12 days of thanks

day 6

(I really wish I did 3 days of thanks l o l)

thankful for my spiritual leaders.

for pmike: for showing me what a personal relationship looks like and feels like, to understand that God knows me

for peter jdsn: for teaching me to open the Word and discover that it's words are living and active, and to seek deeper understanding

for mike hyung: for teaching me discipline, hard work, perseverance, for being the older brother I never had.

for smn: my spiritual mother, the shining example of what it looks like when you have found favor in the Lord, for teaching me Jesus.

12 days of thanks

day 5

thank you to Joseph.

I never thought I would make a friend like you, with how we met and how our relationship has developed.

you have taught me that friendships take effort, and friendships are things that the things you add can never be taken out; they are there for good.

to have a brother in christ is something i have longed for, and the Lord has blessed me by sending you; and i hope i can be a blessing unto you as well.

we are fighting these battles together, and it feels darn good to not be alone in this war. high five, gypsy.

12 days of thanks

day 4

thankful for ohma.

for the unconditional love God has for me, manifested in you. 

for the times you've made me hotdog ketchup dishes, or mooshed corn beef hash into shapes, or making kamja gook (but then sometimes adding that dumb pollack to make bookuhgook), or bringing me pound cake after work, making shirley temples

you taught me to love others and to serve them with your hospitality and warmness; sometimes you work too hard. working for noona and me, giving us money whenever we ask for it, i dont think you've ever said no to us. defending us instead of disciplining, loving us so that we would love ourselves. 

doing boo-ong for you or massaging your back or stepping on your back (when I wasn't so fat) is not nearly what you deserve, for all the hours you work or the hurt you feel, but you are my mother and a wonderful one. 

your treasures in heaven are all deserved because everything i am is because of how you have loved me (and fed me), and how you are still loving me (and feeding me). 

12 days of thanks

day 3

thankful for my dad

now it's not because he just gave me money for christmas, but really, i am so thankful.

when i was just a little boy, you taught me how to put lotion on my face every morning and we would do the song together and at the end we would rub our hands really fast.

warm memories.

you are a traditional korean dad, but you never hit me or made me feel bad about grades or school, you respect my space and my growth even though i am still immature, and yes, i still complain about you but i just complain because i am still just a boy. my complaints hold nothing to how well you have done to raise me.

these days it's hard, and there are times where it's hard to love you. but underneath the bitterness and struggling to come to terms with my emotions, what's buried at the center is my desire to honor you. none of us are perfect, but we can still try. you're still here, so i'm still here, and we are going to make the best of what time we have.

12 days of thanks

day 2

thankful for my sister.

I don't know where to begin and honestly I don't know where I would end.

but dang,

truly a sibling relationship is irreplaceable, unmistakable. and you have help shape me to who I am now today.

you're engaged now, and it's crazy and that's a whole topic in itself but from the bottom of my heart,

chase your happiness, dream and achieve because you have put in your work and be well pleased with what has come out.

I still think you have ways to go, but you are a fearless woman, so go and conquer and be happy. you deserve it.

thanks noonjoon

12 days of thanks

u right God, I complain too much.

I don't need to turn to blog when I'm sad, let me use this space for something else for once.

12 days of thanks, day 1

We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly, and the love of every one of you for one another is increasing.

Therefore we ourselves boast about you in the churches of God for your steadfastness and faith in all your persecutions and in the afflictions that you are enduring.

2 Thessalonians 1:3‭-‬4

-

thank you God for my youth class.

for how they endure and encourage one another, for they experience the struggles I cannot understand and yet you have allowed them to trust me when they share their pains.

they inspire me to be a better man, to show them that the dependence on You reflects the longings of my heart; what better way to glorify You then amongst my brothers.

I have to be a good role model, not because I want to prove anything to them, but because Lord I shall not stumble your sheep, your precious children that you have entrusted to me in this time.

They are blooming before my eyes, I can see the light of your love bringing life to them; behold, your priesthood.

thank you for their youthfulness, their energy and their eagerness to seek you. you give me the honor of being a part of their lives, so let me return it by lifting all the glory to you.

we have a long way to go, but dang, we're gonna fight through it together. use me God, lead me so I can lead them.

today I ran into a wall

career related, again. but I don't want to whine about it.

not today satan.

I know there's a place I belong, and it's not here. 

I'm going to try my hardest, I promise you God, I will try, because in all things You have called me to excellence. 

but if I don't make it, if I dont make their expectations, if I disappoint them and-

not today satan. 

wherever I am going, however You are taking me there, let it be so. and let me praise You all the way til the end.

I used to want to die a good man, I still do, but let me die a godly man, because in the end it is Him in whom i shall give my testimony. and my testimony will not be a story of my redemption or my glory but it will be an account of how vast the Father's love is for me, and when all's said and done, all that matters is just that 

and only that. 

the problem of pain: interjection

when wrestling against these things

it's very easy to stop the match when it starts to look bad

but we wrestle until the end

so either I will receive deliverance or I will die trying to taste it

either way,

come Lord, I wait for You.

the problem of pain: divine omnipotence

"try to exclude the possibilities of suffering which the order of nature and the existence of free wills involve, and you will find that you have excluded life itself" (25)

would I rather be free or would I rather be shackled?

if I knew the outcome of my actions before the decision to go through with it, have I really given it any thought?

if everything is happy and everyone is happy then does happy hold any meaning?

there is a problem with pain and I haven't gotten that far in the book to answer that question intelligently, so let me respond from my flawed emotional heart.

my problem with pain is not that it's meaningless or serves no purpose, my problem is in its very nature of being absolutely necessary.

if I want to experience happiness, then I must know what sadness is.

if I want to know peace, then I must know chaos in just the same way.

if I want to taste joy, then I must taste suffering.

unless my little relationship poetry is wrong, what if these things aren't opposites and maybe more importantly, what if these things aren't exclusive?

let me complain about my thorn again, the robot pierced into my side. from it, I've been suffering in ways I feel so lonely in:

"are you allowed to eat that?"

let me stop there before I go on forever.

pain is lessened when it is shared, but I have an exclusive thorn given to me from the genetic lottery in which I have never volunteered to spin the wheel, which God has not yet let another receive. I am so lonely in this suffering, and it's okay if another cannot emphasize, please stay as far away from the fingerpricks, needles, and medications for I wish no one would go through the trials God has put me through.

I am not here to complain (again), but to reevaluate. because from my thorn I have missed the stem on which it is attached to, and from that stem is a flower, a display of "the grand scheme of things," the work of a Creator.

from this specific pain:

I have received humility, knowing that I am mortal and I am weak. and from humility I have dependence on God, and from dependence, I have a relationship.

I am being disciplined, to controlling my diet and medications and the little nuances of how wheat bread hits me 20 minutes after white bread, or how soda may as well be the diabetics elixer of life. and from discipline, comes health.

I am grateful, acknowledging the statistics that people like me live on average 10 years less than others, let me look for the little hints God has sprinkled in my life and let me cherish them with my whole heart until the day where I cannot cherish anything but the fullness of the Almighty.

I am maturing (slowly), seeing as how my weeping and lamenting can only get me so far, and with God, all things have already been made possible. not in miracles, but in realizing that I have legs that walk and arms that push, and with God, I have that choice to walk and push.

I have all these things, because of pain. I want to change my answer actually: the problem of pain is that pain has clouded my eyes from (this might not be the right word) the source of it all: all things, good or bad (to me), the pains and pleasures of life,

God.

pain is necessary because in this reality in which I am subject to, without it, I would have nothing else. if I did not have pain, there is no depth to myself, and if I do not have myself, then I am not alive.

curiously, the natural antagonist to life is death, but I do not need to experience death to live, because Christ died for me. and Christ took death and took Dominion over it, so now Jesus has turned the polarity of life and death into the harmony of Christ and life.

all in all, I'm alive.