God is sovereign.

He is.

Over all things He is.

I firmly believe that. Even as hard times come, and even as good times come. All for His glory alone.

Okay, so I realize that I write REALLY long posts, so I'll try to scrunch it down some and not let my mind vent (spill) out EVERYTHING that it consists of.

Today was Cafe Night for CCM and man, it was GOOD. I was so impressed by every single freshman performance, including the SOLID "Lifehouse - Everything" skit. Seriously, no joke. It was just as I watched it for the first time on youtube. I almost cried. But I'm a MAN! So I didn't. But anyways, ALL the skits were good! It seemed like none of them really noticeably messed up, except for me ;]. Haha. But it's not about me. I really just hope that God was glorified with my heart during that time, even though I was so shameful of myself after my voice gave out. Stupid NORAEBANG!

But seriously. Mini story. So leading up to the performance, I seriously did not think my voice would be able to do anything during the time of the performance because of the crazy noraebang day the few days before. Seriously the morning of performance my voice was ... still torn and shredded; however, by the grace and strength of God He pulled me through the practice that morning, the practice with Ben, and the performance... all the way up towards the end. That's where He showed me that I was still a weak little human and that I need Him at ALL times, or else I will fall. But anyways, PRAISE GOD! Praise God for giving us talents to share with one another, whether it be to play guitar, sing, act, speech, or just to be able to sit patiently and without remorse. It's all a gift from God. All the good things.

As for the bad things... that's our sinfulness. Forsure. Man I thought I was doing well with everything in terms of not noticeably (passively) sinning or just in general with my spiritual walk I thought everything was good. But it truly showed TODAY how sinful and human I was. I fell into sin hours before the performance and I thought to myself, there's no way I can do this alone. There's no way I can walk alone. The second that I do, it's sin right there.

And also, for the not being able to walk alone concept, we cannot live this life alone. It truly was evident when I heard of a certain passing away of a father. And the way that the person (whose father died) handled it was amazing. To believe and confess how sovereign He is even during the times when you want to curse Him (or at least I feel that I would've) is a very admirable trait. One that comes from knowing God all that more and having that much faith in Him. And that much more faith is needed in walking every day, every hour, every minute with Him because the cost of living a Christ-centered life in this sinful world is seriously a hard thing. Only through Him can it be done. Only. Him. ONLY! as in: just Him who can sustain us through the hard, difficult, perilous, painful, sacrificial life that lies ahead.

That life is one that I want so badly. It's one that I know I will treasure... it's one I'm working on. The Christ-centered life. God only you can sustain me through the craziest of times. Even the times when I want to deny you so badly. Even the times that I sin and hurt you so much. Even in the times when I'm in my deepest, darkest, lowest, most WHATEVER times. I know you are sovereign in my life. I know you are there, waiting for me with Your loving, patient, and peaceful arms.

Lord, I love you. And I want to fully mean that. Not the kind that says I love you 98 percent of the time, but the 2 percent I keep to myself. Not the kind that says I love you out loud, but don't resonate with it at all in my lifestyle. Not the kind that says I love you, but with strings attached. That I only love you when I feel that you are good to me. That I only love you when life .. is .. good.

Life is not good because of us. Life is not good because our selfish, self-centered, self-seeking sinful hearts. Because it only seeks after what the flesh desires. Only what the world puts out for us to feed on and be consumed by. We make life suck, ultimately. Yeah things sometimes come at random, but how many times is the pain ultimately caused by our own selfishness. Or how many times is it because we're so self-centered that when even a slightly hard time comes by, our perspective is so jacked up that we just blame everything on God. Take recognition on yourself, see where you're at with God. And I bet a lot of the stuff we struggle so much with is just soo miniscule compared to the cries of others living thousands of miles away from us.

What about the cry of the poor, nearly lifeless, malnutritioned child in Uganda.
What about the cry of the ravaged, raped, abused child in Thailand or Cambodia.
What about the cry of the man who must work 20 hours of the day to take care of his family in the worst working conditions, getting paid only a couple cents a day.
What about the cry of the woman who was raped by the vile terrorists with AIDS and is now pregnant with no idea of what to do with the child.
What about me? says 99.9% of the other world that suffers so much more than you do.
While you sit around complaining about how you missed that one test that you studied so hard for, or just failed, because you're so driven mad by the perfectionistic minds of your parents. What do I do now? you say. GET OVER IT. Do better next time. Are you even doing this for God? Or just to fulfill your parents' goals, your own selfish goals, to please others, to show off, or live that complacent, peaceful American Dream where it's completely self-driven. Where all you're headed is for your own glory, through your own means. How can we live such a selfish life that has no one else in mind but just within our protective little bubble?

How?

How?

How.

Now just answer that question yourself.

I know I'm there. I know I'm selfish. I know that I need God and that I should be seeking to glorify Him, yet I steal it all to myself. I know that I should be seeking to please His heart and not my own. But what am I, Andrew Jiminy Choe, doing about it? Next to nothing. I need to wake up. I need to snap out of lala land. How can I be more God-centered? How can I be more others-centered?

Well, let's start with not writing in this post for today, being consumed by it and to actually start doing something.

...

and on a lighter note, the "february" month of prayer fasting was for me today. I think the topic was Christians at UCSD. Let's start being God/others-centered by praying ferverently to God for His hand to be sovereign over this campus and over the christians here at UCSD and to move us to do whatever His heart yearns for.