i made apple pie with grace the manna intern ytd.  it was yummy :)

Exodus 35 gave me a fresh reminder of the right order work and rest should have in our lives.  Work, then rest, seems so intuitive to the human mind that we never stop to question this assumption.

It was because of this that I found Exodus 35 rather interesting.  This is where Moses is commanding the people to give the materials needed for building the tabernacle, if needed.  Notice, however, that Moses doesn't start off with the commands "You shall give..." etc etc etc.  That only starts in v4, where he says "This is the thing which the Lord commanded".  Before that, in v2-3, he talks about the Sabbath first!  Moses talks about the Lord's commands about rest, before going on to the Lord's commands about work.

I think there's something there that we can learn.  God made us to rest first before working.  After all, Adam's first full day was the Sabbath.  In Psalm 23, I am made to lie down in green pastures before being led beside the still waters and the paths of righteousness.  In this case, God reminded the people of His divine rest before giving them work to do for Him.

Recently I've been learning to renew my mind and take a different approach to classes.  I've had the mentality of getting my problem sets done as early as possible.  Now that in itself is not a bad policy, but when it wasn't possible I found myself stressed and worried.  I was stressed because my problem sets weren't done early.  That meant that I could not enjoy life before my problem sets were finished!  Now that's wrong thinking.  What would I do then, in the working world, where tasks to do never ever end?  I have to learn to enjoy life while work remains.  Rest even while there is work to be done.

As I read Exodus 32, there was something that I noticed that, perhaps, deserve some attention.  It concerns Moses pleading to God on behalf of Israel.  How did Moses manage to prevent God from consuming Israel?  (It is a marvelous show of grace on God's part that Moses actually gets to plead his case before God, but that's not the point right here.)  I think it has a lot to do with verse 13:

"Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom You swore by Your own self, and said to them, 'I will multiply your descendants as the stars of the heaven; and this land that I have spoken of I give to your descendants, and they shall inherit forever." - Exodus 32:13

God relents right after that in verse 14.  Maybe this isn't the only reason that God doesn't go ahead and execute His judgment, but nontheless it illustrates a point- God keeps covenant.  God honoured the covenant that He cut with Abraham way back in Genesis 15.  How much more will God honour the new covenant mentioned in Hebrews 8?  Let us have full assurance of faith that God is faithful to what He has promised.

hi all!  i've been receiving lots, but there's just no time to type it all out!  haha.  this read-the-Bible-in-one-year program is really helping me be consistent in reading the Word and talking to God every morning, even though sometimes it can be dry.  typing it all out here also helps cos it allows me to share the Word that i receive.

as i was reading exodus, the parts about the sacrifices, one question crossed my mind- where in the world did the Israelites get all those lambs to sacrifice to God?  The priests had to sacrifice 2 lambs every day.  that's a whole lot of lambs, considering lambs don't reproduce that quickly.  do they?  anyway that's a random point.

blake preached a really good message ytd at manna's large group.  the Bible is not an instruction manual peppered with stories, but it is a story, namely the Gospel, peppered with instruction.  the Gospel is all about the good news, the story of Jesus coming down to die for all man.

if what we as christians believe is really good news, why do we have such a hard time talking to other pple about it?  if i won a million dollars in lottery, i don't think i would have a problem telling all my friends about it.  isn't the gospel so much better than that?  the gospel in its purest form is winning the lottery of lotteries.  somehow God chose you, picked you, and gave you EVERYTHING.  and we have trouble telling pple that they can have that too?  i suspect the gospel we believe in our hearts may not be what it truly, truly is.

anyway that's all the thoughts i have for now.  do keep praying for me as i enter the last wk of sch before midterms next wk.  pray for strength and wisdom, and the ability to let go of everything and give it over to God.

just looked up the place that i'm going to for fall break.  it's BEAUTIFULLL :D:D

EXCITED!


of course there's midterms to get pass first...

I just read a verse that I quite like:

"But when they arrest you and deliver you up, do not worry beforehand, or premeditate what you will speak.  But whatever is given to you in that hour, speak that; for it is not you who speak, but the Holy Spirit."  -Mark 13:11

The context from which I took the verse is pretty specific, but I believe that the principle applies in general.  After all, it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me (Galatians 2:20).  Therefore whatever I do or say, should not come from me but from the Holy Spirit.  Now that the Holy Spirit is in me, I don't have to conduct myself in the way I think I should- I should depend on the Holy Spirit in me to conduct me in the way that He thinks I should.

And when trials come, much like the arrests talked about in the verse above, we do not have to worry about what to say or do, but believe that in that hour the Spirit shall lead us in the way we should go.

Psalm 82 is one of the many psalms that expression frustration with life and God.  I was particularly shocked with this psalm because of its outright impudence:

"How long will you judge unjustly, and show partiality to the wicked?" -Psalm 82:2

As I read this, I thought to myself, is the psalmist crazy?  Does he not know who he is talking to?  The God of Gods, the Lord of Hosts, creator of the heavens and the earth!  And you dare to say He judges unjustly?  Do you not know that He can wipe you off the face of the earth just like that?  The psalmist goes on to tell God what God should be doing in verses 3 and 4!

I think the whole point of this psalm is to show how intimate God and the psalmist were.  God was willing to listen to all this nonsense that the psalmist was spouting, and the psalmist was not afraid to pour out what he really felt to the Lord.  Something that I have to remember.... pour everything out to God.  Talk to Him about everything in your life, how you feel, what you think.  That's how you cultivate your relationship with Him.

"For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin.  Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need." -Hebrews 4:15-16

I had more things to type, but it's time to go to class.  Blessed weekend!

some thoughts from today's Bible reading...

"And when they came out of the boast, immediately the people recognized Him, ran through that whole surrounding region, and began to carry about on beds those who were sick in the marketplaces, and begged Him that they might just touch the hem of His garment.  And as many as touched Him were made well."  Mark 6:54-56

I thought it was very interesting that the first thing people did when they heard Jesus had arrived was to bring the sick for Jesus to heal.  This tells me that Jesus had a reputation for being a healer.  I would have thought Jesus would have been famous for His deep sayings, His revolutionary parables, His stand against the religious leaders of the day.  And He probably was.  But at least in this region, the people came to Jesus because they knew He was (is, and always will be) the Healer, the One to heal all.

Another I thought pretty interesting was in Exodus 15:26:

"....'If you diligently heed the voice of the Lord your God, and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians.  For I am the Lord who heals you."

What are these commandments and statutes?  I realized that I couldn't have been the ten commandments at this point in time, because they weren't given until Exodus 19, three chapters later.  hmmm...

in other news, another wk of sch has passed, which means it's 2 more weeks to midterms, 3 more weeks to fall break i.e. the end of the first half of fall semester.  the leaves are starting to fall off trees, and while it's still relatively warm, the sun is starting to set earlier.  the dark times are ahead of us...

I was reading Exodus 15 for part of my daily reading of Scripture today.  The song that the Israelites sang after God had triumphed over the Egyptians was beautiful.  It dawned on me that the only problem was their praise came after the victory had happened.  They could only praise God when they could see their victory.

It is no wonder, then, that just 3 days later they were complaining against Moses/God again at the waters of Marah.  They needed to see their deliverance before they could praise God.  They are like some people we know, who praise God when they see His Providence in a past trial, yet fret and worry over the current one.

That's not the kind of life I want to live.  If I only praise God after I see my victory, life would be a constant "oscillation" between joy and sorrow.  I don't want that- I want to be joyful continually!  I want to be like King Jehoshaphat, who praised God even while his giants stood before him.  He who praises God before the trial always praises Him.  and always wins.

sry i know i haven't updated for very long... been busy.  or no urge to blog.  sch has been ok, mat331 has been particularly challenging, maybe i'm just being to perfectionistic with math.  yeah... and i haven't been sleeping all that well, maybe it's because i'm subconsciously stressed by math.  just pray for me ok?  :)

apart from that everything's been fine.  i've been doing some origami in my free time.  particularly interested in making polyhedra, but not that good at it.  the last thing i completed was a level 1 menger sponge (u can check out what that is on wikipedia) made out of 72 sonobe modules (u can find out what that is on wikipedia too).  not very well constructed, but a feat nontheless.

have a good wk!