I See Love

This week was a good week. It's the week of Good Friday and Easter. Throughout this week, I made more of the effort to meditate upon Christ and what He has done. My morning devotionals have been on the latter half of the Gospels--the chronological events leading up to Christ's crucifixion and resurrection. In remembrance of Good Friday, I decided to listen to Tim Keller's sermon, "Mocking Jesus". I've listened to this powerful sermon at least 10 times, and it never gets old. After the sermon, the song "Third Day, Steven Curtis Chapman, Mercyme-I See Love" came on. This is seriously one of my favorite songs. The lyrics are so good.

Some see a teacher
Standing on a hill
Speaking words of wisdom
Some see a healer
Reaching out his hand
To give sight to a blind man
Some see a dreamer
Wasting his life
On what can never be
Some see a fool
Dying for his dreams

But I see love (I see love)
I see love (I see love)
Light of heaven breaking through
Well I see grace (I see grace)
I see God's face (I See Gods face)
Shining pure and perfect love
When I see you
I see love

Some see a prisoner
Alone before his judge
With no one to defend him
Some see a victim
Beaten and abused
With all the world against him
Some see a martyr
Carrying his cross
For what he believes
Some see a hero
Who set his people free

But I see love (I see love)
I see love (I see love)
Light of heaven breaking through
Well I see grace (I see grace)
I see God's face (I See Gods face)
Shining pure and perfect love
When I see you


With your last breath
I see love
Through your death
I see love
I see peace in the eyes of the king
I see hope in your suffering (I see love)
I see a calm in the center of the storm
I see a Saviour

I see love
I see love
Light of heaven breaking through (heaven breaking through)
I see grace
I see God's face
Shining pure and perfect love
When I see you
I see love
When I see you
I see heaven breaking through
See Gods face
Shining pure and perfect love
When I see you
When I see you
When I see you
I see love
I see love
When I see

Some see Him walking from an empty grave...

"I Will Wait For You"

Took this from my brother's blog. Poet Janette presents her poem about how she will wait for God.

We were all created in His image but you have the ability to reflect, project and even detect the sun. If I were to explain what you look like you would have to look like a star, a son of the sun. I would gain energy simply from the light that You shine on me I would need you in order to complete my photosynthesis. I await Your revelation but once again from the genesis I will wait for You and I will know You, because when you speak I will be reminded of Solomon’s wisdom. Your ability to lead will remind me of Moses. Your faith will remind me of Abraham. Your confidence in God’s word will remind me of Daniel. Your inspiration will remind me of Paul. Your heart for God will remind me of David. Your attention to detail will remind me of Noah. Your integrity will remind me of Joseph and your ability to abandon your own will will remind me of the disciples, but your ability to love selflessly and unconditionally will remind me of Christ. But I won’t need to identify you by any special matthews or any special marks, ‘cos his word will be tatted all over your heart. And you will know me and you will find me where the boldness of Esther meets the warm closeness of Ruth, with the hospitality of Lydia as align with the submission of Mary, which is engulfed in the tears of a praying Hannah. I will be the one drenched in Proverbs 31 waiting for you. But to my Father, my Father who has known me before I was birthed into this earth only if You should see fit. I desire Your will above mine so even if You call me to a life of singleness, my heart is content with You: the one who has sent. You are the greatest love story ever told, the greatest love ever known. You are forever my judge and I’m forever your witness and I pray that I’m always found on a mission about my Father’s business. I will always be Yours and I will always wait for You, Lord. More than the watchmen wait for the morning more than the watchmen wait for the morning, I will wait.

Prayer

My recent prayer requests have been about prayer itself. I listened to a few sermons on prayer, and it never occurred to me that praying was so difficult. Tim Keller says that it's easier to preach for 30 mins than it is to pray for 30 mins, and it's so true! Our minds get so distracted when we're praying. The mere sound of an IM or text message will tempt us to put our prayers on hold just to see what they say.

But more personally, I found my prayers so repetitive, and pretty much like a groceries list. There was no love or adoration in my prayers. It was pure business. Especially being a fourth year now, so many different things have been occupying my mind: school, future career, family in Korea, living situation for next year, church, small group, and the list goes on.

I realized something though. It is okay for our prayers to be repetitive. It is okay to constantly ask God for things. Christ, in fact, commands us to pray like this--to be persistent, to constantly knock at his door even to the point where we pretty much bother him. Why can we do this? It's because we have a basis for our prayers. Our basis is that God is "Our Father". Notice that when Christ teaches us how to pray, he doesn't say "Our King" although he is, or "Our Creator", although he is. The first two words "Our Father" state our basis for our prayers, that it is only because we are his children that we can come to and pray to him intimately.

Just as children ask their parents for things, we should be praying to God about everything we want or need. And then as Our Father, God will either give us what we ask for, or he will give us what we should have asked for. Our Father will always answer our prayers.

-Simon

Sin Is Everywhere!

Every Sunday night, I've been going over Tim Keller Bible studies with Yoejin and Joe to prepare for small group. So far it's been going really well. I feel like I've been learning so much about sin, gender roles, and Genesis 1-3 in general.

There are two things that blew my mind.

1. I always knew that men and women had different gender roles. I also knew that these respective gender roles do not entail differences in status. Men and women were created to compliment each other. Men are better at certain things than women are, and vice versa, women are better at certain things than men are. I love this one quote by Matthew Henry:

"Not made out of his head to top him, not out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected and near his heart to be beloved."

But what blew my mind was how both men and women together were made in the image of God. It's not "man was made in the image of God and woman was made in the image of God". It's "man and woman were made in the image of God". See the difference? The only time God refers to Himself as "we" or "us" is when he is about to create us as male and female. Since both males and females "reflect" the being of God, it means that God has all the traits associated with human maleness and femaleness. Hence, only as male-female together can we show forth and understand the full range of God's character. The relationship men and women have is a reflection of the relationship within the Godhead itself. God is both unified and diverse.

2. The second thing that blew my mind was the fact that the fall caused sin to touch upon all aspects of creation. In one sense I knew this, but only on surface level. When I thought about sin, I only thought of it as affecting humans directly (fleshly desires, which encompasses a whole mess of crap in the world, spiritually, culturally, etc.). But sin affects every part of creation including psychological disorders, physical illnesses, and even natural disasters. Always in the back of my mind, I knew this. But restudying all of this again kind of opened my eyes again. My answer to "why are there natural disasters that kill innocent people" was always "sin", but I always just said that as a cop out answer. But it's true, and now I know why "sin" is the correct answer.

Tim Keller. Why are you so smart?

-Simon

Gas

Joe: "dude, who freaking burps while they're doing ab workouts?"

I normally have a lot of gas, but these days I've been feeling it a little bit more. I don't get it. It's not like my diet has changed. My stomach always makes all these funny noises. I don't know whether it's because I have gas or if I'm hungry, but it's embarrassing. It's weird cause it's not even just farts. But I burp A LOT. I even burp when I'm running on the treadmill and apparently when I do ab workouts.

Although most people around me get annoyed of my gas, I see it as a blessing in disguise. Farts and burps just sound funny. No matter how angry someone is at me whether I fart or burp, they're always smiling. Gas brings joy into our lives!

There are many times when I fart alone and I can't help but giggle out loud.

This was a pointless post. But I suppose some of you have gotten to know who I really am. hehe.

-Simon

Another New Year

2010 has treated me well. It was filled with many blessings and trials. In 2010, I completed my first year at UCLA, my family got to spend time together in Korea (before that, my family had not been together since 2005), my mom moved to Korea, and I finally got to experience what it's like to literally be out on my own.

I realized that ever since I moved out on my own, money has become a bigger issue for me in terms of idolatry. I found myself constantly listening to Tim Keller's sermons on generosity and money. I had to keep reminding myself to love Christ more than money. Reading Dinko's blog on idolatry was a great reminder to me that the result of idolatry was not because we love the world so much, but we don't love Christ enough.

I'm not much of a guy to make resolutions or anything, but I hope that I will grow in grace, patience, love, and ultimately love Christ more in 2011. Whatever blessings and trials may come in 2011, I hope that God will prepare me for them!

Thank you 2010.

-Simon

Internet is my Idol

Internet was out half of the day today. I felt so lost. I didn't know what to do. So after my friend and I did some hardcore studying, we played puzzle fighter for like 2 hours. When internet still wouldn't work, Joe and I were so lost since we always watch shows or youtube clips before we sleep. After I come back from taking a shower, I see Joe searching through the DVD collection to pick out a movie since we have nothing else to do. After seeing his desperate search for a fun movie to watch, I decide to check the internet ONE MORE TIME. The internet was back. We rejoiced, went to our separate computers, checked our emails and facebooks in silence, and after a few minutes, we both realized that the internet was evil.

The end.

-Simon