Life is crazy

Dear Friends,

I’m so sorry I haven’t been keeping you up to date w/ my life. Truth is I’ve been working a lot, sometimes 10 hrs a day + commute. By the time I get home, I’m pretty tired. So I spend a little time with my family, a little time w/ Jesus and then it’s straight to bed for another busy day.

 But God is in control and I feel like this is a season to be faithful with the mundane so He can entrust me with spiritual things, such as moving to KC! Pray that I will pass the test! Pray that I won’t have to take it twice!!!

Things are going mostly well with the Lord. Every now and then when I’m driving I’m just hit with the amazement at God. The fact that the Holy Spirit lives in me is awesome!!!!!! I keep praying, “Jesus, You who have authority over the Spirit, give me Living Water to drink.” I love Him. I’m also praying for wisdom on how to manage money.

 Please pray for my parents. Things are going really hard lately, especially financially. Pray for breakthru of heaven. Pray for wisdom and good stewardship. Also, I’m trying to get a paid internship in Genetics this summer. And PLEASE pray for my mom. She’s been a bit discouraged lately and she needs a few intercessors to pray Eph 3 (strength in the inner man) over her. Thanks for all your love. I’ll try my best to keep this updated.

 lots of love…

The Indwelling Spirit

These last few days I’ve been thinking about this verse: “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water” (Jn 4:10).

Of course, this living water isn’t just a pretty metaphor, or a nice little feeling on the inside during worship in the church or while driving. It’s God. It’s the Holy Spirit, the Indwelling Spirit. Later on, John explains that living water is God, the Holy Spirit (Jn 7:39). Water is a great analogy for the Spirit, b/c He isn’t just about power (anointing oil). He’s about survival, health, thriving. I’ve been praying, “Jesus, You who exercise authority over the Spirit, give me of Him. I want to drink living waters from Him.”

The wonderful thign of course is that the water the Spirit gives me is knowledge of Jesus. Last night I was thinking, “God loves to obey God! He is so humble, so meek!” Jesus never spoke a word or did anything w/o seeing the Father do it first, and the Spirit never says a word except that which He hears the Father and the Son speak. God actually exercises authority over God and God loves to be under the authority of God. I’m sure I don’t really get it, but it just feels so wonderful to actually have some understanding of the Trinity for real, for like the first time in my life. I want more.
Therefore, I feel great. I want to shout I know God, even though I don’t. (The book of Job tells me so). In Your sight, O God, I am great b/c I am the chosen one to be Your dwelling place forever. The stars they don’t move You. Waves can’t undo You. Mountains in their splendor, they cannot steal Your heart. This God who is holy, perfect in beauty, awesome in glory, is ravished by my heart. And though I’m dark You say I’m lovely, though I’m poor You say I’m beautiful. Somehow my weak love, has overwhelmed You. Somehow my weak glance, it has stolen away Your heart! This is so awesome and wonderful!

Thank You for the blood of Jesus.

Meditations on the Prodigal Son – Part II

The famine eventually hits the land. The Prodigal Son now begins to understand his weakness, his frailty. He no longer has any of his inheritance left and it hits him hard: he cannot live on his own. He is not self-existent as God is.

I think often times God sends famines on purpose in our lives. We might call it hard times. Or we might blame it on the devil. But I often think it’s an intentional famine from God. We can clearly see this in the lives of sinners who don’t repent. They reap consequence after consequence, and perhaps one day they’ll humble themselves and repent. But I’ve noticed that in my life famines will come in order to woo me closer to the first commandment. Famines, however, bring real pain, and how can a good God purposely and consciously bring pain to His chidren?

I remember a father at my church, whose little son got leukemia. His son was hospitilized almost continually after a while, and at one point he had a fever that would not come down. So, the doctors asked the father to give the child a cool shower in hopes that the fever would come down. The child asked the father to not do that b/c he didn’t like cold water. But his father gave him a shower w/ cool water anyways…
The love for earthly things is cancerous. It kills the soul; it dulls the heart. I would say I’m a ‘good’ Christian. However, the 1st commandment is about ALL my heart.  ‘Good’ can sometimes be the worst enemy of ‘best.’ I don’t want anything less than a whole hearted devotion.
…The father told us his story at church w/ many tears in his eyes. He didn’t want to cause his child discomfort, but he had to. What a hero! What a true father!
So, why do I think any differently of God?

My hero! My Father!

Dark but lovely

I’ve been studying the life of David. In the past, like everybody else, I’ve been horrified at David’s mistakes – from beg to end, every single one of them. However, now I’m amazed at David’s ability to remain steady, even though he was a sinner as much as I am. Think of it… the man was chased, hungry and homeless for many years, and still did not rise up in anger against the man who wanted to KILL him. Sometimes David quit, but he lasted a lot longer than I ever would. Sometimes now, with only a few little pressures, I feel like I want to quit. I’m sooo much weaker than David.

And this feeling of weakness and darkness was overwhelming. I felt so hopeless. I hate staring at my own darkness b/c I feel like I’m choking. I was crying out to God for help, and that’s when I realized that God created me with certain depths of needs – emotional, spiritual, etc. I’ve often thought my needs were specially deep sometimes, and the more time I spend seeking God, the more holes in my heart I encounter. These unfulfilled desires led me to have a lot of darkness in my heart. I have a lot of darkness in my heart. I feel so totally hopeless and weak against God’s standard of holiness.

But I understood that God created me weak, or perhaps a better phrasing would be “with a real deep God-gap in my heart.” This way, if the greater the hunger, or the darkness, or the weakness, then the greater revelation of God’s love and beauty I have ‘room’ to receive.

This was a bit encouraging, but I still felt suffocated by my darkness. HOW CAN WEAKNESS BE SO STRONG??? And then I remembered, “I am dark but lovely!” What a pleasant thought! What an escape, a way where there is no way!

I remember my teenage years. I loved the Lord and I was zealous. I love Him tenderly but when I slipped I felt like the worst person alive. I couldn’t bear the weight of my own shame. It was so hard. I wanted to follow the 1st commandment, but I limped so much. But now I know better, for even the [zealous] youth shall become weary, but those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength like the eagle and soar.  

Seeds of greatness

A couple days ago, my sister walked up the stairs, went into the kitchen and said to my mom, “Mommy, my nose hurts. Pray for it.” My mom thought she heard wrong and asked, “What?” “Pray for my nose,” Julie replied.  My mom prayed for my 2-yr-old sister, and she walked away and never again complained about the ‘pain.’

We were all surprised by the story. None of us had ever taught her how to pray. Maybe  a Sunday schoolteacher taught her, but we really aren’t sure. She’s never done that before. Whenever she gets hurt we kiss her and say, “It’s healed!” (It’s a Brazilian thing). But, as far as we know, nobody has taught her to pray for healing.

A couple years ago, when I was in Atlanta, GA, visiting my dad and family, my other little sister, Kimberly (then only 2, but now a super-energetic 4 yr old), walked up to us and said, “Jesus told me to give Him all my heart.” We all said, “Good.” But then I asked, “What do you mean?” I was looking more for “how did you hear this? how did you become so prophetic?” But Kimberly understood something else. She walked up to window, put her body against the window and spread out her arms, as if she was on a cross. I was astonished. I didn’t know what to say.

What is God doing in these children? Perhaps, like Mary, I’m just supposed to keep these things in my heart and ponder them. I pray whenever I remember, but I often forget. I always try to imitate Jesus. I ask Julie all the time, “Who’s beautiful?” “I am,” she answers. “Who’s strong?” “I am.” I want to lay a really good Song-of-Song-type foundation in them. Father, Your kingdom come into these kids. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Funniest thing ever…

So, here I am at a bilingual real estate office, searching online for good business contract samples to make my translating job easier… and I come across this “awesome” website w/ a thousand different samples. As I search thru its database, what do I find? A sample letter for ending a lond-distance relationship. Wow. WOw. WOW. I had never heard of this before. And who thought of writing this?

Anyways, for your entertainment, I’ve chosen to paste the letter here. (Please don’t use it).

Dear [name],

When you fall for someone, you hope that love will forever be on your side. You live life separately and together, hoping the day comes when you can live your lives as one. We’ve been together for [number] years now, and the memories that we have made together, I will always treasure. Unfortunately, our lives have introduced us to other opportunities.

Now that we live on opposite sides of the [state/country/world], it’s been extremely difficult to keep our relationship together. I know that my job will never let me return to [location].

They always say that if you’re meant for one another, you will be together someday. This may be true, but now is not the time for us. I wish you all the best in your life. I’ll never forget you.

Meditations about the prodigal son – part I

The other day I realized that the prodigal son’s sustenance while he was sinning was his father’s money. He could not have been so ‘independent’ without receiving his inheritance from his father. He thought of himself as so smart, so cool, so much better than the losers back home, when in reality he was arrogant and stupid. He had nothing and his own arm could not even sustain his practices.

So it is with sin. The universe was created by God and my very existence is upheld by Him. He is self-existent but I am not. I may think I am all that if I go out of my way to do something rebellious, something different and independent. I am not even necessarily even talking about sex, drugs, alcohol and the such. I’m just talking about doing things outside of God’s will. I’ve noticed that we are constantly trying to find a better way, an easier route. We simply cannot understand why God’s way would be better. Our minds are not renewed and we are so earthly. That’s when faith, understanding and humility come in. God is God and He is love. Though I don’t understand it, His way is better. He is wiser and kinder than I am. He knows best and I trust my heart to Him. My heart is safe in His kindness, power and wisdom.
Like sheep we have all strayed away and gone our own path. It was a choice. Yet we thought of ourselves as independent. Such is the foolishness of sin. No one can exist without God, so why attempt to carry on life without Him, or with just parts of Him? This is simple and basic common sense that every man should have, but unfortunately we all fail in it in some way.

Creation

My Father is so great and has lavished His grace on me so abundantly. Sometimes I feel like one of the most privileged human beings in all of history, and I am. Though the darkest of times is just around the corner, the Church’s greatest hour is coming, too. What a privilege it is to live on these times.

At IHOP, the revelation of the greatness of God started to impact me. I always had difficulty understanding some of the ‘greatness’ passages of the Bible, such as in the end of Job. I was actually having a conversation about this w/ a dear friend from IHOP, Maranda. “Isn’t it amazing,” she asked, “when God says that He has all the snow stored in storehouses?” And she went on about all the greatness of God revealed in nature. And I, in my small, scientific mind, replied, “But Maranda, where in the atmosphere are the storehouses? I don’t get it. I don’t get those passages.” She looked at me w/ such authority and said, “Ed, you’re missing the point! You’re not supposed to know; it’s a mystery. It’s like what Stuart said, ‘The day God stops being a mystery to me is the day I stop worshipping Him.’” “Oh…” I said. (Who said women can’t teach?)

We are not meant to have all the answers, but also, we are not meant to be confused by the questions. Questions reveal the existence of a mystery, and when you approach a quesiton w/ your heart rather than your mind, you are drawn to worship. I discovered this at the first time at IHOP. The craziest thing is that when you  allow your heart to go to these uncharted waters of God’s mysteries, your mind quickly follows and the Bible just opens up. It’s wonderful.

So, a few nights ago, I couldn’t go to sleep cause I was thinking about stuff. I pulled out a notebook and wrote a little story about creation of heaven and earth. I decided to set it as a page on this blog. It’s a bit long of a story, and I don’t claim to be a great writer. But I wrote it with my heart. I feel like I actually  understand the Bible now. I understand a bit more of the Trinity, the Incarnation, and such topics that I had never had any revelation of before hand.

I hope you like the story, if you have time to read. I guess it’s a work in progress, and I’ll improve on it, later on.

REAL ESTATE

So my parents opened an office in San Francico called “Terra Via Brasil.” It’s an office of a Brazilian real estate company. What do we do? We sell real estate in Brazil to people who live in America. It’s a great thing. I’ve been here a few days now, doing a thousand little things and it’s been good. The hard thing has been adjusting to the sleeping schedule. Everyday I sleep at a different time. But things are going well.

I officially have my fifth e-mail account: ed@terraviabrasil.com.br. But don’t send anything to me there, unless it’s business related, or I’ll block you! (The website for the company is www.terraviabrasil.com.br, English version under construction).  Too bad I only keep track of my gmail and now this one. I wonder how many e-mails I have in @ucdavis.edu and @yahoo.com…

After things settle down here at the office, I think I might have some free blocks of time thruout the week, and I’ll use those to study the Bible. For now, I’m going to try to read before I go to bed, and listen to Mike’s “Life of David” series thruout the day. I’ve decided to go back to the life of David for a little longer. I guess I’ll be sharing some insights here in my blog.

First Day of Church

Well, first of all, I must say that I think might’ve officially switched to days. I slept from 12:30am-6:30am last night. Does that count? I do have one new word in my dictionary. It’s hmm…. let me see if I can spell it right…. SUNLIGHT! Wow. I didn’t think I could make it.

Anyways, today was my first day at church. I felt quite awkward, but it turned out to be really good. I played in the worship team and God really, really showed up. It was awesome! That’s my favorite, when God shows up. It’s great goodness. Today the focus for the message was children so it was fun. But I just loved being able to experience God’s presence while playing.

I was wondering if people here would think I’m the crazy, naive kid who just came back from IHOP. I’m sure some do but I actually had three people come up to me and ask me to share my experiences at IHOP with the brand-new young adult group at my church. They said the group would be really blessed and built up. How cool, I thought. Maybe this is one of the reasons I was supposed to come back. One of the moms even asked about the FITN program b/c she was considering sending one of her kids. Totally unexpected.

Anyways, I gotta go to bed and wake up tomorrow for my first day at work. I’ll let you know how it goes.