God's side

He's on the outside. He's above us. He sees the big picture.
But He's also on the inside. He sees beneath and behind and within

I am beginning to realize that I don't know anything. I don't know anything. I really don't know anything. I only know and trust God. I only know that I can trust God, and that I can know God, because He says that I can.

I just remember a speaker who said: "You think it just takes believing. But it takes more than just believing. It takes obedience, and ..and... ".... etc. forgot the rest. I just remember obedience. And that it takes more than just believing. The speaker also said boldly: "I know how to love God".

It doesn't matter if the speaker is right or not. but it made me realize that I've been asking that question. How, exactly, do I love God? How does one love God? Obedience is key. what else?

I wish all the brokenness in the world could be healed. All of creation is groaning..

After my freshman year, I went to a 4 day secular leadership camp called LeaderShape. We had to make visions/dreams--things we want to see on tomorrow's newspaper. It had to be something impossible or big, like "World Hunger has ended".

The funny thing is that all 40 of us were engineers from Cornell. And all of us wrote things related to seeing brokenness end. At the end of it all, we all asked ourselves why we were engineers if we just cared about orphans and broken kids and stuff like that.

I wrote about creating a program that offered free private sports instruction to boys from single-parent homes. because I know and have seen the effect of good fatherly coaches on guys, as well as how being good at sports really builds up someone's confidence

In high school, I would daydream about buying a lot of houses in Texas (where they are cheap) and just adopting a ton of kids/orphans and loving them.

In middle school, I would daydream about going to poor people's houses and giving them food and lamps and stuff they need.

Now that I'm in college.... I have fallen into normal-life-mode, but I think it's okay; I was too cliche before. The truth is that we are all broken...  it's not just the orphans or kids with abusive parents in those shelters. That's why we are / should be a light in this world. Everywhere we go there is brokenness. Even though I myself am broken, God can still use me to speak truth into other people's brokenness.

Sometimes it's hard to look brokenness in the eye, and still stand for the hope God promises. And still have faith. Sometimes it's even hard to love, because  you don't think you are able to do anything at all, or have any effect at all

But these three remain. Faith, Hope and Love, and the greatest of these is love.

We need to stand for these things, and pray, believing God hears our prayers and gives us what we ask. Not a guilt-trip-check-list. Put weight on that prayer. And speak what God tells you to say; and go, and obey. Go talk to that woman at that well. Initiate and pursue the conversation.

Okay, don't really know what I'm talking about; I'm trying to say everything on my heart, but I'm saying too much random stuff. God, help us; hear our prayers. is what I should say.

I wish I had known earlier

So many epiphanies.

Not epiphanies that bring about excitement. But, maybe more like sadness. I wish I had known earlier. I wish I had realized earlier. I wish I had had this epiphany earlier. I wish I hadn't hurt people. I wish I had blessed more people and built them up and encouraged them. I wish I had known they were hurting at those times.

Most people at this time, would say to me: it's okay. God is gracious. But that's not my conclusion because I don't feel any guilt.

But I do feel sadness.

It is so, so sad to realize how much God loves someone, and to realize how you did not show that person love in the way God loves them.

We all need that--we need other people to show us love. We need to be healed. Showing people love can heal them.

One person said to me something like "I don't know how to do that, because I was never shown how to do that"--as in, I don't know how to love in that way, because no one did that for me.

I think a couple years ago at split gender/ladies sharing at the end of the year, people including myself, were realizing how big an issue "favoritism", or exclusiveness was. How vulnerable people are to feeling like they are left out, or feeling like others are favored more! Yes, it is because of sin that we feel that way, but being loved can set us free from those types of sinful feelings and wrong mindsets. And set us free to love God and focus and grow in God. Instead of harboring bitterness and holding onto that stuff.

Love covers over a multitude of sins.
Your love can cover someone else's favoritism. Your favoritism can cover someone else's favoritism.

There's nothing wrong with favoritism. Jesus favored Peter James and John. But the sin is failing to recognize other people's needs. Forgetting to love that other person. You don't have to accept everyone into your close friends circle, but you have to love everyone like Jesus. You don' t have to make everyone your Peter, James and John, but you have to love everyone. Not just say hi to the Samaritan woman, but speak love into her heart as well. Like what Jesus did. He looked at her and said stuff. looked at her

A professor came up to me a few weeks ago, and gave me a side-hug, and said to me: "How are you, favorite one?"

It was very healing. He said it genuinely, and I knew it was true. I am probably one of his favorites. (but he probably also said that as a revelation from God for me).  His love from God, covered over my struggles with other people being favored. And released me to realize this. And released me to spot this issue and help others with this issue. And helped me to release other favored people into the freedom of being favored and enjoying that favor

Love is so powerful, much more powerful than we often realize. And we are much more affected by love than we realize.

And these three remain: faith, hope and love. And the most important of these is love

Top Life Skills?

I was googling this, obviously because I'm bored and do NOT have a prelim in 3 hours.

A couple interesting things I found were:

• You must be able to move to another country, burn your house down or quit your job and REALLY be okay.
• You must be able to start, work through and finish things that you DO NOT want to do
• You must know what you will live for, die for and kill for. (defines your life's aim)

haha. funny stuff. I thought I was gonna get things like "know how to fix a car" or "know how to extinguish a fire". But instead I get these cutting edge real things.

And now that I have a prelim and I'm slacking, I'm reminded of the second bullet point.

And recently, I am convinced that I need to think more about the third bullet point. A brother shared that he wasn't sure if everyone turned away from God, if he would still remain Christian. When I first heard that, I was like psh, of course I would. But now thinking about it, I agree that it's hard to know if you would or not, especially when you're in this kind of environment, surrounded by or connected with people who love Jesus.

I thought of Heidi Baker and how God told her to go live in the slums. She didn't mention this when telling her story, but I thought of this: that by going to live in the slums, she basically lost connection with all her (probably middle-class) friends. 18 years of living in the slums. Left her previous life behind. I wonder if I could do that. Follow God and not look back. Leave it ALL behind. After a year, you'd probably forget you had a previous life.

Is God's love real enough for me that I would really believe that He is enough for me? What is hindering me from knowing the extent of His love? I want to give it all up; I'm tired of gross stuff that I hold onto; I want to give it to Jesus, but I don't know what I need to give to Him. I don't know how. I don't really know anything anymore, except that I need Jesus. A lot.

Do I actually live for God? Would I obey Him? How much do I hate sin?

Funny Comic but true

Friend sent me this:

Pretty hilarious. I think the existential part and post-allnighter high are pretty true (minus the kissing part).

The last time I pulled an all-nighter, all these good memories from life started drifting through my mind. I felt like I was dying and started appreciating everyone more as if I was dying soon. I started thinking to myself: "wow, this person has taught me so much in life, but I never told her. I should tell her. But I want to tell her in person" Or, "I should tell this person that I'm excited to see her, that I appreciate that she ___". Basically I became super appreciative. of everyone.

But anyway, I think that is because I'm really bad at pulling all nighters now. I'm out of practice, so the effect is way exaggerated when I do pull one.

Good lessons can be learned from all nighters.

Why I like music

Sometimes I forget that I have this desire within me

this desire that God approves of.

Sometimes life puts me in this task-oriented,enjoyment-seeking, relaxation-seeking mindset,

and I forget the deeper desires that God put in each of us

Desires with the potential to be so strong that they could cause you to not want to eat.

Desires so strong, so unexplainable that tears would start flowing and you wouldn't know why; it's not you crying, it's your spirit crying.

A joy so strong, that you feel a pull to dance before God. and lift your arms up towards heaven

Music reminds me of desires I forget exist within me.

Certain songs remind you of certain periods of your life, of your walk with God.

Certain songs can stir that desire within you.

As you listen to them, raise your arms to God and surrender every hindrance of this world to Him

s o m e

s o n g s

If it is the Lord's will

...if it is the Lord's will we will live and do this or that ~James 4:15

Why, you don't even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life?

If it is the Lord's will, I will graduate and live past white water rafting and go home and then go work in Malta.

Sunday night, I was working on my matlab assignment (that I have to finish to graduate), and I was stuck, even after someone tried to explain stuff to me; it was so hard to grasp and come up with a design for my code. Programming is not like homework. In the end, no matter how much people explain it to you, you have to do it yourself. And I was running into so many bugs, and I couldn't understand fully the person's explanation of the assignment really. I thought I had this inability to do this project.

Anyway, I didn't freak out or anything, but I had some fear. And I had to come to terms with: what if I don't graduate? If I don't graduate, I'll probably loose my offer, and it'll suck. But God could be glorified if I go about the next summer/semester with a thankful/grateful attitude, continuing to trust in God, even after things in life don't go the way I anticipate/plan/want.

Anyway, I finished today afternoon. Miraculously, somehow, all the bugs cleared up and God gave me tons of wisdom to finish today in a few hours what I worked on the entire day (literally from waking up at 8:30am to 12am, even skipped dinner) yesterday and also having worked on it the night before and a couple days in the week before. God does that. Miracles can happen in schoolwork.

God also is funny in other ways. I sent this email to my parents yesterday:

When I was a Freshman, a Senior helped me with programming.

Now that I am a Senior, a Freshman is helping me with programming.

I am so blessed!