Blog Blog Blog!

Okay,
i've finally figured out how to set up the blog so that you guys can ACTUALLY blog from your own accounts! hahah, cool eh. took me many google searches to find out how. :) you better appreciate it. HAHA.

So yeah, i think you just need to sign in with your own email accounts (i've sent out invites to your email)
let me know if it works or not. :) no more excuses about how you cant remember the account/password now. hahaha.

btw, it's almost been a year since we started this blog! KEEP IT UP! :) it's nice to hear from you guys,especially when we're away!

happy blogging!
--amy.

Goodbye

Ya im finally blogging for my 2nd time reason is that nothin rly exciting happened lately so ya something rly important happened yesterday and im gonna blog about it

You guys can probably assume wat my blog is about cuz of the title of this which is "Goodbye." So yesterday night, my entire family was in shock and rly sad last night. At about 7 my grandfather who has lung cancer, was very pale and wasnt breathing. My grandma and dad were all panicing and told me to call 911(for ppl in or near my neighbourhood, it might be the most exciting thing that happened). Anyways in just 10 mins the ambulence police and firefighters came near my house and rushed in to save my grandmother. At that time, i was worried so i prayed to God that he will save him and that he will survive. I was happy cuz about 20 mins later, they finally managed to save him cuz his heart suddenly stopped so they managed to keep it moving again. We were all relieved and so me and my grandma decided to go to the hospital first in guess wat??? A police car! It was pretty exciting in the police car cuz there was a computer in there, which is pretty cool if u ask me. Anyways, back to the topic, when we arrived at the hospital we were waiting for my grandpa.

Unfortunately, when i arrived at the hospital, there was some sort of annoucement that said "Emergency blah...., Code Blue" Reason i highlighted this was cuz one i did not no wat that means(lol) and second im pretty sure it is bad and then my mind started thinking it was my grandpa that was in an emergency condition right now. Also i saw alot of doctors going in to the room my grandpa was in so im pretty sure they need a lot of doctors to save him. Then a doctor came and told us that it doesnt look like he will survive. My heart sank when i heard that. So while we were waiting in the room, i just felt rly bad and prayed to God again to just help my grandpa survive. After a while the doctor told us that he will only survive for only the highest a few hours. All of our family members were rdy and when he passed away at about 9:50 my grandma started crying badly and we were all speechless.

Our family was very sad at that point. After the doctors told us that he passed away i told God that he is on his side now and that i really hope he will get into heaven with God.

So ya im still really sad from the inside and so as my other family members but you guys no that God has set up a plan for everyone and possibly yesterday was my grandpa's ending. I wish i could change it cuz i rly care about him but i realize i shouldnt interfere with God's works so ya.

Guys, plz pray for us, me my bro and my family, especially my grandma who cried for i think at least 2 hours straight in the hospital. i no its long but plz take the time to read it.

-Al

P.S. Never go on a police car. Most uncomfortable car ever. There is no place in the passenger seat so i think this is how the police tortures its criminals in there. Just take this as a motivation to never to anything bad :)

Fallling to my Knees

So, i like to youtube when i study. :)

--amy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0rBdEYHTEI

Through the fire and through the fight
Through the peril of the night
I will trust You for the promise
Spoken over me

There is nothing left to hide
This is my surrendered life
I left behind all else
To follow only You

I'm falling to my knees
I'm falling to my knees
My faith's becoming sight

For Your mercies are made new
Here Your joy is shimmering through
And I'm living for the promise
that my hope is found in You
You're my strength my only prayer
And all the world could not compare
With the wonders of Your great and mighty love

I am here to find Your peace
I've been looking for relief
I have come because
There's nothing left to satisfies

I'm so taken by Your touch
I could never have to much
And I won't stop till You
take me there to where you are

CHRISTMAS!

it's almost christmas :D yay! hahaha, today in church i thought of something. We were talking about the virgin birth of Christ, and the guy explaining how we hype Christmas up and yet we forget the most important part: the miracle of the incarnation (God becomes human). Oftentimes we think of how Jesus was born of the virgin Mary in a manger, blah blah blah, and we wonder how that was possible. But we forget the real miracle: God came down on Earth as a human. He said, "we get excited about the box that the present comes in, and pay no attention to the gift inside." I just thought that was a good reminder. :)

FINALS! attack and conquer. :)

see you guys soon!

--amy.

at the mean time, take a listen: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTJdNungGus

"Can I Stay Here Forever"

Through forgotten convictions
Misplaced affections
I'm losing the sound of Your voice
I've been chasing after emptiness
Trying to tidy up this mess
I swear I've been down this road before
I want to get back to where it all began
When I would long for only You

Like a child I'll take You at Your word
As these mountains of doubt, they fade away
I'm longing to trust and love You more
So for me this is beautiful
A brand new thought, and a brand new world
Can I stay here forever here with You?

I've lost sight of what first drew me
To the love that pursued me
The joy that inspired my song
The friendship that was all I knew
The arms that I would fall into
Seem miles and years from where I am today
I got to get back to where it all began
When I would wait for only You

Can I stay here forever
Here with you?
Surrounded by Your mercy
Clothed in Your truth
Always, I'll stay
Always here with You

Can I be here forever
Here with You?
Can I know what it's like
To deeply love You?
Always, Lord, let me stay
Always, here with You

SEE! I didnt forget :D

ok so remember a few weeks ago when we had bible study with me and we were going to get kicked out of the church and all
and the topic for bible study was serving God
and remember my challenge? ( cough* you know who you guys are)
well in case u have short term memory, I'll gladly remind you
share some experience you had with serving God
common guys I know you have these experiences
ok so I said I will too and sorry for the delay caught up in school work and all but here I go:

So last night I was " music searching"
its an on going thing I do where once every like month or two I go and search out underground bands and other bands that are cool and exploring genres.
So my friend and I find this band called eleventyseven and she went on wikipedia to find more about it
and right off from the start of the article she asks " whats a christian band?"
and right there! I had my moment
presented to me and all I had to do was take it
and bam! I did
spent a good while explaining that christian bands are bands that have christian influences which are reflected by lyrics or even their attitudes.
then she got confused and I asked her to choose a song from another band
the song? stick stickly by attack attack!
search up the lyrics if you so please
anyways I spent a good hour going over the song with my friend
what it really meant
and kinda shared my views on it
then I went on trying to share about God and how wonderful things are with him
anyways after all that I think I have made progress
I got her interested right?
so that's my recent experience with serving God sharing my faith with a friend
sure I felt awkward and made myself look like a Jesus freak
but hey! I'm proud of that!

so yup
guys I'm still waiting for your sharings :D
-arth

It's easier to study- not so easy to experience...

Prophetic principle: an attempt to distance the worldly from the sacred.

Anyway, quite a bit has happened since a month ago. Firstly, more church-hopping. So I didn't think so before, but in comparison to the places I've been, I now think that our church is considerably conservative. To put it into perspective- you know those churches you see on TV with huge congregations and animated pastors? Yeah, that. It was kind of intimidating at first, because I kinda felt like the pastor was yelling at us because he was so loud and animated, but I can't say that it wasn't powerful. Especially the open and free "hallelujah's" coming from all directions of the sanctuary. Seeing people so open about their joy in the lord was pretty powerful. It's definitely not what I'm used to, but it was a good experience.

I've been trying to be more diligent with not doing stuff that's in "sinful nature", but (excuse my metaphor) it's like a line drawn in the sand- if a wave washes it away, I might not be re-drawing the line in the same place where it should be. I'm finding it really hard to balance being social and being a good Christian. I've been reading things that say like, not to associate if you know sinful stuff's going on because it's easy to get tempted. Another thing that struck me was that associating with those kinds of people is like being a bystander- you know what's going on, why are you not doing anything about it? If I'm not making any sense, the example that was given was on people using the Lord's name in vain- just because you're not doing it, doesn't give you an excuse for knowing that it's going on and just standing there. So what was my solution to this? Don't stand around. As in, don't be there to stand around. I've really distanced myself from my "friends" (honestly, I don't know what to call them) because I know that the stuff they say and do isn't good for me as a Christian. But now I'm not as close with anyone and just keep to myself all the time. I know I'm doing better spiritually because I've gotten stronger, I just don't know what the best approach to this is and how to balance a spiritual and social life.

So I kinda had to stand up for my faith the other day. In a nutshell, it was basically my friend saying that all religions could frankly be made up, even big ones like Christianity. He wasn't really putting up an argument or anything, but I still felt the need to say something. So I just said "well, there is proof..." and before I could get to anything else, he said that he wasn't arguing and that he knows that it could in fact be true- because he's an Anglican. So this had me thinking like...if I really did have to stand up for my faith, would I have been ready? Well, my nervous feeling was telling me that I probably wouldn't have had enough to stand up confidently. This also reminded me of how many people there are that are Christian by name, but not by actions. Like I've said before, this isn't what I wanna be.

Long story short- I'm having trouble figuring out where to draw the line in the sand. The fact that I'm trying tells me that I've grown spiritually at least.

Interesting, I last blogged on the day of my last religion midterm. I had another one today. I like this pattern I have going. Haha

--Sabrina

Safety

I know that it's been a while since i last blogged. I'm happy right now. He kept my family safe. Everyday i pray that he would keep my family safe, and it actually is true. Just last week or the week before that, the restaurant that my mom worked in got robbed. Luckily, it was the day that my mom has a day off, but if she had work on that day, she would have to go through being scared at that moment. I just really like to thank God right now, i never thought of these things, but just recently i realized that it was God who was keeping my family safe. I mean the robbers could've robbed the restaurant at any other day, but it just so happened that they robbed the restaurant on the day my mom had a day off.

This blog is really short, i'll try to blog some more. :D


-sherm

Chemistry

I think im getting crazy from studying chemistry. Seriously, it's all physics :'( This makes me sad.

I saw this when i was doing practice problems though. hahaha. someone tell me the answer ;)

Q: Although einstein made some early contributiosn to quantum theory, he was never able to accept the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. He stated, "God does not play dice with the Universe.' What do you suppose Einstein meant by this remark? in reply to Einstein's remark, Niels Bohr is supposed to have said "Albert, stop telling God what to do." What do you suppose Bohr meant by this remark?


hahah, enjoy. :)
btw, this is me trying to update you on my UNI life. hahaha.
God bless,
--amy.

Warrior

Today i went to CCF, and we had a special joint program with the Laurier ccf, campus for christ, etc. It was such a a powerful night, and i must say that it was worth my 4 hours.

So we walked over to Laurier (which is literally down the street) in the rain and cold as a group, so i got a little annoyed. BTW, this is like midterm season, so i've been pretty busy lately. The material that i have to cover isnt hard.. it's just the fact that it's a test/midterm. Anyway, that's besides my point. Today's program was a praise and prayer, and we sang 4 songs for liek 45 minutes. It was good, but it got kinda tiring after. haha. But the message was really interesting. So the pastor was talking about we being warriors, fighting as part of God's army (it was from isiah 13 or something) He continued to go on about how we always tend to take things into our control and make it OUR war, instead of God's. Sometimes we think that we're doing God a favour when we serve Him, when in fact God doesn't NEED us to do anything FOR him, he wants us to serve him out of our own hearts. It really hit me when he started talking about serving God with our own strength. When that happens, we usually get burned out quickly and have no passion for His people. But if we are lead every step by Him we will not grow faint. I'm ognna be totally honest and "transparent' (he used this term a lot) with you guys. There was a few periods of time when i really felt that i was going to fellowship out of obligation and duty. I think i was too self righteous at those times, thinking that i NEED to be there. Yeah, i made it more into a 'what i need to do' thing instead of what "God can do through me" thing. The second point he made was on how we THINK we need to reach a certain level of "christianity/holiness" before we can serve God. This got me thinking to VBS when we encouraged the kids to serve. That was a good week, guys. :) You guys need to do it again! hahahah.

Anyway, another thing that they kept saying was "Why are you here?" Not, why do you go to UW or Laurier, nor, why are you on Earth. But why are you HERE, tonight, at fellowship. I guess this is a really different experience than at home. It's so much easier to just skip fellowship here, because there's really no one taking attendance. The fellowship is so big, no one really notices if you miss a week or two. It really takes self discipline to get out of my room and walk over to fellowship with brothers and sisters. For too long, it's been 'if i dont go, Tina's gonna bother me about it' or, ' i need to go cause i need to do devo sharing/worship'. This is about my relationship with God and the family he's put me in here in waterloo. I think that God lead me out here away from home and church was to show me who i need to be and who he really is to me. He doesnt need my half-hearted service, and he definately doesnt want it. He wants me to realize that i have no one else here besides him to provide for me. It was a very humbling experience today to see all these leaders and pastors servning our God with 100% while i think i had it all figured out with my half hearted service. It's not like i can cheat God... haha. It's good to step down and be the one listening rather than speaking. I feel so inadequate now. hahaha. I'm learning.

So i've really lost my point, but today was a very powerful night for me. I swear the whole room was tearing cause the Holy Spirit was just working in and over us, as individuals and as a family. It wasnt emotional because it was more than that. I realy like this quote from gladiator that they kept repeated today. "May what we do in life echo in eternity" We're put here to do something, and i dont want my name to be passed on into eternity as one that served God half-heartedly.


more to come
--amy.

Disabilities

Today in science, my sci. teacher, Ms. Randall, gave my class a pretty long lecture about doing a presentation. While i was listening to her, my head started to drop lower and i started staring at my desk for no reason. I tried to look at her since this presentation was important but my head dropped again and i was looking at my desk again. This really got me mad and ticked off since im forgot everything from that period. Now i realized that this was really becoming a habit.

This got me thinking, what other habits or mental disabilities do i have? All i can list are these: Can't learn stuff by hearing, short attention span, short term memory loss(not sure)/forgettable, shy and many more(i think). Why do i have disabilities? When did i start having these disabilities? Questions clouded my head. Why does God give people disabilities? Is it because we need disabilities to live?

Forced by curiosity, i checked disability on Google. Mostly, it just had lots of handicapped people with a mild disability such as wheelchair people. They were very weird looking and that's when i figured out why. God created us in his own way; each being unique and special in our own way as well. Everyone should know that they have disabilities even if they think they are perfect(arrogance is a disability since arrogance is like being too proud of oneself, i think) and that we should be happy that God made us like this.

-Billy

P.S., I'm so stupid to not figure that out earlier. If you were lost, my point is everyone has disabilities.

Study the Word

So if you didn't know, I take an 'Interpretations of Religion' course. One day, we were taking notes on Christianity- like on who Paul was & the difference between books in the New Testament. At the time, I thought that I didn't have to take the detailed notes that my prof had up because I know this stuff already. I had a midterm on Tuesday. While studying for it, I skipped the section on Christianity because "I'm a Christian, I've read the Bible before- I got this".

I did not have it.

The one question that I struggled most with on the exam was about John- why did his testimony differ from Matthew/Mark/Luke's?
a.) He had the earliest records of Jesus
b.) He called Jesus 'Christ'
c.) John's gospel was unique from the 'synoptic gospels' (did not take the same common view)
d.) All of the above

I can't remember what answer I put, but that's not the point. The point was how much I hated the doubt I had in my answer. Why had I been so cocky about it? Just because I've read the Bible does not mean I know the Bible. I guess more than anything, this was quite the eye-opener. Am I just reading, or am I studying the Bible? Am I even understanding? There's a difference. It's kind of a funny parallel here. By not studying the Word, I might get a question wrong on my exam. But also, by not studying the Word, I might have the wrong answer for a trial in life. On a smaller scale, that exam reminded me of what life is like. We think we know God & His Word, but do we really? When it comes time to apply it, will we be able to do it? Will we remember His words? You know how if you do a little pre-test thing by yourself and you flunk and then you're all "oh man, I totally need to study more"? I have that feeling right now.

P.S. just ask if you want the answer to that question.

--Sabrina

Rainbow

There's been some crappy weather here. Every time I look out the window, there's always a dark cloud looming overhead. The weather also makes me very gloomy for my 8:30am class, haha. So everytime it rains/storms, I hate it. It's also such an inconvenience to bring an umbrella everywhere. But anyway, so on my way home today, I walk out of the building and I see people with their heads bent and pointing. So i'm like "okay.. what the heck?" and when i looked, i saw a rainbow. It was HUGE! It was so pretty and amazing and awesome at the same time. People were taking pictures of it, and a guy that was speaking on the phone said 'Hey, I'm actually gonna hang up now so i can take a picture of this.' I thought it was pretty funny. Everyone was so at awe of this rainbow. It's like they've never seen it before. (Actually, i dont think i've ever seen a rainbow that huge before!)

The first thing that came to mind was 'i wonder where the end is?' since we always hear that at the end of the rainbow is a pot of gold. (haha). Then i thought of how wonderful it was to see such a spectacular sight in the midst of a storm. Then FINALLY, i thought of God. The rainbow was a sign of God's covenant with all life on earth (Gen 9:12-17). It was a reminder for God and us that never again will God destroy the Earth.. etc etc. But i think it also reminds us of how loving and just and merciful God is to us. God has every reason to judge and punish us, but every time He chooses to forgive.

This reminds me of what we studied in CCF on friday night. We read the book of Daniel 9. Essentially it was Daniel praying for the Israelites. I guess the one thing i got out of it was that he was praying "for God's sake", he wants God to be glorified at the end. It was pretty interesting because, really, how often do we pray for ourselves, rather than for God's glory? Ponder that.

On Sunday i went to another church. It's called Creekside Church, and their 'theme/slogan" is 'engage life'. But the cool side of this was that i had to take a bus there. (i've never done that before! hahaha. church is usually only 5 mins away!) So yeah, this church is literally in the middle of no where. It's on a road called "conservation' HAHA. so there's like a little wood-ish place there. But the inside was really nice and modern. Anyway, my point was that when i first walked in, i thought it was a movie theater. It turns out that their 4weeks theme was MOVIES AT CREEKSIDE! It was so cool, there was free popcorn and juice, etc. So what they do is they play clips of a movie and analyze it according to the Bible. This week was 'Les Miserables' (the play by victor hugo) I've never seen it before, but it was really good! the sermon was on grace/mercy and about whether or not we are people of grace or people of the law. I found it really interesting not just because i got to eat popcorn during church.. but it was a very different way of sharing God's word. It felt like it would be more of a fellowship program. But it was so good because everyone was engaged in God's word in a different way. This church has 3 services back-to-back, so there's lots and lots of people there. It was quite different from what i'm used to. Next week they're starting another theme, so i guess there wont be popcorn and movies! :( hahahha, but i'll check out other ones and let you guys know how that goes.

Random thought: during CCF and church service, we sang THE STAND. So it's been stuck in my head for a while. But it's so good. It really makes me think of who God is as the Creator and the Father (like the bible study i lead way back.. in February? haha i dont even remember)

So what can I say
What can I do
But offer this heart O God
Completely to You

--a.

& It feels like home

I was gonna blog on Sunday, but I'm a very impatient person. And it's more convenient to post now since it kinda ties in with some of the things Amy just posted about.

So for the past 2 weeks, I've been to different churches (Ottawa Chinese Bible Church & Ottawa Chinese Alliance Church). And I'm going to another one on Sunday too, but anyway. The point of "church-hopping" is to try to get a feel for "the right" church. So far, this has not been an easy task. What makes a church "right" for me? I mean that as a serious question! It's hard to prioritize what to look for in a church. Like, at OCBC, I know people from there (from Campus for Christ), so it makes everything easier; but the way service is performed is a bit different that what i'm used to. On the other hand, at OCAC, the church itself is nearly identical to what I'm used to. The whole design (and probably size) is the same as CLBC as well as how sermon is brought about. The only thing is that I found the people a tad unwelcoming. I was with a friend, and we were actually trying to look confused so that someone would just approach us and give us some direction. But no such luck. And as a newcomer (and a slightly antisocial person), it's hard to approach people.

Firstly, I come bearing this message: For a long time, I forgot what it was like to be new. At CLBC during fellowship or whatever, we usually had the volunteers there. I don't think i've ever been the one to try and initiate conversation. Maybe like, after a few weeks. But now that I'm going around to new churches, it's hard to be new! And now, I think it's a lot easier to want to keep going to church when you feel welcome. I understand that it might be hard or uncomfortable to initiate conversation, but it's typically harder for those that don't know anyone else there. So guys, get out there and be welcoming! It's kinda like the first step in outreach.

And secondly, this has so far been a really great experience for me because I was reflecting on my church experiences during this whole process. As I said before, what should i be looking for in a church? You know how we always say "you don't go for the people"? Well, am I gonna go for the building itself just because it reminds me of home?? Maybe I should try a church that's not like what I'm used to? I have no idea yet. But I'll keep you posted.

--Sabrina
(btw, I like to use lyrics for titles. So this one was Home by Sherwood)

Whoa. colourful blog.

Elevation

I'm supposed to be studying, but I feel like blogging. :)

So it's been.. oh, i lost count, almost a month since i moved to waterloo. I cant say it's the greatest, but i've been doing okay lately. So this sunday i went to church with my ccf group. The church was called "Elevation". Inside the bulletin says something liek this: "Welcome: Getting together like this is a reminder to us all that faith is no something you do on your own. We gather together to build relationships, encourage one another in faith, and position ourselves to be changed in the presesnce of God."

I just found it pretty cool when i first read it that morning. It's a nice church, but i guess im not too used to the way it's ran. So after the sermon, there's this time called 'discussion time' where we gather around tables in groups and have some muffins, etc and share. (there's a list of questions.) I found it pretty coold how they do that because it really does create a sense of unity with the people around. But at the same time, it felt like the service just kinda ended there.. and people just start to leave. It was pretty werid, but hey, i guess they like to do things different. I was nice to experience a different church setting. The sermon was titled 'everything else is trash' and y'know, there's really nothing that can make us any 'better' than each other.But ultimately, everything really does go back to God and what he's done for us on the cross. In phil 3:8-9 it says: What is more, i consider everythign a loss compared to the surpassing greatneess of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake i have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that i may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ-the righteousness tha tcomes from God and is by faith.

I know you guys are doing some hardcore stuffs this coming months. :) Keep working, enjoy each other, and pray for us as well :)

May God give you guys strength to rise up in every aspect of your life :) You can elevate with me ;) (get it...?)

Miss you guys!
--a.

Read me if you got time, I'm a long blog

Oh man, everyone blogging excites me and makes me so happy (so very happy)!

So I've officially done everything off both lists that I posted earlier this month. Am I proud to announce this? Not for everything, but every experience has definitely already helped guide me in certain directions.

Today was the first Sunday service that I have ever attended on my own will. Sure, I've been to Sunday services before at CLBC, but only because we had to be there at that time for wild camp. So I went to Ottawa Chinese Bible Church bright and early. But they were moving buildings, so service actually starts at 11:30. It was kind of strange being there at first in a new environment, and I didn't know any of their singspirations or anything. Then there was a "new song" that someone was introducing- Come Home Running. Oh c'mon, could He have made it any more perfect! Seriously, I was just thinking "thanks for the sign". Anyway, the topic was lighter than I expected. It was about like, giving into Christ vs. Satan. One thing that struck me was that like, you don't go looking for trouble if you know it's there because then you're inviting evil into your life. In other words, look to Christ; don't "go" where you know Satan will be in hopes to evade him- because being human, we'll most likely fall into his traps. It was definitely a nice and well-needed reminder.

So I was looking back on my past blogs to track my progress. I had 2 blogs on people saying stuff like "why are you doing that, I thought you were a Christian!" I was hanging out with some people the other night, and I can't remember what we were talking about, but they noticed the cross necklace I was wearing, so they asked me about it, and I said that I was a Christian. Then some of them said that they were too, and others said that they were Catholic. I swear that the first thing that crossed my mind was "no waaaaay". I really didn't think what some of these people did reflected their "religion". I don't wanna be those people. I wanna reflect and glorify God. I guess it's a matter of keeping myself in check to make sure I'm on the right path. So hey, maybe having a few non-Christ-like friends can help me out on this so I can always say "that's not what I wanna be". Hahaha.

One more thing- I went to a cell group (like a little bible study discussion group) on Friday, and I really liked this example that was used to describe what we need to receive Jesus in our lives:
-We need intellect (knowledge/facts), emotion (to feel/experience God), and will (to do God's will)
-That's like a combination lock. If we only have 1 of the 3 numbers, it's really had to get at the solution. If we have 2 of the numbers, it's easier, but it might take a while. If we have all 3, we'll reach the goal in no time.

BLOG BLOG BLOG!
--Sabrina

Evolution

hey guys, i haven't really blogged this lately even though i've been meaning to, but i keep on forgetting. right now i have tape stuck to my index and my thumb on both hands because of my iaps assignment. and itz not very enjoyable. so maybe now u're wondering why i'm blogging about this.

i'm blogging about this because in iaps class we're learning about evolution. well i know that i'll have to learn about it sometime but i never expected it so soon. everytime i sat in class i go through stuggles to convince myself that evolution never happened. but the way the teacher explains it makes it sound so convincing that evolution really took place (and i guess i get convinced pretty easily), maybe that's also part of the material she needs to teach. even though itz a stuggle i always reminded myself the things i learned from the workshop in one of the fellowship programs. and i guess that not only can i remember the things i learned in the workshop, but also my own life is proof that god exists. when i look back on my life and everything that's happened, it can't just be a coincidence, there's no theory to explain the different things that happened in my life and it wasn't my choice in the first place so definately there has to be a god working in my life. if things turned out differently. and i guess that's also the thing tht i need to remind myself to get through this whole topic on evolution.

(lol, i don't know if i'm making any sense in this blog, i'm not really making any sense today, but i am convinced with creation over evolution. hehe just wanted to share this with u guys)

-sherm

so where are you going?

I;m sitting here in front of my comp and I'm goign thru my emails
and bam! I see all these blogs
so I decided to finally go and look at all of them
some thing I noticed right away was the change
the change in envrionment the change in lifestyle and this is the part where somethign sparked in me
I rmeber a few years ago
just entering into high school
someone told me that highschool is quite unique experience
its sorta a time where your not only finding where you are goign or where you are bound but more of who you are and what you choose to shape yourself to be
sorta all about change

recently I;ve been thinking over about who I;ve become
I dig through photos and see how much I;ve changed
it gives me memories of the good and bad times
but most importantly of all it triggered something I havent asked myself in a while

how have I changed spiritually?

have I drawn closer?
or have I strayed?
have I let God use me to impact others?
or have I impacted others because of my own selfish desires?

I find that as you go on through life, whenever you enter a different stage and you change, you have to ask yourself these questions
sorta liek checkign up on yourself
asking yourself where are you going? is it the right way?
I guess its improtant to so you dont find yourslef going way off and never even get to realize what is happening
quite sad isnt it?

so I guess bottom line is that I just want you guys to kno just how urget it is to make sure you are on track
to be walkign in the light and be sure of it
to be walking TOWARDS Him rather than away

yup my memory sparks are quite long :P
-arth

Remembering How Good is God

Hi everyone! I think i would have blogged earlier but Im a very lazy person so i tell to myself to blog later but now, because of my bro nagging me to blog since he feels so lonely blogging himself(lol), im gonna start my blog

Today while thinking about ideas for homework i was also thinking about how God has helped me throughout my life and i just remembered one interesting story to share.

i think it was in late may of 2009 and all the students have summatives to finish.
At lunch my friend said that he needed some help with his summative cuz he was away for like a few weeks so i said yes. I was very HUNGRY so i decided to eat after i finish helping him. It seems like that it took us the whole lunch period and i didnt have time to eat any of my lunch. In otherwords, i sacrificed my lunch just to help a friend whos in need cuz part of the assignment was due after lunch and he didnt even start. Then i realized i had gym and if i have my facts straight, eating means i get more energy and energy allows me to move or somethin like that. My stomach was growling and then when i entered the gym, i realized we had to do the BEEP TEST. Oh man i hate that test.
and since i didnt eat a thing, i knew i will fail it but then a miracle happened. While running the test, i suddenly felt like i had a lot of energy. In the past i usually get 5 for the test but that day i got 6. I start thinking how com this nvr happens to me bak then but then i remembered God and helping my friend.

I think John 3:16 ties in to this experience. he was one of my closest friends so its almost like God loving the world and i sacrificed my lunch and its like God sacrificing Jesus.

Well i hope u like my first blog. Ill blog more soon

Al

Moving On

Hey, this is Billy again. I have some spare time so i decided that i should use this time to blog since i didn't blog in a few months. Anyways, based on the title, i think you should know what i mean by "Moving On." Well, its about high school (quite obvious).
Ever since high school started, it was a very difficult time for me. I had new teachers, many new classmates, and more things to learn. I had to walk to classrooms that are very far from my locker and other classrooms as well. I barely had any friends in this school since practically all my friends went to ACCI (Albert Campbell Collegiate Institute). I was always late to classes in the first few days of classes since it was pretty hard to find the classrooms when they are practically off the school map(that's how far the classes were). I guess it was pretty tiring and stressing for me in the start of the new school year. All I had to do was adjust to the new school environment and forget what i did at Henry Kelsey. But i just can't, Kelsey was a part of my life which was important to my self-esteem at the time. After realizing that, i even had regrets to go to ACI instead of ACCI.
After going to Sunday service at Church, I realized that through the stress-less faces on everyone there, it made me a little more confident and if they are used to high school then so would I. God lead me through this path for me to learn a lesson, "Don't give up no matter how hard it is."

Secure

So this isn't really a big thing. Apparently, at the end of the school year 2009, my school's guidance schedule for almost 75% of the grade 12 students had difficulties sorting out the courses and such. I'm not exaggerating. At first I was thinking it's another one of those little mistakes where they will fix before school starts and everything would be okay. Anyways, on registration day, I got my time table for semester one and semester two. I checked. I had all the right courses and every course in every semester balanced. Everything worked out fine. Later on, I went over to my group of friends. They were all worrying and panicking because guidance screwed up their schedule. Some didn't have the course they need and some had overlapping courses. Just a reminder, all of my friends including myself are all grade 12s. Obviously, we will go crazy if we don't get the right courses for our last year. In the end, my friends solved their situation by dropping other courses, adjusting to it and stuff.

Yeah. At that moment, I realized that my schedule was just right. I felt so happy and "safe" I don't know what's the word, hm maybe secure? In my head, i was just thinking : God planned this. He did this. Everything was just right.
And I was worrying so much about course selections in March 2009. All this reminded me of the bible study (Jeremiah 29:1-11-14?) Jackie taught a while back ago. Yeah, notice the emphasis on verse 11. haha. But yeah, I prayed for my friends as well because I really do not want to see them suffer in their last year. And now, everything just worked out fine as God planned.

K

Home Sweet Home

So now that i got a personal email from Tina, i will blog. hahaa. i've been meaning to, but i've pushed it back til now.

I guess i'll do a little recap of my first week here: I went to frosh. hahaha that's it, really. We were divided into our faculties, then into small groups and we just played games, walked around campus, talk to upper years... etc. the ususal stuff. It's pretty fun. we went to this conservation area near guelph and played sports there and stuff. it's a campground, and it's pretty nice! haha. so yeah, tha'ts all i did the first week. xP We also had dances and stuff.. seriously, i went to 3 dances in 4 days. it was so crazy. but it was fun, i suppose. Sometimes it's kinda nasty cause there's so many people.

Anyway, so i went to ccf (chinese christian fellowship) today and it seemed pretty nice. the people are nice and there's a lot of them! so i have a feeling it's gonna be a good year! it's kinda different to have fellowship with such a large group, but i guess we'll split off into smaller groups, but yeah, it's different to be the one not speaking rather than the leader :P it's a good change. hahaha.

As for devo.. i've been starting at exodus again because the OT is so much fun. haha. it's very different from reading NT cause it's not as explicit. but it's nice. :)

I dont have much else to add... So i'll see you guys later, hopefully!

This is why we blog (pt.2)

So back in May, I blogged about why we blog and how we do it. It had some stuff about making lists, goals, and doing things like writing a letter to God.

I said back then that I'd do it eventually. This is eventually.

Fyi, this is my second day at Carleton. I've already cried. Ridiculous, huh. Except I thought it'd be weird if i was bawling my eyes out with my roommate here, so I tried to keep it to a minimum. How? I opened up my Bible for the first time in...maybe a year, seriously. Now I didn't know what to turn to (but i must admit, Matthew 6:25 was going through my head- aka. 'Do not worry'), but I remember in a SIC (Sisters in Christ, aka. my group of friends getting together once in a while to fellowship) we were supposed to read the book of Ruth, but i never did. So I read the book of Ruth. Okay, I must admit that I didn't really get what I potentially was supposed to out of it, but just having the Word of God was comfort enough. Actually, this is what I needed for a wake-up call. To be nearly completely alone so that I would look to God. Heck, I didn't even look to God- I SEARCHED for Him.

My to do list (for this week as confirmed by my roomie):
-Get to know people.
-Party.
-Drink.
-Get to know people while partying and drinking.
-Leave our door open so that we can meet more (drunk) people- (we just shook on it)

MY to do list (what God wants me to do):
-Get to know people.
-Get to know people that will be a good influence on me.
-Get to know people that I can fellowship with

Alright, so from those 2 lists, I've kinda done stuff from both. From list 1, we've been leaving our door open, that's all. From list 2, I know a few people that are Christian, but it's still early so it's kind of hard to bring church up right now, but it's frequently at the back of my mind.

So guys, pray for me! I need a ton of strength and courage right now.

P.S. i miss you tons already.

[[edit:: So I was just reading Sept.7's Our Daily Bread entry and it was about unanswered prayers. The bottom line was that some prayers are meant to be unanswered because it's not in God's will because He knows what's best for us. So this is gonna sound super-antisocial, but hey- maybe I wasn't meant to do all of that stuff on List 1 right now. In fact, maybe I'm supposed to be antisocial right now so that I'm not meeting people that will steer me the wrong way.
Dang, I forgot how awesome the God & His Word could be!

--sabrina

The Gifted Ones

Hello y'all,

What a cool way to connect with every one from Samuel fellowship! This is my very first post on the blog. The reason I waited this long to blog is because I haven't encountered anything inspiring enough for me to put much thoughts on it. But today, I finally came across something that was so invigorating and powerful that I felt the urge to share it with everyone.

I was randomly flipping through the channels when I landed on channel 36 (yes, it's the Chinese channel). It was a documentary on a family of six. The parents are highly educated - actually both of them received their Ph.Ds. Their four kids ( I believe one older son and three younger daughters) are very gifted.
[Detour: a little background information for you on gifted children, gifted people have an IQ of at least 130. About 3-4 children out of 100 are gifted in the general population, but to have all the kids in the same family to be gifted is a ratio of 1 : 1 million in the whole world. ]

So, the parents of this family are faced with challenges that average families would never face. For starters, they have to raise their four gifted children very differently from others (their son attended university at the age of 9). The parents have gone through all the parenting books, however, they are not exactly helpful since the books were written for the general population with average IQ. After having read many books and guides on how to raise a family full of gifted kids, the parents finally settled on ONE book that they believe their kids should study wholeheartedly - the Bible. And the moment I heard "the Bible", I was thinking "are you serious?" Maybe Bible wasn't exactly the book I was anticipating, because I've always thought gifted people would read mountains of books on rocket science or something not so popular among the people. But the Bible, it is relatively accessible to the general public and the content is comprehensible to average people.

So why this book out of millions of other published books? The Ph.D parents explained, the kids have to know why they are alive on this earth and realize that there is a Great One who created ALL things on earth. All humans are created differently with their own uniqueness and there is a reason behind every existence. Gifted or not, we should simply appreciate what we have and make use of our talents/strengths to serve the Lord, carry out His plans. The Ph.D parents are now nearly 70 years old and are touring around to give presentations on how to raise kids, especially gifted kids. They truly felt the blessings from God as they tasted the fruits of their labour. All of their kids are apparently successful in their careers and have their own families. I am convinced once again that God is the guidance for those who believe in Him. So it might take a few decades to truly experience God's work in plan, but don't ever lose faith in the One and Only who unconditionally loves us as we are.

{L. Wen}

& somewhere out there

So here i am sitting in my room at 1:30am. Apparently it's pouring rain outside, but I cant feel or hear any of it. Is my house really that strong and protective that even the loudest storm can't wake me up?

I was just thinking of my comfort zone. All these years, i've been with pretty much the same group of friends. Sure, there's been fights and disagreements, but in the end, everything's okay. And school's been pretty much just another way to kill time. Sometimes we really lose ourselves in this world. Who am i today? Why do i need to make an effort to do this and that? Why should i bother with homework, with friends... with God, even. I don't know about you, but everyday seems to be just another day.

But there's so much more out there. When im in my room, everything seems fine. But beyond those bricks is a storm (or some sort of it). And school is much more than just a place to kill 7 hours. Once you realize that God has placed you in the school(and churhc) to DO SOMETHING, then you'll see the importance of it. It might just be chilling with your friends and cheering them up when they're upset, or keeping them accountable. You have a role in people's lives, and so do those around you. It's time to take care of others, and let them take care of you.

There's so much out there. Beyond the walls of my house is a storm. I dont know about you, but it's time to let yourself out there and experience what's going on rather than hiding inside your room. Yes, you need to observe, listen, share.. but mostly you need to DO something.

--a.

I miss you.

Since we're on a roll of being honest...

There's been so much that i wanted to blog about, but i keep forgetting. :(
So if you were there on Sunday, Tina preached on Malachi, and it was pretty much about our worship attitude. Not only on why/how we worship God, but God's response to our worship. Y'know, God might be saying "Yo, i dont like the way (s)he is worshiping me." And it just really hit me. Personally, I dont like admitting that i'm wrong. A lot of times, I woudl and will find a way to make myself look like im right, even if im at fault. But is that gonna work with God, who sees right through me? There's really no way to hide.

Again, I need to confess something. So since summer started, I havent exactly done devo, the kind of devo that i did during school. I've come to realize that during the summer time, there really isnt a "need" for me to search for God because I don't encounter any challanges. When I'm at home, I just sit and chill and watch dramas. When I'm at work, well, we do our own little devo time in the morning. And work is really chill, so there's not much difficulties there. There really hasnt been anything that challenges my faith these past months. And I think that just keeps me drifting away from my devo time and my prayer time. I'm still trying to work on this. One of the reason that i'm looking forward to school again is that i KNOW I'll need God's guidance and wisdom, so I'd be doing my regular devo again. hahaha.

Like we asked at wildcamp, Do you see the need to outreach? But i guess a better question right now would be : Do you see YOUR need for God? Because if you dont, how can your listeners understand and believe in what you tell them, when you yourself are unsure?

I wonder if God misses me. Cause I think it's time to go back.

--a.

Come home running

A month ago, I was frustrated with God.
A few weeks ago, I began to lose faith.
A few days ago, I refused to pray when I was alone.

Today, I checked the blog for the first time in a month.
Today, I added the Bible as an essential to bring to Carleton.
Today, I swear I'll take a break from running.

Hello, it's been a while.
It's funny how a job that was supposed to bring me closer to God made me stray farther away. Honestly, I think it's because of my nature- it felt like I HAD to be a strong believer because it was part of the job. When I feel like I HAVE to do something, I become resentful of it. So then I was just stuck in that mindset for a long time. To add to that, because I was still teaching bible stories for VBS without really believing, it killed me even more because now I felt like that everything was such a lie.
I bet you didn't know that I hate birthdays. I hate birthdays because I always think back on the previous years- not the good stuff either, all the crap that happened. So now I'm blaming God not only for things that happened to me, but my inability to deal with it.

So I came to a little realization...well actually, I knew it all along, I'm just more willing to admit it now: I chose Carleton because it's far. I think I've told everyone that. Yes, far away from parents, friends, hopefully the past, and church (the literal CLBC church). I guess I figured it'd be easier to run from God if I didn't feel obligated to go to church here- especially if I was unmotivated to find a church/fellowship in university.

But through all my wallowing in my sorrows, I've always though, "is God doing this because he thinks this is gonna make me run to him harder and faster?" I guess so. I'm stubborn, but I know when to give up. I can choose to ignore, but I know when I'm given a message. It's 20 days until moving day, and I'm a tad mortified. This is what I get for making an irrational decision in an (non-alcoholic) intoxicated mind. Why did I choose somewhere so far that I'll have to be for the next 5 years? I can't leave it all behind. And now that I can't with me home, friends, or family, I'll take God with me. Because that might be all I have, and that might be all I need.

So I'm going to keep running from my past for a while. And God, I need to take you with me during my marathon. Because we all know I can only run so far before I need to stop.

--sabrina

Missing Bird

A baby bird is missing. Please return it to house 36 or 38 if you see it. It's a baby. It cannot fly.

So that's what I got in the mail yesterday, just a plain 8.5 by 11 sheet written in purple marker with a few spelling mistakes here and there. But somehow it made me think a lot. As I was strolling down my street, I realized that I knew the kids that wrote the "letter". They're only in SK and grade 1 this year, but what really struck me was their genuine passion for this missing baby bird. As a kid, I wouldn't think that they would have the energy and willpower to write so many missing posters by hand to try to save this bird, but they did. There are even signs on the lamp posts asking for people to look out for their baby bird. I found it so cute and powerful. I mean, what would I have done? Probably just sit, cry, and move on. Maybe get a fish or something. But they really loved their bird!

What I wanna say is that we should have this same passion. We were talking about conviction and such today, and I wonder if I have such conviction as to tell the world (or even just my neighbours) that I know Christ and what He's done for me. I remember someone saying (probably Antz) that we shouldn't be childish, but child-like. For me, this missing bird incident really exemplified the meaning behind that saying. I mean, we dont have to make posters to prove our faith, but it really does take no effort to say "Hi, I'm Amy, and I believe in God," when you meet someone.

Man, I love kids. They teach me so much.
--a.

Televised prayer

So I was watching TV the other day, and I was just flipping through the channels. Then I saw an infomercial about a "financial seed". So the reverend was "preaching" about how people should buy a financial seed for $100 and expect 7 days of miracles in return.

At first, I instantly thought, "wow how can people believe this?" then I tried to think of reasons why. He did a pretty good job of attacking disbelief and questions about morals. Like, he said that "it's not buying miracles, it's an offering...after all, people like Isaac made offerings and got miracles in return". What I found most interesting was his prayer. He started off by bowing his head and saying something like, "Lord, help these people by..." and then a little later, he looked up and started marketing the sale with "...that they will want to donate this offering and they can believe in Your 7 days of miracles". Then he bowed his head again and ended with "in Jesus name, amen". I found this interesting how he turned prayer into an infomercial. It makes me question how people view Christianity. I mean, where is this money going to? Does he think he's serving God by using his resources to call out to people? And I think this is also one of those Christian stereotypes- the televised donation. So yeah. I know that there are quite a few branches of Christianity/Catholicism, so where does "believing" and "serving" begin and end?

--Sabrina

Friends?

So..., I'm the third last one(Teresa and Alan didn't blog yet) to blog and I'm not sure how to blog since i never blogged before. Anyways, I'm blogging because I'm bored and no one has been blogging lately so here goes.... Lately, my friend and I weren't really talking to each other, in fact, he has been ignoring and this was what happened.

Last week, i was at Cantonese school and he was practicing tae-kwon-do on me. For self-defense, i hit him (accidentally, not on purpose) and he says it hurt really bad(there wasn't a bruise or a cut, by the way) and also his tae-kwon-do moves hurt double as much of what i did to him so i don't know why he's complaining about that. After that, he went back to his group and told his group mates that he should 'get new friends'(note that he is, in fact, an atheist. I know because he told me. Also, he is a honour student and he talks behind people's back like the time he wrote a quiz about his teacher being a total fail since she always make mistakes in a class. That teacher is my history/geography teacher, i don't care if she makes mistakes and she is a christian. I know because she told my class and many others.).

Obviously, i felt kind of offended because that was kind of 'mean' to say that I wasn't a very good person. In the next following days or next week, every time i tried to talk to him, he ignores me and gives me the silent treatment. He evens spends more time with his other friends than me like he used to. I tried to ask him why he wasn't talking to me but he didn't give an answer. When i got back home on Thursday, i started my computer and noticed that he replied to a quiz on FaceBook in a negative way and that really lowered my hopes of still being friends.

Its almost the end of the year and I still want to be friends with him even though he is going to ACCI(Albert Campbell) and I'm going to ACI(Agincourt). So can you please pray for me and him to give me strength to confront him and discuss the problem.

Thanks and hope to see ya at fellowship and Sunday school! :]

-Billy

P.S.:If this post looks weird, don't blame me, this is my first post.

In Need of God

Hey, lookies! My first blog here! :D

So anyway, the reason why I'm blogging here is because, well, I have this friend, who I believe desperately needs to have God in her life..

I mean, she's had all these problems for a long time. They stress her out and they've made her into a very unhappy person. She seems happy on the outside, but she's always thinking negatively about things, not believing in herself, and only depending on her friends to help her get through. So right now, I'm talking to her on MSN and stuff, and she mentioned how I don't need to worry about the things that she has to.

(Before this, I had been telling her how she needs to think positively, everything has a positive side and that she can't always think that there will be someone to guide her when it comes to things like this because sometimes there won't be anyone. (Keep in mind that this friend is a non-Christian, although she has Christian beliefs and is practically a Christian-yet-not-a-Christian, 'cause that totally made sense, yeah.))

Kay, so back to the worrying about things. I told her that, sure, yeah, I do worry about things, but for those things, I trust my friends and myself to work on getting through it, and for the other things, I need to learn to trust myself to be able to fix it, and that that was the part that she needed to learn. I then asked her about what kinds of problems she meant and she said "School.. Life... Everything." I told her, that she needs to make attempts to fix them, to think positively and trust that you wil pull thorugh, but she said that she didn't know how to fix them, how to pull through and that she can't even control most of these things.

So I told her, that that's why she needed to have trust... but she didn't know what to trust, "Trust what? The air?! ..." was her response. I told her, that I trust in myself and in God. But she isn't Christian, so she didn't even know what to say to that. Her response (quoted, from just now): "I don't even know what to say to that... I'm not Christian... -_-"

This whole time, I was thinking, she really needs to be introduced to God. For myself, when I have problems, I pray to God and know that eventually, he will help me pull through. Right now, I think that this friend of mine REALLY needs to find God in her life... so you guys, if you can, pray for her please. And I haven't even replied to what she said, because I don't know how to tell her that I think she should become a Christian.. maybe I'll just say it. o___o

So yeah, pray for her! :)

Thanks!

- Vessi

EDIT: I posted this at 11:11! xD

A sad kind of bliss

So please bear with me because I'm kind of at a loss for words right now, but I felt the need to blog. Today was a tough day. My friend's been having some problems, so during class, me and a teacher sorta gave her an intervention. It was just...hard because I didn't know what to say or do. I said all that I could in worldly terms, so when I ran out of things to say, I knew it was time to bring up God. See, this friend was one of the people that helped introduce me to Christianity. Now to see her so far away, it really struck me deep. I even said to her, "you helped save my life, now I want to help save yours". If you're been following my blogs, you know that I've shied away for a while from the opportunity to outreach. I didn't want to let this opportunity go. At all. Again, it was hard because I didn't know what to say to her rebuttals. It's not even a matter of her not understanding the concepts, it's a matter of her having tunnel vision. Like, I would say "you gotta stop doing this to yourself because you're a temple of God". Then she responded with, "why can't I be a beautiful temple". Like dang, I didn't know how to make it about God because this whole discussion was based around her. So anyway, we also had a talk with the teacher who is also a Christian. After a while, we prayed together, and that's when I basically broke down. The last time I cried during a prayer was out of sadness. This time, it was out of passion. Yes, the situation was killing me, but I was also glad at the same time that I'm able to be apart of this. I don't even know how to explain it, but I literally felt like we were crying out to God so passionately.

Then later that day we had T4C, and during the prayer, I started crying to out of pure joy. I was so thankful for all that I have been blessed with. To have the opportunity to be a part of this religion. For all that I've been apart of. I have a really strong attachment to school fellowships because that's where I feel like I became.

I gotta say that I'm a little traumatized by today's events and I'm over emotional and a mess of emotions. Almost hysterical. I'm kind of laughing and crying right now. In the middle of this blog, I just started praying. It felt awesome.

-Sabrina

My Punishment

This time my blog will be short. Well it all started off with my bad habit (being late sometimes) that started all of it. Well now i will really try to be on time for everything I have to go to. I don't know if any of you guys know this.. but I'm on tracking rite now. For those who don't know what tracking is, you get this sheet from the office at school and you have to be on time for every class and finish your homework and etc. You only get this sheet if you're late a certain number of times. I'm not really sure how I got this tracking sheet but i did. It is soooo weird cuz i looked at my number of lates and mine wasn't that many because it only filled up like 1 quarter of the page while I saw other ppl's lates filled up one whole page. But I've been thinking.. maybe this is a punishment from God. Today in drama class people were like you're still on tracking and I was like yup, it's a punishment from God and I literally meant that. I still have one more day to go, but I definately learned my lesson there.

-sherm

Two steps forward and one step back

I bet you didn't know that I'm afraid of holidays. I'm afraid of holidays because most of them come with a personal "attack" on my faith. Christmas and Easter- I know that's my fault. I have a hindrance that's preventing me from going to service that I can't explain, so when my mom questions me about it, I lie and say that service is at another, larger church in a farther location. Then I get a slight lecture about these holidays being the holiest, which I know. I didn't expect this lecture to come on Mother's Day though. So I didn't get my mom anything, and I was especially bitter and irritated by the fact that she was expecting something- and openly said it. A while after, she said something along the lines of, "you go to church- shouldn't you be more considerate?" And I just stared at my food. Like all the other times this has happened to me, I didn't know how to respond...to this especially. My actions totally do not reflect the church. I thought about it, and I must admit that I'm not big enough to admit that it's just my problem. This incident has caused me to realize that when situations like this arise, I suck at apologetics. At this point, it's probably not even a matter of knowing what to say, it's a matter of having the courage to say it. However, I am glad that I realized this.

On a better note, I just finished having a good chat with one of my friends and I was inspired to blog. I was saying how I was inspired to be more forgiving. For you Samuel people, I don't know if you remember the video "Baggage", but there was a line from that that really stuck with me. It was something along the lines of, "what if God said 'I can't forgive you- what you did was just too horrible'". I can honestly say that I've let go and forgiven people who hurt me, now I'm just sorry that I wasted time by not realizing this sooner. My friend's in a similar situation, and I'm glad I found the time to share this with her. So then, we also talked about how we take our relationship with God for granted- like that concept of praying when we need something. And we're both thankful that we have the privilege to be with a group of friends where most people are Christians. There's no doubt in my mind that things would be very different if I hadn't fallen with this group.

My goals for before/during university: Stay strong about my faith. Learn to stand up. Remember this feeling.

I titled this entry "Two steps forward and one step back" because I feel like those two steps are coming to the realization that I need to strengthen my faith and having the feeling of being thankful for being forgiven. My one step back is not yet being strong or brave enough to stand up for my faith. I'm sure this will arise again, so hopefully then I can do something about it.

Yours truly,
Sabrina

Praise the Lord :D

Okay, so I just feel like blogging so that'll encourage you to.

So today I really felt that God's working in our lives. I have this friend who's still waiting for her uni acceptances. It's been kinda nerve wrecking for her (and me) because the deadline to accept an offer is in 2 weeks-ish, and if you dont have any offeres.. you're kinda screwed. So for a while i've been praying for her because i know she can do it. But the thing is.. she applied to really hardcore programs. Her marks aren't bad, just not good enough for such hard core stuffs. So today at lunch, she tells me she got an alternate offer! Hey, it's still good! She was telling me how she was getting a bit desperate, y'know. And she asked God to hurry and give her SOMETHING. And she even went to a point to negotiating with God, in a way. "God, if you do this, I'll..." And I'm sure many of us have done the same thing. But she told me how she realizes that's not the way to get things from God, but she's just very relieved that God's opened a door for her. It wasn't her first (nor second, i think), but no matter what, God's gonna give us the best that he thinks. This reminds me of something that we talked bout in t4c last week. This guy was telling us how God doesn't work the way people work, etc. and how our attitude should be "God, I'll follow You EVEN IF ... " instead of "If You gimme this, THEN I'll..." I thought that was a really great reminder of how important our faith is, and how we definately need to know God before we can follow Him. :)

So the verse i was talking about last week ( i think?) is found in proverbs. I read it a few days ago in devo:
"In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps." Proverbs 16:9

I hope your spiritual journey's going well. It'd be great if you blogged about it :P

-a.

look, another blog!

yeah, im just blogging cause there's been a roll of posts. i like this. :)

So guys, come to the concert on WED, may 6, 7:00pm at aci. (midland/sheppard) it's gonna be really good, and it's jackie's and my last concert, it'd be cool to see you guys there :)

So today we were just chilling with martine and tom, our coaches from TC. it was pretty fun, cause we were just sitting there, just chatting away. i think it's kinda out of the ordinary, and at first i was kinda hesitant to go because i had to go to the concert at 6:30 and since there was just so little time, i felt that it was gonna be a waste of time. But it turned out to be just a relaxing, chilling time. and it kinda reminds me of how we spend time with God. I mean, sometimes we go like "oh.. it's already midnight, i'll do devo tmr night instead." or in the morning "oh.. i only have 5 minutes to spare.. nah, it's not enough for me to do devo/pray." And we were dicussing this during t4c one day, and we concluded that no matter how much time you have, that shouldn't prevent you from reading God's word. I mean, it should be the number 1 priority on your list, and everything else should come after. Perhaps a few minutes of reading the Bible could get your day started in a different way, change our perspective for the day.
I'm gonna try that one day. :) I'll let you know how it goes.

--a.

This is why we blog.

I must say that I've been VERY excited to blog about this one.

First of all, I might sound like a creeper for this. But on the plane coming back to Toronto, I was sitting beside a woman who was using her laptop. So my eyes kind of...wander. She plugged in her iPod so her iTunes popped up, and I like seeing what kind of music people listen to because I think that it says something about someone. So I'm blind, and didn't want to stare, so I saw the word "God" in one of the songs. So alright. Then she opened her documents, and I saw the word "sermons". So I'm kinda growing interest. I told you this would make me sound creepy. Then she opened something up, and by looking at it, I can tell it's a journal. Not just any journal, a SPIRITUAL JOURNAL. like this blog.

I really liked her format and how she approached the journal. She used a variety of ways. I really liked how she kind of wrote a "letter to God" as I call it because it would start off with a question like "God, what are you trying to tell me about ______?" then she would write out her thoughts about the issue. I also found her list format interesting. First, she would have something like "My hopes for the future", then after that list would be "What God wants for my future". That's an awesome way to compare. There was quite a bit about what she wants, then what God wants. I think that's really thoughtful because you can visibly see where priorities lie.

I was also kind of inspired by the fact that she's in or around university age (i saw the word OSAP) because I kind of have the mindset that it takes half a lifetime to be this committed, but realisticly, steps and depth are different for everyone. But i did find it interesting that she was in university because it's so close to our age, so c'mon guys, we can do it! it's not like she blogged EVERY day. Probably just when something was on her mind, which was even once a month sometimes. At the end of this, I swear that I had the urge to thank her, but that's way weird. So I settled for letting her use my tray table so nothing spilled on her laptop. haha. Oh, and I'm guessing that she was looking over her journal in order to gain some perspective about something using her past journals- that's why we started this!

Anyway, in conclusion:
-BLOG BLOG BLOG!!
-Lists and letters are a good way to organize thoughts
-Blogging doesn't have to be very frequent, but please blog occassionally.

I'll blog using that format soon.
Sabrina

Forever 3:16

So along my trip, I made sure to remember the things I noticed/experienced. First of all, I've never noticed this in Toronto- or maybe it's just present in the States, but at the bottom of Forever 21 bags is 'John 3:16'.

"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life."

I must admit that I'm not the best at all at memorizing verses, and I haven't looked at this one in a while. At first, I thought that the verse might have something to do with ethics that connects to a company policy. Upon further research (as in, looking up the passage), my thought is that it's simple and smart outreach. 'John 3:16' being printed on the bag doesn't take up much space, and it's subtle enough so that those that get easily offended by religion are okay with it. And who knows how many people actually search it up. I just thought it was awesome how the owners are using the store's fame for good.

Secondly, we were in an Italian restaurant whose placemats were of important dates for a few months, and one of the dates was Lent. It doesn't really seem like a big thing, but for me, I find it kind of amusing when I see things like this because society's so like, "don't talk about religion because it's politically incorrect". So i just like when I see religious references (small or big) out in the open like that. Maybe I'm just noticing it more when I go on vacation, and it's no secret that they're more religious in the States, but man. It makes Canada seem so restricting. It's kind of funny how equality all of a sudden became a taboo for religion.

Just a small sharing. More to come,
Sabrina

the days of old...

Hey...

so i m blogging here... cause i feel obligated to i suppose... cause i havent been blogging here or on the uni-page... and i feel a sense of conviction that i need to invest myself into ur lives more and read about what's going on w/ ur lives. cause the last 2 blogs r long and i just get turned off by long blog entries... but dont let that discouraging u from typing long ones... i will make more of an effort to read them because i value ur experiences and struggles as a Christian.

Something I've been noticing is that looking at you guys, it reminds me a lot of the things that we, the UNI group, went through when we were in samuel.. first, is our tardiness... we were often late because we. as a group, justified it by saying, "o it doesnt start till 8:20" so we all just kept pushing it later and later... and 2nd, worship leader would always do some spontaneous song choices, picking the day of because we have Christine and she can play anything... and we took that for granted...

Yes, i m jumping straight to the point because there's no point in me beating around the bush and i dont know how to.... i pray that you guys r noticing too... when we were part of samuel, we raised it up as a group... we talked about it, said, "no, it's not right... there's no respect on our part for God if we keep doing this" .... so we worked on it... I believe you guys need to do something similar... i dont expect you guys to change over night... and one thing i wouldnt like is u guys being on time because i've just raised it and then couple weeks down the road, returning to old habits... Tina and I would not like to keep having to talk and nag at you guys about it... you guys r growing and maturing quickly these days and we want to treat you as maturing adults..

secondly, with regards to worship, I can understand if you guys REALLY REALLY like Cry in my Heart... and I can understand you want to choose it if you have a good sharing with it... but i believe there are many songs out there to be chosen and share about the same sharing.. cause from my perspective, it shows a lack of creativity and willingness to spend time and look for songs to share with one another... and it gives me the impression that the guitarist knows this song the best so they dont need to practice, and hence, if Cry in my Heart is chosen, it will go well during worship.... but in doing so, the quality of singspiration gets taken away... i believe if different songs are chosen, it keeps things fresh, everyone gets exposed to different songs and the instrumentalists get to learn and practice new songs.... i challenge you to spend more time preparing to for worship... and not just doing it cause ur name is in the slot for that day... i challenge you to think of why you're doing it... and with the summer coming up, "i dont have enough time to prepare" is not a justifiable excuse for the lack preparation... if we are to offer our best to God, don't you think we should prepare? a team does not make it to the finals without practice, a band can not play at concerts without practice, i dont see how we can worship our God without practice...

my suggestion is that the worship leader should communicate with his/her instrumentalist a week before.... so the instrumentalist can have adequate time to practice..

ok, it's late... almost 2 and i have work tomorrow... hopefully fellowship can start more promptly this coming friday... and i will try my best to be there at 5.... but in the case that i come at my regular time, i hope singspiration is not just beginning...

- J Lo

p.s amy, please send all emails to jlokine@gmail.com... i dont know where you've been sending emails to cause i havent been getting any....

Luggage

As demanded by Tina, here are the reflection questions based on the clip we saw last week. Feel free to watch it again and comment even if you weren't there! :D

http://www.esnips.com/doc/8205edd1-638c-491b-8b3a-0e0b688cb481/Luggage--Rob-Bell

"You thought you were over it but now you're more into it than ever and the wound is reopened and it hurts more than ever, and then it becomes a day or a week or 10 years later and now it's become a part of you"
Q: What are some of your wounds? How have they shaped who you are today?

"...revenge becomes our only hope"
Q: When was a time when you got revenge for something? How did you feel? Do you think you were telling God that you can handle it better than He?

"The eyes of the Lord are everywhere..."
Q: Do you trust that God is ultimately going to take care of everything?

"You know what? You don’t understand. What they did to me is so horrible, I can never forgive them. But what if God said that?"
Q: How have you experienced God's forgiveness? Knowing this, how can that help you to forgiving others?

"Maybe forgiveness is ultimately about you and me, it's about us. Because when i forgive something and I set them free, it's like I'm really setting myself free."
Q: Do you believe this statement? That forgiveness is really more about the forgiving than the forgiven? Does this make it easier for you to forgive?

"Forgiving is an action. It's something you do."
Q: Is there anyone that you need to forgive right now? Share.

Now there's no excuse not to blog! haha. :D
-a.

Justice

Okay, so no blogs yet... a bit disappointing. but here's mine.

Today I think I experienced something that bothered me a lot. Y'know, it's one of those things that really isn't a big deal, but to me personally, I was upset. I dont know if you've been wrongly accused for something that you didn't do, but I suppose that's what happened to me. Well, so during lunch I was counting money for the music council, since we just did a huge chocolate fundraising event. So i was counting with my teacher and two other students. And we just so happened to run over lunch and I got to class 5 minutes late.. during DEAR. I didnt ask my teacher for a note cause it's just 5 minutes, right, whatever. But noo, my physics teacher was being... extremely unpleasent, and demanded a detention for 50 minutes.. (10 times the length i was late) So fine, whatever, right, I'll take it. It's just detention. But at that time, I felt so.. disturbed, i guess. Honestly, okay, i was late, but 10 times? c'mon. that's just ridiculous. the school policy is to stay for however long you were late for, maxmum double the time...So I tell her, I was doing music council stuffs, i'll ask my supervising teacher to write a note explaining my tardiness. But no, she's like "oh, no. i dont want a note. im tired of your excuses and crap." I think at that point I kinda.. y'know. reached my max "pissed"-ness. So I just sat down and did nothing for the rest of the class. We're not even learning.. we're having presentations. I honestly dont see her reason in being so mean. then near the end of class, she comes to me and says "oh, i just spoke to mr lum (music head), he said there was no reason for you to have been late." and im like "dude, i wasnt WITH mr lum. did you talk to mr church? (the one i was with)" and by this time i'm pretty much yelling.. well, not yelling, more like. rising my voice. and she's like "i don tneed to talk to mr church. i talked to lum already." and that's just ridiculous. lum wasnt even around during lunch. blah blah blah, the story goes on. And something that i hate about myself is that i cry very easily, even if i'm not at fault. So i started crying during class. The class was just doing "class work", so i just kept on sitting there. I wasn't exactly angry.. but when she accused me of missing 5 MINUTES of class because "i just wanted to" was just bs. (please excuse my language) anyway, so by that time i was supposed to go do a bio contest, so i just walk out. i couldnt take it.. what was i supposed to say when she didnt even try to listen? so i left. and did the contest.. which i probably failed. but yeah, so then afterschool i went to my detention. I knew it wasnt gonna be 50 minutes; she wouldnt bother to stay that long. So whatever, i went there to do math homework. The worst part of this was that she brought in mr lum to give me another lecture. Talk about fun. He starts talking about the council's reputation being more important and how people have abused their rights as council members to miss classes, blah blah blah. and how "maybe you guys just want more time afterlunch to hand out (talking to me and my boyfriend) but you gotta go to class on time." and ......... by then i just totally shut him out. DUDE, DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON. he comes in and starts talkign about crap when he doesnt even know the situation. perhaps he was trying to apologize for his "misunderstaning" that i was with mr church at lunch, but it sure felt like he was just trying to save his own rep and justified himself. I'm sure he said more, but i cant remember it. So we got let out like.. 30 minutes after, but seriously.. i dont see a point in it.

I still dont know what i did wrong.. and honeslty, i dont think i did. if they had to put a blame on me, maybe is hould've asked for a note. but what good would that have done, since it was an "excuse" anyway? I felt that i was just caught inbetween two people who had a crappy day. but whatever. I still dont see why i was "punished" for doing stuffs during lunch.. for the council. So then afterschool, i spent a while talking to my friends.. who were totally on my side and such, but there was no point in talking about it anymore, it's done. and lum comes and goes like "do you need to talk about this?".. what can i talk about? you already judged me by "what happened". I guess my reason for being so upset is that.. well, they were attacking my .. character. They thought that i went to class late because i a) just didnt feel like it, b) wanted to spend time with my boyfriend (which was ridiculous, i wasnt even with him =.=) and c) that i do this often. Honestly.. i dont even skip class, if i really didnt wanna go to class, why would i have gone after 5minutes? and i've never "abused" the council title for my own gain.. it's easy to, but i haven't, yet.

So as i was.. just thinking this over, i remembered what we watched last week about forgiveness. He said somethign about forgiveness is actually for the forgiving, not the ones being forgiven. Well, I dont know whether or not i forgave them.. cause i still cant let it go. But i guess that's also part of who i am.. i need to be right. and ... well, i still dont see any bit in how i was wrong. And if i do forgive them eventually, since forgivness is an action, am i gonna go up to my teachers and tell them i forgive them? that's kinda awkward.. isnt it? So then after all this, i was thinking a) maybe i should drop the course RIGHT NOW and never go back. i don tneed it anyway. b) quitting the council just to show them how much work i do, and how much they need me. But well, those solutions don't work. It wont do anyone any good. and so then this verse popped in my head, i don tknow where it is.. somewhere in the gospels, i think. it goes something liek this. "it is the Lord's to avenge" and something like "leave room for God's wrath" I dont really know if it relates, but i guess, God's got this down. And i felt quite peaceful knowing that God knows.. and really, why do i care so much about this? Well, i dont know. But it still annoys me. Perhaps i'll get some insight as the days pass.

more to come,
-a.

*oh, i tried writing formally, but my "anger" took over and so i just kept typing and forgot all my grammar. haha