I will stand firm...

Lol! This made me laugh... because I say "I"m just being honest" alot... does that make me a jerk?? OH NO!!!

On other things.. been an extremely frustrating day... but I think the enemy is trying really hard to take me off course. Like REALLY hard! So many things coming my way... which means I really need to get off my arse and make it to EMP and PRAY for the new season ahead. Pray for work... pray for everything that is in my life... and all that has not arrived yet. 

I walked back and forth the CU campus... not once... but TWICE... I went to one building... walked to another.. back to that same building... and then back to that other building... twice!!! TWICE!! And it's so disgustingly humid outside... not impressed.

Disunity in the workplace... or trying to cause disunity in the workplace... so I shall ignore what sounded like discouragement... and continue to do my job. I know that this job is where I am to be at, and I'm going to stay put here.

Another job with more money... trying to give me significance where I had craved significance before?? I'm flattered... and tempted... but I said no. I know that this job is where I am to be at, and I'm going to stay put here.

Need to further ground myself in God... and to remove the things that not belong in my life. Victory is already mine through Christ. So I will claim that... need to claim that... must claim that and stop losing... Prayers much appreciated! 

Hump Day Happenings...

What an interesting day it has been.... 'twas an extremely busy day at work as I was rushing to finish off some lesson planning done that should be out today for the group to prepare for Saturday's kids program. Got most of that done and will finish off the worksheets tomorrow if I have time... hopefully I will.

Someone asked me something... that caught me off guard... and once again makes me think about boundaries... but you can't define boundaries with someone who won't talk to you... so... I guess all I can do is stay away for myself and hope that eventually presumptions or misconceptions will stop. That is all I will say about that for now. 

Best part of my day, hands down... dinner with the parents of one of my best friends. Love love LOVE that girl, and LOVE her parents! They're the most hilarious people ever! I miss holidays over at their place... turkey for thanksgiving... hotpot for the Christmas season. Driving out to Sherwood Park was always fun... Goodness... it's been a long time since we've all known each other. So much fun! I miss having her around... too bad she couldn't come to Hong Kong too... but I did just see her in Australia not too long ago... so I guess that's ok. There's always whatsapp.... solution to long distance texting. 

So here I am once again... reminiscing about Edmonton and missing a place that I once called home... and still call home most of the time. There are lots things that I miss... even though I know it's not the same anymore... and well, most people are married and have their own families... I still can't help but miss that place. I do want to visit... there are a lot of people I want to see... and things that I want to do. But I am also waiting for the right time. 

Anyways... just wanted to vent about missing home and how much I love the chance to talk about things which are so familiar to me... :) And to end off... a stupid stupid pic the best friend took of me cooking in Edmonton kitchen... man... I miss that kitchen... and drinking with her... as you can see we do in that pic hahahahaha LOL! :P 

Monday Musings...

It's been awhile since I've done my Monday Musings blog... so I thought I'd sit down and do one today.

So I just sat down and read this article. 

I found it quite interesting. What I really enjoyed was her Henri Nouwen quote. 

“In solitude I get rid of my scaffolding: no friends to talk with, no telephone calls to make, no meetings to attend, no music to entertain, no books to distract, just me—naked, vulnerable, weak, sinful, deprived, broken—nothing. It is this nothingness that I have to face in my solitude—a nothingness so dreadful that everything in me wants to run to my friends, my work and my distractions, so I can forget my nothingness and make myself believe that I am worth something.”

I too feat that nothingness. It's a scary place to be in... but I found this quote resounds so clearly the thoughts and feelings during my 6 month period of unemployment. I know that being unemployed for 6 months compared to some of my friends who have been unemployed for much longer periods, but we're not talking about them and their experiences at the moment, I'm sharing with you what I was feeling during those six months. 

It's really scary to be in that nothingness... but like the article says... that means we have put our value in what we do. Yet, I am not defined by my job at Christian Action, I'm not defined by my being a social worker student... I do not find worth in being a placement student with the Hong Kong Federation of Youth Groups, and my new job at ICM does not once again return me to being a person of value. My value has and always will be that I'm a daughter of God.

I fight with this daily... that I am a person of value in the eyes of my Father in heaven. I'm not defined by the ways I serve or don't serve in church. I'm not a valued as a worker by the number of hours I put into work... None of that matters at the end of the day. God is the one to whom I must report to... and at the end of the day He's simply gonna ask me if I had been obedient to what He had called me to do. Which brings me to my next thought...

In the past while it had been brought to my attention that one of my gifts is faith... faith in God, in things... in people. I believe in things no one else of a normal mind would believe in. Prior to this, I thought I was just good at forgiving... letting go of past offences... (sometimes it takes longer than others... but eventually I get there) This past Sunday, someone prayed into me that God has gifted me with love. That He had equipped me with the ability to love supernaturally... to love beyond human understanding and reasoning... to love those who had hurt me... 

It was like a light suddenly turned on in my head. As it says in 1 Corinthians "...and if I have faith that can move mountains, but have no love, I am nothing." Despite that I hadn't really been paying attention while we've been doing this Gifts of Grace series... God still spoke. Hahaha... All of it is only possible because I love. I have faith in things because I love... and ultimately because God loves me! 

The second part was "Don't give up... God knows that it's been hard to love, but you can't give up loving those He had called you to love." It was like the flood gates had opened... I had been waiting so long... for that touch of God... for Him to show me that He's been hearing my cries... my pleas... my aching. I've been wanting to give up so bad... to just run away and hide in a hole... to not care about anything else anymore. 

It's been an interesting time... but I know this also isn't the end but just the beginning of God doing something inside of me. And as much as I want to run and hide from it, I know that the only thing that I can do is accept it and just let God do as He pleases in my life so that I can enter into the better that He has in store for me. 

Jesus Makes Up for Every Sacrifice

This is encouraging... it encouraged my heart today... hope it encourages yours as well! :)

Jesus Makes Up for Every Sacrifice:

Peter began to say to him, “See, we have left everything and followed you.” Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life.” (Mark 10:28–30)

Here's how John Piper explains Jesus's words to Peter in Mark 10:28–30:

What Jesus means here is that he himself makes up for every sacrifice.

If you give up a mother’s nearby affection and concern, you get back one hundred times the affection and concern from the ever-present Christ.

If you give up the warm comradeship of a brother, you get back one hundred times the warmth and comradeship of Christ.

If you give up the sense of at-homeness you had in your house, you get back one hundred times the comfort and security of knowing that your Lord owns every house.

To prospective missionaries, Jesus says, “I promise to work for and be for you so much that you will not be able to speak of having sacrificed anything.”

John G. Paton, missionary to the New Hebrides (today’s Vanuatu in the South Pacific) gives a beautiful testimony of the nearness and friendship of Christ when he was utterly alone, having lost his wife and child, and now surrounded by hostile natives as he hid in a tree.

I climbed into the tree and was left there alone in the bush. The hours I spent there live all before me as if it were but of yesterday. I heard the frequent discharging of muskets, and the yells of the savages. Yet I sat there among the branches, as safe in the arms of Jesus.

Never, in all my sorrows, did my Lord draw nearer to me, and speak more soothingly in my soul, than when the moonlight flickered among these chestnut leaves, and the night air played on my throbbing brow, as I told all my heart to Jesus.

Alone, yet not alone! If it be to glorify my God, I will not grudge to spend many nights alone in such a tree, to feel again my Savior’s spiritual presence, to enjoy His consoling fellowship.

If thus thrown back upon your own soul, alone, all alone, in the midnight, in the bush, in the very embrace of death itself, have you a Friend that will not fail you then? What was Jesus’s attitude to Peter’s “sacrificial” spirit?

Peter said, “We have left everything and followed you.” Is this the spirit of “self-denial” commended by Jesus? No, it is rebuked. Jesus said, “No one ever sacrifices anything for me that I do not pay back a hundredfold — yes, in one sense even in this life, not to mention eternal life in the age to come.”

Desiring God, Multnomah Books (Colorado Springs, CO), pages 240–241

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The above excerpt is the October 27 reading for Desiring God's free devotional app, Solid Joys (available for iPhone and iPad, soon for Android). We've picked a solid joy for every day of the year by identifying 365 of the best cuts from Piper's “big three” books (the “trilogy” of Desiring God, Pleasures of God, and Future Grace), along with key online content from the Desiring God site.


Our hope is that you'll be able to dive in for just a moment each day and come away with something solid to feed your joy in God.



Download the app for free in the iTunes store (or find it by searching for “John Piper” or “Desiring God” or “Solid Joys”).

Many residential streets still await blading

LOL! This is home... whilst HK is a friggin' twenty some degrees... I'm sweating in a cotton cardigan.... blah... I need to move back to higher latitudes...

Many residential streets still await blading:
Road crews still have to blade a majority of residential streets in Edmonton one week after the storm on Nov. 7th.

We can't be just friends...

According to this article.... you and I can't be just friends.... LOL!

Quote...

In the midst of my paper writing, I came across this quote, and I really like it. 

"An unplanned pregnancy is a crisis. Although an abortion may end the crisis, it seldom resolves the original conflicts.”

Something that I want you to know...

Recently I had found out that one of the refugee families that I had the privilege of working with before has been accepted for resettlement in the US. I had met the husband while he was making falafel for World Refugee Day (which also coincided with my first week of work... amongst other things that year... :P) and now as they get ready to leave for the US, they've invited me over for lunch for... Falafel! Hahaha... it's funny. 

This family is very close to my heart because even though I had only known them for a little over two years, I feel like I had gotten to walk with them through so much. I remember first feeling the injustice of the whole UNHCR system... how they had accepted only half the family for resettlement but they didn't wanted to be separated and getting on my knees before God for them. I remember asking God why stuff like this happened? I couldn't understand why it was so complicated! 

Now... I have seen them go through so much ups and downs in the past year, but I'm so excited that they're finally here, getting ready for the next chapter of their life. I'll miss them like crazy because they're one of those families that God has placed in my heart... but I also know that even if I never see them again on earth, I'll will get to see them in heaven. :)

Still... farewells are always hard.