I will recount the steadfast love of the LORD...
Wow, I suck. I meant to put up an update about the summer mission trip to Japan…two and a half months ago.
maybe when I find time one of these days…
But there will be more activity on here: as a small step of applying what we’re learning in the Spiritual Disciplines special Bible study, P. Jong has asked us to start journaling – either in a real journal or on a blog. I can’t seem to write in a real journal for the life of me, so…online blog it is.
Heading out to Osaka for a month – for greater things are yet to come, and greater things are still to be done in this city! There is no one like our God 
Some prayer requests for myself and the CFC Japan mission team:
Personal prayer requests
Everyone on our team will admit that we’re really unprepared – spiritually especially. We have a lot of weaknesses, talent-wise, experience-wise, and even number-wise (team of 10). Please pray that our team’s weaknesses, along with external things like the Swine flu, will not give way to desires to give up, hopelessness, or a lost of focus – but that our weaknesses will instead yield dependent hearts through which God will work with all His wonders.
Each person in our team is bringing a bag that’s over 45lbs – for the guys, we all have two bags that are over 45 lbs each. Obviously we’re bringing a lot of stuff with us. But please pray that beyond all of that, in our hearts we will be going as Moses going before Pharoah – carrying nothing but the dependence on God as his staff.
Peace, Be Still, And know that I am God. Please know that I am God.
A passage I’ve been finding to be particularly encouraging while preparing to leave for Japan -
”And the priests and the Levites who were in all Israel presented themselves to him [King Rehoboam] from all places where they lived. For the Levites left their common lands and their holdings and came to Judah and Jerusalem,… And those who had set their hearts to seek the LORD God of Israel came after them from all the tribes of Israel to Jerusalem to sacrifice to the LORD, the God of their fathers. They strengthened the kingdom of Judah, and for three years they made Rehoboam the son of Solomon secure, for they walked for three years in the way of David and Solomon.”
- 2 Chronicles 11: 13-14, 16-17
I don’t like to mention politics…but I’m going to do that a little bit here. I was thinking about all the controversies about President Obama “toning down” the National Day of Prayer – and the uproar that stirred up within the Christian community. I was pretty resentful too when I first heard about that – “oh how dare he”, “oh what is America coming to” – but now I don’t even think of it as such a big deal. I can’t say that I know what the President’s motive was in doing that – who knows, maybe he was able to have a more sincere and less politicized prayer time because of it – but I can see why some see this as a sign of America’s declining spiritual condition. From the way I look at it though, talking about national prayer only as this one-day thing is already enough indication of that anyways. So thinking about all this along with Japan, the “dry and barren land” I’ll be in for the next month, and Taiwan, I find what happened in this passage to be really encouraging.
Rehoboam was a king that didn’t follow God (2 Chronicles 12:14 “he did evil, for he did not set his heart to seek the LORD”) and Judah was quickly becoming a spiritually desolate land (1 King 14:22 “Judah did evil in the eyes of the LORD” during Rehoboam’s reign). Yet here Rehoboam and Judah were made “secure” by the faithfuls who had their hearts set on seeking God – those who were so set on seeking God they left their homes in the apostate nothern kingdom of Israel to come to Judah in order to worship in Jerusalem. While they were nevertheless subject to an ungodly king in Judah, these people strengthened and brought blessing to the kingdom simply by following God.
This passage reminds me is that regardless of the political climate and the spiritual condition of the country, God is willing to use even just a small handful of His people to bring revival. Especially in a dry and barren land. All He asks of us is that we set our hearts, our whole hearts, to seek Him. When we’re willing to that, He will bring revival to the US, to Taiwan, to Japan, and to the whole world. Having or advocating for “Christian” things like the word “God” in the Pledge of Allegiance or a National Day of Prayer isn’t going to make a nation “Christian”. I’ve come to see that these are only meaningful if they come out as the expressions of a nation’s worship. I know I used to hold onto these things as if they are enough as proofs of America’s Christian-ness (hmm, you could probably still find stuff like that if you go far back enough in my old xanga entries) – but really America can have all these things and still be a spiritual desert. Only prayer and hearts that yearn for God can make a desert into holy ground – not efforts to impose Christian ideals and morality into every aspect of a nation. It’s not even about the ruler in power – whether it’s a super Christian president or a king like Rehoboam. Like Jipsanim keeps telling us – if there’s even just one right heart before God, Japan can change, Taiwan can change, American can change, and the world will change.
But the encouraging part about all this is also the hardest part: setting God as the center and the focus. The sad thing about the story in this passage is that the faithfulness of these people and the priests and Levites only lasted three years. After that, Judah, along with Israel, fell into the long period of decline that eventually led to their exile. 主阿, let it not be so for us!
In this dry and barren land
Among a people turned away
we will stand apart and seek your name…
…A holy nation set apart, a royal priesthood seeking purity of heart
We will stand, we will stand in this dry and barren land
Haven’t blogged/journaled in a long time (even though I should be journaling for the summer mission…)
So I decided to start anew here on WordPress…leaving behind (or bringing with me?) the immaturity chronicled in my Xanga.
I felt particularly convicted to start again with this “…and in all these things” theme/approach – which came from the famous Romans 8:28 – “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him,who have been called according to his purpose.”
While doing my QTs I came across Genesis 42:35-38, where old Jacob moaned “All these things are against me” in verse 36. With everything that was happening to Jacob and his family, it certainly seemed so. Of course, knowing this famous story, we know that tons of blessing awaited Jacob just a few chapters later.
This has definitely been a difficult semester…not academically of course, not at all. Just circumstantially…and with everything that’s going on, I often find myself moaning “all these things are against me…” I find it difficult to believe and trust that all the dissappointments I face now are only a part of the mosaic that would eventually bring indescribable joy.
It’s not too profound…and you definitely won’t find anything profound on my blog entires…but I realized that at every given moment I have to decide which verse I live by – Genesis 42:36, or Romans 8:28? I will always have to choose to respond with “all these things are against me”, or “and we know that in all things…”
I want this blog to be a way to recount all the different things that will be happening – and show that in all these things God works for the good of those who love Him.
Sunrise, sunset, swiftly flow the days.
Sunrise, sunset, swiftly fly the years.
Three years have gone by in the blink of an eye, and already
it is time to say good bye.
A moment like this almost warrants a rhyme, but that would
just be a waste of my time.
We will forever remember the cherished memories we shared,
The memory of a room that means more than a room to us –
It is home, our cradle and our
refuge, here so far from our homes;
It’s where we studied together,
played together and wasted time together;
It’s where we laughed together,
cried together (uhh did we do that?), and joked together;
Where strangers became the best of
friends – and friends learned to be brothers in Christ.
The memory of Snyder 350.
The time our room was flooded with toilet water from the
bathroom.
Finding toenails in our carpet, and finding more week after
week.
The long nights we stayed up studying for business law – but
ended up talking about eunuchs instead;
Taking rock-climbing and marksmanship classes together, and
watching Jim dangle from a cliff.
Talking about our singlehood, and laughing about how
hopeless we are with girls.
The countless nights of gaming – Counterstrike, Command and
Conquer 3, Call of Duty 4, and more – sleeping at sunrise to wake up at 9am
for Sunday Service.
But don’t forget all the times we played the guitar together
and sang together – to worship the God that brought us here;
And don’t forget that it was in Snyder 350 that we grew up
together, matured together, and learned to follow God together.
Some of us will stay in this room – but some of us will be
leaving:
Fred, Jonathan, and Seonwoo – Godspeed in your future
endeavors: whether it be grad/law school, work, or the Korean military,
Here at last, comes the end to our fellowship -
Yet though we shall be separated by the breadth of the Earth,
We remain
Your loving brothers in Christ,
– Snyder 350
天涯海角 , 此義不 渝
不求同年同月同日生 , 只求同年同月同日死
若違此義 , 天誅地滅
青山不改 , 綠水長流 , 後會有期 !
*VERY* rough translation (because the full eloquence and emotion can only be felt in Chinese):
Even scattered to the edge of the sky and the corners of the sea, this brotherhood will not waver
We do not ask to be born on the same day of the same month of the same
year – just to die on the same day of the same month of the same year.
May heaven and earth destroy us if we betray this brotherhood.
The blue mountains do not change, and the green river flows evermore – we shall meet again!
