Hello Hurricane

When I first heard this song, I instantly smiled. There’s just something empowering and assuring about the lyrics and the melody that makes you feel and think that “Everything’s gonna be okay =)”

I know that in every circumstance and season in my life, God has always come through. The good, the bad, the ugly, He’s always been there. And that has built my confidence in Him, to know that however big the storms may be, I can still smile and know I’ve already got the victory =)


"I've been watching the skies
They've been turning blood red
Not a doubt in my mind anymore
There's a storm up ahead

Hello hurricane, you're not enough
Hello hurricane, you can't silence my love
I've got doors and windows boarded up
All your dead end fury is not enough
You can't silence my love, my love

Everything I have I count as loss
Everything I have is stripped away
Before I started building I counted up these costs
There's nothing left for you to take away

I'm a fighter fighting for control
I'm a fighter fighting for my soul
Everything inside of me surrenders
You can't silence my love
You can't silence my love, yeah

Yeah, I said hello hurricane"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqxpDZfKHJ4

welcome to the aftermath

Soul Cravings

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been really challenged and changed by the writings of Erwin McManus in Soul Cravings. Here are a couple of quotes from his book that inspire me to dream and live a purposeful life:

We humans are most alive when we passionately pursue our dreams, live with purpose, and have a sense of destiny.

Bottom line: we cannot live the life of our dreams without an irrational sense of destiny.
And all of us have dreams.
More than that all of us need dreams.
Some of us sadly are just sleeping through them.

All of us long to become something more than we are. We are driven to achieve, moved to accomplish, fueled by ambition.


All of us long for our lives to count in some way. We all have an internal need to achieve some kind of success or to somehow find significance. Pursuing the future we desire energizes and inspires us.

Every one of us longs to create even when we don't know exactly what. All of us, at the very least, want to create a better life, a better future, a better us.

A part of growing up seems to be acquiescing to mediocrity. It's death to our souls. When we stop dreaming, we start dying.


There is a destiny that awaits us all. It calls us, and if we ignore it, we are soon haunted by it.

Without dreams we have nothing to pull us forward.

Not only is ambition a good thing; it's a God thing.


When there is no future there is no HOPE.

The maddening reality is that each and every one of us has been created with a soul craving to become-- to become something-- something better, something different, something special, something unique, something admired, something valued, something more than we are.


This is from me:
Here’s the thing, you are given one life, this one chance here on earth to do all that God has call you to do. Don’t waste it. Don’t live a life of regret, but take joy in your day to day living. Do all that you must for your King. “God has given you everything that you need, to do what He has called you to do, and only you can do it” Joel Houston.

Tyra's Essay

I was watching Friday Night Lights (a show I lovee so much!) and this was Tyra’s monologue; her college application essay:

“Two years ago, I was afraid of wanting anything. I figured wanting would lead to trying and trying would lead to failure. But now I find I can't stop wanting.I want to fly somewhere on first class. I want to travel to Europe on a business trip. I want to get invited to the White House. I want to learn about the world. I want to surprise myself. I want to be important. I want to be the best person I can be. I want to define myself instead of having others define me. I want to win and have people be happy for me. I want to lose and get over it. I want to not be afraid of the unknown. I want to grow up and be generous and big hearted, the way people have been with me. I want an interesting and surprising life. It's not that I think I'm going to get all these things, I just want the possibility of getting them. College represents possibility. The possibility that things are going to change. I can't wait.”

Here’s my version:

“Years ago, I was afraid of wanting anything. I figured wanting would lead to trying and trying would lead to failure and failure would lead to disappointment. But now I find I can't stop wanting. I want to travel the world; visit and experience every culture possible. I want to feed the hungry and clothe the naked. I want to teach and be taught by young child about faith, hope and love. I want to meet the famous people I’ve admired and tell them how amazing they are to me. I want to see myself as the beautiful child God has made me to be-to never second guess myself. I want to surprise myself. I want to be the best person I can be. I want to define myself instead of having others define me. I want to grow and have people be happy for me. I want to not be afraid of the unknown. I want to be generous and big hearted, the way people have been with me. I want an interesting and surprising life. It's not that I think I'm going to get all these things, I just want the possibility of getting them. And God represents possibility. The possibility that things are going to change. I can't wait."

Something changed in me when I saw this and when I found my own version of it. I hope hopelessly now, and I don’t feel silly about it. I love that God listens to me, and that’s all I really want; someOne to listen to me =)

One Thing Remains

As I sang to You, You hushed everything else and said

“Listen to my daughter as she sings to me”

My prayers are lifted up to You Lord. Be it this country that I was born in, the city I grew up in, the institute I study in, the church I serve in, the family I live with; whether it be me, I place it all into Your loving hands, believing and knowing, You will work all things good in accordance to Your will.

I trust You Lord. And to some that may not be enough, but it’s more than enough for me.
All I have is Your trust Lord, and I hold on to it so tightly.
May I never forget how precious I am to You.

Higher than the mountains that I face
Stronger than the power of the grave
Constant through the trial and the change
One thing remains
One thing remains

Your love never fails
it never gives up
it never runs out on me

On and one and on and on it goes
It overwhelms and satisfies my soul
And I never ever have to be afraid
One thing remains

In death and in life
I'm confident and covered by the power
of your great love
My debt is paid
there's nothing that can separate my heart
from your great love

Wish

This may seem a little ignorant, but I was honestly unaware about this phenomenon. Had I known or be informed about at the time, who knows what would have happened. But yeah, news came to me late, and I’m living the shock now =P

Brian Littrell of the Backstreet Boys is a Christian; like a proper gospel singing, Jesus loving Christian…Who knew?! Haha, maybe that isn’t news to you, but I grew up with the ‘Boys’, loved them, wanted to marry all of them (well maybe not all), and to find out that one of them was a Jesus follower all along…It’s mind blowing (literally)...I am so pleasantly and genuinely surprised and inspired =)

Anyway, this one song that’s on Brian’s album ‘Welcome Home’ always puts a smile on my face. It’s like the thoughts in my head were interpreted and then this song was birthed, amazingg. It’s pretty self explanatory, and it’s really how I feel about the past and future sometimes. Hope you enjoy it =)

For just a moment
I wish I could have been there
To see Your first step, hear Your very first word
Tell me, did You ever fall and scrape Your knee?
Did You know Your wounds would one day heal the world?

For just one moment
I wish I could have seen You growing
Learning the ways of a carpenter's son
Just a little boy gazing at the stars
Did You remember creating every one?
If you passed by, would I have seen a child or a King?
Would I have known?

I wish I could have been there
My only wish is to see You, face to face
Wish I could have been there
Just to see You, Jesus, face to face

For just a moment
I wish I could have been there
When You left Your footprints upon the waves
To walk along beside You and never look away
Just Your whisper and the wind and sea obey
To see You feed the people
To feel Your healing in Your touch

To hear you pray in the garden alone
Laying down Your will with each tear
To see You walk that lonely road
Willing to die for me
And in that moment
I know I should have been there
You took my cross and gave Your life
And you live again, oh
And You live again!

Someday I'll be there, I'm gonna be there
I'll see Your face, Your mercy, Your grace
Someday, someday
I'm going to see You, Jesus
Face to face

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VmacF-VZrqk

Awakenings

If you don’t already know, I’m a Psychology Major at HELP University (Msia, KL). I’ve just started my new semester and I’m taking this subject called Psychology of Film-it is the most awesome subject ever! Haha, so for this entryI shall fill ya’ll in on how God mind blowing-ly got me to see this one movie in His way.

The movie’s called Awakenings (1990; starring Robert De Niro & Robin Williams-he was serious in this movie). Not many people have heard of it, much less seen it, which is quite sad cause the movie is so so good… So good! If you haven’t seen it, I don’t intend on spoiling it for you but I’m gonna anyway =P If you are interested in watching it and hate spoilers, then you don’t have to read this (you can read it after you watch the movie =P )

Here I go:

It’s basically about this up tight psychiatrist who's put in charge of several seemingly catatonic (deficit of motor activity that can render patient motionless; mute and rigid, and initiate no social behaviors) patients. As he runs a diagnosis on them he finds out that they respond to certain stimuli (when he throws a ball at them, they catch it) and this compels him to look for a way to help them recover from their disorder. He finds a drug that works wonders on them, and all the patients are awakened from their ‘sleep’ and are given a second chance to really live their lives. But as it turns out, the drugs didn’t last and slowly but surely they all depleted back to their original state of catatonia.

That is the whole movie in short =( I know it sounds horrible, cause of the sad ending…but what was a revelation to me was seeing how the catatonic patients wake up and live their lives again. It made me think about the people around us, the people who don’t know Jesus, who may have known Jesus once but have fallen backwards, or the people who do know about Jesus, but not personally. They to me, are like the people in catatonia, basically asleep, not living life the way God has intended them to, not knowing what *living* is really like. Yet, God(like the psychiatrist) still sees hope in them, and believes that they will be revived someday, only difference is He’s the only ‘drug’ that will work on them and that will never fail. To think that once these people get a ‘shot’ of Jesus in their lives, how set free, how alive, how awakened they will feel, it really makes me smile, and makes me want to try harder for them. In the movie, when those patients woke up, they never wanted to fall back into catatonia ever again, cause being awake felt so so much better, and I know once people experience God, really truly, honestly..they’ll never want to go back again.

What’s on my heart is basically, don’t give up on them. Don’t brush them aside thinking there’s no hope for them, or that they are too much for you…Cause He hasn’t given up on them. Keep trying, believe in that day where their eyes will be opened and for them to really *see* God for who He is =)

And if you think you are that person that is 'asleep' and in need of an awakening, God's so ready to revive you. Of all the people whom will never fail, never dissapoint, never hurt...God's perfect, and I know that may seem unlikely, but He is. He's exactly what we're looking and who we need. We're not living till we have Him, till we know Him, trust me on that. It's never too late, give Him a chance =)

That’s just my prayer for all of us. Thanks for taking the time to read my long story. Hope ya’ll have been blessed =)

Here’s the trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FURflBxeTyI
(quality’s bad but it gives a gist to the movie)

p/s: At the Golden Globes this year Robert De Niro was awarder 'Life Time Achievement' (or something like that) for his work over the many years, and he said the best movie he has made out of all was Awakenings. That day was the day I watch the movie, for the very first time..Didn't think it was coincidence.

pp/s: The nurse in the trailer is the voice of Marge Simpson =P