(To get the full effect of the title, you have to think about Eric Hadland, Nathaniel Strenger, Ted Warsavage and I hiking through the snowy Northwoods singing Red Hot Chili Peppers. Just think, Eric and Nathaniel, doing their hobbly thing, singing. While we're lost. In the cold. Hopefully, it will make you smile and not offend you.)
Well friends, thank you very much for praying for me, but, today, miraculous divine intervention didn't show up and I bombed the math section of the GREs :). There's an option at the end whether or not to report the score.. I decided not to register the score, since umm... I pretty much just guessed on the last 3rd of the test.
It's honestly really very humbling and frustrating, especially since I will have to take it again... in China. And the math section won't go away either. For someone who only applied to Wheaton and didn't think much of the SATs, this grad school and GRE thing is an awful hassle. In our cocky Wheaton arrogance (or maybe just mine?), not being able to complete 28 middle school level questions in 45 minutes without a calculator puts me in my place.
Anticipating these damn GREs, I was thinking yesterday about what it means to trust in God, and even about the nature of your prayers for me. (Ooo... scary questions.) What does it mean when some things we pray for work out the way we want them to, and other things don't? What does it mean when some things look like divine appointments and other times, I can't figure out what God is trying to do, for the life of me?
In the end, I'm trying the best that I can to go the direction the Lord has called me. Personally, the grad program in Berkeley and UCLA look great, according to my standards. I don't necessarily have the numbers to get into them, and whether I get in is really God's prerogative. But if I don't get in, what then? Ah, trust in the Lord. He knows my life and what is ahead far better than I do. Trust in the Lord, and don't mistake God as a divine magician who glorifies an individual. In the end, it must be God who becomes greater as I become less.
Ohh listen to us Christians. If I didn't know better, I'd think we were just playing mental games with ourselves, trying to exonerate the actions of a deity we claim is loving and good. No wonder people think we're fools. (But everyone's a fool, it's just a matter of who we're fools for. I'm pretty ok being God's fool. He's been good and faithful to me.)
Faith is a strange thing. If God played by our rules, it doesn't make sense. But He doesn't play by our rules. (Honestly, it still doesn't make sense, but that has to be ok.)
So for the sweet part, I'm off to China (via Korea) tonight :). I'm gonna keep on going, and worry about the GREs when I need to take them again.
Friends, thanks for praying the will of the Lord in my life. Trust me... I will be needing your prayer.... especially when I come across the math section again.
Let me know how I can pray for you. Really. People think I'm saying that as a gesture of formality or something. I'm serious.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Sunday, May 27, 2007
The Devil's Music
A part of me cringed just a bit today.
The church I used to go to had a picnic, and I showed up just to say hi and bye to my friends. They had set up a speaker system next to the large gathering of those sitting in little groups munching on burgers, pasta and baked beans. It played background music...
... But the background music was CCM worship music. CCM criticisms aside, words about the glory, love, and power of God was, at that point, relegated to being background noise, nothing more than the equivalent of elevator music. Kickball, volleyball, barbecuing, bantering, all of the normal Memorial Day hubbub, was baptized and christened in CCM as opposed to classic rock or some of this weeks top 10.
Yes, some will say I am being too harsh... it's just a church social. It's just music. It's not like someone sat down, took music (supposedly) written for the explicit worship of God, and decided to desensitize it for everyone, using it as a cheap and clean substitute for the devil's rock and roll. It was unintentional, if it can even be considered an offense.
But this is why I'm sad and not angry... the fact that it was unintentional. The fact that music used to worship in one setting is used as noise filler in another, without bothering anyone, says something about the role of that music in our lives. It's not really set apart... it's just a replacement for the worldly version. In this case, I wonder what is more harmful, letting the sacred and holy become mundane, or "subjecting" ourselves to the mundane and worldly.
I had really wished they would have just turned up Classic Rock 103.7 or 99.3 The Buzz and broke out the brewskies instead. I could have at least gotten jiggy to Foreigner and Shakira.
To top it off, on my way out, a man in a wheelchair sat on the outskirts of the group, by himself, watching everyone else have a great time. Perhaps it was just that moment, and perhaps I'm wrong, but no one was talking to him and he looked a little alone. No one in that meeting of Christians, seemed to see him.
To make it worse, I saw him but continued on my way out even after making that observation.
"Jesus said, 'For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind.' Some Pharisees who were with him heard him say this and asked, 'What? Are we blind too?' Jesus said, 'If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.'" -John 9:39-41
The church I used to go to had a picnic, and I showed up just to say hi and bye to my friends. They had set up a speaker system next to the large gathering of those sitting in little groups munching on burgers, pasta and baked beans. It played background music...
... But the background music was CCM worship music. CCM criticisms aside, words about the glory, love, and power of God was, at that point, relegated to being background noise, nothing more than the equivalent of elevator music. Kickball, volleyball, barbecuing, bantering, all of the normal Memorial Day hubbub, was baptized and christened in CCM as opposed to classic rock or some of this weeks top 10.
Yes, some will say I am being too harsh... it's just a church social. It's just music. It's not like someone sat down, took music (supposedly) written for the explicit worship of God, and decided to desensitize it for everyone, using it as a cheap and clean substitute for the devil's rock and roll. It was unintentional, if it can even be considered an offense.
But this is why I'm sad and not angry... the fact that it was unintentional. The fact that music used to worship in one setting is used as noise filler in another, without bothering anyone, says something about the role of that music in our lives. It's not really set apart... it's just a replacement for the worldly version. In this case, I wonder what is more harmful, letting the sacred and holy become mundane, or "subjecting" ourselves to the mundane and worldly.
I had really wished they would have just turned up Classic Rock 103.7 or 99.3 The Buzz and broke out the brewskies instead. I could have at least gotten jiggy to Foreigner and Shakira.
To top it off, on my way out, a man in a wheelchair sat on the outskirts of the group, by himself, watching everyone else have a great time. Perhaps it was just that moment, and perhaps I'm wrong, but no one was talking to him and he looked a little alone. No one in that meeting of Christians, seemed to see him.
To make it worse, I saw him but continued on my way out even after making that observation.
"Jesus said, 'For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind.' Some Pharisees who were with him heard him say this and asked, 'What? Are we blind too?' Jesus said, 'If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.'" -John 9:39-41
By our love, by our love. Yes they'll know we are Christians...
When my buddy and I were in Everglades City, Florida, with nowhere to stay at 10:00 at night, we saw a sign of someone who gave swamp tours. He had also painted a Jesus fish next to his personal contact information. I, being the most shameless Chinese person I know, called his cell phone and told him that we were two students from a Christian college in Illinois and were wondering if he had a yard for us to pitch a tent and crash for the night. In his southern drawl, he asked, "Ya'll are Brothers right?" "Yessir we are." "Well then set up right near that sign." "Thank you very much sir."
Later that week, not having very much money to spend on food, we went to a church with pews full of people with white hair. We were the youngest there. They gushed hospitality and nearly forced us to stay for lunch afterwards (not that we resisted at all.)
"Someone told him, "Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you."
I love the story of the Rich Young Man. There is so much beef and umph in those verses. I love it (yet am secretly a little afraid) when Jesus says that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of the needle than for a rich person to enter the Kingdom, and Mark says, "The disciples were even more amazed, and said to each other, 'Who then can be saved?'" In their minds, wealth indicated God's approval and blessing. I can see them in their amazement; John nudging Peter whispering, "Wait, did he just say that?" and Peter responding, "Dude, I'm not sure..." Without missing a beat, Jesus surprises us again and says, "With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God." Yes, even a camel through the eye of the needle, says Jesus, is possible with God's grace.
Mark ends it by saying, "'I tell you the truth,' Jesus replied, 'no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age (homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—and with them, persecutions) and in the age to come, eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last first.'"
In my selfishness, I wonder what it would look like to really treat others as family, to be truly generous, not just when I have a vested interest. I listened to my brother and his "me first" worldview today, dripping off of every sentence that came out of his mouth. (Granted, it was his birthday.) In my family in which the best has always been reserved for my brother and I, I wonder if I would be hearing a different way with words if we had lived a bigger vision of family.
Later that week, not having very much money to spend on food, we went to a church with pews full of people with white hair. We were the youngest there. They gushed hospitality and nearly forced us to stay for lunch afterwards (not that we resisted at all.)
"Someone told him, "Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you."
He [Jesus] replied to him, "Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?" Pointing to his disciples, he said, "Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother." -Matt 12:47-50
With those words, Jesus redefined "family." Family was no longer limited to blood, clan, cultural, or national ties. "Family" transcended dividing borders, and in Matthew 10, in highlighting the radically offensive nature of the Gospel, lists allegiance to earthly family as a possible hindrance to taking up our cross.
I love the story of the Rich Young Man. There is so much beef and umph in those verses. I love it (yet am secretly a little afraid) when Jesus says that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of the needle than for a rich person to enter the Kingdom, and Mark says, "The disciples were even more amazed, and said to each other, 'Who then can be saved?'" In their minds, wealth indicated God's approval and blessing. I can see them in their amazement; John nudging Peter whispering, "Wait, did he just say that?" and Peter responding, "Dude, I'm not sure..." Without missing a beat, Jesus surprises us again and says, "With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God." Yes, even a camel through the eye of the needle, says Jesus, is possible with God's grace.
Mark ends it by saying, "'I tell you the truth,' Jesus replied, 'no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age (homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—and with them, persecutions) and in the age to come, eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last first.'"
In my selfishness, I wonder what it would look like to really treat others as family, to be truly generous, not just when I have a vested interest. I listened to my brother and his "me first" worldview today, dripping off of every sentence that came out of his mouth. (Granted, it was his birthday.) In my family in which the best has always been reserved for my brother and I, I wonder if I would be hearing a different way with words if we had lived a bigger vision of family.
Friday, May 25, 2007
Come and die, that you might live.
"Unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds." -John 12:24
So I am nearing the end of my walk through "Irresistible Revolution," though the real journey has just begun. I cannot, without counting the cost, follow in Shane Claiborne's footsteps. But I don't think he would call us all to follow his footsteps. He would call us to follow the Jesus he knows, who, without compromising, calls us to lay down our lives and pick up our crosses. If I concede that Shane's interpretations of certain parts of scripture are correct, then I too would be led to his conclusions. I think some of those conclusions warrant much further study, though we should be aware of our tendency to "prove" the status quo and explain away Truth. Every single issue he (scatterbrained-ly) brings up is worthy of our serious consideration as Christians. (If he spent more than a semester at Wheaton, I think he might have hung out with HNGR groupies :)
Whether or not one agrees with Shane's conclusions or manifestations of chasing after Jesus, I would whole-heartedly say that he is dead-on in his holy recklessness (in the eyes of the world) to live for Him. Read the book, if only for the reason of vicariously catching a glimpse of what it can mean to be alive (though there are plenty more).
The Lord will not all call us to live like Shane does (but don't let that be an excuse...). The Lord has called us to our own battles. The challenge is to recognize what the Lord calls us to, and to keep our grubby hands and crusty ideas from distorting it, and then to live it.
One thing I will echo John (and Shane) on... that we must die to live, and that this death just might look very different than what much of us are living right now....
I will not tiptoe my way towards death. Nor will I call the conventionally held measures of "life" and be content.
Love.
So I am nearing the end of my walk through "Irresistible Revolution," though the real journey has just begun. I cannot, without counting the cost, follow in Shane Claiborne's footsteps. But I don't think he would call us all to follow his footsteps. He would call us to follow the Jesus he knows, who, without compromising, calls us to lay down our lives and pick up our crosses. If I concede that Shane's interpretations of certain parts of scripture are correct, then I too would be led to his conclusions. I think some of those conclusions warrant much further study, though we should be aware of our tendency to "prove" the status quo and explain away Truth. Every single issue he (scatterbrained-ly) brings up is worthy of our serious consideration as Christians. (If he spent more than a semester at Wheaton, I think he might have hung out with HNGR groupies :)
Whether or not one agrees with Shane's conclusions or manifestations of chasing after Jesus, I would whole-heartedly say that he is dead-on in his holy recklessness (in the eyes of the world) to live for Him. Read the book, if only for the reason of vicariously catching a glimpse of what it can mean to be alive (though there are plenty more).
The Lord will not all call us to live like Shane does (but don't let that be an excuse...). The Lord has called us to our own battles. The challenge is to recognize what the Lord calls us to, and to keep our grubby hands and crusty ideas from distorting it, and then to live it.
One thing I will echo John (and Shane) on... that we must die to live, and that this death just might look very different than what much of us are living right now....
I will not tiptoe my way towards death. Nor will I call the conventionally held measures of "life" and be content.
Love.
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
"Eels are like women...
... if you try to hold them down, they'll just get away."
It's a quote from an obscure show called Samurai Champloo. I don't suppose too many of you have caught Eels before... I won't bore you with the details. But that idea is a manifestation of something that I'm learning, namely, living life with open hands.
Job says, "The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away. May the name of the Lord be praised." And later, when his wife tells him to curse God and die in his misery, he responds, " Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?"
Perhaps it was Richard Foster who first brought this notion of praying with open hands as a reminder to how we are to live our lives. If we live with open hands, we are free to receive from God and free to give others what we have received. We are also free to give up the things in our lives, even the good things, that threaten to tweak God's will with our plans little by little until it hardly looks like His calling for us any more. By then, what we are clasping tightly to our chest will be a dull watered down rationalized selfish version of something that used to be Christ-centered and glorious.
I'm selfish and I'm sentimental. Blame it on Adam, blame it on culture, blame it on me, the fact remains. But with open hands... when we are faithful, it frees us from having remorse over the things and people we missed out on and allows to live fully in what He has given. It helps us recognize that we, being very broken little people in the world, cannot possibly control all that happens to and around us, but that we can with faith, hold out our open hands receiving from God what He has ordained and letting go of ourselves in the process. It inevitably teaches us to let go of our miserly dreams and habits.
It allows us, in a world full of problems that overwhelm us and pain that threatens to numb us, to listen and obey what the Lord has called us to, where He has called us to it, in the timing He has called us to, and in the strength He supplies, no matter how small or how large of a task it might be.
There is freedom in that to finally breath deeply. I don't suppose something like that comes overnight. It's not so much a single act as it is a way of life.
Thank God for grace.
It's a quote from an obscure show called Samurai Champloo. I don't suppose too many of you have caught Eels before... I won't bore you with the details. But that idea is a manifestation of something that I'm learning, namely, living life with open hands.
Job says, "The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away. May the name of the Lord be praised." And later, when his wife tells him to curse God and die in his misery, he responds, " Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?"
Perhaps it was Richard Foster who first brought this notion of praying with open hands as a reminder to how we are to live our lives. If we live with open hands, we are free to receive from God and free to give others what we have received. We are also free to give up the things in our lives, even the good things, that threaten to tweak God's will with our plans little by little until it hardly looks like His calling for us any more. By then, what we are clasping tightly to our chest will be a dull watered down rationalized selfish version of something that used to be Christ-centered and glorious.
I'm selfish and I'm sentimental. Blame it on Adam, blame it on culture, blame it on me, the fact remains. But with open hands... when we are faithful, it frees us from having remorse over the things and people we missed out on and allows to live fully in what He has given. It helps us recognize that we, being very broken little people in the world, cannot possibly control all that happens to and around us, but that we can with faith, hold out our open hands receiving from God what He has ordained and letting go of ourselves in the process. It inevitably teaches us to let go of our miserly dreams and habits.
It allows us, in a world full of problems that overwhelm us and pain that threatens to numb us, to listen and obey what the Lord has called us to, where He has called us to it, in the timing He has called us to, and in the strength He supplies, no matter how small or how large of a task it might be.
There is freedom in that to finally breath deeply. I don't suppose something like that comes overnight. It's not so much a single act as it is a way of life.
Thank God for grace.
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