a drop of water

Finally broke the 1GB (1003MB) storage and the 10K (10022) conversation barriers in gmail last week, and no, I do not save spam nor do I store my picture collection in my email. Speaking of pictures, I am in progress of uploading selections from the past five year’s archives of pictures to a flickr account linked here. Not all 33K pictures will go up, just the best or the funniest or those worthy. Thanks Benson for the account / graduation gift.

Also, congrats to Ryan and Christine, but I doubt either of you read this, haha, since I have about 4 readers, haha.

Jenn and I were talking about the idea that love is not really unconditional, nor does it ask for nothing in return…

I want to challenge the time-honored saying that true love is unconditional. Can love be unconditional? If love was unconditional, does it mean that it does not ask anything in return? What I am trying to say is that true love cries out for a response; it does ask for something in return. That’s why it is easier to love people who love you, and harder to love people who do not love you. You can love someone who loves you because their love for you is hinting respectfully that you return the love; their love experienced by you catalyzes your love for them. When someone does not love you, loving them is not a natural response.

So, I concede that true love is unconditional; there are no prerequisites to love: if what love asks for in return is not met, love continues on in perseverance. But that does not mean that love asks for nothing in return. I believe that it asks for love in return. For example, when Jesus died on the Cross for our sins, he did it because God so loved the world. Would it be okay to say that God’s act of love asks for a love response? When we love people through God’s power, would it be ok to say that we are in a sense also asking for a love response towards God (instead of ourselves)?

The musical worship was rejuvenating because of the combined passion of the student leaders, the maturity and talent of the worship team, and most powerfully, the presence of the Holy Spirit. Each of the three speakers spoke with a contagious, invigorating excitement and urgency. Each of the three messages refueled essential parts of my life. The first message challenged us to pray with all honesty, “Your kingdom come, your will be done,” to invite God to work through our lives. The second message challenged us to evangelize the good news of the gospel as “the time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is near” in new world view that moves people from a decision to follow Christ, to a transformation in following Christ; from an individual faith to a community based faith; from an after death orientated life to a mission oriented life. The third message challenged us to walk by faith through rejection and failure because God uses them to mature our souls like he did with the blind man who was rejected by his friends, his family and religious authorities after being healed by Jesus. It was an empowering weekend, and now I am back at work.

Ignite Website

Last Thursday we listened to a message by Ricky Myatt, Pastor at Seacoast Community Church. His main message seemed to be that God’s faithfulness is shown not so much in his provision but more so his presence.

I think there is a balance. I would say that God’s faithfulness is shown in the provision of his presence. With that said, Pastor Myatt’s definition of ‘provision’ is weighted by our sense of what we need and more often, what we want. God’s faithfulness is shown not in providing what we want, but providing what we need. This is a shift in perspective. In the United States, the line between what we need and what we want is muddled by culture where ease and relaxation are virtuous. Often times what we really need, what will help us mature, etc is rarely realized. So this got me thinking.

We often study the Parable of the Talents to mean that God has given certain people talents, abilities, etc to use for the kingdom of God, to invest in people, and produce returns. We look on Talents as positive abilities, resources, etc; positive in a world’s definition, but what if we considered Talents from a God perspective. What if we considered the events and happenings in our lives which we have no control over, that we consider as bad luck, to be talents that God wants us to be using to help other people. Events and circumstances that ‘happen’ to us could be used for good if we change our perspective from an individual introspective view to a community-extrospective view (is that word? — haha).

This week Pastor Miles gave part 5 of his series, Road Trip, on the Numbers chapter 16. The tag line was ‘Follow the Leader,’ and Miles outlined the differences between natural and spiritual leadership. Here is a brief breakdown:

Natural Leadership
Independent
Self confident
Knows men
Makes own decisions
Motivated by self gain
Originates own methods
Enjoys commanding others

Spiritual Leadership
God dependent
Confident in God
Knows men and God
Seeks God’s will
Motivated by love for God and man
Follow God’s methods
Delights in obeying God

Miles compared Korah (natural leadership) with Moses (spiritual leadership). There were five points as follows:

1. Korah puffs himself up before man but Moses casts himself down before God.

2. Korah calls men to follow himself, but Moses calls men to follow God.

3. Korah devalues God’s assignment and Moses honors it.

4. Korah focused on himself but Moses focused on the people

5. Korah’s pride destroyed him while Moses’ humility brought him honor.

For point 1, I realize that when I find my self-worth in what others think of me, I am at their mercy, but if I were to find my self-worth in God then I am at the mercy of a loving, all powerful God. For point 2, when we have anyone following us we need to realize that we are following God first and their following is not due to any inherent worth of the leader. For point 3, I find myself always wanting something on the other side of the hill where the grass I hear is greener. For point 4, it’s hard to put others above yourself, but Christ did it, becoming obedient, even to death on a cross. For point 5, I forget too often that my source is God. I can not do anything good unless it is him who works good through me.

Miles summed it bu stating that natural leadership is all about manipulating people for your personal ends, while spiritual leadership is all about receiving.