Putting things back into context

''Then shall your light break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up speedily;
your righteousness shall go before you;
the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.''


--Isaiah 58:8

I remember highlighting this verse in my old, worn-out Bible in High School, and quoting it in letters, cards to friends, and copying down in my notebooks as a self-reminder. But I don't recall if I ever read the verses before and after this passage that I like so much; I don't think I ever read this verse in its proper context.

Then, about a week ago, a friend of mine who was having an amazing, life-altering experience at Downtown Eastside gave me a list of ''Justice texts'' to read. And having kind of strayed away from regular devotions, I thought this would be a motivating, refreshing way to start again. So I went through the list, and I couldn't stop re-reading Isaiah 58:6-12--for its teaching, its richness, and the truth that I needed to reflect on. What kind of 'fast' or 'sacrifice' is pleasing to our God? What makes our 'light break forth like the dawn'?

I believe that everyone have different calling, but one of things we are all called to do is to see justice prevail, and in our society today, injustice still looms over the lives of those who are trapped in poverty, addictions or mental illness.

There are so many practical steps, but I think the first and foremost is to 'start caring'. To conduct research on the living conditions of these people, to dig deeper into social injustice. Then, I doubt that you won't be moved to do something after your discovery.


''Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of wickedness,
to undo the straps of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover him,
and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?
Then shall your light break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up speedily;
your righteousness shall go before you;
the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.
Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;
you shall cry, and he will say, 'Here I am.'
If you take away the yoke from your midst,
the pointing of the finger, and speaking 
wickedness.
if you pour yourself out for the hungry
and satisfy the desire of the afflicted,
then shall your light rise in the darkness
and your gloom be as the noonday.
And the Lord will guide you continually
and satisfy your desire in scorched places
and make your bones strong;
and you shall be like a watered garden,
like a spring of water,
whose waters do not fail.
And your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;
you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;
you shall be called the repairer of the breach,
the restorer of streets to dwell in.''
                                                                      ---ISAIAH 58:6-12


It's nice to be able to put things back in the context, where they belong!

A Safari Slideshow

Safari in Serengeti and Ngorongoro Park - Tanzania, East Africa

June 2010

The Crater

Jeep #2! ready for adventure!

Hungry Giraffes

Beautiful Safari Scenery

Baby Pumba!

This reminds me of a scene from Lion King

Sexy Prints!

Zebra herd (the first animal we spotted)

Mufasa in hiding

Beautiful Anonymous Bird

Mother & Baby Elephant 

Nala?

Bad time to get a flat tire, Sam?

Just chillin' by the branches

Where we camped in Ngorongoro Park

Never seen the clouds so low

Magnificent view.

Wildebeests 

Blue-ass Monkeys. Too bad I didn't get a pic of their behind

Safari Sam and I

wise words

''Love is passion, obsession, someone you can't live without. If you don't start with that, what are you going to end up with? Fall head over heels. I say find someone you can love like crazy and who'll love you the same way back. And how do you find him? Forget your head and listen to your heart. I'm not hearing any heart. Run the risk, if you get hurt, you'll come back. Because, the truth is there is no sense living your life without this. To make the journey and not fall deeply in love - well, you haven't lived a life at all. You have to try. Because if you haven't tried, you haven't lived.''


--William Parrish (meet joe black)

words by e.e. cummings

since feeling is first
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world

my blood approves,
and kisses are a better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don't cry--
the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids' flutter which says

we are for... each other; then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life's not a paragraph

And death i think is no parenthesis

Missing Africaland Already...

TANZANIA, East Africa 

on the way home from school, for the both of us.

from a distance... 

shy kids in the neighbourhood

safari group

best safari jeep #2

Uhuru Peak Elementary school

Cradle of Love in Arusha

I will see u soon, Africa! Dec Trip a-planning...

For thoughts on LOVE and WAR...

Visit a new blog I started up with Jen, my good (and probably one of my oldest) East Coast friend:

LOVE&WAR


www.atloveandwar.com

The question lingers...

There were so many things I wanted to write about for the past few weeks. but I was lazy, and didn't want to seem inconsistent, so I avoided posting up a 'reply post' regarding my last post... I gave myself a hard homework, and ended it with this major, oftentimes unfathomable question: ''Why did God create people whom he knew were 'destined to perish'?


A particular key event led me to seriously consider this question. Though it had passed my mind before, but there's a distinctive different in 'just thinking about it' and actually sitting down and looking for a satisfactory answer. 
I don't think the answer I got is quite satisfactory yet, but I believe it has bulldozed a huge chunk of doubt in me, and has affirmed my faith in the most part.


1) When I became more interested and concerned in humanitarian affairs, I also started to face a lot of hard questions. Reason being that humanitarian affairs had to do with humanity, and humanity-whether we like to admit it or not- is constantly facing a harsh and cruel reality. Take poverty for example, half of the world's population live in poverty - and that is less than $2.50 per day. Though some people, through unwise decisions and holes they dig themselves into, become poor and are unable to relief themselves out of a vicious financial downfall. But most of the those who fall under the poverty line are not poor by choice, but poor by default. In sub-Saharan Africa, Middle-East, parts of Asia and even Europe - people find themselves in financial ruins because of debt handed over to them by their parents, grandparents, community, or their government. As global citizens, teachers, students, economists, leaders, the appropriate questions would seemingly be: ''What can we do to resolve world poverty?'' or ''What are the steps we can take in order to eliminate extreme poverty from the face of this world?'' The Millennium Development Goals set by the United Nations, while hopeful, still has a long way to go before we can witness the extinction of extreme poverty in this generation. And as Christ followers, the appropriate question we can raise before the God of all creation would then be: ''Why, being as Sovereign as You are, can you allow this to happen?'' 


The easy way out would be to throw our hands up in the air and say, 'Well, sometimes God just does inexplicable things.'' or ''He has His will with the way things are.'' or  ''If we have an answer for everything God does, then what makes him God?'' But up until recently, I think I was lazy and maybe afraid to challenge God, to ask Him hard question, and to dig fervently for a solid answer. Sometimes I feel like I'm just scratching the surface with my faith, and when nothing resounds from the other side I simply shrug my shoulder and move on to easier questions. 


These past few months, I've been attending a Bible Study with my Pastor, and whether he did this intentionally or not, he shook us with such intensity, that we could not help but awake from our 'lazy faith', and looked intently for answers to questions on suffering, evil, and God's sovereignty amidst all of this. 


And what I have learned is this:


A. We have to first grasp who God is, and what His Purpose is for creation. God reigns over all, and He is complete and perfect in Himself. He does not lack in anything, and did not require anything more. He chose to create the world and us in it, in order to demonstrate His Glory, and for us to worship Him. 


B. We have to recognize who we are, in comparison to the God of the universe. He did not create us because He needed us, or because he was lonely. But oftentimes, as it is with human nature, we tend to regard ourselves higher than we should. We deserve to live, we deserve to have this car, this house, this degree, this family, this health... the list goes on. And when things go wrong, when we lack in the things we think we deserve to obtain, we immediately turn to either the person next to us or society as a whole or God of the universe and demand to know why.. God has a purpose for us, and maybe he took things from us in order for us to play an unique role in his plan. We look at humanity sometimes as if it's invincible, and something great - but by doing so we fail to recognize that God is greater than us. When we use our perspective and shake our fists at God demanding to know why He allows bad things to happen to good people, it's a perfect depiction of Roman 9: 19-23:


19 You will say to me then, “Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?” 20 But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?” 21 Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use? 22 What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, 23 in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory— 


It's so humbling and so hard to accept at first, but that's why whenever I have trouble swallowing this fact, I need to return to point A and reflect on who God is.


C. We must have faith and know that God has his perfect plan for us, as it says in Romans 8:28:
28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, [1] for those who are called according to his purpose.


I don't think I am through with asking God 'why?', but I'm pretty sure that I'm at peace with God being sovereign over all..


This has been a long post and it is in dire need of thorough editing. but I'll leave it raw and maybe come back to it with PART II.


God is good!