posted on: Wednesday, August 23, 2006
future.
I know my future is in Your hands. indeed, what can we fear for our future. unmet needs? God has already given you His Son, what else wouldnt He give to you? worrying about tomorrow? The bible says "do not worry about tomorrow for tomorrow will worry about itself" afterall, if what's coming can even come to you, it's been through God's eyes and hands before it comes to you. God will not allow anything He did not will to happen to you. it's written, "God will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear"
yeap, just got posted out into the medical centre. got to say, God has been blessing me more than abundantly. its amazing, im the only one who got to the camp behind pjc. the nearest camp to my house and the next nearest camp would probably get me lost. the environment there... on first sight, not inviting at all. God save me. these are my thoughts. am kinda worried i can't handle everything there. but yea, i know my Jesus is gonna go through this with me. man, i really hate adapting to new places. this line actually reminds me of winson. i miss my bunkmates already. lol.
all i pray, is to be able to participate in the building of Your kingdom Lord. i want to go for anniversary choir practices! i want to invest in the lives of the singers! i want to FIND MORE SINGERS! i want to bring more direction to the choir! i want to avail myself more to Your usage Lord!
posted on: Sunday, August 20, 2006
was posting about doubt and faith. look what God has let me discover. found this in rzim.org
Faith is basically the resolve to live our lives on the assumption that certain things are true and trustworthy, in the confident assurance that they are true and trustworthy, and that one day we shall know with absolute certainty that they are true and trustworthy.
Faith has three main elements. In the first place, it is trust in God. It is a confidence in the trustworthiness, fidelity and reliability of God. It is about rejoicing in his presence and power, being open to his prompting and guidance through prayer, and experiencing the motivation and comfort of the Holy Spirit. It is a deep sense of longing to be close to God, of wanting to praise his name, of being aware of his presence. In many ways, this aspect of Christian faith is like being in love with someone: you want to be with them, enjoying their presence and feeling secure with them. It concerns the heart, rather than the head; it is emotional, rather than intellectual. It is the powerhouse of Christian life, keeping us going through the difficult times and exciting us during the good times.
The difficulty is that all too many people seem to get no further than this stage. Their faith can easily become nothing more than emotion. It can become superficial, lacking any real depth. It seems shallow. It has not really taken root, and is very vulnerable. Yet faith can only flourish when it sinks deep roots. There is more to faith than emotion, experience and feelings, however important they may be to you. Christianity isn’t just about experiencing God—it’s about sticking to God. A mature faith is something secure, something that you can rely on. If your faith is not deeply rooted, you will be tempted to find security in something else, only to find that this alternative will fail you (Matthew 7:24–27).
In the second place, faith is understanding more about God, Jesus Christ and human nature and destiny. By its very nature, faith seeks understanding. It seeks to take root in our minds, as we think through the implications of our experience of the risen Christ. To become a Christian is to encounter the reality of God; to become a disciple is to allow this encounter to shape the way in which we think—and act.
For in the third place, faith is obedience. Paul speaks of the “obedience that comes from faith” (Romans 1:5) making the point that faith must express itself in the way we act. “Faith is kept alive in us, and gathers strength, from practice more than speculation” (Joseph Addison). Or, as the Oxford writer W. H. Griffith-Thomas put it, nicely linking these together:
[Faith] commences with the conviction of the mind based on adequate evidence; it continues in the confidence of the heart or emotions based on conviction, and it is crowned in the consent of the will, by means of which the conviction and confidence are expressed in conduct.
And it’s at this point that doubt can come in, simply because you have allowed your faith to be shallow. The New Testament often compares faith to a growing plant—a very helpful model to which we shall return frequently in this book. It is very easy to uproot a plant in its early stages of growth; once it has laid down roots, however, it is much harder to dislodge it. By failing to allow their faith to take root, some Christians make themselves very vulnerable to doubt. They haven’t thought about their faith. For example, someone may raise a question about the historical evidence for the existence of Jesus. They don’t know the answer. So doubts begin to creep in—often quite needless doubts, it must be said.
If this happens to you, view it in the right way. The gospel isn’t an illusion that is shown up for what it really is by hard questions—like the emperor’s clothes in the famous story by Hans Christian Andersen. The fact that you haven’t been able to give adequate answers to some person’s questions or objections to your faith doesn’t mean that Christianity falls to pieces the moment people start asking hard questions! It doesn’t mean that you’ve committed some kind of intellectual suicide by becoming a Christian. It shouldn’t mean that your confidence and trust in the gospel collapse, like a deflating balloon, just because someone asked you a question you couldn’t answer. It does, however, mean that you haven’t thought these things through.
Your faith is real—but it is not mature. It may be a little shallow and superficial. But—and this matters enormously!—faith can grow, and it strengthens as it grows. It needs to take root, and grow into a strong, vibrant plant. The problem often lies not in the gospel, but in the nature and depth of your response to it. You have allowed the gospel to capture your imagination, but not your mind. Your faith is shallow, when it should be—and can be—profound. Your failure here ought to be a challenge to you to go away and read more deeply about these matters, or talk them over with other more experienced Christians. In addition to helping you deepen your understanding of these things, doing this will enable you to be more helpful to those interested in learning about Christianity.
=D
posted on:
today is the second blue moon whereby im having my sunday afternoon free. so i've decided to blog with no agenda, and let my thoughts flow.
doubt. we all face doubt to some extent all the time. or at least i do. in fact i face plenty of it. but along with this doubt, God has always been exchanging it with faith. everytime i look back and reflect upon my life. especially in these 4 months of ns, God really has been so faithful. how can i ever doubt this life i have in Jesus? it's illogical to doubt that there's a God, a Father, a Friend i have in Jesus. really. when i reflect upon my ns life. i have been blessed beyond measure compared to many others.
oh well, my free sunday just became occupied. got a movie to catch with cg mates!! yay!