Mid-week and a reflection on the cross...

Two more days before Ben's family and I journey toward KL - and meet up with dad....

*jeng, jeng, jeng* :P (sorry couldn't help putting in the sound-effects - it was too hard to resist... Hehe!)

MLM training tonight at church. Spiritual formation and Community duty tomorrow @ MBTS. Meet up with the florist on Friday. Above all, I'm gonna try to turn in my week's assignments before Friday is up.

It's a busy week all right. I will get busier still as the term goes on... toward my wedding. But I feel more alive now than I did last year... even with all the bending, stretching, chipping off of unwanted bits and pieces, chiseling... Perhaps what they say is true ~ taking up the cross sounds harsh and unpleasant... and subjecting ourselves to the Potter's hands which mould us, imperfect vessels of clay, sounds intrusive indeed. However when we surrender to these, we are set free from the disturbing dissonances within us that come from wrestling with the gentle yet persuasive promptings of the Holy Spirit... as He bids us to leave behind our old selves more and more (whatever is necessary - be it giving up old sins, taking up new challenges, releasing control of our lives unto God, choosing His way, etc). Yes, we are set free. This is the power every child of God is entitled to receive when he or she yields to His Spirit. We dare not at times... but when we glimpse the immense beauty of the transformed life, we timidly wish for such transformation - except that it may not be quite as painful.

At one junction of my life, I was there with my Eating Disorders, wondering if I would ever proceed... if there was such a thing as freedom from EDs... if there is truly healing in taking up the cross...

picture source

Now that I have discovered the resounding "YES" to the above questions, I am at another junction of my life with some other struggles that have yet to be worked on. I will not lie and say that I am great at taking up the cross. Sometimes, the hardness of its 'wooden frames' bruises my shoulders and the cross feels too heavy for words... so I (being your typical hedonist in nature) yield to the temptations to set it down for a bit. I always cringe at the slightest pain and open my mouth to pour out copious complaints! (And I am wondering how I'll behave during childbirth...May God give lots and lots of GRACE!) But dear friends, thank you for inspiring and encouraging me (in different ways) to deny myself and take up the cross again. Yes, please kindly continue to motivate me. I will need and appreciate it.

Christ... first took up the cross. While we share in His sufferings today, He will make us more than overcomers.

So don't lose heart.