2014 in review
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2014 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
A San Francisco cable car holds 60 people. This blog was viewed about 2,700 times in 2014. If it were a cable car, it would take about 45 trips to carry that many people.
a term in review
Last night a friend asked me if I had had time to reflect on the term. And I hadn’t. I was doing residual school work up until today and now finally it feels like I can just begin to sort through the rollercoaster that was this term. A year in review won’t happen for another few weeks. That will take a considerable more time.
I went into this term running. I’ve probably mentioned that before but it’s probably a good way to start off the description. I came straight out of summer running on camp high/low and then straight into welcome week. I haven’t even finish the welcome week recap post but in short, it was a good time and insightful but tiring. I was reminded that a lot of the work I do is more background oriented and long term and I’m okay with that.
Applications came and went and with the scrambling of writing essays and getting references and triple checking everything, September flew by. And then there’s really nothing to do until January though I’d be lying if I said I haven’t thought about interview questions that I got last year and how to answer them more appropriately. Courses this term felt brief. Psych, while it did allow me to interact with ccf first years, came and went with little consequence and little intentionality. I will say global health was refreshing. Although I didn’t learn a lot of theory, it reminded me that I still have much, much more to learn about global missions and that I will most likely need to be some form of long term. It’s also been really eye opening reading the missionary blog and seeing just how different and limited things can be. It’s not to say I’ll end up in uber rural Angola where there are no clocks. I’m excited for next term. Christian ethics, one less elective, and Chari. It’s kind of insane though that I’m graduating so soon. Feels a bit like grade 12 where I flirted with the idea of taking another year just to take woodshop and cool random stuff. But I think it’s about time I moved on from BHSc. Fourth year and I still don’t know what I’m doing in there. I seem to be getting asked quite a bit (as would be expected) how fourth year is going and most of the time I can’t really answer that. It has passed in a blur with barely a discernable sign of it happening.
Probably the one place that I’ve been seeing the most differentiation is my time and role in CCF. I came back excited to be sage-ing. A bit nervous because I didn’t know how I’d handle it but excited. I understand the sentiment now that fourth years often describe of not really knowing the rest of the fellowship anymore. It was just a little bit funny that during the game time of pot luck, many of the fourth years lingered behind to clean up. It’s not that I don’t love the first years. I hear fantabulous things about thing but perhaps I am slowly learning that I cannot be everywhere at once. And while I will meet up with a few frosh, I don’t think frosh are really my ministry this year. This year seems a bit like watching from the outside. I haven’t been knowledge fed from CCF programs for probably two years now and while I’m not in overt leadership, I don’t think that’s changed very much. DG has been nice but as I said earlier, it is best that I am not considered in how to cater to the DG members. I am there to participate and to aid and to encourage but I’m okay if it doesn’t address my specific needs. And perhaps it’s a good thing because it means I’m struggling with the self-discipline faith now instead of after I leave. Reading through Psalms and Proverbs has definitely been a struggle but the verses seem to come up at just the right time. Proverbs was very insightful when it came up these last few days. I’ve really enjoyed the aspect of leadership development and being able to meet with leaders and walk them through their thoughts, things to think about, and to be able to pray for them and give encouragement. I can probably see myself doing that in endgame when in general my body doesn’t have enough energy to handle heavy front line stuff. But even with roughly four or so people I’m meeting up with, I’m struggling to do it consistently and with only one more term coming up, it feels again, all too fast. I know Ken wants me to come back to mac next year to help run meetings (I feel so ridiculously inadequate for that) and for now I’m entertaining it. I really would love to see what God is continuing to do at Mac in CCF. How the next few years play out. There’s a bit of a struggle in my mind wondering if anything we did last year really had impact in ministry but at the same time seeing that the fellowship is definitely heading somewhere different. They’re not really opposites. So I know that some people are just waiting to leave Mac and go to bigger places. I’m really okay if I end up getting placed back in Hamilton. I feel like I have yet to scratch the surface of what God is doing there. And maybe, I’ll never be able to grasp the fullness of that.
There’s a weird bit of dualism too. While I’m taking on leadership development mostly because I’ve been in these positions before, I am also relearning what it means to live when not in leadership. It sounds weird. But at the beginning of the term, I didn’t know what to do with all my spare time with less school and less leadership. I won’t say I’m leading H4H or retreat in the best way possible but I struggled to take control of my own time. And so it’s been a continual struggle of getting myself to wake up on my own terms (not because of thesis) and to make good use of my time. It is slow but I think it is one of the more intentional periods of my life with God in the past while. My excuses are thinner than ever now and I have to face Him and in consequence, myself. But it is a good and necessary struggle. Though perhaps I am experiencing less urgency than in prior growth periods. I feel like time has very little concept in my mind anymore. That this Christmas does not represent anything special in and of itself even though there’s the usual “Jesus is the reason for the season”. I’m not sure if it’s good that my mindset is more “this is where I am with God right now and we’re going to keep tracking this way”
Although November isn’t a theme, I feel like it requires a note here. I didn’t finish nanowrimo this year. 31k. And still not sure how to finish the actual story this Christmas break. I started off the month with a test of physical endurance. The month continued as a test of mental endurance to which I did better than last year. And then it ended with a wave of academic endurance. A week of late meetings and deadlines. I’m a bit sad that I didn’t legit win nanowrimo this year and it’ll probably be the last time I get to nanowrimo in November for a while as anything I’m applying to will be definitely harder and more rigorous than health sci. But it was a fun month and there was definitely some fun camaraderie in it all.
// As I was writing this a thought came to my mind. A friend had stated how she felt like God was taking everything from her hand one by one so she could hold them open and at the time it felt very specific to her. But as I think about it now, that seems crazy accurate of what has been happening in the past few years. First the uncertainty of where I would end up in the long range future and how I was going to raise a family potentially under persecution or in more resource limited areas. And then last year and this summer and a bit of this year, letting go of career future and not knowing where I’ll end up for school or whether I’ll get in. And now this year…God is slowly but thankfully opening my hands for that near, personal future that I was holding onto. And it is not an easy journey in the slightest and the shivering has been happening but…He disciplines those He loves and I know it is for my good.
Bit of a wrench
Tonight there were pictures of the fifty people that left us, graduating early to become doctors. I couldn’t help but feel like I had in some way failed as I looked at those pictures. And truth be told, they probably will make better physicians than I would be. But there is a bit of me….perhaps it is the pressure that the rest of us feel. I know that it does not matter where I end up. It is a truth that the Lord will use that. But there is a struggle in my fickle heart. But I have played this game before. I am no stranger to broken hopes and banking on statistics and wait lists. I shall not play that game this year. It is not meant to be the tune of my heartstrings.
This week has been a blur and a weird kind of oblivion. I’m not even sure I used that right. Projects are to be handed in.
3cc3 performance Thursday.
4pa3 report Friday presentation Monday.
Cabaret tomorrow. Conference tomorrow.
New laptop formatting Sunday.
Nanowrimo 30k behind finishes in 9 days.
Cooking for another DG.
Baking for first years.
Baking for ccf auction.
Ambiguous thesis land.
Tonight was inter fellowship praise and prayer and while it was a beautiful sight and a blessing to see a rally of so many Christians and the varieties of people that God brings together, I couldn’t help but feel so drained. Between all the things I had to do, I could barely focus. Having just come from leading a bible study and my voice was constricted, a feeling of stuckness in my throat. Oh Lord I am weary. I look onto the horizon of December and see it as peace but I can’t keep going like that. It will crash and burn. But I knew I needed to be more broken over prayer. That everything is welcome and should come under prayer.
Savouring
You have not given enough time to savor God’s goodness. And He has been so good. You have filled it up so much to the point of you not recognizing and sitting in all His goodness. Like the meeting after church was such a beautiful moment but you had to run off and do school, musical and you got bogged down with the house situation. Sit at His feet little child.
goodbye
Today I saw my grandma off though in truth, she had passed long before the funeral. We probably killed a small tree worth of resources with the amount of tissue and wood we used this day.
As weird as it sounds, I will say that Mr. Green got many things right about funerals. That they are indeed for the living and not for the dead. I realized that a lot is spent on sentiment. I learned that close to $8000 worth of one-time-sight flowers stood in the visitation room. I realized extravagant coffins are made simply to be thrown into a furnace and reduced to ash. And while my sister is not wrong in saying it’s a sentiment thing, it doesn’t necessarily justify it.
I thought about how the only thing we leave behind are the images that we have left in people’s minds and the fruits of our labor, which are mostly people. I did not know my grandmother well. I will never get to know her for myself but I will hear stories about her from my mother and aunts. And though I did not know much of her actions in the past few years, she raised five women who would one day in turn, raise my cousins and I and part of that is to her credit. That is what we leave behind. And in less than a century, it is likely that nobody on this earth will remember her anymore and the life that she lived. They will speculate from family pictures things about her.
//this is probably not in any way official but if I was ever to die, I’d want a couple things done.
- My body is first to be given to organ donation
- Then to medical studies (a.k.a cadaver) and then long after it can be cremated and I can be scattered into the winds or something. Please don’t pay money to keep me in a glass case so you can come visit ashes.
- Do not buy a coffin. Do not get flowers unless you plucked them from the house. Spend the money on those who are living. Give it to charity or something.
- Do the Remember the Titans chant. Na na na na Na na na na Hey hey hey Good bye.
- For those who want to say goodbye or some thing at some kind of small, low key ceremony, just tell stories. Remember what the Lord has done in my life and what He has done through me. And that’s really all that’s important. Hopefully I’ve left enough silly and funny moments to give a couple of good laughs.
50:56
Today I ran my first 10k race. Reflecting upon it, it’s curious how we pay money to beat our bodies into submission. Especially with a thing like a race. I mean this isn’t rock climbing where I can’t really do this on my own. I can theoretically just…run along the Rail Trail and try my darn hardest. Or I could have bought the Blerch race kit and run it on my own. In all honesty, I’m not quite sure why I signed up for the 10k. I’ve neither trained adequately or really had much evidence to go on that I would do alright. But I signed up for it anyway, probably because like many things, I’m usually up for a good challenge. And I like to beat my body into submission for productive work. Does that sound too masochistic?
I spent the 15 minutes before the race wondering whether I should go get long pants/regretting the decision to go in shorts. I kept trying to find evidence of other people who did not look super jacked who were in shorts. I found little. I lamented that I would be in shorts on a near 0 degree day for roughly an hour. In retrospect it was rather foolish of me. I was about to run a 10k.
Despite having performed pretty well and past my own expectations and those of Ken, part of me was a bit disappointed in myself. I mean I did pretty well for having pretty much popped out of bed (haven’t run in about 2 weeks) and having only run 10k in practice once before. Even in grade 8 as I ran the paltry 3k (which was a crazy challenge back then), my goal had not been to win but to never stop running. And today, despite the much longer distance, I had hoped to do just that. I started off probably very fast, rounding the first kilometre in roughly 4:30 and I will admit that the thrill of the pack and the crowds of people was a pretty decent hype train. Even breaking away from Ken by the 4th kilometre, the first 5km were pretty good. But then began my starting and stopping. I told myself I would just stop for 10 seconds after 5k to blow my nose. Then pretty much every kilometre I stopped for a few seconds to blow my nose. But every time, it got harder to stop back up again. Fortunately, there were enough people in Edu Deo shirts that I always made it my goal to keep up with one of them. By 8k, I had stopped probably 4 times and the last push from 9-10k felt much longer than any of the first 5 kilometres. Even as I saw the finish line, there was a constant voice (I guess I’ve experienced the Blerch) insisting that I could really just walk past the finish line. But there the mixture of the fact that walking through the end would be mad shameful and the fact that I would have all week to rest and be sore kept me going until I heard my name called. And then I pretty much didn’t want to walk any more. I also curiously had the chorus of Who I Am Hates Who I’ve Been from Relient K stuck in my head for about the last 4 kilometres. Probably didn’t like myself for having stopped and wanting to give up.
The most evident analogy of the whole thing was the race of faith. It’s probably a combination of the fact that Hebrews 12:1-2 is my favorite verse and that the HCCF theme this year is that verse and explicitly, running the race of faith. And I think the way I ran the race kind of mirrors where I am right now. I am in the middle of the pack. I’m sure if I knew when the day came that I was to finally go home, I’d give a great hurrah and go super hard. And there was once a beginning where I was filled with initial passion and the growth curve felt awesome. But I am now, and will be for a while, in this phase where it is hard to push and it is hard to try and see growth. It is reflected in my bible reading plan too. Still sitting in the middle of it, ironically struggling through a book that speaks on the importance of wisdom and slow speaking. It’s been a struggle in fourth year to really reclaim my faith as my own and that it is good in and of itself to know Jesus. But it has also been a very necessary lesson as I come out of a heavily work-associated 3rd year and a summer. This verse comes to mind and it cuts pretty hard.
Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air. But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified. – 1 Corinthians 9:24-27
Only one receives the prize. I mean even though I was technically fourth out of 15 and 1:30 from getting onto the podium, and if I had not stopped at all I might have made it, there is still the idea that we push to give everything. If Paul was to play the comparison game he would have easily out done just about every other Christian in most cities he stayed at and he could comfortably sit in his wisdom for a long time. But he didn’t play the comparison game. I guess that flows into another lesson that naturally seems to coincide with my 4th year. I can see myself falling into the trap of being content with being the one of the wisest people in certain groups. I can ask stimulating questions and help to guide new leaders. But as I stumbled upon this random sermon a while ago, a truth resounds. I am far from wise and perfect. I have so much still to learn. I am not my own judge not because I would be too critical but because I do not see anywhere close to the depths of my sin and callousness. In the same way that the beast runner who got 33:44 at the head of the race (and first in my category), exists, there is Jesus who is infinitely better in every way and that is who I am technically compared to. So I cannot play the comparison game, whether I am in 1st year, 4th year, or just on my deathbed because in all of it, I will lose. But if I really believe Hebrews 12:1-2, Jesus has already won and while there is still a prize to obtain, it is a faith, not a standing. Something I am still very much learning but I have found more and more that I have been praying with a fragment of these words:
In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. – 1 Peter 1:6-7
So I am ultimately quite glad and quite blessed to have been able to run today. This month will be a test of endurance in quite a few ways and how appropriate that it should start off with a physical trial.
85 1282 Christopher Chung 51:06 LM20-24 4/15 59 5:07 50:56 Hamilton
*On a side note, there were 3 kids who were 14 who ran faster than me. What is life.
** I wish these 1310 words could count towards nanowrimo
this too shall pass
I’m quite certain that’s a song title. And I’m quite certain that’s okay. There is nothing new under the sun.
I supposed there’s almost an obligatory post in this kind of thing. It’s one of those kinds of moments that everyone feels like sharing in one form or another. I shall probably say right off the bat that I am no poet or philosopher and I have nothing new under the sun to share.
Tonight I visited my grandmother in the hospital as she lay there in probably what will be her last few hours. We don’t know if she’ll make the night. Her blood pressure seems to agree with us. This was something I had been kind of avoiding all week, from the texts describing her condition to telling myself I’d handle it today. I can’t say I’ve ever been close to my grandmother. We see each other at dinner, we barely communicate, and I haven’t really been home in the last four years. I was told tonight it was 9 years since I last had to deal with death in the form of my grandfather. I’m not sure how much I knew about the world at that time and I’m not sure how much I know about the world now. I know I didn’t blog at that point in my life so I can’t recollect what thoughts I had. So far, hospitals have been a place I associate the word thesis and babies with. And generally despite being in the level 3 NICU, these are babies who you generally find a lot of hope in. They might be super sick but generally…they make it out and they become…fully realized people. As I sat in that room for no more than half an hour, I found myself crying. I haven’t cried in at least half a year other than for post-yawning. Part of me regret not coming home earlier and seeing her when she was still able to stay awake yesterday. I could’ve skipped child health. Heck I probably could’ve skipped all of this week. But I stayed and did all the menial things that I usually find myself doing. Today hundreds of people came out for the death of a soldier who died at the hands of a broken man and in a day or two my grandmother will pass with maybe one or five of her daughters by her side. I cried for probably all the other reasons people cry when they are to face death. I knew I did not know her but this was at the very least the woman who raised my mother, who would go on to raise me. And if I found no reason to be sorrowful, I knew my mom would. For as much as I knew this passing would mean that she has…more opportunities to be out and about, it is no easier for her. She knows it too. The classic questions came to mind. What does it mean for us to live until we’re old and become something we barely recognize? What do we really leave behind? For I know very few of the stories of my grandmother but no doubt she had a youth and she had stories to tell. I imagined myself here at the age of maybe 40 or 50 staring at one of my own parents lying in a hospital bed, shriveled, wrinkled. I don’t know if irony is an appropriate word but it’s peculiar how we start off as children and we end essentially as children. All I know of her was that she spent many of her last days watching TV and as a workaholic, perhaps that’s what I feared. Wasting my life no matter how old I got. This post is a mess but I suppose that’s about accurate of my thoughts. They will contradict and fight and at times be pretty wretched. This too is accurate. I suppose one of the looming questions was asking whether she was saved. For isn’t that the question we ask when we are confronted with whether or not we really leave anything behind? I’m told that she said confessed and believed three years ago in her last hospital spell. But I do not know, as really nobody knows. I wondered what I had done. If I had given up early, citing my lack of language and relationship. We talk about it a lot in Christian circles of what it means to be a light in families, and in harder way, to those who are a generation apart. But there’s a reason for that. I mean the only thing we really leave behind are people. This is my Father’s world. There is nothing new under the sun.
And as I sat/stood in that hospital room, I thought about what I had signed up to do in my life. I thought of myself and my mother and my grandmother and those who would be me in other rooms. You hear it in practice questions and in sessions when people are asked why they want to be in medicine or healthcare. Heck even I’ve said it, that line about wanting to do it because I want to walk people through life at its most vulnerable moments. And I do not in any way mean to say I have discovered this or that I am now enlightened. But I think I’ve had a a glimpse of it and…it doesn’t terrify me. If anything I think it gives me more peace about becoming either a doctor or a nurse. I thought a lot about that scrubs episode (yes I know it’s a tv show) where JD and Turk stayed behind to talk to the man who was dying that night. And I know that most of any profession is not made up those intriguing and story worthy moments. But that state of being…that’s why I’d do it. Not really for any glory or stable income. Now my real nursing friends will call me out on my naïveté probably . That’s okay.
I end this post with maybe nothing profound. Tonight my services were sold to the highest bidder and that is what I will return to in a few days. But as hard as I’ve been trying, I cannot compartmentalize my life.
a final course
This will join my other drafted posts but I at least wanted to get down some thoughts. It has been a crazy month but in the midst of it I am seeing the beauties of this fourth year. I mean there’s a truck load of perceived stress and expectation but I can see the Lord being so clear in the things I am to learn this year (or at least for now). This Monday was probably one of the most joyous feeling prayer meetings/sessions I’ve had in a while. Sitting there for what was probably at least 15 minutes and being able to laugh and chuckle and hear the innocence of a sister, that was really beautiful. The recurring theme in my mind of being child like has come back in this last year, countering the thought that by fourth year I’m/we’re supposed to be some sort of wise force. And perhaps we have tidbits but oh how much we still have yet to see. And sitting in on DG was so weird. It is going to take some time to get used to not leading. Because the point of dg isn’t too get across the best explanations or well worded questions or concise goals, it is to grow together. And for my role as a sage with Joey, it is to foster leadership in him. Which is arguably harder than just taking reigns. But it was also nice being able to sit back and to not know what the schedule was. I did prompt a couple times but…yea. And it’s (obviously) a very different group than last year. Bigger actually. But still young. So as I often say, I’m excited for what God is going to do this year. And I’m glad to see the year coming out more, having more events and desiring to come together for our last year. So grateful for people like Gloria who are so full of joy and innocence. I’m excited.
.
My actions today during a group quiz showed more of my character than I had seen in a while.
I realized I’m still very greedy and jealous for my marks. Despite it really being a 0.4 percent difference on my final grade, I made such a big deal about it. I felt entitled, having “helped” three other people before on quizzes that seemed more straightforward, that I should end up with a harder quiz and with less people to help. How foolish of my heart. And how fickle it was. Who am I to deserve 90s and 100s on quizzes that were designed to be tricky.
And tonight, I gave up on a friend. I got angry because I forgot they had specific needs, judging them based on their capacity to write and help on a silly quiz. I didn’t ask if they would come to ccf, I didn’t try to plead with them. I didn’t even ask what they were doing for the rest of the night. I didn’t ask if they needed anything. I gave up. Ironically, despite being labeled as one with much hope, I stopped trying because I lost hope. I had succumb to the idea that it was pointless to ask and that I had good reason to be angry or upset or cranky because I was hungry, tired and had imagined doing poorly on the quiz. But none of those things are worth being a poor witness for.
My heart is so wicked and so easily tempted. Oh the humility that I need if I am to be a light.
Storm before the calm
I know today I will try and control everything. To grasp all the ways that things could go wrong, mitigate them beforehand and go onto the next problem. I will try and prepare every aspect of the morning intake so that I know exactly where everything is.
But I won’t. I won’t be able to. There is only so much time left.
And although I could have sat at home planning out more things, I am so grateful for a night with the triads quads. It has been a while since I was saturated in their combined slight insanity. Though perhaps I am really the only insane one and they simply love me enough to still sit there and watch. There are many things I wish we could have done. Talks, prayers and walking in the moonlight. But those would not be possible even in a full fledged sleepover. But I suppose I have a year with them.
And so begins the storm before it all leaves my hand.
metaphorical morphine
Five days of vbc decorations. Other things happened interspersed within those hours. But five days of a to do list and essentially basic art. And it terrifies me that my mind is capable of this mode where I can turn it off for about eight hours a day, task it with getting through a chunk of work and then turn back on. VBC as a whole is a ministry but nothing this week in decorations save for the playing of Christian music would even remotely hint that this was any different than any other camp. And the thing I know is that it could be more. That there is an opportunity to have fellowship and to do more because if I really put it into perspective, the amount of decorations we really have does very little. The perfection of a monkey mural adds very little and there are better things at stake.
This summer God’s been revealing to me more and more of what my life and time is and what I have chosen to do in a day. And perhaps it used to be enough that on a whole I was giving myself to ministry and the Kingdom by doing vbc that summer. But it’s not so simple anymore. Every day I choose things and it can’t be a relative scale anymore. Because I could easily be in a room and be the one who can carry a spiritual conversation but not even really be building people up. The point isn’t and was never to be the best one in the room. It’s easier to do that because it depends on the relative environment and you can play pretend. But as Jesus said to Peter as he asked about what would happen to John, it doesn’t matter what happens to them. Follow what I have talked you with. And this summer it is most definitely the theme of giving a life to Jesus fully. And I have been nowhere near as close or as awesome as I thought I was. This is the repeat line of the year isn’t it?
This week I’ve been making excuses. Saying that when I’ve covered the bulk of decorations then I’ll___________. Or when I finally have a day off to myself (which is not happening for at least a month) I’ll________. And we can say catch phrases like we could be dead tomorrow. And we could. But we reason with ourselves that it is the same rough likelihood that we’ll have fifty years ahead of us. So we go with the fifty years saying there will be time later to learn what it means to give everything to God because… it’s easier and because it means we can still on the whole be awesome if you average everything up. But there will always be fathers to bury and people to say goodbye to.
I don’t have many or any answers at the end of this post. I’m terrified that my mind is capable of doing ministry but not really having a heart there. And if I were honest this wasn’t new news. It’s happened many times before. My heart is still so in need of healing and transformation.
It is indeed a narrow road.
God, grace please.
18 inches of story
(On a tangent, I am increasingly not quite sure what to name my posts. I am terrified they will draw attention. Most of the time they are random words and references strung in my mind.)
The topic of evangelism has come up a lot this summer both in the fact that evangelistic bible studies (not sure what that even means) are happening amongst the triads and there’s been this idea of living life in a way that suffers for Christ as a testament to non believers of who Christ is. I can’t tell if I’ve already written about this. But I will again anyway. And the phrase gets used a lot without ill intention, this idea that it’s not okay to have pretty much mostly Christian friends and not have non Christians you can actively bring the gospel to. I get the sentiment behind that. And as Sam put today, there’s also a type of heroic imagery there. That THAT is missions and the purpose of discipleship. I fully agree that it has its place. And maybe this sounds like a massive cop out but I don’t think all people are called to that. I’ll be truthful in saying I hang out very little with people outside of the ccf circle. In truth, I have very few friends. I’m generally amiable with most people and mostly get along with people. But I have few friends. So although I might even spend a lot of time in the ccf circuit, I would say I don’t have a spectacular number of friends. Woo infj. Deeply personal. I guess. Perhaps what I mean to say is that I doubt I do this because it’s comfortable and gives me friends.
The thing is, while I am totally down for the unreached and the need to spread the gospel to those who have not experienced it, I guess I am moreso interested in what our testimony is. Borrowing words from py, going on missions whether it be to our friends close by or to Manitoba or elsewhere, those things aren’t big deals in and of themselves. They are a big deal because Jesus is a big deal. That’s it. The mission in itself, though it may seem heroic and in the Christian community be “better”, they are not things that are a big deal in themselves but it is only because Christ is important. I have full intention to do the unreached people group thing down the road in that I do strongly believe I’ll end up in long term, less developed region missions. I am hesitant to say international because there are parts of Canada that still fit the image on my heart. But my, I believe, God given passion is to see people now figure out and explore what it means that God is a big deal for themselves. So yea I spend a lot of my time baking and visiting those in the Christian community. And while this is very inward focused… I believe there is still a need for us to spur each other on to a deeper understanding and struggle of what a life in Christ even looks like. This is not a a post to defend myself. I find no reason to. I think what I struggled with for a bit of time was whether I feared doing outreach. And I found out yesterday that this journey this summer of seeing many of us and myself still not quite completely sure of what a life given to Christ means has actually aided in my heart for outreach. It is indeed a challenge. I mean shouldn’t my biggest witness be my life and what does my life really say about Christ? Past the “slight inconvenience of time” used in church and at CCF, what has it really cost me to love Christ? It is a hard question. One I don’t have an answer to and one I wish to answer alongside others. Because it would be so much easier if the mission itself was a big deal. Then you can be on and off. But it isn’t. It can’t be.
It is a summer of learning the obvious fact (most things are) that our lives are long stories and we have much more to grow in. And so as I walked around with the children of Koinonia, as the sun was setting and slightly haphazard buildings surrounded us, I wanted to do more than simply hand out bags. I wanted to sit and hear. Perhaps there is a slight romanticisim of the situation possibly from hearing py and Carter’s encounter with Sean. But I wanted to hear their stories. To tell them mine. To tell them of Christ’s. I wanted to spend time with them. (maybe that’s why I enjoyed katherines. It’s about the telling of stories.) And when the end of it all came and I knew we had just delivered things, there was a bit of sadness in me. The same kind of sadness that pops up when I know there’s something more that could’ve been done. But hearing Steve was really important. It was important that I heard at least one story yesterday. And by grace that one had a positive ending in both spiritual and physical needs.
Today I met Sue and I didn’t get very much time to talk to her as she packed up, having decided that 18 inches of subway would be sufficient for her dinner and lunch that day. There wasn’t much discussion but as I crouched awkwardly beside her battling social fears, there was a desire to hear more. There was a desire to love her in more than a small physical way. But I gave into the timing of her packing and a reservation across the street and bid her farewell after a few sentences. Only mustering a paltry God bless. I don’t even know why. It was so cliché and I don’t even know what it means. I have problems ending those conversations. I wonder what I leave them with. What I should leave anyone with. What is of importance that I can say. Not that I would be important but that Christ would be given importance for them to see. Oh I am still learning that. Very much so.
I wish I could tie this whole post together. An idea that whether you are a zealous evangelist in the fringes or someone disciplining those in the church, they are not as far apart as one would imagine. That as God grows you in one, He also grows you in the other. And it’s kind of a delight to see that. Maybe it’s a reference to Romans 8 or Philippians 1:6. I am beginning to understand what I said when I replied that these ministries and choosing to partner with them are deeply personal. It’s hard and roughly ineffective to co opt a large group of people to do it continuously because…have they even understood what it is they are sharing. A testimony and witness of more than words but of their own story and life. And I’m excited to see what happens next year when saging is at least a little more possible and this kind of work has a smaller but stronger push.
That concludes my scattered thoughts of the day.
On an ending side note, I’m so grateful for these wonderful boys who have twisted my mind in not only their thoughts but on how to love them. I know people are missing. =P
oh philippi
it’s always been an interesting idea to look back at ourselves and this blog is no different. the idea has recently surfaced about whether or not I’ve really changed a whole lot since this whole thing began in 2010(?). And while this is always a lingering question, it gets a little more attention when it has bolts of substance strapped onto it. It’s an unnerving feeling, seeing that possibly many of the things that I wrote about 4 years ago are similar to the themes I write about today, albeit with a little more detail back then. py says it’s because I started off mature but I don’t really see that as being too true considering all the craziness that I was in high school. It is a tad unnerving.
But as I opened up Philippians to hear about Paul’s complete confidence and eager expectation of the work that Christ was doing in him, I wondered at how I ever read Philippians. Because the more and more I look at it, it is a book full of imagery about quite literally dying for the work of Jesus Christ. How quaint that the church sermon series coincides with the summer’s questions. It’s a story about Paul, in chains for a total of four years, rejoicing in his suffering and encouraging the church in Philippi that despite this, there is most definitely joy and there is most definitely confidence to be had. It is a letter about letting the gospel spread through your very lives and what it means to give your life wholly as an offering. As I scanned down from today’s sermon passage even by the end of chapter 1, Paul has hit this point.
“For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake, engaged in the same conflict that you saw I had and now hear that I still have.” – Philippians 1:29-30
And now long in chapter 3 we have the example of Epaphroditus, whose almost-sacrifice of his life en route to the church of Philippi brought a kind of completion to the gospel. It was a living representation of just how much Jesus means. I’m not sure how I read this as a younger version of myself because like I had to say in Pneumatos yesterday, these are weighty words. These are weighty things. There is much at stake. And perhaps as I grow older, it is an ever growing realization of their weight. As I begin to hold more of my own life into my hands, understanding that time is no longer carved out for me by my parents or by a preset school system, Jesus calls an ever increasing more of myself. And I think I’m realizing more and more as I grow older ( and hopefully more mature) that the words that Paul speaks and the disciples speak, that those are to be my words. That I am to have an “eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed but that with full courage as always Christ will be honored in my body”. That the words Paul says about being like him as he follows Christ, that those actually apply to me. And Paul is a tank, in pretty all ways and although my rhetoric and ability to staple arguments together will probably not reach his skill, I am to have the same heart. So while I might be talking about the same things as I did when I was four years younger, it is my hope in Philippians 1:6 that tells me that I have come to understand, if not just a little more, of what I have been called towards.
Also this quote that py sent to me today:
Self denial is never just a series of isolated acts of mortification or asceticism. It is not suicide, for there is an element of self-will even in that. To deny oneself is to be aware only of Christ and no more of self, to see only him who goes before and no more the road which is too hard for us. Once more, all that self denial can say is: “He leads the way, keep close to him.” – Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Our lives are not flashes and bangs, a firework in the sky, one shot stories of slaying dragons and recovering ancient treasure from the bottom of the ocean. And while the imagery a person holding us to gunpoint asking us whether or not we believe in Christ is hard, it gives a somewhat heroic feeling. It is perhaps more scary that we are called out Christ for the rest of our lives. Our lives are long stories and for many of us, there will be no epics and legends written about us.
On another note, it was encouraging hearing Pastor Lou speaking today not only because he’s an excellent story teller and that he’s actually quite intellectual but that there was such an obvious air of trust and obedience in flow ministries. That while I am still here, there is just as much opportunity to do some dying and going.
//on a completely different side note, it is going to be an increasingly hard year. there are too many people backing the rampant part of my mind.
don’t waste your fourth year
this will be a post to flesh out thoughts which is essentially all my posts because let’s be real, I don’t often have coherent thoughts in my mind.
tonight I had the career talk or whatever else name it has. I had anticipated that it would come from somewhere at some point. I guess just not tonight when I feel behind on VBC and a part fail as a friend. the question was whether or not I would get in next year but the impetus was a question of whether or not I would regret not trying hard enough if I didn’t end up getting into med school next year. I was going to throw this at the end but I think the chief fear in my mind right now is whether or not under all my nonchalance and calm speaking, I am just another terrified gunner med school applicant. That I will be someone who regrets not putting enough effort into it if I don’t end up in med. That sounds like an empty life. It sounds like the man who on his deathbed, broke down that he had wasted his life not knowing Jesus. but an empty and wretched and earthly form of that.
I had gone into the prospect of this year taking it as one where I could be…free. But in ways that probably weren’t quite what people were thinking or at least not my parents. I had taken courses that I thought would be interesting except for psych 1×03 because that’s a nursing pre req. I guess the ironic (is it even ironic?) thing is that all the courses I’m taking for “prereq” reasons are for nursing and not for med. That’s besides the point. I was/still am excited for global health innovation and sermon on the mount ethics and Hartley’s courses. I took them because I thought I’d be genuinely interested in them. Which is why I didn’t take a pre-req year filled with orgo and biochem and physics and all the other stuff I would have to take to be eligible for 3 or so schools that barely take out Ontarians anyway. You can see I’m super biased here. I had anticipated being a musical lifer, joining gospel choir, taking a dance class again, mentoring people and unofficially semi-helping in dg leading. And yes, I would apply again to med school and maybe become more knowledgeable about current news in medicine and whatnot but it wasn’t going to be a big focus of my year. I wanted it to be about people. I wanted it to be about building relationships and building into people and recently, how to love sacrificially on people so that it exemplifies and compliments the sharing of the gospel. It wasn’t going to be a med year.
I’ve written this probably at least once if not multiple times before that my mindset going into med school applications was that I’m going to do kingdom work and I’m going to do what I think…is a blessing to others and sometimes fun. I’m not going to purposefully stack anything on my resume or be “well rounded”. I’m going to take dance classes and be in musical and do nanowrimo because…they are awesome things in and of themselves. And I had hoped partly that if I got into med school this year…that it would validate that assumption. That I don’t have to be a gunner in order to get in. And perhaps there was a slight balance because I should have some knowledge of medicine if not in a pursuit of just entrance into a med school at least for the sake of understanding what the heck I might be getting myself in to. That I get. But I’ve been terrified of the notion of being someone who kind of puts everything towards getting into med school. Not really only because I’m not fully sure if that’s what I want to do but because…it’s such an empty-feeling life. Putting all stock and worth into whether or not you get into a program. And there are stories both ways. I have friends who are trying their utmost hardest and have thus…given up some things in order to pursue medicine. I know people who are super diverse and are super involved in other things and are still in medicine. This is the point in the post where I begin to get less and less coherent. I’ve seen two streams of thought amongst Christian friends too. The ones who will say that it is a gift to have the opportunity to apply and get into med school so we should do everything to honor that, thus putting that as their priority. And there are those who are kind of the other way and the kind of thought I was which was essentially that Kingdom work comes first and not to worry or gear things for the future because it’s not really up to us. I’m not condemning one or the other though I can’t imagine living the first one. I don’t think with any of the turmoil that I will end up living the first one anyway.
But I was asked tonight if I would not join musical for another year, join some clubs related to med, do some volunteering in…med related places. When I first started writing this post I had juggled the thought of reducing ccf stuff as if it was some kind of tradeoff. But I think I’m beginning to see that maybe I will have to drop musical or gospel choir or nanowrimo or things like that but not because of med school. What I have to ask is whether those things are for the advancement of the kingdom and if they aren’t…am I called to give those up? I mean anything, even kingdom work, is free to be called away from us at any point. And if I’m going to do those things…I need to kind of understand why. But they can’t be for the comfort that they inherently bring because sometimes ministry work in and of itself becomes comfortable work because it’s been going on for so long and you get used to it.
I’m going to end this post here. Probably with no fully fleshed out idea. As I told a friend earlier today…I don’t really know what I’m saying most of the time as much as I’d like to. I might happen to be right once in a while but I’m still…very much not sure and that irks me sometimes because I don’t know what to respond with. But what I know is that I don’t want to waste my life on the pursuit of myself, veiled behind outwardly pretty motives. And I pray I won’t regret that. And if Philippians or any of the new testament is a witness….I won’t.
explosions in the sky
perhaps this is me overthinking things or as cass would say, turning something small into something big. But perhaps this is my nature. I turn things into stories, themes and give meaning to things. Because I believe our actions have meaning.
As I looked upon the Canada Day fireworks, I wondered what the allure of fireworks really was. They are bright explosions in the sky, moments where we set off gunpowder or something so that it flashes bright colors and then disappears into smoke. Sometimes we’ll feel the sound against our hearts seconds later. Sometimes the colours will change. But that’s it. In ten minutes, the show is over. Thousands are spent and a cloud of smoke trails off unseen into the dark night. People pack up their bags and head home. I wonder what the allure of fireworks is. If anything I was more entertained/intrigued by the child behind me who had wonder in their eyes. Or the sunset on its own as it fell across the waterfront.
I guess it speaks to who I am. I don’t enjoy flash and bang moments. I don’t enjoy bursts of things that dissolve and disappear right after. Sure I enjoy playing card games and having a good laugh playing munchkins with friends but at the end of the day, it’s not those events that are important. I’m the kind of person who loves to know what the long term journey is. Who writes a book about a group of people who mostly live everyday lives and who happen to spend some time on an adventure. When I read the stories of Jesus healing a blind man and then seeing him proclaim Jesus to the rest of his town I want to know so badly what happens next. Because there is always more. There is a lifetime and it is not in the loud and exciting moments that we see who we are but in the aftermath. When nobody is watching and the time is long. I don’t know if this is being jaded. I guess I like to think it’s sober-mindedness. That I’ve seen that things are a long journey. That whether it is choosing to DG lead or write a book or become a missionary, it will take time and effort. There is a cost to be counted and we don’t seem to think of that enough. Either way…
I wonder what the allure of fireworks is.
HEARTheSound
If I’ve had to currently process this summer and give it a theme, it’d have to do with God revealing to me where my heart is and more of who I am: my tendencies, strengths and flaws. And it’s not like these aren’t things that he has been constantly revealing to me over time; I have learned plenty of the above things in the past school year. But perhaps it is the experience of being much less busy, or rather much less single-minded, that has opened my eyes to see more and to come to terms with it.
This weekend with the triads/quads(tbc) was something in and of itself. For one, not having seen them for so long I realize that I love them. And I might not show it and I might seem really strict about things like washing dishes and rinsing with both hands so you can feel if its clean and all those things. But when I look at them, my heart desires their joy and for their eyes to be wide. I desire for them to seek out passions and to speak boldly about them in the Lord. But I know I struggle with even that, having conversations with them when it’s not structured about the Lord in their lives. That the automatic topic to bring up is what they’re doing with their summers or what they’ll do when they graduate or to joke about the fact that many of us will be in school for a while. while those are different topics, all that show a different part of me, the fact remains that I love them. It’s odd/interesting that more and more this summer God is showing me what certain feelings look like in the church. Gentleness (oh praise the Lord for that one) and love (not in a perfect degree but a better one than I knew). And it’s not that I love perfectly. In no way. Perhaps much of the time I am restricting and patronizing but when I think of a word to describe what I wish for them…it’d be freedom. Perhaps it is because I have tasted it and it is good. It’s mind boggling but it tastes so good. some will attribute my finding of this freedom from my lack of schooling or some will relate it to a score I received on tests or courses. But I attribute it to the Lord and I believe…I WANT to see it in them because it is so much better. but there is also a fear that our year (like myself) has fallen into a kind of structured rhythm. That most of our conversations won’t talk about the riches of grace until we’re at a bible study and there, it is a study of the bible but we barely discuss how it rends our hearts. When I look at it, above the fact that we didn’t have a lot of group games or hikes, there was a lack of prayer. We did not seek intercession nor was it really asked at my morning group what the Lord was revealing in this very day and age. And that includes me. I had become so comfortable with it. “we will have have a bible study on monday” I said to myself. How cunning and wicked that part of our hearts are.
The question was asked at camping where we would be in ten years. There are funny and whimsical answers like all of us starting up a clinic or some people starting up a bakery in ccf. But they are whimsical fancies for the propagation of discussion. The scary thing is that I can imagine some of us will wander off, grab hold of a job and even a family and kind of disappear, going to church maybe a couple times a week but having lost their passion. possibly never having grown one. but the future is not for me to plan or discern. and so I arrive at the question of how to love these people. how do I love them other than sending out a sermon, that while very demanding and questioning, does not necessarily show that Christ is moving in that way. long has it been since I have loved a non-Christian so deeply as I love these people and desire their growth. but the question remains how I love them and how to be wise with the time that I have been given.
I was told by a friend who I often haven’t talked to that I look busy. The news is not new but she said it in a different way. That she senses I am busy keeping track of people and everyone. And I realized that’s really probably what makes me more weary than anything else. I am a tracker and potentially a control freak that has just enough energy to actually go through with being a crazy person. it’s also verging towards 2am so this might be written strangely. But I do realize, whether it is simply sitting there watching people or hovering (I know this is not a good thing) over the dishwashing crew because their process is inefficient, I am a person who enjoys being involved in people’s lives. But not in some heavily controlling way. At least that’s not the intent. Execution is not a direct reflection of intent. I think part of it is wishing they would just learn certain things so that they can have more time and life. Maybe it’s like I’m trying to bring the level of conversation that I have with only a few friends and the MCBC group. But sometimes it comes as off patronizing because while some of the things I have learned or processes I believe in are possibly better, they are not always 100% adaptable to others. the examples in the past few weeks have been superficially the dishwashing method and on a slightly deeper level, the idea of wanting some guy friends to learn singleness and the peace of it. But there is a way to teach people for their good in brashness and a way to do it in love and gentleness. And while the Lord has shown me the feeling of gentleness, it still has a long ways to go in all my other aspects of life. And if this busyness on my heart is anchored to a watching of people which ultimately can lead to my controlling of them, I need to learn to give people up and things up. This whole camping trip I could feel myself kind of always planning and being alert, trying to look out for what was the best way to meet the needs of the group collectively whether it was just doing the dishes anyway even when it wasn’t my turn or having a place to dry towels, it was tiring. I found myself checking all the google docs multiple times and downloading them and packing things with the intent of it being useful for someone else. There is an element to it that is wonderful and satisfying. Managing and caring for physical needs is my go-to when I am either scared of showing too much emotional attachment or when I am simply too tired to emotionally give myself away. Perhaps it is almost a paternalistic instinct in me. But I wonder sometimes if I had not spent so much time on the things I did this weekend and instead perhaps chose to talk to just one or two people and really seek out their heart, would it have been different? In reality I wanted several times in the past two days to talk to people like Gloria and R because they intrigue me and there is the sense that there is so much kingdom-thought going on their heads. But alas, I did not spend much time with either and the others I wished to speak to. And it relates to the first chunk. Wisdom. Because there are many ways we can spend our time. Oh so many ways and as much as we wish there was an option to see timelines, possibly the darkest one, it is not a real thing. And if the Lord does indeed want me to continuing to love and serve in the way that I have, then to have peace with the fact that I will miss out on serving in other ways and that’s okay. Someone else is called to that.
there are a couple other places my heart are. sometimes I am scared it comes out all too readily in the tone of my voice and the gaze of my eyes. they become soft and speak to something I should not be letting out. I fear them for they seem to be the death of me and will cause others to stumble.
The summer also has taught me where my heart is not. It is not in research and while the pursuit of new answers and that sort is a noble goal, I realize I have very little love for it. I’m most excited for the global health innovation course next year. I also have very little desire for arguments now, even to come up with things like theology tests for people. I found myself seeing a lot of that in 1 Timothy: the putting away of desiring topics and discussions that we know far little about, instead caring for widows, relearning and developing core disciplines because those build up the church.
I have also been questioning myself in line with the idea of suffering for the gospel just how much I’m willing to give up in the moment. Because unlike a friend who can give up everything now but puts limitations on the future (like not ending up in China), I struggle with the exact opposite. My lessons of giving up things have been future related. They have been of giving up a comfortable life in Toronto/any urban area, potentially being called away to some place random, potentially not ever having a family of my own or a wife. And these things, while they have are not upon me as readily as what I shall eat for the next day, I have learned to have less clenched hands for. but this week I spent pretty much at least three days doing nothing but edit a novel that is more for selfish gain than for anyone else. I sat in my room, reading through over 200 pages. I could have spent more of that time cleaning out the fridge, making dinner for some nights, planning VBC decorations, heck even doing lab work. But I chose to edit a novel, for a deadline more or less set by myself. And I had/have to ask whether or not it was a wise use of my time. That while it will produce a pretty, self-accomplishing book that I can talk about at interviews and tell people about, did I fail to really give myself to Christ and His kingdom first this week?
in a complete side note, I saw real fireflies for the first time. they are a beautiful mystery. there is a wonder to the fact that you don’t know where it will show up next and shine brightly for just a moment.
//in unnecessary news:
the freezer chest will be staying and nobody will need to take on finances
letters will only be written to a few (and even then I don’t know how)
apparently there is a tech guide to be written for a certain 4×03
my abode next year will be the batcave of ward
the zombie apocalypse warning in Kingston should be turned to abysmal
I’m back at Mac for a fourth year.
I am glad that I will be spending another year with these people. although I would have never pegged or would have foreseen that I would look upon all of them with a heart, it has happened that I do.
home
I realize that in both places that I call home, there is no true and deep peace. Not quite fear, but a lack of long peace. As if an explosion can happen at any moment. And in a way, it has become a blessing. A reminder that nothing is permanent and a call to pray because my callous heart so easily forgets.
verbs
I am apparently a verb.
Crate:
it stands for a lot of things
It stands for getting ppl to quiet down
It stands for doing the splits
It stands for biking 50k
It stands for doing the splits
It stands for biking 50k
It stands for DTR ing
it also apparently now stands for getting into SOLAR at 12:01 only to mistaken the course codes for two very rare courses for their 2nd and 3rd year code counterparts. alas I will not be dissecting former living humans but at least I’ll get to act and read books about people with cancer.
on another note, the fact that I’m associated with DTRing is bittersweet. It’s nice but at the same time I wish it would be more widely adopted so as not to be so unique.
I have no attempts at wit or song lyrics tonight
this post started off as one about character traits that I’ve been seeing in myself and it will continue to be. But there’s alot of other stuff that’ll probably be interwoven now too. It’s going to be choppy as this was over two days and as much as I’d love for all my thoughts to link up deliciously…they won’t this time. I don’t think they will and probably not at 2:30 in the morning.
so here goes//
Righteous anger. I’ve come to realize that there is really no such thing or at least if it exists, I’d rather not feel it. I think I’ve figured out what irks me about reading through the psalms. I used to think it was because David was so flimsy about his emotional state. One psalm he’d be praising the Lord and in the next he’d be wailing about how everyone hates him. And while I still feel tinges of that (I mean could it really be that bad? You were king of Israel) I realize that it’s the way he curses his enemies. It’s probably what was appropriate back in the old testament but it seems so strange. That he would ask God to curse his enemies while he asks for mercy and escape from his trials. Seems kind of….counter Christ. And in that way, while the people say they can really relate to David because of his wide emotional moods….I can’t because I don’t wish that ever upon people. I realize that I haven’t been angry for a really long time. It probably isn’t in my character since grade like 4 or 1 when I used to bite people. I think in situations where I’m supposed to be mad…. I’m just sad. I’m sad that their eyes don’t see. Though to be fair I haven’t had any like real enemies but in this day and age I doubt there rarely exists any hardcore enemies. But I’m often now filled with some kind of sadness because I wish people would stop wasting their time hating people or trying to find fault with people or even finding fault for things that deserve it. I wish people would see grace and how much freedom is in that. I’m still learning it but somehow by God’s grace I’ve been growing in it.
While we’re on the topic of motivations and traits I realize why I was so affixed on writing letters this summer. I was originally going to write them with the knowledge of a leave but who knows, I might still do them. But I haven’t started them and the fear in that is that I don’t know how to respond to people after delivering the letters. Because letters are like paintings. They are something you can work on and you can finish and you can then have people look at. It is a final piece and almost in that, it is simple. They are words that I would say to you if it was the last time I see you. And they aren’t cluttered by the little small talk or whatnot because they are boiled down to the core of what I would wish or leave as encouragement or reconcile one last time. But talking with people afterwards…that almost ruins it. Or rather it means I have to deal with the aftermath of someone reading the final remarks. Which isn’t bad in and of itself and if anything, it’s what life has to be. But it looks so messy and it gets so trivialized. So I have yet to write these letters though I’ve been writing them in my head for a long time now. Thinking of the things that I would say and leave people with. Perhaps…I am afraid that my own witness afterwards as I live will not aid in what I write. Because the writing explains and wishes a pure concept and I fear that it would be negated by my life which can sometimes be so contrary from those pure concepts. Like the fear of the phrase “follow me as I follow Christ” and instead I would rather say “don’t follow me, follow Christ” because I’m scared. And maybe with right. or maybe without right.
And though it doesn’t seem that way, I think the fear relates to the fact that I have grown very disinterested with church. I realize it more and more during times of worship. I’ve been to roughly 3-4 things in the last week where worship has been done. Musical worship if I’m being specific. I find myself not really being able to sing through an entire song or if I do, I catch myself singing half of it due to the fact that I know the lyrics and it just feels so regular. Or I play the game of thinking about the worship music as it happens. For example, chuckling inside as the kna band plays a song in an indie or whatever way. OH THAT THERE WOULD BE MORE THAN THIS. I know there is more than this. And I see the words and I catch myself singing out of comfort and I stop. Because they are WEIGHTY words. Like I can barely get through a song because I don’t know if I can be honest. I find myself praying more during worship than singing now and maybe it’s because I’ve recognized that I get caught up in the sound of my own voice but it’s also that I’m probably more honest in my praying than in worship. I don’t know what to do as a Christian right now. During lab I’ve gone to listening to good secular music for the past while or things that are mildly related and my mind just mentally processes them as “oh maybe that refers to something spiritual” instead of worship music but almost because I don’t want worship music and real honest songs to just fade into the atmosphere that I’m used to and words that I become used to. Sometimes when people become disinterested in church they leave it. Or they leave for another church. And while I can sense that there are definitely things I run to that aren’t necessarily great like the rpg that has started working again on my phone or the idea of watching all of community, I know they are purely escaping things and they are so worthless. So I do not think I will run off into those things though there is still a caution that I should cut them before I am numbed. Or I don’t think leaving for another church is of any value because…what I seek cannot be found in another way of running church. I wanted ground zero this summer in terms of not doing anything because I wanted to rediscover the treasure that the man found in the field and that was so extravagant that he sold everything. Because right now…everything is words but I know there is so much underneath those words. I want to know what it looks like (at least for me) to actually be free. Throughout the whole kna coffeehouse I was frustrated. I mean I love that the kids still have enthusiasm and they still are trying and that’s really what God wants, their hearts. But I wanted to see what they thought of what came after. People would be freed from their chains and then they’d just…walk off the stage. As if everything was okay after. Or as if they were free to repeat the same mistakes. And God seemed like an absentee landlord. One who makes something, peaces, or frees you, peaces and then shows up again. Or he seemed needy. But He’s not those things. And for the vast majority of the people sitting there that night, I knew they already knew the story up to the point where Jesus frees you. And there wasn’t a lot of time spent on just really what sin and being shackled IS. Artistic representations are cool but what is it really? I don’t know where to end this part of the post. I wanted to drop down to ground zero or disappear into writing a book or try and wait out a “busy” period with the hope that I would emerge on the other side allowed to stop and really think. Even words like “Jesus is all” which py has probably said over and over. They are thick words. With a lot of truth. But the words are also so numb. God I need life breathed into me. I have spoken words so many times. I have sung words. I have read words. I read the words over and over again in the psalms. But have they lost their breath in me? Because I KNOW THEY ARE WORTH MORE. I KNOW that the man gave everything he had for the pearl. I am a lazy double minded man. Wanting more but running so easily to other things that I know will only hold me for a little bit because I can’t find it but I always end up still wanting. there is more than exists in my heart right now. there is more. I want to see what it looks like. because business as usual just doesn’t cut it anymore. And so I wonder how to teach grade 6-9 boys about missions. Admittedly I wonder more about what their dreams are. And I want them to see. That there is more.
And as a side note, I can see God giving me a gentler spirit. Because I look back at high school and the debates we would have and now…I don’t think I get as riled up. And it’s nothing of my own doing but of how God has been molding me these years at CCF and humbling me. But oh how much work still needs to be done.
Currency
Tonight we were asked what we’ve been spending our heart currency on. It wasn’t hard for me to see the answer. Because it might not be an inherently dangerous or bad thing. But I knew exactly what it had been taking in me. The idea of a relationship and marriage and all the things that come with it. I’d made the decision to watch a rom com late into last night, I had played scenarios in my mind, even compared myself to the protagonist, saying I wouldn’t be like them. Saying I knew better. I’d come up with an idea of an engagement gift and wedding favors. I’d conjured up a vision and a desire. So I knew the answer to that question. I knew exactly what I was spending my currency, worshiping.
If only you knew what would give you peace, Jesus said as he approached the city that would reject and butcher him.
Tonight I held my hands up during worship and I realized as I sat with my knuckles against my knees that it was an unfamiliar action. I’m almost always drumming on the chair in front of me or gripping something or just hands down beside my legs. But I sat there, fighting the biological reflex or curling my fingers inward. I would have to give this up. And I had a feeling that He wouldn’t give it back to me for a while.
But tonight was also when I started seeing the other things he’s put me in for what they actually have the potential of being. He showed me my Sunday school class, something I had taken on more as a “lesser of two evils” sort of deal but realizing that it is actually something of mass potential. Grade 7-9 boys. Just remembering what my little emo time in those years was and how I could help there. And the curriculum is about missions. And today I saw another part of the older brother in me. The one who loves the father’s things and possibly his work and just being in the things of His father. But he doesn’t love the Father. Not more than the things. How twisted my heart is.
So God, I’ve heard you’re pretty good at loving. That’s good. Because I’m not very good at it.
mimic
today I awoke from my innocuous nap time with a physical tear in my eye. not from yawning or some physiological nap related thing but it was the result of the dream. it’s strange how sometimes you wake up saying the word you did in your dream or in this case…mimicking the bodily function you were experiencing. Except in the dream I was pretty much sobbing.
It was a dream of goodbyes. The previous event had become lost on me but I was just outside of an unfamiliar house with a brother saying thank you for something and then goodbye. It had the feeling that it was the last time we would see one another for quite some time and all I do was tell him not to thank me and hug him before we parted ways and I began to sob in that really nasty, uncontrollable way. It’s been a while since I had one of those in real life. I guess the thing that perplexes me is that this wasn’t a brother that I’ve ever been particularly close with. Sure the last couple days have meant that I see more of him but…it’s not like I’ve ever been particularly fed into by him. I wondered for a while why I had cried so much, why the goodbye had meant so much. Perhaps it would have made more sense had it been someone I talk to more or who has been a guide in these 3 years. But perhaps…it would not have been. With those, there is the understanding that it’s going to be okay, that maybe we’ll keep in touch and I know God will continue to build them up. And then there are relationships that I…truthfully do not see myself crying over. Brief executive meetings and group work that knit us together and while fun, I would not cry. No, I think I cried because it was a work of uncertainty. In particular, this was a brother who I desired would learn something, who would learn to grow in trust and finding worth in the Lord. And I think that’s what I cried about. Not seeing that come to fruition and leaving it at a hanging end. Not sure if the work would be completed. People who I didn’t know if would be okay for. Because “okay” is not something that is really dependent on circumstances. It’s fixed in the point of Christ’s resurrection and promise.
I’m not saying that I’m leaving. Far be it for me to say though I think I’m slowly gaining more peace with the prospect as much as it is a bittersweet thing.
The four hearts
For the past month I’ve been sitting in a standstill and it’s not because I’ve been bored. It’s because I’ve been scared. I don’t know where I should put my heart because it has so many places it could be. So many places that I should be logically. But places I’m scared to start in.
There’s McMaster and all the people that I can still invest in over the summer. The most familiar of the many but the second scariest one. The easiest because it’s been my home for the last three year but also the place I could very well have to leave in two days. At least mentally. So should I dig roots? I know I can and should for at least the summer but the fear of withdrawal….is definitely not helping.
There’s Pneumatos, the fellowship I’ve been away from for a long time but who I know God has in some way called me to. Whether by obligation or the sheer fact that I’ll be back most weekends. Yesterday was nice. A small, familiar group and discussion I haven’t had in a long time. But I know there’s a lot more than just prepping some questions and talking with kids I already know. There’s a lot of out/in reach or whatever you call it to reach people who need a fellowship the most in our church. Not scary but a tiring pull of the heart.
There’s my other house. As much as it’s part of McMaster it holds a different place in my heart and it holds more weight and calls more attention. As this week revealed, I’m not the only one who could be leaving.
And then there’s my other house. My family. Ironically as I’m typing this there’s a sermon about biblical family. My house. I’ve been an escapee for three years. And yet as I’m forced to come home every weekend, more and more I can no longer simply ignore the fact that it’s a wreck. For three years I left, in a way giving it to my sister who had unintentionally left me with it for four years. But neither of us are fixers. Not true. By personality I am a fixer but this wasn’t something I could or can. I realize that even now I don’t really know what it means to honor your mother and father because I’ve never really seen them be on the same front and present something unified to honour. And I don’t know what I’m doing at home anymore. This day is supposed to be mother’s day, signified by a gift or a meal or a card. But as much as I can make banana pancakes and cook a dinner with my sister….those aren’t what’s needed. It’s silly to think that what people really need are extravagant flowers and cards. It’s never really about that. This is the heart that is the scariest, the most unfamiliar and the most time consuming. Because I know not what to do, I have no words of my own to say, and yet I know that it is by far the one place I should be. The place I’ve been called to since birth. It’s easy to build into friendship and even new people at Mac and to a harder degree with old friends at Pneumatos. It’s an even harder thing in my mind to build into my family. Because the truth is, I’ve never known how. I don’t know how to be a mediator because my sample size of what is happening is so small. Even this morning I could feel the words I spoke not be mine. I was using his words because I’d just heard him speak. And before I’ve used her words because I heard her opinion. I wish I was able to be unbiased and be able to present something cohesive… but I can’t right now.
And then there’s everything else in the world like lab work and VBC coordinating and the possibility of teaching Sunday school and welcome week stuff and musical writing….things that will keep me busy. Things that I’ve lacked heart in but luckily have defined enough tasks, unlike relationships, that I haven’t fallen too behind in them. There’s the surprise evangelistic bible study (for all intents and purposes I’ll call it that) which was nice…but again, something I just give a lot of time and thought into.
So as much as I want Tuesday to happen and come… a lot of things aren’t fixed by any of it. My family doesn’t change. If anything the possibility of being closer or farther from McMaster puts a particular strain on things, Pneumatos, at least for the summer, doesn’t change as it has always been a summer commitment in my mind. The only things that change are the familiar ones. The ones I can most easily put my heart into. And maybe one could say that I can do all four. I mean I’m technically in enough locations for it to be possible. But if there’s anything I’ve learned this year…I need to stop doing so much. Some things you can say no to. Some things, you wish you could, but you really can’t.
And I realize, the saddest thing about all of this….is that because I’ve been pulling my heart out of everything in fear of it being the wrong thing or the hard thing, I’ve stopped really praying for a lot of them. Because I’ve lost that sense of responsibility to them. This entire year something a wise woman said to me last summer has ring over and over. Only say yes to things that you will pray for.
I was challenged by a friend recently to love extravagantly towards a housemate to win them. Because Christ was extravagant to win us. The truth is, I’m finding it difficult enough to love “averagely” towards everyone first.
Father, give me eyes to see and ears to hear and boldness to do it. Thank you that I have no clue what to do. It’s been a while since I felt so distraught. It’s been a while since I sought real wisdom. She’s been calling in the streets for some time now.
it’s going to be a while
it’s been a feels day.
with the mix of a lovely, honest wedding + a less honest wedding in my HIMYM marathon + a particular playlist on my phone, it’s been a feels day.
I don’t mean that it’s been a bad day or a bad week or anything like that. Some very interesting things have happened like finally finishing my child health project (long overdue) or getting insta-hired to be vbc coordinator this year or having a child offer me their mewtwo pokemon card as a farewell gift (which was super cute but I couldn’t take it) or a bunch of other things. But I can feel that my heart is still super restless for a bunch of reasons. It doesn’t help that I’m home. There’s always a strange feeling when I’m home, a feeling where I don’t really have control over my time, where I wake up and I don’t know what’ll happen next because maybe I’ll be called out to do something or maybe I won’t. It’s a different kind of caring than when I’m in Hamilton and I still haven’t deciphered exactly why. It’s always been hard for me to integrate back into my family as odd and kind of sad as that sounds. Years of being away and having your heart in a completely different place will do that to you.
I also don’t know what to say to people anymore. I’ve been sitting in this limbo and people keep bringing it up, with no harmful intentions, but it reminds me all the more that I am indeed waiting for nine more days to pass. As if that news will change the way I talk to people. But it won’t. And in the mean time, I’m not sure how I want to carry conversations with people. Am I trying to ween off things? Is it weening just for the summer or for longer? It was nice last week bumping into my sister’s friend and really just skipping over the formalities. The only question I was asked was how I was doing with the Lord and that…was really refreshing. Because it’s a question I also need to really stop and ask myself, especially with where my heart is. Reading through psalms again, I found myself unable to really relate to David. I mean the man probably wrote a lot of this in the midst of war and the world as a whole was different but I can’t say that my enemies seek my death or that the only sign I need from God is not to be trampled by my enemies because….that’s not where I am right now. I am not very much aware of any potential enemies or my life is not being sought by evil people. I am simply…being pulled all over the place by that figurative organ beating sixty times a minute or more when a silver trees song plays.
But it was also nice to see a marriage. To see people be honest and giddy and guffawing at their wedding. In a way, to look on with hope in the same way that God has taught me to look on CCF with hope. That He’s got a lot more for them and the work that He’s doing in all of us, transforming our minds and redeeming us, it’s going to be a while. and that’s awesome.
…comes the end of our fellowship
I used to say a lot that I hadn’t written in a long time. That fact hasn’t changed really. But there’s a certain excitement in me as I think about the fact that I can just sit and listen to music and write. A certain freedom in it though I know it won’t last for very long. I am, in the end, a chronically busy body as it would so appear.
soundtrack to this post. just have it on.
-musical
Musical has always been a very interesting part of my life. It was one of the first things I joined in first year along with CCF when I knew absolutely nothing about Mac (and still don’t). I’m not even sure why I joined. I don’t think it was because Joanne had joined…maybe Ben spoke of it? I can’t be certain. But nonetheless it came. Over the years I can’t say I’ve been the most dedicated to musical and I know that full well. But there’s this sense of familiarity that almost inherently comes with it. Something that you can’t really run from unless you try really hard. I find myself every year just smiling at the younger years from a little further. This year watching them do their dinner break dance parties and just seeing the great camaraderie there. As Ken would say, there’s nothing that brings people together than a strong vision and common goal. I think I’ve met some of the craziest people through musical. I don’t keep in touch with many of them and last night while we were kind of just sitting there I thought back to the people in our first year chorus. I remember their names and characteristics and when you don’t talk to someone, maybe that’s all you can ask for.
There are times when I have felt almost a kind of tension in my heart between musical and CCF. Both are pretty time intensive and maybe it’s not tension but rather, room in my heart. This climaxed on the night of graduation after the Friday show. Here were two events that were kind of climax moments. Grad dinner, possibly the last time I’d see a lot of people. One last go to dress up and take a ridiculous amount of pictures and smile. It’s a little strange that it all accumulates to that. A night of mostly taking pictures, as if they could represent the feels of the previous 8 months. One of a few pictures with my DG and it’s not even complete. I got there just in time for pictures and apart from a pair of white runners, I looked like I’d been there all night. Maybe in years past we’ll look back and I’ll completely forget that I wasn’t actually there to hear heartfelt speeches and see crazy lipdub dance videos. It’s a bittersweet event. As much as we got to have a more intimate kind of prayer session at our last CCF Friday, there’s always an amount of words that haven’t been spoken yet. Things that we should say.
But I digress. That night we finished our second show, possibly our best, and I had to leave immediately, unable to really speak to anyone about the show, my heart already fixed on leaving to get to the next thing. Through dark roads and bellowing winds, I fought a foe from an ancient time walked alone through a darker part of Hamilton. And there it was in my heart. Like I hadn’t given enough time to let my heart sink in it all and almost grieve for the ending of possibly two great things in my life. I make it sound so melodramatic and it wasn’t so. But it goes into the idea of finishing and leaving.
Last night we had our last reunion for the year. Watching the musical there was a bit of that feeling that it doesn’t really matter whether people are watching. Because years from now when we watch this (which is the only real record of our show) and when we listen to our recordings, I won’t remember that I was in tableau off camera or that I sang a bass harmony that wasn’t picked up by the soundboard. But I delighted in them. And however unfortunate that is, it’s okay. Much more has been achieved in 8 months than simply three shows and $11000. In the same way that I look at the younger years in CCF, there’s always a smile that crosses my face when I see their freedom. Imagining how their cohort, second years in both groups, will carve a way through the four years. It’s probably the most cohesive group I’ve ever seen in my three years. Musical is indeed in good hands. I give so much thanks to the Lord for having given me eyes and a voice to be part of this musical adventure.
-overstocking & the danger of time
I got so caught up with this concept of leaving that I think it made me do two things. Firstly it made me finish nothing. Other people will probably try to be nice and not echo these feelings aloud but I really think I dropped the ball second term. In…everything. Besides child health where we picked up the ball in CCF, men’s ministry, DGL, DG, ecomentors, habitat, it all feels like I’ve dropped the ball. I think I wrote this in another post about how I got paralysed and it’s true. I was so caught up in how to end well that I didn’t end really at all and it leaves a lot of things empty. I feel like apologies need to be given, both formally and informally to just about everyone. I mean the first up will be my DG and I’ll have to do that via letter now because…I won’t be able to see all of them together again for a long period of time. I’m grateful that there weren’t a lot of mandatory things in committee that needed to be done and if there were, Matt took on most of them from the admin prong. It became a game in my head of “how do I want to end this”. I sat on the floor of a beautiful student home last night and really just watched. I guess I’ve come to the stage of coming to terms with the fact that maybe there isn’t a great way to end. That if it comes to it, I’ll drift off like a whisper into the night, fading out. I’ve always like the effect of fading out in powerpoints over really anything else. As we had our final year BBQ, I spent most of that night washing dishes half out of obligation as a host but half because I didn’t know what to say to people. I wanted to wish them joy and all the best for their summers. But what do you speak of? I had grown weary of the little talk that we often have together of school and exams. Oh that there is so much more! And I know our eyes can see it like a distant shore, a place that we’re fighting for. But how do we get there? How do our lips begin to speak of such things? So in my quest to end well, I ended very little. I have become paralysed. Almost anticipating May when everyone has already left and I am left to begin again, to try and repair through paper, pen and stamps the lack of closure I have given and had.
The second thing it did, on the coat tails of the first, is that it made me become just as busy for next year. Correction, for an envisioned next year. Sitting with Matt Ho today, I realized that I had already overstocked my next year with hopes and dreams of things that I can’t realistically do at the same time. Even without ecomentors or Habitat I wanted to mentor and co-lead with a DG leader, to keep up with Kevin through his leading, to do chair support, and I wanted to year lead. And as much as these aren’t committee roles, I can already see that the first two items, if done well, will take much of my time. Depending on what capacity of school I’m in, I might not actually have that much time despite my emotional attachment to these roles. This is all on the assumption that I will be coming back next year.
There are mixed suggestions from people. Some have told me to move on, that my time here has ended. Like the elves who have sailed off to a distant land. And some, as well as the majority of my own heart, still wants to come back if given the choice. But either way, as I had talked it out today…I can’t keep overstocking myself. If God has taught me anything this year is that I need to give up things. I can survive a year of three execs and a desire to cook and clean and bake for people. But I only just survive.
The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. – Psalm 23
He leads me to rest because I simply don’t know how.
it is better
As I sat there during service, I got so used to my little rock. I knew which grooves on it fit which fingers and I could roll it around and know. But I also kept saying to myself over and over “It should be bigger”. And it really should. Backpacks of rocks. The program leader in me imagined different ways we could get people to record and load their sins into some carrying case for a week. But that wasn’t important.
By the time it was time to give up the rock, and I knew it was coming, there was almost a bit of sadness in me. Oh I knew that it represented my sin and that it was a joyous occasion to cast it away. But maybe it was the part of me that tries collecting souvenirs (read rocks and shells) from everywhere I go that wanted me to hold onto it. And how appropriate of an analogy it was. As much as I knew it was sin and it was bad, it had grown on me. There was an odd and warped kind of comfort associated with having it. Just like I had grown comfortable with flirting around a particular idol. I had it sought it thinking it was harmless but this week more and more I realize…it needs to stop. As I held that rock, waiting for the line to subside, I kept repeating to myself “it’s better. you know it’s better.” I’d known it last September. I’d known that the Lord himself was better. I’d known it this September and somewhere in between..it got muddled up and I got used to it. A plastic, disposable cup and a piece of matza you know you’ll eat doesn’t feel as nice and tangible as a rock. But you know it’s better. I knew it was better.
And as the plastic cup has been disposed of, the matza attacked by acid in my gut, and the rock probably returned to some place outside, the real challenge comes. to know it’s better.
blood moons
Despite my better academic judgement I figured I’d blog tonight because it’s one of those nights where I can kind of feel the void. Or maybe it’s just the Holy Spirit finally confronting me that I need to stop. Rather depending on what perspective, it’s time for me to start moving again.
I think for the past two weeks I’ve unconsciously been waiting for May 13th to roll around thinking that it’ll bring me some sort of closure. I mean there are definitely things it would bring closure for. a thesis, future academic plans, what I’m doing with my lease, where I’ll be for the next years of my life. But it won’t give me closure for the one thing I think I want it too. Because it might tell me whether or not I’m here for another year but that doesn’t mean anything. That doesn’t change…anything and the reality stays the same. Maybe I want to know that I’m leaving and that would provide…some finality to everything.
I was prompted to read through some of my old posts recently. Having printed a book for it you’d think I’d get around to reminiscing and laughing at myself but that has not been the case. At least not yet. I say “I haven’t written in a long time” a lot and it’s usually how I begin my posts. Even when it was only three days instead of now…three months. I’ve been meaning to blog for a while but that’s like saying I’ve been meaning to vacuum the basement stairs for a long time too. There’s a certain fear to blogging. Because I have to actually stop and see myself and look at who I am and what I’ve been doing. I can’t keep running anymore. For the last while I’ve been at a standstill. I mean I can still run ministry and do things like DG, though I’ve probably dropped the ball on both of those things, and I can pray. But I can feel myself drawing from roughly the same things that I did a year ago and trying to still run on them. But they’re becoming empty and I…need to stop moving on the outside and start growing again.
grass of the fields
There’s a very comforting feeling knowing that after I leave, after we all leave, that the people here will still lift song and praise to their God. That they will still come before Him as children long after any of us are around. And that’s good to know. Good to know that i am indeed a wisp: here today and gone tomorrow. That people have been singing these songs for years and decades and for some, centuries.
These past few weeks having weird feelings in my throat has probably made me more aware of corporate worship. Sometimes I wonder what I’d do without my voice if I happened to have some kind of cancer and my vocal cords had to be altered. And as scary as it is and as much as I wouldn’t be able to rally people at camp, I realize that maybe it will be so. I’m a little too comfortable with the sound of my own voice anyway. It’s the sense that yes, I may be gifted with some things. But these too shall pass. For the time being, I will use them in whatever way I can to build up the church whether that be baking or cleaning or even buying an extra pizza here and there. But when God decides to take those away, He will set another task for me. For I am just a wisp: here today and gone tomorrow.
I think of the judges in the old testament. They were called and led the whole of the Israelites for probably a lot of years. A lot probably happened and they probably said and did some great things. And yet, they get maybe one line in a list of many. Some may say they were even lucky to get a mention. Because in the end it was never meant to show that man had any glory. No, the recurring character is God.
A traveler’s song
Not sure what’s happening right now in my head. A lot of…dullness I think is what I would call it. At least towards things like school and trying to find a thesis prof. Still can’t wrap my head around how to tell people I might not be back and it doesn’t seem right that they entrust some piece of their research or something to me without knowing that.
I think it’s beginning to set in more than before that I might actually end up leaving. And a part of my mind runs through all the scenarios, asking myself whether I really want this, asking whether I should deny any acceptances and just do accelerated nursing next year. And with what I felt to be a pretty significant slide in my abilities today during practice….I don’t know. I know it’s all up to God to put me where He wants me and though it’s daunting to think I could end up in the one place I said I wasn’t the type for, it’s not really my choice.
Other than that the Lord reminded me this week of just people in my life and how they are. Reopening my eyes to some hurts and feelings and in most of them….I’m primarily helpless apart from prayer and listening. I was also encouraged to begin pulling out a bit…in the sense that I should decrease what kind of impact people have on me so it isn’t as hard a blow if I end up leaving. But as I reflected on this I came to the conclusion as I had a few times in the past that I have very relationships where I draw support despite being in relationship with a lot of people. I say there’s about 3-4 people who I’d probably feel serious withdrawal with. Probably stay in online conversation but…yea I think that’s the reason why I wanted to plow hard for the next two months. Not because I wanted to necessarily draw much but I wanted to sow as much as I could…and I still want to see a lot.
dysphagia
I am really beginning to like this distraction-free writing page. Not that anyone sees this part of wordpress.
The question has been asked at least 10 times today. “How did it go?” and it’s not that I’ve grown tired of answering it. It’s probably more that my answer doesn’t change very much and can’t. I have to be very careful of what I write here because I signed a confidentiality agreement =P I think when it comes down to it, it is what it is. The MMI stations were touch and go for some which was expected but I think I just had a lot of fun in the panel. As much as I had thought of some answers to some questions, it felt so very natural. And maybe I laughed a little bit too much but I like to think that somewhere in the subjective criteria they’d like to take people who comfortable and if not, that’s perfectly okay too. I got to talk about ballet, my novel and I think I had the opportunity to be light in a more explicit way. Not sure if I was able to come up with words that gave justice to what Christ has been in my life but again, it is what it is.
The rest of the day was interesting. I felt super intimidated first going into the lobby because as much as I think I look decent in a suit and tie, everyone else seemed to look a billion times more legit. I mean I am 20 and apparently the average entrance age is 24? (you learn something new everyday). There were decent amounts of time that I sat by myself on a couch singing musical lyrics from Rent because that’s all I could think of. Actually, the past 2-3 weeks I’ve been singing Finale B. Maybe it’s the way it starts. There is no future, there is no past, thank God this moment’s not the last. I don’t know how much truth is actually in those lyrics but there might be that subconscious hope that the future isn’t creeping on me so prevalently. Anyway, I got a lot more comfortable closer to the interview after meeting someone familiar and being able to talk to them. And post-interview it was nice to hear that some of the current first years also had touch and go feelings about MMI and thought the panel was fun. Not sure how I would actually feel if I got into Queen’s but…we’ll get there when we get there. Kind of excited for tomorrow, seeing a bunch of MCBC faces. =)
Unfortunately I’ll probably in some capacity enter into the over-thinking stage. Or maybe I won’t because there’s just so much to do. I almost feel like I should apologize to committee and just about every other group because I’ve been so out of it for the past week and still very much disconnected, as a continuation from going to South Carolina. There’s a lot lined up for this week but I think it’ll also be a week where my actual heart can rest and stop. The Lord’s voice for that has been getting stronger. This weekend was good. Letting go of just about everything and apart from the two hours of concentrated intensity, it’s been nice just to meet with people (some random) and hear from them. Even got to hear about KCCF tonight. And then I get to go back and have a nice DGL discussion about Q&A. =) Praise the Lord.
Microcosms of dreams
I feel oddly very detached from just about everything coming back to Mac. And I guess it’s to be expected when you pretty much isolate 25 people for a week. I’m still coming to terms with firstly what happened on the trip. There are a couple logistical things that need to happen like repayment and stuff but for the most part it’s more reflecting on what emotionally it meant. This was probably my last year and though I’d have liked to take more pictures or other specific things, it played out a little differently. And then there’s the fact that as much as I would like to stay connected with all the people I spent a week with, it’s just not possible right now. Especially because I don’t do well with many friends. And past the having to get back into school work and prepping for an interview, I need to replug back into the ministry work. Tonight my Father reminded me of just how much hope and love is here at CCF. But there’s also the reminder that I have a race to finish.
//
The first thoughts I get when I think about this trip is that it was almost a dream. A microcosm of society that pretty literally floats above my semester. From the outset it was very evident to me that I was going to be rather disconnected on this trip. Having sporadic jolts of WiFi while on the bus ride made for quite a bit of inner conflict. It was the feeling that I couldn’t have any of those cute, flickering conversations any more with people. And at first it had caused some level of angst because I’d become so used to it, to being able to flick banter at lovable personalities but also to be able to talk about struggles when needed. I wouldn’t have that anchor for an entire week. But I came to the realization that although it’s good I have such lovely friends and the Lord has blessed me so wonderfully, I have to be able to unhitch myself from them eventually. I might maintain one or two for a long time but chances are…whether I leave this year or the next, I will not be able to hold onto all my friendships. And it had been a while since it was just the Lord and I.
It didn’t quite hit me that this was my last trip until a couple days in. It’s not that I’ve been for very long or I had had the intention of going for three times, but there’s an element of finishing well that I’ve been carrying everywhere and this was no exception. I’ll say I probably had the most fun on this trip out of all three, partly because of the personalities on this trip and maybe it was simply that I was more comfortable than I’d been in the past. I hope the first years weren’t nearly as awkward and shy feeling as I was in my first year. But what does it mean to end this kind of thing well? To “soak in every second”? What does that in itself even mean? Was it taking a lot of pictures? because if so I kind of failed. No, I think I’ve come to realize that others will take pictures and it’s probably best that I just don’t try. That thought came to mind when we were on the tree. We got off the bus just to take pictures with the tree, hoping just to capture the fact that we had been there, probably only trying to recollect it afterwards while staring at pictures we only vaguely remember taking. That might not have made any sense.
“I hope this old train breaks down. Then I could take a walk around.” Jack Johnson came back to me during this trip. Part of me, when finding out that the trip might be cancelled due to the state of emergency + snow storm, was kind of glad. I would not have minded a full week of simply…nothing. Obviously I’d do some work but I kind of wished I could slow down. The feeling was prevalent all throughout the trip. Running around Charleston, knowing that we’d only have 7 hours, starting the 7 hours thinking it’d be too long and ending feeling like it just hadn’t been enough. Some moments were nice. Sitting along a swinging bench with darkness swallowing up the ocean singing Vitamin C and semi-lamenting that we would part ways not too long from now. That was kind of beautiful, to just sit and be with some of the coolest people I’ll probably ever meet. But even that had to come to an end. I think it’s okay that the building wasn’t “anything new”. My dad asked me after coming back whether the building was a challenge and I realized that it hadn’t really been. Having gone three times, even the circular saw isn’t a big deal any more. That part came with a good amount of peace. Seeing that there was always just work to be done. We sow into fields that others have started. We see the fruits of labour that began long before us.
Maybe the whole trip sounds a bit depressing right now or very introspective (which it was) but I can also speak of the fact that it went very well. Overall quite tiring and not nearly as restful as I would have hoped (somehow people wake up earlier than 6am) but tons of fun and it was delightfully warm and all those compliments. I had the honour of spending time with some really real and admirable people and though I’d like to keep up with them regularly, I know that probably won’t be happening and that’s okay. I think I can tell I still have lingering feelings from it because I still find myself checking the dropbox and sifting through pictures at least once a day.
//
On the bus ride home I started reading “a mildly curious life” or rather, my old blog posts assembled into one large 200000 word document. I did a lot of smiling and chuckling as I read through just a couple but I also realize…maybe I’m not so different from who I was back then. I’m sure mentally I’ve grown in how I attack new problems and what stresses me out (not that much now) and how I pray and come before the Lord, but at the same time, the bullet headings are still kind of the same. Struggle with devos and resting, struggle with some feels and ministry. Never anything to do with school and as much as that might worry my parents or my colleagues may consider that irresponsible of me, I don’t think that’ll ever need to be a problem I really worry about. And this idea of “how have I really changed?” flows into a question that came out of our new comm meets old comm. When they went around doing reverse sharing for 7up they kept saying things like “it’s okay that you’re different from Creight, he’s more vocal and that brings something but you’re a different leader and that’s okay”. I agree completely with that fact and I think it’ll be a good change but I think the main thing was I started wondering what difference I’ve actually made and what I’ve actually brought to men’s ministry. Apart from instating gender-only nights and Q&A and maybe shifting the DGL structure to be a lot more collaborative, I don’t know if it can be said I’ve done much. it goes back to the feeling I had on the beach as I walked and my footsteps made almost no indents into the sand. They tell us that our work will be slow. That we probably won’t reap the harvest that we sow into. We might not even see it if we come back years from now. But I think reflecting on this year…I feel that more than ever. And there are two ways I could go about this. I could be really depressed and try all the more to make changes, try flipping tables, get more tired. Or there’s what I think God is calling me towards right now. The past couple days I have more almost audibly heard His voice saying “Come and sit son”. It’s the idea that maybe not everything that I think I have to do is necessary or is as ragingly important as I think it is. So it’s okay to actually rest and not be running because as much as you think you’ll miss something important or not fulfil something…it’s okay. It’s okay to come and sit at His feet and just be for a bit. And again the promise of Phillipians 1:6 and Isaiah 55 rings true, He’s going to finish the work that He has started, it’s going to happen.
//
this post is spanning three days so it might seem kind of disjointed and although I’d love to re read it and put it all together in a real cohesive way…this week just doesn’t allow for that. Coming back has been weird. Taking an entire week out of life and putting it into essentially something different has kind of led to not quite knowing how to reconnect with everything coming back. For one there’s friendships and just even the usual conversations I have with people. I haven’t heard from them for a week and as much as that doesn’t sound like much…it’s been hard to get to that point. Also people keep asking me how South Carolina and apart from writing a what I suppose to be a 1000 word blog post, I don’t really have a good answer to that most of the time apart from “good”. Really kills deep conversation =P. But I think one more thing is where I’m putting my time. Part of me knows I’m supposed to ramp up studying/prepping for the impending med school interview this Saturday but at the same time…I don’t internally actually feel that pressure. Most of me still wants to publish my nanowrimo book, even bake an apple cake after seeing I have so many apples, go to ballet and water polo and DG. Not sure if that’s irresponsible. I like to think that med schools want actual people and while hardcore preparing might be necessary, I’m going to take this like I’ve taken really everything med school related. Seek first the kingdom. So I’m still trying to figure out how to balance all this. I want to sit and to finish reflecting (as you can see this is a super disjointed account) and I want to reconnect with people and I know I need to get some amount of work/prep done. And so I’m back to this inner conundrum of what to do with my time. I think slowly I’m getting better at this. I woke up yesterday and despite feeling the need to do stuff and piling deadlines in my mind…I was drawn to sit on my bed and to pray/just spend time talking with my Father.
Committing to the hygeneine hypotheses and pointed orange sticks
I wrote a couple posts while in South Carolina and instead of each one getting a post I figured I’d just mass them all here.
//
Darkness – Feb. 15
There’s something about darkness. Like the finale of scrubs. A sense that because you can’t see it, anything could be out there. Anything is still kind of possible. Is that what’s so romantic about the night?
What a blessing its becoming to be alone. There’s still heart tugging and things I’d just like to talk to people about like how the toilets were subversive and flushes automatically every couple minutes (which always makes you fear back splash) or just to hear how people are. But at the same time I see myself going to prayer and praying for things like new comm and my DG boys individually, things that I haven’t really been able to do well before. I know in a couple hours I’ll have access to a laptop and it kind of changes but at the same time….not really.
It’s also been a while since I threw on music and just listened to it. Nobody hears the voice of God and mistakes it for a mortal’s thoughts.
______________________________________________________________________
One last connection
I think I was scared of the loneliness. More than feeling overworked, tired and restless I think I was wholly more scared of the loneliness. Eight hours into this trip and already I’ve tried making communications to people over McDonalds WiFi even if it’s just snippets of small talk. On the bus I had such trouble just sitting there, not sleeping, not reading and just being with the Lord. And I realized this is actually a week that will test the robustness of my relationship with Him. How intimate are we? Kind of like my own version of “date me for three years”and it’s not like I don’t need it. Because here the ministry is gone. The christian friends are not here to proxy and I am wholly…alone. But it’s an important week because more than the fact that I need to med interview prep or finish off assignments, this year I have probably been more tethered to a small group of people more than ever before in university. The introvert does not have wide pools of friends, rather he is latched onto a small group of people he loves.
Clarence spoke of the mission field as a lonely place on missions night. And while I intend to go long term with a family/wife, the exercise is important. Despite the creeping tendrils of unofficial, nonmedical TSA, I know this week is a mission field. 24 people. I don’t know most of them, I know none on a deep level. So this week is more than work, editing my novel, reading papers and playing board games. The Lord has work set out for us this week. And although the loneliness is a bit daunting, I get to spend time with my Father. Why should my heart be sad?
the price of love is loss
but we pay anyway
Logically I should be sleeping but it happens to be one of those nights where I’m not all too worried about sleeping. A bit ironic seeing as my body is the most tired its been in a long time. Perhaps it’s because I have made several observations in the last few days and they are….interesting.
First is my growing stance on next year. I realize that whether or not I’m in formal executive leadership or not, I will be serving in some capacity in some way. It is almost actually part of my nature. How the Lord has led me through many years, teaching and showing me that His work is always so much more worth it and if I am to do anything, it should be to love His people. That isn’t quite new. But it is the capacity in which I may attempt to perform should I find myself here. I realize I really like the kind of thing Ken does. To aid leadership and help in their growth but not being the leader myself. At least for know, it seems that for the most of the last six years I have been serving, almost expected by people to fill that position. It has not been horrible per say or in any way detrimental. They have been blessings. But maybe for next year…I would like for once to simply see and guide from behind. Probably one of the most joyful things is seeing someone else lead a ministry with passion. Still, much of next year is up in the air so yea….
I now have a newfound respect for ballerinas. I do not know how they are alive. I barely made it through that lesson without cramping. I have a slight worry for how I will feel tomorrow morn.
Innertube water polo is a ridiculous sport.
I finished “the fault in our stars”. Within a day. Probably not my most enlightened choice but it was a bit too intriguing to put down for long. Such a witty book with random profound quips just embedded. Things like “you don’t get to choose if you get hurt in this world, old man, but you do have some say in who hurts you”. Part of me wishes that if I simply read enough of his works I would be able to write so beautifully. But the truth is that is not the case. Simply observing somebody play a sport doesn’t make you good at it. But yes, quite an intriguing read.
And it was nice to see people wanted to pray at prayer meeting. You would think it intuitive but it has taken a lot of trial and error. Who knows where it’ll go from here.
//
Today I was faced again with the thesis crisis. One of the prominent but pushed back topics in the “am I back next year” conundrum. It is still very much a conundrum.
Monkeys on my heart, rattling their cages
// in hindsight this post will make little logically flowing sense//
I sat in that sanctuary and I did not feel well. Not in some disease state but I could feel my stomach fold over itself, a tightness overall in my core. And it has nothing to do with the church, me doing lighting or anything. I haven’t been in this place in a long time. In a church worshiping with a congregation. The last I did it was kind of with CCF but it feels different with them. The time before that is was at MCBC and there….I am distant at best.
First song. Christ is risen. I didn’t write it here but during retreat that was probably the song I remembered the most. Apart from it’s high shout-ability, it was the lyrics of “come awake”. How it resonates with the idea of hope. Such a great hope is waiting for us people of God! Come awake! Come and live and see it! In short that was what God showed me about CCF. Some other things came up but the big thing was showing me that there was so much hope for the fellowship, his people and although I am sometimes frustrated, often times because of the men, it is because I wish more of them. It is because God has made them and desires so much more for them. Hope.
Here as I sang it today, there was still that feeling of hope and I wanted the church to come awake. But I could also feel the tiredness of this week kicking in. And I think that’s why I felt knotted. Because as much as I loved being amongst the church and serving, I could feel the tiredness. I didn’t think coming into the second week of the new term it would pick up so quickly. But between the three clubs I have and personal relationships, and the essay that hangs over for Monday, I can feel the busyness already clinging at me.
and so as I sit here I know what I need probably more than anything is to lie on my bed, not to sleep but to be in the presence of the Lord.
//
God has a nice sense of humor. Because as much as I was apprehensive about this relationship at the beginning of the year, fearing that I would be so egged on by the other, it has turned into a very interesting, blessed relationship. Three hours in a coffee shop is new for me. London fog is new for me but a less consequential kind of new. Hearing each other’s hearts and what we hope for the fellowship and identifying flaws in ourselves and what that means for each of us next year potentially. Haha I guess it was called a civil conversation. Even insight on my own lady feels. Those…sit at the same practical position. Dormant. But that is another conversation that will most likely not find its way here. But yea, it was such a nice thing to see the desire that both of us wanted to see men and women grow and build up to be all that God would have for them. Funny how we each think the other is more suited for that hovering leadership. Many different ways that could play out and all of them just so interesting and so at the end of it….it brought back tinges of the hope I was shown. Here was a man I knew would continue the good work that God is doing and who really wants it.
//
We are almost at the end of the sermon. Yes I wrote this during the sermon. I listened. A slightly ironic sermon because I think I have people telling me to not try and do so much with people.
Hello to you too, 2014
On most blogs this should be some kind of obligatory new years post. But as Christmas, the passing from one arbitrary day to another signifies very little to me. If anything, I live on the CCF calendar where January 1st means nothing less than the number of days before retreat or the number of days before I return to school (for which I am ill prepared). Ironically, I believe my non-Christian friends were much more excited about Christmas day than I was. So this isn’t a post about my entire year in retrospect. Youtube, Google photos and wordpress have attempted to summarize my year but it is mostly just symptoms and paltry at best.
The famous empowering quote goes that
our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. – Marianne Williamson
And it’s a fabulous poem, the whole thing. It’s been recited by epic people and at one point I think I had it somewhere on my Facebook profile. Maybe it’s still there. But what if our fear is actually that we are inadequate? That was rhetorical.
I realized today that one of my greatest fears, probably not my greatest, is that I will be my father. That could probably use some exposition. It is not that he is the worst human being on the planet, for I am sure that there are greater depths of depravity, but it is that he is a very bad representation of a husband. I say this having seen and recognized that my parents have a very dysfunctional relationship for many years and it is only because of particular circumstances that they are still living together. And it’s not even that the circumstance brings them together, at least not any more. I should also clarify that I do not regard his entire being as horrible. He is what I would expect of a worldly man. He is a decent father and I am grateful for many things in my childhood like him teaching me math early and reading with me before I went to bed and for the most part not bugging me about marks or how well I am achieving in school. For those things I am grateful and I will most likely carry many of things forward. But the role of husband, the one where you are to love someone and at the very least care about them and desire to share in life with them, for that one he is a poor representation. Because his depiction of marriage in this stage is that they are simply two very separate entities and that they only come together for big things or whenever it is convenient. And in a way I am kind of angry and frustrated because this is supposed to be the man that shows me what it looks like to love a woman. I mean I know he’s not a Christian but were the values of marriage so far off? Or did he become the prototypical example of individualism? I care not that I am the one left to hear my mother’s venting. For that I am fine. But I am also left with the debilitating feeling that I am completely useless in the matter. That as much as my cooking and assisting in cleaning can help to momentarily relieve the symptoms, there is no rest because there is nothing to go to when the cooking and cleaning is all over. I am frustrated by a man who I haven’t heard apologize for an argument maybe ever. Who spends at least half of his home time on his best day hidden behind a pair of headphones, a tablet screen or his phone. My sister and I joke that there’s a mid life crisis happening and as much as I joke about it, I hope it crashes soon. Because that’s the only way I see any real change coming. But I’m scared the world won’t let him down in time and everything will simply disintegrate instead. I realize counselling only works for someone who wants to change.
I’ve joked before that maybe the reason I’m so touchy with other guys is because I’ve never had affection from the usual Western place for that, the home. Maybe that’s why I try so hard to be transparent with people. Or maybe why I have such an affinity to Disney movies and romantic comedies because before the gospel, I didn’t know what it looked like to be in a marriage relationship. So my greatest fear is that one day I will become like my father in husbandry. And while I can’t comprehend how someone can marry someone without being at the very least interested in them and what their joys are in the same way that I can’t comprehend why people would make out but not date, very much like the latter I know that it can happen.
Philippians 1:6
what kind of heart doesn’t look back
I usually start these posts off with saying that I haven’t posted for a length of time. For this one it’s almost been two months. A lot happens in two months. I wrote a novel, I logistically turned 20, I had a lot of meetings, it can be said that I learned much. But those aren’t all necessarily things I want to write about right now. I think ideally I’d like to go out for a walk amidst the snowy and frozen streets in the darkness; it has a sort of calming effect I would presume. But I doubt I would be allowed and so for now, this will have to do. Tonight I write for no one because I’m sure it’s been so long that nobody checks any more. It’s a nice feeling. For those who know me, it’s a Sara bareilles and william fitzsimmons kind of night for me.
I thought the winter break would be restful or at least I had hoped dearly that it would be. But I’ve come to realize I don’t know what rest means right now. It’s been so long since I last had it that I can barely remember it. Like faint wisps. I lie on my bed and I can feel my fingers itching to touch something, reaching over for my phone. Or if not, I still have thoughts running through my mind. Logistics and administration, thoughts about the two movies I’ve watched in the last two days, knowing that I need not have watched them. But I decided to burn the time anyway. The whole semester I kept saying I was looking for rest. And yet in my prayers I’m not even sure if I asked for rest. I asked for eyes to see and ears to hear and God answered that. But did I really want rest? When you run for so long you’re not sure what it looks like to stop. I thought rest would come naturally when people started going away and I was forced back into a much more secluded environment. But instead I was received by the pandemic that is checking Facebook more often than I can remember or will admit to counting. I’m not even sure what I’m looking for on there. Most everything on there has no relationship to me. Heck, if anything it just feels fickle. And still I go to it.
I cracked open a Tozer book yesterday and a quote from another man was written there. It spoke of a man who when asked what he would do if he found out Jesus was coming back soon, his reply was that he wouldn’t change anything about what he was doing. I read that and I think about myself. What am I doing and would it change if I was told Christ was coming back in the next month. The next year. The next week. I didn’t know how to respond to myself. The immediate answer is yes. I would change it. But then the deeper probing begins. Why? What needs to change?
The reason why I’m running is probably a place to start. And this running isn’t necessarily the running of the race marked out for us as highlighted in Hebrews 12 when Paul writes. No, this is just running for the sake of running. Sometimes it aligns with the race marked out. Sometimes it’s a lap just for kicks, letting the adrenaline build up again so I never feel the drop. Ironic that earlier in the term I told somebody else to stop running from themselves. I’d still tell them that. For me, it’s not so much running from who I am and my past and my identity. For me it’s running from my future and the expectations that I inherently must deal with when looking at it. I wrote the MCAT, applied to med school partly with the mindset that it was something I’d try. Like Paul I’d start walking and I hoped God would tell me to go another route if He wanted me to. It’s really how I’d always thought of med school. Never had to go. Just would if I was given it. There were always better things to think about in the now anyway. But now I sit at a crossroads where the decision I might actually have to make in May can affect more than just me. It’s not just about whether or not I’ll go to med school or not. Whether I’ll be around for a 4th year of Health Sci. There’s a house lease that needs to be signed. And more importantly….there’s the talk of a committee position. It’s different from the bomb that was dropped in the summer of Grade 11 when my youth pastor insinuated very strongly that I’d be the chair when I was in Grade 12. I had anticipated it. It’s not like the idea was new. And in the same way, it’s not like the idea’s necessarily new here either. If anything, it’s been insinuated not by a youth pastor but by other friends this time. From there a fear creeps in. One that I haven’t necessarily let myself feel in a long time but that I was very much reminded of. How I can fail people’s expectations. How I can damage people. Oh that last one. I was recently reminded of the last and possibly the most pivotal time that I damaged somebody. More than sitting on Andy’s back in the fifth grade I damaged someone without knowing it. A few weeks back as the time slid past midnight I sat listening to two friends angrily vent with words coming out of their scarred hearts which had now built iron walls, frozen and callous. I realized how enduring the damage I dealt could have been. I thought of how to apologize, how to try and go back and say sorry again and I realized…it might very well be futile. I burned the bridge long ago hoping that they’d heal if they didn’t see me any more. see, hear, read, interact. None of it. So that feeling came back. Feeling like I could very well let people’s expectations of me down. It was catalysed by the feeling that the term has already come to a close. That the year has already ended, nominations for next year are up and what….what have you done? You came into the year so pumped and ready for men’s ministry. So full of passion and it’s not like that passion died. But it took so long to manifest didn’t it? There’s a sadness that is mixed in with the joy of growth. That it kind of took us an entire term to come to terms with our roles and how to move forward. And the forecast for next term is better but it’s already half over. In various meetings over the term we talked about what CCF was, what committee was, what my own role was, what CCF could look like. All of them good things. But all of them were spoken with the warning at the end: it’s going to take time.
So I went into my most common mechanism. Make yourself less worth of it and then, just maybe, you’ll never have to deal with the calamity of damaging someone. I mean that’s what I did for dating relationships isn’t it? Or at least I tried. If I become a bit gross, not bother to be fashionable, and just overall unappealing then no girl will like me and I’ll never have to deal with unintentionally breaking someone’s heart. It’s a little different with not wanting people to nominate me or expect that of me. I still don’t know what I’ve really been doing. I think for myself I let myself become lazy. Lazy with devos. Lazy with sitting in the presence of the Lord and being still. And how ironic that I was running away. My heart has been in misalignment for quite some time though I’m glad that it hasn’t fallen so far away that it no longer feels tugs from the Lord. Because I feel them every day. I just…sometimes don’t know how to go to them. The feeling of disappoint almost pervades into just about everything. For the second time in a row I failed to be a good BHSc Buddy. I couldn’t even schedule one meet up with them, my messages over Facebook in hopes of getting a common time came out empty. Feeling like I didn’t pour into my DG enough this term, going to Tuesday nights sometimes wholly unprepared. Not knowing what I was doing for a good number of DGL meetings and hoping that Matt had it covered. Not being able to make it out to a bunch of prayer meetings and despite trying to see them, still feeling wholly disconnected from my year. Not putting nearly as much effort as I should into leading Pneumatos, feeling completely at a loss for that ministry because it doesn’t feel like my own and yet it has been given to me. Seeing Evangel pretty much have to remind us every time to do things even though he’s supposed to have passed the torch down to us. Seeing rifts in the house and being unable to do anything about it because I’m not even supposed to know. And yet I still see God’s grace in it all. I see that despite me the DGL meetings haven’t been altogether bad, that the men enjoyed simply seeing each other. Hoping the DG feels pushed. So there’s the knowing that God has been working still despite myself and for that I am joyful. And yet I still carry a burden that I was not enough. And moving forward…I don’t know how to reconcile them. It’s not my first time with the thoughts. I just haven’t let myself wrestle in a long time.
I’m like an older son who keeps telling his father that he’ll go into the house. But for the longest time he hides out in the bushes, hides under the porch, gets as damn close to the door as possible but doesn’t go in yet. He looks absolutely FOOLISH and he knows it. but he won’t go in yet.
I was told in November in reference to my birthday banner that I was much loved. I don’t argue that. But I also feel a fear that I could do more damage than good. And right now…it’s kind of crippling. It’s been said and read that perfect love drives out fear. I’m still getting there right now.
green fringes on the sky
I don’t know what this feeling of blankness is. Not sure if it’s coming from just waking up at 4:30am or whether it’s actually a blessing to wipe my mind and to refocus on what everything is for. Because what was made clear is that I need to step back and prune the things I pour into. And this isn’t the first time I’ve heard this. Part of it feels like I’ve been running from going hard by going shallow everywhere. Baking a lot of pies, doing admin, fulfilling needs that I see everywhere. Realizing that as much as I like to do, as a pusher I actually want to see other people push. I don’t actually want to lead prayer meeting. But I want people to drive prayer meeting hard. It’s been really good to have people come up to me and ask me to push harder with the men I’ve been given. To be honest, I think I lost of bit of that responsibility.
And as much as it was nice to hear feedback from me, it was a good reminder that God has placed very good and real people that He is developing to lead. That there is a good balance between say, the frosh leaders. And to see leaders who maybe I haven’t seen in a while or I don’t have much idea about their ministry, to see them passionate and as strong, gifted people, it was nice.
I’m excited for this 5 day break. I don’t know if anything I’m saying makes sense. =P
//more than 36 hours later
I wrote the above when I was in class after our wombo combo. It sounds silly when typed. But that time was good even though I woke up at 4:30 to go. I wanted to see these people who wanted to walk deeply and go hard. All of them. It was an encouraging time and one where I received some revelation that I need to have a tussle with. Actually, if anything it already started to sink in yesterday as I was leading DG that night. But it was also good to see other people speak of what they were called to, to profess it with their mouths. I’ve said it before. I love to see people who are driven. I don’t want to drive everything, I just hate to see things left unattended to and floating in an ether of irresponsibility. Glad to see the younger generation has got a lot of great brothers and sisters that God is really building up. I mean I knew it and we knew it when we picked the leaders fr this year, but it was a good reminder to hear it again. It was also just nice to see the sun rise from the student centre. It means something when the sun only merges with the treeline just as you finish up your three hour meeting.
The rest of the day would turn out to be rather heavy. I guess it can’t be helped when one is up for 24 hours in a row. Not really constituting an all nighter but probably the first time I’ve done anything like that in a very long time. At least it gives me a bit of hope that if I do end up in the healthcare field, 12 hour shifts won’t be so bad.
One of the recurring pieces of feedback I got was that I have to cut down on my ministry in one way or another. I can’t keep going around looking for things to do. God has given me responsibilities, words and people to care for and me doing all these other things is neglectful of them. I realized that I’m going to have to do men’s and not just let it slip by but actually pray hard, push hard and really seek out the DG leaders as well as my own DG members. Yesterday night was a good reminder of that. Being able to speak the little experience that I’ve been given to one of my men.
I think this year, God has been bringing back a friend house in the same way that He did last year with my parents. Just as I forget or just as I feel like everything is going well He reminds me that there is much to be done. I was reminded of that yesterday. There had been notions all throughout the year to pray for them but it didn’t seem all that bad. And last night the Lord reminded me that there is so much healing to be done there. Sometimes I wish I had the ability to break down as easily as other people do. It’s really been a while. So much angst exists in that house and it’s going to need a lot more than pies. Still learning how to be gentle. Being firm but not fighting for your own argument simply because it is your own, but because it is the one that God wants.
And though the ordeal was very much just that, I realize now that it is the first time this year that I did something with her. We served together last year and all but this was the first time we had prayed with one another and really desired something solid together. Something that I needed to be strongly reminded of especially because her role hasn’t been too much in the forefront yet.
The year is moving very quickly and all the more yesterday was a call not to let it slip through but to dig deep and to go hard for the Kingdom. The talk raised a lot of questions to ask myself but that’s always a good thing.
As a last kind of comment, it’s strange that my future role in next year has been brought up on multiple occasions this year. I had never pegged myself for med school next year but I hadn’t wholly dismissed it either. I wonder where people get the impression that I will be…what they say I will be in the upcoming year. But that’s not something to really thing about. One ministry at a time.
“Come, everyone who thirsts,
come to the waters;
and he who has no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without price.
Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread,
and your labor for that which does not satisfy?
Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good,
and delight yourselves in rich food.
(Isaiah 55:1-2 ESV)
through and through the week
It’s one of those nights where I don’t feel in any way poetic so this isn’t going to be in any way eloquent but who needs it to be. It’s not like med schools are going to read this. It’s silly to think they’d bother searching me up on Facebook anyway.
I should have seen this coming. No, I did see it coming but I guess I had hoped it’d come after Monday when I could just drop dead and kick myself out of the house and go for walks. Because the past week has been madness. And it’s not like stuff is piling up or anything. True, everything got pushed back because of the OMSAS and I’ve been spending the last five days catching up. I’m not even fully caught up yet seeing as the biochem midterm looms over me.
And it’s not like things haven’t been fruitful either. DG was really good even though we were missing both our frosh. It’s a pretty straight-shooting group with not a lot of fluff. Like if I ask them, they’ll say it and I’m really excited for it. Tonight was also apparently good from feedback that people have said. Though I now realize the whole night it felt like the days in Koinonia when I would be leading a program. Because it’s this feeling of wanting to be part of a group and to be a part of building each other up. But instead I spend most of the night thinking about the next activity. And there was probably a bit of me that felt weird. I don’t usually plan “fun” activities probably because I feel there’s a lack of time already so I’m apprehensive to spend time in that. But even that sentiment probably comes from something deeper. Because I know in my logical mind that it’s necessary. That it was good to have this night and to know that guys can just hang out together. Maybe it’s the fact that I myself couldn’t really enjoy the activities. So many maybes but I guess it’s only natural as that’s my current state of being.
The main problem distraction tonight was my audition where I screwed up the song piece because I blanked super hard in the middle of it and didn’t recover. I probably pride myself on my singing more than acting and dancing, which I also don’t know how I did. It was probably that seeing the frosh gave me the feeling of being replaced because honestly, they look so beast. And maybe it’s for the best or maybe this is me putting way too much stock in whether I can perform. I find that’s the theme this week. Feeling disappointed in myself with applying incorrectly for Ottawa, finding that I cannot do everything that I set out to do, not finishing biochem in any way, being an almost total leech today for the CRAP quiz, not really preparing for DG until the last minute, feeling like I’m not doing anything in ministry, in other clubs in anything. Feeling like I have to perform to some degree for everything and not reaching it. And that’s why I’m tired. And my silly attempts to console myself do nothing. And this self-absorption seeps into everywhere. Oh the irony that tonight I talked to the men about sacrificing in accordance to Romans 12:10. Yet when I went home there I was, being so consumed in getting home and getting away that I did not really offer to walk a sister home. I let them go off because they said it was more convenient. Not that I have to walk them home but the way I handled it reveals a deeper issue.
Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor.
(Romans 12:10 ESV)
It’s nights like this that I wish I could play the piano because it sings like nothing else that I’ve heard, the nuances and the physical emotion that drives each press.
Trickles of the night
I haven’t posted in a really long time for a lot of reasons, the primary one being that I almost neglected all facets of life for this one thing that in the end, I did kind of wrong.
But more than the silly OMSAS and all that came with it, God’s really been tugging on my heart these past couple days of how important a vision and purpose are for ministry of any sort. From talks with a mentor to pop in chats with a house mate to prayer meeting sharing. This recurring idea that some things are lacking vision and its actually so detrimental. Not only does it leave chaos in its midst but it leaves a sense of unfulfillment. As if there is no substance. But it is a good struggle and one I am praying God will give me eyes to see through. That’s been a constant prayer : give me eyes to hear and ears to hear.
waiting for the falling
on my face.
It’s as if I anticipate more to come/ More work to be done. I come home and there’s another bike to fix. or there’s dishes in the sink. Or there’s something new to try.
As much as the hectic welcome week frenzy has ended, it doesn’t feel like anything has slowed down. Birthdays, bible studies, prestudies, club meetings, never leaving what seems to be enough time in between for anything. If I was to be very honest, I’m probably super behind in school right now. I know nothing about what’s happening in CRAP as a whole, only bits and pieces of concepts she spoke of in lecture. There’s a quiz due Saturday. There’s a literature search due on Monday.
In biochem I’m just going to class. Haven’t done any questions, read first two chapters but fearing edition 3 is some trap. There’s a quiz on Monday that’s actually worth a lot. It’s a good thing child health is slow to begin with. But already I can anticipate it being heavy as well.
And so it’s almost like I’m waiting for someone to stop me. To be honest, I don’t think I’ve had deep talks with anyone yet ever since I got back. And it’s not probably anybody’s fault but it’s a lack of really letting things go. I mean at prayer meeting it was nice and I did ask for balance and it was nice to see a brother be changed and to have his heart pointed towards Christ. But I think it’s very different. And this isn’t a cry for help or a public proclamation for somebody to talk to me. I have people in those roles. They’ve just been…busy and we’re having a hard time scheduling. But even then, it’s not like they’re an anchor for my soul.
Tonight I stood in the kitchen doing dishes while my housemates were jamming. And the analogy of Martha and Mary came to mind. But it wasn’t accurate because even after I joined them, there was very little if any rest. I was still doing. My mouth was still opening. My feet and fingers restless.
Holy Spirit turn down this body because I don’t know how.
why do we?
The last 3 days gave me a stark view into our hearts my heart and God also gave me clarity on why I desire certain things in the house.
For the last three days, 4 of us from our house woke up earlier than 7:45 to line up for roughly an hour for a chance at $25 to use at an athletics outlet. I’ll admit, I was quite enthralled by the prospect. Over the 3 days I got $65 worth of stuff you could say. But even on the first day, it struck me how odd this was. Here was this thing, monetary and frankly mostly unnecessary as far as living supplies went. We would wake up early, line up for it, sit on the dusty steps of our gym building waiting for the doors to open and a weary looking man to hand us a printed colour piece of paper with some words on it.
I thought of how willing I am to wake up an hour earlier every day for the Word. To spend time with the Lord. I’ll be honest, I struggled with whether or not I should go to morning prayer meeting. What if I’m late for the sale? Everyone else in my house is going. Crowd mentality right? In retrospect I’m almost disgusted that it was even a partial struggle. And in the end, God showed his grace: the day that I obeyed and sought Him first in the day, things worked out. I mean that even after we finished prayer meeting and we went to line up, we were still in the top 25. Not to say that the goal was always the money but it’s that being obedient is more important. And so it makes me sad how much we’re willing to do for something so temporary and altogether superfluous and yet how much are we willing to risk for Christ, when the rewards don’t look as personal or as easily grasped and spent?
It’s almost as if a part of me is internally screaming like Levi the poet, “Repent!”
Concurrently with this observation and revelation, God gave me clarity in why I insist on the basement people cleaning the basement washroom or why I want them to hep in the cleaning in general. It’s not so much that I want to see the house clean. I can clean things. Heck, I would probably do it whether they lived here or not like the toilet and sink in the basement. But I realized it’s because I want to see them take responsibility of something other than themselves, to see that their is a worth in putting their efforts into maintaining this house. Or moreover as a general rule, it makes me sad when I see a Christian who has been going to church for a while and has not found any way to serve. And I don’t care if it’s in CCF or not. I couldn’t care less about that. But I want to see men serving, seeing the Lord’s work in other places, seeing the world for more than what it can do for them. Because service doesn’t always bring immediate joy and it often takes time out of a schedule. But when you do it for the glory of God it’s an evidence of an inward surrender to Christ. And that’s what I want to see. Thinking about it puts me in the “almost crying” mode. Or maybe that’s the sad bareilles music in the background.
But DGL gives me hope. More importantly, knowing that this is what God wants in men and knowing that He’s God gives me hope. Thanks for renewing a passion for men’s that frankly, I was scared had diminished over the summer.
we wake to the sound of dancing
In retrospect, it was a tremendous blessing that I didn’t get to be a Pathogen this year. I don’t know how I would have managed CCF + Pathogen seeing people worn out by only one of those things. I’ve been meaning to blog for the past week really. Much has happened in the span of the week but I haven’t been given much time to think on it. As one would say, my introverted nature is feeling very neglected and wary of seeing so many people. Don’t get me wrong, I love the games and meeting new frosh but it doesn’t really always fill you up. It leaves me wanting for Him.
A week ago I was lying in a very different bed than this one. One in a little Korean-owned building that doubled as a church and backed into a forest of slenderman proportions. Probably at this very moment in time, the words blood-brothers were being said again for what was probably the tenth time. The committee retreat was very much needed. I mean we’d been out of contact for essentially the whole summer, only getting together really for the sake of logistics and doing our homework. Even still, 24 hours wasn’t quite enough. But sharing our testimonies was really important. Seeing where God has been in each of our lives brought a sense of realness. Brought out where each of us are today and how we see God working. It was probably especially valuable for me to learn of Zach. I still got mad trolled by him (something I still need to come to terms with) but it was a blessing to see that beneath all of it, he could ask serious questions and desired genuine worship.
But it ended quite abruptly, sending us all packing for what was to be a week of being thrown into unfamiliar familiar territory. Like a ramped up version of what I’d known.
Before retreat I’d also been to Deedz. Met some other Christians, met someone who knew my housemate. But the biggest part of the night was feeling so low in remembrance. I’d forgotten it, this kind of relational evangelism where we meet people and speak with them. Speak with them of their roots, of what they’re up to now, and of our story. The need to pray for the world had been left in the recesses of my mind tagged with “will do later”. That night the Lord reminded me that even if it’s awkward, to go. And I got to learn more about a sister who I’m growing to admire. “I’ll only say yes to it if I have time to pray for it” she said. It spoke so loudly of who she was.
My farewell to Markham wasn’t particularly graceful. That weekend I hadn’t gone to church because of the retreat. Still, I had been able to regroup with the 3 to chat, eat and pray. And really, that’s more than I could ask for despite possible premature deafness. =P A last minute meeting with Shawna concluded the Pneumatos related happenings of the summer, a good reminder of the need for vision and coupled with that, endurance.
How different that universe is from CCF. Everything fast paced, 4-5 meetings a week with different and the same people, new people everywhere, digging in Word over and over again. But as I briefly discussed with Ben, that isn’t usually the case in post-undergrad life and it’s important to realize that.
Coming back it was as if I never left. The house needed a bit of cleaning but in terms of the people, we all got back into our usual things. The three of us did our cleaning and began to tidy up, I was sad to see some already being reclusive but I know that some of us have made goals to be more intentional. I see so many faces each day, already 15 from my own year and I want to know how every one of them are doing, how their summers were, how they’ve grown in their depth of the knowledge of the Gospel. But alas, most of this week was filled with activities that couldn’t facilitate that well. Collander was a lovely time and full of wonderful laughs and so was Just Dance. But they leave something to be desired. I know DGs will start soon and that’s exciting. But for now, the week has been filled with a lot of admin-ing, adding emails, fixing up the blog, printing sheets, making forms, coordinating different groups. Even my house has contributed to this tiredness; many games and watching of movies/shows have taken place but they lose their merit when they reach a certain degree. I mean no enmity with games. I found Saboteurs most fun and enjoy being with my house. But my heart desires substance and it feels that for all that has happened in the past few days, not much has been found.
But reading through the OT is going well. A continual reminder of a few themes. God is more powerful than we imagine, He is holy, the Israelites (and by extension, us) are a very forgetful breed, and it is not by their holiness that God has chosen them but because He loves them and has chosen them.
The next day speaks of more meetings. 3 in total if it is to be counted. I wonder if the dancing rain will greet my waking tomorrow.
Let’s pretend we’re all healed up and happy and moved on
That’s a line from a song that I was just listening. So it’s not to say that’s my sentiment at the moment though at the same time, it feels pretty real.
The next few days don’t look particularly slow paced so I think I might as well end the night with an attempt to process things.
As the two weeks of VBC ends, I can see the summer literally trickle away. This august that I had assumed to be filled with excitement and reflection passed by almost unconsciously. There was a nice week after MCAT of a little quietness, reading The Hobbit, fleshing out a bit of my not-so-far novel but even that was filled with the underlying rush task of coming up with a wedding slideshow and having multiple fails on various devices.
Then VBC quickly approached. I think one change in the past 2ish years has been that feeling of detachment from those that I’m with. Almost like I’m borrowing them (the children) from someone else who really has them. At least that’s how it felt this year. I knew I’d only be around for a week and then someone else would be taking them. Mixed in with the constant feeling of tiredness, I know that my effort this year was different and probably less than in my youth. Part of me is heavily considering applying for coordinator next year but I wonder if even that is a cop-out. I know that I’m a good planner not as a point of pride but because I’ve actually done it and God has put in me a desire for organization and logistics. But at the same time, as spoken in the devo that I read that week, of course those that work out of their own strength grow weary. But it is the supernatural Holy Spirit that give supernatural strength for the work of God. And that’s something I’ll have to struggle with this year too, especially after talking to Freddy today about the state of Pneumatos and realizing that my own preconceptions of Pneumatos and half-heartedness contributed to the current confusion. I had dreamed a little but hadn’t given it to God trusting that He would actually build it despite seeing committal problems and not having a lot of outside support.
Two smallish but significant things that randomly happened.
At Frosh Connexion I was recognized by an old student in my Peer Tutoring class. And it was actually such a surprise and he looked different, primarily older, but it simply amazed me that he had this change of heart. I mean he was still a bit goofy but he made the joke that he wasn’t any more trouble because he’s converted. Thinking back, I was pretty much stunned by seeing him and didn’t really respond very much. But to see him firstly finishing high school and going to college and secondly, pursuing fellowship and Christ, it really reminded me of God’s character; He calls the most unlikely of people to Himself.
And meeting up with Ben was nice. I was a little worried I’d be anticlimactic (he makes everything sound epic) in comparison with his other meet ups and I didn’t want to leave my cousins for too long at the ROM but the time turned out to pass by really quickly. I would’ve liked to be able to pray for one another as there’s a lot happening for both of us pretty soon, though probably more change in his life than mine. In a way, we’ve shared many of the same things. Frosh leading, health sci, the same DG, committee. But at the same time, we’re very different people: I’m much more task-oriented and overall quiet whereas he loves talking and is probably more emotionally driven. I’m excited to see him challenged and although he’s not particularly close by anymore, I don’t think the friendship is over. It’s been a real blessing to learn from him and to see his passion in DG this year. He may not always be the most sensible man but I thank God for his wisdom.
And here I am again, ending a post without really having cohesively tied it all together. Still that feeling of summer fragmentation.
Georgian Bay sunsets
I have yet to process a lot of things. I seem to have grown much slower with processing. I think I’m accustomed more to trends than day to day lessons now.
But as I think back on VBC this past week, I can’t help but think of how I was when I was younger. My great fervor with which I longed for the kids’ hearts and I wanted to gift them and my energy was so much more full. I feel like now I get this verse so much more.
Have you not known? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable.
He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength.
Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted;
but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.
– Isaiah 40:28-31
I’m still considered young. But I can see what my a good friend was saying when she said she seems to have a childlikeness that she once possessed. And in a way, I feel very similar. I think my heart has grown hardened, trapped in a world of what is “feasible” and expected. I may pray expecting but it may not he much that I’m ready to expect.
Holy Spirit free me to dream bigger.
T +10
I haven’t had the chance to write a post-MCAT post yet. This originally drafted a lot time ago but every day I think I’ve wanted to spend time away from a more public thought space in order to actually gather myself. Or there are some days that I’m seriously drained and not quite in the mood to write very much. Today feels like one of those days but I have the feeling that’s how it’ll feel every single day of this week.
Looking back, I realize that coming out of the MCAT, I was quite inconsiderate. For those who messaged me that day or asked me subsequently how it went, I apologize if I came off as whiny and self-absorbed in my own self-pity. Now that I actually tie it together, the past few days’ devos on proper thankfulness have been quite relevant. The test went as it did and while it didn’t feel spectacular while I was writing it or after I had left, nobody knows until 30 days after anyway. At the time, the most absorbing thing was the thought that I might actually have to rewrite the test in September and thus, spend another month studying. I had dreaded the idea of that. The test was supposed to free me from this madness that I seemed to blame for my summer. In the end I decided against retaking the test in September. it was a mixture of convincing myself that I had done decently but also the fact that there were things I wanted to do this month apart from studying and finally, that it was fine if I didn’t get into med school this year. That last one was never a hard one to come to terms with.
The following trip to the states was good, albeit a little more stressful than it should’ve been. Having two days to shop two malls and go to Christmas town is not really enough time. And it was also the first time in a while that I’ve had a real life application of “give to Caesar what is Caesar’s”. Seeing that some things that I’ve become used to and complicit in are actually quite directly contrary to Christ’s command.
As for the following week since I wrote the MCAT, I’ve been slowly getting myself re-accustomed to other things. I’ve started reading again, albeit not necessarily the books I had intended to during the year. I started and finished The Hobbit. I think part of it was to get my mind in the idea of what a work of fiction is like. It’s been so long since I’ve read recreationally and I must say, it was nice. I love the simple feel of a book in my hand. In conjunction with that I’ve been working out a couple more things for the novel. I think I’m spending way too much time in the beginning of the novel but then again, there’s still quite some time.
I haven’t seen a lot of people. There seem to be a lot of events in the next couple days revolving around reunions or hanging out. As much as I miss people, I’m not sure if I want to enter so quickly into that. I know come September I will almost instantly be thrust back into an environment of seeing friends and intimate interpersonal fellowship. But for now, I’d like to be able to be quiet. It’s been a while since my soul has actually felt there wasn’t so much looming over me that I could rest.
I’ll head off to bed now seeing as I have VBC and then frosh connexion tomorrow. I also feel like an old man at VBC. Tired already by 2pm even with only 5 decently well-behaved kids. I’m also probably one of the 10 oldest volunteers. It’s come to that.
When I had first drafted this post, I was listening to a sermon and although this was only a minor portion, it resonated again with my exploration in the OT:
And he said to them, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory? ” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself. (Luke 24:25-27 ESV)
I’m actually seeing a lot from the law. Examples of Moses and Aaron interceding, the fact that God organizes His people so that all are cared for, His impartial nature towards sojourners and Israelites alike which foreshadows the welcoming of Gentiles in the NT.
T minus one
Haven’t posted here in two weeks. Probably because I don’t really have much to show in these two weeks except for sets of three numbers. And in the end, what does that matter?
I guess it could be said that I’ve been waiting for this day for a very long time. Probably a month. And yet, now that I’m in it, I’m not quite sure what to do with myself.
I feel like I’m just waiting for the day to end. For 10 to come. But even still I have the urge to review last minute formulas or facts about spermatogenesis (I still known nothing about repro after anatomy and a class).
But I think at this point, the nerves aren’t necessarily associated with med school or not being able to apply this year. I know that I’m at peace with that. Whether I end up in med school, in nursing or whatever it is, God’s blessed me with a kind of peace in that.
No, if I’m to be honest, it’s simply the fear of failing. It sounds so darned cliche too. But I haven’t honestly failed something…since grade 6 probably. Sure there are times when I’ve wished that I could do better but if often turns out neutral if not decently good. But this is probably the first thing that has had such a heavy bearing and at the same time, I KNOW that I am not prepared. There are chapters in the bio textbook I have never touched. There are physics formulas I have not memorized. And ultimately I know it’s all a game of luck. My last two practice test marks should be reassurance, I mean they’re the highest I’ve ever gotten. But I attribute that not to knowledge but to the fact that they gave me passages I was familiar or at least semi-familiar with.
So really, it’s not a question of my future. It’s a matter of my pride. And fearing that for once, I might actually fail. Sounds lame eh? not that it matters what whoever reading this thinks. Unless it’s me from the future. Still doesn’t matter.
The past few devos have been about obedience. In accord with being one who does the Word. Now my own delving into the word for the past while has been reading through the law and how the Israelites are to be camped. I know the narrative begins again soon but that’s besides the point. I need to see it as more than just a reference book. Maybe I’ve been answering with it for anomia because that’s what I’ve made it. But it’s so much more than that.
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Ideally, I’d like to finish this post. But the night has already come and I think it better that I stop this now. Hopefully I’m tired enough to fall asleep…
The Unforced Rhythms of Grace 