| | So it's been a while since I've last blogged and it would sadly be impossible to recap it all.
First
off, I definitely still need lots of prayer and support. There's still
plenty of uncertainty kicking around: where am I going to live in the
next school year, what will I be doing in school next year, do I have a
summer job, when do I rewrite the MCAT, what does God have in store for
me after graduation, am I leading in love, the Word, righteousness,
selflessness, and intimacy better today than yesterday, better tomorrow
than today, ACF exec for the next school year, where do I go to church,
and plenty more questions. So thanks to everyone who has continually
be praying for me, it is much appreciated.
I must confess that
I haven't been doing my 'share' of support. I have been very
complacent and 'satisfied'. I'm a dry well, but I don't want to be
filled by Him either. I know I need Him, I have tasted and seen that
the Lord is good. I need Him so badly, but I just don't want to let
Him enter. I need to learn to love 'Pez' and not the container it is
in.
"All
Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof,
for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God
may be adequate, equipped for every good work." -- 2 Timothy 3:16 NASB
I
want to be trained in righteousness, I want wisdom, I want adequacy, I
want to be equipped to do every good work and so much more; so then why
won't I invite Him in and give my whole mind, body, heart, and soul to
Him? Do I REALLY want to know the will of God for my life? (Francis
Chan, Passion07) If God was allowed to have complete control over my
body, send it to wherever He wanted, to make it say whatever it is that
He wants it to say -- if it was TOTALLY up to God to decide where I
would go and what I would do, do I really want to know? Well ... no.
It would freak me out. How stupid is that? God has the best
intentions and most amazing mind-blowing things in store for us. Why
don't I want to know? Why don't I want to be a part of the most
amazing, never-ending story of God? Why won't I just let Him do what
He wants with me and be obedient?
-------------------------
-- Passion07 --
A generation united for His renown (January 1st - 4th, 2007)
“Yes Lord, walking in the way of Your truth we wait
eagerly for You, for Your name and renown are the desire of our souls.” -- Isaiah 26:8
There's a lot that happened within the 4 days of Passion07. If I have time, I hope to write more about it.
Louie's first talk was about being rescued because a price had been paid (in Colossians 1). We were reminded of the gospel, the reality, and the Truth of what happened. Even if we are in the kingdom of chaos, we were bought, ransomed, He came for us, a life was given for us. So that we could go from ashes to beauty -- ashes to life. A great reminder of who we are. Louie had a great analogy where he had an ugly (plant) bulb which then grew into a beautiful flower. Ask either Priscilla or myself, we'd be glad to send you this talk (or ALL the talks!).
"For He grew up before Him like a tender shoot,
And like a root out of parched ground;
He has no stately form or majesty
That we should look upon Him,
Nor appearance that we should be attracted to Him.
He was despised and forsaken of men,
A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;
And like one from whom men hide their face
He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.
Surely our griefs He Himself bore,
And our sorrows He carried;
Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken,
Smitten of God, and afflicted.
But He was pierced through for our transgressions,
He was crushed for our iniquities;
The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him,
And by His scourging we are healed.
All of us like sheep have gone astray,
Each of us has turned to his own way;
But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all
To fall on Him.
He was oppressed and He was afflicted,
Yet He did not open His mouth;
Like a lamb that is led to slaughter,
And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers,
So He did not open His mouth." -- Isaiah 53:2-7 NASB
A beautiful passage of Scripture that prophesied the coming of Christ and His suffering that lead to our freedom.
The thing that probably rocked me the most was going to David Crowder's breakout session called "Everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die". He was talking about how how his album, A Collision, is an album about the Christian viewpoint and appropriate response to death. Death isn't a calamity -- Jesus came to give us life. It just wacked me in the face. My grandmother isn't doing that well right now and she doesn't know Christ. So it's something that really struck me. So here I am listening to David's album hearing about what the band has experienced in their lives with death. Here I am realizing how deep this album truly is. David also shared a new song with us at Passion07 that blew my mind also. I wanted to share it with you all:
Oh the Glory of It All – David Crowder* Band
Verse 1:
At the start, He was there, He was there;
In the end, He’ll be there, He’ll be there.
PreChorus 1:
After all our hands have wrought, He forgives:
Chorus 1:
Oh the glory of it all is He came here,
For the rescue of us all that we may live
For the glory of it all, oh the glory of it all!
Verse 2:
All is lost, find Him there, find Him there;
After night, dawn is there, dawn is there.
PreChorus 2:
After all falls apart, He repairs, He repairs:
Chorus 2:
Oh the glory of it all is He came here
For the rescue of us all that we may live
For the glory of it all
Oh He is here for redemption from the fall,
That we may live, for the glory of it all,
Oh the glory of it all, the glory of it all, oh the glory of it all!
Bridge:
After night comes a light;
Dawn is here, dawn is here;
It’s a new day, it’s a new day;
Everything will change, things will never be the same
We will never be the same, we will never be the same,
We will never be the same, we will never be the same!
Chorus 3:
Oh the glory of it all is You came here!
For the rescue of us all that we may live!
For the glory of it all!
Oh You are here, redemption for us all,
That we may live, for the glory of it all,
Oh the glory of it all, the glory of it all,
Oh the glory of it all!
Something that Priscilla said when she was sharing about Passion07 at ACF the first night was her analogy that came from the Candlelight 'latenite' session. She described how if was quite windy that night and people's candle lights kept going out because a gust of wind would blow. But not to worry, there was always someone else close to you that would relight your candle. Nice! I thought about it and took the analogy even further: in the beginning, there was only one lit candle -- the Light of the World came -- Jesus came. There was darkness in the world because of sin, but Jesus came to shine His light and it started with only a few people, but then continued to grow throughout all the generations -- He transferred us from the dominion of darkness into the Kingdom of the Son in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. We are children of Light who are safely in the Kingdom of the Son, whom He loves.
Thanks to whoever took the above photographs (they weren't by me). (From left to right): First, the final 'latenite' session at Passion07 where all 24,000 of us walked to the field in silence and a single candle was lit which then spread to the rest of us. Beautiful. Second, bricks that were bought to help build the Freedom Center in Iraq to spread the love of Christ to those who have never heard of him -- freedom because Jesus paid it all. Thirdly, SHINE, one banner of graffiti art where students could write, draw, and express their cries, confessions, and thoughts to and for God. The names of major cities of the world and all the universities and colleges represented at Passion07 were on the banner also -- through it all, one word, SHINE. Fourthly, an image in the "Do Something Now" area where people could meditate, pray, write, and confess what has been holding them back. People could then pray with them and pray for them -- barriers, then breaking free. Fifthly, An image of something drawn on one of the graffiti art banners: Be Light.
-------------------------
-- ACF Winter Retreat 2007 --
Being Marked By Christ (January 19th - 21st, 2007)
To be "Marked by Christ" means to:
- Be clearly noticeable
 Be singled out
- Have a distinguishing characteristic
- Make a lasting impression
From Acts 1:8 (NASB): "but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth."
Pastor
Phil continued to say that a martyr = witness in this particular
passage. A witness is "one who does what he has seen, heard, or
knows"; in other words, they are a doer. In order to be true followers
of Christ, we must be doers. "When we are marked by Christ, we leave our mark and we get marked."Those who are marked by Christ are characterized by the Fruit of the
Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
gentleness, and self-control. When we are 'doers', we do the fruits of the Spirit: "Fruit to go".
True followers of Christ have the fruits of the Spirit manifested in
their lives. Pastor Phil attached this to living lives of freedom and lives of balance. Thus, the mark of a Christian life is that it has FRUIT, it is BALANCED, and it is FREE!
He
ended off with a pretty funny line: “We Shine like Stars and might pick
up Scars”. Although I'm sure he actually meant that we WILL pick up
scars instead of 'might', there seems to be a lot of "Shine"-ing this
year. 
So
here's the cool part that I hadn't really thought of before. I know
that we are filled with the Holy Spirit -- as a 'lead worshipper', what
would we be doing if we weren't filled by Him?! But then the
implication is: "we are to be marked by the Holy Spirit's filling" --
an anointing fragrance can come on you onto your head, lips, eyes,
shoulders, hands, heart, or feet. One's cup overflows. Prayer with
cupped hands. It was so cool to hear people share about what God did
with them at retreat :) Beautiful! Yay! So happy for Missy and her
void being filled with Him. So glad that Abraham encountered the Holy
Spirit overflowing his cup in a very obvious way. Like wow.
Saturday
night's worship set :D Woohoo! The darkness trembled ... a lot!
Prepare the way of the Risen One! Saturday night was definitely the highlight of retreat for me. It just reminded me of why I love being a 'lead worshipper': to be able to help people express their hearts of gratitude, thanks, and fear of the Lord with their whole body, mind, and soul. It isn't any thing that I do, but because God was present, filled the room with His fragrance, touched people and said: "Dance for Me. Sacrifice your body in the form of an active consumption of energy of unstoppable praise to Me.". Satan flees and darkness hides because Light owns this place.
My chains are gone! I've been set free! My God, my
Saviour has ransomed me, And like a flood His mercy reigns!Unending
love, amazing grace!
I'm
so glad that Kitty got to come and join us for the weekend. I was so
blessed by her support and her prayers before Saturday night's worship
set. What would I do without her? I was so busy all weekend I didn't
get to spend much time with her, but that's okay!
Yay
to the Holy Spirit working so
hardcorely in this fellowship. Of course, there were a ton of laughs
and good times! It was great to see Glendon and Caleb again AND to
have them help lead us to the throne of God Saturday morning. I was so
glad that I had a chance to pray with people Saturday night. What an
amazing opportunity! I love you all very much. Let what we do in
here, fill the
streets out there.
    All images available at http://chrisluk.myphotoalbum.com-------------------------
-- Kitty's 21st Birthday --:D (February 10th, 2007)
So officially, Kitty and I have been together for 1 month and 17 days as of today. Indeed, quite a short time, but for all of you that are so ridiculously surprised; we've known each other for almost 2 years, but we've officially been together for that long. So if you're like everyone else that said, "I thought you guys were together for forever!", now you know! So the idea was that I would come back to Toronto on Friday night to surprise her and crash her party (without telling her). All was set. Until I got into Toronto and realized that I didn't even look up directions to get there. Oooohhh .. so what do you do? Pray and hope for God to lead you where you need to go. Funny story, I circle the plaza twice, passing by Jack Astor's and everything not finding Demetre's, so I decide to leave, head out to Leslie St. and look for another plaza where it might be. I find nothing. That's okay, call people that know where it is! Call Caleb first ... he doesn't pick up. Call Kat second, she doesn't have any minutes left on her phone, so she doesn't pick up. Last resort. Call Kitty. I don't even say "Hello". Chris: "I'm not going to lie ... I'm lost." Kitty: "I knew it!" Suffice to say, I eventually found the place with Kat's guidance, parked, and being the smart woman she is, she knew that I was going to TRY and surprise her Friday night. Girls are impossible to surprise, they're just too smart! It was a great night! Got to see lots of great people that I hadn't seen in a long time.    Kitty was soooo sweet that she got me an early Valentine's Day gift. It's a scrapbook with pictures, quotes, song lyrics, Bible verses, and much more of things that are of significance to us both. Absolutely wonderful. Very sweet. Thank you :D Saturday night, we had a chance to go to a wonderful family run restaurant for dinner. Have you ever had a 32 ounce prime rib? No? Go here and try it! Peter's of Markham Steakhouse and Seafood. Amazing. Definitely my favourite place on the planet to have prime rib, especially 32 ounces for the low, low price of $40 (relatively speaking). We also got the mushroom caps and it was unstoppabley good with the sauce the prime rib was drenched in. Super hot fresh garlic bread with sesame seeds was served too! We also got a huge slice of chocolate mousse cake that was the perfect sweetness. Easily one of the best restaurants in Markham.  |
