A Warrior And His Defeats

It's never going to be easy. A warrior's commitment is not just to win one battle--it is a series of battles that will be fought in many different battlefields. There will be battles that require less attention than necessary, and there will be those that require everything that is necessary for victory. There will be those battles that will confront us when we are most unprepared--but the warrior's task is to embrace it with courage and dignity no matter the cost.

And battles will cost something. It's always been that way. Defeats will cost hope, confidence, strength, and testimony. Defeats will intimidate us, shake us, and slow us down. But it will also give important lessons, valuable experiences, and big opportunities for growth. To a warrior, defeats are meant to strengthen his resolve and enrich his spirit. Defeats of different scope and magnitude will always push a warrior to seek for truth and clarity, they will lead him to innovate, recreate all for the sake of redemption. Defeats make him a better warrior. 

Defeats are never the end. They are the beginning of something you can do again this time better. Fight!

The Force Called Love

Love is a many-splendored thing, so goes the song. And it might be right. Poets and writers and artists and philosophers and skeptics of different ages have attempted to define the concept and examine the nature and purpose of love. But can one really fully grasp its meaning? Can one really have the slightest understanding of a force so strong and so capable without being shaken and moved and changed by it? Can one really come close to defining it without having one's own definition altered once he gets to see what it really IS? What if love is not meant to be defined, and that love is actually a meaning on its own, a purpose on its own: incomprehensible yet fully known, infinite yet fully tangible, multifaceted yet one concrete whole?

Ah, love is a many-splendored things! And it is meant to be experienced and demonstrated.

Happy hearts day! :)

Killing Pride

If there's one thing that an infinitely loving God detests, that is pride. No sin and human tendency since the creation (and even before it) has caused so much of the trouble in the world than the sin of pride, arrogance, and rebellion.

Way into the second chapter of Isaiah, God again issues the same invitation He offered in the first chapter. He invites us to come, and go with Him and experience Him. We who are a bunch of prideful creatures are still loved by God with an everlasting love that He still wants us to come.

But I must first be willing to meet the standards of His holiness. How can I come to the Lord and be able to experience Him?

I should get rid of any pride in me. God is never pleased with the proud--He detests and destroys them (v12-17). Pride only makes me trust in my own ability and resources. In order to come to the Lord, I must go before Him with humility and total abandon of myself and say, "God, you're all that I need..."

I must get rid of my idolatry (v7-9, 8, 20). Anything that distract my focus on God must be shattered. Anything that gets attention in my life more that God must be severed. There's only one focus and that is the Lord my God.

I must determine to exalt Christ in my life (v11). I must realize that the sole purpose of my life is to please God and exalt Him always. Anything less than the glory of God in my life must go. I must desire to achieve greater faith and obedience for the praise of His glory.

Pride and arrogance have no place in the heart of a servant of the Lord!

Scarlet, Crimson, and the Blood

Personal holiness and purity in today's culture is no more than a thing of the past, an idealized virtue that broken people like you and me try to pursue and yet willingly ignores. Here's a fact that I know of: morality is mocked, purity is laughed at, and the people who try to stand for these are labelled as bigoted and intolerant and Dark Age prophets.

But here's the truth that remains today: God still demands holiness and purity. It has not changed over the course of generations when God issued the decree which commands His people to pursue purity. The call to be holy and separated from the world is ever more resounding today.

God through the prophet Isaiah proclaimed that same message many generations ago: "wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; put away the evil of your doings from before my eyes. Cease to do evil." (Isa 1:16)

God desires our purity and holiness. He is a holy God. No sin and transgression can ever stand before Him. For without holiness no one will be able to see Him. (Hebrews 12:14)

God desires repentance. He wants our turning away from evil. Physical offerings and works are never sufficient to obtain God's forgiveness and grace. What matters to the Lord is a repentant heart that is willing to yield to God's heart.

God desires my utmost devotion and obedience. A direct result of repentance is obedience to God and His word.God desires our obedience because with it comes the essential process where we can experience His awesome power. It is in obedience to His commands that I will be able to experience God fully in my life.

Today, He still invites people to come to Him and reason with Him (Isa 1:18). God is daring us to settle the matter before Him, with the promise that if we repent, even our darkest deed and sins as deep as crimson and red will be forgiven and forgotten. Will you come to Him today?

A Million Little Lights

She's looking at the constellation of stars suspended in the canvass of an evening sky when she asked: when was the last time you fell in love? I always fall in love, I said, gesturing at the grand sky. Nah, you know what I mean, she insists.

Well, do you know that the stars didn't actually form themselves into constellations and images that we now know today? That what we see are just patterns produce by the human mind to make a sense of what we see on a night like this?, I said. Lame excuse.

I'd like to believe that falling in love is like that sometimes. People make a construct out of this human emotion and experience in order to make a sense of what we can't explain. But like the stars in the universe, emotions are infinite, unreachable, unfathomable. We cannot figure them even if we wanted to. And perhaps we're just here to appreciate them and enjoy them and make the most out of the experience.

You are my night sky, I said quietly. And my feelings for you are like constellation of lights in a never-ending confluence of time and space. Yet while it is not too profound, not too mysterious, it is true and real. I fell in love with you like a star falling from its place, and bursting forth with intensity nothing could ever stop... so that when it hits the ground it shatters into a million little pieces lighting up the dull landscape of the dark, lonely night.

She looked at me and smiled. Can you hold my hand?, she said. Sparks fly.

And then the sky exploded once again into millions of bright lights and lit up this little, lonely planet which is my heart as I take delight in knowing that tonight, with her, I own the universe.