who do you trust

I read this just now and i'm going to paste it here. Sorry about the English.

Reader, this is an important question. Listen to the Christian’s answer, and see if it is yours. “On whom dost thou trust?” “I trust,” says the Christian, “in a triune God. I trust the Father, believing that he has chosen me from before the foundations of the world; I trust him to provide for me in providence, to teach me, to guide me, to correct me if need be, and to bring me home to his own house where the many mansions are. I trust the Son. Very God of very God is he—the man Christ Jesus. I trust in him to take away all my sins by his own sacrifice, and to adorn me with his perfect righteousness. I trust him to be my Intercessor, to present my prayers and desires before his Father’s throne, and I trust him to be my Advocate at the last great day, to plead my cause, and to justify me. I trust him for what he is, for what he has done, and for what he has promised yet to do. And I trust the Holy Spirit—he has begun to save me from my inbred sins; I trust him to drive them all out; I trust him to curb my temper, to subdue my will, to enlighten my understanding, to check my passions, to comfort my despondency, to help my weakness, to illuminate my darkness; I trust him to dwell in me as my life, to reign in me as my King, to sanctify me wholly, spirit, soul, and body, and then to take me up to dwell with the saints in light forever.”

Oh, blessed trust! To trust him whose power will never be exhausted, whose love will never wane, whose kindness will never change, whose faithfulness will never fail, whose wisdom will never be nonplussed, and whose perfect goodness can never know a diminution! Happy art thou, reader, if this trust is thine! So trusting, thou shalt enjoy sweet peace now, and glory hereafter, and the foundation of thy trust shall never be removed.

Source: ccel.org

~shalom~

learning from phil 2

I was really encouraged going through philippians 2 with jim and hannah. Even though its was just the three of us, we had a good time, a lot of laughs.

I'm reminded again what it means to be humble. It means to be like Jesus, He gave his life up for us so that we can be free, and receive the redemption that can only come through his death on the cross. As someone said for Jesus to come and live like a human was like for a human to become an earthworm. Although not an accurate equivalent, it gives us an idea of how low he had to come all because of him love.

Paul encouraged the people to live in unity, having one heart, one purpose. And its interesting that unity comes when there is humility. When no one seeks his own but regards the other higher than himself. This is not to say we lose our self worth. We are all bought with a price and are a priced Jewel in the hands of the maker. But really for unity to exist, someone has to play the fool and look stupid so that peace can win over. Bible says by this shall men know that you are my disciples, when you have love for one another.

It was interesting that we had covered this topic because just before the meeting we were discussing about how to increase the participation of the members and commitment and there all the answers we were looking for was there, in the text for the day.

Perhaps the most challenging thing paul encourages his brothers and sisters in Philippians 2 is not to complain or argue about anything thats right, he said ANYTHING. This he put in another way when he said be careful for nothing but in everything through prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God and the peace of God that transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Its easy to just say oh, i won't worry about anything because the bible says so and become indifferent and lazy. Thats not the purpose. I think it means that don't let things trouble you until you lose your peace instead commit your worries and anxieties to God and trust him to take care of them for you. Afterall he says cast your cares on me and i will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you for my yoke is easy and my burden is light. So the next time you see me complain, remind me.

Its interesting that this comes up because something happened during the week that bothered me a bit. When people say things about you that you're not sure if its true or not because you need to ask God to be sure that its not true, it can be a bit confusing because you think you know yourself and then someone says something that give an impression of you that even you cannot recognise. I'm trying not to reveal too much but yeah. There are somethings that are outright false and there are others that needs to be checked on.

People of course are not perfect and say things out of their insecurity or false judgement and perceptions of what they think they know about you but in the end its between you and God and that person. All i can say is that its not the first time and thank God the last time was a case as mentioned however time will tell if this time its really true or not.

I won't let it bother me because i dont fight my own battles, never have. My name mean God's battle. And the verse in the bible that goes well with it is Exodus 14:14 and the Lord will fight for you and you will hold your peace. And speaking of peace, Psalm 119:165 says great peace have they who love thy law and nothing shall offend them. With man this is impossible but with God all things are possible.

I'm trying Lord to love your law, I know sometimes i just have to hurry off but I know that I will come to that place of exclusive devotion to your words. I trust You.

~shalom~

collections: homosexuality

I came across a very interesting article today and would like to share it here with you.

...the corruption of language has contributed to this confusion. When words like love, friend, male, female, and partner are transformed in a new sexual context, what was once understood to be pure and undefiled is now subject to sniggering and disrespect. (more)

Tim Challies writes a lot about life issues and living as christians and i love to read his blog.
~shalom~

Gone

In life there are many things that come our way and for a time they cause us so much joy and pleasure but nothing in this life is permanent. Someday they will be gone. Here's switchfoot gone.

Gone - Switchfoot - Beautiful Letdown

She told him she’d rather fix her makeup
Than try to fix what’s going on
But the problem keeps on calling
Even with the cellphone gone
She told him that she believes in living
Bigger than she’s living now
But her world keeps spinning backwards
And upsidedown
Don’t say so long in the cellphone
Don’t spend today away
Cuz today will soon be

Gone, like yesterday is gone,
Like history is
Gone, just trying to prove me wrong
And pretend like your immortal

She said he said live like no tomorrow
Every day we borrow
Brings us one step closer to the edge (infinity)
Where your treasure, where’s your hope
Forget the world and lose your soul
She pretends like she pretends like she’s immortal
Don’t say so long
Your not that far gone
This could be your big chance to makeup
Today till soon be

Gone, like yeterday is gone,
Like history is gone,
The world keeps spinning on,
Your going going gone,
Like sumemr break is gone,
Like saturday is gone
Just trying to prove me wrong
You pretend like your immortal your immortal

We are not infinite
We are not permanate
Nothing is immediate
We’re so confident
In our accomplishments
Look at how dark it is

Gone, like frank sinatra
Like elvis and his mom
Like al pichino’s cash nothing lasts in this life
My highschool dreams are gone
My childhood sweets are gone
Life is a day that doesn’t last for long

Life is more than money
Time was never money
Time was never cash,
Life is still more than girls
Life is more than hundred dollar bills
And oh the town fills
Life more than fame and rock and roll and thrills
All the riches of the kings
And up in wills we got information in the information age
But do we know what life is
Outside of our conveinent lexus cages

She said he said live like no tomorrow
Every moment that we borrow
Brings us closer to the God who’s not short of cash
Hey bono I’m glad you asked
Life is still worth living, life is still worth living

Its ok la my friend, God has the best for you. Just keep seeking Him. I'm always here.

~shalom~

Tweaks

I have an insatiable desire to change things, to see how they look if this was changed, or this value changed, or something here put there. As a kid growing up, i guess thats why i broke a lot of my toys because i would always get a screw driver and open it up to see how the insides look like and then after putting it back again it was never the same.

I spend a lot of time online, mostly looking at websites and reading articles on webdesign, just look at my delicious tags for webdesign and you'll see what i mean. If you notice i've made a few subtle changes to the way things look over here. I'll let you guess the rest but one of the things i changed is the blockquote class that defines the behaviour of the blockquote tag. This post describes how to style your own blockquote.

This is a blockquote
I sort of like the way tumblr displays quotes so i looked into the css file and customised it for this blog. Now quotes will be italicized and will have a font of 25px. It was originally 32px but i thought it was too big for my liking. The color also changed. Initially the font was Helvetica but it didn't look nice so i changed it to Georgia, consistent with the rest of the site.

One of the things i want to do with my 3months break is try and make a few more tweaks to this site and explore working with grids and playing around with a bit of photoshop and hopefully come up with a new look for the new year :)

I realise i've used a lot of I's in this post and want to apologise for using one more.

I noticed the music on the blog as nice as it is can be kind of annoying sometimes to some users so i'm going to change it so it doesn't autostart. Went into the code but can't seem to know what value to change to alter its behaviour but will look into it.

~shalom~