To Sharpen Iron: 3 Lessons Learned from Worldview

It wouldn't be stretching the truth to say that Worldview changed my life. Again.

As I think back upon this past week, I see the faces of my small group. Girls who changed the way I see God's heart. Who stood by each other through bleary-eyed mornings and tough lectures and intense discussions and six-pack-developing laughter. I see my small group leader Michelle, who imparted words of wisdom I will never forget and who sacrificed her time and energy and heart to six girls last week. I see the faces of our next generation, guys and gals who stand side-by-side, cupping the truth within our fragile hands. 

And we are not afraid. Not afraid to ask the tough questions and wrestle with issues of government and law and biblical authority. Not afraid to step onto the streets of greater Seattle to witness to the Light. Not afraid because we have been trained to testify to the Truth.

I have the greatest admiration for these young men and women, who have a desire to know God and know Truth. For when we know God, we know Truth. And Worldview enables us to know both God and Truth. And to not only know Truth, but to share it with the world and empower others with what we've seen and learned. 

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1. Richard

On Wednesday, all 160+ students headed out to Fremont and Queen Anne for evangelism, armed with tracts and God's truth. And that's where I met Richard and my eyes were opened to God's heart. 

Here was a man, stubborn in his belief that the Bible was contradictory and illogical. That the maximum IQ was when two people converge and how the Bible undermines women and promotes slavery. How the Bible was full of errors, while he himself was the supreme authority on what was right and wrong. How he believed he would simply disintegrate in death and how he believed he was a good person. 

Oh Lord, forgive him, for he did not know what he was doing. Open his eyes. Break through to his heart. Show him Yourself in all Your glory and grace and love.

It was in that moment that I saw God's heart break. I saw a glimpse of God's immense pain for this man. He was God's beloved creation that He had sacrificed His only Son for, and yet he remained hostile with his sick heart in direct defiance of everything good and right and pure. Psalm 81:13 reads, "Oh, that my people would listen to me, that Israel would walk in my ways!" That day, I felt God's heart cry out in pain. I felt God's agony when He looked upon His creation and saw a disobedient people.

Yet, at the same time, I felt utter frustration, like I was beating against a wall of stone. 

For how do you describe light to a blind man? How can you simply make someone see the box of lies he's been living in all his life?

That day, my eyes were opened and I saw the thousands upon thousands of people so blind and lost and dead in Seattle. Not just in Manila, but here in hip, coffee-drinking, tattooed Seattle. We are surrounded by the living dead. 

Yet, so often, I am so selfish. I have the antidote to the poison permeating the world's population, yet I do nothing. I sit home on couches and watch TV and go about my daily business, when people are living and dying in their sin in direct rejection of the Truth.

Oh Lord, how can I be so selfish that I would withhold Your life-saving grace to the blind?

Richard showed me God's heart. And for that, I am eternally grateful. Please pray with me for Richard. Pray that God would turn His heart around that he might see God's eternal, unchanging, unconditional love and accept Christ as Lord over his life.

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2. Devos

Christianity is a relationship, not a religion. And it is my privilege to study God's Word. 

Growing up in a Christian home, we take a lot of things for granted. Often times, I read my Bible because as a Christian, it's the "right" thing to do, but I forget that Christ bought and paid for my relationship with Him. Jesus died for me, so I can know Him and love Him. 

Similarly to romantic dates, we have the opportunity to "make a date" with Jesus. I don't mean that to be cheesy, but it's true. People who are in love with each other treasure each moment spent together and cherish each opportunity to spend time with one another. It's never a chore or a burden, but a gift. 

It's the same with Christ. He loved us so much He died for us, and how do we repay Him? By treating His Word and our relationship with Christ as a duty or another task on our to-do list? Something to skim through each morning, so we can move on with our day?

Father, forgive me for abusing this beautiful gift of having a relationship with You. Draw me ever closer to Your heart.

Do we have to pray? Do we have to read the Bible? Do we have to do devotions each morning?

No. But we get to. We get to approach the throne of the Almighty God whenever we want and open His Word to learn more out our Creator and Heavenly Father. We get to make a date with Jesus whenever, wherever. 

And so often we forget the immense privilege it is to approach our Lord Jesus through prayer and through His Word. 

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3. Government and God's Truth

Recently, I've been struggling with imposing my own Christian standards on unbelievers through law and government, regarding issues like gay marriage. 

One day at Worldview, I got to eat a meal with one of the speakers at Worldview, along with some other debaters and speechers. Mike Schutt explained it, not as imposing morals found in Scripture, but as upholding the Truth, found not only in Scripture, but in the natural order of things. Regarding the issue of legalizing gay marriage, he explained it as looking at how men and women were created physically and the natural process of childbirth and sex. Instead of only looking at Scripture to find what legislation to approve or oppose, he taught that upholding Truth was the more correct principle to apply to situations regarding religious beliefs and government.

And that really helped me reconcile the issue, because as a believer, it's important to always look first to God's Word. But realizing also that God's Word is truth and the natural order of the world supports truth helped me see that there are more reasons to endorse legislation than simply religious beliefs. And that'll help me in turn explain my political opinions to an unbelieving world.

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Worldview Academy was incredible. It revived my personal devotions and strengthened my desire for evangelism. It united me with my brothers and sisters-in-Christ, who sharpened me as iron sharpens iron. It taught me incredible truths of leadership, apologetics, and worldview and satisfied my hunger for intellectually challenging, biblical teaching. For what God has done through Worldview, I am eternally grateful. 

Worldview changed my life. And I would highly suggest you to let it change yours.

{To watch the Seattle video, click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zm5Y2J624_Q&list=UUvhBE_nSIkeioS6_OX5yr4Q  }

Pursuing the People Instead of the Process - Fighting Against a Task-Oriented Mentality

A lot of people ask me how I get my schoolwork done. 

I don't know. I shrug. There's no trick to it, only that I find satisfaction in the done, in the checking off the task, in the putting down the pen and shutting the laptop and unplugging the guitar.

And I find that's how I get through life. Day by day. Hour by hour. Assignment by assignment. Ticking off my little checkmarks.

Sure, I can accomplish a lot.

But I also miss a lot in the process.

One of my favorite quotes by John Steinbeck reads, "I wonder how many people I've looked at all my life and never seen."

Because that's me. Caught up in the task, so intent on pursuing the done and the finished and the completed that I never enjoy the pursuit or the process or the people. So self-absorbed that I miss the people in my life who make my tasks possible. In my selfishness, I forget that I'm not the only one on this planet. That this life is not about me, but the One who made and died for me.

And I think about the pastors I met in the Philippines. I think about their service with such open-hearted self-abandonment and how they gave up their careers and jobs and goals in life for the dirtiest, the poorest, the neediest. 

They saw people.

They put down their books and phones and jobs and money and decided to give. To serve. To love.

And that is what I'm missing. That heartfelt dedication comprised of sacrifice, of realizing the importance of others above ourselves. 

Isn't that how Christ lived? In complete self-abandonment, with a heart and mind focused on people. He had God's will in mind, yet lived in complete self-denial. In Matthew 14, Jesus withdrew from the people to a desolate place, probably to pray and spend time with His Heavenly Father. Yet, even then, a great crowd gathered when He went ashore. Instead of sticking to His to-do list, instead of doing what He set out to do, Christ abandoned His plan, had compassion on the crowd, and and healed the sick and loved the lost and held the children. 

If even Jesus, God Himself, gave up His own plans for the sake of others, how much more so are we, as His disciples, supposed to sacrifice our own agendas to love and serve those around us?

And in America, in this busy society where everything is a blur and time never stands still because there is always one more thing to be done, always one more thing on our to-do list, do we ever truly see? Do we ever take a moment off of our busy selves and our packed schedules to see the people? To appreciate those who love us and pray for the unreached and the missionaries and the church and our families and do we thank those who are never thanked or talk to those who don't have anyone to talk to?

Because more and more, the Lord's convicting me of my task-oriented heart, how I care more about getting things done than about knowing and loving and serving those around me. How I only see myself and my own goals in life rather than others. 

James 1:27 reads, “Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” Not to finish reading the Bible ten times or memorize the entire Westminster Catechism or donate X amount of money. Not about checking things off a list, but about caring for people. Things, not people. And the second most important commandment is about loving our neighbors as ourselves. Again, not things, but people. 

Because the truth is sometimes tasks and to-do lists are easier to love than people. People mess up and betray our trust and friendships get messy and relationships may fail. And it takes a lot to be able to trust and accept and love, despite knowing that things may get real and it might not be comfortable or nice or pretty to love our neighbor. Things are easier to control. It's easy to sit down, finish X amount of math problems, be done with it. That's in our control. But people aren't.

And I think God understood this. He understood that it's easy for all of us to become self-absorbed in our tasks and love things because that's within our comfort zone and it's safe.

It's so easy for us to be selfish but so hard for us to be sacrificial.

Yet that's what Christ called us to do. To give up and reach out, to love the people around us as He Himself did. To be willing to sacrifice our own agenda for the sake of others. 

For if we are called to live like Christ, if our actions should follow after our Creator, then that's our calling isn't it? 

To love even when we don't feel like it. 
To love even when we have other things we want to get done. 
To put others first. 

So let's lose ourselves today in the pursuit of loving others. Let's lose ourselves today that we might abandon our self-love and encourage those around us, for we were called to be fishers of men.

"Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it." Matthew 10:39