:)

Sunday, June 18, 2006

Day 3 : Beginning to see the Light

Began the day in church....doing the most painful thing for me....Praising God.

At the missions trip training, I had to preach, and so did everybody else. My message was titled, The Power Of Praise. At that point, I was still expecting God to work a miracle for me. A miracle of passing my exams and going to the Philippines. I spoke about praising God at all times. I spoke about the life of King David, how his soul praised the Lord, even when things weren't going all good for him. I said, that praising God helped us to put into perspective the troubles that go on in our lives. When we praise God, we are saying that God is bigger than the situation we are in. I told the rest that when we praise God, we are looking beyond the current circumstances, to the end product, where God will make all things beautiful. I even added in my sermon an, 'add testimony here' clause. In the event I did go to Philippines, I was gonna testify God's goodness in seeing me past my exams so I could be there. But I guess God has other plans. As I spoke, I was believing, so sure that in about a weeks time, I would be in Bagiuo, speaking to all the Filipino college kids; challenging them with 3 words, to "Praise The Lord". I closed my sermon with a challenge for God to give each of us a new song of praise to sing to Him, even when at times we didn't feel like it.

And then, my world caved in. And here I was, in the presence of God, struggling to praise Him, so contrary to the confidence I had just a few days ago. But I told myself, live what you preach. And as I did, I cried. Coz it hurt so much. The ironic thing, the first song that went up had Praise The Lord all over it. Felt like God knew my hurt and He was rubbing salt all over it. Or so I thought. But praised Him, I did.

Halfway through, I realised my my heart wasn't so heavy anymore. By the end, I was smiling, my spirit uplifted. Somehow, praising God also lifts up your spirit to rise against the challenges that lay ahead.

Praise The Lord!

3 comments:

han-yu said...

Thanks for the post. It means so much to me. Praise the Lord even when the situation is against us. How often we look at our problems and think that they are too big until we can't praise Him, but isn't praising God means testifying that God is bigger than our problems? And that we invite His holy hand to come into our problems and do something to it?
Thank you bro.

picibel said...

Hi Wee Liem,
I applaud your desire to rise above your current circumstance & aknowlege God's kingship over all you're going through!

lets also not forget the power of pain- because in the presence of it, there will be no comparable moment in which we long for healing- long to see the daylight, long to taste the trickles of joy, long to gaze His beauty like never before- Its always in moments of seperation in which we desire what matters the most.

Don't need to rush the moment- because even on our knees we learn to move forward.

you're stronger than you think you are; and you'll only find out through hindsight- Its the many cries you make when you're weak that He hears, and its that every last ounce of strength that you give He adds another. Today's mercies, enough only for today- He renews it every morning yeah.

God Bless, & heal well!
(this is Evan.. in case you didn't know) :P

Jowen said...

Praise The Lord, WeeLiem

AMEN!!!