Issues

Here are some of the issues that I’m going through right now:

1. Social deprivation

I admit it. I’m such a hermit these days. I’m just stuck at home, studying and trying to study for upcoming GMAT exam. What I miss the most though, is the fellowship that I had when I was in college. Not having brothers and sisters in Christ around me is really disheartening. Which leads to my second issue.

2. Spiritual deprivation

I don’t understand how someone can live spiritually well when they have no support from brothers and sisters in Christ. My father has been doing so, not going to church but listening to sermons and doing QTs at home. I guess that’s what I get for not getting into doing QTs and having a personal time with Father. I’ve been struggling, better yet, giving up almost in my spiritual walk. I think instead of searching for the water in the desert, I’ve come to be okay without the water. Basically at this point, I feel so numb that I have forgotten the difference between life and death. I’m walking a very dangerous road right now.

3. Vision

I’ve realized that I lack vision. Where do I see myself in 10 – 15 years? It’s true that nobody knows where they are exactly going to be in 10 – 15 years, but we should have something to shoot for. I always thought one step at a time, just focus on God and He will lead me. I don’t know if that’s a right attitude to have any more. May be it’s because I’m going through issue #2 but who knows.

Father and I… are kind of in this relationship where you know each other but it’s been so long since you’ve seen one another that it feels awkward. It’s like those names in my phone book that I haven’t kept in touch with and so it feels awkward to call them up.

Well, it’s pretty obvious that I’m spiritually sick. I need a doctor.

On drinking.

I know this is end up going to be linked with sinning and such but I’m going to start off with a very objective and yet subjective view on why I despise drinking and people who drink.

I hate the glow.

It’s the most unattractive thing you can find from a person to have that asian glow in their face when they drink. Sadly, I’m part of that unfortunate 95% of asians who have asian glow.

I especially hate the glow on girls.

Like I said, I look at girls and their attractiveness more than guys, and that makes it worse for them to have that glow.

I don’t like dealing with people without fully awake conscience.

It’s annoying and they smell bad. Everyone have their own reaction to alcohol but I hate those who act stupid and act immature. Unfortunately, it’s scientifically proven that drinking alcohol make us more immature.

I hate the feeling of getting hot.

And thirsty. Plus, the after-effect if you forget to drink lots of water.

All these reasons make me wonder why people love to drink. Why is alcohol the center piece of all kinds of parties except my baby cousin’s birthday party? Obviously it gets you happy and loose to the point you forget that alcohol is actually a depressant.

I would rather have energy drinks at my party so we can all be hyper and play all night long.

Do I really have to give respect for those who knows the taste of alcohol and enjoys drinking alcohol? Honestly, alcohol is bad for you. It fakes you out big time when you get thirsty. You get thirsty and you pop that cold beer open and gulp it down. The result? YOU GET MORE THIRSTY. In addition to that, if you keep drinking it, guess what… You are going to get dehydrated. It’s like drinking salt water but WORSE! You get migranes and hang over if you don’t drink more water. Then you throw up because your body can’t take so much liquid and all you are throwing up is just yellow alcohol piss from your mouth.

Well, may be I overreacted a bit. I do respect people who knows how to drink alcohol. I mean those who knows alcohol. People who knows their wine, people who can appreciate the taste of whiskey and take sips instead of taking shots. People who enjoy the taste rather than getting loose.

As much as I have this personal dislike for alcohol, I know drinking itself isn’t a sin. Still, it’s not a holy thing to do either. It can hinder others as well as yourself. Playing with fire won’t kill you, but it can hurt you or even kill you. I feel like drinking alcohol can be analogous to letting a child play with fire. It’s always borderline dangerous unless you have other brother and sisters watching over you.

I confess, I would have definitely been a party person if it wasn’t for my dislike for drunken people. Don’t get me wrong, I just dislike the state of asian glow and drunkenness, not the people as a whole.

Just my opinion on drinking, that’s all.

Being a child of God

Honestly, I’ve been refusing to write an entry about God and I still feel little uneasy but I feel that Holy Spirit is revealing a deep foundational truth to me and is encouraging me to share with others to know what it means to be a child of God.

So we call ourselves children of God. Do we really know what that means? When we were born, were we God’s children? Surely that isn’t the case. Because the one and only child of God is Jesus Christ himself. Yes, God created us, but he also created monkeys and flowers. (I mentioned monkeys just for the kick of it) Are monkeys and flowers children of God just because God created them? No. Oh we can’t be compared to those things because we are created in His image. So can we be compared to Jesus? It’s only by grace and love of Jesus that we are called His brothers and sisters.

Matthews 26:62-65

⁶²Then the high priest stood up and said to Jesus, “Are you not going to answer? What is this testimony that these men are bringing against you?” ⁶³But Jesus remained silent.
The high priest said to him, “I charge you under oath by the living God: Tell us if you are the Christ,^[e] the Son of God.”

⁶⁴“Yes, it is as you say,” Jesus replied. “But I say to all of you: In the future you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and coming on the clouds of heaven.”

⁶⁵Then the high priest tore his clothes and said, “He has spoken blasphemy! Why do we need any more witnesses? Look, now you have heard the blasphemy. ⁶⁶What do you think?”
“He is worthy of death,” they answered

It’s easy for anyone to say you are a daughter of God but it’s always hard for anyone or may be just me to say you are a son of God. I always call myself a child of God because I can’t dare to call myself a son of God. However, biblically we are to be called sons and daughters of God when we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior and be His brothers and sisters.

We are saved by grace and faith only. We often misinterpret it as we don’t have to do anything but believe to gain salvation. Which is true to some extent, but to understand being saved by faith, we need to understand faith.

Matthews 19:21-23

²¹Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

²²When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth.

²³Then Jesus said to his disciples, “I tell you the truth, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. ²⁴Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”

I understand that this passage isn’t one of the passages, but I found from this passage a perfect example of what Jesus is expecting of us when it comes down to faith. Jesus wasn’t aiming to ridicule him. Jesus wasn’t trying to teach people that it’s bad to be rich. I mean, it’s true that being rich has its disadvantages but what Jesus was aiming at was the leap of faith the rich man needed to come to Christ. Yes, grace does not require any action but to receive that grace. However, if you don’t trust that grace, and the one who’s powerful enough to show you such grace, how can you say you will receive that grace?

Let’s turn the tables and look at ourselves. Do we have enough faith to take our everything, give it to the poor, and trust that God will provide for us? Obviously our first answer to that might be, “Well, are we called to do that?” or “We shouldn’t do that because that’s testing God!” What kind of calling are you looking for? A sign from the sky?

Matthew 12:38-39

³⁸Then some of the Pharisees and teachers of the law said to him, “Teacher, we want to see a miraculous sign from you.”³⁹He answered, “A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a miraculous sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.

I believe that these Pharisees weren’t testing Jesus per say, as they did in the later chapter, but they simply wanted a sign from Jesus to make sure that He was something. Then again, the passage does have the hint of doubt and the desire to test Jesus. Let’s come back to ourselves. Do we ever doubt Jesus? Have we ever wanted a confirmation from Jesus one after another? Do we ever wonder why or how we can’t do miracles like they do in Africa where people are getting healed physically and spiritually?

Matthew 21:18-21

¹⁸Early in the morning, as he was on his way back to the city, he was hungry.¹⁹Seeing a fig tree by the road, he went up to it but found nothing on it except leaves. Then he said to it, “May you never bear fruit again!” Immediately the tree withered.²⁰When the disciples saw this, they were amazed. “How did the fig tree wither so quickly?” they asked.

²¹Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and it will be done. ²²If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.

Matthew 17:20

²⁰He replied, “Because you have so little faith. 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.”

Do we really have faith of a mustard seed in Jesus? Do we believe in our financials more than the power of our God? Do we believe in our brains more than the widom of our God? Do we have more faith in ourselves and our situations and our surroundings more than the One who is above all things?

Matthew 16:24-26

²⁴Then Jesus said to his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. ²⁵For whoever wants to save his life^[h]will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. ²⁶What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?

We are God’s children because when we are saved, we choose to lose our lives with Jesus on the cross and resurrect with Him as new creations. That is why we can be called children of God; Because old is gone and the new has come; Because we are no longer bound by the law of this world, but we are above the law with Christ; Because we choose to be obedient and trust in God’s providence as a child trusting his father.

Brothers and sisters, we really need to know what it means to be children of God from our hearts. We really need to know what it means to have faith. We really need to know the cross. We really need to know Jesus.

WTF.

I know it’s been a while and I don’t want to start out my blog with such a vulgar statement but after seeing what I saw, I had to press prt scrn on my keyboard and did horrible things to it.

Close up

Yes. That deserves a big fat red F.

I paid 20 dollars to go watch Hillsong United concert.

Was it worth it? May be.

I found myself not being able to close my eyes to focus on God and worship, because I wanted to see them play. I mean, I paid for the concert, so why should I close my eyes? Was I picking Hillsong United over God? May be.

Then I found myself looking around and judge others on the same criteria. “This man’s cheering for Hillsong not God, and this girl’s taking pictures of Hillsong instead of worshipping.” Was I being a hypocrite? May be.

The concert was held at a huge church in VA Beach. As soon as I saw couple of Macs lying around the church for people to use, I thought, “So this is where all the money from concerts and offerings go.”

Was it worth it?

Yes it was.

Experience SOVA.

Argh, I hate saying “SOVA.” What I hate even more is calling my town “757″ Then again, I really don’t want to say Yorktown, Williamsburg, VA beach simply because they are just too long.

My father hates his job. He’s sick and tired of serving people that he cannot communicate with. I understand him though. Some people are just rude and look down on him because he can’t understand what they are saying. Frankly, it took me a while to understand our customers too. I’m not being racist, but black people have their own grammar structure. My father also have the hardest time trusting them. He’s been robbed once and caught someone stealing twice I believe. For this very reason, my father have this notion that when a group of more than three black people comes in and spreads throughout the store, they came to steal. Yes, it has created some unfriendly misunderstandings and arguments, but what can I say… A real life “Crash” is happening in my dad’s store. Especially with a growing number of homosexual customers we have. Even a year ago, it was rare for us to serve a homosexual customer. Now, about 30% of our customers are homosexual. May be there’s some connection between people turning gay and recession. Funny thing is, unlike every other beauty supply store we play a Christian radio station. I don’t mean to generalize homosexuals, but they are mostly sensitive and will get affected by the littlest things. I treat them the best as I can just to avoid any misunderstandings. My dad, he does the opposite.

Anyway, the reason why I’ve been talking about how my dad hates his job is because I want to talk about how much he loves his only free day of the week, Sunday. Yes, he loves to worship the LORD, but also he wants to do the craziest things he can’t do during his work days. For my mom, Sunday is the only day she can stay home and rest. I find it appealing to stay home and rest too… to recharge for the following work days. My dad, however, would rather provide careless service to his customers than to take his only free day staying at home. So every Sunday, we end up going to places that every SOVA people take their guests to.

First, we drive up to Colonial Williamsburg. Thanks to Brian Sato, I found out that we don’t really have to pay to visit Colonial Williamsburg. Of course you need to have a ticket to get the full experience, but we are satisfied with walking around and eating at the Cheese Shop. After, we would drive down the Williamsburg-Yorktown parkway. Honestly, I have never been to such a beautiful road as this parkway. Driving through a cave made of trees for a while and we see the Yorktown beach. We sit on the bench and enjoy the summer breeze as me and my mom enjoy Ben & Jerry ice cream. My dad can’t eat ice cream because of his stomach. He always try to persuade us for a bite though.

After the beach, we would have dinner somewhere and then drive to the “Fountain.” I never thought of it as much but people love it there. There’s this humongous fountain and you just stare at it. So we stare at it for 30 minutes or so and then we come back home.

There you have it. You just experienced the whole SOVA just by reading this entry.

While I’m at it, I’ll tell you about NOVA.

Eat, Shilla, Tysons.

P.S.: My dad actually realized his flaws in not serving his customers as well as he did before and not being able to love them for who they are. He realizes that they are still God’s creation/children and he ought to love them as well even though it may hard for him. Praise the LORD! That won’t change the never ending trips to random places on Sundays though…

This is a cry of the unfaithful one.

Father,

I’m sorry that I doubted you. I’m sorry that I have forgotten who you are. Life truly flows from you. You are the potter and maker of all things. Lord, I am nothing. Yet, I confess that I have believed that I deserve something and that I have a right to make conclusions and assume things. I confess that I have believed that I know what you are doing and all your ways. Your ways are beyond my comprehension, you work in the most mysterious ways. Gracious Father, I praise you and I worship you. Father, I confess that I have been a doubting Thomas. Even now, I can’t help but to feel ashamed at the fact that I’m lifting my hands up for you only after I have seen your power with my own eyes. Lord, help me to trust you and have faith in you when things are uncertain, and never let go of you.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

To those of you who read my last post…

MY NEPHEW IS ALIVE!!!

Doctors concluded that my nephew was brain-dead. My nephew was taken out of his life support, and we were just waiting for his little heart to stop beating. I can’t imagine how it was for my sister to watch her son dying… one heartbeat at a time… It has been 3 days.. 3 days. 3 days. The doctors were wrong. Without life support for 3 days, without food for 3 days, here’s my nephew opening his eyes. Not only that, he’s opening the eyes of everyone’s hearts. He’s opening the eyes of my heart. God is opening the eyes of our hearts brothers and sisters. When all hope is lost, God is there. The doctors don’t even know what to do with the baby because they just don’t understand how this happened. They are SCARED. They are scared that they might do something that may harm the baby. They finally realize that it is not in THEIR skills, THEIR technology, THEIR knowledge that saves, but the grace of God that saves.

Thank you for all your prayers. Power of prayer is unbelievable.

Something’s terribly going wrong.

Few days ago, around 11:20pm as I was sound asleep, I was awoken by  a terrible sound that I would have never wished to have heard. It was my mom crying over the phone as she talked with my sister. The moment I heard her cry, I knew it was about my second nephew. My nephew, who’s not even a year old, has been suffering from some sort of a brain tumor. He went through two operations already, but hope was fading quickly.  It seemed that my second nephew, whom I have never seen, is dying. As I was sitting on my bed, not knowing what to do, all I felt was complete numbness. I convinced myself that I feel this way because I’m in such a shock.

The following morning, I came down to the dining room and saw my mom sitting on the couch and my dad eating his breakfast. Complete silence fell in the room and it suffocated me. Then suddenly, my dad started coughing and went to the bathroom. He couldnt stop from tearing up. I don’t understand why I’m so insensitive right now. I’m messed up in my head to the point that I’m insensitive to the fact that my baby nephew is slowly dying. Is it because I have faith that God is in control? Have I finally reached that point where I have no fear about the outcome because I have completely surrendered it to our Father in heaven?

I don’t know if I’m that faithful. If that’s not the case, I am the worst-case victim of selfishness. I don’t feel anything towards anyone else only because it’s not about me. I’m not the one getting hurt so I dont’ care. I’m not the one who’s sick, so I don’t care. Come to think of it, even with facebook, I tend to act this way. I only check facebook if facebook e-mails me about someone tagging me or commenting about me or writing something on my wall. I never go to other people’s profiles and see how they are doing because I simply don’t care. I always defended myself by saying, “Hey, I don’t like to stalk other people and I don’t feel comfortable writing things on people’s wall because everyone can read what I wrote.” I would also get angry at how facebook loads the pictures so slow and how annoying it is to navigate through people’s profiles and waiting for pages to load.  I would not wait 10 seconds for my friend’s facebook profile to load.

Something’s going terribly wrong in my heart. I need help. I need prayers. Lots and lots of prayers.

MIGRAINE.

wow. my head.

This is probably one of the worst symptoms.. One minute I’m fine, and then a second later, unbearable pain just shooting at my head. Usually a nap or a good night sleep would help me out… but this time it’s different. It’s been 3 days, and it still hurts. At last my mom brought me to this lady who can do acupuncture and she like killed my head and my fingers and my toes with needles, and right now… I must say I feel better. I don’t know how it works, but whatever, I feel good. Headache’s still there though.

I miss ACF. I miss hanging out at Joash’s house with everyone to the point that… yesterday.. I DREAMED of just hanging out with people at Joash’s house… Wow. What’s more sad is.. in the dream… we were playing Super Mario. Yes, we were playing a video game, in my dream. We could have done so much more, but all we did was playing a video game. I mean… how real can we get here? But I guess what I miss the most is just that. Couple of close friends just being with one another and doing something stupid like that.

Yeah, I might visit JMU again… very soon.

I wasn’t intending for this but…

I ended up finishing strong. 3 A-s and 1 A. How it happened? Only God knows. I’m not going to lie, even though this isn’t going to help my quest for the perfect job, I feel good. Who knows, may be this would help me to get into a nice grad school.

I’m sick of hearing about Miss USA.

I miss JMU, the people, ACF. What am I doing here?