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Crossing The River Jordan

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"And the priests who carried the Ark of the Covenant of Jehovah stood firmly on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan while all Israel was crossing over on dry ground, until all the nation had completely crossed over the Jordan." (Joshua 3:17) I attended a virtual crystallization-study of the Books of Joshua, Judges, and Ruth. Like always the in-depth trainings held by Living Stream Ministry have been landmarks in my Christian life, prompting me to come to the Lord Himself to dwell on the revelations unfolded in these sessions of spoken messages. I take them as messages spoken from the Lord Himself. This time I was struck by the record of the children of Israel crossing over the River Jordan to enter into the good land. The parting of the Red Sea is quite famous, where the children of Israel exited the world (Egypt) and the ruler of the world with his evil forces (Pharaoh and his army) were buried. In our Christian life, the crossing of the Red Sea is a picture of our baptis

Minute Post: Receive the Love of the Truth

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Second Thessalonians 2:10 says, “And in all deceit of unrighteousness among those who are perishing, because they did not receive the love of the truth that they might be saved.”  In the past, I read this verse thinking that they “did not receive” because it had not been given. But clearly God intended to save! The following verses further expound that God sends them to an operation of error that they may believe the lie because — verse 12 mentions — they have taken pleasure in unrighteousness. This portion of the word is on the coming of Antichrist, the man of lawlessness, and how presently the mystery of lawlessness is already operating as signs that the Lord’s second coming is imminent.  To be sent to an operation of error by God is terrifying. Watchman Nee warns that in the last days people will accumulate wealth in an unprecedented way with multiplications of material enjoyment and lustful indulgence (Collected Works of Watchman Nee, Vol. 61), I suppose thinking that strong financ

Minute Post: God's Compassion

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I'm creating a new series entitled "Minute Posts" to jot down quick posts since I have recently been gifted a newborn and blogging time is extremely scarce. Hopefully this series will help me journal my walk with the Lord. Blogging and re-visiting my own posts have been very cherishing to me since they've been a constant reminder of how the Lord has been and has done in my life.  This week I just finished reading The Book of Second Chronicles. Second Chronicles ends with the record of the children of Israel's deportation to Babylon and the proclamation of their release by Cyrus the king of Persia to return and rebuild God's house in Jerusalem.  Needless to say, the deportation was a devastating event in the history of God's people. Often that's all I remember — just how severe God's chastisement can be toward His rebellious children. I was deeply touched when I read these verses in the last chapter of 2 Chronicles (2 Chronicles 36:15-16): "And

Job: The Purpose of God in Dealing with His People

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I am overwhelmed by a renewed vision of the relationship between God and us, human beings. I always benefit from the in-depth study that Living Stream Ministry conducts semi-annually. This time the topic is on Job, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes, tackling the great question that consists of two parts: what is God's purpose in creating man and what is God's purpose in dealing with His chosen people? This question arises when we read the Book of Job, a perfect man in his integrity, morality, uprightness, and material blessings yet suffered immensely and stripped to only his bare existence.  Job and his friends had multiple rounds of discourse attempting to provide some kind of logic to his sufferings. However, the underlying concept of their back-and-forth was a misconstrued thought concerning God's relationship with His people. I can't blame Job and his friends because I frequently find myself trapped in the same fallacy. That is, if we do good, God would reward us and if we

The Cross of Christ: Prayer for Our Nation

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It's time to pray. Pray for our country. Pray for our nation. There was a short prayer that impacted me greatly in these recent days: “O God, forgive our country. The immorality and chaos are offenses to You, the righteous God. We ask You to remember the cross on which Your Son, our Lord Jesus, died.” The prayer was in the outline of a recent Christian conference that I virtually attended and was actually a quote from the first chapter of a book entitled "The Satanic Chaos in the Old Creation and the Divine Economy for the New Creation" by Witness Lee. It was based on Genesis 8:20-22 when Noah built an altar and offered burnt offerings to please God concerning the keeping of the earth, which had just passed through the deluge, God's judgment. The significance of the altar and the burnt offerings is for us to come to the cross (signified by the altar) and offer Christ (signified by the offerings) to God. In the context of Noah's building an altar and offering burn

Return to Me

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I am in the middle of a training on the in-depth crystallization study of the books of Jeremiah and Lamentations. We just got done with the first two messages. I have to admit that I have not adequately prepared for this study. I only began reading Jeremiah this week and indeed the chapters were lengthy. But I was overwhelmed with how moving and emotional the beginning chapters of Jeremiah were. Jeremiah 2:13 - For My people have committed two evils: They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters, to hew out for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns, which hold no water. Jeremiah 2:19b - ...Know therefore and see that it is an evil and bitter thing, that you have forsaken Jehovah your God and that My fear is not in you, declares the Lord Jehovah of hosts. Jeremiah 2:37 - For Jehovah has rejected those in whom you trust, and you will not prosper by them. Jeremiah 3:1b - ...But you have committed fornication with many lovers. Yet return to Me, declares Jehovah. Jeremiah 3:12 - Go an

The Cry of Humanity

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To many it may be easier to respond to the developing Black Lives Matter movement, especially when the experience has been engrained and subjective to their personal lives. Honestly I can never say that I truly fathom the importance of this movement to the African-American community because of the simple reason that I am not part of the same community. I can only empathize to some extent. Back in my hometown I did go through an episode of ethnic cleansing in the late 90s where our family had to hide and pray for our lives. I remember the overwhelming feeling of insecurity that caused me to surrender to whatever was next. I lived in and witnessed the social reform that took place in the aftermath. Things got better but the solution had never been thorough because two decades later—it became world news—a local politician was incarcerated mainly due to his ethnicity and his faith. Soon I realized inherently things had not changed much. That was just the fact. This cry for justice, for

Take Comfort in the Sovereign God

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I just participated in a virtual, international Christian conference with over 80,000 attendees. The general subject of the conference was "A Timely Word concerning the World Situation and the Lord's Recovery." The messages spoken were indeed timely and sobering, especially with the timing of the current world crisis. I'm enlightened concerning where I am now and what I should be doing because God is here. He is invisible but He is right in the center of the world situation, sitting on the throne, administrating the whole universe to accomplish His purpose. It is easy to be stumbled and to ask, "Where is God? What is He doing? Why is He letting all these innocent people suffer?" This is why we truly need a spiritual vision to see the throne of God, the spiritual scene behind the world situation that we see with plain eyes, and Christ as the center of God's administration. To be honest, when I heard the consolation to be comforted because God is on the th

A Prayer in this Pandemic: "Lord, Have Mercy"

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I recently read one of Watchman Nee's books. It was written in January 1923 on the first issue of a publication called "The Present Testimony." The issue itself is entitled "What is Prayer." Through some of the gatherings I had via video conference, the burden to pray began to increase within all of us. However, we soon realized that we took prayer for granted. Often I pray due to a need, to ask for things, but really, what is prayer? There's a particular paragraph in Watchman Nee's writing that deeply edifies my being. Allow me to quote: "To pray does not mean to change the mind of heaven. It is the greatest mistake to think that God is hard and stubborn and that we must use prayer to battle with Him until He yields to us and changes what He has predetermined. Actually, any prayer that is not according to God's will is useless. Because God's will has suffered a hindrance from either men or demons, we come before God (as if we are wrest

In the Midst of a Pandemic: Anxiety, Assembling, Built Up Together

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Different lines of thoughts run through my mind during this COVID-19 outbreak. What is truly happening? Is this just the beginning? Anxiety, panic, fear mixed in with some utter ignorance and recklessness. Then the actual pestilence itself swiping through nations. The world is shaken. As a Christian, I know that I have to participate in prayers and caring for those in need. I also acknowledge that God has a specific need in this time, although I am not yet clear what He needs except for the unchanging fact that I must seek Him in prayers and in His word. He also obviously desires to spread the gospel of the kingdom to all the nations. But there's this great torpidity that drags me into a spiritual inertia. I have more idle time in my hands. It makes me restless and anxious wanting to fill my day with other stimulating excitements at this time. I can easily enjoy activities that do not necessitate the presence of many others. (I am an introvert by natural makeup so general soci

Reading Bible Stories to a Seven-Year-Old

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These days I have been pondering on the Book of Deuteronomy. I was deeply impressed with a recent Living Stream Ministry's training on the crystallization study of this book. I knew Deuteronomy meant second law, or a respeaking of the divine law. Moses was rehashing God's commandments with all the statutes and ordinances to the younger generation of the Israelites, to prepare them to enter into the good land. But little did I know the sentiment and the pressing burden that Moses had, just like an old grandfather admonishing the young ones. Moses knew what were about to happen, how the children of Israel would turn away from God. Moses was almost pleading to the children of Israel to not forget Jehovah, to remember all He had done, and to obey all His commandments, truly for their own good. There were too many crystals brought forth during that Deuteronomy training. But one thing that I had been considering in recent days was the importance of the next generation - our chi

Jesus is God

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Every time I visited Mrs. L, I saw a framed Chinese calligraphy hung on the wall behind where she was sitting in the living room. One day I decided to ask her what the writing meant. It read, "Jesus is God." I didn't consider it much then. That was about a decade ago. Shortly before she went to be with the Lord, Mrs. L told a few believers who were caring for her in her last days that we must fight to stand with this fact, that Jesus is God. At her memorial service, we sang over and over again proclaiming, "Jesus is God." I took this into my heart but frankly, I could not understand why this was such a big deal. I immediately thought of some out there claiming that Jesus was a mere man and that He wasn't God Himself, or that after He died, He ceased to exist. I thought this was only a battle of doctrines. Recently I read a study on the walls of the New Jerusalem. I learned that one of the primary functions of the walls was to protect the interest of

There's A Life That's Deeper Than Our Mind

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This past week I helped my youngest brother moved to start college. Without much delay, we found ourselves sitting in a cozy living room with a happy rescue dog lying down in the center of the room waiting to be petted. It was Friday night and we were surrounded by dear believers, young and old, singing hymns to the Lord. My heart was deeply touched that we could go to a new city and jumped right into a fellowship that was low-key but in essence, dripping with life. Bringing my brother to this new city reminded me of my own transition as a freshman in college. Both my brother and I came from a high school in another country. No one could convince me otherwise, all these years Christ in the church has been the anchor of my soul. The Christ in the ministering of the word, in the church, continuously heals and humbles me.  This does not mean I never struggle. I did encounter questions in my heart and at times came across offenses that hurt. But the power of life in the ministry of

God Also Needs a Home

Making ourselves at home in God is not a mere theory. This implies daily we must live in the sphere, the presence, even the person of God in the sense of living in His most intimate desire. As the Apostle Paul mentions in Philippians 3:8, "be found in Him (Christ)." So that means whether we are resting or laboring, we do all things in Him. This is challenging. Well, I discovered a marvelous phenomenon - I am most restful when He is restful, I am most satisfied when He is satisfied. Yes, God desires to rest and be satisfied. Who is God God does not have any lack in Himself. He is the Alpha and the Omega, He who is and who was and who is coming, the Almighty. Omnipresent, omniscient, eternal, self-existing, ever-existing, unchangeable, perfect, absolute, and complete. Praise God! Yet He is also a purposive, yearning God. When an ordinary human being has a desire in his heart, he will purpose in himself to gain what he desires, he then will plan accordingly how to accompl

Conversations with Mrs. L - Loneliness (Part 2)

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Mrs. L was once single, then she was married to Mr. L, then she was single again after Mr. L went to be with the Lord. I asked her concerning loneliness when I was still a young sister in the church. I only wish I would have the opportunity to ask her this question again at a different stage of life so that I would already be married and loneliness would reveal a deeper aspect of being human. But Mrs. L is no longer with us. I did, however, asked another older sister whom I treasured dearly. Her husband passed away more than a decade ago and she had remained a single sister ever since, still pursuing the Lord, actively running the Christian race, and serving faithfully, ministering to the Lord in the church. I remember she mentioned that she had learned to embrace loneliness like it was another natural process of human life such as aging. She said even if you were married or you had many children, loneliness would still be there to some extent. "It's real, you don't p