Randomosity

His realness begins from the moment I breathe
The wake of a new day
and the moment I say hello.

Quiet night sky with the stars above.
The airplane flies by and I know it's okay.
Because he's saying hello back.
Because he's saying 'I love you' still.

I love God's grace. I love how it is new each day and I love how it meets you with a different taste at different moments in your life. I love how God always allows U-turns. I love how God allows you to be tired in his arms and how he challenges you to the hurt-most core. With God, it's about being real. It's about being 100% or nothing. It's about living a crazy sort of life because he's sort of crazy sort of God who does crazy sorts of things.

!!!

Anyhowsers. I went on a lovely date today. We went to The Boiler House at The Distillery District and it was quite good there! And yes I suppose today is day one. (holymothersocscaredit'sbeenwaytoolongandidon'tknowwhati'mdoingbuthe'sagoodboysoit'llbeokay). :)

hard decisions

sigh.

sometimes you have to make hard decisions.
hard decisions so that you can make the best of your life.
decisions that God lets you choose to go one way or the other.
decisions that take that extra muscle in your character that is more difficult to use than the others.

even if people around you disagree with you.
even if your own heart disagrees with you.
but that one tic toc inside says mmhmm. "i'm here with you".

1.tick
2. tick

3, 4.

mini RAH RAH RAH

I am sick after a hiatus of not being sick for a year and a half.
Boo to my fail immune system!

I am so excited for this year. I am SO excited for 2010!
I am so ready to surrender and realistically change everything.
i told a few people this but there are four areas of my life that I want to work on specifically and those are:

1. boys
2. alcohol
3. laziness
4. materialism

To be honest I feel like the third one is going to be the hardest because I'm such a cow in so many ways.
Strength from God!

One other thing that i really really want to work on is building my relationships this year into stronger, more honest and truer ones. Especially with those girlfriends that I've come to know and love in the past few years (and months). I want to learn to love and stop thinking always about myself, ESPECIALLY with those girls (and one or two guys).

I am a missionary

I'm so pooped from GKYM but I am so so blessed that I went.

I forgot again. (doh!)
I am a missionary. Yes even as a probable future graphic designer, I am a missionary. And even if I don't become what I plan, I shrug my shoulders because God has a plan for my life.

My plans for 2010 are open for Him. I had it all set up but my heart is open. My hands are open. I realized so much at this conference again.

I am a broken person. A sinner who was saved and I stand justified before the feet of God. My heart that is filled and constantly being held together by the love of Christ Jesus is wholly His. I offered (and I offer even in this moment in time) my everything and that made me feel so relaxed and peaceful and quite amazing inside. 'Ah rest for my soul'.

I don't want to use the word 'strategic', but I'll say that strategically I know what I need to do in my life. It came hand in hand with what I discussed with Pastor Young a few months ago after the Onnuri retreat. I keep giving excuses to live in a certain way because I see other people living in the same ways and it being fine. But I'm tired of wanting what other people have. I want my own. I want my own vision, my own plan, I want my God in the ways that He is always ready to pour into me.

My life is not ready for it. I know that if he spills more of this new precious wine into my life, it will all break. It will all spill away because I've seen it happen over and over again. It's time to stop compromising everything.

People are so hungry to know Jesus. We are so hungry inside. We are so thirsty inside for living water. Yet it's true. There are places in this world where they have never heard of this precious precious name of Jesus. God wants to be in relationship with them, he's been giving them dreams about Him. Yet we need to be the feet to spread it.

It's going to be difficult in 2010 I know it. I feel like this coming year will be a year where there will be very difficult choices to make. My insides will be stretched, my heart examined and refined through extremely painful and wordless ways. Am I ready to say 'yes?' I have so much fear but I need people's prayers. I can't do this on my own. I can't do anything on my own!

So for the few who have read this/glancing over this blog. If you could do a sister some good and pray for me. Pray for this possible one year alcohol fast that I might do. (A seemingly impossible stretch which is sad). And pray for my discernment for a certain situation in my life that I think I already know the answer to, but need absolute confirmation.

I feel like this post sounded a bit morbid (what is new....lisa you emo loser....hehe). But this page is kind of dancing before my eyes right now because I'm so tired. I will sleep until 5pm now.

Love Snow

(deviant art)

It's been such a rush of things these past few weeks. Today I realized that even though I hate commuting to work and to school, it's the one time in my day that I get to really just rest and be still.

It was dark when I was walking home from the station today and it began to snow. It wasn't just any snow. It was LOVE SNOW. I love love snow. When the snow just slowly falls down and reflects when the light from the street lamp hits it just right. I slowed down my walking and I took a big deep breath. 'I love you Jesus' is all I said and I realized that I forgot the deep simplicity of love and my purpose in life.

That Israel and New Breed song "To worship you I live" really captures it at times. Over and over again he sings, "To worship you I live. To worship you I live, I live to worship you." And in that I realized that God is the only one who provides true rest.

Hm on another note, Pastor Young spoke about sacrifice last Sunday. I wondered to myself, 'what do I truly treasure and hold dear that I am not so willing to give up.' And my answers were food, sleep, and time. And I realized how barbaric that was and sad as well. Food because thinking about having to actually fast scares me. Sleep because I'm never willing to wake up an extra hour early to meet God. And time because I'm so busy with all that is 'life'.

In 1 Chronicles 21:24 David wants to build an alter to God after realizing his own sin. God tells him to build it on the threshing floor of a guy named Araunah, who offers to give it to David for free. This is David's response:

But the king replied to Araunah, "No, I insist on paying what it is worth.
I cannot take what is yours and give it to the Lord. I will not offer a burnt offering that has cost me nothing!"
So David gave Araunah six hundred pieces of gold in payment for the threshing floor.

I love that. And I wonder how many times in my own life I have given sacrifices to God that have cost me nothing. I bet it's more than I want to account for. I want David's attitude in life. I don't want to carry an empty cross and i don't want my words and actions to be burned as wood. If waking up earlier, fasting a meal or two, and giving more time to God and His people didn't cost me anything, they wouldn't be worthy sacrifices would they? HMmmm.

____________________________________

OH crudder!

I know I've been in a crudastic mood these days and I feel bad for going off at people in slightly angry ways.

I was taking a nap today and woke up to an unpleasant circumstance and wrote quite an angry email to my mom.
I always feel so bad about them afterwards but this one had to be sent. I hope all things work out well.. SIGH...SUPER BIG SIGH.

To keep my mind off of school and my desire to go to heaven right now because of thus, I'm going to list things I'd rather be doing right at this moment in time.

- sketching architecture in rome
- yelling out 'yah-hoooooo' on top of a korean mountain whilst taking a swig of fresh mountain water
- horseback riding in the country side
- eating a gigantic pancake. like HUGE.
- bungee jumping into water.
- being with susan and ashley doing anything. like vegging out or whaaaatever.

Today I was walking on a street near our school where there are design firms and small companies of the sort. One of them was on the second story roof and had clear windows so you could see inside. Awe-some. People were working on designs and the chairs and office spaces were just so lovely. One dude walked towards the window to look out and I waved at him. (Wow that kind of sounds loserish...but I was with a friend...!). And he waved back! And I felt like it was Christmas. I also felt like I would like to be the one waving at loser design student from up on 2nd story office one day, and not vice versa as well.

Anyways I can't wait for the break! Christmas dinners! Seeing old time friends! Going to the conference with Sohyung! Jesus you have blessed me with so much!

---------------------


Totally going to get these one day.

Old journal entries = Fail present self.

Does it ever happen that you try to look for a certain file in your computer and you come across a vast array of written diary entries that were hidden under secret code file names on your computer? (longest question sentence ever.) It just happened to me and my insides feel quite sick.

The reason is because I don't know where that Lisa went. I used to have so much passion. So much emotion. I cared about specific things and I had an opinion on life. I read my judgmental viewpoints and biases but I cherish that part of me back then because in those times I didn't care as much. I wrote for me. I wrote and took hold of my true thoughts even though I knew they were wrong. I stretched my insides more. I physically beat my heart because I could not take this adamant refusal of Christ-centered living without a fight, even though I knew and acknowledge that I fell every single day. I was willing to make a wrong so eventually I would get to that right.

The colour of my life is turning to grey, and I hate it. There are days where I am a bright green or a yellow, but there are rarely those days where I am a red. I need a part of my life back and I want to fight for it once again.

When I taught Bible study to grade 9 & 10 girls back in second year, we came up with this thing called a foodnalogy. Basically we would reflect and describe our spiritual condition by using an analogy of food (since we all love food. well most people love food so it's easier to get a grasp of what someone is trying to get at). I just updated my facebook with one but there are probably more. What I updated was 'It's like I'm eating a bologna sandwich trying to convince myself it's just as good as the amazing steak dinner i ate four weeks ago.' Another could be 'It's like I'm drinking watered down milk.'

I know I seem to only write when I have issues or bothersome thoughts but that's just my style. I swear I'm going to be 50 years old, look back on my blogs and journal entries and think I was one messed up emo kid. (half true). I don't know why I feel like I have to explain myself. Maybe it's because new people like Kevin Sun read my blog and think I'm going to jump off a cliff. I'm...fine. :)

On another more happy note (note to social self: people like happy notes), my small group. We're finally starting a Bible reading plan. We're trying out the 52 week Bible reading plan I found on the net for a month and see how it goes (maybe jump to another one or what not). If anybody wants a copy, lemme knowww.

From February 20, 2007:

Then you start hanging out with them.
And they start to get comfortable with you.
They share their lives with you, their jokes with you.
You share with them. Sometimes they don't understand but they accept you for who you are.
So you start getting into what they are already deeply into.
And what you do is familiar with them so they accept that you have accepted.
But deep down inside you have not accepted.
Deep down, you're just doing it to be accepted into this group of people who seem to know what they are living for.
Then one day down the line,
you'll see that you can't live for acceptance.
You can't live for lies.
So you'll break away and you'll run away.
But for some reason, you'll find that there is something that follows you, no matter how far you run.
And you wonder what it is but you ignore it.
You question what it is, but it never answers you.
Then one ordinary day.
You'll know.
It'll smack you in your face so hard and yet so light. Because it's been there with you all along.
That you do believe.
That you do know.
That it is real.
And that life is real.
The truth is real and it is within you.
Until that day.
Until that day.

Anyways if you're still reading. What's your foodnalogy?