yesterday Jin and Ae and I were talking about Naomi (from the Bible) and how at first she was so upset at God, after moving to an abundant land to escape famine, she ended up the only survivor in her family. She blamed God and called herself bitter. So the question was, when we feel angry at God, are we comfortable enough to express this to God and each other.

All of us sheepishly answered no, not really. I mean, all of us had felt upset with God in recent days and weeks. We are all in the same very small house church and see each other and talk about God every day. So why does it still feel so secret and personal and embarrassing to unveil what we are really thinking towards the Lord?

Our house church is hitting a particularly lovely stride. The relationships among us are life-giving and generously opened out to others. Last week, Bu came to visit our home group after her good friend Ae told her about God over a period of many months, as Bu opened up more and more about her struggles and Ae opened up about hers and about the Lord’s help. Shortly after she walked in, her baby started crying and Duke, Jin, and Ae scrambled to put together a make-shift hammock for the little one. It was cool to see everyone working together to welcome someone, but this is now what we regularly see.

Last week, on her one evening off, Mother Duke suggested to everyone in the church (Michelle and I weren’t around) that they all pile into a taxi and pool their money to go visit a family in a neighboring province… This family came to our church camp last month and decided to follow God there, but they are fairly isolated in a remote area in Bangkok’s outskirts. This is the second time she has initiated a visit out there, and it’s amazing to me that someone who works so hard (6 days a week, plus overtime) for so little money (about $240/month) would be so interested in sacrificing time, energy, and money to follow up with someone she barely knows—all for the sake of sharing in God’s love.

Last monday

I listened to little Ice say that she wants to follow God here at 13 years old and thought, she has no idea what she's asking. She can't imagine the doubt and heartache and obstacles that life will throw at her in the coming years.

Dressed in her baptism gown along with her friends and the other new believers I was struck what a leap this is for everyone and how these young ones just do not know what the future will hold for them and God; they couldn't possibly be ready. But it doesn't matter. Looking back on my own life of faith since my infant baptism I can say one thing for sure, GOD is faithful. This commitment ceremony is a really beautiful promise between two: God and you and God himself will bless and honor it forever. How awesome:


The girls on their way to the ocean to get baptized and start a new life.

more ring drama

When Rod proposed to me, the ring he had chosen did not fit. It was too big and so slipped off my finger easily when I washed my hands or showered or did dishes or anything... A dangerous situation in an active life.

So I went to Chinese gold shop to ask about getting it re-sized. He looked at it with his jewelers microscope, whatever that's called, and gave me good and bad news: The jewel (Burmese ruby) is real. But the silver is not. The ring was merely silver-plated and thus could not be cut and melded back together seamlessly.

The next day I took it to another jeweler who said he could resize it, but it would leave a mark-- the spot where the ring is fashioned back together is not as shiny as the rest of it.

Now with this ring on my finger, I like all the work that has surrounded it, the love Rod put into choosing it for me (in a color that I like so uniquely), the way that it wasn't quite right and needed adjustment and the adjustment shows, even the idea that the jewel is real and lovely but the ring itself is just ordinary-- A reminder of the precious faith and love that God has poured into us in our lives and in this marriage is like "treasure held in jars of clay"-- how could something so lovely be contained in something so imperfect and ordinary?



My ring, Rod's tat... God bless us!

Wow... I'm engaged. I keep looking at this lovely ring and marveling at what it all means; I can't say I comprehend it yet. The ring Rod chose for me is a round cut ruby on a silver band, and this morning I was fingering it as I read Scripture and prayed for us and our future identity as a couple.

One prayer that's been significant for me for years is Psalm 131, a prayer of humility and trust:
"My heart is not lifted up (or proud) ; my eyes are not raised too high for me.
I do not think on things too great or marvelous for me.
But I have calmed and quieted my soul.
Like a weaned child with its mother is my soul within me.
Like a weaned child I am content.
Oh Israel, trust in the Lord, from this time forth and forevermore."

As I feel so full of joy and peace I look around and see that marriage is so fragile, that we are so vulnerable stepping into the unknown together. As I pray for who we're going to be together I realize we don't have that much wisdom; we don't know what we're doing really (like my parents said, "Getting married is like jumping off a cliff... but it's a gamble you've got to take!") So this morning I was asking that God would bless us with wisdom from him, make our paths straight, estabilish us, all of that. This is what I read, from the third chapter of Proverbs, which I always thought went nicely with the psalm above:

"Do not be wise in your own eyes.
Fear the Lord and shun evil.
This will bring health to your body and nourishment to your bones.
... Blessed are those who find wisdom, those who gain understanding,
For she is more profitable than silver...
She is more precious than rubies;
nothing you desire can compare with her."

So when I look at this ring and think about love and life together, I want to be thinking and praying about this too... If you think of us, please pray that God would bless us with a gift of wisdom.

attending a neighborhood exercise group, I overheard a neighbor telling the visiting aerobics instructor, “Oh that white girl? No, she’s not a guest, she’s one of us! She just lives here, she’s lived here for many, many years.” A small dark thought arose in me: “I’m not the same! I am a successful college-educated person here to HELP you…” Almost instantly, my stomach turned. Who do I think that I am and why in the world would I feel the need to separate myself from my neighbors, especially as “above” them?? Ew. I immediately asked God’s forgiveness and then could see the sweetness and honor in my neighbors accepting comment.. and THEN i actually felt something a little bit like joy.

A few months ago, a small group in Orange County, California donated some money for us to outfit our little slum youth center (which is also Jin’s house). We were excited to buy fans, a sink, a DVD player, etc. The day after Jin and Michelle returned from the store with the new DVD player (we had taken ours to her house and left it there for youth events), Jin spent the night with her brother in another part of the city. The next day, I got a phone call from a worried neighbor, saying that it looked like youth center had been broken into. Jin rushed home to find that both the new and old DVD players and her computer monitor had been stolen.
We soon found out that everyone knew who had done this. One of the kids who has been involved with our ministry from the beginning, a boy who, without attentive guardians of his own, has spent a good portion the last 7 years sleeping at the homes of various house church members… Just a month after his huge (church-hosted) 14th birthday party, he and two of his older friends broke into Jin’s house and stole this stuff.
At first I was shocked… and then so sad. I also felt irritated: I wanted my DVD player back! How foolish. To sell his spiritual health and his whole community who loves him for a DVD player? Because all of his peers (the other youth) knew about this, now he felt he had to make himself scarce and avoid everyone. For what? It reminded me of Esau, who trades his family blessing from God for a single meal!
However, suddenly I thought of myself. How many times have I compromised my own soul for much less than a DVD player? Stretched the truth just so that other people might think I’m cool? Refused to forgive someone straightaway because I wanted to feel like I was right?
All of a sudden the mercy of God struck me: God chooses to be good to the ones he loves. Constantly. Even when we make foolish, foolish choices that take us away from God. His posture towards is still this: goodness and love.
Jin, Michelle, and I discussed this matter and decided not to confront the boy, or talk to his mother, or ask for our stuff back. Instead we would seek out and take every opportunity to reassure him that he is welcome and we love him. We went to his motherss house and told her that we missed him. We have greeted him warmly and tried to engage in conversation when we run into him… he still hasn’t returned to any church activities or any church members’ house, but I can't stop thinking about how good God to us is when it doesn't look like anything... good to me, good to him, good to these other "hopeless cases" I see around me... we have a God who chases after us and, as the psalmist writes:
"Makes us lie down in green pastures, leads us beside quiet waters... Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life and I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever." Why is this? "For his names sake."
Once God chooses to have mercy, he chooses to have mercy and he loves forever. If we are some of those lucky ones that have received God's grace, what choice to we have but to see others in this same boat of undeserved unrelenting love?