Risk Factor

I am currently attending a course called Project Timothy.  This is a course for OMF members.  The course focuses on God's calling, our own experiences with God and how He shapes our characters.

One of the activities is creating a Timeline.  It is a summary of how the Lord has shaped me.   As I sit and jot down all the critical events and those God moments, I slowly see a pattern of how He moves in my life.  I will share the Timeline in another post.

Today, the instructor showed the video of Wai Jia and me.  It is again a reminder of God's goodness in our lives.  As I saw the video, the verse, I will risk myself in you, spoke to me again.

After getting married, a number of single guys shared with me their struggle with relationships.  One of the patterns I see is that there's a hindrance in pursuing because it is risky.  What if the girl doesn't like me?  What if our friendship is broken?  How do I know she is the right one?

Love is very risky.  There's no guarantee.  No one can tell you what's gonna happen.  Perhaps it is meant to be this way. This is what it means to love.  To love without knowing the love will be returned.   To love not knowing you might get hurt in the process.

And then there's the Great Love.  The radical Jesus willing to risk His life to redeem those who do not love Him in return.

I love how Wai Jia shared in the video (11 min) asking is this how we determine who we 'love'.  Based on the probability that we love have to be perfect in every way. Is our decision based on a risk factor?

I wonder if we serve the Lord the same way.  Looking for the most comfortable and safest method to serve Him.  When we reflect of the love of the Father for us, it should make us take more risk, not less.  It should get us out of our comforts, instead of fortifying them.  It should make us take the risk to love in His name and to love those who do not deserve to be loved.  And this is risky too.  Because we will have to give up our lives.  Just as the Lord has given up His for us.

It is amazing to see someone like Peter, a fisherman.  After hauling probably one of the largest catch of his life, he just got up, leave everything and follow Him.  Peter didn't know where Jesus would take him.  But he just followed.  Even willing to follow and risked his life for Him.

Now that's love.

When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” 

“Yes, Lord,” he said, “you know that I love you.” 

Jesus said, “Feed my lambs.” 

Again Jesus said, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” 

He answered, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” 

Jesus said, “Take care of my sheep.” 

The third time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” 

Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you.” 

Jesus said, “Feed my sheep. Very truly I tell you, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.” Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him, “Follow me!”

John 21:15-21 NIV 

Love is...

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.  Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.  It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

- 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

I remembered I used these verses when I told someone I like to get into a relationship a long time ago.  Looking back, it was nothing but a fainting memory.  It no longer hurt as it was before.

It wasn't until recently that I realized Paul used this passage to describe the love among brothers and sisters in Christ in a church setting.

There are two ways to read this passage.  I can read this and critique others.

Oh someone doesn't very patient.  Clearly he is not lovable.  Why should I care about him?

Lately, I am trying to read it as an encouragement for my own actions and feelings. Especially those times when I am feeling not very lovingly....

I am losing my patience.  I am getting angry.  I don't want to keep going.  This is so hard.  Why should I have to love......I don't want to love. I am losing hope. This sucks.

Then I reflect on this passage....

Oh...though I don't feel like loving right now.  To love is to preserve.  Therefore, I can or learn to choose to be kind.  Choose to have patience.

There's a difference between aligning Scriptures to fit me instead of aligning myself to the Scriptures.  The former is self seeking.  The latter Glorifies God.

Bin Laden and Loving Your Enemies

Last night, the announcement that Bin Laden is dead. This morning, I watched BBC as they covered how he was killed, those that were involved, eye witnesses and those that are celebrating.

I was browsing online and found a post about Loving Your Enemies in response to the recent news to Bin Laden:

http://theresurgence.com/2011/05/02/love-your-enemies

The announcement hit last night that Osama Bin Laden had been killed in a firefight in Pakistan. The news reports on this cycle between commentators, stock Bin Laden footage, and Americans celebrating. While celebrating may feel like the right thing to do, as Christians we should consider how we relate to the death of evildoers. 

Image taken from http://theresurgence.com/2011/05/02/love-your-enemies

Companion of the Forgotten

In the midst of thinking and discerning what's the best way to give..sometimes all we need to do is to give with a compassion heart.




³¹ “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. ³² All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. ³³ He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

   ³⁴ “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. ³⁵ For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, ³⁶ I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

   ³⁷ “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? ³⁸ When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? ³⁹ When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

   ⁴⁰ “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

   ⁴¹ “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. ⁴² For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, ⁴³ I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

   ⁴⁴ “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

   ⁴⁵ “He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

   ⁴⁶ “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”

Matthew 25:31-46

Quiteness, Doing and Loving...

Quietness...

I wouldn't say lately I am feeling good. I always feel a deep burden for the lost. The feeling to be alone. To not do anything. Even though, there is many things I should be doing. I just want to stop for a min.

I know I should rejoice to be in awe of my salvation....I have an urge to lament. The thought of Mississauga. The city with so many people. So little of them know Christ. Many souls wondering searching for something. Some of them are lost. Some of them came to Canada looking for a better future. Some of them trying to make a better for themselves and their family.

How many of them know Christ? How many of us are going out there? To preach, to act, to pray? I am afraid just like everyone else. But I want to see the Kingdom coming down upon Mississauga. I don't know how it will happen or when. But I know my Lord listens and is acting right now slowly....

...Doing...

Today, a highschooler asked me about going to downtown and feed the homeless. I shared with him back in July and he wanted to join. I forgot and he reminded me today. I told him we would do it in late Nov or early Dec. Sometime it feels like what I do and act feels so different than the norm. Put it another, is someone seeing what I see? It was encouraging to see him asking me. A small thing. A small seed. Of all the things I do..I am encourage by that...

...Loving...

Lastly, I am reading Crazy Love by Francis Chan. This book just hit home how I have been feeling. I have been praying lately for God to convict me once again and refuel me with His passion and desire. The biggest struggle is to stay complacent in the church (building/organization). Keep the sense of urgency and the desire strong.

There is one quote I think captures what love is...Francis quoted it from Frederick Buechner in The Magnificent Defeat:

The love for equals is a human being - of friend for friend, brother for brother. It is to love what is loving and lovely. The world smiles. The love for the less fortunate is a beautiful thing - the love for those who suffer, for those who are poor, the sick, the failures, the unlovely. This is compassion, and it touches the heart of the world. The love for the more fortunate is a rare thing - to love those who succeed where we fail, to rejoice without envy with those who rejoice, the love of the poor and the rich, of the black man for the white man. The world is always bewildered by its saints. And then there is the love for the enemy - love for the one who does not love you but mocks, threatens, and inflicts pain. The tortured's love for the torturer. This is God's love. It conquers the world.

...
People who are obsessed with Jesus give freely and openly, without censure. Obsessed people love those who hate them and who can never love them back.

AMEN!!! God show the love to the x-th degree....I am in awe of that...so what am I praying for? For God to show up as He promise. For Him to act in this city of lost people. And if God has to drag me through the process....may I not focus on the pain and the suffering....but on Him as He suffered all that on the cross with humility.

Pain is good.

Good pain is good.

Godly pain is so much sweeter!

Pain, suffering and Christ follower

I have been doing triathlon for four years. Looking back, I changed quite a bit on my approach in how I train. In this season, I am working on more intense sessions. Time wise they are shorter but they are much more 'painful'.

I am sharing about this pain is because it relates to living a life as a Christian.

Most people often wonder why I train so hard. After all, it is much easier to sit back and watch tv. And to be honest, there are many times I have thoughts of not pushing this hard. It is a voluntarily pain embracing moment.

So why do I do it? To put it simply, it is the only way to get better (aka faster).

One professional Ironman Triathlete, Gordo, once said, "There is no easy way."

Indeed this mirror to being a Christian.

I am specifically talking about being an authentic servant (got this term from my friend's blog). I had many discussion about being authentic and about being a servant.

And it also dawned on me with my experience at Open Door, being servant has a much more cost.

It is such a paradox and if not counter-cultural to see why would someone die for someone else? The truth is that Christian will get persecuted because Jesus get persecuted (John 15:20, Matthew 5:11-12). The idea of following a faith that requires comforting and suffering is almost un-natural. Yet this is what we are call when we become the children of God (John 1:12-13).

So what does this mean practically...

Looking back at my experience at Open Door...right when they were serving the dinner, I could have hang back, stand by the corner and just wait until they were done. In fact, my group didn't have to be there until the dinner is done and then come in, do the games and leave. This is a program-focus thinking. Not loving people thinking. It was at that precise moment when I was standing there and there was a spot available for me to sit down and strike a conversation where serving begins.

What does it cost me? The cost to connect with others? Even when they are uncomfortable or 'suffering' because of clashing personalities. And I have to admit. I am not a very people person. This, however, is not an excuse for not going out and connect. After all, God didn't choose Moses because of his youth and his speaking skills. God can work through and will work through my weaknesses regardless (this is a more humbling experience!).

I think this is where being authentic and being a servant starts. It is to love those who I normally would not love. Not naturally. Not because I have to but rather this is who Jesus will go after. Among the marginalize and in the fringe of society. And as a Children of God, as a disciple of Christ, this is where I ought to be. Not duty but from the desire, compassion and love.

Despite my feelings to leave and be more comfortable, I have to remind myself, this is what Jesus would do. Jesus would never stay in His middle class house and lifestyle without a care for those who are in need. And during the 'suffering' and 'pain' this is where faith comes in. I have to discount my feelings (excellent blog post by Challies about this) and rely on the faith that God will continue to deliver. After all...it is may Your WILL be done. Not mine.

Sharing the Gospel in the Gay Village

Picked this up from Challies.com. It is his pastor friend sharing how he is sharing the Gospel in Toronto's gay community.

He ended with:

I do all this because I love the LGBT community. They are a community comprised of individual eternal souls. Sadly, they are culture that has almost no contact with biblical Christianity in any form. How many drag queens can count a born again Christian amongst their friends? Very few, to our shame.

To our shame indeed.

I know for me, it is often easy to be pious and have a high chin that i am better than anyone (especially those who ain't Christian). It is a humble reflection that we are all sinners and only through Jesus dying on the cross that we have salvation...

Don't feel 'like' loving others

The title of today's blog is came from an email conversation with a friend.

We were discuss about loving others and loving God. I propose the question, can someone love God and not love others? We talk a bit some more..and the phrase, 'don't feel like loving others' comes up.

Friend replied with a Scripture:

19We love because he first loved us. 20If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. 21And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother. 1 John 4:19-21

...on my previous post, Love, Strauch, in his book, Love or Die, described how to love the local church:

By dealing with difficult people, facing painful conflicts, forgiving hurts and injustices, reconciling estranged relationships, and helping needy members, our love is tested and matures.

One simply cannot grow in love without the stresses and strains of life together in the household of God, the local church.

I was joked that a church is not a church unless it has problems. And at times, these problems are painful and emotionally draining.

Last Fri, I was doing a long run in the morning. And I was speaking with God. I can feel I was very frustrated about things. My goal was to run 5 laps around my house. I ended up stopping at two. I couldn't run no more. It was eating me.

I ended up going home and read the Sermon on the Mount. I am glad God pointed me to this post later that day.

In my midst of seeking God, I forgot about love. I forgot about the grace of God. I am reminded that in order to follow Him, I have to love others. And loving others hurt. It hurts a lot.

Love

I read this post from Challies this morning. He reviewed a book, Love or Die by Alexander Strauch.

Of my continue to search on what it means to be a Christian, this book fits very nicely and a reminder that to be a follower of Christ is to love one another. As Challies described it, it is a mark of being a Christian.

No ancient or modern philosopher--Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Russell--ever taught such far-reaching ideas about love. No political figure, from Julius Caesar to Winston Churchill, has made such demands upon his followers to love. And no religious teacher, whether Buddha, Confucius, or Mohammed, ever commanded his followers to love one another as he loved them and gave his life for them. No other system of theology or philosophy says so much about the divine motivation of love (and holiness), or expresses love to the degree of Christ's death on the cross, or makes the demands of love like the teaching of Jesus Christ and his apostles.

Strauch continues to go on describing to love the local church.

Love requires both a subject and an object, thus love is a corporate learning experience. We grow in love by engagement with other people, not in isolation from them.

Christians cannot develop love by sitting at home alone on the couch watching TV preachers or by attending a weekly, one-hour church service. It is only through participation in "the household of God," the local church (1 Tim, 3:15), with all of its weaknesses and faults, that love is taught, modeled, learned, tested, practiced, and matured. By dealing with difficult people, facing painful conflicts, forgiving hurts and injustices, reconciling estranged relationships, and helping needy members, our love is tested and matures.

One simply cannot grow in love without the stresses and strains of life together in the household of God, the local church. The local church truly is "a spiritual workshop for the development of agape love" and "one of the very best laboratories in which individual believers may discover their real spiritual emptiness and begin to grow in agape love." If you are not a participating member of a local church, then you are not in God's school of love.

What's more encouraging is to see the response of the church from Ephesus after Jesus rebuke them in Revelation 2:2-6:

We know how the church at Ephesus responded to Christ's rebuke. Some time around the beginning of the second century, Ignatius, one of the Apostolic Fathers, wrote a letter to this church at Ephesus. He had been arrested for his faith and was being taken to Rome to be executed. As he and his guards passed near Ephesus, a delegation of Christian brothers was sent to encourage him as he faced a martyr's death. After this visit, Ignatius sent them a letter thanking them for their care. And in this letter he specifically praises their love, commending them as a church "characterized by faith in and love of Christ Jesus our Savior." He rejoices that they "love nothing in human life, only God" and he comments on their church's overseer saying he is "a man of inexpressible love." He says that in the love shown to him by the delegation he could see the love of the entire church at Ephesus. These Christians heard and heeded the loving rebuke of Jesus Christ.

I am most encouraged by Ignatius. Willing to die for his faith and encourage other brothers and sisters along the way.

I wonder what would Jesus say about my church and my brothers and sisters in Christ. What would He describe our fellowship? What would He rate my role as an elder?

Have I...

study love?
pray for love?
teach love?
model love?
guard love?
practice love?