes time to grow and blossom, i choose to grow in my own time so that i may feel comfortable. i don't want to feel uncomfortable at this retreat- maybe because i don't know as many people, maybe because i don't feel apart of the church community yet. i mean, i barely went and i definitely wasn't considered a regular church-goer. i don't want to feel pressured nor envy others' relationship with God. i don't want my own uncomfort to hinder me from focusing my attention on Him. Recall from my previous blog an excerpt:

"Daughter. I will never leave you or forsake you. But, you must wait. Don’t be anxious. Do not get in a hurry. Don’t look around and fear or envy the things others have received from me. You must keep from looking off or away."

And like those very words, i won't look around and i won't fear. i like the place i'm in, the feelings that i have. and if it feels so good, i must be doing something right... right? maybe it's not the time for my first retreat.. maybe my heart has to be in it 100% before going. maybe it just takes time. but i know He won't leave me, so i have nothing to fear. my heart is finally at rest :)