Love God, Love people.

2020 marks the 10 years of my Christian journey and looking back, I give thanks for the many opportunities and breakthrough I have with Jesus and in serving His people. Yet somehow, at this juncture, especially after reflecting through Saturday sermon, I honestly dislike where I am now! I start to question where did my fervor go, was all these years just a hype thing? Have I lost sight of my previous conviction in Him or my heart for the things and the people that matter so dearly to Him? 

At the place where I’m given the privilege to lead His people in such a front line manner, the privilege where I get to serve Him full-time and see the beauty of the body of the church at work… I start to lose myself to the idea of familiarity and structure. I start to lose focus on God and place a lot of focus on myself, on what I can bring to the table, on what my comfort is when all God ever wanted was for me to obediently yield myself to Him and to be His light to genuinely love people to Him. It was never meant to be about me but about Him.

What seems like a peak in the secular world is considered a loss if Christ doesn’t take center stage. And this is a loss to me because of the lack of personal worship, the lack of deeper revelation in Him. It is not that the current revelation isn’t enough to worship Him but the whole idea of over-familiarity causes me to desire much less of God. And in this heart of putting myself down, of being discouraged and discontented with who and where I am, I am reminded of God’s heart through the song “So Will I”.

God of salvation You chased down my heart through all of my failure and pride On a hill You created The light of the world abandoned in darkness to die And as You speak, a hundred billion failures disappear Where You lost Your life so I could find it here If You left the grave behind You, so will I I can see Your heart in everything You’ve done Every part designed in a work of art called love If You gladly chose surrender, so will I I can see in Your heart, eight billion different ways Every precious one, a child You died to save If You gave Your life to love them, so will I Like You would again a hundred billion times But what measure could amount to Your desire You’re the One who never leaves the one behind

Through all of my failures, Jesus lost His life just so that I could find a new life and a new hope! Because of His unfailing and such unexplainable love, He set aside His comfort and His own will just so that I could no longer be in bondages, just so that I could live a life of freedom and just so that I could be bridged to God again. And if such love has been so freely lavished on me, I pray that my response will always be “so will I”! Not I, but Christ lives in me and works through me.

Do I truly know God?

Isaac Ong struggled 13 years of unfruitfulness yet all he ever wanted was to still obediently fulfill God’s promises for him. Job in the bible lost literally everything yet in his turmoil, even as he struggled and wrestled with God and his friends, he persevered and humbled himself before God. Daniel in the bible was righteous and a man who seeks after God but was put into a situation where the people used the law of God to put him down and send him into the lion’s den yet in the confusion, he trusted in God’s deliverance. Abraham in the bible struggled for years with infertility and God finally blessed him with a son at the age of 100 but was asked to sacrifice his son to God yet without complaint or negotiation, he obediently did it.  Paul in the bible gave his life to Jesus and became His witness, spreading the gospel to many cities. He was thrown in prison for doing God’s work yet he continued to worship in prison and continued to write letters and have his best interest for the people out there.

This is the life of what it means to deny yourself, to take up the cross and follow Jesus. It is not a life full of roses but a life full of sacrifice and a life full of mockery. Yet, in this age and the country we live in, it is so easy to downplay the cross that we have to carry and the idea of Christianity easily becomes something more of what we deem as the hype. But a life that truly desires God’s character and God’s will is a life that is willing to go through such struggles and yet respond just as Habakkuk did;

Habakkuk 3:18 (NLT) “yet I will rejoice, yet I will be joyful in the God of my salvation.”

42 He looked David over and saw that he was little more than a boy, glowing with health and handsome, and he despised him. 43 He said to David, “Am I a dog, that you come at me with sticks?” And the Philistine cursed David by his gods. 44 “Come here,” he said, “and I’ll give your flesh to the birds and the wild animals!”

45 David said to the Philistine, “You come against me with sword and spear and javelin,but I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. 46 This day the Lord will deliver you into my hands, and I’ll strike you down and cut off your head. This very day I will give the carcasses of the Philistine army to the birds and the wild animals, and the whole world will know that there is a God in Israel. 47 All those gathered here will know that it is not by sword or spear that the Lord saves; for the battle is the Lord’s, and he will give all of you into our hands.”

Inadequacy, weakness.. all this doesn't amount if you knew your identity. When you know how much the God who is in you is greater than that of those in the world. There were be no fear because we ourselves knows who is in control.

The same authority that God holds is living in us and we ourselves can be like David, a young fellow with apple cheek and peach fuzz with so much authority to go against the enemy because he knew who holds the final call, "for the battle is the Lord's, and he will give all of you into our hands"

So there's actually not a need to fear though fear is definitely inevitable but with the same fear, we should still know that the authority in heaven and on Earth has already been given to Christ and now because his in us, we will be able to say to our enemy "you come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but i come against you in the name of the Lord almighty" 

And yet again, I will rejoice in the Lord almighty! Because as the devil is so evident in my life, I know that God is evidently reigning in my life as well, fighting for me and pushing back all the darkness. And because I knew that even though the devil is so strong in my life, God is too and the battle is his so I will and want to give all praises in my trouble time.

And at the end of the day, when the battle is won, let all glory go back to God because this season is used to shine forth God's glory and goodness for people who witness it to see. "All those gathered here will know that it is not by sword or spear that the Lord saves; for the battle is the Lord's, and he will give all of you into our hands"

Because God works all things good for those who love him and he who began a good work in us will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus so we will continue to praise when we are weak because his grace is sufficient for us, for his power is made perfect in weakness and therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 

It was disheartening yet it had given me an opportunity to talk to this parent whose hearts are harden towards their child. Negativity, worries kept coming out from their lips and as I saw how much this parent tried to be sacrificial and giving, the child's expectation kept raising as they raised their sacrificial and giving spirit.

I had so much thoughts about slapping that child up side down lol because indeed, hearing so much from both side and even being able to have the chance to witness how their family do life.. I envied them, to be honest because that child is indeed so abundantly bless with a loving and complete family.

But seeing how much, the parents is starting to get upset and disappointed over their child's behavior towards the family.. yet, the parent didn't chose the easy way out of Indifferent but choosing to embrace and think of approach with some tough love in the way as well to help their child.

Listening to their experience, Im thankful for the opportunity to be able to relate from the child point of view ( relating myself to that cause im a child as well ) and from the parents point of view ( understanding adults and also understand my dad ), it just show how much we all have different expectation, different values, different view but we need to learn to give in to one another and it could only be through love.

If one lacks love, and harbor indifference, there is almost 100% chance that this relationship would not even work out. 

And listening from the parent point of view, Im thankful to know that, no matter what a brat or a wretch this child may be, a parent can and will never choose to look at you with an indifferent heart and say, this child deserve to be out of this world... no. Even with disappointment and a little bit of tough love.... it still love, isn't it?

As I was speaking to the parent, I could only be reminded of how much God didn't gave up on me. Im a wretch, i'm flawed but look who said on the cross during his death... "Forgive them for they do not know what they are doing". He took the blame, he took the shame and I'm graced. 

It never is or never will be. But one thing for sure, God is leading.

Hour of goodness (((:

As I was worshiping in unit meet, as we were singing a pure heart and God of this city, I was stumbled through God's question upon me...

"Do you really love? Or do you love because you are told to do? Do you dread to love the people? Or are you loving out of the abundance of your heart?"

As I thought through the question and feel like im halfway in, halfway out and couldn't really come to a point of whether I really love or I love cause I have to. Then, God reminded me of a verse in Song of Solomon 2:4b where it says

Let the banner over me be LOVE

I believe through the season, many will start to go through the motion, the motion of having to love because I have to, the motion of serving people, serving our family, our friends, our classmates, our Lifegroup, in ministry wise and we forgot the main point of what it is to really love people out of the abundance of our heart.

We ended up with doing the cliche cause the higher authority called us to, the bible say so, abiding to rule but I believe today, God stirred in my heart and place a burden in me to love! A heart that is pure and blameless to love the sinners, the unloving and the indifferent.

As I talked about having to go through the motion to love, give and serve the people, God reminded me of this quote

You can give without loving but you can't LOVE without Giving.

I think all my heart long for right now is to find the root of all love, the love that genuinely wants to love, the love..... Just like Jesus do.

The LOVE that Jesus did... To demonstrate love through dying for us while we were still sinner. - Romans 5:8

God, I want to love people out of the abundance of my heart. That where love is, God you are there too. amen

Love; it doesn't apply to christians alone or the people I know but LOVE that drives towards every single living people on Earth

The greater we become in God, the less about us our lives become. We dont build true greatness by adding self-esteem. We build it by subtracting self-reliance so that after our pride has been stripped away, Christ in us is revealed.

The higher you rise in God, the lower you'll be willing to go, because you'll realise more and more that the purpose of the greater life isnt to bring attention to yourself. its to bring glory to One who will always be greater

From time to time, God has to bring something into our lives to help us realize we're not as great as we think

John 3:30; He must become GREATER, i must become less

Looking back from the start when I took over NP1 till now, I can’t help but to give thanks to God for his providence and grace despite the many down times. Not about the increase in attendance but having to see hearts that have been harden returning back to his arms, returning back to serve him for greater purpose.

Such a joy to see these people coming back to step out and build the LG. Indeed all the many down times are worth it for me to witness such joy and sight.

The worst day of a leader are always always better than the best day of an onlooker

If i have chosen to give up then or because of my inadequacy and not obeying in taking up the call, I would never be able to come to this point of witnessing his faithfulness for the LG firsthand (:

Many times, I personally like to think out of the box. I like to think of things that is far above my capability and because of that, there are times when I start to feel dejected because I couldn't achieve it.

God reminded me that thinking out of the box is just "wishful thinking". Things that you wish you will achieve. I'm not saying that it is a bad thing to dream dreams because the truth is that we all dreams and if we are dreaming out of the box, there are many times we will just end up dreaming and not working.

But we have to start thinking in the box, in the box where our capabilities is reach. Where it mention that we have to be faithful with the little and if we are able to start small, dream small, God will then add upon us and expand our box to the bigger thinking.

I don't want to see myself thinking out of the box, pursue straight for that dreams only to realize that its all my will and God is not in it. 

Let me start small, let me be faithful, let me serve where I am right now, let me just think in the box and know that God is gonna add upon me and be victorious.