in saul’s footsteps.

in small groups this semester we’ve been reading about Saul in 1Samuel and talking about how poor saul is at his ability to go after God’s heart in his leadership. we talk about his sins of disobeying not only samuel, but God and eventually being dethroned by David. Someone who seemed like they would such a good leader, turns into a sinner unwilling to repent.

though reading about his disobedience, they seem so insignificant and almost like white-sins, like a white-lie. He was humble in accepting his kingship, he gives sacrifices to God in desperation before he was supposed to, he doesn’t murder the best of the plunder to sacrifice to God and these are BAD THINGS! these “little” sins that actually have a bit more background, but still seem like legit actions are reflections of Saul’s heart that loves other things more than God. It even seems like he obeys God, but his heart does not act with intentions of wanting to obey God.

I was sitting in small group, just reflecting on my own leadership and life and saw dangerously close similarities between Saul and the person i’ve become. the leader i’ve become. i’ve turned into saul himself, more concerned with my appearance as a leader and concerned with pleasing people. i’ve become this logistical monster that only cares about things running smoothly, making emails look aesthetically pleasing, and organizing anything and everything. i love organizing which in this case comes as a disadvantage to me. because i love details! i love the color coordinating and the lists and deadlines of putting things together. i know im freakn weird. but that’s all i care about now! it’s like a drug. i feel so accomplished and good about myself that i had to pull through all those people who don’t email back and crazy situations of last minute who wait till the bitter end. and then it all comes together, somehow. and then i take a deep breath, thank God, and pat myself in the back. and this has become my new spiritual high.

and them im so exhausted from all the planning and running around to make sure things are perfect and when i finally sit down, there’s no one to sit down with or i have such a huge wall of pride built up i can’t even enjoy my time with people. i just keep thinking, “do you know what i just went though so YOU, who did nothing, can enjoy this event/can have a ride to the retreat/ can have food to eat? NO, you don’t do you?? you don’t know what i went through! you don’t know how hard i worked so that YOU can be comfortable. so that YOU can be blessed. so that YOU can be filled.”

have i revealed too much about myself? does anybody even still want to be my friend?

i feel like i’ve become just a aaiv figure who has it all together and plans events. the one that yells directions at people and tells people what to do. i feel like i’ve become this awkward friend who never has time to deepen relationships and loses her temper all the time. the upper classman that used to care, but disappeared.

i feel like i’m not carrying God’s love and the most important part of who my God is, is no longer a part of me. aaiv has become a job. and it’s not that i hate my “job”, it’s that i do it because i have to. i do it because i’m supposed to. not because I want to fall in love with God more and  not because I love God’s people.  i like helping out, but i know that that’s not the heart God is looking for.

i’m not doing well in school.
my mentor teacher doesn’t trust me.
i’m not doing well as a leader.
my relationships are not getting any stronger with anybody.
i’m surprised people still even want to be my friend.
my relationship with God is dwindling.

and i feel like such a failure right now.

i don’t know what else to say…

trust? or not to trust?

out of all the things that have been going on in my life, this is what i chose to write about at 5:49am.

so, i’ve had a lot of trouble trusting people this year. even people close to me, i get super paranoid that they’re talking about me behind my back. and you might think, “that’s so random”. but i have my reasons that i can’t publicly expose.

so do i trust them? is this one of those trust until proven guilty situations or to start putting up my guard immediately and prepare to find out the worst to just deal with. i would rather not chose the later because i  think it ruins friendships. cause really what is a friendship without trust? but everything in my past relationships and experiences tell me otherwise. they tell me to shield up and get ready for yet more battle scars and broken friendships.

i really don’t like the innate nature of girls to gossip. i know because it’s in my nature. even small things that don’t seem like a big deal. it makes me feel lonely.

ugh, i’m so distracted. there have been so many more significant things going on in my life that are much more worthy of updates, i’m just lame enough to write about this instead.

fall retreat: brokenness 0ct2-3
i don’t know where the excitement is building from. but i know God is a BIG God. and a faithful God. and i also am excited to see alum~

if you guys aren’t going, please pray for us. God’s presence has been so strong in AAIV this year. the spirit is moving not only in our chapter, but on our campus. please continue to pray for the spirit to be working in our chapter. to raise us up to be the generation, with selfless faith, that continues  revival on our campus for it truly has already started.

falling in love. with Jesus.

so i read a lot of grace’s old xanga entries. something i know a lot of us are guilty of. so as i read and read and read some more, i saw the depth, the intensity, the crazy amounts of how much she loved Jesus. every entry whether silly or serious, devoted to her one true love: God. i realize now how little we scratched the surface of her love for God. that her love for God ran deeper into her soul than i could ever imagine.

” Ohmygoodness.  I hung out with the greatest guy over the weekend.  In fact, I was talking to him just now.  He’s so cool and awesome.  He just makes me feel amazing and totally beautiful when I’m around Him.  He’s so incredible.  You won’t believe it.  I want you to meet him.

His name’s Jesus.

this is our purpose.  this is His will.  Don’t forget it.”

Grace Yu 1-9-06

Jesus, I want to be in love with you. so madly and deeply in love. now. now now!! not tomorrow, not at the next retreat, not at the next sunday service, not at the next prayer meeting, NOW. Jesus, steal my heart away.

in the morning when i rise, in the morning when i rise, in the morning when i rise, give me Jesus.
Give me Jeeeeesus,
Give me JEEEEEESUSS
you can have all this world,
but give me Jesus.

JESUS, ROCK MY WORLD!!!

my dad loves me.

i don’t exactly know how to craft what i want to say or what’s going on in my head. so here’s some messy thoughts.

i started watching this korean drama. and in the first episode, the main character’s dad dies. talk about drama right from the start. so while crying along with the poor girl who had just lost her second parent (her mom had already passed away), i thought of how depressed i would be. there wouldn’t be any adjective that could describe how depressed i would be if my dad ever passed away. since i started moving past my rebellious/ puberty stage, i’ve started to realize how much my dad loves me. and it makes me cry sometimes just thinking about how much he loves me. does this sound selfish? cause it might be, but that’s just how much he loves me. does it sound conceited? that’s how much my dad loves me. enough for me to sound boastful, full of myself, pretty much like a princess. his eyes light up whenever he sees me. even though he’s exhausted from work he loves cooking for me (my dad makes amazing food), even though he has no money, he always has so much to give to me.

my dad doesn’t drink, my dad doesn’t golf, my dad doesn’t take vacations, my dad never sleeps in, my dad is getting old and he still never stops working for me at a job that he didn’t major in, at a job that he doesn’t love so one day i can take vacations, sleep in, and wake up to a job that i love.

can you imagine loving someone so much? that you are willing to sacrifice everything for them? your hobbies, your interests, your friends, your whole life.

i think sometimes it’s hard to imagine how much God loves us. He seems so distant sometimes, no? just me? as of late, it’s been hard to conceptualize and feel how much God loves me. As i went to services in His name, read His word, had meetings to plan His work, even led meetings in hopes of furthering the work and will of God, i didn’t feel God. i felt like he was a father figure and not MY dad. i felt like he was someone i was working for.

but, i saw my dad today. and was instantly filled with a overwhelming sense of  sacrificial love. as i gave my dad a hug, i knew that he would protect me even if it meant taking his life. as he gave me money, i knew he would always provide for me, even if he meant the bare minimum for himself.

and as i think about how much my dad loves me and how much more God is supposed to love me. i get into this hazy unreal territory of unfathomable-ness. but that’s how much God actually loves me. more than my dad. my dad that treats an undeserving daughter like his princess. “are you checking?” -pastor peter hong. God’s love is so surreal. but it’s not. because it is so real. so so so real.

did you know that my dad loves coffee too? whenever we’re together, we drink coffee. my mom always yells at us that we drink too much. but we just smile, sipping at our mugs.

you’ve got mail.

purse stolen take two.
this time was much better than the last time. only some cards (as in credit and debit), license, little cash, and my lovely new coach skinny-mini (sigh, that was the hardest to accept). well it seems that each time my purse is stolen, there’s a wild card item that makes my situation that much worse than what is should’ve been. last time it was my social security card ( i know, it sucks!) this time it was my house key.

a house key is only useful when there’s a house to go with it. lucky for me my license was in my wallet. licenses have addresses, unfortunate for this case. i came home every day/night wondering if everything in my house would be gone, if someone was hiding in some closet or nook, or if any of my family members would be harmed.
so i told my parents and to my surprise, my dad didn’t think it was necessary to change our locks. maybe it’s cause we don’t have the money, but still…safety first, no? i started praying everyday. just for safety and such.
my mom gave me my mail today.
in an envelope was my license. no return sender. just a stamp marked “found loose in mail”. i also got a receipt of something i bought the same day i lost my license. also marked “found loose in mail”.
i’m not sure whether to feel more scared or reassured…
seriously…i’m confused. should i contact the post office? or just pray that this is some kind of God sent sign that my house is safe.

(i wish they would send me my coach. )

untitled.

one of my summer school classes is a educational pyschology course for adolescent age period. this covers mostly the junior high age. dipping into 5th grade and high school freshmen.

so, do you remember how hard those years were? the awkwardness between girls and boys, the popularity and different lunch tables, the confusion, the body changing, the friends being flaky, the wanting of freedom and privacy, the wanting to grow up, thinking you were mature, following all the trends…

good times? not quite. for most kids, junior high is the worst time because there’s all these changes physically and emotionally going on. thought processes are so much deeper and the adolescent child is capable of a lot more than the elementary school child. it’s a different playing field and looking back, through forced reminiscing cause of my class, i laugh at how utterly lost i was. lol so, you think you had some bad junior high years? well there are people who experience those years worse than anybody else. do you know who those people are?

YOUR PARENTS!

i love my class because i am not yet an adult. well, legally i am. but in terms of responsibilities and maturity, i am still very much a kid. and this becomes extremely apparent to me while i sit in class and listen to discussions and watch videos and read studies on research about kids growing up and the kids are a year or two younger than me! but we talk about the adult perspective of all the issues, and more speicfically the teacher persepective, but we learn A LOT about parent/child relationships and such. and i have a new found respect for my parents.  i never knew how stressful it must be for parents to one day, so suddenly have your kids start locking doors, not wanting to be loved by you, not wanting help from you when they clearly need it, when they are in front of their computer screens for 15 hours a day after school, when they stop talking to you, when anything you try to do cause you love them just pisses them off! when they yell and lie for no reason.

THE FRUSTRATION OF A PARENT WHO JUST WANTS TO LOVE THEIR KID AND THE STUPID KID WON’T LET THEM! OMG!!!!

watching these interactions from the parents point of view is so interesting! for the first time realizing, “OMG, i was like that!” , “That’s how i treated my parents!”, “my parents felt like that?” it’s all very eye opening. and so one would think, o wow you must be excited to be a parent now cause you’re learning about it.
HECK FREAKN NO!

i am currently debating if i ever want kids at all! omg. kids are the worst people EVER! lol and being someone’s teacher vs. being a parent is talking two different worlds.
it’s weird, how as we get older, the more  unprepared we feel: the working world, marriage, kids…
IT’S ALL HAPPENING TOO FAST!

my once strong desire of wanting kids early so i can be a “cool mom” and what i thought was maternal insticts seem to have disapeared into fear and ..well just fear for now.

though all of this has led to some very interesting conversations with my mom. and other parents.

i guess this is how God must feel. how heartbreaking and frustrating He must feel, sitting up there, watching us try to live life so blindly but reassuring Him that we got things under control.
i love watching new parents, reminds me of God’s love a lot and how we should act as the kids. and then we grow into rebellious teens. sigh.

being a teacher seems very daunting at the moment. my stomach has this sinking feeling and is more nervous than excited to start school and student teaching this year. i feel like i got into something knowing about only the tip of the iceberg.

(btw, if you want to see the videos, my professor emails them to me, so i can send it to you too.)

just a conversation

While attempting to prepare a sermon for the Sunday School kiddies, i came across this picture. What an awesome picture, no? Why is it so hard to pray sometimes, aka…as of late, when it’s just a concersation between friends? Have I not gotten to know God through these past couple of years enough to just tell Him how my day went? I neglect my friendship with Him, trying to make it more gradoise and “prayerful” (ironic) and “deep”, when all it really starts with a simple conversation.

my faith is a mustard seed.

God has been faithful in very obvious ways lately. it’s strange though cause I don’t really feel fire-y all the time, or very much at all, as of late, even a week after C.U.P. even as my faith is as small as a mustard seed, God has truly still, as always, been faithful.

i identify myself as a teacher candidate pursuing to teach in an urban setting, more specifically CPS (chicago public school). i’ve talked about my career and experiences endlessly with everybody i encounter. i feel like it’s a part of who i am now and there’s no way of disconnecting myself. i kept getting reaffirmed that “YES! my future belongs here! where i can serve God’s urban poor and teach in under privileged schools!” and i was happy with that!! i was excited to start serving God through my work and loving my experiences, i eagerly anticipated my teaching certificate to walk into “those” schools and start teaching “those” kids. but, as of late, i was very shaken. i knew myself as a future CPS teacher and so did everyone around me. someone i met for the first time actually knew me as, “tracy the teacher”! and suddenly i had high and unexpected doubts. after a couple horrible experiences in the classroom (and i mean BAD! like the movies when kids are running around uncontrollably bad) experiences, i questioned, “is this really for me?” Being Asian-American, can i really teach black/latino kids? as i have come to realize, there are MANY cultural differences. not only with ethnic backrounds, but with social class as well. and i started seeing how big these gaps were and how getting respect and authority couldnt be achieved through yelling, being “the teacher”, or through threats and prizes. and i know, the “omgosh level” isn’t going very high on your radar, but for me, this was a faith shaking time. being so sure of what God was calling me to for quite a while and then it was all being taken away! the passion, the desire, the will, the confidence, it was all gone. i didn’t want to go to school, i didn’t want to graduate, and secretly i thought of other career paths i could pursue. i was too embarrassed to admit to anybody how much i didn’t want to be a teacher anymore because being a teacher is WHO I AM! i questioned the suburbs and other countries…i questioned grad school and administration, and nothing settled as yes, i want to do this for the rest of my life! kinda ordeal as CPS had before.

so, i went to C.U.P. and i was bitter. for many other reasons as well, but especially for this. i purposely DIDN’T sign up for tutoring children. and i heard a lot of  “wow, i’m surprised!” and i thought to myself, “i am NOT JUST teaching, i have other talents or passions in my life!” but, really i was more scared that i would get there and utterly fail at something i was supposed to be so good at or had a lot of experience in.

but as certain as snow in april in chicago,

God, was at CUP. and He spoke to me. more directly than i ever felt in my life.

We had a panel time of 4 people who were living out justice in their daily lives. TWO out of the 4, were Asian-American women teachers, teaching in an urban setting.

did you hear me? or rather read correctly??

i said 2. not 1. not male. not latino, not black, not white, not any other color, not from the hood, but TWO, middle class, Asian-American women teachers.

they told stories, they told of God’s faithfulness in their lives, they talked about struggles with their parents, with money, with classroom management, cultural differences, how to approach differences, how to connect to the students, how it was awkward, difficulties, success stories, how they came about the decision of teaching in CPS, and as they spoke,

God spoke to me,

“this is your story. this is for you.” He told me, “it will be hard, there are differences, but it can be done. YOU can do it, not because of what you learn in school or the experience you’ve gained, but because I, the great I AM, have created you to expand my kingdom, and this is how I will use you. Do you hear their stories? that, one day, will be your story.”

i sat there in tears, overwhelmed. i didn’t know exactly how to feel except shuddering in God’s undeniable presence at that moment.  and even as i type, i am at a loss of words of how to explain God’s faithfulness.

²⁰ “You don’t have enough faith,” Jesus told them. “I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible. Matthew 17:20

cps, here i come! =)

nothing to say?

i have nothing to write about. i suppose i can write about “life” but it’s not quite worth writing about…at least to post about and share with the rest of the people who weblog.  as i type im wondering if i should private this because it doesn’t seem like a worthwhile entry to post. but why? why can’t i just write for no reason? can i only post my most interesting thoughts (which are very few) or an intense struggle or extreme moment of happiness? what, then happens to all those moments in between? are they just not worth remembering?

i used to write a lot more, journal a lot more when i was younger. but now i filter what i write about. i only feel like it’s necessary to write down the most important things in my life or most “intriging”. so i just get really lazy. on writing about anything cause it’s not “worthy” to be remembered. and i just end up not writing anything at all.

i say, what a waste. of normal memories that actually probably affect us a lot more than we realize.

i’m actually procrastinating studying for my midterm. which is in about 2 hours.

WHY am i not getting freaked! I WANT MY A! but…at the same time i don’t care. but i know when i get my B or C back from my teacher, i’m going to be extremely disappointed in myself and be all depressed about it. but i don’t even deserve an A. if one of my students studied the way i did for one of my bigger test and got a B or C and complained. i would say, you don’t deserve an A, why did you magically expect to get one? is it slightly ironic that this class is about how to assess/test your students and about making tests? yes? no? maybe.

am i really satisfied with Bs now? it’s not what i live for, but God doesn’t want me to slack. but i’m feeling so…unfocused. my mind is in a thousand blank places. literally, im trying to think about what i’ve been thinking about other than studying. and there’s nothing. what am i thinking about? where is my mind? and why can i not focus! usually around an hour or two before my exam…it’s crunch time and i get all freaked out. but as if i just smoked up some really good marijuana, i am as chill as can be.

i like my header picture. it’s cropped from a picture i took out my window. (i wanted credit for it) i love the bus stop in the middle. it’s as if someone should be standing it in, but there’s no one there…or it’s just really hard to tell. it’s kinda mysterious, no? there’s so much focus on it. but there’s nothing to it. not even a person inside of it. but your eye just draws to it.

maybe i’m wrong. but hey, there’s no wrong answers about art. im no professional. im actually not artistic at all.

less than 2 hours.

my weed has not worn off.

no! i am not apathetic. and yes, i still do care. Don’t think that 20 years of my life could be erased so quickly. what a joke! I CARE! I CARE! I CARE!!! but it’s so much easier…to not care. You, have hurt me. You. You that i have been so faithful to! You who i have wasted coutless hours with! Do you think it’s easy? after 20 years of inconsisitentcy. 20 years of emotional pain and hurt. 20 years of scattered memories of being back stabbed multiple times, hate and apathay streaming through your veins! and BETRAYAL! i TRUSTED YOU! I TRUSTED YOU with some of the MOST IMPORTANT people! the most important and precious beloved part of my life that i have ever, ever encounted. and you, you think that after 20 years, it’s just that easy. to look again, and open my heart. to make myself vulnerable to you again, to care again. to love again. HAH!!!!!!!!!!!! ARE YOU KIDDING?! do you feel that you deserve this love that you’re asking of?? that you think the pain is justified? that i’m healed?? is that what you think??? i am not going to half-ass my love, because that’s not what i have learned! it’s not what i  feel is right! and it’s not the kind of person I want to be! so i will wait. until i am ready. selfish? call me selfish. call me ungrateful! call me the one who betrays. call me whatever you want! but NO! NO. healing takes TIME! and you haven’t even given me time! everytime i start to heal…you give me new fresh wounds. i want to run away forever. but it’s been 20 years. i wont just run out on 20 years.