Category: Grace

God’s Grace (Trin-I-Tee 5:7)

There’s so much I love about this song. It touches on so many aspects of God’s grace for our lives but the last words of this song sum it up well “Just remember that His grace will keep you.” If you are struggling today, remember these words “Today, God’s grace will keep you because His grace is sufficient for you today” (2 Corinthians 2:19).


Yes, God still miraculously heals today!

On Sunday, September 27th, 2010, God supernaturally grew out one of my legs and then evened them out. Yes, a physical creative miracle happened. The back story on this is that over the last four or five years my lower back has been steadily giving me more and more pain. All of this culminated a week before when I flew from Los Angeles to Chicago (September, 19th). After the flight I started to feel a sharp pain in my left leg and it even started to go numb from time to time. On Monday, I rested as much as I could, but the pain was still there. On Tuesday, I was walking through a grocery store and in the back by the pharmacy there was a little stand where a chiropractic business was checking people’s balance. I filled out the form and let them know that I had ongoing lower back pain and that now my left leg had just started to hurt and go numb from time to time. So, they had me stand on two scales, one for each foot and checked my balance. What the balance test revealed was that I leaned almost 12 pounds (5.5 kg) to my left leg which normally should only be a 2-3 pounds (0.9-1.2 kg) difference confirming that added pressure was being put on my sciatic nerve and was possibly causing the numbness.

To back up a bit, the week before all of this happened I felt the Lord really challenge me while I was at a prayer meeting (Septmeber 15th) where people were praying for healing for a woman. I very distinctly heard Jesus ask me: “Do you really believe that the Father will give you anything that you ask of Him in My Name?” His voice wasn’t an audible voice, but I distinctly felt and heard His voice reverberate throughout the whole of my being. I heard it in my head and in my heart all at the same time. It was like Jesus was speaking directly to my spirit. So, for the next few days I really wrestled with this question. But as I wrestled, Holy Spirit kept reminding me that the only reason that I live, move and have my being in Him at all is because of God’s grace. All the blessings in my life are truly undeserved; be it healing, salvation, deliverance, redemption or restoration. As Paul so eloquently put it, “But whatever I am now, it is all because God poured out his special favor on me—and not without results. For I have worked harder than any of the other apostles; yet it was not I but God who was working through me by his grace” (1 Corinthians 15:10 NLT).

If you know my story, then you may think that if anyone should get this it’s me. But, though I have experienced many supernatural moves of God’s grace in my life, I still wrestled deep within my heart with a distorted view of God’s heart towards me. God’s heart towards us is to heal, save, redeem and restore, period. I mean He gave up His one and only Son, Jesus, so that He could accomplish all of these things through an intimate relationship with us for all eternity. That’s God’s heart towards us. He’s not stingy with His love, goodness, mercy and grace, but infinitely generous and compassionate when it comes to gifting, blessing and showing favor towards us. We just need to believe and receive His love, goodness, mercy, grace, gifts, blessings and favor. Coming to this revelation has really freed up my heart and mind to just receive from the Lord and allow Him to pour out the fullness of His grace upon my life. In my wrestling what I was confronted with was the belief that 1) I thought I needed to work for God’s grace, 2) I didn’t think that God wanted to show me more of His favor and 3) because I was too proud or too ashamed I would just plain refuse to accept God’s favor. But, the breakthrough came when I began repenting for these distorted beliefs of trying to earn God’s favor by working for it, of my own self-condemnation that I projected onto God thinking He didn’t want to show me more of His favor and of my pride and shame that refused to accept God’s goodness and blessings towards me.

Now back to the healing miracle at hand. After leaving the balance test, I began to think that maybe my left leg was a little longer than the other and because of this has effected my lower back over the years which is quite typical from what I understand. That night I had my connect group (small group) pray for my back, a couple people said they definitely felt like there was a spiritual component, one of them saw an image of a vine wrapped around one of my legs. When I woke up on Wednesday, the pinching and numbness was gone. Later that day I felt like I should try and measure my legs and ask for God to even them out. So, I sat on my bed stretched my legs out and placed my hands on my right hip and began to simple ask the Father in Jesus Name to even out my legs. Nothing fancy. Right away my right hip began to tingle for a minute or so and then stopped. In my spirit, I really felt like God did do something, but I wasn’t sure what. So, I thanked God for healing me and that was that. (I know this post is extra long, but I really want to give as clear and detailed account of everything that happened, so please bear with me. I promise you it’s worth it.)

Fast forward to Sunday, September 27th, 2010 around 8pm. I am at a teaching session on healing (through my church: CITC) at Chris and Nancy Whiteley’s house. As the teaching portion was ending, I asked the group to pray for my back pain. I didn’t go into detail of what had transpired earlier in the week, but did share that I felt like my back pain had a spiritual component, was possibly connect to a generational curse and that I felt like one of my legs could possibly be longer than the other. So, Nancy and Chris led me through a prayer of repentance over the generational curse over my family and then began prayerfully breaking in Jesus Name any connection that a spirit of infirmary may have had over my back pain and began praying for healing and restoration to any degenerative damage to my back. During this time I really didn’t feel anything at all. So, next they had me sit in a wooden chair with my lower back resting fully against the back of the chair. Chris then had me lift my legs and he held my feet together to see if they were different lengths. After the group looked at my legs they said that my right leg was definitely a little shorter than the left.

So, while Chris was holding my feet, Dave Foster put his hand on my right shin and began to invite the Holy Spirit to come and bring healing to my leg. Then Taylor Lyall, who had his hand on my right thigh began to command my right leg to grow out in Jesus Name. Here’s where it gets good. All of a sudden my right leg from the knee down began to tingle like crazy and then it felt like someone yanked really hard on my right foot and I literally felt my leg grow out from around my ankle area. Everyone there started screaming that my foot just totally grew out like an inch or so (maybe around 3 cm). Personally, it really felt like my leg had grown too much. I didn’t say anything but then Chris had Monica come put her hand on my feet and she began to pray that God would even out my legs. Then my left ankle area began to tingle too and it really felt like both my legs were shifting about. It was quite a strange feeling. I was literally holding onto the chair like I was about to take off or something. All in all, I think we prayed for maybe 10 minutes while I was sitting in the chair. Afterwards, when I stood up it definitely felt different.

Today (September 27th), as I am writing this the calf muscle in my right leg feels extra tight and my right knee feels a bit weird like it’s adjusting or something. I have no more pain in my lower back, but I do feel like the muscles back there are a tiny bit sore as well. Maybe my lower back muscles, nerves and tendons are also adjusting I’ll see over then next few weeks if I need more restorative prayer on my back. Over the weekend, I bought a balance board and ordered a Bosu ball because I wanted to work on resetting my balance. I’m glad I did because now I can work on my balance, not because I have one leg shorter than the other, but because God miraculously lengthened and evened out my legs and now I need to reset my balance because I have too legs that are the same length. God’s grace and goodness towards us is so amazing! So amazing!!!


GRACE III: grace story

The more I meditate on the grace of God, the more I am convinced that the only reason that I am not dead is by God’s grace. And the only reason I am where I am today is by God’s grace. It is only by God’s grace that any of us are not as bad as we know in our hearts that we could be and it’s by His grace that we are also the best we could ever be. The amazingness of God’s grace is that it is free with no strings attached. If you have never spent time meditating on God’s grace, I highly urge that you do. I would even suggest that you begin to ask God to reveal to you just how His grace has impacted and shaped your life. I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of letting other things shape and form me. What is it that is shaping your life apart from God’s grace?

In my last post, I talked about the equal need of God’s diamond of grace resting in and on each of our lives and how it’s not about degrees of grace, but rather differing facets of the whole of God’s grace. And how grace flows freely out of the goodness and kindness of God’s heart towards us. I would also add to this image that God’s diamond of grace reflects the reality of the Kingdom of God because grace is also the overflow of the Kingdom of God. The more I learn to embrace the fullness of God’s grace upon my life, the more I will learn to rest and walk in Holy Spirit. And the more I rest and walk in Holy Spirit, the more I will live in the atmosphere of the Kingdom of God. I mean, Jesus says that “the Kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21 NIV) because the Holy Spirit lives within every believer (1 Corinthians 6:19).

Grace is simply amazing. From my perspective, embracing God’s grace and experiencing living in the Kingdom of God go hand in hand. I know whenever I get to share my God story with people, they are impacted by the reality of the Kingdom of God because they are impacted by the love of God and the hope of the Gospel which are large components of God’s Kingdom. That’s why I truly believe that testifying about how God’s grace has impacted and shaped our lives is so critical because the words of our testimony have the power to reveal both God’s heart towards people and the reality of Kingdom of God. I mean according to Scripture, the weapons of our warfare against the Evil One are the Word of God, the blood of the Lamb and the words of our testimony. What’s your grace story?


GRACE II: grace flow

I think it is safe to say that we have all at some time received grace. Grace is unmerited favor. It means receiving something undeservedly. Simply speaking, this may mean receiving mercy in a trial or blessing in hard times. I find that generosity is a good descriptor of grace because out of the goodness and kindness of heart grace overflows. Often times one of the hardest things for a person to do is to receive grace. We would much rather work for the favor, than have to owe someone. But, this isn’t grace because grace gives freely with no strings attached. This is real grace. I mean that’s what I gather from reading the Bible, God gives generously and freely (no strings) out of the goodness and kindness of His heart. Do you believe this?

I’ve often heard grace described in terms of degrees. But, the more I experience God’s grace, the more I’m confronted with the inadequacy of this description. I believe a more robust image is needed in order to really capture the magnitude of God’s grace. We are all in need of grace, so rather than speaking in terms of degrees I’d like to propose facets, like a diamond. The amazing thing about God’s grace is it’s vastness, but also it’s particularity to each person. So rather than think in terms of more or less grace (degrees), it makes better sense to describe God’s grace in terms of differing facets. Because Sin manifests itself in differing ways in people’s lives, so differing facets of God’s grace will be needed. It’s not that a person needs more or less of God’s grace, but rather each person needs a unique combination of the many differing facets of the whole of God’s grace.

Now what has sparked this whole theological musing is the desire to level the playing field (so to speak). I mean Scripture says that “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23 NIV), but I can’t tell you how often I hear people compare themselves to others in terms of grace: “that person needs more grace than I do” or “I don’t need as much grace as they do.” But, I believe this kind of thinking often comes from a place of self-righteousness, I mean isn’t that the way the Pharisees saw it? This way of thinking can begin to both directly and indirectly form an unspoken hierarchy amongst the people of God. Again, it’s not that we need differing degrees of God’s grace, but rather that we are in need of differing facets of the whole of God’s grace. Maybe to some this may seem like semantics, but my heart behind all of this is to bring greater love and unity to the people of God where we truly begin to see that we are all in this together and that from Heaven’s perspective we are all in equal need of God’s diamond of grace resting in and on our lives.


GRACE I: grace dealer

I was called something the other day that I’ve never been called before: a grace dealer. Now if you know my story that’s more than just a little ironic. Personally, I find it miraculously hilarious! Only God could transform a person from being a drug dealer (a destroyer of lives) into a grace dealer (an encourager of lives). But, I’m getting ahead of myself. What spurred our conversation was the fact that I love to pray grace into people’s lives. From my understanding of Scripture, without God’s grace we are all lost to our own devices, dysfunctions and distortions. Hence, the reason that I love to pray that God’s grace would literally invade a person’s life. Have you ever thought about what the world would be like without grace? I shiver at the thought.

Grace is a crucial component to the healing and recovery process of addicts and alcoholics. From what I surmise from reading the Bible, grace has a way of setting people free from the bondage of sin. I mean when Jesus walked among us, He embodied in fullness both the grace and truth of God (John 1:17). And this grace and truth healed and set people free because anytime grace is mixed with truth it will always encourage and empower people. It is also through Jesus that we experience the depths of God’s amazing love. I know I say this a lot, but knowing the Father’s perfect unconditional love changes everything. His love has a way of turning our divided, shallow, hardened, wounded, scarred and deceptive hearts into whole, deep, tender, healed, renewed and genuine hearts.

I mean God’s heart towards us is to let His wonderful grace rule in our lives, over and above sin (Romans 5:21). But, giving people grace can be messy business because who knows what they may do with this grace. I believe that’s why Paul admonishes us to not abuse God’s grace by using it as a license to sin (Romans 6:1,2). But, from God’s vantage point, He’s not worried. He knows what His grace can accomplish in a person’s life and He’s patient. There’s a verse that says “God’s kindness leads to repentance” (Romans 2:4) which I couldn’t agree with more. But, if you’re like me, than it’s all too easy to slip into the mindset that through judgement people will come to repentance. And though I do believe that the fear of judgement can lead people towards repentance, it will always be God’s grace that brings a person into His presence.


FREEdom II: living free

Walking out the freedom that Jesus extends to His followers is easier said than done. The sad reality of our fallen condition is that we would rather live the way we are familiar and comfortable with, even if it means living in bondage, rather than embrace the new and unfamiliar way that Jesus has for us. I mean, the scary part of being a new creation in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17) is the deep longing to be transformed, but not knowing what that looks like and the difficulty in being able to recognize the new way when God brings it into our lives. But, I do believe that the more we learn to embrace this new way, the more our hearts will trust in God’s ways where the rocky road of sanctification will become more comfortable to us than the smooth road of convenience. At the heart of this is trust: learning to trust in the goodness and grace of God.

Rather than rattle off verse after Scripture verse that talks about the goodness and grace of God (I do recommend doing a word search of both words) I think a better question to ask is, “What kind of thorns and scars do you have in and on your heart?” You see, it is these thorns and scars (our woundedness) that keeps us from living free because our woundedness keeps both God and people at arm’s length. It’s our woundedness that distorts the way we see the world, people, ourselves and God. But, the Good News is that God is lovingly faithful and patient and His perfect love has a way of healing our hearts. The more we soak in His love the more our hearts are tenderized both towards Him and people. What I love about God’s unconditional love is that His love is active, meaning, His love moves Him to pursue us. Isn’t that the words of 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.”

When I came to faith roughly 10 years ago, I remember feeling so inadequate in my ability to both give and receive love. I also remember being moved by Holy Spirit to begin asking Jesus to show me what it means to love and be loved. I literally prayed this prayer for at least three years, if not longer. Today, I’m feeling the same tugging at my heart to begin again praying this prayer. It’s humbling, the deeper I delve into the Father’s heart, the more aware I become of the shallowness of my own love, both for God and others. From my perspective, living free means the ability to love free. But, our woundedness is stingy with love and likes to horde love which hinders us from loving freely. Now a verse that has been a great comfort to me is “We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19 NIV). What this says to me is that I don’t have to generate love on my own, rather all I need to do is lean into the Father’s perfect unconditional love and His love will begin to fuel and fire my own love which will also set me free to love.

When I look at Jesus’ life while He walked the earth, I see a man who loved passionately, faithfully, authentically, virtuously and completely free. Jesus knew what it meant to love and live in freedom. Nothing held Jesus back from living and loving free because He fully understood our Father’s love for Him. He knew without a shadow of a doubt that He was God’s beloved Son. It is the same for us, knowing that we are God’s beloved sons and daughters changes everything because the more fully we embrace this reality, the more readily we will “approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (Hebrews 4:16 NIV). I know personally, the more I am around the throne of grace, the more I understand who God is to me and who I am to God. He is my beloved Father and I am His beloved child in whom He adores and delights. When we experience the depths of the Father’s love, His love heals, saves, redeems, restores and sustains us. Remember nothing can separate us from the love God has for us in Jesus (Romans 8:31-39).

Living free means loving free. Being a new creation in Christ means becoming more and more like Him each and everyday which means learning to love more passionately, faithfully, authentically, virtuously and completely free. Jesus promises us that if If we seek the freedom to live and love free, we will find it (Matthew 7:7,8). I don’t know about you, but that sounds like Good News to me. This is my prayer: “Jesus, show us what it means to love and be loved. Show us how to live and love freely. Teach us to love like You. Heal the wounds of our hearts that hinders us from living and loving free. Whatever it takes Jesus because You are worth it. We love You our Savior King! Amen.”


lovingAWE

Jesus tells us that “God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth” (John 4:24 NIV). Now this isn’t a suggestion that Jesus makes, but more of a non-negotiable declaration. If we are to be worshipping in the presence of God, we must be filled with His Spirit and Truth. I’ve often heard this statement, “The only way to approach a holy God is to do it His way” which is true. Now if the Father desires true worshippers, who will worship Him in Spirit and Truth (John 4:23), who are we to deny the Creator and Giver of life by worshipping Him in our own way. Do you think that He will accept our worship? Probably not. I mean that’s why there are so many religions in the world because people are deciding for themselves who, how and why they worship. But, Jesus is adamant about Him being the only way to the Father (John 14:6). It’s interesting that Jesus says “the Father” and not God. Because Jesus isn’t inviting us into some objectively impersonal notion here, but rather a subjectively intimate familial relationship.

What I find interesting in today’s churches (without getting too ecclesial) are the two extremes of friendship with God and reverence for God. On the one hand, there are churches that solely emphasize that through Jesus people are now friends with God, while on the other hand, there are churches that only emphasize having reverence for God. Both are true, but what my heart longs to see a great blending of the two. To see the people of God in a vibrantly deep and intimate familial relationship with the Father while they stand in awe of His majestic glory. After talking this over with some friends over lunch yesterday, we concluded that it’s through our friendship with God that should draw us into a deeper and more vibrant worship of God in which we experience a greater depth and magnitude of His majesty, beauty and glory. But, something is getting lost in the translation.

I can only imagine what it would be like to be in the throne room of God. What comes to mind is Ezekiel 1 where the heavens open and Ezekiel sees visions of God. Without going into the details of the vision (I recommend reading through the chapter yourself), what seems to stand out is the sheer magnificence of God and the glory that radiates from Him which moves Ezekiel uncontrollably facedown (Ezekiel 1:28). All this is pretty amazing, but it’s the next verses that have drawn my attention: the Lord says to Ezekiel, “‘Son of man, stand up on your feet and I will speak to you.’ As he spoke, the Spirit came into me and raised me to my feet, and I heard him speaking to me” (Ezekiel 2:1, 2 NIV). The only way that Ezekiel was able to stand in the presence of God was by His Word (command) and Spirit.

Through Jesus, believers today do have the Spirit of God living within them (1 Corinthians 6:19) and are hopefully filling themselves with the Word of God. So, we are able to stand in the presence of God. And as the writer of Hebrews tells us because Jesus is our High Priest, “Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (Hebrews 4:16 NIV). Maybe what needs to happen is more of God’s people need to be meditating on the the throne of grace where Jesus, the spotless Lamb of God, sits (Revelation 5). I believe the more we envision this, the greater we will see Jesus not only as our beloved Savior and Friend, but also as the Lord of Lords and King of Kings (Revelation 19:16).


closER

Today, I’ve been meditating on what it means for God to be the Creator and Giver of life (Genesis 2:7), who literally dwells within me (1 Corinthians 3:16; 2 Timothy1:14) . The reason being is that lately I’ve been struggling something fierce with my flesh (Romans 7:15). I’ve come to the conclusion that all my flesh desires is to satisfy itself whether it be through greed, lust, gluttony, comfort or laziness (to name some of the usual suspects). But, just today God gave me this revelation: that He is closer to me than even my own flesh. Hearing these words has electrified my spirit and begun filling me with great hope. If I truly am a new creation in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17) which I am, then it makes perfect sense that because of this I am no longer a slave to sin, but a slave to righteousness (Romans 6:18). This means that the righteousness of Christ is closer to me than the sinfulness of my flesh, right?

To take this a step further, I believe that the life that we are living here on earth will be completely paled in comparison to the eternal life all believers in Jesus get to look forward to. I mean can you even imagine what it will be like to be literally standing before the throne of God? The amount of glory and life that must radiate from God must be simply awesome. I mean He is the very Creator and Giver of life, the one and only true Living God. Everything that God does has eternal ramifications. He holds all of life in the palm of His hands. When He speaks life or death happens. And it is this same fully alive almighty God, who literally dwells within us and is actively breathing more life and glory into us day by day as He recreates us into the image and likeness of His Son, Jesus, through His Spirit (2 Corinthians 3:18). What an amazing truth! When I really sit down and think about this, it blows my mind. The very notion of this can’t help but to create awe and splendor towards God within me.

So this is my prayer: “Help us Lord to recognize the wonderful gift of the Holy Spirit who dwells within us and the amazing truth that You are closer to us than even our own flesh, that it is Your righteousness that now defines us, rather than the sinfulness of our flesh. In Jesus Name, Amen.”


suffocatingSOUL

What is it that defines you? Throughout my life I’ve allowed a variety of things to form me. To use biblical language, I’ve allowed a variety of things become my potter, rather than allowing God, the Creator and Giver of life, be my Potter. For the better part of my life drugs formed and defined me. But, even before I started using drugs, I allowed anger and bitterness to control the way I lived my life which when left unattended steadily grew into hated and vengeance. Some of the outward fruit of this showed itself through lying, stealing and eventually drug use while inwardly this hatred and vengeance slowly, yet, relentlessly ate away at my soul; suffocating it from faith, hope and love.

The day I came to faith (solely by the grace of God), the fragrance of Christ invaded my being and a miracle happened, I became a “new creation in Christ” (2 Corinthians 5:17). From that day forward my spirit became eternally joined with the Holy Spirit and He has begun to bring healing, salvation, redemption and restoration to my decaying soul. In many ways the process of sanctification has been like a great airing out of my soul. No longer does hatred and vengeance control the way I live, but rather peace, love and kindness. No longer am I defined by drug addiction, but rather God is my Potter and His Truth defines who I am. Faithfully, He has been purifying my soul by peeling away the many layers of sin that has been suffocating my soul. Do you feel like your soul is suffocating?

The bible says that Jesus offers freedom to those who choose to believe and following Him. I have experienced (as many others have) this freedom. As the Apostle Paul puts it, freedom from the slavery of following the law (Galatians 5:1ff) which can be interpreted as freedom from the yoke of religion. The Creator of Heaven and Earth is a relational God who loves, likes and enjoys spending time with His creation. I believe a lot of people believe God to be a distance, stoic God who angrily puts up with us. But, I don’t think there could be anything further from the Truth. “God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us” (Romans 5:5). This same Holy Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead (Romans 8:11) will also teaches us how to live a life out from under the law (Galatians 5:18). A life based on Truth (John 14:26) which Jesus says will set us free (John 8:32).

My prayer is that by God’s grace the Holy Spirit would help you to surrender more of your life to Jesus, so that He can breathe greater measures of faith, hope and love into the areas of your soul that are suffocating. I proclaim freedom over you in Jesus Name, Amen.


biCULTural

Trying to live between two cultures is much like being in my own cult. The lonely feeling of ostracism is almost palpable at times. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve wrestled with my internal editor about you name it, we’ve debated or argued about it. You see, my internal editor identifies more with the Chinese culture while I tend to identify more with the American culture. I’ve struggled with this inner conflict for as long as I can remember. I believe it was because I was racially teased and bullied as a child that I learned early on that to fit in, I needed to be American rather than Chinese. So, as a young child I became ashamed of my Chinese heritage and learned to disconnect from that part of me and voilà! My internal editor was born.

It wasn’t until after I came to faith in Jesus, that I became aware of how much this inner conflict has effected the way I live and see myself. Jesus has blessed me with a greater self-awareness where I’ve begun to literally hear the inner dialogue between the two cultures living within me. He has also helped me to reconnect with my Chinese heritage and embrace my internal editor rather than being combative with him. You see, what I always thought I needed to do was to just continue denying that I was Chinese and just become more and more American which only created more disconnectedness rather than healing. What I am learning today is that I need to embrace that I am Chinese, but to also embrace that I am American and allow God to redeem all that is good in both cultures. This has helped me to see being bicultural as a blessing, rather than an annoyance or even a curse.

Why I feel this is so important is that the burden of this inner conflict was one of the factors that pushed me towards drug use in the first place. Because if I consicously knew it or not, I wanted an escape from the inner struggle of trying to understand myself. It was just easier to stop dealing with it. Inwardly, the pains of rejection and the failed attempts of fitting in only fueled the growing inferiority complex that was first birthed in my heart through the racial teasing and bullying of my childhood. I feel like I am really only beginning this journey of becoming who God created and redeemed me to be. I am learning more and more everyday that He loves that I’m a Chinese American and wants me to embrace all that is good in both cultures. It’s who I am and I need to begin to celebrate this because when I do I also embrace and accept how God sees me. I feel like I’ve spent most of my life asking God why – rather than simply telling Him thank you for creating me and giving me life.

 9 “What sorrow awaits those who argue with their Creator.
      Does a clay pot argue with its maker?
   Does the clay dispute with the one who shapes it, saying,
      ‘Stop, you’re doing it wrong!’
   Does the pot exclaim,
      ‘How clumsy can you be?’
 10 How terrible it would be if a newborn baby said to its father,
      ‘Why was I born?’
   or if it said to its mother,
      ‘Why did you make me this way?’” (Isaiah 45:9, 10 NLT)

I’m learning Lord, I’m learning… ~Gerry

::also posted at The Slanted View: reflections on faith, brokenness, culture and manhood from a Pan-Asian American perspective::