The Kingdom Way

For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

Romans 14:17

Have you ever felt that being a Christian is all about obeying the do's and don'ts rules? Well, I used to think that to be a good Christian, I need to be this and I cannot do that. I was striving to be perfect. I was trying too hard. I was practicing a religion rather than living in a relationship with the living God.

Imagine your relationship with your parents. What fun is there when it is all about doing what they tell you to do and being forbidden to do what they think it's not good for you to do. Although obedience is good and godly, but true obedience lies in knowing true freedom.

Now I do not obey God's rules, I obey God's voice. It's far more than performing a set of prayers or rituals or good works, it is living and abiding in His presence at all times. It is so much more fun, I can know so much more freedom in doing what I ought to do and to refrain from doing what I know I ought not to do as it will displease my Father in Heaven.

It's no longer living in a place of fear but of freedom and reverence. That is why the fear of the Lord is not supposed to be scary but to be enjoyed and understood from a place of love.

God wants to empower us. He wants us to know Him so that we can be like Him, like His Son. He told us His plans so that we can partner with Him, we can hate what He hates---sin, iniquities, injustice; and love passionately what He so loved---the world, people, the creation.

Even though the world is not where it is supposed to be, not as God has intended it to be, knowing His heart will enable us to move with God to restore the world back to what He has always intended it to be. That is the our calling, that is our hope and our destiny.

That is why the kingdom way is so much more than the religious rules. It's about intimacy with God, knowing Him through His Spirit, empowered with joy and peace to do all that He purposed us to do.

He is able, so are we!

God's election

I have been reading the book of Romans recently. I am just completely absorbed into it all over again! I love the book of Romans. It has so many messages which speak to different groups of people, the Romans, the Jews, the Gentiles (including the Romans), those who like to question God's fairness, those who are depended on their own good works, etc, etc.

In Romans Chapter 9, I am blessed reading that God's way of election is completely different from any that we could ever imagined. Often we forgot that God is God. He does not need to explain why He does certain things in a certain way but we as human like to question and make logic everything that God does. We are not satisfy until we understand in our own limited and finite minds of the things that God has chosen to do. It's crazy but we could not help but continue do it sometimes.

That is why, I need to read the Word not with my intellect but with the Holy Spirit. Unless He choose to reveal to me, it's okay for me not to understand all things. That is ultimately what faith is all about. To trust in God, to put our hope in Him even when we cannot figure it all out. After all, He is God and we are not.

The way God choose us to be His promised people is an example here in Romans 9. He does not have any criteria. He has plainly said, Jacob I loved but Esau I hated. Why? No one truly understands. Esau may not be the most steadfast man but Jacob was full of deceit and treachery as well. Esau chose to forgive Jacob but Jacob was a changed man after his years of encounter with God. So who is better, we cannot truly judge in our own moral standards. For His ways are not our ways, His thoughts are higher than our thoughts.

But the most encouraging part is this:

"in order to make known the riches of His glory for vessels of mercy, which He has prepared beforehand for glory ---even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles. As indeed He says in Hosea,

"Those who were not my people, I will call 'my people'

and her who was not beloved I will call 'beloved'"

"And in the very place where it was said to them, 'You are not my people.'

there they will be called 'sons of the living God'".

This is awesome!!!!

God has waited to put aside His wrath and jugedment so that He can make us His sons! My body shuddered as I wrote this sentence. What a privilege! When we were still sinners, still making Him angry with all the despicable acts and sinfulness, God has already planned to make us His sons and daughters! What a way of election! This is just the most brilliant Mastermind I have ever known!

That is why we must never try to figure things that God has not yet revealed to us. There is a time in everything. It's not our man made time, it is God's timing. We do not need to be worried when will that happen, we just need to know that He is in control and that He knows what He is doing, just through the way He has chosen us, the amount of love and forgiveness that He poured out onto us, I can only say, 'Thank You, Father. You are God and I will choose to trust in You in every season of my life. Help me to do that with Your strength and not my own.'

I am laying it down for the joy of the Lord!

Felt emotional today. Many things just got on top of me. My colleague annoyed me and another manager told me off for taking my lunch home instead of eating at the canteen. I did not even know that I was not allowed to do that!

I knew I just needed to spend time with God. I need to be refreshed in His Spirit. I need His strength. Things seem so much bigger and much worse when I am not full of His Spirit. I need to be constantly walking with the Spirit and not in my own strength, i.e walking in the flesh.

And so, I am trading all my sorrows, my pain and my emotional burden and I am laying them all down for the joy of the Lord!

When I have His joy, I will have His strength! What a marvelous exchange! :)

Thank you, Jesus!!!

Love is the Way, the Truth and the Life!

Have you ever wondered what love is? What would you think if I say that "love" is not a noun? It is not something that you can describe. It's not a sensation or feeling, it's far more than the butterflies in your tummy or the lightheaded-ness that you feel. It's not even the heart palpitation that you get when someone you fancy tells you how much you mean to him/her.

It's a verb but not just that. Although I would agree that love needs to be expressed, it will be too insufficient to say that it is just an 'action' word. Love is a Person!

To know that Person, is to know Love Himself. True love is not selfishness, it is sacrifice. I may be able to see blobs of touching sacrificial love here and there in this world, it's only because of Him. Love is God and God is Love! The definition of Love is Jesus Christ (took this verse from Jaeson Ma - Love it's a great song, btw! @http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73kZ6wBoqTk)

I love love. Nevertheless, I would never ever knew how to love without knowing the One who is Love Himself. Everyone is selfish by their sinful nature. Even as a Christian, if we are not walking by the Spirit, we can easily revert to walking in the flesh. One would not be able to love in the flesh. There will be striving, bitterness and anger.

I know my parents loves me to bits, they sacrifice their desires and life so that I would have a better one. Now one would think that this is perfect love but I must admit that my parents will not be completely happy if I choose to disobey them or did not ever consider of repaying their kindness and goodness to me.

And I know my husband loves me so much and vice versa. However, we clearly know that without loving Jesus and obeying His commands, we would never be able to love each other unselfishly and willingly. Again, we understand that love is an option and it is a day-to-day choice to walk with Love which includes putting aside our needs and wants in order to fulfill the needs and wants of others.

Love comes with a price. So does God's love. Although many may say,God loves us just because...there is not reason and He choose to love us because He wants to and that His love is unconditional, I do think that His love is only able to reach out to us with a hefty price. Jesus pays this price with His very own blood and again, this is sacrifice. Without sacrifice, there will not be love.

One thing for sure, Love is not all about me, myself and I. There will not be room for that. It is helpful when we know that we are first loved, but it is so that we are empowered in Love to love others. If we know God's love and keeps it all to ourselves, then it is no longer Love.

For you, brethren, were [indeed] called to freedom; only [do no let your] freedom be an incentive to your flesh, and an opportunity or excuse [for selfishness], but through love you should serve one another. For the whole of the Law [concerning human relationships] is complied with the one precept, You shall love your neighbour as [you do] yourself. ---Galatians 5:13.14

I am still learning about Love as I learn to know Love more everyday. to be like Love more everyday, to do as Love does, to walk as He walks on earth. As carriers of His glory, and Love Himself, there is much responsibility within myself to represent Love well in this world. Yet again, I can only Love because He first loved me.

Without You, there is no meaning

'Life' is a very interesting topic. I keep hearing people around me complaining about life. That life is tough, I hate my life, why does life have to be so difficult, etc etc.

I have too, for many times, asked those questions before. I tried my very best to make life happy, to aim to make others around me happy as I thought that would make me happy. I found myself failing miserably to please everyone, to try to put a smile on my parents' face, to be helpful, to do good works, to be a good person. Still deep down, I was not truly happy. What really, was happiness? What really is the purpose of life? To grow up, to get a job, to get married, to have children (while working), to work, and then continue to work, perhaps go for holidays (every now and then) but is that really all life is about?

I have tried to enjoy life and I knew deep down, I was still not satisfied. Life is still far from the perfect picture that I had in mind. There must be something more than this, I realised.

As I look at the world around me, people are full of strive, they are not happy, they seem to be so temperamental, two faces, dishonest and moaning and complaining about everything. All these made me even sadder. I just don't want to be like them! Somehow, even before I knew that there was more than what I see, I already despise what I was seeing. I wanted the world where people live in peace, people love and not hate one another, people encourages and not blaming and shaming each other, a world where children can truly enjoy being children and the adults can truly be who they taught their children to be.

It was not until I read the teaching of Jesus that I finally understood, I am living in a fallen world. A world who was once beautiful and without blemish, a world of perfection and love but it is no longer the same as it used to be now. Hence, all the dissatisfaction that I felt and the injustice that I could not explain. This is a dark world, ill-stricken with sinfulness.

Still I did not know what to do but Jesus found me. He told me that there is hope. There is a world awaiting us and we don't have to wait until we die to get there. It is the life born of the Spirit, to live in His presence now and forevermore, to feel His touch, to experience His grace and mercy, to know the joy of His forgiveness, to understand the real meaning of love. This is heaven on earth, the perfect place that I have always dreamt to live in. Although it is still yet to be completely fulfill for "Now we see only an indistinct image in a mirror, but then we will be face to face. Now what I know is incomplete, but then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known" ( I Corinthians 13:12)

And although yet at present we do not see every everything subject to Him, but we do see Jesus...(Hebrews 2:8)

For this reason alone, I know my life is not a coincidence. As I behold His face, I know that without Him, my life will have no meaning whatsoever.