Surpassing Knowledge, Filled with Fullness
Ephesians 3:17-19
“17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. “
Love that far surpasses what we can understand.
This is a true beauty. We are to live in a fact that surpasses our limitations.
There are very distinct differences between living in a fact, in limitations and living in a fact that surpasses our limitations.
Faith has the power to breakthrough, has the power to surpass limitations, it makes us live not only under our limitations, but to see things surpassing our limitations, any possibilities in which we’ve been bounded by our experiences.
We always say: “According to what we know, this and that is hard, it’s difficult, it can’t be done, there’s no way for it”
Why let your limitations be your God, the limit of your faith?
We’re not the slave of history, we’re slave for God.
We should see the possibility under God’s plan, God’s leading, God’s promise and God’s power.
This is a spirit that will cause revival and reformation in churches.
Experience is precious, but it’s much less precious than God’s promise.
- Rev. Dr. Stephen Tong
Forcing Myself to Memorize His Words
There will come the lowest point of my life. Low points, probably, because I wouldn’t know when the exact lowest point will be. But it’s just at that point when just the mere knowledge of cliche-ish thoughts: “God loves you, He’s there, He’s omnipresent, with Jesus by your side, you have nothing to fear” is not bringing any cheering up. The words that you ought to know as a Christian, repeatedly chugged down your brain by you yourself, the people around you, your Christian community, is really mere knowledge and have no warmth to your soul.
The time when Satan has its chances. A chance to bring you down for all the sins that Jesus has paid. Pushing you to sin, because anyway, you’re already sinful. Telling you not to do anything, work hard at anything, because after all, you’re a failure to God, and you don’t belong with the group of holy Christians.
How can I not, at this time, force myself to memorize God’s words. Eventhough I know I suck at memorizing words. I do not like reading the Bible because I thought I have understood it all. I already had the gist of the whole Bible,why should I know it word for word?
It’s because it’s exactly at this point, that I needed those Words, the living Word, Jesus Himself, that could refresh my soul and point me back to God.
Today, I’m thankful for Psalm 73:25-26
“Whom have I in heaven but You? On earth, there’s nothing I desire besides You.
My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. “
When I am at the point where I do not feel as if anyone understood my struggles. I do not think that anyone would listen, at all. No one is there to share my burdens. I do not blame them, for we have our own struggles and when they are not that similar, it’s just hard to understand each other. I am at the point where my flesh is so prone to sinning. My heart just seeks for everything, every temporal pleasure, besides God. It’s the point where I couldn’t take control of how my heart wants to feel. It’s blinded by useless and empty emotions. How can I not tell myself “but He is the strength of my heart and my portion forever”?
This is what you need to feel, self. There will come time like this when it just seems that no one is listening. But it’s okay. because whom have you in heaven but God Himself? Let your heart desire nothing besides Him on earth. The fullness of God will always be enough.
Cry
There are always points of time in life when… the world, or heck, Christians around you just expect you to be normal, happy and content when you’re in fact strange, sad and very unsatisfied with your life.
At this point of time, you don’t need people to tell you how to live your life, because, let’s face it, we both read the Bible, we both have the same God, we are just in different kinds of boats.
You know what is right, what is wrong, what you should do, what you shouldn’t do.
But whatever is happening now, isn’t really supportive of you to do what you know you should do, what you know is right.
In short, it is right, but whatever happened now showed otherwise.
Men will be lonely not when everybody else leave them. Men start to be lonely when noone else try to understand them, know them.
This world lacks sincerity. Christians too. Me, especially.
Do Not Labor for the Food That Perishes
By Pastor J. Piper
Our focus today will be on verse 27 where Jesus says, “Do not labor for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him God the Father has set his seal.” What does Jesus mean that God has set his seal on the Son of Man? What does he mean that we should labor for the food that endures to eternal life? What does he mean that we should not work for the bread that perishes?
// More after the jump
Me and Evangelism
This post, just like this whole blog, serves the purpose of capturing my thoughts, emotions and sharing about a certain topic. And today, it’s about evangelism.
I have been involved in my church’s Saturday morning evangelism and visit to hospitals in the city, particularly one where most Indonesians visit. I remember once, someone from the group asked all of us what were our intentions in doing this every Saturday morning. Differing answers are given. Some said because it’s God’s command which we have to obey, some said because it’s something we owe, some said they don’t really know why, there are just burdens in their heart to do it. For me, I might have just given the most selfish answer of all. I went because I just want to learn, I want to experience.
I want to learn from those people who are so convicted as to wake up every Saturday morning and sacrifice their weekends (if one didn’t see it as a privilege, sacrifice would be a good term, and for my case it’s like a sacrifice) what it means to love those who God loved. What it means to love strangers. What it means to have a crushed heart, compassionate instead of sympathy knowing that there are many others, empty, helpless, hopeless, needing a Savior.
I was talking on the phone to a friend from church who shared to me how he escaped brutal beatings by rowdy highschoolers back in Indonesia around 5 years ago when a family of 3 riding a motorbike crashed into his car. It was right in front of a certain highschool and coincidentally the school bell just went off and kids were just hanging out in outside the school. ‘The car is always at fault’, he said, and to make things worse, he’s a Chinese and the family who hit his car are pure Indonesians. The rowdy kids crowded around his car, shouted for him to get out of the car, blaming him for knocking down the family. It was then, a brave Chinese woman who saw what happened, came down from her car, with arms wide opened in an action to protect him and tell the kids off that it was the family’s motorbike who crashed into his car and it’s totally not his fault at all. Then she went off. Not long after that a police came and brought them to the station.
He shared that it was that day, that night that he started questioning the meaning of life, started feeling helpless and started depending on God. It was a turning point for him. He could’ve been beaten up to death, we know how rowdy people in Indonesia are. He could’ve lost his life, but that day 24 Dec, he said, turned out to be the day God showed His loving kindness to him, on Christmas’ eve.
While hearing his sharing, I almost cried. I was happy for him, I was touched by how God worked. In a way, it reminded me of what happened to my uncle, just a few months back. How my plan to tour Bali after all these years, to stay in his house, buy things for him and his family, all fell apart when a motorbike on high speed hit him while he was crossing the road. It reminded me that things do not always work the way we expected to be. He didn’t have the accident, recover then accept Christ in the process. He was in a coma right after the accident, never got up since then, and passed a way a few days after the accident. He passed away not knowing Christ.
Sometimes I think I tried to see how God’s plan worked out, how his mystery might be solved, just by looking at a series of events in a short period. I always failed to see his goodness and I ended up rebellious, disappointed and blaming, questioning Him. Maybe I was just finding reasons to cover my sadness, my disappointment, though deep in my heart, I know there’s no way at all God could be evil or unfair or whatever bad. It’s God. He’s gotta be good, no question to it.
First I saw how my mom struggled at her work, how she was “tortured” by the authorities, how her agents left her for her oppositions, how stressful and sad her life is and how she heard about the accident, how scared she was but just had to be brave because she’s the strongest of the rest of the family members, how she paid for all the hospital and living expenses there, afraid that grandma would get heart attack from hearing the news about the accident, trying to make everything okay and then her little brother passed away just like that. It doesn’t end there. Then comes the story about the evil ex-wife of my uncle, how I come to learn that human being can be THAT EVIL and to face that all on her own, a woman, I can’t help it but just cry in helplessness and pray that God help her.
Just looking at those series of events, I am very saddened and a lot of times asked where is God in all those. Why those evil ex-wives always win? And the kind next-door-neighbour guy like my uncle had to die in such a tragic accident? I was living in my own drama land where everything’s perfect. But this world, is just not like that. That is not how God works.
One thing I wished I had thought of, or done, is telling my uncle about Jesus. It never entered my mind, not even once. I’ve never once prayed for him, never once thought of sharing the gospel to him. I am just THAT selfish. How I wish there were people, strangers, Christians who shared to him about Christ, while he’s alive, while he was in the hospital, in coma state, etc. I could just regret now. This is God’s wrath. It is scary.
Since then, I had made a commitment, to just go for the Saturday morning visit and evangelism to the hospital. I did not really care what my motivation was at that point. Maybe I was so sick of the Evil one trying to persuade me not to evangelize because I didn’t know much, didn’t know enough, didn’t have a pure heart, didn’t understand this and that, whatever that stopped me from even trying. I went there with a thought that I may have selfish or whatever motivation but I wanted to keep going there and let God Himself clean me and make it right. I don’t know how He will do it, I just want to learn. I don’t know how I will ever learn what love really is, all I can do is to do what I know I should do. With a strong hope that one day I will finally understand, finally be joyful the way Paul rejoices, love the lost sinners the way so many people I know and respect do and of course to learn to give thanks. All I know is that I shouldn’t stop. I just need to continue to be faithful, to move on with faith.
The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever. – 1 John 2:17
My Replacement Gods
A letter of apology to God
my Creator, my King, my Savior, my Friend and my Father.
an omniscient God, who knows the deepest, most profound depth of my heart,
You, of all, know the ugliest, most darkest, disgusting corners of my being.
They say the most cruel and insulting action we can do to a person, is by not acknowledging their existence.
You, of all, know that’s the exact insult I am throwing at You.
My good and bad, you know them all.
You knew them even before I was born.
My indulgence, my sloth, my ignorance,
the more I know, the more I rebel against You.
There was no fear in my eye, no fear in my heart.
I’m practically belittling a graceful God, for Your gracefulness.
How doomed am I?
Every day, every night, I searched up and down for little comforts in life.
Comfort in friends, comfort in leveling my pride,
and I look forward so much to conversations with friends, those that kept me feeling important, feeling special.
While I honestly turned my back against the One who can comfort me most, truly, completely.
The self, the flesh,
the more I indulge, the more I’m addicted, I rebel against You.
I have replaced You with so many other things in my life.
Friends, money, comfort, pride, every single thing that made up my life right now.
I know fully well that I’m just feeding on my fleshly desire.
So help me, God.
To be rid of all these replacement gods,
to be once again, drawn back to You.
To wait patiently, daily for Your presence.
To look forward to conversations with the source of Comfort.
For good works, for working out my salvation,
with fear and trembling, like what Paul said to the Philippians.
Please don’t let me drown in this pool of fleshly, self-loving,
judging others, pointing, evaluating others’ mistakes,
but never mine, for that’s where all my pride is, myself,
I just can’t see it break apart, can’t I?
point me back to the Cross, where all my glories should be.
like E. Clephane once wrote in her hymn:
“I take, O cross, thy shadow for my abiding place;
I ask no other sunshine than the sunshine of His face;
Content to let the world go by to know no gain or loss,
My sinful self my only shame, my glory all the cross.”
So teach me, Lord. make me want to learn again.
not to lose sight of You, then replacing You.
teach me to fear You, trusting and obeying Your words.
teach me how to love You, Lord.
For I don’t know and I can’t right now.
Maybe God should throw me back to one year ago, back to helpless, hopeless state, to know and relearn how irreplaceable He is. Have mercy on me, God.
Hypocritical Thanksgiver
“Be sure to thank God as you work that he has given you at least the will to work.” Do not say, “But it is hypocritical to thank God with my tongue when I don’t feel thankful in my heart.” There is such a thing as hypocritical thanksgiving. Its aim is to conceal ingratitude and get the praise of men. That is not your aim.
Your aim in loosing your tongue with words of gratitude is that God would be merciful and fill your words with the emotion of true gratitude. You are not seeking
the praise of men; you are seeing the mercy of God. You are not hiding the hardness of ingratitude, but hoping for the inbreaking of the Spirit.
…”Thanksgiving stirreth up thankfulness in the heart”
From Head to Heart
Everytime I read about righteousness from any Christian-related source be it books, articles, even from the Bible itself, I tend to have this already projected image on what righteousness is. It simply means the rightest one, forever right. But whenever the word “sinner” and “righteousness” comes together, the righteousness declared for the sinners always seem less righteous than the actual ‘rightenousness’ itself. O well, this may seem confusing, but what I’m trying to say is that righteousness for sinners, to me, simply means our sins are forgiven. I even used the term “God sees us through Jesus as our Redeemer”. So we’re still sinful but forgiven thanks to Jesus.
For a moment there’s nothing wrong with the above paragraph. Except one, that it’s not the complete story of Salvation. Being made righteous is much more than being forgiven. Though, being forgiven in itself is already a huge gesture. Not only are we declared “not guilty” but we are at the same time declared “righteous”.
Thanks to the youth fellowship we had in church last Saturday that I can now see the word righteousness in a whole new light.
Of course, thank God who still soften this hard hearted soul to still learn from others and especially from Him.
When the head understands, knowledge is formed
When the heart experiences, the relationship is formed
Let me have both O Lord.
From Bunyan’s Grace Abounding
… that it was not my good frame of heart that made my righteousness better,
nor yet my bad frame that made my righteousness worse, for my righteousness was Jesus Christ himself, “The same yesterday, today, and forever” (Heb. 13:8).
Alone with Him
We need time to be alone with God. That loneliness is never truly alone, for He had bear the loneliness on the cross that we are not to be alone anymore.
Have mercy on me God.
