The Resurection

"I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die."

John 11:25

what is the resurrection to me?

• it's a hope, hope for a better life than being trapped in eternity in the sinful nature under the power of the evil one.
• empowerment by the Holy Spirit. It was through this same spirit that Christ was raised from the dead. if only we can live each day in the power of the resurrection, we will definitely be greatly empowered to do His will.
• It's a new life. Jesus promised us a new life after death- no more tears, hurt or sorrow. if we can live each day as an overcomer, this new life will be even more glorious. we'll not only get that mansion just over the hilltop, we'll get a whole hotel. yeah, dat's wat i believe.
• it's my message. Because he lives, we know we have a future, we know we're not alone. we know that we can somehow get through live's ups and downs by the mastermind of our creator. we know we didn't come here by accident.

"If we were united with him in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know that we were crucified with him so that our body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin, because anyone who has died has ben freed from sin."

Romans 6:5-6

Take courage, we have been empowered by His resurrection!

love...how?

“You have stolen my heart.”
Dashboard Confessionals

For some weird and twisted reason, I am madly in love. For confidential purposes, I cant put down the name of the person.

Because I’m madly in love, I’ve been thinking about love a lot these days. Sadly, I’ve reached the conclusion that at this point in time, I’m just not ready to be in a relationship with any guy. You know why? Coz I think I don’t know how to love in an unselfish way. If I can’t even love my cell members enough to care for them, how can I expect myself to give my heart to a deserving guy? A relationship between a guy and a girl is not merely feelings and attraction. It’s a relationship two persons enter into that is centered on the will of God whereby two of them have a common destiny in god and are willing to pursue together. That’s kinda deep huh?

Someone once wisely said, “I want to be captivated by God’s love before I allow myself to be captivated by someone else.” The other reason I think I’m not ready to give someone else my heart is because I have not truly been captivated by God, the original Lover. I need to “love the Lord with all my heart and with all my soul”. I feel that if I allow someone into my life right now, he will only be a distraction from God because I will not enjoy & seek God’s companionship or guidance as I should. When I have learnt to appreciate God as a lover then I will be ready to BE a lover to someone else the way God intended.

See, this is the logical part of me thinking. The illogical part of me however, has a stolen heart already. How nice, the song is playing now as I’m typing this. Coincidence? The fact is, I think about him all the time. I long to see him, to talk to him. You know why? Because he is a man who wants to serve God no matter what God calls him to do. Because he is committed to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. Because I respect him. When I finally give my heart to somebody, I need to know that he understands that God has called me to do great things for His glory. I don’t want him to just follow me around, I want him to know his mission in Christ also and take me to the ends of the earth. I need to know that he is worthy of my respect and that he is someone worthy for me to submit to and to obey. First of all thought, I want my heart to be stolen by the great Lover. I want to be in love first with Him.

Sometimes when I think about it, it just overwhelms me. I get knots in my stomach, I feel my eyes getting moist. I guess the longer I wait, the more beautiful he will be when God finally sends him. (him=the perfect guy God has chosen for me)

I’m waiting in eager expectation. Oh yeah, I think I understand better what it means to wait actively. “They that wait upon the Lord…”

Stand Firm!

“So, if u think you are standing firm, be careful that u don’t fall!"
1 Corinthians 10:12

How true! Lately I’ve been planning a lot on how to really live a holier and more spiritually disciplined life. Of course, all this in pursuit of knowing Jesus better and knowing His ways for his ways are higher than our ways.

But, along with these plans, I’ve unconsciously developed a pride – thinking just because I’ve made the decision to start meditating, not that I’ve been faithfully practicing, I’ve become holier or smarter than most people. I realized I started getting frustrated when things didn’t go my way. I started criticizing the source of frustration, thinking I have the best solution, forgetting that I know next to nothing. When I got frustrated, it didn’t end there. I lost my temper, started getting angry, throwing tantrums, basically one sin leading to another. It didn’t feel holy being angry with somebody who tweaked my patience but it did feel good staying angry. I guess it’s the human nature taking over, I now understand a little better how we can lose our control, yield to the sinful nature. “For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin, because anyone who has died is free from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.”

I consider myself to be strong, not that I boast in this but because god has called me to be strong, strong enough to carry others. But my mistake was thinking that I am standing firm. Unknowingly, subtle temptations crept up without me even realizing, I was falling into sin. I am so grateful for this gracious warning from god, that I don’t think I’m infallible. For me, although all ate the same spiritual food, although all crossed the red sea, I want to be at the end. I want to put my trust in God.

“In every victory, let it be said of me:
My source of strength,
My source of hope,
Is Christ alone. “

Worker's Conference - Leadership

if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.

2 Chronicles 7:14

today spent the whole afternoon at worker's conference. this is probably one of the best and most memorable conferences i've attended in all my life in FGT. basically all my life ler.

started off with Datuk Paul Low. He's some big shot political/economical leader/pioneer in the country. the difference with him is he constantly makes stands for righteousness' sake. next was Shelton Johnson. shared from my favourite bible character- Joshua. shared about the calling of god and our responses. powerful message. i knew there was a reason i liked joshua. maybe i'll name my son joshua next time. he's a man who responded to god even though he didn't have the burning bush experience. So long as we know that god has called, don't keep looking for spectacular signs ler...yup. don't doubt the calling of god. lastly was of course pr. Hong Seng. showed us the importance of looking for the person who will serve. he gave this acronym:

Learning posture
Excellence
Anointing
Disciples
Energy factor
Relational skills
Servanthood and shortfalls

how true. many times people want to call themselves leaders but they refuse to be a disciple. i'm beginning to realise how important humility in leadership is. God opposes the proud. it's true. when we refuse to acknowledge our sins or weaknesses, we don't allow authority to speak into our lives. don't get me started on authority.

well, after these 3 speakers shared, we heard 3 testimonies from the pastors of FGT KK, London and Melaka. these testimonies was my sort of "breaking point". really touching ler. they were sharing about their churches and how god was blessing their churches. there was a sense of jealousy at that point. on one hand, i was really happy for them coz they made it through, they didn't give up, they produced fruit. on the other hand, i look at myself and ask why i can't be like them. it's sad knowing i'm called to be like them yet i still can't even be disciplined enough to pray regularly or to love people like jesus loves. it's something i need to repent constantly of and surrender to God. (if you are an FGTian reading this and have always been in your own church, i challenge u to visit the branch churches. it's really a different experience knowing god is working elsewhere, knowing how much the leaders at the branch churches have sacirficed just to be there to give their all. you just cant' help begging god to bless them and their efforts. visiting FGT KK has been a real eye opener for me spiritually. Go!)

after that we had a time of prayer. prayed in groups of 5. my group consisted of: aunty prema, grace, menghong and uncle rafael. this is one really special prayer for me. a first if i might add. when we started praying in tongues, tears just started streaming down my face. i KNEW at that moment that if i were to pray anything out loud, i would definitely burst into tears so i waited till the last hopefully the tears would stop. well, i still did burst into tears though the tears significantly dried up by that time. this has NEVER happened to me before. was sobbing uncontrollably halfway through my first sentence k. felt so weirded out man... was exhausting though. i guess i was just so sad that though we have such a big task ahead of us, there's still so many obstacles- people, circumstances... there's still so much nonsence (sometimes) that goes on that just makes serving the lord so tough and mind boggling. yes, we're serving together but somehow there's mistrust, there's unwillingness, there's no transparency. how can we win the world if we cant' even trust each other? hmmm... then i realised, (eventually) things aren't going to change unless i change. i got a sense that everything, this whole responsibility rested solely on my shoulders. if i don't pray, nobody's gonna pray. if i don't love, nobody's gonna love. it's really not dat bad but it feels dat way. just like wat my dad said a while back, god is just looking for that ONE person who will decide to stand in the gap, to run between the living and the dead. well, guess what, i want to be that person. nobody said it was easy, but if it kills me, i'm gonna try. it just takes ONE person.