Wow. It was already about a week since I wrote my last post. I noticed keeping the blog is very time consuming. But when I got feedback from other people, I guess I found a new meaning to writing the blog.
In my first post, I felt hopeless, like I couldn't help anybody even if I tried. I hated myself for not being able to help or trying to help and failing. But this past week, reading the comments, hearing how this blog changed their perception of not only me, but God, and by having a more positive outlook as a daily basis, I found how to help others. I found out that writing my grievances and thoughts in a readable and expressible form greatly helped others.
I found a new purpose for writing the blog.
Anyways, this past week was hectic with school and other activities. The only thing keeping me from giving up and going to sleep for that extra time and having that energy to push through and get work done was Reach on Friday night.
Reach, with out a doubt, was a spiritually moving event. But there was something more. It did not merely move me in my spiritual life, but it moved me on how I expressed it with other people.
I thought Reach would be like that normal praise night with songs and a couple bible verses recited here and there, but it wasn't that at all.
It taught me how blind we are as a society to the low class. The class of the homeless, the class of the needy, and most of all, the class made up of PEOPLE.
How blind can our society be to walk past a homeless on the streets as if walking past a statue? We walk past the homeless, we drive along the streets of the homeless, and we ignore the homeless.
What makes them different from you and me? I'm human. You're human. They are human. They are made up of the same body parts, the same bone structure, the same heart and soul. And yet we shun them from society.
We treat them as dirt. Filth. Rubble. In fact, we don't treat them as such because we don't acknowledge them. They are nothing. They are not worthy of our attention.
But are they worthy for God's? I believe that God thinks of the homeless just as much as you and me. You and me of the society, and the shunned homeless.
In God's eyes, we are the same. There is no society in which he labels us in. We are all children of God, but then why do we ignore and deny our fellow brothers and sisters? Why then do we walk past them to spend six dollars on Yogurtland when a single dollar can be a blessing to them? Why do we leave our brothers and sisters on the streets?
The message that was shared at Reach was different. Unlike all other messages about the homeless, the needy, the poor, this particular message invoked us to act rather than to merely watch.
The statistics given on the video he gave us and the video posted is scary. It's horrible knowing those numbers. "Oh my God" and "Wow" were most of the reactions. "Oh my God" what? This is the world you live in. This is also the world you can CHANGE. But in order to change, we must first act.
Evan asks, "How do you change the world?"
God says, "One single Act of Random Kindness at a time."
Evan Almighty (2007)
We must be a society willing to do that random act of kindness. We must break the walls of our society down and change the world.
But in order to change the world, we must first change ourselves. Change ourselves from an elite society blinded by selfishness to an aware group of people holding each other up reguardless of color, age, whether they are dirty or clean, whether they have nice clothes or have messy clothes, whether they are enemies, we must be one nation unified without hate, without discrimination, without criticism.
Don't worry, I'll fix whatever doesnt make sense in the morning. hahaha
Phil
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
The small miracles
Today was just a normal day with its ups and downs. It felt like any Wednesday that feels like a Thursday. It felt all in all, repetitive.
But today at lunch, I saw something different. I FELT something different. I saw God through somebody else.
I know God does crazy stuff. Miracles like walking on water, the shining light down from the Heavens, all that stuff. But man this hit me harder than any of that.
I don't know... Maybe it was because he sat right next to me at lunch, or because it was too silent for a group of friends, or maybe it was a sign.
He was praying.
He was praying not to set an example to others, not to be the "holy one", not to stand out, but to merely speak with God before the meal. A conversation between him and God and nobody else! That is what I witnessed today. It was two seconds of my life. It started and ended with a glance. Honestly, if I didn't turn my head, nothing would have changed. He would still be praying, me still waiting for my other friend. But I looked. I saw the image. It wasn't a chance. I saw it.
I know, because I felt His presence filled within me just for a second.
That was the miracle I witnessed today.
Not the feeding of the thousands, not the healing of the blind, but the healing of my heart. The power overcame. No, I didn't break down. No, I didn't cry. I simply felt.
Such a simple action as prayer can have the mightiest of powers. When the world withers away and dies, that conversation between you and God is still strong within prayer.
Other than that, though, it was a normal day. Normal classes. Normal parents. Normal events.
But if that was normal, miracles like this happen every day. You just have to open your eyes to them.
Listen and you shall see.
To my journal,
Phil
But today at lunch, I saw something different. I FELT something different. I saw God through somebody else.
I know God does crazy stuff. Miracles like walking on water, the shining light down from the Heavens, all that stuff. But man this hit me harder than any of that.
I don't know... Maybe it was because he sat right next to me at lunch, or because it was too silent for a group of friends, or maybe it was a sign.
He was praying.
He was praying not to set an example to others, not to be the "holy one", not to stand out, but to merely speak with God before the meal. A conversation between him and God and nobody else! That is what I witnessed today. It was two seconds of my life. It started and ended with a glance. Honestly, if I didn't turn my head, nothing would have changed. He would still be praying, me still waiting for my other friend. But I looked. I saw the image. It wasn't a chance. I saw it.
I know, because I felt His presence filled within me just for a second.
That was the miracle I witnessed today.
Not the feeding of the thousands, not the healing of the blind, but the healing of my heart. The power overcame. No, I didn't break down. No, I didn't cry. I simply felt.
Such a simple action as prayer can have the mightiest of powers. When the world withers away and dies, that conversation between you and God is still strong within prayer.
Other than that, though, it was a normal day. Normal classes. Normal parents. Normal events.
But if that was normal, miracles like this happen every day. You just have to open your eyes to them.
Listen and you shall see.
To my journal,
Phil
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Beyond the water reflection
Who knew writing your heart can be so lifting? If I knew that, I would have started writing a long time before I actually did. Actually, I think it's because of my english teacher. Man, how that guy can teach. Before I knew it, I started loving to read and write when I hated it last year. He's really awesome. Although if he read this, he would find all the rhetoric and all of that english stuff that was missing... Through all that, this blog goes out to him for inspiring me to not only write, but to express.
I've had some time to think stuff over the past day on what I wrote. Man, I really poured my heart out.
Maybe I was just over thinking, but maybe not. Can I really help others? If so, how could I help them without feeling what they have felt that caused them to do such actions? How do others help? How can I feel the same pain that they feel so I can connect without actually committing those actions? So many open ended questions....
Anyways, today was a weird day. I found out people actually read this kind of stuff. I got so many reactions, I don't know how to respond to them. What makes them care? Why should they take time to read this? Does it change them as a person by reading my pains? I hope it does. I hope that my pains and struggles will benefit others.
At least, today was so much better than Monday. Monday was a bummer both emotionally and physically. Today, my mind wasn't as clouded, but I was still confused. I asked the question: What's going on with my spiritual life? Is it going forward or backwards?
I remember somebody told me that if you aren't moving forward in you walk with God, you're falling back. Well, I always thought of it as a rope connected to God in heaven hanging down to Earth. There always has to be a connection with God towards him. You have to hold that rope leading to him while he pulls you up even in the struggles of daily life. Even when you are tired of holding the rope, Hold! For at the end there will be a greater prize. But the pain of holding on gets worse and worse as you get higher and higher. There's always something trying to pull you down. There's something trying to get you to let go of that rope.
I fell down that rope. I went from great heights, to the lowest of lows. I'm at base level now. The thing is, it's so hard to get up that rope, but it's so easy to go down. It frustrates me. It frustrates me because I know I always fall off. I know I can't hold on for more than a year, six months, or even three months. It frustrates me how I am always reborn but I am never constant. I cut the lines every single time the connection is made.
That constant struggle to connect for a brief period of time and feel great! Then to break it as if you flip a light switch.
How heartbreaking must it be for God to watch his kids cut themselves off every. single. time.
Sure, to cut themselves, they must first make a connection. But what then after? What happens when somebody asks of their walk with God?
One of the pastors from SMT when I was in junior high talked about this and I never seemed to let it go. This message was for me.
He talked about being a christian, not for seven years, but for one year reborn 7 times. He talked about how the walk with God can not be broken to shards, but it must be constant, unending, habitual. He talked about post-SMT feelings and that there WAS going to be a spiritual high. We all knew it. We all understood it. But what we did not understand was how high the spiritual high was and how low life was without it.
I think another shard of my religious life was cut this past weekend. I felt dark and tenebrous in living life in general. But now is a new day, a new life, a new commitment.
A new commitment not to be reborn again every single time a retreat happens or when SMT is in action, but to fortify the bonds between God and me.
A new commitment not to be a one year old seven times, but be a seven year old one time.
A new commitment not only at church, but as a lifestyle.
Wow if my english teacher read this, he would kill me.
To my journal,
Phil
I've had some time to think stuff over the past day on what I wrote. Man, I really poured my heart out.
Maybe I was just over thinking, but maybe not. Can I really help others? If so, how could I help them without feeling what they have felt that caused them to do such actions? How do others help? How can I feel the same pain that they feel so I can connect without actually committing those actions? So many open ended questions....
Anyways, today was a weird day. I found out people actually read this kind of stuff. I got so many reactions, I don't know how to respond to them. What makes them care? Why should they take time to read this? Does it change them as a person by reading my pains? I hope it does. I hope that my pains and struggles will benefit others.
At least, today was so much better than Monday. Monday was a bummer both emotionally and physically. Today, my mind wasn't as clouded, but I was still confused. I asked the question: What's going on with my spiritual life? Is it going forward or backwards?
I remember somebody told me that if you aren't moving forward in you walk with God, you're falling back. Well, I always thought of it as a rope connected to God in heaven hanging down to Earth. There always has to be a connection with God towards him. You have to hold that rope leading to him while he pulls you up even in the struggles of daily life. Even when you are tired of holding the rope, Hold! For at the end there will be a greater prize. But the pain of holding on gets worse and worse as you get higher and higher. There's always something trying to pull you down. There's something trying to get you to let go of that rope.
I fell down that rope. I went from great heights, to the lowest of lows. I'm at base level now. The thing is, it's so hard to get up that rope, but it's so easy to go down. It frustrates me. It frustrates me because I know I always fall off. I know I can't hold on for more than a year, six months, or even three months. It frustrates me how I am always reborn but I am never constant. I cut the lines every single time the connection is made.
That constant struggle to connect for a brief period of time and feel great! Then to break it as if you flip a light switch.
How heartbreaking must it be for God to watch his kids cut themselves off every. single. time.
Sure, to cut themselves, they must first make a connection. But what then after? What happens when somebody asks of their walk with God?
One of the pastors from SMT when I was in junior high talked about this and I never seemed to let it go. This message was for me.
He talked about being a christian, not for seven years, but for one year reborn 7 times. He talked about how the walk with God can not be broken to shards, but it must be constant, unending, habitual. He talked about post-SMT feelings and that there WAS going to be a spiritual high. We all knew it. We all understood it. But what we did not understand was how high the spiritual high was and how low life was without it.
I think another shard of my religious life was cut this past weekend. I felt dark and tenebrous in living life in general. But now is a new day, a new life, a new commitment.
A new commitment not to be reborn again every single time a retreat happens or when SMT is in action, but to fortify the bonds between God and me.
A new commitment not to be a one year old seven times, but be a seven year old one time.
A new commitment not only at church, but as a lifestyle.
Wow if my english teacher read this, he would kill me.
To my journal,
Phil
Monday, October 19, 2009
The raw heart
Wow.... where to begin.
I never thought I would actually come to make this. This really is crazy. Why am I doing this? I guess I just can't open up myself to any one thing and feel fully understanded. Yeah.... thats why. To pour out my heart without anybody crushing it.
Man even just that part made me feel happier. How come I didn't make one earlier?
Anyways, this past week or so has been crazy. No, over crazy. It's opened my eyes. I feel the sky just darkened, the dark advanced, and the light was shaded. Too much information went through to my brain over the last few days.
It just hurts watching others get hurt by drugs or alcohol. I feel horrible standing next to them not being able to do anything. ANYTHING to help them. How do I help them? They're so far down the line, even the small little sayings that I encourage to them on a daily basis won't work. Sure, they say it's fine and they NEED it. But do they really? Is it necessary? Is it vital to them to function properly? They're so far down the line, I feel I can't help them back up. I feel useless.
It just enrages me. Just think! How could they even go down that path? Why dive into a pool of drugs and alcohol........ I want to help but I can't. How can I offer help if the minds and the hearts of those in need are not ready for it? Its like running into a wall where on the other side is a world full of hate and pain ready to be fixed. I want to fix that, but I can't. The worst part is, the people on the other side erected the wall.
I'm just down. I feel worthless. Do I really make an impact on anybody?
So much pain so much pain through the thoughts of watching friends, family, even strangers go down the wrong path: the path leading nowhere but to worse things. Strangers! How can that be? I don't even know them, we've never met, we never had a social connection. And yet, my heart aches for them. Where will they be in 20, 10, or even 5 years from now doing the same stuff day after day... It just hurts thinking of the possibilities.
Even my spiritual life is dwindling. Sure, it was great during missions and retreats, and even at church, but outside of all that, I feel it is nonexistent. The worst part is, I know that, and it pains me. It hurts me every day knowing that, but I don't have the willpower to stop and change directions. Am I on the same road down the way to worse things? Is this the start?
I hope it's not. I don't want to go down that road.
This blog is a test of faith for me. I have so many unanswered questions. I need answers. I need guidance. I want to see if this can change my life. For the first time, I'm writing down my life in a solid form of a diary, or a journal. This is the fork in the road leading up or down. This is the solid proof of the fact that I am lost. This blog, hopefully, will change my life.
Feels good to let it all out
To my journal,
Phil
I never thought I would actually come to make this. This really is crazy. Why am I doing this? I guess I just can't open up myself to any one thing and feel fully understanded. Yeah.... thats why. To pour out my heart without anybody crushing it.
Man even just that part made me feel happier. How come I didn't make one earlier?
Anyways, this past week or so has been crazy. No, over crazy. It's opened my eyes. I feel the sky just darkened, the dark advanced, and the light was shaded. Too much information went through to my brain over the last few days.
It just hurts watching others get hurt by drugs or alcohol. I feel horrible standing next to them not being able to do anything. ANYTHING to help them. How do I help them? They're so far down the line, even the small little sayings that I encourage to them on a daily basis won't work. Sure, they say it's fine and they NEED it. But do they really? Is it necessary? Is it vital to them to function properly? They're so far down the line, I feel I can't help them back up. I feel useless.
It just enrages me. Just think! How could they even go down that path? Why dive into a pool of drugs and alcohol........ I want to help but I can't. How can I offer help if the minds and the hearts of those in need are not ready for it? Its like running into a wall where on the other side is a world full of hate and pain ready to be fixed. I want to fix that, but I can't. The worst part is, the people on the other side erected the wall.
I'm just down. I feel worthless. Do I really make an impact on anybody?
So much pain so much pain through the thoughts of watching friends, family, even strangers go down the wrong path: the path leading nowhere but to worse things. Strangers! How can that be? I don't even know them, we've never met, we never had a social connection. And yet, my heart aches for them. Where will they be in 20, 10, or even 5 years from now doing the same stuff day after day... It just hurts thinking of the possibilities.
Even my spiritual life is dwindling. Sure, it was great during missions and retreats, and even at church, but outside of all that, I feel it is nonexistent. The worst part is, I know that, and it pains me. It hurts me every day knowing that, but I don't have the willpower to stop and change directions. Am I on the same road down the way to worse things? Is this the start?
I hope it's not. I don't want to go down that road.
This blog is a test of faith for me. I have so many unanswered questions. I need answers. I need guidance. I want to see if this can change my life. For the first time, I'm writing down my life in a solid form of a diary, or a journal. This is the fork in the road leading up or down. This is the solid proof of the fact that I am lost. This blog, hopefully, will change my life.
Feels good to let it all out
To my journal,
Phil
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