So Many Stuff.

This list of thoughts upon which I have been pondering has grown to 2 Word doc pages. Even when I am stagnant in my pursuit of deep relationship with Jesus, the Spirit never ceases to stir in me stuff. Things like:

Being in relationship and conversation with people who think differently is essential to my internal and external growth. I am constantly challenged to humility and openness, not only to different ideas, but to entire beings of people whose beliefs and basic ideologies deviate from mine so drastically. Or should I say, from whose beliefs and basic ideologies mine deviate so drastically. When it comes to being in relationship with people who haven’t established a relationship with God, I’m challenged to ponder how our worlds could ever manage to converge when we’re living in such polarized truths. I wonder, if my God is true, why isn’t this truth being manifested into being in and out of my life? Perhaps it is. Spirit, show me if/that it is.
Listening to worshipful songs, or even singing them, in another language that I comprehend absolutely blows my mind. Given that the only other language I can speak/understand is Korean, I speak precisely about them Korean chan-yangs (ironically also the last names of my two Chinese roommates). I think back to all of the Friday nights sitting in my dad’s worship team practices; the Saturday nights following my parents to choir rehearsal; the Wednesday evening services singing along to the songs in those floppy black leather Korean hymnal books; and I am overcome with a grateful nostalgia. Listening and singing along to “하나님은 너를 지키시는 자” informs to me, my God as the God of two distinct nations, of two distinct peoples. And then I remember that he is God over all nations - and then my mind is blown at this simple truth, one I’ve never truly handled a grasp of. I am so small. Definitely going to make more of an effort to worship in Korean like a good Korean dinosaur.
I honestly don’t think I know who Jesus was in his days beastin up planet Earth. I think I have a great pastel-colored, sepia-tinted, dusty-illustration picture of him and his ministry, and what a bawse he was among his robe-wearing brethren. I think I have a great relationship with what he did for me (and the spiritual implications of that), but not with the man that he was on this earth, in a time where society - its social norms, its socio-economic hierarchies, its racial tensions, and more - happened. He is a barefooted homeless man with a dirty beard, stained shirt, and worn jeans walking around Berkeley convincing other grown men to leave their computer engineering jobs and follow him wherever he goes. This guy with no social capital (and therefore no legitimacy to be heard) garners this huge following. He’s charismatic; he’s controversial. If he came up to me on Sproul, I’d walk the other way. I need to legitimately remind myself every day, of what it means to follow Jesus in this life. To drop everything, to hate my own father. To the ends of the earth, Lord?

As I grow in age, I will only grow deeper in my realization that I am a product of my mother’s prayers. In hindsight, I see that her intercession over me has guided me through every fork in the road, in both the physical and spiritual realm. I could have made so many more foolish decisions than I have. I also honestly believe that the ease with which I am rescued from the enemy’s lies and ushered into his all-transcendent peace is because of her prayer life over me. The greatest parenting advice she never told me is that she trusted the Lord even before herself, to raise her child. Her faith and rightness with God are great. Jeremy Lin is a warrior like my ma.

Still other things to share. Maybe I will just post them in separate consecutive entries.

Tuesday Nov 11 @ 05:21am 4 notes

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