What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very self?

Wake me up, breathe into me. As I find peace again in unfailing grace. As my soul stirs in the warmth of Your love, like how the sun rays beam down upon the drooping daisy that has seen too many days of rain.

Whisper softly, call my name. As I still my heart again to hear Your voice. As my soul rests and listens for the path You have laid out for me, like how You are the Master Potter and all is in Your hands for You to mould as You will.

Gentle presence, guide my life. As I lay it all down again to follow after You. As I choose to pick up my cross daily, my very self denied for the righteousness of Christ, and in Him I live and move and have my being.

Able arms, pick me up. As I find myself being lifted upon eagle's wings. As I hope in Him and surrender all, giving up my right to understand and be in control - For once again, I remind myself, this is not my life.

"I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live -
But Christ lives in me.

The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God -
Who loved me, and gave Himself for me."

Jeremiah 18:4, Luke 9:23, Acts 17:28, Isaiah 40:30, Galatians 2:20

Questions and feelings

1:41am, on a Tuesday morning.

Lord, I don't understand how and why You do the things you do. I am so undeserving, and yet there are others who deserve Your love so much more than I do but go through hard times. Those who are faithful and reliant on You, but endure so much pain and suffering - yet here am I, barely walking the straight path, with a life others could call near perfect. This isn't fair. Perhaps I should be the one suffering. The one enduring the hurt. God knows I deserve it - think about how many times I have vowed to You, and then turned around and betrayed You with my words, thoughts, and actions. I am the nails in Your hands. I am the thorns on Your brow. I am the spear in Your side.

Perhaps, most probably, definitely, I have the wrong perspective of You and Your love and who You really are and what You really consider us to be. But it is difficult, and I am at a standstill in the midst of the ocean. I am a mess; an alphabet soup, a crumbling apple pie. I understand, and yet at the same time I do not understand.

Sometimes I feel like You shouldn't love me anymore, because I've disappointed You enough and someone as perfect as You shouldn't have to keep putting up with such a child as this. I feel like You should just set me in a corner and push me along and say, alright, you've messed up enough, its just you along this path right now, try not to screw up too much maybe? And maybe when you get your act together again, I'll come and pick you up.

The thing is I know, I know, I know, that it is not the Jesus of the faith. That is not what His character is like, its not who He is, its what He would never do. He is love and faith and hope and grace. I know that He is always there, ever willing to pour out grace and love each time, but a part of me fears that one day, everything will just run out and He will get tired of me disappointing Him. Do you understand what I am trying to lay out? It is so difficult to explain. My questions are, what is the extent of His grace to a believer that knows and understands the fullness of His life and yet keeps running away? When will He withdraw from the believer who has seen and tasted that the Lord is good but continues to falter between solid ground and sand?

... Update. 12:17pm, just woke up on a Tuesday afternoon.

Freedom Truths and Cancerous Lies


Anonymous asked: Hi Unka Glen. I’ve been feeling so down lately and I noticed that it affects my christian life (prayer & devotion). How can I restore it again? How can I make my christian life more lively?



Unka Glen answered: There are two schools of thought on this kind of situation. The first is that people are sinners, so when they feel bad, or do something bad, it’s because of the sin in their life, and they need to stop sinning, and know that Jesus is the answer to everything.

The second school of thought is similar, but perhaps a bit more evolved. Yes, we are all imperfect sinners who constantly feel the pull of temptation from our flesh, but on a deeper level, it’s about a struggle between the lies we’ve been sold, and the truth. Moreover, there is also a constant pull from the Holy Spirit, drawing us closer to Himself.

Thus, if we break down the lies, it’s like casting off a hindrance and ridding ourselves of those things that entangle us (Hebrews 12:1), and then we can better respond to the pull of the Holy Spirit.

In this second school of thought, sin (and lots of our suffering in general) is the result of buying into those lies. Think about it this way— if I open a person’s brain and implant a lie that says that God doesn’t love you, what would be the likely result? Well, they wouldn’t go to God for strength or comfort because they’d figure God wouldn’t want to give it to them.

So they’d turn to the things of the world to comfort themselves, and they’d have no strength to resist becoming addicted and dependent on those things. But here’s the important part, you can get someone over that addiction, they can confess their sins with bitter tears, but if the lie is still there, then this whole thing will just play itself out again.

At the heart of every struggle, there’s a lie. That struggle could be an emotional struggle, a lifestyle struggle, or a relationship struggle. Dig deep enough, and you’ll find a lie from the enemy (no wonder Jesus called him the “Father of Lies”). Replace it with the truth, and the truth will set you free.

Here are a few common lies you may have bought into:

- It’s never going to be any better than this
- How can you be saved? Look at what you’re doing!
- God is not impressed with you (and He needs to be impressed)
- You aren’t what God is looking for
- If I changed for the better, I’d be invisible
- I’ve got one good chance to get this right
- Yes, God technically loves me, but…

Your life should be about finding these lies, and replacing them with the truth of God’s Word. Every time you beat up on yourself, you’re feeding a sin-producing lie in your life. Every bad body image thought, every insecurity, all the self-pity, they’re all symptoms of lies that are spreading like a cancer, and taking things from bad to worse.

Know the truth, and the truth will set you free. Here are some truths to focus on:

- You are God’s treasured possession (Deuteronomy 14:2)
- You are awesomely and wonderfully made (Psalm 139:14)
- You are a child of God. (John 1:12)
- You will not be condemned by God, you have been set free from the law of sin and -death. (Romans 8:1-2)
- The Son of God gave His life to ransom you. (Mark 10:45)
- You have been accepted by Christ. (Romans 15:7)
- You have been chosen by God to obtain an inheritance. (Ephesians 1:9-11)
- You are no longer a slave but a child and an heir. (Galatians 4:7)
- You have bold and confident access to God through faith in Christ. (Ephesians 3:12)
- You are joined to the Lord and are one in spirit with Him. (1 Corinthians 6:17)
- You are like a living stone, built into God’s house (1 Peter 2:5)
- You are a citizen of heaven. (Philippians 3:20)
- You have been made complete in Christ. (Colossians 2:9-10)
- You have been raised up with Christ. (Colossians 3:1)
- You have been chosen of God, and you are holy and beloved. (Colossians 3:12)
- And You have been set free in Christ. (Galatians 5:1)

The week in words; A food journal 30/05 - 02/06

How many molecules in a bag of guacamole? Avocado's constant!

Ugh I really love avocados. The first time I tried them, I expected them to be sweet so I was totally thrown off by the potato-ish flavour (Perceptions, perceptions!). But after getting used to them, I now love them! The creamy potato taste :-D ON A CRACKER WITH A SLICE OF CHEDDAR CHEESE. Just a post dedicated to the best fruit for the month of May. Fact, avocados are also known as alligator pears.

1. Avocados contain more potassium than bananas (up to three times more!).

2. Avocados aid in the absorption of other nutrients in your body.

3. Avocados high content of Vitamins C and E, carotenoids, selenium, zinc, phytosterols and omega-3 fatty acids helps guard against inflammation.

*cuddles an avocado*

001. I dropped my watch in school on Monday. That is to say, it fell off my wrist without me noticing it, so I had no idea when or where it dropped to. I was quite sad because I really liked that watch and I got it when I was 15, no sentimental value really, but I liked the way it looked! So I went home sadly, thinking that I would never see my wristwatch again. It was raining heavily that day and if I had dropped it on the floor/road in school, if it weren't stepped on or run over by cars, it would definitely have been dead. I didn't bother thinking about my watch (My way of dealing with loss.... Remove thoughts of it along with all said emotions from my mind and focus on other things! Also known as denial. Also, I had a History exam the next day.) but when I went to school the next day, someone came up to me, held out my watch and asked if it was mine. I would have hugged the guy! (But I didn't really know him and that would have been awkward.) :-) He found it on the floor and someone must have told him that it was mine. Yay! Thank You, Jesus!

002. Exams are over. How do I feel? Relieved to say the least :-) I'm happy. Now I've got 2 weeks of holidays to spend! The moment I got home from school, I dropped on my bed and slept for 4 hours. It rained and rained and the winds blew and blew but I didn't hear a thing. What shall I do for 2 weeks? People keep asking me what I want to do after SPM. How do I answer that? I want to do a lot of things. I want  to go to Croatia, I want to ride a camel in Egypt, I want to end poverty. The question is not what I want to do after SPM, the question is what can I do after the SPM examinations for further education and what course I'm interested in taking.  Tsk, I'm still young. I don't agree on leaving the course of the future in the hands of 17-year-olds! Wait, that just sounds like the denial talking again. I'm just lazy to look around and find out what my options are.

003. I ate frogs for the first time last night, at my grandmother's birthday dinner. I really like it! The texture is a lot smoother than chicken but tougher than fish, and it has a bit of a crabmeat-ish thing going on there. I think it's better than chicken. But everyone I've told it to made a face at me and said I was gross for eating frogs (along with the declaration that they would never eat frog meat). If you think about it, we eat cows, pigs, chickens, ducks, fishes, eels, sheep, goats... What makes eating those kinds of animals ethical, and frogs not? See, it's all in the mind and conditioned perceptions. We need to step out of our mindsets and... Eat some frogs!

14/05 - Today, I woke up and got ready for school. It hasn't been raining and the sun has been shining really nicely the past few days, but Jesus told me to bring my jacket to school. So I was like, "Okay," but being the absent-minded person that I am, I didn't pay much attention to it and forgot, and went to school without bringing my jacket. Guess what? School was freezing and I had to write my Bahasa papers with cold fingers. Writing essays with numb fingers - not fun. Not fun at all. Lesson of the experience: When God tells you to bring your jacket, you do it.

15/05 - Seems like my only school is the only one that's smart enough to put History, Maths, and Chemistry papers in one day. I got steam-rolled by the Chemistry paper and when they asked what I would put on an alkaline jellyfish sting to relieve the pain, and to give reasons to support my answer, I ended up writing  about vinegar and one of the reasons was because you could buy it in stores. A friend wrote, "Lemons, because it is found in abundance in nature." Hahaha.

When I'm not studying, I'm drooling over pictures of the interiors of pretty apartments & loft rooms. Like, who needs to stalk celebrities when you have buildings and beds...

What's a nicer word for "babblings"?

Line are great. I love lines. Triangles are my favourite geometric shape. Don't even get me started on angles! ANGLES. ANGLEZZZ!!!! Love love love straight lines. I know I got some angles wrong, these don't look very 3D, but these are just doodles from while I take a break from memorising wordy passages, sorting out mathematical equations, ignoring my Physics textbook, and contemplating the meaning of life. Mostly I think about cats, in case anyone was wondering. And the occasional platypus. Why did God create the platypus? WHY? Amusement, a sudden creative outburst, mischievousness while thinking, "These humans are never gonna figure out what this is when it waddles out from that river!" or? I imagine God laughing in the Heavens while slapping a coupla angels on the back when that baffled team of European naturalists found it, thinking it was some kind of conspiracy. Platypuses are also venomous. So don't touch it. I wonder how platypus meat tastes like?

Jesus is great. TOTALLY great. I mean, He knows you, you know? Like, better than you even think you know yourself. Seriously. Has anyone really felt like wow, I really know myself!, and suddenly something comes your way and you find yourself questioning who you are and your existence and the meaning of everything and you feel like that plate of unwanted jelly nobody wants to eat anymore sitting alone on top of the dining table. (Or maybe its just the puberty speaking. When does puberty end? Kidding. It ends when you're 34, right?) Anyway, Jesus can totally sort you out. He's there and He loves you. Just a reminder, maybe someone forgot. I know I nearly did. It's a crazy thing to forget but even being a human is a crazy thing. He sent me a reminder in the form of a willing servant. Oh, and, when Jesus tells you to go do something, just do it. It might be ridiculous. But someone decided against all rational thinking to tell me something ridiculous from God, and it saved my life (Me being a dramatic teenage girl here). No, but really, yes. God knows, and He loves you, even when you feel like that blobby piece of unwanted gelatin.

Life is not a straight line leading from one blessing to the next and then finally to heaven. Life is a winding and troubled road. Switchback after switchback. And the point of biblical stories like Joseph and Job and Esther and Ruth is to help us feel in our bones (not just know in our heads) that God is for us in all these strange turns. God is not just showing up after the trouble and cleaning it up. He is plotting the course and managing the troubles with far-reaching purposes for our good and for the glory of Jesus Christ. — John Piper