#musicmonday: Out of the Boat | @yeohjo

Boats were mentioned in Realm Makers and today in Ignite.

Faith, fear and costs

I was thinking of not writing this, but then I decided that I should, if only so that I would remember.
I don't know where to begin.

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The point is to not let your fear keep you from where faith wants to lead you. (Paraphrased from Pr Greg Devries.)
But that is where I live sometimes; camping out in past miracles, too afraid to move on to the next thing because I don't know where I'm going or what it will look like. Because I cannot yet (properly) split who I am from the things I do. And I am afraid of how spectacularly I will fail and how that will destroy me.
I don't know why I'm convinced I will fail. Probably because I don't have a workable plan.

And bang into my paranoid, kiasu (afraid to lose), kiasi (afraid to die), Asian heart came also this word that from eternity, God plants a seed in time - he sees a need on the earth and creates a person to deal with that problem/need... and takes into account your psychological need to plan, to think, to change your mind a gazillion times, to stress out about the future, to go crazy thinking of plan A and plan B and plan C and dither and then shrugs and goes "off you go now." (Super paraphrased from Pr Quoc).

It's freaky that when you finally go for prayer (because you've been subconsciously avoiding it for a while) the pastor quotes "Satan has asked to sift you like wheat" in his prayer and then goes on to pray for freedom from depression, which is what you've been denying for a while. Because you're not even sure what depression looks like. Because you're living just fine and everything is carrying on as usual.

And somewhere in the midst of this is where I come to the point of this post, which was really the culmination of the notes I wrote in church one Sunday:

Do not jump from security to security. It's okay to be insecure while you trust God. Because that's trust.

And along with that gem comes the feeling that the time is coming to say goodbye soon. Not to say that it will happen very immediately, or that I've figured out what's going to happen, but that the word positioning and timing are becoming very, very important and relevant, especially considering that I've been reworking the notes for Following Jesus in the Real World for Cley discussions. And that maybe if the goal is to make an impact in the arts in Penang, as you've prayed about, as you've written about and talked about, and moaned about, it might be time to count the cost and position yourself where you need to be. Even if it's a pay cut and an end to free trips to the US. Even if you don't know yet where that is going to be or what it's going to look like.

Because you need to live in the here and now. Because your heart cannot be divided across geographical space and your life cannot be divided over segmented time. Because your tenuous focus needs to be refined and refocused and not spread over a gazillion things at once, because frankly, you are a pretty horrible multitasker.
And your call, for now, is here until God says otherwise.

The dream sustains us through the process.

But your heart also needs to respond.
Be it unto me according to Your Word. 

Destiny Conference, 215District and serendipity

It's been a crazy weekend at the Destiny Conference. I could put it all down to coincidence or serendipity, really but let's just say it as it is. God's been pulling strings. ;)

I had been ambivalent about attending the conference despite ohmygoshit'skutless and lookpeopleit'stheexactsameverse!Serendipity! moments.

So I did what any normal person in 2014 does. Divert ambivalence into a complaint about lack of money on facebook. And then this woman full of awesomesauce GIVES ME EXACTLY WHAT I NEEDED FOR TICKETS AND MEALS at the conference. (Though it turns out I didn't actually really need to get meals, it was so near my hotel). (No linky on this woman because she might hate me for it... she shall stay anonymous until she decides to say something.) (Really, don't listen to me when I complain about money because I really, really, really do have enough. I'm just stingy and trying to convince myself to spend on something I want, other than books.)

I just opened my book of notes, and I love it how the (kind of) first phrase I wrote down from Mario Murillo says, "Some of you look at how impossible your dream is. You're looking at the wrong thing." Somewhere down the page, it continues, "Even when you don't know what to do next, God is going to do amazing things!" It's as if God is just affirming again and again and again that I don't have it all, but it doesn't matter. He knows what's going to happen.

Your latter will be greater

"A culture of victory and excellence can be handed down to create a generation that exceeds the prior generation." - Mario Murillo

Even as we start to build 215District, I believe this is a word in season, this is the word that we need at this time. It seems as if things are falling apart, and we are trying to build a new culture, a new identity from scratch. It's difficult. But we have the people and the tools in place - setting that culture of victory and excellence NOW is what is going to ensure the future of the generations to come.

We are called to be counter-culture, and in a world where standards don't matter, where excellence isn't a big thing (even in the church), we should (and need to) build a culture of youth that care about doing the right thing, and doing it well. Let's not buy in to the lie that it's okay to be mediocre, it's okay to kind of just follow along with what everyone else is doing. The verse says that we shine like stars. Another verse says that we do it all with excellence as if doing it for the Lord. Other verses promise that we will be the head and not the tail.
I covered the book of Daniel in cell group before I left, but this was an interesting thing Mario brought up that I don't think we considered during our discussion. Daniel served through the reign of 4 kings. We know that. But the thing we didn't think about was that in those days, each new king that came into power purged (i.e. killed) all the servants of the old king and put his own people into power - but Daniel was so valuable, that they couldn't kill him. Each time, he was reinstated to power.

If you stay right with God, He will promote you to be the leading edge of your culture.

And we need that. We need to stop playing catch-up with where the world is going. We need to stand up for our convictions. We need to be so good at what we do, and so strong in what we believe in that people will stop and listen. Even if they don't agree.

There's more to be said, but I'm sleepy.