The Bare Truth

Life's changed. For the better.
Last Saturday for YA (young adults) service, we had the Praise and Worship Extravanganza night, and boy was i glad i went. For the past weeks/months, life's been terrible and my walk had faltered so much. Like backslided. I mean i didn't go that havoc or anything, but it was just really different from before. i know that this is nothing really interesting to some of you, but my experience and my life in God is really nothing short of amazing, and that i really feel compelled to give this testimony. I guess it started from before my Os. Before that i was in the YM committee and in leadership all that. I guess i was pretty ONS, in a good way, and that my walk was good, consistent and i heard from God regularly. But something changed along the way. I'm not too sure what it was, but i guess it was because of the people around me who began to fade away. I would hate to say that i was influenced by them but i guess to a large extent it's true. I've always thought that i wouldn't be the one who would be pulled away when others leave but i guess i wasn't strong enough. And i was so ready to leave church. I mean it was a pretty low point in my life, like i broke up with my ex, was having to deal with really crap prelim results, and the impending Os, and the stress from having to deal with both seven-day-a-week church commitments and the problems at home at that time was pretty overwhelming for my little 16 year old mind. I was so ready to walk away from it all, and taste a bit of the outside. I guess having grown in such a pious and "religious" family from young made me a little curious to wonder what i would have been like in another life. But God, i guess, really is that omnipotent. A deliverer in the form of my mentor Isaac, had a vision of a boxing match that pictured me struggling with God. And all this without having told him anything except how stressed i was. He said, that i was on the verge of a spiritual death and that the struggles with God is killing me, and that if i left, it would be the final straw. I know this sounds a bit morbid and scary, and i was quite fearful at that time, i realised that deep down, God loved me so much to want to see me leave. And now, older, i know that if i had left, i would have never gone back. And that i guess would been pretty terrible knowing how my life would just have gone downhill down there with the kind of people i hang out with. So instead of leaving, i stepped down from leadership and focused on music ministry. I went to Church regularly, and did the "normal Christian" things. but i guess to an extent, i felt really empty, not like before. I guess as i grew older, i grew more jaded, more cyncial and harder to feel. Without going to much detail or throwing a sob story, i guess one of my greatest weaknesses is in the area of love. I mean i know that people and God love me, but the problem i guess over the years, each time i get hurt or something, i constantly put up walls around my heart. its not a trust issue, rather i get so numb sometimes that i don't feel love or loved, or that i give love. like i know my parents really really love me, but its just that, knowledge. and i now, i know the walls are still up. each time during praise and worship, i cry out to God, i cry out to feel His love, but often i feel that tiny little bit before it gets sweeps away. and i know that its cause of all the walls i put up, and that i prevent God from reaching into my heart. i guess it could be that i'm afraid that i would get consumed by it, and that i'm afraid that if i put my heart in it, and that if it doesn't work out, i would get really hurt from it. and guess, that this time round, going back, i'm really trying to pry out my heart and lay it before Him. and well tonight has just been awesome. i was just doing a little mini p and w, and QT at the same time, i singing How He Love Us, and like i really really felt the peace and assurance that comes from His love for the first time in such a long while. If you haven't watched the video in the youtube section, please do, and watch the WHOLE thing. cos it's like super awesome. the girl, Kim Walker even says in one part about how some people have not encountered the Love of God, how He wants to encounter them. And how the Love of God changes us, and we're never the same after encountering the Love of God. and wow. i pray pray pray, that this is not some short term change. my "grandpa" who's my mentor's mentor, was saying before that no matter how deep i get into a hole, God will always be able to pull me out. and i guess, that this time round, the really earth-core deep place i got myself into, God has delivered me out of.

"the wickedness of the wicked man will not cause him to fall when he turns from it" Ezekiel 33:12

New blog skin; realised the narrowing limits of my IT skills and how its so freaking complicated.
On a brighter note, it's the mid of the much needed hols, and the mid of the f-ing prelims. Anyway, life's been better; a little.

Thinking of taking up smoking. Heard it relieves stress. Somehow it's smelling nicer.

I'm lying.

Anyway, it's the f-ing stress that's been getting to me. Dunno why, but for the first time in my entire academic life, school's been a real pain in the ass. Coupled with the stupid shizz thats been going on, it seems God is out to get me (though i know otherwise). I've been really really freaking faraway, and like what Rach felt, I feel like an outsider. I went on Saturday a couple weeks back, and like i was just standing freaking alone. I know it's cause the rest were busy and stuff, but compared to like years before, i would be able to talk to ANYONE. Times have changed, and maybe, we've grown up and grown apart. Both with the people and with God. Crisis.

I'll probably get a flood of concerned messages, but i guess its time to take it slow and alone. Though i said i felt like an outsider, the scary thing is that it feels alright. Loneliness as much cursed and feared, seems okay. Maybe i just don't care anymore. And thats what scares me most.

For those peeps who've been asking, i'm okay alright. I know i've been (and probably still) in a bad state and all, but thanks for your concerns and all ok.

Life's just one big mess, and we live to unravel it.