just my thoughts

i find it funny that many people that supported obama during the election is hating on all the mccain supporters for being sad, upset, depressed, angry, thinking-America-is-about-to-end, and that they should all suck it up and start working to support the new president, as both mccain and obama asked everyone to do. it's true, everyone must get behind the new president and not continue to be divided.

but i find it funny because it's like people can't remember back 4 years, when many kerry supporters thought bush's re-election meant that the united states would fail, were sad, upset, depressed, angry...all the same - and were also told to suck it up i'm sure. now i don't have sources, but i'm sure it's true. as they say, when you point your finger at someone, 3 fingers are pointing straight back at you.

i find it funny how we all have such short-term memories. that we (myself included, i'm sure) can't extend a hand of grace to the loser in whatever we do. that we don't have the humility to see or admit that our own faults are just as great as others.

"Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?" -Matthew 7:4

for the record, i was torn between mccain and obama, and i ended up voting for neither. but my faith is not that one man or the other is going to be the "change we need" or maybe the "change we want." it's a God-given gift that we have the right and freedom to vote, to exchange power peacefully, but i find it silly that we get so caught up in who is going to be president, how one candidate means greener days ahead (metaphorically and metaphorically) while the other means gloom and doom - and which one is which depends on whom you vote for. maybe this is my youthful, haven't-paid-a-dime-of-tax (actually, i think i paid $40 freshman year from work-study), ignorance, is not all power - good and bad - given by God, and are not the leaders (and all of us) accountable before God for our actions and how they affect people? i don't really get caught up in politics, just enough to try to make an informed decision. so what if life is harder or easier, if times are good or bad, if things are looking up or down. Maybe we're too comfortable with the idea of comfort, security, wealth, the American Dream, that we forget that God never promises that our life will be comfortable or wealthy, or that our job will be secure, or that we will ever fulfill the "American Dream," whatever that may be.

It's not that that comfort, security, wealth, freedom, or whatever else we associate with America is bad - again, it is a gift, a blessing, that our America stands for the ideals that it does and gives us the rights that we have that so few others in the world also have.

but the moment I forget why I live and for whom I should be living is the moment I get caught up in the things of the world and start living for myself. we get so caught up in what's best for me and you that we lose sight of the fact that all things belong to God and exist to glorify God. God's purpose in this world was never to merely make us happy but to turn all eyes to him and glorify himself. and because of that fact, i find peace in whatever happens, whoever is president, wherever the world is headed.

"...You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye." -Matthew 7:5

Maybe we should take a pause from worrying about our own futures and ponder what it means to be a Christian in a non-Christian world...

i have found that the "change i need" is to change my focus from living for myself to living for God, and the "change i can believe in" is Christ himself.

Tiger Mentality

Jason Sobel: "There are some people who would argue that you risked too much that week [2008 US Open at Torrey Pines]..."

Tiger Woods: "This is true. Mmhm."

Sobel: "What do you say to them?"

Tiger, straight-faced, without even cracking a smile: "I won."

-ESPN Interview with Tiger Woods

that's right.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=caple/080919/venues/11-100

18. Notre Dame Stadium
Location: South Bend, Ind. Opened: 1930. Capacity: 80,795.

Because no matter a school's tradition, history, legacy, fight song or cheerleaders, none can match the mystique of Notre Dame.

________________________________________

that's right. Go ND.

temptation

"Temptation is a suggested short-cut to the realization of the highest at which I aim -- not towards what I understand as evil, but towards what I understand as good...God does not save us from temptations; He succours us in the midst of them." -Oswald Chambers

I only now begin to realize how low I am aiming.

family trip continued...

more pictures are on facebook.

relationships

"...God gets glory when two very different and very imperfect people forge a life of faithfulness in the furnace of affliction by relying on Christ." -John Piper

the west

long overdue, but some pictures from our family trip to San Francisco and back - in a car, of course (7/25 - 8/3).

Mt. Rushmore, SD. I forget the peoples' faces but you can look them up yourselves. It's a lot smaller in real-life than I imagined...oh well, still impressive that someone spent all that time to carve up that mountain.

Old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park, WY. It smells like sulphur everywhere. I actually got absolutely drenched by a geyser that day...hah.

Elk? Also in Yellowstone. Underexposure problems.

Guy painting at the Lower Falls at Yellowstone. Inspiration Point was closed because of road construction, so this is at Artist Point (I guess it is correctly named...). Gorgeous place.

Grand Tetons National Park, WY, just south of Yellowstone.

Sit-down restaurant at Jackson Lake Lodge in Grand Tetons National Park. Food was OK but expensive. You pay for the view, definitely.

Sunset in Logan, UT. I think we're waiting in the parking lot of a KFC, stopped because someone had to use the bathroom (not me).

Great Salt Plains, somewhere between Salt Lake City, UT, and Reno, NV. Yes, my dad pulled over in the shoulder of I-80, and we got out and took pictures.

Hoover Tower at Stanford University in Palo Alto, CA. Bells at the top of the tower. Everything else was boring.


San Francisco, CA, from the Oakland Bay Bridge, the double-decker one the collapsed in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. Taken out the backseat window of a moving car.

SunRISE on the way home from San Francisco. We left SF at 7AM on a Saturday...and got home at 11PM on Sunday. This was around sunrise on Sunday morning...that was not a fun drive home.

That's all...I have a lot more (I took about 800ish pictures, but a lot of them are bad) but it takes forever to upload on my slow internet.

first week

first week of medical school is almost through. my thoughts and impressions:

-medical school is already extremely humbling. the Dean shared people's personal statements at the white coat ceremony. there was a guy who was a medic in Iraq on 3 occasions, an NCAA record holder, a start from last year's Butler Bulldog basketball team, and many others. I feel remarkably...normal - and that's ok.

-2 days into anatomy and i already feel behind. lectures go so fast, the professor just seems to whip through different parts (we're studying the superficial and deep back muscles right now) without even thinking, having memorized human anatomy it seems. again very humbling. and the other classes (cell/molecular bio, biochem, immunology...) haven't even started yet. head is already spinning...

-food, no matter how bad it looks or might be, tastes better when you cook it yourself. though i am extremely slow. i called my mom while cooking b/c i was worried about some smoke/steam coming from the pot - fail.

-one week in and most people seem to be nice, relaxed, and caring. are we all being genuine to each other? we'll find out soon enough once the stress and group work begins.

-it's hard fight the urge to write about med school in the language of medicine. but i must, lest i forget how to communicate with the rest of the world.

-first day of anatomy, we dissected cadavers, looking for the muscles of the back. i can't say i was affected by it, but i can't say it didn't affect me either. it's just weird to think about what we're doing, basically digging into what was once a living, loving, loved, human being who was willing to (knowingly) donate their body expressly for our education. i'll admit, it is a little eerie when i step back during lab and watch my lab group (and others) hammering and chiseling away at the vertebral column so we can dissect the spine. and it's weird seeing people use a turkey baster (no joke!) to drain fluid from the table...more on anatomy in the future.

-finally, where is God? i need/want to find a church, a community, brothers and sisters who share my faith. i find myself hiding it, not mentioning it too much. today, in a session on professionalism, the speaker (an M.D. or Ph.D or some other highly educated IUSM faculty) asked us to share in pairs about our values, and i found myself having a hard time sharing about what i value most, what i wanted to get out of being a doctor, and what i wanted from my life. is God that far away...rephrase: am I that far away from God? (read Chambers for Aug. 13.)

...and classes haven't even started in full yet...oh boy.

"Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,
and grace my fears relieved.
How precious did that grace appear
the hour i first believed.

Through many dangers, toils, and snares
I have already come.
Tis grace that brought us safe thus far,
and grace will lead us home.

The Lord has promised good to me.
His word my hope secures.
He will my shield and portion be
as long as life endures."

-Amazing Grace (stanzas 2-4) by John Newton (1725-1807)

family road trip!!

we are taking a road trip to San Francisco, CA, via Mt. Rushmore, with a 2 day layover in Yellowstone National Park and Grand Teton National Park.

gone July 25th - August 3rd.

try to have pictures when i get back...

so long for now!

...for when i am weak...

...then i am strong.

new lens

nikkor 50mm f/1.8 = much fun.

fallen petal...


pooped-on light fixture.

small town, small reunion, small bug - with pictures

rochester, indiana (population, 6414), where my dad works once every other week because there's no full-time cardiologist there.

relatives visiting another relative (not shown) in Indy - my paternal grandmother's siblings. I have never met any of these people before; my father has not seen most of them in 30 years, some he has never met. (white balance is a little off.)

home. a bee helping make our house prettier. (soft focus due to slow shutter speed. 9:15PM, 200mm f/5.6, ISO800, 1/25s with VR)

attached

i looked in my wallet today and discovered my washu id still occupies one of the four credit card slots in my wallet...

when i went to open a new bank account, i needed two forms of identification. almost instinctively, i pulled out my driver's license and washu id - the lady opening my account asked me about school, and it felt weird to say that i was actually going to be a student at indiana university in the fall...

i'm still attached (i sometimes think that i'm still going back to saint louis in august...) but glad to be moving on.

but i don't plan on taking that out of there for another few months...

slightly anxious

all this apartment searching in indianapolis has gotten me slightly anxious about medical school and the rigors of first year...

role reversal

so my mother is in chicago until wednesday. I dropped her off at the airport here in SB Friday afternoon, and she said to me, "Take care of the family while I'm gone."

by take care, she means cook and clean (except my dad beat me to the dishes yesterday...).

i'm cooking dinner today (some steak, hope nobody dies) when my sister gets home, refuses to help me cook the rice because Dad wants her to go outside and help him wash and wax the mazda...

then it dawned on me. why is my sister outside washing cars while i am inside cooking dinner?

faith and sports

I was watching ESPN First Take today. There was an interview with Josh Hamilton of the Texas Rangers, the 1999 No. 1 overall draft pick, the current RBI leader, the fastest person to 50 RBI in a season in MLB history, and also coming off a 3-year hiatus from baseball to overcome crack-cocaine and alcohol addictions.

He mentioned God a few times, and that piqued my attention. But then, when asked by the interviewer what his life was like now, post-addiction, he said, "...my wife told me, you're going to get back but it's not going to be about baseball. It's going to be about sharing what God's done in your life." When asked what he knew about himself now that he didn't when he went through his struggles, he said, "I can't do anything without Him, that's how I live my life today - Jesus first, family second, baseball third." Then he was asked what it would be like to be voted into this year's All-Star Game. He replied, "I had a dream I was at a Home Run Derby, and they had an interview after you come out from taking your swings...I got to share with a whole stadium full of people about Christ right there. That's a good combination right there, so I will hopefully get to do that sometime this year..."

I know there are Christian professional athletes. I know that every other athlete out there "thanks God" first for everything when they succeed. But he went beyond just thanking God for his success. He knows it's all about God. How many people would say that, on national television, in a live interview, and sound perfectly genuine, full of conviction. I can barely do that with people I know that aren't Christians - let alone on national television.

i boast no more

I often think in song lyrics.

"No More My God, I boast no more
Of all the duties I have done.
I quit the hopes I held before,
To trust the merits of Thy Son.

No more my God
No more my God
No more my God
I boast no more.

Now, for the loss I bear his name,
What was my gain I count my loss.
My former pride I call my shame
And nail my glory to His cross.

No more my God
No more my God
No more my God
I boast no more.

Yes, and I must, I will esteem
All things but loss for Jesus' sake.
O may my soul be found in Him
And of His righteousness partake
Amen, amen.

The best obedience of my hands
Dares not appear before Thy throne.
But faith can answer Thy demands
By pleading what my Lord has done.

No more my God
No more my God
No more my God
I boast no more." -I Boast No More by Caedmon's Call

I will admit, I am a prideful person; only I usually keep my prideful thoughts within, so no one else knows. Yet, "man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart" (1 Samuel 16:7). I want to elaborate, but I'm tired - so I will at a later time...

expectations and burn-out

"They met Moses and Aaron, who were waiting for them, as they came out from Pharaoh; and they said to them, 'The LORD look on you and judge, because you have made us stink in the sight of Pharaoh and his servants, and have put a sword in their hand to kill us.' Then Moses turned to the LORD and said, 'O LORD, why have you done evil to this people? Why did you ever send me? For since I came to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has done evil to this people, and you have not delivered your people at all.'" -Exodus 5:21-22

I wonder how many people's expectations I have left unfulfilled this year, how many people I have disappointed. Everyone has expectations for everything. Do people really expect me to be some super-small-group-leader-servant-team-member-older-brother-... I feel like I've given what I can - or maybe I haven't. I feel like I've at least tried to care for people this year - or maybe I haven't. But it really doesn't matter.

I not sure where I am. Am I at day 7 of being in the wilderness for 40 years, or am i at day 7 of marching around Jericho?

You wonder why I want to withdraw myself, remove myself. You wonder why it seems like I don't care anymore. Myabe I just want to withdraw. Maybe your suspicions are correct, that I just really don't care anymore. You be the judge.

All I know is it is the end of the year, and I am tired, perhaps somewhat burnt out even. i think i've hit my wall.

I have been afraid to believe it, until now, but I think I am ready to go.

male pms

does it exist...?

bad luck and being on call

5 days post-op, most of the pain is gone...except for my lower left jaw. Dentist says probably have a dry socket (alveolar osteitis, to be technical...better get started now), meaning that the clot that forms to help heal the wound probably disintegrated prematurely.

wikipedia (and the dentist) say there's not much to do, but take more ibuprofen and keep the area clean. pain should go away in a week or so...ugh. suck.

i must have had pretty bad luck w/ this whole wisdom teeth extraction thing...seriously. nausea from the IV sedation, 4 days of post-op pain, and now another week because of apparently my body just sucks at healing itself properly...

but it was weird paging a dentist on a saturday afternoon. I know how irate my dad gets sometimes when he gets paged at inopportune times...I'm sure saturday afternoon is not a very fun time to be paged. but it was weird to be that guy that pages the doctor, you know?

hmmm...shades of my future.

and why do i struggle to touch my Bible whenever I'm on break?

wisdom teeth

i'm glad i never have to get my wisdom teeth out ever again...

nauseous and sore and hungry since i can't keep food or pain killers down because of the nausea from the medicine they used to sedate me.

not to mention i can't sleep either.

...surrounded by your glory...

"And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. He looked, and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. And Moses said, 'I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned.' When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, 'Moses, Moses!' And he said, 'Here I am.' Then he said, 'Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.' And he said, 'I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.' And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God." -Exodus 3:2-6

I wonder...

if God appeared so obviously to me today, would I even know it? Would my faith be strengthened, having seen had a glimpse that God was real? Would my immediate reaction be to worship God and feel empowered to do great things?

Or, would I be like Moses and hide my face and be afraid. Would I not know what to do. Would I question everything I thought about myself and start convincing myself that I was no use, that God should choose someone else to do His work.

Honestly, probably the latter. Assuming I even recognized the burning bush...

intrigue

time for a not-so-intellectual question (at least to some people. to others, it may be extremely thought provoking)...

How interesting, on so many different levels, would a Lakers-Celtics NBA Finals be?

or even better, a Bulls-...wait, that's not going to happen at all =(.

feelings of incompetence

you're back...go away.

"But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong." -2 Corinthians 12:9-10

sunshine

"I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen today: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else." -C.S. Lewis

what would jesus do?

"What would Jesus do?" goes the cliché. have i ever stopped to think about what that actually means?

Mid-February of senior year. Yes, by now most everyone knows I'm going to medical school. Is that it? Does that mean that I know my future direction? My calling? My purpose in life? God's will for my life? Hardly.

I ponder what we mean when we say something like "this is God's will." What is God's will? What does that even mean?

"Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect." -Romans 12:2

"If you want to know the future details of God’s will of decree [God's sovereign will - what He has planned for your future], you don’t want a renewed mind, you want a crystal ball. This is not called transformation and obedience; it’s called divination, soothsaying." -John Piper

I often just sit in my room, thinking, praying to God, asking for some kind of divine direction, either for the future or some immediate decision that may or may not be trivial in the grand scheme of things. What am I supposed to do, God? Show me what to do! I guarantee you that 95% of the time, I hear absolutely nothing. Does that mean I am praying wrong? Does that mean I am not listening well enough? I have no doubt in my mind that there are times that scripture directly reveals what is the best course of action to take. Yet, I the more I walk with God, the more I feel that that is generally the exception, not the rule.

God does not simply want me to know what the next step is and blindly follow. We are not meant to be children forever. Knowing the future and blindly acquiescing, that is merely behavioral change. External. God doesn't merely want a grumpy obliger (Philippians 4:4). From Romans 12, what God desires is the transformation of my mind. The whole world is dying to know what lies ahead. If I follow, I am still "conformed to the pattern of this world."

So back to the question: "What would Jesus do?" Is it really that cliché after all? Perhaps it's cliché because we think the saying is stupid. But I think that that is exactly the question God wants us to ponder when we wonder what we're supposed to do, what God's will is.

Why?

God is sitting (maybe standing, pacing, crying?, who knows) here, deeply desiring to make us into His likeness, to become "Christ-like" as we say - for that is, ultimately, what sanctification is. In the meantime, I am caught up in what girl I'm supposed to marry, where to go to medical school, where to serve in the future, urban/suburban?, what to study for the next small group. God is concerned with the "transformed;" I with the "will." All the while, I forget about that little word, "discern."

Discern. To separate (things, or one thing from another) as distinct; to distinguish and divide. To perceive or recognize the difference or distinction; to make a distinction; to distinguish or discriminate between. To distinguish (one thing or fact) by the intellect; to recognize or perceive distinctly. To have cognizance, to judge of. -OED

"What would Jesus do?" We don't really want to know the answer to that question, do we? We just want to know what to do so we can get on with life, right? It is like eating the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 3) and then telling God that we don't actually want that power or responsibility anymore. We want it? We got it.

But then again, God's sovereign will acknowledges that we will make wrong choices and choose not to obey his "will of command" (refer to Jon Piper link). And I gather that God's plan is that we be transformed, to think like Him, to know the answer to the question, "What would Jesus do?" It's more about knowing how to act in accordance with Biblical truth rather than just knowing what to do.

To paraphrase Romans 12:2, "the will of God is discerned by the renewal of the mind." Renewal happens through transformation. Transformation through scripture, knowing the truths of God's word, and, just as importantly, the promises.

It might be cliché, but I have a hunch that it's the question God intended us to ask.

pasttimes

i'm laying in bed, trying to fall asleep;

i miss home; thinking of family,

and things we've done together that make me smile:

-spring break in florida;

-65 hour round trips to california;

-walking around the Vegas Strip with my sister at night, watching the Bellagio fountains;

-sitting around with brother, sister, and mother, late at night, talking about relationships and dating;

-thousand-piece puzzles;

-chinese buffets and yummy steakhouses;

and countless others...

in the last 4 years, i have never had a longing to go home, to be with family...until now.

spring break is a month away...=/

weary

"But Hannah answered, 'No my lord, I am a woman troubled in spirit...I have been pouring out my soul before the LORD.'" -1 Samuel 1:15

General consensus [correctly] has it that I'm not a woman, but I feel like I can echo what Hannah told Eli.

grace

"And the LORD God made for Adam and his wife garments of skins and clothed them." -Genesis 3:21

God first act of grace towards man after sin.

Do I truly know God's grace, or do I merely pay lip service to it?

words

"A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in a setting of silver." -Proverbs 25:11

"The words of a whisperer [NIV - "gossip"] are like delicious morsels; they go down into the inner parts of the body." -Proverbs 26:22

i think...

words mean more to me than anything else...

words are powerful..."And God said, 'Let there be light,' and there was light." -Genesis 1:3

they cut through me like a sword, pierce the deepest parts of me that other things cannot.

words spoken - coupled with facial expression, words in a letter or e-mail, they mean the most because they touch at the center of how i give and receive...

...i think...

"...out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks." -Matthew 12:34

thoughts...?

i am never at a loss for thoughts over break. reading C.S. Lewis does that to you. but why can i not journal at all, not even one day, during break? are all these thoughts for naught, like the first winter's snow that falls but fails to accumulate or amount to anything significant...

finished over break: The Golden Compass, Mere Christianity, A Grief Observed, The Weight of Glory

self-confidence

"For you created my inmost being,
you knit me together in my mother's womb...

...(I remember a lot about my childhood.)...

In Chicago, I remember making my Chinese tutor cry because I told her I did not care about Chinese.

I remember first moving to Indiana in 1993. Second grade. Nerdy glasses. Ugly comb-over haircut. I was the new kid, and because of that, I was well-liked.

I remember recess, playing basketball (trying to play basketball). Watching. Watching. Waiting. Standing. Finally, they passed me the ball once. I threw it up, two handed, like any uncoordinated, Chinese, second-grader would do. I remember it vividly. It bounced of the back iron, then the front of the rim. Off the backboard, and through the hoop (we had no nets back then). Super-esctatic. Then one of the "cool" kids comes over as we're going back inside. "I could have made that. That's not that far," he says as he mimics shooting a ball through the hoop from where i was, probably at the freethrow line. My head sunk.

I remember being the best speller in my class. We'd make our own spelling lists. I had the hardest words. But I remember getting second place at the district spell bowl competition. I remember getting second place in the second grade spelling bee. Always second. Shrug.

I remember getting the second highest score on the math placement exam for sixth grade. At least the guy above me was also Chinese.

I remember being second in the geography bee in sixth grade. Well, I did beat out most of the 7th and 8th graders.

...(Does this all sound nitpicky and stupid? Shouldn't I have gotten over all these things by now?)...

I remember being told on for swearing in sixth grade. I felt like shit.

I remember being caught doing homework for English in social studies class. Ooops.

I remember getting extra credit points for getting the lowest combined score for a competition in the "enriched" (i.e. "gifted and talented") class.

I remember Chinese school, being placed in a special, taught-in-English class with a 40 yer-old woman because I could not handle the other, normal classes.

I remember never having a piano recital where I did not mess up.

I remember my mom asking me when I was 13 why I wanted to get baptized. I did not know. I had no answer. (Seriously?!)

I remember going to visit Ivy-League schools with my brother in 8th grade. I'll never get in.

I remember freshmen year of high school, on a field trip to the Art Institute of Chicago (I was the only freshmen) to see a Van Gogh and Gauguin exhibit, my two best friends, girls, a year older, got sick of me, I assume because of my insecurity about my knowledge about my own language. I stared out the window, alone, the entire bus ride home. It took two weeks for them to talk to me again. They said I was very insecure about myself in general. I never noticed until then.

...(Is this all even important? Does any of this matter?)...

I remember getting accepted into the All-State Honor Band senior year, only to realize that percussionists in the All-State Band (kind of like the 2nd team) blew me away in auditions.

I remember my dad asking me when the deadline for the Lilly Scholarship was. I told him, "...a....mmmmmonth....ago." His voice still rings in my ears.

Freshmen year of college, I remember my dad yelling at my sister for talking too much on the cell phone. I remember sticking up for her, telling him that his punishment was way too harsh. I remember being told that my opinion was not asked for right now and did not matter.

I remember disappointing many people in the last 3 years.

...

Senior year now, and I still feel the effects of my experiences. Perhaps I always will. Where is my self-confidence? When did it leave me? Did I ever have any? I can't sort it all out. I am a people-pleaser. I struggle for acceptance. And until I realize, and truly know that I am more accepted than I can imagine, despite my failings and disappointments, I always will. But why do I always desire that acceptance in a real, tangible, human way?

...I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well." -Psalm 139:13-14