God Is God

God is God, and I am not

I can only see a part

Of the picture He's painting

God is God and I am man,

So I'll never understand it all

For only God is God.

These are some of the most impactful and memorable lyrics of my whole life. They come from a song called "God is God" by one of my favorite artists, Steven Curtis Chapman. 

When I was a freshman in high school, my grandma was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor called a gliboblastoma. It was terminal, and there was nothing the doctors could do to save her. It was so painful to watch her regress into a little girl, trying to remember and relearn how to do basic, everyday tasks. My mom was her main caretaker, and wow, did it take a toll on her. My whole family was visibly hurt by my mom's absence.

The doctors performed a brain surgery to remove the growth, but there was no way to reach the root of it & take it out entirely. So, with the roots still intact, my grandma was her normal self for a few weeks. But the tumor would not relent, and soon she was back to the little girl trying to remember and relearn. My grandma Isabel passed away that year. It was one of the hardest years of my life.

We would take her to hospitals that were quite a distance away - I think Redwood City?  I remember so vividly - one late night we were driving back home from the hospital. My grandma was spending the night in the hospital so it was just me & my mom in the car. The song "God is God" started playing. My mom began to sing and as she did, tears started streaming down her face. She didn't have to explain anything to me. See, the song is simply about a person going through something incredibly tough. And although they can't see all the answers or understand why God does what He does, the person is still giving God the permission to intervene and the honor that says, "Win or lose, we praise Him."

This song will forever spark immense emotion in me. My mom was a picture of Christ to me that night. No matter what happened to Jesus -  "Not my will Father, but Your will be done..."

We cannot understand the ways of God. We cannot always know WHY. But we must have the faith to say that God is God, whether I can see the big picture or not. 

An Epiphany

"... When the enemy comes in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against him." - Isaiah 59:19

The Hebrew word for “flood” here is nahar. It means a stream or river. I assumed it would mean a gigantic, overflowing pool of water that is unstoppable & inconquerable. But no. The BEST the enemy can do – his idea of a flood – is a little ol stream. 

Look at these pictures. 

Now tell me, what is a little stream in comparison to the One who made entire OCEANS!

The Hebrew word for “lift up a standard” here is nuwc (“noos”). It means to escape, depart, disappear, put to flight. God will dissipate the floods of the enemy, and allow you to escape without knick or scratch under His covering.

When the enemy is threatening attack, remember this verse and realize the infinite ability of your God, versus the pathetic streams of the devil. And just as all rivers must run into the ocean, so will the enemy HAVE TO return to the Ocean and succumb to It's ebb and flow. 

Lord, raise Your standard! Amen

A Drink from the River

Well, as God keeps moving, speaking & shaking things up, I think we sometimes figure, "Well I got my fill for today... I should be good for a month." Nope. What I've learned as this whole move of God continues is that even when WE think we've gotten our fresh drink of water for the day, God is still not done. While we worship, what we're doing is getting a cup & dipping it in the river to get a drink. But even when that cup is empty and you've taken your drink, is the river dried up? No, its still running and twisting and turning beyond your control. God is not done just because YOU are done. He is still working and flowing. It is now up to us to go to the River each day and get a new drink of living water.

"What I love most about rivers is, you can't step in the same river twice."

                                                                                                         - Pocahantas

toothpastefordinner.com

I Did It!

The Fuse was awesome tonight. Service was good, but post-service was... well, it was God.

See, lately, I've been doubting so much! Like, is this where I want to go? What is my life's grand purpose? Really, what  is my passion? Usually when people ask me that, I say its dance, because that's always been my auto-pilot response. But lately I've been really doubting the truth of that response. What IS my passion? What do I want to do? Many times in my life, I have wanted to dance before the Lord in worship, but I never do for fear of looking weird, or even not wanting to distract people.

Let me backtrack a bit... Recently, our church has just exploded in worship. There's a new freedom to worship exactly how you want to worship. There's a guy named DJ & his way of worship is dance. I'm not talking about swaying side to side or even simply jumping up & down. I mean full-on krumping. Hands, arms, feet going crazy for the Lord. Seeing him be able to really, fully worship like that reopened the desire in me to do the same in dance. Last night at the end of his sermon, P. Nick just wanted to get into worship because as he was speaking, God was telling him 3 words: "Never the Same". After being in the presence of God, it is impossible for you to be the same - a change has to be made. Troy & I led worship for a while, and it was good, it was probably the most flowy (if you know what I mean) we've ever been. We worked as a team & allowed God to take over. But I was getting frustrated. It's hard for me to focus on singing, focus on playing the piano, and focus on God all at the same time. I wanted to just worship. P. Nick prayed & dismissed anyone who had to leave. After that, everyone kind of just didn't want to leave His presence. We wanted a "Never the Same" Experience. We put on some worship from Kim Walker & Jesus Culture and one by one, all the lights were turned off until it was Morning Prayer Black in there. As people prayed and worshiped and danced and sang and shouted, you could just feel Freedom entering the room. It was beautiful to look around & see all the ways people worship God. And as I was able to just worship, no microphones, no piano, no sheet music, I did it. I danced. And it was the best worship I've ever had. It was the quickest entrance I've ever made into the presence of God. My gut feeling about dance in worship was right, this whole time! It was almost a scary thing to know that, yes, this is what I was made to do. Just 30 seconds of dancing before the Lord re-ignited 2 years of lost passion.

So dance, scream, shout, skip, sing... whatever YOU have to do to get into HIS presence.

1 Year!

Yesterday, August 7th, Santos and I celebrated our 1st year together. It may not seem like a big deal to everyone, but to us, it means so much. Neither of us have been in a relationship like this before, and it's not easy, but we are always learning more & more.
He took me to Benihaha's in Burlingame. He brought me flowers & we just had such a good time being out together. He looked fiiiine, too :)

So, Happy Anniversary Santz! Just the first of many.

Friday night update

Well tonight me & Beena took the reigns for The Fuse Bible Study. I was a little nervous about it only cause this week was pretty booked & we couldn't get together and I barely even had time to study. But at the same time, I wasn't that nervous cause I know God is on the move lately & the night would go however He wanted it to.
To open up, we did sort of a Reality in a Box, but just switched up a bit. Erik & Anthony helped us out - we all gave a really condensed version of our testimony; the areas where we struggled to attain purity. Whether it was mental, sexual or spiritual purity or purity of the heart, we all shared with passion. I went on to explain the reason for sharing the impurities in our lives. Anything we think or do that is contrary to the Word of God creates impurity in our lives.
For altar call, we did a song called Start A Fire. It was cool that we did that song; I hadn't heard it in a long time, but I've always loved that song. I was singing by myself, just me & piano. Part of me wanted to be nervous cause I don't like to sing alone, but God is helping me learn to rely on Him in worship times just as much as I would in any other situation. So I decided to relax & enjoy the song I love so much. As I did, God reminded me of one of the lines in the song - it says, "Burn away the dross, holy fire of God." I remember the 1st time I heard that song, I didn't really know what that meant, so I decided to look it up. I'm glad I did cause it came in handy tonight. When transforming gold from earthen mineral to precious metal they place the mineral form over a flame & just keep turning up the heat. When they do this, all the impurities come out. They have to come out, they have no choice. Dross is all the impurities that are burned out, so that the gold becomes more precious, more perfected. I shared this with everyone, and after that, I guess I felt more... prophetic? I don't know, something kind of changed.
Anyway, it was just a great night. Thank You, Lord!