Lately as I’ve been reading the Word and meditating on it and praying it back to Him… He has taking me just a little bit deeper into understanding of who He is and the greatness of His love… and my response has often been an awestruck “… really?” As in, ‘You’re really that kind? You are that merciful? Like, Your Word truly means what it says when it says all those incredible things about You? That’s really who You are??’ Not that I didn’t believe those things before, but it’s like they’re coming alive to my heart… and I’m so in awe that this beautiful God loves me.

And then I was a bit sad too… that so many (… and even sometimes my own little heart) buy into the lie that God is a mostly angry deity, looming over us full of hostility towards us, just waiting for us to slip up so He can give up on us, cast us out of His presence and into hell. But when we read the Word we see the truth about Him… that He is the One who delights in mercy (Micah 7:18), has compassion on all that He has made (Psalm 145:9), the One who is compassionate, gracious, slow to anger and abounding in love and faithfulness (Psalm 86:15), the One who carries His people close to His heart (Isaiah 40:11), the One who so loved the world that He gave His only Son that we could be with Him forever (John 3:16), the One whose love for us is so much greater than our hearts’ tilt towards sin, the One who remains faithful to us even when we are unfaithful, the One who judges in perfect righteousness (Revelation 19:11)… and so on and so on… I can’t write it all out, so go read the Bible…

I want to know truth about Him… I want to know Him as He is… I want my eyes to see the King in all of His beauty (Isaiah 33:17)… for He is too good to settle for believing less than the truth of who He is.

We dance to this song in my contemporary class… I love it!! Snaps for Shawn McDonald…

Speaking of dance… I am going to Sydney to dance in a ministry thingo called Project Dance… it’s Christian dancers from all over the world dancing outside in Sydney (as well as New York, Atlanta and Hong Kong)… and people can just walk by and watch… and there will be evangelists out in the crowd talking to the people who stop to watch… ooooh I am SO excited!!

So please pray 2 Thessalonians 3:1 for us… “… that the word of the Lord may run swiftly and be glorified…” … or pray for us that the word of the Lord may be danced beautifully and be glorified

I am so in awe of God… this One who is love (1 John 4:8)… and loves me. The One who has searched me and knows me (Psalm 139:1)… who sees all the darkness and the unsettled issues… and yet calls me lovely (Song of Songs 1:5). The One who knows the plans He has for me (Jeremiah 29:11), the One who is leading me in paths of righteousness (Psalm 23:3), the One who allures me into the wilderness and speaks tenderly to me (Hosea 2:14)… that I would come up leaning upon Him (Song of Songs 8:5). The One whose great pleasure it was to create me (Revelation 5:11), fully knowing how many times I would choose disobedience and run after all those other things instead of into Him… and in spite of that loving me. Loving me even when I was His enemy (Romans 5:10). Loving me first… knowing that when I began to see His pursuit of me and begin to glimpse His love that surpasses knowledge (Ephesians 3:19) I would love Him in return. I love Him because He first loved me (1 John 4:19).

This is why I was created: to love the Lord with all of my heart, soul, mind and strength (Mark 12:30). It’s more than a commandment, it’s my life vision… and what He is fully able and more willing than I can comprehend to bring into reality. Because it’s not about me gritting my teeth and making myself love Him more… it’s Him who is love showing me what love is, showing me the love He has for me and so awakening my heart to love Him still more and more. Him captivating my heart by opening my eyes to see still more of His beauty. He is the One who crowns me with love and compassion (Psalm 103:4)… the One who takes my ashes and gives me beauty (Isaiah 61:3). I don’t deserve it and I certainly could never earn it… and yet His love has been lavished upon me (1 John 3:1). He delights in showing mercy (Micah 7:18)… and delights in me.

What a beautiful God. I love Him … I love Him as best I can… in my weak-but-true way which somehow overwhelms His heart (Song of Songs 4:9)… *happy sigh*

Soooo… this is pretty much my favourite song at the moment… haha sorry about the Spanish subtitles and sometimes odd slideshow (I don’t understand the significance of long lines of people holding hands…), but it was the only way I could get the song actually on here…

• “… apart from Me you can do nothing.” John 15:5
• “Yet I am poor and needy; may the Lord think of me. You are my help and my deliverer; O my God, do not delay.” Psalm 40:17
• “The Lord hears the needy and does not despise His captive people.” Psalm 69:33
• “The Lord protects the simplehearted; when I was in great need, He saved me.” Psalm 116:6

I like John 15:5. Apart from Him we can do NOTHING. I’m clinging to that truth… and running into Him when I’m feeling overwhelmed by my weakness… and humbling myself when I’m feeling like I’ve got it all together in my own strength.

But lately I’ve been feeling more overwhelmed than having it all together. Taking a long hard look at the choices He’s put infront of me about a whole bunch of things, consequences of choosing either option, confusion over what His will is, meeting my inability to know what is His voice and will, feelin’ torn between obedience, wisdom and desire… and feelin’ overwhelmed…

And yet, in my weakness His strength is made perfect (2 Corinthians 12:9). And He sees past the weakness and treasures the heart that desires to love and obey Him completely… He delights in it… says that I am dark yet lovely (Song of Songs 1:5). And He knows, even more than I am discovering, that I can do nothing without Him (John 15:5). And He wants me to love and obey Him even more than I want to. And I ask Him to help me… and so He will. He will. He is the God who saves (Psalm 68:20)… the God who delivers me because He delights in me (Psalm 18:19)… and strengthens my feeble knees (Job 4:4) and helps me run after Him… even when I feel able to do no more than curl up into a ball and cry. But by the grace He’s given me I choose to not cry about my weakness but rejoice in His strength…

… and spend all day singing this song… my life is a musical, for sure…

ps. everyone loves a good “na na na na na na na…” at least I do…

I saw an ad yesterday for what appears to be a celebrity gossip website… the website’s ‘catchy’ slogan?? “Where fans go to worship.” I felt slightly sick when I saw that. My friend next to me goes “ummmm… end times worship movement…” and I agreed.

We were made to worship God… the One… the only One… who is worthy of all glory, honour, power and praise (Revelation 4:13). He is worthy of our attention, our devotion… all of our heart, soul, mind and strength (Mark 12:30). But already so many other things tug at our minds and our hearts for our attention and devotion. Our culture is already so full of idolatry… it glorifies it. American Idol. Celebrity gossip sites… where fans go to worship. People collecting lots of memorabilia of their favourite footy team and calling it their ’shrine’. Oh, these things that we sacrifice our time and money to…

… about a year ago (when I was a Christian and about to leave for my internship at the International House of Prayer), I paid seventy-something dollars and went to see my formerly favourite band in concert. I was having fun in the moshpit… jumpin’ around with everyone else… pushing and shoving along with everyone else… screaming out the lyrics with everyone else… reaching out to try and touch the lead singer with everyone else… lifting up my hands before the band along with everyone else… and then in then middle of all that madness I suddenly stopped… lowered my hands… and was like “… what am I doing????” and, feeling quite shaken, ran into His unending mercy and repented. It all looked no different to a high-energy church service… except we weren’t worshipping the Lord and singing about Him. We were worshipping a band and singing about how alone we feel and how overwhelmed we feel by all the darkness inside… any surprise that I used to cut myself listening to this band’s albums??

The world today is getting so good at this worship thing… and soon a man is going to come along and bring ‘peace’ to the Middle East (Daniel 9:27)… three and a half years later he is going to demand that everyone worship his image… and will kill everyone who refuses (Revelation 13:14-15). But why would you refuse, when he has brought ‘peace’ and economic reform (Revelation 13:16-17) and established a worldwide religion (Revelation 17)…?

I can think of a very good reason to refuse… the Antichrist is not God.

Oh that my heart would be ready… I want to prepare my heart for what it is to come. I have to eat the scroll (Revelation 10:9)… I have to be devoted to long and loving meditation in the Word of God that His truth would be written upon my heart (Proverbs 3:3). I want to have a history of intimacy, a history of worship and undistracted devotion to Him… He is worthy of nothing less.

If in that day I choose to worship God alone I could be killed by the Antichrist… and then I will enter the fullness of joy in the presence of the One I love (Psalm 16:11). Or I could worship the Antichrist and live another day… only to spend eternity tormented in the presence of the One I chose to despise (Revelation 14:10).

So today… and every day… I set my heart to worship God. For I will have to choose on that day… and my life… both temporal and eternal… will hinge on it.

… I have already made my choice… and oh God, give me grace to remain steady…

These verses have been going round and round my heart for the past couple of weeks…

“This is love: not that we loved God but that He loved us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” 1 John 4:10

“… when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to Him through the death of His Son…” Romans 5:10

… and tonight we were doing worship with the Word, all about the crucifixion (today is Good Friday)… and these verses continued to go round and round my heart… and sometimes even out into my singing.

I love this… that God loved us so much, even when we hated Him, that He sent His Son to die for our sins… the sin that we chose over Him back in the garden (Genesis 3)… and over and over and over again since. But He loved us… and still desired that we would be with Him forever (John 17:24). So Jesus died to reconcile us to God… that we could be with Him forever. We deserve eternal torment… yet because Jesus went to the cross, forever we can experience the fullness of joy in His presence (Psalm 16:11).

We are so loved

And so I live to return that love… in my weak-but-true way that moves His heart (Song of Songs 4:9)… *happy sigh*

Tonight after prayer (Wednesday night worship with the Word yaaaay!!) I was out in an icecream shop (I really like icecream :D as well as donuts. Once in Japan I had an donut with icecream in it. Oh, happy day!!). I was just a couple of minutes down the road from the prayer room, in the middle of the city we pray for so often… and a fight broke out (not in the icecream shop… but nearby). And my first thought was “oh, Jesus come back…”

When Jesus comes back He will establish His righteous government on the earth (Psalm 89:14) and bring an end to wickedness (Daniel 9:24)… no more brawls!! So when I pray for Him to come back I am asking for this. But before He comes back wickedness will increase (Matthew 24:12). And it’s not going to be like tonight in the icecream shop. I am not going to be safe because I don’t want to fight. Christians will be persecuted and put to death, and hated by all nations (Matthew 24:9). Yes, martyrdom does happen right now… but not at a global scale. Today in the country I live in, Christianity does not attract the death penalty. Me and my friend were praying in the icecream shop and nobody dragged us off to prison.

All that to say… things are going to get worse before they get better. So when I ask for Him to come back I am ushering in the full package… the increase in wickedness… but then His return. In His perfect wisdom, that is the way He wanted it… who am I to think I know better??

It will be glorious. The church is going to come out the other side clothed in righteousness (Revelation 19:8). A pure and spotless Bride… for the pure and spotless Lamb. With hearts burning with unquenchable love (Song of Songs 8:7). A people who will come out declaring “Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and power belong to our God, for true and just are His judgements” (Revelation 19:1-2). A bride coming up from the wilderness leaning upon her Beloved (Song of Songs 8:5).

It will be the darkest hour the world has ever seen… followed by an eternity of God dwelling with man (Revelation 21:3). Hallelujah!!

Soooo, in a nutshell… people fight, I pray for Jesus to come back, fighting and all other wickedness will increase (Matthew 24:12), the world will go nuts and try to fight God (Psalm 2:2)… and then Jesus will come back

All that in mind, my prayer remains the same… “oh, Jesus come back…”

… but I am feelin’ the need to be rooted and grounded in His love (Ephesians 3:17) so that as He shakes everything (Haggai 2:6-7) I will not fall away… my love will not grow cold (Matthew 24:12)… but that I would be found with the rest of the Bride: pure and spotless, with a heart burning with unquenchable love, declaring the praise of my just and true God, leaning upon my Beloved.

Loving other people… I can be pretty sucky at it.

In a way, I guess I find loving God ‘easier’… because I know that no matter what He loves me… just as I am… to love other people involves me opening up and letting them love me… means letting them see the darkness which I try to hide. And I still need to grow in revelation of the ‘dark yet lovely’ (Song of Songs 1:5) principle… but to some extent I ‘get’ it… enough to ‘expect’ it from God. But I honestly find it harder with people… it’s like I don’t trust them to find me lovely when faced with my darkness. And that hinders my heart from loving them… because I’m too scared to let them love me.

I think about this a lot… who am I to not love those God loves? Those He died for (John 3:16)… and I don’t show them love. And He has so loved me… oh that that revelation would cause love to abound in and overflow from my heart. And He commands me to love others (Luke 10:27). It’s right up there behind loving Him.

And it’s not just loving people who I expect to return my love… He calls me to loving my enemies (Matthew 5:44). Trying to love like He does… faithfully, even when met with unfaithfulness. Like Hosea and Gomer… like God and Israel… like God and me. This is how He loves… and I want to be like that. I want to do more than simply ‘accept and appreciate’ His love… I want to live it… to have it fill my heart and overflow into loving Him… and loving others.

Even if it ‘costs’ me (what love doesn’t??)… even if it would be ‘unreturned’… would being like Him, obeying Him, knowing He sees and knowing that even my weak efforts move His heart (Song of Songs 4:9) be reward enough. Would I find delight in the fact that I am loving… or at least trying to…

Would my love not be conditional… only offered if it’s going to be responded to with equal or greater love… that’s not how He loves, and I want to love as He does… for His love is perfect. And I want to be filled with confidence in His love. For knowing He loves me gives me strength to love others. Knowing that He loves them helps too Knowing that the love that surpasses knowledge (Ephesians 3:19) is ever for me… the only love that will ever fully satisfy is already towards me… gives me strength to ‘risk’ not being loved in return.

Also, I want to be loved by others … but I am always waiting for the other person to be vulnerable so I can love the other person in their weakness… but they are waiting as well. So nothing happens. Argh.

And it’s not always as seemingly heroic as responding with love when being confronted with someone else’s weakness. What about being constant… always, always responding with love. No matter the circumstance. Big, small, if they’re your best friend, if they’re your enemy… always loving.

Wooow I am getting sleepy and rambly now… sooo goodnight

Today one of my tutors was saying how one thing he doesn’t like about ‘theologians’ (I took this as being synonymous with ‘Christians’… but I could just be oversensitive…) is that “… they ‘pick and choose’ the science they want to agree with.” And… well, I am not here to rant and rave in response to that… but I did, internally, as he said it don’t know if that’s a good thing… and if it isn’t, well, I am willing to be changed…

… I am getting off topic…

So anyway… his comment made me think. We (Christians) have reason to be choosy with science we agree with… but what we also tend to do which we have no excuse for is being choosy with which Biblical concepts we believe… not just ‘oh yeah I believe that…’ but having hearts that truly believe it, so that it impacts what we do. Not ‘believing’ as in hearing the word, but ‘believing’ as in we hear it and do what it says (Matthew 7:24)… no matter the cost. I know I am prone to being ‘choosy’ with God. Like, “I will obey this much because it doesn’t hurt ‘too much’… ummmm, but that’s a bit ‘too costly’…”

Argh!! How can I say this to the One who gave His only Son for me when I was His enemy (Romans 5:10)?? I want to take His word for what it is… and be transformed (Psalm 19:7). Not trying to change His word to fit me… but to let His word change me… that I would hear it and live it… all of it. Not just the bits that don’t seem ‘too hurty’.

… buuut I will continue to be picky when it comes to science… sorry Mr Darwin…

I really like the song “I Will Waste My Life” by Misty Edwards. I love to sing it, I love to play it, I love to dance to it, I love to listen to it… it captures something I otherwise just ‘feel’… and puts it to music. But all those times I would sing “I will waste my life…” I envisioned being an Anna (Luke 2:36-37), spending my days (nights!!) in a prayer room seeking His face through prayer, fasting and reading the Word… and then from that place of learning from God who God is, going out and making Him known… and then back into the prayer room again

… but He led me here… to days packed full of university or work and waaay less time in an actual prayer room… a life that is simply BUSY with things that seem so meaningless to me (Ecclesiastes 1:2)… oh, but there definitely are things I love (eg. Wednesday night worship with the word sets… *happy sigh*)… and on top of all those other things filling it up life is full of longing to just be back to ’wasting my life’… spending time sitting in a room, knowing that on the outside I appear to be stayin’ up all night talking the atmosphere and missing the odd Taco Bell run here and there… but on the inside something so much bigger and more beautiful is going on… and who even can comprehend what it does to the heart of the Lord (Song of Songs 4:9)?? And when the heart of the Lord is moved… look out, you powers and principalities (Colossians 2:15)…

I would cry (*sigh* still do on the odd day…) “God… why am I here?? It feels like such a waste of my life…” … but one day I remembered the aforementioned song… and all those times I would sing “I will waste my life…” envisioning a life sitting (and dancing!!) in a prayer room… because it had gotten to the point where that didn’t seem like a ‘waste’ of my life at all… but what I wanted to do with my life more than anything… and my heart just came alive like never before when I had a chance to pray, fast, read the Word and worship through dance and song fulltime… being a successful accountant no longer held any appeal… aaand it still doesn’t, but I am nevertheless still pluggin’ away at the accounting degree…

Wooow bunny trail… ok, back to crying and remembering…

All those times I told Him I would waste my life… envisioning something that wasn’t a waste to me and being excited by the prospect… and then He leads me away from that and into something completely different… something which truly does ‘feel’ like a waste… and three years of it sitting ahead of me… but I am totally aware that the way I feel doesn’t mean that’s how it is… it feels like a waste when I forget… when I forget that He remains fully in control (1 Timothy 6:15), when I forget that He is wiser than I am (Isaiah 40:13), when I forget that He wants my heart (Song of Songs 7:10) even more than I want to give it, when I forget that His will is good, pleasing and perfect (Romans 12:2)… oh that I would truly see things the way they are… the way He sees them… not filtered through my emotions and weak understanding…

Lots of emotions rage inside me when I step back and look at it all. When I weigh up my hopes, dreams and desires against reality and God’s will. Oh, that they would all be one and the same… but as of now there are lots of clashing emotions… usually one or two more dominant than others… the turmoil of frustration, weak but true love, momentary peace, painful confusion, crushing despair, glimpses of hope, flashes of offense, weak yet growing trust etcetc (haha ok, this maybe sounds overly dramatic… but I’m trying to express myself better so we’ll see if this ‘works’ or is overkill..)… but oh that it would all be overwhelmed and silenced by love.

I have been known try and start arguments with God… ha… one day I was crying to/trying to argue with Him… and I’m all “… but I was willing to sacrifice so much else and just pray…” and I felt a resounding “obedience is better than sacrifice” (1 Samuel 15:22) and I was like “*pause*… danggit!!” Shut down by God… I cannot win an argument with God… but who am I to even start arguing with God?? I picture it as me the little kid, kicking and screaming when she doesn’t get her way… and Him just holding me close, holding me still… as I calm down and begin to trust Him…

… I am so loved…

All that to say… it doesn’t always ‘feel’ like it but He is drawing me closer and leading me into the plans He has for me… and honestly, I have no idea what they are… and try as I may to fight it, this is where He has me now… I don’t understand it but I guess that’s His job… mine is to trust and obey and love as best I can… God help me…

“… just let me find I’m at Your feet…”