incidence

At the station today, 3 young men yelled at me "Hey!"
I turned my face to them.
"Do you have 2 spare dollars?"
"Sorry, I don't"
Then, they swore at me.
Walking on the street, I got quite angry. First of all, they yelled at me "Hey!", did not even say "excuse me". Who is the one asking for favour? They were the ones asking for favour! Whether to help them or not was up to me. I didn't owe them. And they had the attitude.
I didn't have the spare money, and even if I had, I would not give them just for their bad attitude.
Why do I see young men like that a lot?
While I was feeling angry, I was thinking, it's in times like these I really wish there will really be a hell burning for an extended period of time, to let them know what they deserve.
Though I had another thought, they need the gospel, too; they could actually become Christians.
And then I had another thought, even if I could, I would not share the gospel with them, let them perish.
Then I realized just how evil my thoughts were.
Luke 9:
51 ¶ And it came to pass, when the time was come that he should be received up, he steadfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem,  52And sent messengers before his face: and they went, and entered into a village of the Samaritans, to make ready for him.  53And they did not receive him, because his face was as though he would go to Jerusalem.  54And when his disciples James and John saw this, they said, Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elias did?  55But he turned, and rebuked them, and said, Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of.  56 For the Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them. And they went to another village. 
Comparing the way I think to the way my Saviour thinks, I feel so short of His glory.
What happened to me was simply a few ungrateful young men, what happened to Yahshua was being crucified innocently, and that He volunteered for it. No one took His life, He freely gave it away.
Pondering on His story, His character, I feel embarrassed; yet again, feel attracted to His beauty, and actually feeling proud for worshiping a God like that.

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He Knows My Name

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The good fight

Wayne, I don't know how to address him, was our group leader for that week at the Living Waters conference at Collaroy; one week long, I got to know him a bit better, and he was a patient, firm and  enthusiastic leader. He had such a smile that was telling everyone he was approachable. During the regular Living Waters course, we did not have much time together which would make it convenient for us to get to know each other. That one week at Collaroy was mainly the only time he made an impression in my eyes.
Nearly 2 months after his death, I learned this tragedy while reading the Summer newsletter of Living Waters. To me, it was a complete shock; and it did not only surprise me, it actually made me sad.
One week of getting to know each other better, generally should not make us friends, and after the conference, I hardly talked to him again; after 2006 Living Waters, I've never seen him ever since. Yet when I was moving home, doing the pack-up, I did again notice this particular greeting card with his nearly-doctor's-handwriting; telling me something like this "I sense God is doing a work in you" that he gave me during the conference. It always brought my memory back to that sunny week at Collaroy, an unforgettable week.
Ron summarises it well, definitely much better than my knowledge of Wayne; yet I still remember what I heard during 2006 Living Waters, when Ron was sharing with us Wayne's testimony, how God transformed his life. A former sex addict, he learned to surrender to God, and redirected his passion to the Father, pressing his brokenness into Christ, and found his true self in the Father's heart.
Instead of going to Canada with his fiancee, he chose to remain in Sydney to serve God in this special way at Living Waters.
And just 4 months after he got married, a car accident took away his life. He no longer feels any pain, resting in peace; his widow, however, was left with a sorrowful heart. I feel deeply sorry for her.
As for Living Waters, it is also indeed a great loss that such a leader of integrity has left us.
Yet, I feel such a relief to know that he fought the good fight. For Christian men especially, sexual temptation is such an intense and ongoing struggle; (I say for Christian men especially, because Christian men still have a conviction while facing the enormous temptation); and Wayne, having found his true identity in God the Father, he found victory and peace; in the fight for purity, he was a victor, and left us a precious legacy. He was an inspiration.
And I can't help but to think about myself. I still have unresolved issues that I still need to work on; I've got heaps of wounds that I desperately still need to find healing in Yahshua-yet I have delayed it; I've not yet learned to fully throw myself in the hands of God the Father and to let Him define who I am, my true identity; to rest in His love, and to surrender myself fully to Him without reservation or compromise. I have in fact experienced substantial losses in my own battle by refusing to trust in the good will and wisdom of Yahweh.
I sense, he was a true man of strength by acknowledging his weaknesses and trading it for Yahshua's strength; he became a victorious warrior because he allowed himself to become weak first; he became
who he was meant to be in the first place by hiding himself in Yahshua.
We don't know how many days lay ahead of us. It is of no use to threaten ourselves into good behaviours because of the uncertainty in our lives; I still believe God's love compels us; will I fix my eyes on His glory, give HIs truth my ears, pay Him my "sh'ma", and allow Him to be the One I always talk to? I do not wish to see regrets in my life near the end of it, whenever it will be.
Wayne was an example of what it means to deny ourselves, trade our failures, our lies, our brokenness in order to find out our true selves.
Wayne died in victory, while countless of Christian men died in failures and struggles.
I am afraid I will not find myself in the stage Wayne stepped in anywhere in the foreseeable future, I am afraid I will fail. What Wayne went through seems so unreachable. However, shouldn't I know it is God who is behind, working in us.
Wayne allowed God to take over in each of his decisions. God's strength was made great in his weaknesses; I shall admit my own weaknesses to God and let Him take over.
It is a tragedy to still be unable to find out who I am; and Wayne's death reminded me it is time to catch up.
No one can tell if it was God who wished to take the life of Wayne. I am not in a position to make comments; but it is possible that it was simply an accident that killed him; or maybe Satan hated him so much because he was reflecting God's character more and more day by day; and he was doing a service so pleasing to God.
I feel sorry for the loss of Wayne-my group leader for a week.

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For with Thee there is forgiveness, that Thou mayest be feared.

Psalm 130:4 For with Thee there is forgiveness, that Thou mayest be feared.

In the past, when I read this verse, I felt a sense of awkwardness, because forgiveness doesn't seem to match fear, when we are forgiven, we are relieved instead of afraid. People say, Fear God, because He knows everything that you do, and He will bring judgment for all you have done, and be afraid of His punishment.
In fact, immediately precedes this verse, in verse 3, it says, "If Thou, LORD, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand?"
The writer did not write "if Thou, LORD, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand? That Thou mayest be feared."
Instead, he put in between these 2 ideas, "For with Thee there is forgiveness".
Knowing that God knows everything we do, and that none of us can stand when He marks our iniquities, may indeed make us tremble, and it may indeed make us be afraid, but it is not the fear in verse 4 here. We would be afraid of the punishment, for the consequence of our sins; but God doesn't ultimately want that kind of fear, what He wants, is that we fear God Himself.
This fear translates to our acknowledgment of His greatness, a surrender of our hearts; and it is the result of our realisation of just how different God is to us; how differently He thinks, feels and acts; and yet we so easily fall in the trap of thinking what would God think about me based on our own pattern of thinking and feeling; we try to interpret God's character and what He wants to tell us with our finite mind.
Isaiah 55:8For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the LORD.  9For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.

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Saddened

In the past, I have mainly put my focus on the human rights violations in China, today, however, as my sight was widened, I am getting saddened day by day.
There are several kinds of human rights abuses: the institutional abuse that is either enforced or sanctioned by the governments; by civilians; terrorism; and there is the kind of abuse we tend to overlook, domestic abuse.
Sometimes when I am reflecting upon the news I have read, the tragedies around the world, people's overt abuses; and people's indifference to what's happening in the rest of the world, and many of them are ignorant, and wish to remain that way.
And as a person, an individual, 1 among 6 billion people, I feel so powerless. I cannot change the legislations; and I cannot change people's opinions; and as for terrorism, I am frightened. My personal concern over the tragedies seems a waste of time.
Seeing so much injustice, sometimes I even kind of wish there really would be a hell that burns the human rights abusers on and on; but there isn't such a thing; then I am also reminded, I am not perfect, and I am a sinner myself.
Yet my saddened heart just tells me how difficult for God. The people who impose abuses are not my relatives, I do not see any connection between them and me. God created the whole world, and how sad must He be feeling to see His own creation doing harm to each other. I am only seeing the tip of an iceberg, whereas God is omnipresent, and He sees the tragedies around the world every second, and I believe He sees more bad than good.
Which just marvels me even more when the Bible tells us that the wicked will not be burned on and on and on without an end; but instead, they will be consumed away.
He is not interested in keep torturing the wicked (as much as they deserve it, some of us may feel), He simply desires to put an end to the whole tragedy of the human race.
God is great, because His heart is great, and we cannot comprehend it.
And we see it especially in the so called Christian nations.
Yes, secular countries like Japan and Islamic countries show even less compassion; but it is a disgrace to Christianity when people from the so called Christian nations show indifference to so many people suffering under tyrannies in other parts of the world. Particularly when their "brothers and sisters in the Lord" cannot worship God freely, the Christians in the western Christian nations do not really care about what's going on elsewhere. As if Yahweh was God of only them.
It is always easy to say God loves the world, but it is always difficult for us to love the world God wants us to.

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Who Am I

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