¹There were some present at that very time who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. ²And he answered them, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? ³No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. ⁴Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? ⁵No, I tell you; but unless yourepent, you will all likewise perish.”

Now this passage has a very clear message but also another amazing implication that I would not have thought of.  The very clear message is the message of Romans 3:23 and 6:23 that we are all sinners and have fallen short of God’s glory; therefore, we all deserve death and eternal punishment in hell.  Jesus made clear to his audience that just because certain calamities or accidents happen to certain people does not mean that they are worse than the people who still live.

It is interesting though that the first group of people that Jesus mentioned were people who were in the temple giving sacrifices who ended up being killed there also, which as MacArthur pointed out in his sermon about this passage, could be classified by most people as “good people,” who did what can be considered right in the eyes of men.  So people might ask, “What kind of God kills ‘good’ people?  What kind of God kills innocent people in a catastrophe?”

Both of which sound valid to me, especially when a calamity just happened and everyone is very emotional and empathic.  But MacArthur pointed out that we are asking the wrong question.  Our question should be, “What kind of God lets anyone live?”  Especially if we have the background knowledge that He is a holy and righteous God and we are filthy sinners deserving of death and punishment.  The real question is, “Why are we still here, despite that truth?”  The answer is in the passage: REPENT.  God is giving people time to repent from their sins and turn to Him.  How amazing is that?

Now, just to clarify what repentance means – according to the Greek Lexicon, it means

“to change one’s mind for better, heartily to amend with ABHORRENCE of one’s past sins.”

And as John Piper (and other pastors) said in his sermon, repentance is a 180 degree turn AWAY from sin towards Christ.

Two things I truly got out of my quiet time today: God’s kindness and repentance – God’s kindness truly leads us to repentance as Paul said in Romans.  And even as I conclude my blog post, I am still in amazement of God’s mercy and grace in my life, I hope that you are in amazement too.

I am a pastor’s kid and for the longest time I had the unconscious, perhaps conscious, thought that I am saved because I am a “good child.”  I did not steal, I did not curse, I went to church every Sunday, I read my Bible, I prayed — name the religious thing to do, I did it. Now it is interesting that about four years ago, my eyes were opened to my own hypocrisy and “woes” as Jesus said in the passage I just read.  I was simply doing religious things while I was rotting inside and earning my way to hell, because my “good works” were simply filthy rags in God’s sight.  My parents’ faith could not save me. Church attendance could not save me. Simply being outwardly religious COULD NOT save me.

From the passage, Jesus names what kind of things the religious leaders were doing that were still earning them their condemnation such as outward cleansing, meaningless rituals, pride, deceitful, misusing Scripture, neglecting justice and the love of God. The religious leaders showed-off their cleanliness by washing their hands, not for hygienic purposes, but to show off that they are washing off their contamination when they touched anything unclean.  They had other meaningless rituals which were also ways of showing off how “good” and “clean” and “moral” they are.  They all sought the praises of other people.  They did all those things so they can say that they are better than everyone else.  They did these things to cover up their rotting souls.  They were all for making themselves feel good.  They misused Scripture and added other rituals and requirements, which Jesus condemned.

Out of all the things that Jesus named, the ones that I think stuck out to me and summarizes everything is verse 42; it says,

“But woe to you Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and every herb, and neglect justice and the love of God.” (ESV)

This means they followed the Law and they did everything that is right in their own eyes but neglected the most important commandments — love the Lord your God and love your neighbor as yourself.  Now we cannot do any of these without God’s transforming power and the help of the Holy Spirit in our lives, both of which only true followers of Christ have.  By God’s grace, I know firsthand the difference between practicing false and true spirituality/religion.  Praise God that He did not give up on such a selfish hypocritical rotten sinner and gave me grace that I will never ever deserve.  I hope this encourages people and also wakes up other people who might be in the position that I was in years ago. This does not mean that I am now perfect, but my God is working in me everyday.

I got struck by the passage that I read today.  See, I usually read a passage or two from the Old Testament then from the New Testament.  And today, I decided to go back to the beginning of the New Testament and read about the Lord Jesus’ life and ministries again.  The chronological Bible took me to Luke’s account of John and Jesus’ conception and birth (Luke 1:1-80).  And God reminded me of something.

That God TRULY uses people — weak, imperfect, doubtful humans – to fulfill His great plans. Just think about the greatest plan that God has ever revealed to us, his plan for SALVATION.  Who did He use to bring the Savior into the world?  Who did He use to prepare people for the coming of the Savior?  He used these people:

• Zechariah and Elizabeth – barren and old
• Mary – young virgin

But God chose to use them to fulfill His plan of saving us, not because of their perfection, superpowers, talents, might, fame or money, but because of their FAITH and WILLINGNESS to be used by God in great and mighty ways. Zechariah and Elizabeth were considered “upright in the sight of God” and they were  “observing all the Lord’s commandments and regulations blamelessly.” (Luke 1:6)  I’m pretty sure they weren’t perfect people because the angel Gabriel later said that Zechariah doubted the prophesy him having a son at an old age.  Nevertheless, they were obedient and faithful to God.

As for Mary, well, she was a young woman, virgin at that.  Those words are not necessarily the best description during her time.  She was considered lowly.  But God chose her to bear the Savior of the world.  Why?  Because she “has found favor in God,” (Luke 1:30) according to the angel Gabriel.  How?  Well, later on you can see that Mary calls herself “the Lord’s servant” (Luke 1:38) and submits to God’s plans.  Yes, Mary was a young virgin, but God used her to be the carrier of the One who saved us from eternal punishment.  How awesome is that!

After reading this, yes, I know it’s not a new passage to read, but it’s just amazing that God reminded me that despite my failures, He still loves me and will still use me for His glory - as long as I remember how much of a failure and sinner I am compared to a loving, Holy God every morning that I wake up and continue to have faith, trust Him wholeheartedly and submit to His will.

It’s just such an amazing reminder that even though we’ve failed so many times, God still accepts us AND uses us to fulfill His awesome plans.  Hope you realize the same thing!

So besides praying for my beloved friends, here’s an encouragement:

Psalm 73 (Contrasts the fate of the wicked from the fate of the righteous in Christ cos of God’s faithfulness)

²⁵ Whom have I in heaven but you?
       And earth has nothing I desire besides you.

²⁶ My flesh and my heart may fail, 
       but God is the strength of my heart
       and my portion forever.

²⁷ Those who are far from you will perish;
       you destroy all who are unfaithful to you.

²⁸ But as for me, it is good to be near God.
       I have made the Sovereign LORD my refuge;
       I will tell of all your deeds.

And here’s the song “The Words I Would Say” by the Sidewalk Prophets:

(If you can’t play it, search it on YouTube, it’s a good song)

And for my other friends who need prayer, just text me and send me a message.  What are brothers/sisters in Christ for right

Let me recount my 2009. 

• I turned 20 this year and my first thought during my birthday was, “Where did all those years go?  How did I turn 20 so fast?” Haha, I know it is quite funny.  But it’s true, it’s what I felt like. Then of course, I thanked God that I actually got to live at least 20 years so far. 
• A green card approval notice came that early July Saturday that we were raising funds for the then-planned young adults retreat.  I tell you, I was jumping up and down with joy and praises in my heart.
• Talking about the then-planned retreat, it was canceled, and sure enough that brought sadness to all of us, especially to us who were the committee planning for it.  But looking back, it was an awesome experience planning for it.  We all got to know each other better and we actually had something we were aiming for for once. 
• Another thing to add to my unforgettable summer, church issues that affected me so much.  Now, I don’t want to recount that at all.  All is well now, praise the Lord.  All I want to say about that is that I learned so much and got closer to my family, to my church family, to my boyfriend and his family.  God is truly good.  He never gives us something that we can’t handle.  I learned a lot of things, especially of how faithful God really is.  He truly never changes in spite of changing people and circumstances around us.
• To close my unforgettable summer, my mission trip to Alaska.  I learned a lot of things in that trip, especially about opening up to people.  You cannot live with walls up and showing everyone you’re okay when you’re not.  And also, I learned how to love people to Christ.  Sometimes, it is better to just show God’s love on top of telling people about it.
• Early fall was when I started meeting up with my awesome cell group (with Ate Kristine, Tash and Myrrh).  That’s another thing I wanna thank God for.  I have awesome ladies to share my burdens with and who encourage me so much.  I love them.
• My boyfriend and I celebrated our first year anniversary in September.  That is really something to be praised God for.  We have a long distance relationship with a 3-hour difference in time zone.  Add to that what we went through during the summer.  God’s awesome.
• I got a job in October. Praise the Lord.
• Oh of course, my in-state classification battle in school.  I fought for that for 2 months.  And there was nothing else I could do but drop by the residency classification office as much as I can, give them every evidence of my Maryland residency, and pray pray pray.  Now, I’m proud to say that God has blessed me with that residency status.  Therefore, I can finally be a full-time student in the spring semester.
• And oh, God blessed me with a $1000 scholarship for the spring semester.  That’s minus a fourth of my tuition.

Those are just the highlights of my 2009, there’s more to praise God for.  Here’s a disclaimer: TO GOD BE THE GLORY.  I did not blog about this for my own sake but to boast of the faithful and loving Father’s works.

During the first week of December, I read Psalm 40 and I saw this passage:

Many, O Lord my God, are the wonders You have done.  The things You planned for us no one can recount to You; were I to speak and tell of them, they would be too many to declare. (verse 5, NIV)

After reading that verse, all I can say was, “Yes. Very true.”  God has done so many things in 2009 and even though I’m not assured of what 2010 will bring, I am sure that my Father is faithful and good.

Starting today, I’m going to try to blog about what I read during my quiet time, especially the verses that popped out while I’m reading.  My posts will not be as long as my past posts but it’s all about quality not quantity.  And God’s Word is the is priceless.

• Luke 17:1-10 – In this passage, Jesus was talking about forgiveness and faith.  Right before verses 3 and 4, Jesus was saying how it’s not good to lead other people to sin or to abuse people, especially children.  Then He says:
• “So watch yourselves.  If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him.  If he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times comes back to you and says ‘I repent,’ forgive him.” (vv3-4)
• This is such an interesting passage because I’ve seen this disobeyed a lot of times, by me and by other people.  In our circle of influences, we are accountable for our brothers and sisters and Christ.  Rebuking doesn’t mean beat the other person up because he’s imperfect, but it means bring to his or her attention the sin that you see and then restore and encourage that person in the Lord. We’ve seen Jesus do this a lot of times during His ministry on earth.  Sure, He rebuked a lot of people, but His purpose and goal was always to restore them back to God, not to break them and leave them torn into pieces.

• Psalm 34 – David’s psalm when he pretended to be insane before Abimelech (when he was running away from King Saul, I believe)
• “Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him.” (v8)
• It’s just always awesome to be reminded of God’s goodness every single day.  It encourages us to live daily with joy and peace in our hearts.  To live and influence other people with that joy and God’s love and goodness.

I’ve got peace like a river/I’ve got peace like a river/
I’ve got peace like a river in my heart

I’ve got peace like a river/I’ve got peace like a river/
I’ve got peace like a river in my heart…

Today, we had our usual Wednesday prayer meeting, and yes, as always, it was refreshing.  There is something so amazing about just lifting everything up to God.  He just really takes away the worries and replaces it with His peace that surpasses all understanding. Oh yeah, I am such a worrier, always Miss Practical.  But worrying won’t do anything but stress me out and waste my time.  Praying…. is indescribable, oh, especially when you do it with people who are passionate for the things they are submitting to God.  This blog is a short one, I just wanted to share my thoughts.  But yeah, after my turn to pray, I just had “Peace Like a River” playing in my head.

For all other worriers out there:

Philippians 4 (NIV)

^“4Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! ⁵Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. ⁶Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. ⁷And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”

By Your Side – Tenth Avenue North

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J95rAr0gOFU

Jesus loves me this I know / For the Bible tells me so

Little ones to Him belong / They are weak but He is strong.

Yes, Jesus loves me.  Yes, Jesus loves me.

Yes, Jesus loves me.  The Bible tells me so.

Now, who doesn’t remember that?  Good times, huh?  Anyways, I just thought of that song right now after looking at my notes from Sunday’s sermon and Tuesday’s small group.  It’s interesting how they are connected.

It was my dad’s installation service on Sunday and the sermon was delivered by Rev. Dan Peterson, the executive minister of the Mideast Baptist Conference (MBC).  I really liked the passionate and sincere way he delivered God’s message.  He based the message on 2 Corinthians 4:1-7.  He discussed three things: Attitude of the congregation (recognize the role of the pastor as called by God), Attitude of the pastor (leadership with integrity in life and ministry and proclaiming Jesus), and the combined effort of the pastor and the congregation (authenticity, vulnerability, genuine relationship).  The last point he made struck me.  He said something about us being jars of clay and what that really means.  As jars of clay, that means we are fragile and sensitive.  We are weak but we were designed to be used not to be displayed. What does that mean for us followers of Christ?  Well, this was the part where I was struck and my perspective totally changed.  This just reminded me that God uses the weak for the fulfillment of His will, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 1:26-31.  Ok, now I’m going to talk about the topic we talked about in my small group, hang in there, and you’ll realize how they connect.

In my amazing small group (I truly thank God for them), we talked about Esther’s characteristics.  We had a homework, which is to read the whole book of Esther and pick one characteristic of Esther that struck me the most.  I did that and I picked Esther’s genuineness.  Cos in one part of the book, Esther was honest about her fear of punishment but still had faith in God and asked for prayer and fasting from her people.  I just thought that was cool.  And true enough, that was one of the things we discussed about Esther — that she had unselfish modesty and authenticity.  She did not hide her fears or weakness but showed it with grace and faith in God, and asked for help.

So from both of those times, I learned authenticity and vulnerability.  More often than not (especially when in position of leadership), we show ourselves strong and tend to build walls up to hide our weaknesses.  But I think this shouldn’t be the case.  Yes, we should be strong — IN CHRIST and in support of our brothers and sisters in Christ, not of ourselves. In other words, we should be honest with our weaknesses and shortcomings but ask God for strength and ask other Christians to pray.  Keeping to ourselves and trying to be strong by ourselves would only wear us down, while being vulnerable to our personal God and to our brothers and sisters in Christ shows real courage and real faith. I’m sure that encouragement from both sides would make us stronger and can keep us going.

Maybe a lot of people or even scholars already know this but it’s something that I noticed after I read the whole book of Psalms.  Most of King David’s psalms start out with thanksgiving or praise, then he becomes honest with God about what he feels and then he finishes it off with praise and his declaration of his trust in God.  I just think that’s something awesome.  Just shows how human King David was but at the same time, hey he is called “a man after God’s own heart.”  So I am going to try to use his pattern for this blog post.

God is so awesome. Words that I use will never ever give justice to His indescribable nature.  He is so faithful and He proved that during the summer.  I went through and learned a lot the past months and I thank God for both the good and the bad.  People change and circumstances change in a blink of an eye but God showed me how consistent and everlasting He is.  He is truly the only One who’s there when everything else fails and everyone else can’t be there.  He let me meet amazing people from my team and gave me opportunities to share His love to others during the mission trip.  He made me stronger and He made me have more faith in Him.  Now I can actually not worry to much and just pray about thing.  I can tell you, it is hard to be smacked in the face by the fact that I can’t do anything. Haha. But it’s comforting to know that God is in control.

I’m scared of what’s next but I won’t worry about it cos I know my Father is in control and He will always be faithful and good.  Yes, I accept the fact that I don’t know what the future holds but I won’t fret.  God is everlasting and almighty.  What is there to be worried about, right?  Life on earth can be so exhausting and draining but I’m holding on to God.  He gives me strength and hope to continue to live joyfully while away from Him.

Well, this part is not a usual part of my blogs.  But it’s something I am so thankful to God for.

My boyfriend and I just recently celebrated our first year anniversary.  I know, for some people that’s such a short time.  But the past year has been crazy.  We both went through a lot together.  I really thank God for getting us through the whole year.  My friends know how hard the year was.  God molded both of us the past year both as a couple and as individuals.  He taught us a lot and He also showed His faithfulness to us in so many ways.  I also thank God for the people who keep us accountable.  I thank God for our parents who always keep us on the right track, for our friends who check up on us once in a while and for “fans” who constantly comment on our pictures (haha).  I just really pray that these people will continue to guide and support us.  And that God will continue to give us strength to maintain our long distance relationship.  That we’ll continue to put Him in the center, that we’ll continue to set our priorities straight and grow closer to Him.

In everything, I just praise God.  He is truly amazing.

Commitment
I’ve been reading 2 Chronicles for the past weeks and during the trip, there was a day that I read chapter 15 and it was about King Asa.  He’s probably one of the few “good” kings of Judah.  He was described as “fully committed” in verse 17.  He had awesome qualities and he was encouraged by the prophet by saying, “But as for you, be strong and do not give up, for your work will be rewarded.” (v7)  A lot of things have been happening that has been affecting me big time, but this is reminding me of what I SHOULD do.  Stay committed to God and to His work, no matter what. I really know how things can change and people can change in a blink of an eye, but God never changes! He’s the everlasting God!  My commitment to Him would never disappoint me and would never be in vain.

Consistency

During the mission trip, I was part of an awesome team (praise God!) of thirteen people.  Our team was called OVERFLOW.  My team leaders (TLs) came up with the team name because of the thought of us overflowing with love, from God, to give to the natives we were to meet.  And it’s interesting cause the same day that I read about King Asa, I read about the passage wherein Jesus teaches about the fruit in people’s lives (Matthew 7:15-20; Luke 6:43-45).  And I got this, “The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart.  For out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks.” (vv. 43-45) How can we have good things stored up in us?  By reading God’s Word and praying. By being consistent in our fellowship with God. It was really awesome how after reading this, I was praying to God to help me carry out His Word and really fill me up with good things so that I will have good things overflowing to the people I meet, then suddenly God gives me this image in my head.  I imagined the water tank that we had in the place we stayed at.  Then I imagined the hose and pipe that connects it to the faucet, and that faucet is where we get our good, clean drinking water.  And I thought, if i put a cup under that faucet, for the water to overflow out of the cup, the hose and pipe has to be connected to the source, which is the water tank.  Then I thought, hey, it’s the same with us.  We can only be overflowing with God’s love and things of God if we’re constantly connected to our Source: God.

Love

LOVE.  It’s probably the most complicated four-letter word that we all know.  People long for it, people try to find it in the wrong places and wrong people, and we people lack this most of the time.  And really, we don’t have LOVE unless we have Christ, the ultimate LOVER. Now, for love, I really didn’t have a passage while I was on the trip, well, besides 1 Corinthians 13, which talks a lot about love and how important it is.  This is how important love is: It’s what Christianity is about.  I don’t know if we think about that or even remember that.  The whole point of Christianity is LOVE, and how a loving God made a way for His justice to be satisfied and for his beloved (us) to be saved at the same time.  Sure, there’s the commandments and other instructions that Jesus gave, but what’s the whole point of those?  LOVE. Yes, love.  Love for God, love for others.  Not legalism, not rules, and definitely not to sort out the perfect from the imperfect, cause we’re all failures.  Hah, I think I already went on to rant about love… But the way that I was reminded by God about love was mainly being on the mission trip and all you are left to do is to love everyone.  God taught me how to love my team and how to love the people of Copper Center.  The people in my team were from different churches, different states and different families, but we all came together for one purpose: share the love of God.  Before we were able to accomplish that goal, we had to love each other first.  Oh, how I thank God that He gave us the strength to love each other and to love other people.  There was a time when our team was walking outside with some of the natives of the village and one teenager said, “What?! You’ve only met each other last week?  I thought you’ve known each other for a while.”  She thought we all grew up together cause that’s how we treated each other.  Love is something that other people will notice as a difference in Christians, if only we actually show it. Remember, it’s what Christianity is about.