“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”

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.

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.

Thanks to Pastor John Piper’s sermon on Pslams 42, I guess I am starting to learn to read the Psalms in a new light. At least less “I know this already”, more “I wanna know more”.

As someone belonging to a church where right doctrines, teachings and understanding of knowledge are highly emphasized, I’ve found myself suppressing the feelings part of being a Christian. Yeah, we always criticize the emotional extremism that certain denomination emphasized and most of the time I found myself “corrected” before I even began talking about my feelings as a Christian. “How do you feel?” seemed like a complete no-no in the community cause they wanna know what you understand, what you believe, not what you feel. I guess I just need to be brave enough to say that it’s exactly this which is the ‘excess’ of being in a Reformed church. I fully realize this. Not forgetting that it’s true that it’s not the original motivation/spirit that the church planter/leader had in mind.

One of the lessons I’ve learnt from listening to the sermon, is that one of the most important purpose of Psalms is to teach us how to feel “correctly”.

Psalms 42 is unique and very encouraging. I see myself very much in the similar situation, not knowing that such situation is there on the Bible, and is not wrong as I thought it was.

⁷Deep calls to deep
at the roar of your waterfalls;
all your breakers and your waves
have gone over me.

How many times I’ve complained to my friends about this kind of situation, where I’m in a quicksand of trouble, trying to get out of it but getting more sucked into it as I struggled out? His breakers and waves have gone over me, and I can’t seem to swim back. And all this while I thought to myself: no one else had this problem, don’t try to act as if you understand what I’m going through. If only I read deeper into Psalms. I will be so ashamed of that statement.

⁸By day the LORD commands his steadfast love,
and at night his song is with me,
a prayer to the God of my life.
⁹I say to God, my rock:
“Why have you forgotten me?
Why do I go mourning
because of the oppression of the enemy?”

The Bible has so much of such irony in successive verses. Just like Jonah in the storm with the sailors where he clearly showed them that he had very clear understanding about His God and yet he showed the least religious behaviour as compared to the sailors. On one hand, we know so much about God, we know so much that He is always there, never abandons, steadfast and all that. But on another hand, it just FELT like He has abandoned us, forgotten us, let us suffer in the hands of our enemies. This is a reality. We are not being hypocrites or such, we are being honest. We know, but we don’t feel it. And we’re here to say it out honestly.

Another very important conclusion to this Psalms 42. It didn’t end in the psalmist deliverance, nor did the psalmist asked for deliverance.  What he asked for is simple. He asked for God and God alone.

¹ As a deer pants for flowing streams,
so pants my soul for you, O God.
² My soul thirsts for God,
for the living God.
When shall I come and appear before God?

How beautiful it is to learn from Psalms, from the Bible, knowing that it is not AT ALL far-fetched but really revolves around the relationship between God and men.

Still holding on to Him, my salvation, my God.

One of the many weaknesses of being in a Reformed church is that as we receive much deep and biblical knowledge from our preachers, many of us may just lose our appetite for the Word of God itself. I personally realized that I, too, have been slowly and gradually moving away from using bible verses in self-arguments or in conversation with others. It’s actually easy to just capture the concept and forget the verses. And later on to justify self by saying “as long as I struggle with the concept, I guess it’s enough”.

However, I find this very disturbing and totally defeating the purpose of having a church and teaching which should in fact point us back to the Bible. Well, the church and its leaders are doing their jobs, just that the slothful and sluggish me is abandoning my own responsibilities. I fully realize my gradual drifting away from the Word of God, though I may hold certain posts and serve in different kinds of ministries in church as well as on campus, which is really ironic. I have less and less time with God, I justify my actions a lot. It has turned into a really scary scenario.

Today, somehow, Psalm 19 is read aloud in church. It reminds me these verses that I used to memorize, few years back. And I wonder where all the enthusiasm has gone.

7) The law of the Lord is perfect,
reviving the soul;
the testimony of the Lord is sure,
making wise the simple;

the precepts of the Lord are right,
rejoicing the heart;
the commandment of the Lord is pure,
enlightening the eyes;

9) the fear of the Lord is clean,
enduring forever;
the rules of the Lord are true,
and righteous altogether.

10) More to be desired are they than gold,
even much fine gold;
sweeter also than honey
and drippings of the honeycomb.

11) Moreover, by them is your servant warned;
in keeping them there is great reward.

I guess my response to this verse, the uneasiness, the troubled mind while reading and the reminiscing of the past just confirm even more that God’s words is at work in me even at that period, even when I least expected it, when I’m not actively seeking for it. Such power, such greatness, how can I lose sight of it all this while?

The law of the Lord has always been torturing, hasn’t it? How can it be reviving/refreshing the soul? How can it be rejoicing the heart, enlightening the eyes? Am I again using my unbelief to judge the word of God? Pardon my unbelief, Lord.

If His words says that the law of the Lord are all those, then let me experience it, Lord. Teach me to love it, do it and enjoy it. Let me take off this mask of unbelief, this skepticism that’s always been inside of me, this feeling of “i know that” and all the pride of being a Christian, especially from the Reformed denomination. Let me relearn what it is to love the law of the Lord, the perfect law, the fear of the Lord that keeps me clean which will keep warning me from unrighteousness and reminding me of the hope ahead.

If I cannot love God’s words, how can I ever say that I love God? I am such a liar then.

Help me with my unbelief, O Lord. Help me stay near to Your heart.

An Indonesian Bible (Alkitab Indonesia), complemented with an English KJV Bible. Features include search, bookmarks, annotations and history. Completely free and I hope this would be a blessing for all IMPORTANT : click on the verse number when viewing the bible text to annotate, highlight, or bookmark it Get it through iTunes here

“But as we were allowed of God to be put in trust with the gospel, even so we speak; not as pleasing men, but God, which trieth our hearts.”

– 1 Thessalonians 2:4

I’m not gonna let the evil one use my feelings to drag me into self-pity, stopping me from being blessings to others and most of all stopping me from being satisfied in God.

Why being depressed over one thing , turning a blind eye to the fact that infact you have so many people around you who love and care about you a great deal.

A small man expects a great deal of others
A big man expects a great deal out of himself

I feel joy that even when I’m in fear but when I look into the eyes of a sister in Christ, I see a look in her face saying “I know you’re scared, be strong”

Also joy when another sister in Christ puts a lot of *obvious* effort in listening to my unending rambles, when she’s not even a listener type, just because she really misses having me around.

Every small gesture, offer of help, or even a simple how are you and remembering one piece of small detail about me to strike a conversation. It’s already much more than I deserve.

Joy from knowing that my life is not all about me an myself because as selfish as it might have been, it would be a totally meaningless life.

Joy to finally learn what it feels like to be sincerely grateful to God.

knowing that having all these thoughts are not something inborn, something I read from books, or that I somehow conjured up in my head but to know that it’s truly by God’s grace alone