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 :)