Skip to main content

Onward to a new season

Today I begin a new season of my life as a student affairs professional in Singapore. I've never been to Singapore but I hear it's quite an efficient and law-abiding city (both of which are strikingly fitting with my personality). I do have anxieties about starting from scratch in a city where I only know three people, but can't help but think that my year in Philadelphia prepared me for a move like this.

A card I received last summer when I left AA
I knew one person when I was moving to Philly, an old middle school friend whom I was happy to reconnect with. Deciding to leave Michigan for grad school was one of the hardest decisions I've ever made, but one I knew I very much needed. Leaving behind everything I knew in a familiar place to start over seemed illogical, but I came to see my relationship with God in a new light through the challenges of being in a new city, investing in a new church, and surrounding myself with a new community.

If there was one truth that came alive through my year in Philly, it was the fact that God did not give us a spirit of fear but a spirit of power, love, and self-control (2 Timothy 1:7). By God's grace with the support of a loving (but different) Christ-centered community, I was able to look past the fears I initially faced to live out the purposes set aside for me.

As I look to what's ahead, I want to commit to living with BOLDNESS and REPENTANCE. Doing one thing every day that scares me (instead of caving in to my fears), and turning away from my ways to trust in His instead. God, take me deeper as I put my faith and dependence on You.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

And just when you least expect it..

Today I went down to the food court with another intern and as I opened my box of sushi, I hesitated. Feeling as if there were too many eyes on me (I only ate with one other person -_-), I questioned whether I should pray before my meal, in fear of social rejection. After I prayed, she asked me if I was a Christian, and I awkwardly responded that I was. Then she said, "Finally! What a relief to know that there are other Christians!" WHAT THE.. I couldn't believe it. Here I was, sitting with a co-worker that I had simply exchanged cordial greetings with, now talking about God haha. Even though I was scared and honestly did NOT want to pray, God used a habitual thing like that to open up opportunities for me to invite her to small group and share my faith. Crazy how He works when you least expect it.
5 comments
Read more

Delirious

delirious (adj): marked by uncontrollable excitement or emotion; ecstatic; filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy (1 peter 1:8); me I don't think I had a personal relationship with God until 2 weeks ago. There have been a lot of formative moments and experiences in the past 6 years of me considering the existence of a higher-being, 3 yrs of being a Christian, 1 year of living by faith, 6 months of serving on church leadership, 1 month of dire circumstances, each of which have been challenged and supported by specific instances in my life.* But it's only been 2 weeks of finding pure joy, satisfaction, and freedom in Christ (alone). Though it's been 6 years since I first stepped into a church building and 3 years since I accepted Christ, I was always afraid to admit that I didn't know what grace, freedom, repentance, or Jesus meant--in terms other than the ones I had heard or read--it was always a theory and never a reality in my own life. After years of doing chur...
5 comments
Read more

Surrendering my career

"Whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it." The concept of surrendering my career never made much sense to me because I've always known what I wanted to do, and was perfectly en route to achieving it. I thought I was better than everyone else for knowing what I wanted to do. In all frankness, I just thought I was awesome and gave myself credit for every accomplishment in my life. When God directly confronted me last year with how much I had been living for myself, I made all excuses to rationalize and justify myself. Somehow God changed my heart to be willing to let go of my perfect plan and insured that I would never find the type of security and identity that I found through a job title or company reputation. He took me through a whole year of rejections and dejected moments so that I would learn what it means to be satisfied with merely having a relationship with the God of the universe , not just praising Him or want...
2 comments
Read more