Man, i'm so blessed.

I've been reading this book titled, Invitation to Lead by Paul Tokunaga. Amazing book. It's odd. I bought this book 6 months ago at Urbana and haven't touched it since. But now that i've started reading it, I can't seem to put it down.

It's about leadership. With the idea of becoming a leader next year, I've grown anxious and hesitant about fully committing myself. I fear being rejected or made a fool of. I have always been performance oriented (as many asians are), driven to do my best even to the extent of exhaustion. And when i don't perform well, I fall into self-pity and the devil starts to deconstruct my mindset of living for God. I fear if i don't see results, I will start to doubt myself or even worse, doubt God.

I am truly incapable of leading.

But. That's where God comes in. I am so thankful that I'm not going into this next year alone. With God along side of me guiding me and helping me and loving me, I can go the distance. THe only way for me to be used, is to fully commit my life and work to God. Only then, will his power truly preside in my heart and soul. Giving my all is hard. Isn't it? Giving everything to God is even harder. But i'm still learning day by day to give it to God. Because only he can do good things with it. I can't.

Lol. I also noticed that I never talked about Urbana. Perhaps, the tornado of events that occurred after the convention deterred my equilibrium so much that I disregarded the fact or i just simply didn't want to extend my thoughts to the world.

Urbana 03:
- a truly exhausting experience. I was constantly on the move. My every waking moment was spent going to seminars, eating, meeting up with friends, worship, and small groups. It was nonstop. We had to travel from the dorms to the arena, from the arena to the local buildings for the individual seminars (3 each day), back to the dorms for dinner, from the dorms to the arena for the evening session seminar. Everywhere you went there were lines. But the great thing about it was, i loved it. I loved being so busy. Always needed to be somewhere, always needed to go to a designated area. I loved the fact that the random people you ran into, you could praise God with. You could be waiting in line to go into a seminar and you start pouring your guts to this random girl who asked you what time it was. I loved being treated like cattle whilst going into the arena with 20,000 other brothers and sisters, to worship and dwell in the presence of the Almighty.

- God delivered peace in the midst of the craziness. I spent one day just in complete awe of God's majesty. That day was the only medication i needed. It allowed me to rest in God's power and authority. Through that time, I finally realized what it meant to depend on God. In that moment, the phrase "Once you put God as priority, everything else falls into place" made sense to me. I must admit, my passion for missions wasn't inflamed, I wasn't necessarily engrossed with the idea of urban projects or traveling to the outskirts of Manila. But in the back of my mind, i realized that i can't do it for God unless he knows that i want to do it for him. I must go to him first to express my fears, doubts, worries, anxieties, pain, guilt, shame, love, joys, sins before i can effectively work for him. I praise him that he has redeemed me of my past.

- Jennifer Ling approached me. She came to me and asked if I wanted to be discipled by her. She asked me if we could be accountablility partners. My God. I was honored by the sheer fact that she even considered me. To this day, I'm grateful for the time and energy that she has invested in me and the wisdom she has imparted into me.

- Spent a day with Peter and his friend Joseph. One day, I went to the seminars that these guys were going to. I also had lunch with them at this mock Subway place. I had an interesting conversation with Peter. He was very candid with me about the things he was going through that last semester. He also progressed to inform me of his wish to start a bible study. And this bible study has grown. We've grown to be a community within another. I am truly amazed at what God has done with this small idea and to see the fruits of God's grace to be shown is astounding. And for that, I appreciate Peter's vulnerability to me.

- New Life Fellowship. I rode up to Urbana with my cousin's church. It was unbelievably encouraging to see a group of believers on fire for God. I remember that at the end of the day, the girls came together to talk about the spiritual matters that God had taught us for that day. They were so vocal about their thought patterns that I wish I had the capability of doing so, so candidly.

- John. Hah. He's this guy i met one day. I was in line for the bus to go the arena. Some guy was standing to the left of me. And he proceeded to ask me, "how's it going?" I looked up and we made eye contact. Man, was he cute, I thought. I played it cool and turned my head into my original place, and said, "pretty good, how about yourself?" "good" My gosh, the thoughts in my head were going 100 miles per hour. I was so nervous and afraid at the same time. I didn't know what to say. I was scared that i would start stuttering or mumble my words into a jumble. I said God, this is just a guy. Let me remember that. And he gave me peace. We walked slowly into the bus. He was from Georgia Tech. He was leading a small group at the dorms so he was split up from his fellowship. We sat together on the bus. I asked him why was he at Urbana. And he said that many of his friends were going on missions so he wanted to get more information on missions in general. But, he didn't answer my question. I asked him why was he at Urbana. He asked me what did i mean. Well it seemed to me that his entire purpose was the benefit of others rather than himself. OF course, it is necessary to think of others before yourself. But it's also important to consider what God has in store for YOUR future. And after i told him all this, he was befuddled. And he said that is a very good question. hAH. For the first time in my life, I felt as if i was provoking someone's thought pattern in the right direction. I thank God for that conversation because it gave me confidence. Not confidence in myself but in God. Let me explain, this situation is quite unique, you must understand. I don't communicate well. I don't express my emotions or thought pattern as best can be. Needless to say, when it comes to guys, i'm a failure in speech communication, especially cute guys. haha. But what i'm trying to say is that that simple interaction changed my perspective. It has allowed to me engage in conversations with guys. It has allowed me to understand that it's okay to ask hard questions. It's okay to be serious with a person of the opposite sex. You don't always need to talk about the latest NBA stats nor the latest Acura model. After that conversation, i never saw the guy again. how ironic

- Overall, it was an experience never to be forgotten