Dear…
Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise: be thankful unto Him, and bless His name.
Psalm 100:4
This verse popped up on my computer screen as I prepared to express in written prose, the joy that our good Lord has placed upon my spirit. And an apt verse it is.
Just today, at lunch with a dear brother, we were served by a nice young man whose name is Christan. The thought came to me that if he has the additional letter i in it, it would be nice.
God is good. The young man observed us giving thanks before the meal, and started a conversation with us. He went through a humbling process, and from what we gleaned, he is now very much closer with our Lord, hence his positive service attitude as well as keen awareness to connect with Christians in his work. And indeed his name is Christian, for there was a misspelling in his name tag.
In You, O Lord, I put my trust…
Psalm 31:1
We extol the grace of God when things go our way, when our prayers are answered.
But most of us struggle to have the attitude of gratitude when our desires seems not to be answered.
Clearly this young brother in Christ has found his peace with our Lord. And we are glad that our Lord provided this opportunity for us to know Him, affirm His faith, and more importantly remind us of the need for a thankful heart.
For the finite man in us often seek conclusions, God desires our obedience.
But as for me, I trust in You O Lord. I say, You are my God.
My times are in Your hand.
Psalm 31:14-15
Waiting upon our Lord. This is not easy, for our finite understanding often rationally justify the need for action, much as King Saul did, when he figured the enemies were approaching, and God will understand the need for his disobedience. He was wrong.
( 1 Samuel 13:8-16)
And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart. Therefore, as we have the opportunity, let us do good to all especially to those who are of the household of faith.
Galatians 6:9-10
The disappointment of not having our desires met is frustrating enough, yet God expects us to think of others, much as we are wondering, ¨ Is He thinking of our needs?¨
Yet, this very silence in itself is an opportunity for us to walk in faith, and live out our faith. In doing so, we will experience Godś grace in the lives of others, but will we experience His grace in ours?
The seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how.
Mark 4:26-29
By His grace, these past 19 years of seeking to follow Christ, to let go and let Him, I have like many who seeks Him, experienced with awe, the prescience of Godś timing and ways, that one cannot but acknowledge His Sovereignty. And understand this truth, that if He were to always answer our prayers our finite ways, we will never be able to fathom the depths of His love, and the infinite wisdom of God our Father.
And I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not, and I will lead them in paths that they have not known, I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight.
These things will I do unto them and not forsake them.
Isaiah 42:16
As the year comes to an end, it is good to take time to reflect upon the things that God has blessed us with. And more importantly, to revisit the disappointments by looking from His perspective rather than from our own understanding. In doing so, He will open our hearts to appreciate His plans for us, and they are always good plans. Then can we indeed face each new day with a thankful heart, in joy and peace, with a God sanctified assurance that surpasses our human understanding.
.....weeping may stay for the night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.
Psalm 30:5
God Blesses
Eng Hieang
(27th Nov 2019)
An afterthought : Fukuoka again(27th Nov 2019)
I would have lost heart, unless I had believed. That I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
Psalm 27:13
From the point in Nov 2012, that our good Lord pointed me to Japan, to bring hope to the hapless through empowerment in the marketplace, it has been a wonderful journey of seeing the impossible made only possible by His grace.
From the vision of creating employment(beyond which I had no clue as to where and how to start) for the local Japanese via property investments. Our good Lord has made possible my maiden foray(in May 2013, on hindsight, at the most depressed state of the Japanese economy) in a 200 sq ft shoebox apartment, a remnant of the heydays of the 1980s, in a hitherto little known backwater in Kumamoto City in Southern Japan, into something much bigger.
And interestingly, Kumamoto Prefecture is significant as not just where a shrine venerates the grandson of the first Emperor of Japan(believed to be the direct descendant of the Sun Goddess Amaterasu, an interesting fact as witnessed in the recent ascension of the present new Emperor Naruhito of Japan, who spent a night in the presence of Goddess Amaterasu), but a Christian hotbed, which witnessed both the flowering of Christianity in the 16th Century, as well as the determined campaign to exterminate them a few decades later.
As I pen this, by His grace, we are about to complete the purchase of our 2nd building(via our firmś Japan Property Fund) in Fukuoka City, the capital of Kyushu Island. And the journey has not ended. I believe God will continue to unfold the tapestry that He has put in place for Japan, using Fukuoka City as the key to His plans.
It is not about how big one can scale to, but how willing are we to be the instrument of Godś love and grace, that wherever God calls us to, the world will truly be in awe of His Sovereignty.
It is a journey of learning to totally depend upon the Lord our God, and in doing so, being privileged to experience His love and glorious sovereignty in our lives and that of people He placed in our path.
Wait on the Lord. Be of good courage, And He shall strengthen your heart. Wait, I say, on the Lord.
Psalm 27:13-14
Most blessed if you could revisit my past sharings in the links below that covered my journey in Japan at the onset.
Japan revisited( oct 2015) http://hieangchildren.
Japan( may 2015) http://hieangchildren.
Land of the Risen Son (sep 2013) http://hieanglightness.
No comments:
Post a Comment