i miss you and what we shared.
I’ve tried my best, yet it comes back time and time again.
I’m sorry, I hope you know that.
Plunging into the deep!
July 26, 2011
Hello there!
The past 2 weeks or so has really challenged me in perhaps every way possible. But I suppose “every way possible” isn’t many ways. Nevertheless, God is an awesome God indeed. Even in moments where I struggled so greatly to trust in him, he was still the God in my situation. He gave me the grace to say three very simple words, ” I surrender all”.
Couple weeks ago, I began to feel very lost. I felt that I not heading in any direction and that my journey with God grew very much stagnant. My emotions too was also like a rollercoaster. Sometimes I felt high up there with God, the next moment, I’m struggling again. It came to the extent where these words, “It’s not about how you feel” meant nothing to me because I didn’t know how I was feeling. I knew that probably these inconsistency in emotions was due to my relationship with God. Which was pretty much unstable though I didn’t want to admit it. There were so many questions in my heart, so many emotions within and it was really a complete mess within. Though I was able to still say that God was in control and that he is still father, it came very much from my mind but not my heart.
However, over the course of these few days, I’ve come to realize many things about myself with the aid of someone. These words, struck me quite a bit. “Distorted image of Love”. The words “image of love” just spoke to me greatly. Reflecting on these words stirred my heart and I knew it was from God. As I spoke to a friend, Derek, I began to realize how my image of God’s love too was distorted. Yes, though I’ve experienced the love of my heavenly father many times and though I was questioning how was this possible, it was true. My image of Love was distorted. And because of this distortion, it prevented me from receiving my Heavenly Father’s love completely. This distortion was due to many reasons and I think one large factor was the past relationship I had with my previous girlfriend. This image was derived very much from the relationship I had with her. Love, to me was transactional. I had to do something to receive love. Which is completely distorted because God came and comes to me loving me. In my brokeness, in my flaws, in my imperfections. He is a God who loves. And when I realized this distortion and just allowed God to love me, he just told me to look back on all the times I felt loved. The 6 weeks I spent with him in SOW especially. In that 6 weeks I felt loved by both human and God. By my community there and God. And I was simply loved there. No strings attached. Just plain, pure love. And that was what God was telling me, that I love you as my child. “I simply love you!” says the Lord. It was indeed a time of great healing as well as reconciliation. It’s funny how something so fundamental such as love can so often be overlooked by us, humans. But I suppose that’s how love is. It is so simple yet so great. And God is love. Simple, yet Great.
Thank you Jesus.
It’s good to be back!
July 4, 2011
Hello peeps!
It’s really been some time since I last blogged. Looking at my previous post, it was Easter that I last posted! So, I decided to do a reflection and wow, it’s really been a good 2 months with Jesus. The past 2 months has been truly one of immense struggle for me and even until this day, I still feel the struggles and tussles within my heart. But nevertheless, Jesus has been faithful to me in such a tangible way!
Chasing after the heart of Jesus really isn’t as easy as I thought it would be. Along the course of these 2 months, I’ve asked God countless times, “Why must it be so difficult?” But Jesus always gave me the same reply, “It isn’t about how you feel anymore.” And truly, this walk with Jesus isn’t about how I feel anymore. Looking back, the journey with Jesus although difficult, has been increasingly intense each day. Many days, I’ve felt extremely dry and empty, as if God wasn’t present but as each day passed, I was challenge more and more to believe that Jesus is still there even though I may not be able to feel it. And in times where I fail in my challenge, be it falling into sin, running away or the thought of just giving up, the faithfulness of God never ceases to push me on. It wasn’t God taking away the feelings of dryness or emptiness but the grace of God, unconscious to me, giving the strength to fight for God in these times of darkness. To be a soldier for him and to really fight for him, to fight to receive once again the love which flows from his heart. Truly these months has been one of growth in this area of commitment to the will of God as well as faith in the Living God. The God that is as Alive as ever!
The months has also been one of great healing for me. I suppose when God places his finger on something, you just know it. And God has been placing his finger on this area of love. Somehow I was afraid of being loved. And because I feared to receive love, my desire for love was not met and I felt very much alone in all these struggles. I felt like I had to carry the burdens all alone. I felt so hurt by a relationship I had with someone and I felt very much guilty for hurting this someone as well as myself. I blamed myself for whatever that happened and I really couldn’t forgive myself. But in the midst of all these, Jesus spoke to me in my time of prayer, “Leave everything. Your burdens, worries, hurts and frustration and just come and sit with me.” He spoke to me once again on Friday, which was the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, “Come find rest in my Sacred heart.” And finally in last Sunday’s Gospel( Matt 11: 25-30), it said come to me all who are tired and weary and I will give you rest. My yoke is easy to bear, so come my child, come. Such intimacy with the Father moved me to tears. And truly, God was there, in my struggles, in my hurts and in my brokenness saying, It is okay to be broken. For Jesus too, was broken man on that cross. But by the power and love of God, he was made whole. And the same applies for each of us! Praise you God!
Love,
Stephen
Eyes on Jesus.
April 23, 2011
Hello brothers & sisters!
How’re all of y’all? Clinging unto Jesus I hope! Well it’s Holy Saturday and just hours before the Easter Vigil mass and my heart is truly captivated by the heart of our Lord Jesus! His faithfulness never fails to amaze me, his love never ceases captivate me! How wonderful, how glorious is his name!
Holy week has been one of great struggle for myself as I really didn’t have time for myself due to orientation and the many events going on in Church. My heart truly felt so tired, frustrated to a certain extent, empty. Unconscious to me, many negative emotions welled up in my heart and it just made things worse. It wasn’t until I entered mass on Maundy Thursday that God revealed to me these emotions within my heart and to be honest, I felt really confused because I really tried to let go of it but the emotions just remained. The void within just grew larger and larger. I recall the Lord telling me these words, “Your desire is so great, yet your flesh is so weak”, as I sat down in adoration in church. It didn’t make sense to me then and this emptiness within my heart continued on to Good Friday. My constant question to Jesus was why? why am I feeling so distant from you? Yet, I didn’t get my answer.
However, as I sit here this morning, I testify to all that this God of ours is a God who will answer, perhaps not immediately but answer he will. As I just sat down in morning prayer, I would say I dragged myself to the bathroom to wash up and then drag myself to enter prayer. And as I entered prayer, Jesus just started to speak within, explaining the reasons why he seemed to be so absent in my heart. It was because my eyes were not entirely fixed on him, my heart was so distracted by so many things that surrounded me. School, events, proving myself to others. And my heart was not aligned completely with Jesus. Also, he wanted me to experience that hunger for him, that deep spiritual hunger to hear his voice. He spoke of the need for my to constantly fixed my eyes on him. To desire only him and him alone.
And as I enter Easter, this time of celebration, I desire to fixed my eyes on him. Not because I have to but rather, because I want to. Not because I love him, but because his love is overflowing! And truly as it says in Romans 6, You live not under law, but under grace, the grace of our Lord Jesus, the grace of our Heavenly Father. The God who comes down to his people through Jesus. The God who loves his Children. Jesus, who has won for us our Salvation through his blood. Through his cruel, violent, inhumane death, has destroyed the depth of darkness of our Sins. The cross is how evil and is the magnitude of darkness of our Sins! Yet, this darkness is overwhelmed by the light of Jesus because he gave himself up for us! And so my brothers and sisters, I invite you to join me as I gaze upon the cross, and as I fix my eyes upon the heart of Jesus, to chase it with all that I am.
“Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal bodies, to make you obey their passions. Do not yield your members to sin as instruments of wickedness, but yield yourselves to God as men who has been brought from death to life.”
– Romans 6:12-13
Father, make me Your new creation. For all things flows from your throne of grace. Everything that I am, is your grace. Surrendered, I am.
Love, Stephen
Awaken my Heart, Father.
March 11, 2011
I feel so excited for the plans that my heavenly Father has made for me this weekend! The joy and excitement just stirs my heart this afternoon. God truly has prepared an amazing weekend for me, to really deepen my relationship and desire for him, to purify my heart even further and to continue molding me into the man he desires me to become. I full faith this weekend, as I enter into my community’s retreat that I will come out just in awe of God my father. Just desiring even greater to be his son, to chase him and to chase him with all my heart. I honestly don’t really know how I am feeling now but all I know it is just a great sense of positive energy flowing through my heart and this energy, this joy, this excitement only comes from God. He is the only man who can put such a great flow of energy within me. Truly my heart rejoices now in the presence of God my Father.
Father, awake my soul to see the glory of your name. In my heart Lord, awake me, awake my senses to just deepen my great desire to follow you. Put within me a fire that can never be extinguished. I challenge you Lord, to show me your love every single day of my life. I challenge you Lord, to awaken my heart.
My heart, for yours.
March 9, 2011
“Reveal to me your heart Jesus, show me your face.” This has been my prayer for the past few days. To truly allow me to see the power of his cross and the magnitude of the love behind his sacrifice, so that I may receive even greater this lent. And somehow, this desire to just see the heart of Jesus has brought me into a time of deeper reflection into his the Cross that he bore for us.
Recently, I had a dream that I was going to be crucified on the cross. And in the dream, as I lay on the cross awaiting the nails to be driven into my palms, a huge sense of fear overwhelmed my heart. The fear within was just so great, the fear of the pain and just the thought of the blood rushing out as the nail pierced through my palms, just crippled me. Thankfully, as I felt the tip of the nail touch my palm, I woke up. And at about 5.15 in the morning, I felt just a small fraction of the fear which Jesus went through. And later in the morning, I just had this prompting to watch the Passion movie, to better understand the true Passion of Christ. And as I watched, it dawned upon me that this man didn’t just die for me, he didn’t just suffered for me. And watching it, my heart ached and ached and ached to the extent where I could not continue watching. This was the man whom I’ve been speaking to in the adoration room, this was the man who has been healing me of the hurts within me and this was the man whom I had fallen in love with. And to see him, not just dying for me but really his flesh was torn out and whose blood was literally poured out for me, it just made my heart ache so much. Yet, as he carried his cross up to Calvary, he met his mother and he said these words to his mother. “See mother, I make all things new.” And these words, it just struck my heart in a way which I truly cannot explain. The magnitude of the love behind these words. What did he make “all things new” for? For US!
Finally, as I watched Jesus being nailed onto the cross, I thought to myself, what can be greater than this? What suffering can be greater than this. What love can be greater than this. Love, is an understatement to Jesus’ Cross. And now, as I just write out this post, I would say throughout my journey with Jesus, I’ve never been so touched by any other love. Just seeing him scourged, mocked, humiliated, nailed on the Cross and his blood just dripping from his head to his toe, I would say God deserves my heart. Lent, is a time of Sacrifice for Jesus. Truly, he deserves my sacrifice for the greatest sacrifice he made for me. I believe this Lent, God calls me to surrender my heart to his just as his Son, Jesus, surrendered, despite the great fear with the knowledge of how much he would suffer as he bore our sins. But nonetheless, Jesus surrendered his heart to his father. So Lord, I surrender my heart to you, Father into your hands, I commend my spirit.
Show me your heart, show me your face, So that Lord I may give you my heart, in exchange for yours.
March 3, 2011
Wisdom, is the ability to recognize one’s flaws and to see another’s strength. This has been my personal reflection recently, I’ve constantly been asking God, “what is his plans for me now?” And the Lords, constant reply to me is to follow in the footsteps of Jesus. Today, as I ponder on my relationship with God, there are so many areas of my heart where God isn’t present or places where I am afraid to let God enter.
Yet, as I reflect on the life of Jesus, there is so much that I have to learn from him. His humility, his wisdom, his patience and most importantly, that intimacy he had with his Father. That amount of faith and trust in his father. You know, as i was just having some time of silence yesterday, Jesus somehow just appeared and he took me by the hand and just told me to have a walk with him. And in that walk, I just told him how much of a struggle it was for me sometimes to connect with God, to follow God. And his reply to me was simply just to build up a relationship with him before I enter deeper into my relationship with God. Jesus says in the Bible that he is the way, the truth and the light. The way to the Father. And truly, there’s so much which Jesus can teach me. His life was truly a testimony for all who desire to follow God with all their heart.
And so Lord, today I pray for the grace, the grace to follow in the footsteps of Jesus. Grant me the ability to have Faith like Jesus, that trust and desire to do your Will. Just allow me to learn to walk with you Father.
February 19, 2011
The journey throughout the past two months has been indescribable. Being on the School Of Witness (SOW) for the past 2 months or so has just been so beautiful. The community, the sessions, most importantly, discovering the love of God for me. It has never ever struck me that I never really actually knew what or who God is.
Reflecting back, I didn’t really know God at the start of the School. But during the first week, someone asked me a question, “Do you know God?” I didn’t. My faith and my walk with Jesus was pretty stagnant. But throughout this 6 weeks, I’ve grown to discover and understand this man whom i call my Lord. I have come to know Jesus, the Holy Spirit and God the Father. And never in my life have I experienced such an immense love. I’ve constantly been soaking and drenching myself in the Father’s pool of love. This love is overwhelming, it is not just a feeling of love. It is a feeling of being outrageously, excessively loved. God’s love is supreme and truly it is unending. I testify to this awesome awesome love.
Now that the School is ending, somehow there is fear within me. Fear that once I come out from this “safe” place of mine, I would lose this love and desire for God. But God assures me that I will not lose it so long as i Depend on Him and Walk with Him in Faith. To be “planted, built up in Christ. Firm in the Faith.”
Do you know God?
empty hands held high 