对基督徒非常有帮助的29条建议...Part I

1.下次如果觉得自己了不起时，试试行在水上。
2.当魔鬼提起你的过去时，请提醒牠的未来。
3.你不是幸运，是蒙福。
4.若想要真正活着，得先彻底死去。

Let's strive for Him...

To all who stumble upon this little blog, I hope you will find something here to encourage you in your travels along the way...something to comfort you, something to help you, something to uplift you.

Jay Bruce


“Self-sacrifice brought Christ into the world. And self-sacrifice will lead us, His followers, not way from, but into the midst of men. Wherever men suffer, there will we be to comfort. Wherever men strive, there will we be to help. Wherever men fail, there will we be to uplift. Self-sacrifice means not indifference to our times and our fellows, it means absorption in them. It means forgetfulness of self in others. It means not that we should live one life, but a thousand lives—binding ourselves to a thousand souls by the filaments of so loving a sympathy that their lives become ours. Only when we humbly walk this path, seeking truly in it not our own things but those of others, we shall fined the promise true, that he who loses his life shall find it. Only when, like Christ, and in loving obedience to His call and example, we take no account of ourselves, but freely give ourselves to others, we shall find, each in his measure, the saying true of himself also: 'Wherefore also God hath highly exalted him.' The path of self-sacrifice is the path to glory.”

-- Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield, from his sermon Imitating the Incarnation

Struggle for Him...

What about your struggles? Is there any chance, any possibility, that you have been selected to struggle for God's glory? Have you ever been granted for Christ's sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for Him, but also to suffer for His sake (Philippians 1:29)?

Here is a clue. Do your prayers seem to be unanswered? What you request and what you receive aren't matching up? Don't think God is not listening. Indeed he is. He may have higher plans.

Here is another. Are people strengthened by your struggles? A friend of mine can answer yes. His cancer was consuming more than his body; it was eating away at his faith. Unanswered petitions perplexed him. Well-meaning Christians confused him. If you have faith, they said, you will be healed.

No healing came. Just more chemo, nausea, and questions. He assumed the fault was a small faith. I suggested another answer. It's not about you,I told him. Your hospital room is a showcase for your Maker. Your faith in the face of suffering cranks up the volume of God's song.

Oh, that you could have seen the relief on his face. To know that he hadn't failed God and God hadn't failed him-this made all the difference. Seeing his sickness in the scope of God's sovereign plan gave his condition a sense of dignity. He accepted his cancer as an assignment from heaven: a missionary to the cancer ward.

A week later I saw him again. I reflected God,he said, smiling through a thin face, to the nurse, the doctors, my friends. Who knows who needed to see God, but I did my best to make him seen.

Bingo. His cancer paraded the power of Jesus down the Main Street of his world.

God will use whatever he wants to display his glory. Heavens and stars. History and nations. People and problems.

Rather than begrudge your problem, explore it. Ponder it. And most of all, use it. Use it to the glory of God.

Today is the day...

Today is the day, Xu Yuan moved in.

Today is the day, that we should welcome our new member into our house.

We did a hot pot for the welcoming. We have done this for Janette too, for her farewell.

There were people living with us that have to say goodbye, yet there are people coming to live with us. Episodes by episodes, they seems to never end.

Today is also a day, which our heavenly father had plotted to send his only son to be crucified on the cross the next day. He did this for demonstrating his love for us. How much pain he had had to make the decision to send his one and only son, how much pain Jesus had had to suffered just because of the sin that he had never done. His skin peeled off, His blood dried out, His heart torn, and His soul cried for His father in heaven to take away His pain... How much pain our God had had to see his only son dying for his helping hands...

How deep the father's love for us
How vast beyong all measure
That He should give His only son
To make a wretch His treasure

How great the pain of searing loss
The Father turns His face away
As wounds which mar the chosend one
Bring many sons to glory

Behold the Man upon a cross
My sin upon His shoulders
Ashamed I hear my mocking voice
Call out among the scoffers

It was my sin that held Him there
Until it was accomplished
His dying breath has brought me life
I know that it is finished

I will not boast in anything
No gifts, no power, no wisdom
But I will boast in Jesus Christ
His death and resurrection

Why shoud i gain from His reward?
I cannot give an answer
But this I know with all my heart
His wounds have paid my ransom

Father, we know we have failed to demonstrate your love in one episode, but we know that we will be success at the other, for we say sorry and repent, and we ask for your help. For you are gracious and merciful, and you are all mighty.

Grace

It was a usual Monday morning when Grace chose to meet us.

Grace is my second baby. She shares the same name of my first baby, Ern, in chinese term.

Grace did not give me alot of hard time as how Ern has given me during the labour. And she did not let me make any difficult decision for her at all.

The moment when she came to this world, she did not know how to breath like other newborn babies, we thought she might not be able to make it. But, Grace carried on with her persistency as how she used to be when she was in my womb. She picked up how to breath, and she even knew how to swallow. The baby doctor was amazed and wanted us to decide whether to feed her with my breast milk. And they even wanna give her vitamin K injection like how a normal baby would have got it. She even did a wee on me!!

She was with us for a little while before she left us. She was breathing through her little pinky mouth on my chest, and making a little snoring noise. I was lucky enough to be able to take video record on her. She has given me and vincent the blessing to hold her in our arms and spent a couple of her precious time with us on this earth. Looking at this little creature, we really wanna tell her how much we love her and treasure her. Tell her that we hope to spend time with her reading some bedtime story to her, singing some songs for her, dressing her like a little pinky princess when she grown up...

Now that she has left us, to our father in heaven. We know that she is in a good hand and that our father has chosen the best for her. She did not suffer and she was in peace and confort when she was with us. This is what we have been praying for.

Our housemates have given us lot of great supports. Janette cancelled her appointment and came home to take care of Ian when we rushed to hospital. Louisa help us to take care of Ian when vince can accompany me for a nite at hospital, she even made me a whole pot of herbal chicken even though i could not finish.

Our church members and pastors have been giving us a lot of great helps too. Spending time with us and taking care of the funeral service.

All these people are like part of our family in melbourne, all of us share the same love among us from Christ the Lord. If not because of this love, we would be crying alone, and not knowing what to do but grieving...