In his book, Maps of Meaning, Jordan Peterson writes, “Something we cannot see protects us from something we do not understand.”  I cannot agree more.  God knows that we are not as ready as we think we are in knowing something.  He knows that knowing before our time might prove to be more harmful than good.  Hence, what God does is He shields us from seeing something we should not see. 

In his farewell speech, Moses the servant of the Lord said this to the Israelites, “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever that we may do all the words of this law” (Deuteronomy 29:29).  I wonder what Moses was thinking when he said this.  I wonder if he thought about his experience of walking with God, how God led him out of Egypt after living there as a prince of Egypt for 40 years, how he lived and raised his humble family in Midian for 40 years, and how God finally called him to lead His people for the last 40 years of his life, how he, in each phase of his life, had no clue what God had in store for him, and how he only obeyed what was revealed to him.

When Mary heard the call to anoint Jesus Our Lord with her costly perfume, I imagine, she must be confused and perhaps, wondered if she had heard correctly.  That’s a lot of perfume—and money—to give away.  But it was revealed to her, so it belongs to her—for her to obey.  So, she obeyed.  Did she know that what she was about to do would reverberate even till today, 2000 years later?  No.  Did she know that Jesus Our Lord was going to be crucified days later and be buried?  No.  Did she know that perfume was never poured upon the body of Jesus after His death because by the time the other women came to do it on the third day, Jesus had already risen?  No.  She did not know but what she knew, she obeyed.  So, the honor was given to Mary of Bethany, who always sat at Jesus’ feet. 

Pastor Paul

C. S. Lewis writes, “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain.”  I can see the point that Lewis tries to make but I must also say that the fact that God shouts in our pain doesn’t make it easier for us to understand the message of pain and suffering.  Pain and suffering can be so confusing that we cannot ascertain what God is trying to say to us through it.

That explains why in Gethsemane, Our Blessed Savior struggled to accept His Father’s will for Him to die on the cross.  And that also explains why on the cross, Jesus the Son of God cried out, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”  Pain and suffering so covers our eyes and close our ears that we cannot see what God is doing and hear what He is trying to tell us.  So, this is what I usually tell those who are in pain and suffering, “Do not try to understand the message behind all this pain and suffering because you may not understand it.  Let it be.  In God’s time, He will reveal it to you.”

Even though the disciples were around Jesus Our Lord all the time and heard Him speak about His arrest and death, they still did not get it.  They finally got it later—after the fact, after Jesus Our Lord rose from the dead, after He ascended to His Heavenly Father.  But once they got it, they stayed faithful to the end.  But here is what we need to know: The key to their understanding the message of suffering was that they remained close to the heart of Jesus.

So, that is what we will also do—to remain close to the heart of God and wait—wait on Him and wait for Him.  Mrs. Charles Cowman in the Streams in the Desert explains, “When we wait on God, He is waiting till we are ready; when we wait for God, we are waiting till He is ready.”  When we are ready, He will let us know the message that comes with it.  Then we will wait for Him to get us out.

Pastor Paul

Yesterday our sister Shinta and our brother Pardi celebrated their golden anniversary.  Congratulations!  The fact that they have been together—lovingly together—for 50 years is nothing short of great.  But what makes this union special is also the fact that for the past few years our brother Pardi has been sick.  He is no longer able to talk or to remember much anymore.  Despite his limitations, our sister has always been there for him, treating him with the same love and respect that have bound them together all these years.

Some say that the greatest gift we can give to our children is the brain, or education.  All the knowledge and skill they learn will be their future assets.  I agree.  Some also say that the greatest gift we can give our children is the spirit, or spiritual heritage.  What they see in us as we walk obediently with the Lord will motivate them to lead a godly life.  I also agree.  There is one more thing that we sometimes neglect to mention: the heart or relationship with our spouses.  The stronger, the more harmonious, the more loving our relationship is, the more equipped they will be in building their marriage and family.  And the kinder they will be toward others.

Marriage is not meant to be easy. I am sure our sister Shinta and our brother Pardi will agree with me.  Marriage is meant to be so hard that only those who love each other and are committed to each other can keep it together, and not break it.  Marriage is also meant to be hard because only that which is hard will render the greatest reward.  And the reward of marriage is not only love and satisfaction but also seeing our children grow to be full of love, full of commitment, and full of obedience to God and us, their parents.

Congratulations to our sister Shinta and our brother Pardi.  You’ve set a good example to us; in sickness and health you stay and love.

Pastor Paul

Life is full of struggles, but some have more than others.  Days ago, I spoke with someone who has been struggling over the course of decades.  The thoughts of suicide have come and gone; it is the fear of the Lord that has kept these desires at bay.  Ever since I first met him over a dozen years ago, he’s always been depressed.  He told me that he felt guilty and ashamed of himself for letting God down.

He thought of himself as a failure and believed that God thought so, too.  I disagreed with him.  I told him that the fact that he’s standing firm against the current, despite a few steps back from time to time, showed that he’s making progress: he’s not failing, he’s moving on.  Had he given up, he would have been swept by the current and we would not be having this conversation.  Standing matters!

This reminds me of an illustration given by C. S. Lewis about taking a test that we know we’ll fail.  There are two choices: We can either leave the paper blank or we can try to answer it as best as we can.  If we leave the paper blank, we will get no point at all or zero, but if we try, we’ll get some points. God looks at our efforts and He gives us points for trying.  At times standing matters more than walking. 

At the beginning of the week our sister Andri was admitted to the hospital and had to be put on a ventilator.  When Santy and I saw her, in a comatose state, our hearts crushed.  But when we saw her again a couple of days ago, our hearts leaped with joy.  She was off the ventilator and all cheerful; for the first time in weeks, we could communicate with her. Yes, she did not recognize us and could not remember going to church but this was what she said about church, “I love church.”  Coming out of her mouth, that touched our hearts. She can’t do much; she cannot sing in the choir or clean the church.  But she can still love the church.  To God that is more than enough.

Pastor Paul

God uses men and women alike. Years ago, when I visited a small town in Java, I was told by the pastor of the church that they had a ministry up in a mountain outside of town. But the ministry was not started by him or the church that he pastored; it was started by a woman missionary. Despite her limited ability to communicate in the local language, she managed to win many to Christ.

One of the women God used in a special way was Amy Carmichael,a British woman who gave 53 years of her life serving God in India. One of the men that influenced her was Jeremy Taylor, a British pastor who lived in the 17th century. One of his prayers that he wrote became her prayer for life, “Lord, do Thou turn me all into love, and all my love into obedience, and let my obedience be without interruption.” A beautiful and powerful prayer, especially the last part of it, “let my obedience be without interruption.”

As I reflect on it, I must admit that my obedience is often with interruption. There are times when I take a break and do not obey God. In other words, I am not always consistent. So, it is fitting for us who take following God seriously to strive to obey Him without interruption. At any time, in whatever condition, we obey Him. But as the prayer indicates, it can only be made possible by love. We obey God because we love Him. Only love can make us obey God consistently, without interruption. Without love, nothing lasts.

And it was her mother’s love for Jesus that released Amy to go to India as a young woman, as she eloquently wrote to her dear child, “So, darling, when He asks you now to go away from within my reach, can I say, no? No, no, Amy, He is yours—you are His—to take you where He pleases and to use you as He pleases. I can trust you to Him . . . . “ Let our love and obedience be without interruption.

Pastor Paul

In his book, 12 Rules for Life, Jordan B. Peterson points out that it is not easy to live with healthy people. The reason is a good, healthy person is an ideal, hence, it requires strength and courage to be near such a person. Simply put it behooves us to have humility to be near a healthy person. It’s like standing in front of a mirror and seeing who we are; healthy people show us who we really are.

In the same way we might not like to be near godly people. Being near them requires humility and courage because we get to see who we really are. And we might not like what we see. It is no wonder that we often run from those who lead a godly life. We do not want to see what we don’t like to see. And that is what godly people do to us, even though they may not even want to do that.

God brings different people to our paths for a lot of reasons; one of them is for us to see who we are. King Saul should have benefited from David because David was not only a healthy individual, but he was also a godly man. Living near David should have given Saul a clear picture of who he was and driven him to grow to be a better man. Unfortunately, Saul did not seize the opportunity for growth; on the contrary, he tried to squash David. The same we can say about Cain. Instead of repenting, he resorted to killing Abel.

God uses a variety of ways to call us to repentance and growth and He gives us plenty of opportunity. Whether or not we make full use of the opportunity depends on one factor, as pointed out by Jordan Peterson, humility and courage. We, who are not humble, and we who have little courage to confront our own vices, will usually waste the opportunity given to us. The end is often tragic, as we can see in the lives of Cain and Saul. So, when God brings healthy and godly persons into our lives, welcome them, and thank God for them.

Pastor Paul

First, I would like to thank you for giving me the opportunity to visit my mom in Indonesia.  Thanks to your prayers, she is now making good progress.  While there, I flew to Malang and spent a day to visit with friends in the seminary who are ill.  By the grace of God, they are weathering the storms of life; they live one day at a time and do their best to remain active while they can.  It was both joyful and painful to see them.  I pray that I will be able to see them again.

While in Malang, I also got together with some old minister-friends.  Because our children are about the same ages, we used to go out to Batu and Tretes together in the early days of our stay in Malang. But now they are retired, so the topics of our conversation are different.  Now they asked among themselves questions like, “Hey, are you still able to put on your pants standing up?”  One answered, “I have to sit” while another answered, “I must lean my back against the wall.”

Hearing that I chuckled, not because I can still put on my pants with my two feet on the ground, but also because I remembered hearing the same conversation between Oom Tek Bien and the rest of the gang that used to sit at that corner in our dining hall, which they nostalgically called, Warung Pojok.  Never did I imagine that I would be engaged in the same conversation fifteen years later!  Time flies and I am catching up.  We may have come from all over, but we are headed in the same direction and traveling on the same road.

Psalm 71:20 gives this assurance to us who are already on that road, “Though You have made me see troubles, many and bitter, You will restore my life again; from the depths of the earth You will again bring me up.”  What lies behind this earthly destination—the depths of the earth—is this new life in heavens.  God will bring us up; He’ll restore our lives again; and He’ll make us see bliss, many and sweet.

Pastor Paul

How do we define greatness?

There are some amazing people in the world who many would call great – great athletes, great musicians, great leaders, great designers, great parents, great students, and the list could go on – often times we look at greatness and aspire to be like those people, but why?

I’m sure God sees greatness in those people, and actually in all of us – but He has a different criterion for those He considers the greatest.

Jesus says in Mattew 23:11, “The greatest among you shall be your servant.”

But sometimes the role or a position of a servant isn’t always the most appealing position; it often isn’t the type of position or lifestyle that someone aspires to be like.

There’s got to be something special though about being known as a servant; something that sets us apart in God’s eyes. Jesus also said, “If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also”. John 12:26

And there we find the secret, the power, and the reason behind choosing to posture ourselves in the role, lifestyle, and decisions to be a servant – we’ll be where Jesus is. It will be the position or role in life that we’ll be most able to identify with Jesus. It’s the secret to developing a heart like His and be great in His eyes.

Pastor Steve

On Monday, Our Blessed Lord came and took Remy home.  Remy was the grandson of Kak Indra, and the great nephew of Cynthia.  He was 24.  And it was his birthday.  We do not know the cause for his death pending further examination; what we know is that he slipped into eternity while he was asleep.  No wonder he looked so peaceful, as if he was still asleep.  We are grieving with the family.

The day before Remy still went to church near his home where he’d attended for quite some time.  And that day Cynthia and the family were going to have dinner to celebrate his birthday, which he so looked forward to.  But God had a different plan; the birthday party was moved to His Eternal Home where those in attendance were all the saints and the angels of the Lord.  It was Remy’s best birthday!

One of the questions we often ask when faced with a sudden death, especially the death of one who is relatively young, is “Why now?”  We do not know the answer and we’ll only know it after we get to Heaven and meet our Heavenly Father.  But this we know: It is in the plan of God.  You see, one of the paramedics that administered aid to him was from the church that Remy attended.  So, he knew Remy.  And one of the nurses at the hospital’s ER was also from the same church.  She, too, knew Remy.  You see, God put them there to be with Remy on his last day on earth.  Long before Monday, God had already known and made preparation for Remy’s homegoing.

Losing a child—and burying him at such a young age—is very hard.  Knowing that this is in the plan of God gives us comfort.  On Sunday, Remy sang praises at the house of God on earth; on Monday he sang praises at the house of God in Heaven.  On Sunday with his eyes closed, Remy prayed to God; on Monday with his eyes opened, he spoke to God.  In God’s good plan, all is for the better.  Always.

Pastor Paul

At age 73, after 20 years of ministry around the world, Corrie Ten Boom’s body began to weaken, she’s tired and in need of rest.  The doctor who cared for her health suggested that she take a year off, to stay put in one place and to stop travelling.  So, she followed the advice; she went to Uganda to a place prepared for missionaries for a retreat and lived there for a year.  She did not stop ministries; she still went to church in and around the city she lived in, but she did not travel far.  Every night she could sleep in the same bed.

After one year of rest, it was time for her to resume her ministries, so she began making plans: a few months in Africa, a few months in America, and a few months in Eastern Europe. However, something happened during the planning process: she did not want to go!  She felt tired of sleeping in different beds and living out of her suitcases.  So, she changed her plan; she’d continue writing and speaking but only in the area.  She’d settle down and she’s happy with the plan.

But God was not too happy with her plan.  Not long after a minister from Rwanda came and shared the struggles that Christians faced there due to civil war and invited her to come to Rwanda.  Corrie wasn’t too happy, but she still asked the kind of message that those in Rwanda needed to hear.  The minister then opened his Bible and read from Revelation 2:1-5. When he came to this part, “But I hold this against you that you have lost your first love” Corrie knew that the Lord was speaking to her; she had lost her first love for Jesus.

The story of Corrie Ten Boom was the story of one who whose life was aligned to the life, the work, and the interests of Jesus Our Lord so much so that she had no life of her own.  But in having no life of her own, she received the honor of infusing life into so many around her, not only in her lifetime, but also till today.  It is still flowing.

Pastor Paul