Wildly and Irrationally- He loves me

have been reflecting about love.. think I am a nutcase.. I love to talk about love more than anything else in the world. Because God loves me, and His love truly comples me to many many things i would never do if not for His love..

There are 4 levels of love..

• 1st level: possessive love-Lust
• 2nd level: gratitute love. Love out of gratitude. "We love because God first love us." Many of our love stops at this level.
• 3rd level: love of excellence. Loving the person because of his/her qualities. There are still many who love God because of who He is.
• 4th level: irrational love. Love even when there is no reason for love, even when the person is unlovable.

God's love for me is irrational. He loves me even when I am unlovable. He has no reason to love me. Why does He love me then? (Well, I have forgotten that in irrational love, there is no reason.)

I have been ask ing God, "How are U loving me?" But today, I asked myself, "How am I loving God?" If God loves me any lesser than Irrational Love, will I still love Him? If God puts trials in my life to test my love for Him and to refine my love, will I make it?

If I love God with the love of gratitude (2rd level), then I may stop loving Him when I think He has stopped loving me. N this is highly possible because there will be many situations in life when we will be tempted to believe that God does not love.

If I love God with the love of excellence (3rd level), then I may stop loving Him when i think He is not worthy of my love. One day I may find that God is unkind (again due to trials and sufferings in life), and I may stop loving Him.

Reflecting on the irrational love of God, my so-called love for God pales in comparison. His love for me is passionate, its jealous, its fiery. His love for me is so.. I dunno what to say..

No one can love me the same way as God. Nor should I expect that.. (Or can I?) Can I love someone wildly and irrationally? (Maybe my child?) Human love is so flawed..

Father, help me love you. Help me to love you even when there seems to be no reason to. N I thank you God that you will bring me to a deeper level of your love, slowly, slowly.. Never rushing me, but never allowing to slack either.. I love you God. Mayb not the level that is the best, but God you love my love for you at whatever level I can manage.. As long as its my all, even if my all is only 0.0001% or even lesser of yours..

Some pictures..

This place is called Li Jiang.. Its about 8-9 hours bus ride from KunMing.. Lovely place.. Though many parts of it have been commercialised.. wat a waste.. I want to go to many many beautiful places in Yunnan still.. One of my wish is to bagpack Yunnan.. People think I am siao to bagpack in such a place.. pple usually go Australia or wat..haha.. i like east than west bah.. And I am dreaming to travel to Yunnan through Vietnam.. Or Myanmar.. But i think via Vietnam might be safer.. =)

Just wanna share with all of you my dear nephew baby Lucas.. so CUTE!! We went shopping at Bugis, suppose to buy clothes for him.. But then ended up my sis and I kept taking pics with him then my parents were the only one atually choosing the clothes.. =)

Love, Faith, Works

It has been a while since I last post..

Jus to respond to Jul. Well I guess girls do tend to reflect more than guys.. at least in my circle of friends, its my female friends who reflect deeply together with me, feel deeply and engage deeply with me =) Females are deep.. So v v deep.. If you ever attempt to venture into understanding females, be sure you have lots of courage.. =) not for the faint hearted.. =)

After reading Rach's blog, set me thinking.. If I was like her in my teenage-hood, wld I be better off? Yet I have no regrets as to how I have offered my hearts to many people.. (not only in the BGR sense but also friendships.) To love is to be vulnerable.. To love is to feel put yourself at risk of love, and this risk is almost guaranteed.. To love is to sacrifice.. Love is scary, yet love is beautiful when the flower of love blooms..

"To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it careful round with hobbies and little luxuries, avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket- safe, dark, motionless, airless- it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irremdeemable.. The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all dangers... of love is Hell" C.S Lewis

He is one man I truly admire.. He knows what love is.. Not just because he wrote about love.. But he demonstrates love in his life. He married his wife when she was having cancer. He married her to serve her, not to use her to serve him.. And this lady had 2 sons when they were married, she was a widow. He married a woman with cancer and 2 sons. He willingly took on the responsibility of caring for her and 2 sons. And the 2 sons loved him.. Eventually his wife did recover, but only for a short while before cancer return and took her life away. What a dear man..

To me, love was such a simple matter. Jus simply bare your heart.. Yet, I am taking on a different perspective now. Love is tough and painful. I thought that Love requires lots of faith. Faith that when we step forth in love, our hearts to be more loving. Faith that God will take our pain and hurts and heal them. I have forgotten (just been reminded) that Love requires works too. Faith and Works needs to go together. I need to Work through Love and nuture Love such that it will grow.. James says that Faith without Works is dead. While Works without Faith is useless.. In Love, I am learning that it takes Faith and Works to make Love blossom.. Ultimately, all these need to be submitted under the Sovereignty of God.. Because only God can makes things grow. We can only water and nuture.. and by faith believe that Love will grow..

Was talking to Santi last night about Discipleship. Would say its a frutiful time.. Summary of our discussion.. Crucify ourselves! It was a time where we talk about the most blatant reality of our Christian life.. the Cross is not about glory but about pain and suffering and shame.. Were we willing to pay the price for Christ, for love, for the cross..

God, your way is indeed the narrow way, but which leads us to heaven.. Broad indeed is the way the leads to destruction.. Keep me to your way Lord.. My dear God, my lovely Jesus..

Captivating

Been reading "Captivating". Its good.. Thanks to Santi & Suyin who got the book for me. Provoked alot of thoughts. BEAUTY. Tt's what the book talk about. A woman's essence is in her beauty. Woman made in the image of God, reflects God differently from a man. She reflects Beauty while he reflects Strength.

I also want to be beautiful. There is nothing wrong about wanting to be beautiful, but the beauty is in the soul. It sounds so clinque, but to me, its mysterious. How can I be truly beautiful? I may beautify my appearance but can I beautify my soul?

I learn that Beauty invites, Beauty inspires, Beauty comforts. A woman who is dominating or controlling oppresses others around her.. (Oh, I am so often times like this and seen many such people ard). A woman who is anxious does not reflect the Beauty of God. Instead of telling others that "All is well", an anxious woman tell others that "All is not well" (I fall into such weakness as well). Woman reflecting the Beauty of God makes people comfortable around her instead of giving people the feeling of oppression. Woman reflecting the Beauty of God gives people the message that God is in control, and with such she is at rest.

I wonder how I can be strong but not domineering? How can I surrender to God and not be weak? Beauty is mysterious, just as God is mysterious and just as all women are mysterious.. Perhaps I can never figure Beauty out, but I am going to pray this into my life. Only God can make me beautiful. As I look at my beautiful God, as I reflect Him more and more, I will be more and more beautiful. Maybe beauty is not a state of doing but a state of being..

Woman are Captivating.. But many wounds and lies in life tell us otherwise. Instead of being told we are loved, delighted in, captivating and worthy, we are told all the lies that you can imagine. N being fallen, we reaffirmed those lies in our lives.. We truly believe we are worthless, ugly, unwanted etc etc.. (i realised that I have difficulty believing people when they say that they like me or that I did well. Perhaps I really believed that I have nothing much for people to take delight in.) The only solution is to let God tell us that we are Captivating.. We are Captivating. There is no accompanying reasons to the fact that we are Captivating.. We just are..

There is a vacuum in all of our hearts that only God can fill.. But today I realised that there is also a vacuum in God's heart- a vacuum only I can fill. He made me to love me, He is awaiting me.. Yet I struggle.. to love Him is to obey Him.. To submit to Him.. I struggle with obedience.. I know God does not want my dutiful obligations, He want my devoted worship to Him. Worship Him out of my free will, out of my love, out of my passion for Him.. Yet I struggle.. I find it hard to give God wat He wants. Not that I am facing some big issue in my life tt require me to make a Lordship decision, but I know to be totally devoted to God requires a high price. Thinking of it brings pain.. Literal pain.. I can feel it across my heart..

God I need to see the reward and glory awaiting me. I need to see Your love motivating me. I am unable for I am merely human. I need your empowerment to surrender to you. God you do not take me by force. You wait for me to surrender to you. God you are gentle.. Father you are loving.. I pray that you will make me yield myself to you.. Thank you Lord for your patience, for showing patience toward my stubborn heart..

Father continue to expose the lies and wounds in my life and clean them out. It is painful I know but I also know that your healing balm is there for me. N Lord I know that unless you are Lord, I am not giving you access into those painful areas, and you cannot heal me. I struggle bcos I want your healing but at the same time I cannot open up those areas for you.. Help me.. Help me..

This is my prayer,
Make it my one desire...
That in my secret heart,
No other love competes,
No rival throne survives,
And I serve only You.

Let me see your Beauty..