Two Ears, One Mouth

A text message I received recently said, “We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak”.

These past few weeks, what God has been dealing with me is about listening. I see posts about it on Facebook and WordPress, spotted it on a book title on a bookstore… and many other places and circumstances where I find myself remembering that word, “Listen”.

It’s not just… no, it’s God, dealing some things with me. And I know that at times, I have some serious listening issues.

Or maybe I talk too much.

James 1:19 says, Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger;

As I read these words, this is the first thing that I feel: GUILT.

I can’t change myself, only God can. I want to practice being a good and a sincere listener. As a leader, I have to, since leadership is more of  a listening act, than of talking. I think the first step into achieving this is to stop talking too much. How would my ears work to its full efforts, if my mouth is working? After all, the Word of God says, “When words are many, transgression is not lacking, but whoever restrains his lips is prudent.” (Proverbs 10:19)

Listening is a selfless act. When we talk, our motives might be stained by our own selfish human desires–to impress those who are listening, to love it when people respond with such an enthusiasm, to receive compliments about how good we are. It could just easily go wrong when we are talking.

But when we listen, no matter how we feel towards the speaker, when we give him our ears selflessly, and even give him our time to listen, I think that is enough to show them our love. After all, love is not a feeling, it is a choice, it is a decision.

What Society Didn’t Tell

“Society kills the teenager”.

I do not know who said those words, but young people seem to understand it very clearly. And maybe, just maybe, those words are true. That society is a killer, because I was once a victim.

Society quotes that “high school is the best part of a person’s life”. Society says that in high school, you will experience countless wonderful things. Society instructs me to treasure every moment of those four years, by doing everything I like to do, making everything of my youth.

Yes, that is what people say—but now that I’m older, I realized what society didn’t say: In high school, you’re going to be a stranger. You have to wear a mask in which you are called in a different name, because under your real name, you will be rejected.

I am sure everyone experienced it. That invisible force that pushes you to do what you shouldn’t be doing in order to fit in to a group. You’re not really that kind of person, but you began wanting to be one just because all of them are. You know that feeling? I felt those, too. You’re slowly and unconsciously turning into a stranger.

I was a victim. I became a different person. I was a product of the society. I was stranger in my own body. I was so not myself.

But here’s the thing: I was lost, but now I’m found.

I became my true self when I knew Who is my Creator. He told me who I am.

Let me put it this way. When you buy a new appliance, how do you know its name and what is its purpose? For example, a rice cooker. How did you know it’s called a “rice cooker” and how it’s used? Did you ask it? No, only the inventor will be able to tell you what is it. And you will know how to use it by reading the manual. It’s the same for us people, we don’t know who we are. And we, too, have a manual. And with that manual made by the Inventor, I knew my purpose. It showed me the way how to be the real me.

That manual is the Bible. And God is the Inventor.

In high school, society killed my true personality. But during high school too, I was born into a new identity. I am a stranger-no-more.

Yet, I Sleep.

“Get up and pray, so that you will not give in to temptation.”

Reading Luke 22 this morning, the echoes of these ancient words reverberated through the corridors of my soul. I was convicted—guilty as charged.

Just hours before he would carry all of humanity’s sins on his shoulders and in his own body, Jesus spoke these words to his friends, disciples, the men who would be responsible for his world-wide mission. He invited them to enter into and share His agony through intercessory prayer. But, they were exhausted with grief and the self-absorbed pursuit of moving up the leadership ladder. How could they sleep while their Master suffered? What a shame! Well, over 2000 years later, He speaks these same words to me.

I am in that garden, sleeping. My Savior invites me to pray with Him, but I am exhausted with grief and hopelessness, self-absorbed pursuits, and the lack of curiosity. My Savior has invited me into His pain. Yet, I sleep. My Savior has invited me to agonize with Him over murder, abortion, rape, slavery, genocide, infanticide, abusive relationships, failing marriages, oil spills, hurricanes, and earthquakes. Yet, I sleep. He comes to me and finds me sleeping. I’m found out. I’m embarrassed. I offer no words of excuse or rationalization. I was sleeping—plain and simple. I wipe the sleep from my eyes and the drool from my mouth, only to recognize that he has been praying while I was sleeping. He has been praying and agonizing over the pain, the brokenness, the sins, the fear, the anxiety, and the hiding of the world, and I have been sleeping. My Savior kneels alone on His praying ground, deeply troubled. Yet, I sleep.

Because I am sleeping, I am not praying. And, because I am not praying, I am more prone to fail. I am in the garden, sleeping, and I am prone to give into all kinds of temptations: irrational fear, unnecessary anxiety, blatant satanic lies that my sins can outrun God’s grace, the delusional belief that I know better than God and can control my own life, and feeding my flesh is more important than feeding my spirit. It’s time for me to:

Get up!

Arise!

Wake up!

Pray!

Intercede!

Talk to God!

Be devoted to prayer!

Enter into this exhausting, powerful, and intimate spiritual habit with my Savior.

Will you join me in being devoted to talking to our heavenly Father daily? Let’s awake and pray so we won’t fail Him and others we love.

(Source)

Not Today

 Rate: 4 out of 5 stars

I watched a movie again, entitled Not Today. It is a movie exposing the rampant child slavery in India. It was heart-breaking, and very moving. They did a great job persuading the audience on taking an action. I know that God is behind this movie!

Some of the notes I wrote while watching the film:

• Anikka (daughter): The sky appears big sometimes, and sometimes small.
  Kiran (dad): The sky does not change but our view changes.
  –  I like to compare this conversation on how we view God’s greatness. Sometimes, we think that God is so big, because He moves on big things–problems that are impossible to solve, miracles, etc. And sometimes, He appears small to us. When we have big problems and think that God cannot do anything about it because nothing seems to be happening no matter how we pray.
  But like that father said to his daughter, God does not change, but our view of Him changes. God is God, He is Who He is. It is us who limits Him, when He is limitless. It is us who tries to fathom His character, even though He is fathomless.
• Just because He didn’t answer things your way means He didn’t answer?
     –  Sometimes, we don’t see God’s answers to our prayers. There are also times when we have to wait a very long time to see it. And most of the time, we just have to change our view to see His answers. Either way, He answers all our prayers.And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him.  (1 John 5:14-15)
• Sometimes we have to be broken to be useful.
  
• It seems easy to see that the hand of God was guiding because now I’m aware. I have no more excuses, and the very best thing I can do is get involved.

All in all, this soundtrack at the end of the movie sums up all that I felt and learned while watching the movie:

What Love Can Do by Kari Jobe (Lyrics)

I could sit here and pretend I didn’t know
I could move on and you’d just assume I had to go
But now that I have met you
I gotta take the chance
I could turn and walk away

But I’ve seen what love can do
When you set it free
Pick up the pieces and make it new
Break through the walls between us
And I know if let go of this
Fear that held us here and make a move
We’ll see what love can do

I could hide away inside this American Dream
And tell myself it’s someone else’s destiny
But now that I have held you
I’ve gotta the chance
I could turn  and walk away
I’m tired of saying no to the truth
That I can be the change and the proof
That love is alive and grace is still amazing

Season of Miracles

A rate of 3 and a half out of five for this movie. It’s a Christian movie that magnifies Isaiah 55:8,

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways,”
declares the Lord.

I learned from this movie that weird things that happen to our lives are not accidents. They are connected, weaved together, by God just like a tapestry. It also teaches us that any people can be used by God, even a person who has an autism.

It has been a question to me whether persons with mental disabilities can be saved, and I got some real answers from pastors, but this movie made it clear to me that really, they can be saved. Everyone can be saved. Indeed, He is able!

YMI Blogging

I blog not to impress, but to express.

You probably have seen that tagline on several blogs today, and I would have said the same thing in answer to the title of this article. But that’s cliché, and does not fit the motives on why  this blog is created.

I am blogging not to impress, not to express, but to bring glory to the God I serve. I am not good in writing, but I believe that when I am writing for His glory, He gives me what I need–ideas, topics, anything–to write a good article that would benefit His kingdom. It might be meaningless to other people, but I know that this thing that I’m doing does not count as a vanity to God. This is an eternal thing.

Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.
1 Corinthians 10:31

This blog is bounded by the “1Cor10:31 Rule”. Everything written here glorifies Him. Why? Because it’s all about Him, not you and me, it’s Him.