Change

First of all, I wanna praise God for this weekend at home.  It was definitely needed.  I didn't have any arguments with my mom and was able to enjoy spending time with my parents.  AND I have enough food for almost a month now :).  Kinda looks like I'll need it with the winter storm coming up O_O.

Anyway, I wanted to write about the sermon at church this morning.  I find myself waking up early on the weekends now, so we went to the early service.  It's a lot less crowded and I was thankful for that - less distractions.  The sermon started out a bit slow for me, but it really hit home at the end.  It's like every time I go to church, the pastor is speaking directly to me.  The main point of today's message was about yielding your heart to God through repentance, faith, and obedience.  Basically letting down your walls so God can do good work in you and change you.

That point got my attention, but his next point was what really struck me: we need to continually yield our hearts to God.  I think this is a mistake a lot of Christians, myself included, make.  We think "oh, I remember the turning point in my life where God changed me" and that's it.  No.  We must continually seek God and open our hearts to Him to grow closer to Him and let Him change us.  When I heard this I felt very convicted.  The past couple months I feel like I've built up a wall b/t myself and God... and with others around me too.  It's time to change that though.  I know it won't happen overnight, but I strongly believe that more devo time will help me get back on track.  I will continue to repent of my sins, have faith in God for my life and future, and obey His Word.

I hope everyone has a blessed week.

A New Start

Eh, it's a bit late for this post, but that's okay.  I have some new year resolutions! (I usually don't make any...)

1.  Call parents/brother/go home more often
2.  Don't get annoyed with mother so quickly when at home/on the phone
3.  Get homework done before the weekend
4.  Fast for 24 hours to grow closer to God (I've never fasted before and can barely go a couple hours without eating)
5.  Don't let emotions impair judgement/decisions
6.  Don't jump to conclusions/assume quickly (goes with #5)
7.  Smile at a stranger everyday (who knows, it may make his/her day... or make me look like a creep)
8.  1 hour devotional time at least once a week

That's all I have for now.  I might add more if I think other shtuff.

Faith

I told you all I'd have a more serious post :).  Well, here it is...

I've always been open about my religious faith; if someone were to ask me whether or not I'm Christian, I'd say I am, but that's about all the detail I'd go into.  After about 3.5 years of college and ACF, I can say with confidence that I am a woman of God.  It's something I take pride in.  Knowing that He has my back in whatever I do is comforting.  However, I've recently been struggling with my faith...

I've had the occasional doubt before, but nothing like this.  I'd say it started maybe 1-2 months ago.  The cause: medical school applications.  As I've mentioned before, I haven't received ANYTHING for a while now.  No invites, no rejections, no pending notifications.  Nothing.  It's like I'm not there.  Like they never got my application.  At least that's what it feels like.  Is this how everyone else feels?  It's hard to know when I don't have many pre-med friends.  It's even harder when my own mother tells me I should start studying for the MCAT this semester.  Those words were like knives today.  Yes, she said that to me just an hour ago.

I've gotten to the point where I'm doubting God.  Is He listening to me?  To my daily prayers?  To my family's prayers?  My friends' prayers?  I've always felt like this was my calling.  Like God gave me the tools to pursue this path.  My interests, skills, and experiences have all pointed to this field.  I've been so sure of this ever since I was a child, and now I'm doubting.  For the first time ever, I'm doubting if this is what I am to do. It's a gut-wrenching feeling.  It sucks.

About a week ago, I shared my struggles in the ACF Core prayer request email (we all post our prayer requests in this email for others to know about) and a friend responded to me.  He's been going through very similar struggles and gave me words of encouragement.  It has definitely helped.  Here's a bit of what he said:

The question arose: Will I still trust him now?  Even when things are bad?  Even when things might go downhill?  And I said to myself, "even when things are bad, I will still trust in him... I will trust in him with my life."  What choice do I have?  One Christian friend at the conference said, "There are two big temptations for me: to trust in the World and to fear the World.  And the solution is to trust in God and to fear God."  He also pointed me to Romans 8:28: "And we know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose."

It's a slow process up this hill, but I'm making my way.  "Even with things are bad, I will still trust in Him... I will trust in Him with my life."  Amen.  Sure it's easy to trust in God when things are great, but it takes extreme faith to trust in God when things are bad.  I will continue to trust Him.  He's never steered me wrong before, and I know He never will.

Snow!

I'm so bad at this.  I don't even know how long it's been since my last post.  I suppose I could look, but my fingers are too lazy for those few clicks :P.  Let's see... what has happened since my last post?

Well, the main thing is I went back to Taiwan for a little over 2 weeks!  That was a lot of fun... and when I say fun, I'm referring to having fun while eating... constantly :).  I ate so much over there.  It was glorious.  The pictures below are from the International Flora Expo, some museum in the mountains, Christmas dinner with my mom's side of the family, and other randoms in Taiwan.

Everyone in Taiwan is so well dressed... and TINY.  I felt like a huge fatty over there, rather than a normal fatty over here.  I swear, I was bigger than 80% of the guys over there.  That's... not... right.  They need some more meat on dem bones haha.  The girls are so small over there... even they're feet are small!  The shoe sizes only went up to 8.5!  I was lucky to find a pair that fit me.  I'm happy to say that I bought some nice clothes over there :P.  Nice as in more stylish haha.

With all the delicious food and warmish weather in Taiwan, I have to admit I'm glad to be back home.  Yes, it's dreadfully cold here, but it's home.  The beds are soft and the pillows are fluffy here.  There also aren't pesky mosquitoes biting me at night.  PLUS, it's snowing!!  I CAN'T WAIT TO GO SLEDDING!!!  Yeeee!

I think that's all I have for now.  I'll probably have a more serious post up later O_O.  I'm hungry now.  Bye!