remember

November 29, 2005

last week, a professor was sharing with us that we often see the work of God in our lives in hindsight. it's only after-the-fact that we take notice that God was involved in the process. what a true statement! this idea of remembrance and reflection has been on my mind the past while. something i've learnt in one of my readings was what sabbath really meant. most of us associate the sabbath with rest. rest means you don't do any work and at first glance, this seems quite obvious.

in the creation narrative, God rests on the seventh day. in other words, He took His sabbath. but then, the question becomes, why would God need to rest? was He tired? did He somehow run out of energy after creating the entire universe and everything within it? the answer is a resounding no! what was the purpose? here it is: it was for reflection and remembrance. God took the seventh day to reflect and remember all that was done during the past six days. i mean think about this for a second. He created the ENTIRE universe and EVERYTHING in it! that's a LOT of stuff. so on the seventh day, it was all about taking in what was done.

that's what the sabbath was all about. so many of us miss having a sabbath in our lives. even if we thought sabbath as resting, who actually rests on a sunday? people work, study, do homework... the list could go on and on. when was the last time you intentionally sat down and took time to reflect on your life? when was the last time you reflected on what God's been doing in your life or what God's been revealing to you? was it a day ago? a week? a month? a year? a couple years?

our culture has lost what it means to be at rest. everybody is so go-go-go that we hardly take time to pause and reflect. people think it a waste of time to journal or to sit around thinking and reflecting. we have no time for activities like that. perhaps the only times it happens are in moments of crisis—when we're forced out of our busyness and made to think about the importance of life. as a result of all of this, so many of us drive through life never realizing the work of God in our lives. we miss the soft, gentle whispers of our God. we miss the gentle promptings of the Spirit. we end up concluding that God is not active. we conclude that He is far and distant. we wonder where God is.

henry blackaby says that God is always at work. that's one of his principles in his book, experiencing God. i read that book a long time ago and i've never forgotten it. if that's true, then where exactly is God working? what exactly is He doing? i think our question could be more readily answered if we took our weekly sabbath. it's just like my professor said. we often see the work of God in our lives in hindsight. if we don't ever look back in the rear view mirror of life and only concentrate on the journey ahead, we miss out on the richness of answered prayers and God revelations through life experiences. we forget everything.

have you ever prayed about something and then forgot that you had prayed about it? i have. i've done it so many times. when God answers, you might attribute it to something other than God, unless you remember that you had previously asked God for that. what about life experiences? i've gone through my share of them. i would never have understood why God allowed me to have fibromyalgia if i didn't take my sabbaths. i would never have understood why God would allow eric to leave this earth so soon if i didn't take my sabbaths (though i don't fully understand this and never will). if we don't pause and reflect about these life experiences, we miss out what God's trying to say to us through them. i believe God uses experiences like these to mold our character and to reveal more about Himself.

sabbath is also helpful for our own character growth. it helps us see if we're becoming more like Christ or less. weekly reflection allows us to think about our interactions with people, our thought life, our words, our actions. we can ask the Spirit of God to help us in the areas that we've stumbled. if we truly desire to bear the fruits of the Spirit, this is crucial. how could we identify areas that need improvement if we don't think about it and ask about it (i suppose you could wait until someone does the difficult task of telling you straight up)?

i hope you see the value of the sabbath. it doesn't have to be a weekly thing either. it could be more regular than that—day-to-day, moment-by-moment. i'm glad that i learnt the importance of reflection early on in my Christian walk. these journals have been extremely significant for my growth and walk in the Lord. it's helped me to see the work of God more clearly and more actively in my life and in the lives around me.

in summary, taking regular sabbaths allows us to:
1. see the active work of God in our lives and in the lives of others
2. see the past work of God
3. see if we're becoming more Christ-like or less

remember. reflect. pause. that's what God commands us to do.

"remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. on it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates. for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy" - exodus 20:8-11 [NIV]

passion toronto

November 23, 2005

three years ago (louie said four at passion, but i'm pretty sure it was three), louie giglio came to toronto to speak at a worship together conference at queensway cathedral. it was the first time i saw him in real life. on one of the conference days, i distinctly remember us splitting up into small groups. louie was the head of one of them so i immediately proceeded towards it. i remember a bunch of us asking him about passion and whether or not there would be a passion canada and whether or not passion would ever come to toronto. i remember us all saying that if passion ever came to toronto, we would be there and if they ever came to canada we would totally support them too.

who would have ever thought that a casual discussion like that would start the ball rolling for passion to think about expanding their ministry to the north? that blows my mind. last night, november 22, 2005, marked the first time passion ministries left their native, american soil and stepped into a different country to minister to a collegiate generation in toronto, canada.

there's been much excitement and anticipation in my heart for passion toronto. not so much for the bands or even the speaker, but because of their heartbeat for this generation of college/uni students (okay fine, i'll admit it, i did want to see david crowder band live). i was so excited to see what God would do, how He would move, how people would respond, all of that. i'd love to see our generation make much of God. i'd love to see our generation fall passionately, head-over heals, in love with God and give our lives for His namesake. i long for our generation to rise up and be the people of God that we were meant to be. i long for our generation to turn this world upside down in the name of Christ.

the night started off great. i loved how they got all three worship leaders up together to lead us into the night. it showed incredible unity and demonstrated that it's not about any of the bands in and of themselves. i loved it. after some time, louie came up and told us how passion ended up coming up to toronto. he then told us some history about toronto, and i bet, most of us torontonians didn't even know it ourselves!

the 100 year inauguration of toronto was held at the very grounds of where we were that night. the inauguration speech given that day contained a portion of Scripture in it from isaiah 62. louie was basically saying that we were there as a result of their prayers. that floored me. i was shocked at how much that meant to me.

about two years ago, after coming back from vancouver, i realized just how much i didn't like toronto. i don't like the urbanness of it. i don't like how rude the people are. i don't like the fast-pace of it. and i don't like the weather because it's far too cold for my body having fm. in contrast, vancouver was easy-going, relaxed, full of creation everywhere, great weather, friendly people. i loved it. i loved being surrounded by nature, by mountains, by oceans, by trees, by flowers, by everything! i started thinking about vancouver more and more. i didn't want to be in toronto if i didn't have to be, so i started to pray about it. was i in toronto merely because of circumstance or because God had something else in mind? as i prayed, it became more and more clear that toronto was the place i needed to be, for the sole purpose of how strategic it was. i kept hearing about how toronto was one of the most multi-ethnic places in the world. i realized that the world could be reached through toronto. so hearing that 81 years ago, our forefathers used Scripture in a speech about our city... wow. that really put perspective on things for me.

another thought swirling in my mind that night was just how blessed i am to live in this day and age. i mean God could have given me life at any point of history, but it was now that He chose to let me live. i'm so thrilled to live in a time where movements like passion exist. i'm delighted that i can listen to the teachings and hearts of godly men and woman around the world who really are on board with the heart of God. i'm ecstatic that our technology and means of communication lets us get into places that we couldn't without it. who would have thought that a Bible study for singles in atlanta would inspire so many of us here in toronto? i've grown so much from the teaching of louie through 7:22. it's been a huge source of encouragement for me and God's really spoken to me through it. i really feel fortunate to have discovered it so early (i think 1999/2000).

all this being said, the night went different from what i had thought. i suppose my expectations were different from what passion intended to do and there's definitely nothing wrong with that. it was just... different! i thought that they would have focused more on our generation, on challenging us to be about making God's name great in our lives, that sort of mentality. instead, louie did his message on God's bigness and our smallness and put an evangelical spin on it. it was a great message, don't get me wrong. we all need to be reminded of that and i know it really made an impact on a lot of people. but, it was such a great space to really talk to us, you know? college/uni kids were coming from out of town, lots were skipping class... i dunno. like i said, it was just a different focus.

and it's interesting that that was the message of the evening. i was mentioning in the car on the way down to passion that i find it so amazing that God gives us such a loud voice (aka freedom of choice)! i mean who are we, to decide the course of our lives, when the Creator of the ENTIRE universe made us and fashioned us for a specific reason and purpose? who are we to be able to join this God in establishing His kingdom on little-bitty earth? here's an idea to remind yourself of just how big the universe is. put pictures/images of space around you. set your screen saver to be a space one. set your desktop to be a space one.

maybe i expected the theme of the night to be more like their passion conferences. perhaps i expected too much to happen in one night. i mean, after all, it was only three hours long.

in any case, i was very glad to have gone. it was a great time of praise & worship. it's been a long time since i've really been able to meet with God and connect with Him so intimately and i really needed that again. i was also so excited to see so many college/uni students there too. my mind spins and dreams of what could happen if everyone in that room were seriously committed to making the fame of God know in this city and the earth. can you imagine the possibilities? can you imagine what toronto would look like? oh man! :) the potential is endless.

“yes Lord, walking in the way of Your truth we wait eagerly for You, for Your name and renown are the desire of our souls" - isaiah 26:8 [NIV/NASB hybrid]