Changing Realities.

Meet Josh.

Josh is a Chinese-American, more on the American side. He’s American but he looks Chinese and his ancestors come from China. He loves the Steelers, pumping weights, and well…. all Pittsburg sports.

When we got off the plane coming back from China there were two lines. One was for American citizens and one was for visitors, internationals, foreigners, (anyone not American). We all moved into the American citizen’s line. But Josh, who was running behind because his luggage got left missed the turn and just followed the crowd and ended up in the international line. When entering a new country, you go through many more checks if it’s not your own country. What are you doing here? How long will you stay? Did you bring anything to sell? Blah blah blah. Security is a bit tighter for you because it’s this idea of “We don’t know you. You don’t know the way things are in America/India/China/Etc. We need to make sure you’re not bringing your own countries rules into our country.” It makes sense, happens to me in every country I go to except America is much stricter with…everything.

Here’s the deal. Josh got in the international line and starts getting all this extra checks and issues. He has to jump through many more hoops. They’re checking him extra and being strict, quick, slightly defensive towards him. They basically took away his rights as an American citizen because they thought he was Chinese rather than American. He lost his rights. This was Josh’s first time coming back to America so he thought this was normal procedure for America to do. If Josh would have known the reality, the truth, his rights – he wouldn’t have had to go through the harassment, precautions, extra work, etc. Silly Josh.

Silly us. I created this story to tell you this fact. We are who the Bible says we are not what we experience. So often we have an idea of God, an idea of the Christian life, and an idea of how things are supposed to happen because of the reality we live in. God’s good, most of the time but not always. He give us sickness, pain, struggles, so we can suffer through it. We are sinners saved by grace. We’re basically still sinful even though Jesus has died for us to free us that we could become His righteousness because I still struggle with a lot of things. I can’t seem to break free no matter how hard I try from these addictions, back talking, gossiping, trash talking someone, losing my temper with them, lusting, judging them based upon what they wear or how they look and then putting myself higher or lower to them in response. Being a Christian means being polite to everyone, never getting angry, listening only to soft Christian music on the radio, being extremely conservative, and accepting a lot of the bad in my life because it’s “God’s will that his people suffer.” Some people are called to go out and tell about Jesus and they have a special gift for that. I’m just working on reading my Bible each day to get my time in.

Everything I just said does not line up with the Bible. The parts that are in the Bible are misquoted and taken out of context. They are misapplied to our 21^st century context and simplified and watered down. Like Josh, who went through a lot more crap than he had to because he didn’t know he was in the wrong line and had to put up with it, we often suffer a lot of things that we don’t have to. Christ has paid and finished so much at the cross. The finished work of the cross provides coverage for all sin, (that means the ones you may do tomorrow that you’ll feel guilty about and let Satan beat you up over for the next 5 min, hour, 2 days, 2 weeks). In Christ there is no condemnation (Rom 8:1). There is no more bondage to sin (Rom8:2). You are not a sinner anymore – that is not how you are defined. You have been made the righteousness of God(2 Cor 5:21). You are His son or daughter and are entitled/co-heir with that of Christ(Rom8:15). Many times in a situation we’ll accept guilt, shame, or even take it on us to think “this is real repentance” rather than accepting that Christ has already taken all of that and walking away. I say this because we as citizens of heaven (Phil 3:20). We don’t have to accept all of this – instead we declare our identity, our citizen ship. “Wait, no. I’m an American. I don’t have to go through all of this.” “Wait, No. I’m a Son of God. I don’t have to go through all of this.”

What’s stranger than this are the things that Jesus said “if you believe in me, you’ll do the things that I do…but greater things.” (John 14:12). Many times we accept not doing these things because I haven’t seen it, or it didn’t work, or I don’t have that gifting. He said it, it should happen. We accept realities around us all the time that we don’t  have to. We need to fight for our rights as citizens of the Kingdom, as sons or daughters, as one’s under the power of the blood.  We don’t see some healings, encouragement, prophesy, or other incredible acts of Love from God to His people because we accepted the reality or the experience that it doesn’t happen…or it doesn’t happen to me.  That’s accepting a false reality. It’s letting the experience change your theology rather than letting your theology change your experience. It should shift things in the atmosphere. It should shift things in your daily circumstances. “Well, not everyone is joyous every day” is a piece of reality we have accepted as true even when we don’t have to. The second fruit of the Spirit is JOY (Gal 5:22). Jesus tells us to abide in Him so that “My joy may be in you and your joy may be complete.” (John 15:11) Joy is a prevailing theme throughout scriptures. Jesus doesn’t want us to be knots on a log, or to be overcome by the world, or “just having a bad day” again…for the 12 day in a row. We aren’t promised sports cars, but we’re also not promised poverty both emotionally and physically. Don’t think being a self-martyr makes you more Holy or makes you more Biblical. It actually makes you more prideful because the focus is on what you’re doing and now that Christ has already done. He comes to bring joy and life and life more abundantly. (John 10:10) If you’re not joyful, pray for joy. If you’re not patient you pray for patience. In the list, joy is 2 before patience.

We cannot let our experiences change how we read the Bible, we have to let the Bible change our experiences.

Don’t accept this false American reality. Don’t accept what your preacher says. Don’t accept what Christian radio explains. Don’t accept what I’ve said. Don’t just accept circumstances because you are in them. Let the word change you, then declare His promises and His reality and His truth into the circumstance you’re in. It’s not some cosmos thing. It’s like there’s this fog in the room that everyone has accepted and your stating what’s on the other side of the fog because God has told you it’s there and then other people begin to see it and move past the fog. There’s this false reality in America, in China, in the world that we’ve been lulled to sleep by and accepted as if things are the way they are not. As mirrored wall makes the room look bigger, a thin sheet hung up closes the room down. If you don’t know there’s another side to the room, you will live and function within the confines of the small room. But if you know there is more to the room, you will not let the sheet act as a wall and you will enjoy and use the full space of the room. We are called and given the whole room – but we have to know the reality that God states in the Bible. If we do not know it, and we don’t walk in that reality, we will live half a life, a defeated life, and such a smaller amount than what God has created for us and Christ has bought back at the cross.

Salvation

I am back safe and sound in the States and am working on processing and getting things ready to present at different Reunion Spots. Family Reunion Spots. :) I'd love to tell more stories and I probalby will on here because they are too many to tell in a 30min-1hr time slot. For today, I had a thought I wanted to encourage and share with you all. It's the idea or point of "being saved" what that looks like.

Salvation is not a prayer. It’s a surrendering event where you lay down your weapons of rebellion against God the King, your dreams of being comfortable, and your ideas that you know what’s best. You follow Jesus into the throne room of God the King and coming undone by the insane tangibility of Love and bow down before him surrendering your life. You hear the name Jesus and as you look up you see the sword of the Lord knighting you, adopting you, coronating you into the royal family. This is the only time in history where the surrender became a coronation ceremony.

QQ Status

Chinese people use QQ. QQ is an instant messaging program on steroids. It's created by Chinese people and EVERYONE uses it. They dont do email, they use QQ. Everyone, everyone's mom, everyone's grandma, and probably their 6 year old little cousin uses it too. (No joke or exaggeration.) In the office each computer has someone's QQ logged in and they will chat on it as well as send important official documents as we would use email.  (Anyways, this is a snippet of Chinese culture.)

Last night, I got on QQ to talk to a student when I saw one of our guys from our study online. He mentioned earlier in our study that when he puts something about Believing in his status his parents will criticize him and tell him not to take it to seriously - that it will distract him from his study. One of the other guys laughed because his parents did the same thing. He gave him some advice "write it in English...your parent's won't be able to follow along." The whole group laughed - but you kind of see the problem. So last night I checked his status and was filled with joy as I read his message (after translating it with google translate).

"让我明白一生只为见证与荣耀" – "I understand that life is only to witness and honor."

How legit is that? This is what I'm talking about. I know he is completely sincere too. It's so cool to see his growth. You know it's not a nice or polite thing he says just to get attention because well... people don't do that here with this stuff. It's not something that people will pat you on the back for like in the States and say you're a good kid. I'm super proud of him and so thankful to see the Spirits work. Thanks for letting me see this. It makes it easier to leave knowing you've got things taken care of. 

Can Soap Change a Nation?

I had the awesome priveldge tonight of doing something that changed many lives.

As we've been drawing our study to a close these last two weeks, tonight we wanted to go out like the J-man went out. We went through some passages of promises He made and the call He gave to us, and discussed their heart and questions. Questions burning inside about those in rural China who have never heard the story. "Maybe you should go?" Josh asked. Then we asked one of the guys if he would read John 13...in Chinese. He flipped to the page and said "are you really...?" and the three of us walked outside.

We came back in with a tub of warm water, a bar of soap, and a towel. One by one we were able to get down on the floor and wash the feet of the men we've been walking along side for the past year. These are the guys we've seen each week in our study. These are the guys we've been meeting with at least one other time to talk about life and the Word and junk going on. I couldn't help but smile as I washed "Mr. President"'s feet. I was just filled with joy as a tear ran down my cheek.

 

Two of the four continued to wipe tears from their eyes as we washed their feet. It was as if J himself were doing it. They were so touched, so moved, so undone. I just watched in amazement of the reality I was seeing. I had the unmistakable passage rushing through my head "How can hear unless someone goes? How beautiful are the feet that bring good news." I think it was specific for them. It was a glimpse of what He was doing. We were commissioning. As He commissioned the 12, so we were now sending them out. One is going to France for the next few years to study and go to school, one will work with underprivileged teens this summer, one volunteers now at a Family coffee shop, and one confessed he wanted to share more, but didn't know what to say so He was going to spend the summer getting to know the Book and the Father more. I am so proud of them. We read it over them then lifted them up and sent them out. (Literally, their dorm closed at 9:40 and they left my apartment at 9:43.) 

As they left, one turned and said, "I'll never forget this night..." and I think neither will I. The course of China will be changed by these men, and I am proud to get to know them and serve them. Thank you for being part of what's going on here. 

 

Americans Eat Meat.

Today is Wednesday. We found out this afternoon that our train to take us to Beijing from our city, Changchun, is going to leave on next Friday night instead of Saturday. Oh crap...that changes alot of things. I thought that was bad until I got the next message. 3 minutes later, I got a text saying that we need to send our luggage ahead of us. It should be in our FAO's (foreign affair officer) office by 8 am Monday morning. Basically, that means instead of having the planned week and some to finish packing and grading - we have half a week. I hadn't started packing yet. So our grades are supposed to be done by Tuesday-ish. All of our luggage (aka apartments) should be packed up by Monday. Not to mention the fact that we've pretty much already booked every meal time with students and a few extra times in between as well. It's going to be a very busy next few days. Thoughts are highly requested.

As we transition, we begin to think about changing our diet back to the American way. Eating more dairy is on the top of the list. We also have told our students that "No, we don't eat rice every meal. We actually dont usually eat rice. We eat some sort of bread, meat, and maybe a form of potato."  We eat big pieces of meat - here they eat slices or slivers of meat. That being said, I'll introduce the following question.

Tannah teaches "Survey of English Speaking Countries" aka "Western Culture/History." For her last class before their final test she was going to answer some of their questions. She had the students write down any question they wanted to know about and she picked the main/common ones and taught about them again. As she read through them, I got a text in my office reading "Do you have your camera?" I didn't know what was going to happen until she came in and put this down in front of me.

I'd like to mention the fact that this is one of the students that I dont teach. haha. This is an awesome question though. Thanks for asking. We Americans do like our meat. Mmm Mmmm Beef.

The Battle Within

This is just a quote from a devo I've been doing and some thoughts the Father gave afterwards. It was talking about those who are poor in spirit.

"A castle that has been long besieged and is ready to be taken will
deliver up on any terms to save their lives. He whose heart has been a
garrison for the devil and has held out long in opposition against
Chr---t, when once The Father has brought him to poverty of spirit and
he sees himself damned without Chr---t, let The Father propound what
articles He may, he will readily subscribe to them. 'Lord, what will
you have me to do?'" (Thomas Watson).

I think we often don’t see our hearts as a stronghold for the devil. We see them as basically good or ok – as we check ourselves by our moral standards or the culture around us. We don’t understand why we have to be broken so much or lose so many things if we’re “doing pretty good”. We consider G to be slightly mean and cruel because He keeps attacking and tearing down our hearts that were doing ok. He starves out enemies that are in us that are hiding that we don’t know about. He besieges our whole being to put us in shock and to search our inner being and inner walls. Sometimes with our search but often by just pure emptiness we find the enemy inside. The secluded enemy/lie/habit that is with us surges from the darkness in fear and anger as its being starved for attention and it's way of life has been cut off. It crawls out snarling ready to fight and at that point we turn and realize what’s been inside this whole time (or maybe we already knew) but now with our realization of our weakness we surrender it to the Father. Then, He moves with His mighty Word to demolish all that is not of Him. A scepter of righteousness, light, and strength to dominate every form of evil so that life and love may full live abundantly. The one who "has it together" (is insecure/hiding/or unaware of what could be inside) is the one who needs to be besieged to recognize all that's within. But it's the poor in spirit, the one who acknowledge there probably are things hiding inside that need taken care of that He can rule in. Let us be that poor that He might rule in majesty.

For my name's sake... (future plans)

Have you ever prayed so emphatically but accidentally. Well, in case you haven't, I have. To be more specific we should probably use the phrase "ignorantly" rather than accidentally.

It's June 6, I leave my city in 17 days - two and a half weeks. "what are you doing next year?" people ask as I excitedly get to tell them "I'm going to go study the Book! I want to learn more about Yesu." oh, where are you going?" haha...well...I don't know yet. It's the beginning of May so I'm still ok but pressed a bit. Wait, no it's beginning of June. I'm used to finishing college in May not June (for students it's July- we leave early). So it's even more of a crunch.

Am I worried? Yes. Do I feel immature? Yes. Do I feel irresponsible? Yes. Do I have cold sores in my mouth to prove it? Yes, multiple ones for multiple weeks. Have I looked at schools? Yes. Have I found the right one? No. Does that bother me? Yes. Am I going home in about two weeks? Yes. Shouldn't I know by now? I would think so. Is it to late to apply? I hope not (some schools it is, others it's not). What happens if it's too late for this semester? I have no idea - I'm expecting it to be. So, when will you know? I dont know! I thought a month or so at least! I know this doesn't seem like that big of deal when it's not your life - but seeing how it's mine, it's a big deal to me. I feel isolated, unable to process, and feel like I'm behind, always behind on everything.

As I began explaining things and processing them out with a teammate a few nights ago (a.k.a. verbally vomiting all my unprocessed junk from the past few months) we struck gold... or at least the cause of it all. Back to the original paragraph. Gen 12:1-4 "The Lord said to Abram, "leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you...So Abram left, as the Lord had told him..."  Maybe that didn't strike you as interesting, but I was amazed by that. He told him to go to a place he had no idea where, but just pack up all he had and go... Abram didn't even get a direction to start heading in. But his response was, "So Abram left." Man, I want to be like that. Make me like that. I want to just go when you say go. 

There it was. That was it. Started in high school when I first read that. I had no intentions of actually leaving the country. I didn't even mean it, really. I mean I did, but I had no idea what I was thinking. Since then He's been growing my trust in Him. In high school I found out in January that I was going to Concord in August (7 months to prepare, adapt, adjust, plan.). At the end of Concord University my time was getting close and I found out in April I was coming to China (4 months to prepare, adapt, adjust, plan, support raise, transition.) Now that I'm in China my time is coming to an end (2 weeks) and I believe I'll be starting school in August (2 months to transition, apply, get accepted, find housing, place to stay, etc.)  I never thought about packing up all my stuff into my car and driving into a new town to go to college without a place to stay for the night or semester. Essentially, that's what Abraham (Abram) did. Except he had his family too... and a ton of livestock and servants to go with him. Yet, he trusted Him to provide. No wonder he's credited with so much faith!

I find myself (a simpler, modern day Abram) being transformed into the King by way of Abraham the one who walked by Faith even when He didn't know and it wasn't practical or logical or even wise. At the end of  our conversation my teammate stopped me when I said, "I just feel so immature and irresponsible, like I dont have my life together and I'm a slacker." She responded, "You're waiting on G to provide you the college He wants you to go to, while loving and serving Him where you are, and searching when you can and he tells you to and you feel like you're lives not together and your irresponsible?" I had to think about it for a min before I caught what she was saying.

It's good to be "responsible" but you can't argue with being Bookical. We walk by faith and not by sight, plans, wisdom, or hopefully college application deadlines and fees. I want to see the Book stories come to life now. I said one and many times again expecting glory not necessarily myself to be waiting and trusting so much. I'm glad I said it, and I'm glad He trusts Him more than I do. I dont want to be behind, but I will wait for as long as possible - (but I'd like to know where and when pretty soon.) So I guess even more now, I'm being made into my name's sake... I want to be more like that, by His grace and His fruit in me, I will be...

"Abram believed G and it was credited to him as righteousness." - Romans 4:3