Peace

I saw my picture, and I looked so different...

This is how I originally planned this blog post, but today I once again talked to Chris Liu, received advice and picked at his brain and was once again reminded of the importance of the Gospel.  Often times it's easy for me to stress out about things.  I try to go through almost every scenario in my head without actually doing anything... it's sorta ridiculous in all honesty.  It causes unnecessary stress and pain, and it often distracts me from my Lord.  Yes, Lord as in master, a term which has a negative connotation, but in reality it shouldn't. However, that's a side discussion, my point is Jesus is the foundation for everything.

If this doesn't make sense/you don't agree, please talk to me.  I would love to understand you better, and hopefully not only share my view but learn more so I can further develop myself.  But my point is, peace comes from God.  Security comes from God.  The reason I strive to do good is for God, but at no point should that become the focus of my actions.  The point is not to do good and show God, it's I love you God and here is my meager offering.  God can and will use all things for His glory, and I need to be open to that.  So I thank Chris for constantly stressing Jesus while giving me advice, but ultimately I give my thanks to God.  As foolish, as dumb, and as much of a sinner as I am, I thank you.  I pray that you continue to be my foundation in all things.

Age

Sometimes I feel far older than I really am, like I prematurely aged or something haha.  And maybe I'm just pessimistic and fatalist or something.  I look at the first years, and I realize I can't laugh like that anymore or at least as often.  I find myself looking at a lot of things completely different from the way I used to.  I think I've grown to enjoy talking less and just sitting more, but I have also gotten more impatient, so I'm not sure how that balances out haha.

I guess what I'm saying is... I feel old.  So old that I wonder about a lot of things.  I guess it's time to take the future more seriously.  Where will I go, what do I do, etc.  I have vague impressions/hopes, but I think I need to finalize them more.  I see a lot of my friends who are doing crazy things with their lives, and part of me is happy for them, part of me is jealous, but overall I think I'm sort of content with my life.  I know that a lot of things that they have done are things that I would not have done.  But I do find myself looking back a lot and thinking I wish I could change this or that, which is unhealthy for the most part.

Honestly, I feel too old to even be in my class haha.  But I guess in my actions I'm still a little boy... hence my blog title.  Regardless, it's time to continue to grow up, but grow up in Christ.  I've accepted the fact that I won't be rich, and part of me is happy about it.  I think if I was rich... my walk with Christ would nose dive, but who knows maybe I will be rich and actually be a good steward of the wealth provided by God, probably not though haha.  Rambling.... so night world!

Sleep

I have to admit that I love sleep.  So much in fact, I think I've gotten to the point where I just don't value anything.  It's hard for me to want to do work and even focus.  I thought I'd be asleep a couple hours ago, but clearly.... I'm not.  Today, I have nothing incredible to share.  James Kang taught me today which was fun, and I realized I need to get over this excessive awkwardness I feel in front of other people.  But yes, I'm too tired so I shall sleep.  I guess this is a fail at my everyday this week post something, but goodnight world.

On one side note, I think I've grown to appreciate coffee more and more as time goes on.  Should I celebrate, or consider myself old.... I know not. Haha.  Peace out.

One Struggle

Today, coming up with something isn't that hard.  Honestly... I wish I was asleep, but I want to do this. lol.

I struggle with... sharing.  I can share to an extent.  I can be open to an extent.  But there is a certain level where it's hard for me.  But with shame it's one thing, but then asking others to hear my pain is another.  I always feel like I'm being a burden.  I know these people have their own problems to deal with, so I'm like I shouldn't bother.  Or they are busy or tired, so I decide not to share.  And sometimes it's just the simple fact that I'm too tired.  Regardless, I constantly come up with excuses.  Even people I'm close to, they know me to a certain level.

There a lot of things that I keep confidential in reality, and I think I try to hide behind the excuse of it's between God and me.  And yes, I call it an excuse because if I can't be completely honest with other people at all, how sure can I be that I'm being completely honest with God?  Of course God knows everything, but that doesn't absolve me of being honest or not being honest with Him.  Also, that isn't to say that I'm not being as honest as I can with God, but I've learned that sometimes the people you share with can probe you in ways that you didn't think about, and open new dimensions to your train of thought.

I've always struggled with how I thought that people felt like they couldn't be open with me.  I've always wanted to be an older figure that someone could look up to, partly yes, because of pride (which is definitely wrong), but also because I do want to share and help people on a more personal level.  I enjoy general serving for the most part, but I genuinely love more personal relationships/mentoring.  I think that's why I love talking to older brothers because they have so much to offer.

But perhaps because people can inherently sense this wall that I've created, they don't want to open up.  Maybe, I'm just being dumb haha.

But I digress.  I think I need to be more honest with other people, especially if I ask that of them.  I want to help others, but I don't want to be helped.  What kind of dumb logic is that?  But it's the logic I often follow.  So this is my prayer request/hope/honest statement, I'm a closed individual, and I want to be more open, I'm just scared.  Scared of hurting others, but also of being hurt.

But I believe that the Gospel is a message of not being scared, so I hope I can be more open.  To any that read this, hold me accountable.  Just be aware... that for some people I'm not going to say as much, but I'll try.

Frisbeee

Blogging everyday is harder than I thought... I assumed I could think of something but clearly I can't.  On a positive note, my room remains clean, and I did the dishes again today! Yes! Haha.

Perhaps, I shall talk about sports, more specifically Frisbee.  This is my favorite sport, but maybe too much so. I think I have gotten better about being a better sport, but I definitely still struggle with it.  I expect a lot of people when playing, but I've been playing so badly it's hard for me to say anything haha.  Sports are fun though.  It's good exercise, stress relieving, bonding time, but sometimes I do worry about at what expense.  I have people tell me they have tests and stuff, and I hope they realize that the sport is not that important.  Sure, I love winning, who doesn't?  And when I lose, I always dang it, we could have won if we did x, y, and z.  I think this is an okay attitude, but I hope that no one over values the sport.  I am definitely guilty of it.  I would rather play than do school work.  I would rather practice than study.  I think I would rather do an forms of exercise rather than work...

But, if sports ever interfere with your walk with God, don't come.  This is something that I have to remind myself daily.  Especially since I am in charge of the men's frisbee team.  I know we try to pray before and after games, and we try to play with good spirits and enjoy the other team's company, but if one's personal walk is failing, I would rather lose every game and that they recover in their walk.  Granted.... losing every game would suck.  So I would like to know reasons for not coming to games, but if one's relationship with God is failing or school is not doing so well, don't come.  Sure you want to, but don't come.  Or at the bare minimum, work harder so you can come to play (in terms of school).

My little advice for others, but also a huge reminder for myself.  Why am I alive?  To glorify God.  Can I glorify Him through sports?  Yes, I believe so.  But that should never be an excuse to not seek Him because He is the reason for my existence, not a sport that I can't even play for UVA, let alone past college.  Sigh.... the limitations of one's physical abilities/limitations of the sport not being beyond college as an occupation.  Haha, clearly I have been called to other areas, which I hopefully can discover soon.

On a side note, my sleeping has been suffering for some reason, so please pray for me.

Simple Joys

I think I'm going to try to blog about something semi-meaningful everyday at least for this week just to see what it's like and see if it's actually worth it.  Am I actually talking about meaningful things or not?  That is the question.

Today I was reminded of many little joys.  One being cleanliness.  I am a dirty person.  Not in terms of my body that much, but in terms of my room.  It's normally filthy, although today I cleaned it and I have to admit it looks nice.  Yes it can look nicer, but it is a good step one in my opinion.  It makes my room feel so much more welcoming and peaceful.  I think there are times when I definitely enjoy working out in the living room, but sometimes I need my room.  For example if people come over, and I need to work, there is no reason for me to get that annoyed when I can just go to my room.  But if my room is too dirty to go into... that sounds like a problem. Haha.  So ideally.... I can keep my room at least semi-clean and organized.

I also did dishes for the first time in a long time.  I got into this bad habit of expecting others to do it, or even just putting it off until it was unbearable (aka a huge, ginormous pile).  But I realized, that seeing a clean sink is a very nice feeling.  It just gives a sense of well being, although if only this pollen would hurry up and stop so I could actually feel well.

Another small joy today was hanging out with people.  I've noticed how I basically don't hang out, at all.  I skip wahooru's every week because I have work due by midnight, and somehow I'm so busy during Friday that I can't do it earlier.  Granted sometimes I am, but normally I just waste time somehow.  So seeing people besides my roommates and the typical Clarke Ct. crowd was nice.  I think because I've been spending so much time by myself, I have been promoting rather emo tendencies.  Of course I do need to analyze myself and  such, but I also need to have fun.  Or at least... I should work harder if I'm gonna be by myself.  But I often forget that it's fun to hang out with people, even if it is annoying at times.

I think this is good for the second day in a row.  Lessons learned: cleaning isn't fun, but being around cleanliness is, and people are fun.  Not that I thought people weren't fun... just... I dunno lol. Anyways...that is all.

Broken Friendships

Today, Chris Liu shared about the Gospel in a refreshing way to help bring life not only to non-Christians, but also to those that are Christians and have lost site of the joy in it.  It was good, and I definitely appreciated it because it's a reminder that I definitely need often.  I always get wrapped up in laws and such, and forgot about the pure joy, the love, the grace all from Jesus Christ.

But, as I listened to this, and I reflected just now, I was reminded of brokenness.  Not only my brokenness, but the many ways I've broken friendships.  Please allow this indulgence of self-pity/regret.  I look back, and I see so many friendships that have ended from lack of effort on my part.  From stupid mistakes or just lack of a loving heart.  In my mind, I can only berate myself.  Pastor Byung talked about how when forgiveness occurs, it occurs at the expense of one of the parties involved.  And that really hit me.  Repentance is always a good thing, but does repentance lead to healing for the other person as well?  I mean I guess that's something I shouldn't worry about right?  It's in God's hands.  This is one sense a source of comfort, but how often do I just use it as a means of making myself feel better, of a scapegoat?  I honestly have to say I don't know.  I wish I understood myself better.  I wish I could look at myself and point out reasons that clearly explain my actions.  Too often I have no idea, or I think I understand and then later on I realize that I'm just confused.  But in the end, I don't want someone to have to suffer, get the short end of the stick because of me.  Maybe this pride, and not concern at all.  Pride in the fact that I shouldn't have even made them suffer, and I only can forgive not them...but it's sorta ridiculous to think like that.

I guess in the end, this is my apology to all those I have wronged, granted almost none of these people will probably read this, but I am sorry.  Haha, the funny thing is that I'll probably go through this once again.  A time where I am furstrated at myself, sad, bewildered, and I'll probably apologize again, but by then I guess I'll have more reasons for it.

I just pray and hope that the people I have wronged, can forgive me, and ultimately find peace in God.  I don't understand people that say they have no regrets in life.  I think it's really awesome if you can say that, although I'm sure those people have some really dumb decisions but who knows.  Sidetracked... lol.  I do hope that everyone will come to know Jesus and that I can be an instrument for God.  Too often I look at the world and can only see brokenness, but there's beauty as well, I just need to look with God's eyes.

Little Lights Part 2

It's already been a week since Little Lights, and I have many mixed feelings.  I wish I was still at Little Lights.  the entire time I was studying for my exams this week, I struggled with how can this be important.  What is the importance of these tests, when I could be serving at Little Lights?  But for me, one thing is being satisfied in the small things.  I have a purpose here at UVA, and even studying can be used to glorify God, but it's so hard in light of the service trip.  But another problem is that I need to be careful not to place so much of who I am in my works.  Just because I was there and serving does not make me more worthy of God or His grace.  I struggle with this a lot.  So yes, serving there was an incredible blessing.  But, being here is also a place to be a servant of God, and I need to fully embrace that.

But going back to Little Lights, I still feel so blessed by the trip.  Little Lights doesn't have videos like Hana sadly... the videos are in my head.  Haha.  For one of my classes, I have chosen to receive counseling weekly for 6 weeks.  So far it's been really interesting, but today my counselor closed our discussion with talking about how an error that many people commit, is that we look at the outside of people and compare that to the our inside.  As in, there are times when I say look at how happy those people are, why can't I be more like that.  Or these people seem to have it all together, and I say why can't I be the same.  But in reality, I don't know about their internal struggles or lack of struggles unless I ask.  I might look at someone and be like, dang so holy, but maybe they are struggling and in need of someone just to talk to them.  (Hopefully this makes sense.)

To bring that back to Little Lights, as stated before the staff shared a lot about their testimonies, and why they serve.  For me, I was looking at their outside as servants and assumed man these people are super busy, and stressed, but they seem to be happy, why can't I happy like that.  But I learned so much more about them, like their daily struggles, why they strive so hard, and even learned about the struggles of the kids.  Being able to understand more of their inside makes all the difference.  Now they are people that I feel like I can approach, not just overseers that I report to.  Haha.

In closing, I honestly wish I was still serving there.  Everyday I felt like, God I'm doing this for you.  The desperation I felt for God then was so powerful, but already I have begun to become complacent.  Already, I take things for granted, and I struggle to seek God faithfully.  But, I find myself taking heart for some reason.  I feel almost encouraged by this struggle because I want to take it on.... haha.  No I'm not a masochist, but every time I struggle, I feel the grace of God working, and I come out stronger.  So yes in many ways, I am still riding the high of Spring Retreat and Spring Service trip, but more than that, I have come back to the foundation in Christ.  Christ... is greater than anything in this world, and when I take the time to reflect on this, to really remember, the peace and joy I receive is unmatched by anything.  Although.... winning frisbee is fun. haha.

Alright this is all over the place, but in closing.  Little Lights is awesome.  Jesus is more awesome.  I need to take joy in serving here in whatever ways I can.  Just because I can specifically say I served at Little Lights does not make it greater in God's eyes than serving Him faithfully everyday here.  I hope everything makes sense, and if I said anything wrong please correct me.  Hope you all are doing well.

Little Lights (Part 1, hopefully more to come)

Today, driving home by myself from Charlottesville, I took some time to really reflect, and pray out to God.  This past week was full of stress, annoyance, exhaustion, and once again sickness (thankfully just a fever for a couple days).  But God worked in ways that I still can't fully comprehend.  I want to try to attempt to unpack a lot of it, but we'll see how well I do.

Our group was random in many ways, and composed of people I could say hi to, but nothing beyond that.  Oh, how things changed.  Now, I feel really tight with you guys, and for me, it's so cool!  Biggg yes! (LOL)  But seriously, our group in of itself was a blessing, and if I offended any of you at times please forgive me.  I count all of you as really close friends, and I want to meet up with you guys post trip.  I'm sitting at home right now, glad that I can relax, but still wishing I was with all of you.  I think it took me a couple days to really open up, so the fact that the trip seemed to end so quickly made me sad.  I feel like even the Tech team was sort of random, but we got to bond with them as well.  Praise be to God.

Moving on, this year by far was the best year of serving at Little Lights for me.  One reason is my desperation for God before this trip and during this trip.  This time I took on the actual role of a leader as opposed to last year, where I feel like Jenn did almost everything, and I realized how hard it is.  Mad props to all leaders, it's not easy.  Things went wrong, or miscommunications occurred, but then God worked and all my fears were put to rest.  Despite all Spak and I did, God was the one who made it work.  To be used by Him is a true blessing.  During this trip, I felt like a strict parent sometimes as I tried to enforce certain rules and punctuality, but I hope that everyone took it in the right way.
For me, first year seemed to be more of the eye opening experience, that touched me but didn't rock me.  Second year was when I began to have my eyes and heart opened, but I think because my walk with God was undergoing a long dry spell it was hard for me to focus and see God.  This year, I was floored.  I wept on the car ride back for the people of Potomac Gardens and Little Lights.  I saw God's love and His hand moving in ways I never before saw.  Little Lights expanded in new ways with a family center and providing part-time work for residents.  The staff shared more of their testimonies this year, and I saw their hearts crying out to God for these people.  You could see the bags under their eyes, but daily they smiled and showed love.  I saw kids I had seen for the past couple of years still in Little Lights, and I was so happy about it.  Sure they forgot me, but it was okay to me. lol.

To be honest, I'm not really sure to address everything else.  Lol.  My request is that everyone would really pray for Little Lights and Potomac Gardens, and possibly donate.  They are having a fundraiser in September where if a lot of people donate to them, they get extra money, which would be really helpful.  Also most of the members of the Little Lights team should have a can (I'll hand them out on Friday Large Group to people) to collect change for Little Lights as well.  If any of you guys are in NOVA during the summer and have time, I would highly recommend that you volunteer if you can.

I think there's so much more that I want to talk about, but this is a beginning, and it's probably easier for me to talk in person.