Hate sin

You know how sometimes you can feel that something is coming? Like something bad or something big is gonna happen, and you "feel it coming"? Well.

I feel my downfall coming.

I probably shouldn't say that. But it's true. If I don't change, it will come.

I need to hate sin. Recently/past few days or more, I felt like (or realized) my Christian life has been running on momentum, like a train whose engine just turned off and yet is still running only because of momentum. It's easy to run on this Christian auto-pilot momentum thing without knowing that you're running on it. because it looks the same, both to the outside world and to yourself. The train is still moving, and it feels almost the same... but doesn't last forever. Hence the downfall.

I need to hate sin. A sister sent me this site about mortification of sin. It's really good. Downfall doesn't happen overnight; it's a build-up. And perhaps one of the first steps toward downfall is forgetting what it means to hate sin. Another is pride.

Pride. Just this past monday, I was surprised at how upset/frustrated I was that I couldn't find good courses to take. My mom prayed for me, then told me to pray too. I was silent for a minute. She was like "why aren't you praying?" I was like "I don't know what to pray". That was a lie. What I meant was, I don't want to pray. What I meant was, 'I don't want God to change my heart. I don't want to realize that my frustrations are silly. I don't want to realize that all I need to do is trust God.' ... Anyway, I ended up trying to pray. It was probably more like angry mumbling, saying things like "God help me to ___, even though I don't want to". (with irritated tone emphasis on 'even though I don't want to'. But the awesome thing is that God still listens to prayer even when we pray in an irritated fashion.) But yea, it's funny how we know we're supposed to assume that we are prideful, and yet when symptoms of this pride come up, we're still surprised.

By the way Romans 8 is awesome. I love the progression from talking about not gratifying the desires of the flesh to talking about how the Spirit helps us in our weaknesses to talking about how great God's love is. What a great progression. This is why we hate sin. Because we love God. Because God's love is so great.

Seeing myself in my brother

Just now I felt annoyance toward my brother, which I haven't felt in a while. At first analysis/thought, I just concluded it must be because he's not paying attention while doing homework, is getting distracted, playing with coins, making noises, eating things every so often, and doing like 1 easy math problem every 10 minutes, and I have to keep reminding him, "thomas, do your homework". (We were working across from each other in the dining room. We usually work together because he doesn't like working alone.) After a couple hours of this, I was feeling pretty annoyed and upset, and told my mom my frustration. She told me to go work upstairs in my room and that she would work with him. I packed my stuff up and headed upstairs, but before I did, she said (gently), "Only parents don't give up on their kids. Siblings still aren't the same".

Well, so after ten minutes of reflection, I realized the deeper/real reason why I was upset. It was because I saw my own weaknesses in my brother. Early today, I had told him to do his homework. He said "I did", which I knew was a lie. I said, "No you didn't. Hurry up and do your homework". And he said "even if I finish my homework, there's nothing else to do". He wants some grand activity or prize after doing homework, like watching a movie or going somewhere or playing a game. He wants me or someone to promise him that there will be some fun reward after finishing his homework. I was like "why do you need some grand prize at the end of your homework? You should just finish your homework and then figure out something to do".

I realized that I so badly wanted my brother to be self-motivated. To just do it. Gosh, why can't you just do it? Why can't you just be responsible and have a good work ethic and just do your homework as soon as possible so you can go do other stuff later? I used to be the kind of kid who would eat the vegetables first, and then eat the yummy stuff later. My brother eats the yummy stuff first, in hopes of the possibility of getting out of having to eat the yucky stuff. I thought my brother and I were opposites in our work ethic, in our sense of responsibility.

But I am the same as him. Sigh. It sucks to realize that what you dislike about someone else is also what you are.

I'm tempted right now to decide to change, to muster up all my internal determination and tell myself seriously that I will finally change. But I don't do the changing. God does the changing. I need to remember that I am powerless on my own, that I can never take pride in so-called "will-power", or "determination", but that through God, all things are possible. In fact, I'm already inevitably changing each day as I allow the Spirit to work within me. Allowing God. That's hard-- our pride hinders us from receiving what God has already given us. That's why changing your character is so hard. Also, I think that a lot of times, we need to forgive ourselves (and others) for not being perfect, as God has already forgiven us.

Several weeks ago in church, I was told that most Christians have this methodology:

I am not _____ [insert biblical adjective, like 'holy']

I should be _____; Therefore, be _____

But instead we should use the logical progression used in the bible, which is:

I am _____; Be ______

(like 'you are perfect' 'be perfect')

It was pretty cool to realize. A sister told me that she thinks that the second way of thinking helps her to change, knowing that she is already____(renewed).

by the way, my brother started really focusing and finished pretty quickly after I left. He came up to tell me he was finished while I was still writing this post.. probably to cheer me up or something. I told him the real reason why I was upset. (he's 10 years old)

Shout out to all you younger siblings: sorry that older siblings suck and always want you to be perfect and always think they're better or know better. maybe not all older siblings, just ones like me.

Lost the Awe

Have you ever read Psalms and just wanted to skim through parts of it? because it's like the same thing, blah blah, I know what you are trying to say; it's all flowery/descriptive and sometimes you're not "feeling it". Actually most of the time, that is. What I mean is Psalm 104.

It's actually really beautiful. And I didn't have the patience to read it. And even after reading it, I'm not "getting it". ...Like, if I sit back and really read the imagery, I can see how the author is so in awe of God. How else can you come up with this lavish imagery? you can tell that the author really has a sense of the majesty and greatness of God--something I have lost.

“With the loss of the sense of majesty has come the further loss of religious awe and consciousness of the divine Presence. We have lost the spirit of worship and our ability to withdraw inwardly to meet God in adoring silence… The words ‘Be still, and know that I am God’, mean next to nothing to the self-confident, bustling worshiper in this middle period of the twentieth century” ~A.W. Tozer

(This also reminds me of something a brother once said about a song)