You open my eyes
I had a dream last night. It was a weird dream - I was with the servers at DTB only they were different servers and it was an entirely different place, and we were playing games late at night (early in the morning) and sitting in a circle and suddenly lions came and I used this humongous plastic bag to protect them while everyone else ran away. And after that we were back in camp and 408 people (Lingzhi and Verna) were with me and were choosing which glitter nail polish we liked best, and TSD people kept coming in one by one with makeup on their faces.
...I don't know.
But those were the more trivial parts of my dream; most of it included something and someone really strange which I don't think I want to talk about. This isn't the main point of my post anyway - I wanted to talk about love. Like, genuine real love. And a bit of Pastor's sermon today. Long thoughtful post ahead ~
I was watching The Notebook yesterday (great show which everyone must watch, I am not kidding you. If you don't like 'sappy stupid romantic shows' which it isn't, at least watch it for Ryan Gosling. Seriously, that man is gorgeous.) and I was thinking about what love was before I went to sleep, and I came up with this analogy.
Suppose we're all teacups. Yes, teacups, filled with tea. Each of us is one teacup, and each of us has a specific amount of tea inside us. Now, say I fall in love with someone, i.e. another teacup. The only thing that will join us together is a saucer that we're both on - so now, we're two teacups on the same saucer, each of us filled halfway or more than halfway or to the brim with tea.
As we love each other, we have to keep giving out tea - we give love, i.e. we give tea. And the amount of tea that we're able to give as humans, with a fixed amount of love/ tea, gets less and less. Eventually, when the tea runs dry, we become two empty teacups on a saucer, ready to crack each other and break apart.
But suppose, now, that in our relationship, it isn't just us two teacups filled with tea on a saucer anymore - it's teacups, tea, a saucer, and a tap above each of us that endlessly provides tea. As teacups now, we are perpetually filled to the brim with tea because the tap above us never stops running. And guess what, because that tap never stops running, the tea overflows; it overflows into the saucer, onto the table, and into other teacups' saucers.
I guess if you read the entire analogy you'll know where I'm coming from. Each of us is a teacup, and the tap above us is God. The saucer is the shared ground each of us has, and the table is the meeting ground for the other teacups/ people. If we keep trying to give the other party love from ourselves, eventually it'll just drain out and away, and like I said, it'll become detrimental and just shatter you into pieces. You won't be able to impact others with your love; you'll just be empty.
But if we let God turn on His tap, and pour His love endlessly into our lives, we'll be able to continuously give that same love to our partners, and to others as well. Effectively, we're not giving love from ourselves - we're giving the overflow, the excess that God has given us so freely and abundantly. It may seem strange or wrong that we're giving 'leftover love' - the tea that pours out after we ourselves are filled. But if you think about it - that's the only way we can ever love someone wholeheartedly and fully - when we ourselves are full; full of Jesus Christ and His love. His love is infinitely more perfect and so much more and better than the love we as humans can give. And I think this is the sort of love that I want my future partner and I to share - love that isn't from ourselves, but that is from God.
I don't know if I'm really qualified to even say all I just said because I mean, I've never experienced something like that. But well, in the future, when I do, I'll be able to say whether I understood this topic when I was 17. :)
Another thing I want to share is a bit of what Pastor preached in today's sermon - 'Where sin abounded, grace abounded much more.' But he also said this - what we see is a situation where God plays catch-up. We see the sin, and then we see the grace coming to cover up that sin. But thing is, that's not what God does - He doesn't play catch-up, He initiates. He initiates the good that's about to come, and then the devil comes to mess it up by putting in discord and troubles and worries.
I just felt that really encouraging. This just means that God already has the blessing in store for me to go regularly and easily for church and CG and etc, and to serve in a ministry where I may not seem good enough - the devil is just trying to ruin His perfect plan for me now. Well, God has the last and final say, so maybe I'll be a testimony in future - look here, friends, nothing messes with the divine plan that God has for me. So do not be worried or discouraged; all things work together for good.
Also, my parents got me an iPod Classic! Yay.
...I don't know.
But those were the more trivial parts of my dream; most of it included something and someone really strange which I don't think I want to talk about. This isn't the main point of my post anyway - I wanted to talk about love. Like, genuine real love. And a bit of Pastor's sermon today. Long thoughtful post ahead ~
I was watching The Notebook yesterday (great show which everyone must watch, I am not kidding you. If you don't like 'sappy stupid romantic shows' which it isn't, at least watch it for Ryan Gosling. Seriously, that man is gorgeous.) and I was thinking about what love was before I went to sleep, and I came up with this analogy.
Suppose we're all teacups. Yes, teacups, filled with tea. Each of us is one teacup, and each of us has a specific amount of tea inside us. Now, say I fall in love with someone, i.e. another teacup. The only thing that will join us together is a saucer that we're both on - so now, we're two teacups on the same saucer, each of us filled halfway or more than halfway or to the brim with tea.
As we love each other, we have to keep giving out tea - we give love, i.e. we give tea. And the amount of tea that we're able to give as humans, with a fixed amount of love/ tea, gets less and less. Eventually, when the tea runs dry, we become two empty teacups on a saucer, ready to crack each other and break apart.
But suppose, now, that in our relationship, it isn't just us two teacups filled with tea on a saucer anymore - it's teacups, tea, a saucer, and a tap above each of us that endlessly provides tea. As teacups now, we are perpetually filled to the brim with tea because the tap above us never stops running. And guess what, because that tap never stops running, the tea overflows; it overflows into the saucer, onto the table, and into other teacups' saucers.
I guess if you read the entire analogy you'll know where I'm coming from. Each of us is a teacup, and the tap above us is God. The saucer is the shared ground each of us has, and the table is the meeting ground for the other teacups/ people. If we keep trying to give the other party love from ourselves, eventually it'll just drain out and away, and like I said, it'll become detrimental and just shatter you into pieces. You won't be able to impact others with your love; you'll just be empty.
But if we let God turn on His tap, and pour His love endlessly into our lives, we'll be able to continuously give that same love to our partners, and to others as well. Effectively, we're not giving love from ourselves - we're giving the overflow, the excess that God has given us so freely and abundantly. It may seem strange or wrong that we're giving 'leftover love' - the tea that pours out after we ourselves are filled. But if you think about it - that's the only way we can ever love someone wholeheartedly and fully - when we ourselves are full; full of Jesus Christ and His love. His love is infinitely more perfect and so much more and better than the love we as humans can give. And I think this is the sort of love that I want my future partner and I to share - love that isn't from ourselves, but that is from God.
I don't know if I'm really qualified to even say all I just said because I mean, I've never experienced something like that. But well, in the future, when I do, I'll be able to say whether I understood this topic when I was 17. :)
Another thing I want to share is a bit of what Pastor preached in today's sermon - 'Where sin abounded, grace abounded much more.' But he also said this - what we see is a situation where God plays catch-up. We see the sin, and then we see the grace coming to cover up that sin. But thing is, that's not what God does - He doesn't play catch-up, He initiates. He initiates the good that's about to come, and then the devil comes to mess it up by putting in discord and troubles and worries.
I just felt that really encouraging. This just means that God already has the blessing in store for me to go regularly and easily for church and CG and etc, and to serve in a ministry where I may not seem good enough - the devil is just trying to ruin His perfect plan for me now. Well, God has the last and final say, so maybe I'll be a testimony in future - look here, friends, nothing messes with the divine plan that God has for me. So do not be worried or discouraged; all things work together for good.
Also, my parents got me an iPod Classic! Yay.