AF video... (:

I am in class now, just marking class participation, so I'm rather free to surf the net...

I was looking at my past posts, and I realize that I haven't been posting many of new spiritual insights that I have... guess I'm getting a bit too busy...

Yes, I finally see that I'm living in the expectations of others... not God... Am I living my life as though God is watching, or as though man around me are watching...

I realize that our life is and always will be subjected to scrutiny or observation from others. Our friends, our superiors, our mentors, our brothers, our sisters...

I believe our testimony is very important, and many around me think so too, that is why this "being a salt & light for God" thing is commonly heard in our church. I believe if we try our best to fix our eyes on God, and allow Him to mould our lives slowly, crawl out from our residual comfort zones, we will 'survive the scrutiny'.

" Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3 More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. 6 For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly."

Romans 5: 1-6

My friend asked me yesterday, "What do you mean when you say that everything happens for a reason?"

Another asked, "If God has a plan for your life, doesn't it mean that we are just robots, executing his plan?"

I believe 2 rules of thumb can help address these queries:

1. God is 100% sovereign
2. Man are 100% free and responsible

As counter-intuitive as it sounds, both occur at the same time. Much like how Light has both wave-like properties as well as particle properties, some things are difficult to comprehend, but if you want to assume light ONLY has wave-like properties, then your theory cannot explain its particle-like properties.

I believe Man are still 100% responsible of each choice they make, but God, in His infinite wisdom and power, is sovereign over all that occurs.

Everything happens and happened for a reason... and sometimes we just need time to appreciate God's guidance through the things that have happened...

Not interpreting things just from our limited view, but seeing things from God's perspective.