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.