|
| I suppose that more than anything, my goal in this letter is to communicate to you, my friends and family, my heart and my passion. If I've spent any amount of time with you, you'll notice that there's a strange dichotomy in me. On the one hand, there's a childish, wild little boy in me that refuses to grow up. But on the other hand, there's a tenacious, loyal soldier in me who intends on spending everything, even his life, for the sake of his Savior.
God has granted me an opportunity to exercise my unusual gifting for His kingdom. In several weeks, I'll be leaving for a 5-month mission trip to Chiayi, Taiwan with OMF International. OMF Taiwan focuses its energies on reaching the working class. Although the church is established in the cities and amongst the more educated, over 15 million working class people do not have a church in their own context. Most working class people do not fit easily into existing churches, because of differences in background, mindset and education. Most working class people feel alienated from the established church, and OMF's mission is to reach out to them. My job in Chiayi will be working with the children and youth of these working class families. My life will consist of the following: to assist in organizing youth events, spend time with kids and establish meaningful friendships with them, lead Bible studies, help out with church services, go to vocational schools to contact more youth, assist with park events/outreach, and prayer-walking around the community. On a more personal level, my hope over the next five months is to learn how to walk out God's calling on my life. God has given me a heart for college, youth, and children's ministry, which I've been involved with as far back as I can remember. More recently, as a police officer, God showed me that I have a shepherd's heart, as I tenaciously protected, defended and loved the citizens of Fresno from its wolves. My goal now is to learn how to effectively walk this out in my life, and I believe the mode of my education will be my upcoming experience in Taiwan. So I have two simple prayer requests regarding this mission trip: The total cost of this program is $4,530. If you feel led to partner with me financially,please feel free to do one of the following: 1. Go to the OMF website at http://www.omfconnect.org/p-20-charitable-contribution-for-missionary-support.aspx to make a tax-deductible electronic donation. This is a good option because you can look up additional information about OMF if you're interested in learning more. Also, the money you donate will show up in my OMF account right away. 2. Donate at www.razoo.com/story/Luke-Chow-Mission-Trip-To-Taiwan. Razoo.com is fast, easy, efficient, and more personal. It takes a couple weeks before OMF sees your donation. 3. Tear off the bottom of this page, cut a personal check and snailmail it to OMF. Thanks so much for partnering with me! I'll be updating my status constantly on Twitter (twitter.com/luketchow), Xanga (xanga.com/lukeydookey), and Facebook, so please join with me as I seek to live my life worthy of the calling I've received.
| | |
| (Note: I'm aware that this letter looks blurry... it's because Xanga compressed the jpg file. If you want a sharper copy of it, just let me know and I'll email the pdf to you! If reading the jpg makes your face hurt (like Jin's), then below I've copied the text of the letter. Thanks guys!!)
****************************
"For I have been crucified with Christ, and it is not longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me." ~ Galatians 2:20
So here it is: my first prayer letter. I've never done one of these things before, so I apologize in advance if I end up butchering it. But I suppose that more than anything, my goal in this letter is to communicate to you, my friends and family, my heart and my passion. I think that if I've spent any amount of time with you, you'll notice that there's a strange dichotomy in me. On the one hand, there's a tenacious, loyal soldier in me who intends on spending everything, even his life, for the sake of his Savior. But on the other hand, there's also a childish, wild little boy in me that hates eating lima beans and thinks that boogers are the funniest thing in the world. (And better-tasting than lima beans too.) (Oh my gross did I seriously just write that?)
Usually, this dichotomy in me is relatively counter-productive. Like that one time I went on a date with this pretty girl, but it ended kind of abruptly when I start flicking lima beans at her face. Or that one time I wrote a prayer letter asking for support for a mission trip, but then I got 0 prayers and $0 back because all I did was talk about boogers and lima beans. Yeah, worst prayer letter EVER. I'm never writing another one like that.
However, God has granted me an opportunity to exercise my unusual gifting for His kingdom. In several weeks, I'll be leaving for a 5-month mission trip to Chiayi, Taiwan with OMF International. While there, I'll be serving at a community center and spending time with the local children and youth. I'm stoked. I have two simple prayer requests regarding this mission trip: The total cost of this program is $4,530. If you feel led to partner with me financially, please feel free to throw money my way by doing one of the following: 1. Go to the OMF website at http://www.omfconnect.org/p-20-charitable-contribution-for-missionary-support.aspx to make a tax-deductible electronic donation. This is a good option because you can look up additional information about OMF if you're interested in learning more. Also, the money you donate will show up in my OMF account right away. 2. Donate at www.razoo.com/story/Luke-Chow-Mission-Trip-To-Taiwan. Razoo.com is fast, easy, efficient, and more personal. It takes a couple weeks before OMF sees your donation, but you're also able to leave little comments for me. 3. Old school method. Tear off the bottom of this page and snailmail it and a check to OMF. Thanks so much for partnering with me! I'll be updating my status constantly on Twitter (twitter.com/luketchow), Xanga (xanga.com/lukeydookey), and Facebook, so please stalk me as I seek to live my life worthy of the calling I've received. | | |
| I'm not much of a writer anymore. I think that in college, when I was an English and Philosophy major, I would write stuff in my Xanga and feel like a writer or poet or something. But then again, I used to take about 15 minutes to write my super deep and meaningful thoughts, then I would then spend the next 3 hours creeping around on Xanga. "Ooh that girl is cute. I'm going to subscribe to her."
I think I wrote stuff in my Xanga as an excuse to creep. Thank goodness for Facebook, so now I can be a full-time creeper and not have to write anything. I also don't have to worry about anyone going to their site and reading something like, "Lukeydookey has visited your site 36 times today. He is weird, and on top of that he has gas."
***
You know what's a great word? Hellacious. Who made up that word? Was "hellish" not enough? I hope they make "craptastic" a word too, because seriously, "crappy" just doesn't cut it sometimes, and I don't want to break out the S-word because people that say the S-word go to hell.
Shittyshattyshiteryshitshit
***
Life happens so fast. On the one hand, I know that I'm a very different person than I was just a few months ago, but on the other hand I feel like I'm the same little lame-o dork butt that got ostracized all through elementary school. I'm smarter, wiser and maturer (-erer) than I've ever been, but I'm also much sillier, much more childish than I've ever been before too. I'm much closer to God than I've ever been, but the closer I get, the further away He seems. I feel like a turd. A fresh, steaming, craptastic turd.
Once, when I was a little sweaty boy of about five years old, I went up to my dad and I said to him, "I like to fight." He responded by saying something Christian to me, something like, "It's not good to fight," or maybe it was, "Jesus doesn't want us to fight." My dad meant well; it's usually not good for sweaty five year olds to go around picking fights with everyone. And I'm sure he could tell you about all the dumb fights I picked as a kid. But I spent the next 25 years trying to suppress the fighter inside me of channeling him in the right direction. I was trying to muzzle a t-rex. Or ask a rabbit to use contraceptives.
God taught me how to fight. Yeah I know how to put someone in a control hold. And I know how to effectively beat said person with a stick. I even know how to bust a cap in a mofo. But that's just a fraction of what fighting is. Like the great philosopher Rocky Balboa once said, "It ain't about how hard you hit; it's about how hard you can *get* hit, and keep moving forward." What a wise, wise man. Or maybe he's a stupid man in a stupid movie that got lucky and said something smart once.
***
"Luke, you became a cop because you want to help people. That's not why you become a cop. I became a cop so I could drive fast, kick ass, and take names. You signed on for the wrong reason, so you weren't meant for this job."
The concept of being a servant, a punching bag is so foreign to the world. It goes completely against nature. Any reasonable person would think that at the rate Christians get martyred, we should be extinct by now. But then again, I think the concept of being a servant is probably pretty foreign to a lot of Christians too. I think it's especially antithetical to the Charasmatic movement's prosperity gospel, because yo Jesus, physical blessings are much more preferable to me than spiritual ones.
I'm constantly tempted to look at things through physical eyes rather than spiritual ones. The most common instance of this, of course, is with girls. I'm pretty superficial. But yo, what if she's a "Picasso" (pretty from far but far from pretty!)? Or what if she has "summer teeth" (summer there, but summer not!)? I'm outta here. Haha. I'm so glad I know those jokes.
I acknowledge that I have a distorted view of beauty. But I think the sad thing is that the beauty I see in people is usually much more accurate than the beauty they see in themselves.
What was I talking about again? Oh yeah: seeing with spiritual eyes. I'm tempted to look at my termination from the police department as a failure. In a worldly sense I suppose it's true, and my pride still makes me upset about that. But when I look at it from spiritual eyes, I believe that I overcame. If things were only slightly different, I would still be on the streets right now. But God needed to tear me away from it if He wanted me to do something else, because I would've given my life serving, protecting and loving the people of this city. Despite the hellacious stress and the abuse that I underwent the last few weeks on the job, I took it in the chin but kept pressing forward. (Yeah that quote a couple paragraphs up? Spoken to me by my last supervisor, who did everything he could to get me terminated. He succeeded. Score!) I finished this race, and God's taking me to a new one now.
I have no idea where I'm going now though. The last time I lost my job I felt free. But this time I feel a little more pressure. I don't know how to rest or relax anymore. I still think that a bad guy with a gun is going to pop out of the bushes everytime I walk by a bush. Any bush. Like that one over there. Oh snap.
***
Options.
I think I'd like working at a Christian camp. They're all fully staffed these days, though, so I'm not terribly hopeful. However, nothing has brought me greater joy than working at camp and making fun of my kids.
I think being an intern at my home church would be cool too. I have my reservations about working within the system, but I feel indebted to the church that has taken care of me my entire life, and I want to give back to my church.
If I'm going to remain in law enforcement, then I'd probably want to work for the Feds. I think that my strength was in conducting thorough, meticulous investigations. I wasn't too keen on going from call to call to call and not being able to rehabilitate anyone. I also feel indebted to my country, which has afforded me blessing upon blessing, and again, I'd like to give back. I also miss catching bad guys, and I think I might be getting the itch again.
These days I've been thinking a lot about going on missions. I'm not myself when I'm not serving. I'd like to think that I'm a giving person, but the real me is pretty selfish. Me me me. I've actually never been on a mission trip before, which is kinda weird given my upbringing. I think it would be cool, though, to go on one, so that when I get there, I can get a picture of what the church is supposed to look like. OH SNAP did I just dog the American church? I think I did.
***
Wow, what an update. How I've missed you, Xanga. Now goodbye again for a long time, and excuse me while I go creep on people on Facebook.
| | |
| I've been examining the book of Ruth lately. I love it. It reminds me so much of "real life." In most other books of the Bible, God performs miracles and signs and wonders, but there's no light-show in Ruth. God worked through sadness, pain, suffering, risk, danger, and random events in order to bless His people and glorify Himself. It feels like it is--or hopefully someday it will be--the story of my life.
Usually the focus of this book is on Ruth (hence the name of the book). However, I recently realized that it was actually Naomi's love and selflessness that caught God's attention and got the ball rolling:
In chapter 1, Naomi moves to Moab with a husband and two sons. Given the patriarchal society she lived in, a woman's livelihood, honor, and social status were found only in the men in her life. However, all three of the men in Naomi's life died. All she had left were her two gentile daughters-in-law.
Naomi lost her status, but at least she still had a couple friends, right? But look what she does--for their sake, in verses 8-9, Naomi advises her only friends to go back to their families and start their lives over: "Go, return each of you to her mother's house. May the Lord deal kindly with you as you have dealt with the dead and with me. May the Lord grant that you may find rest, each in the house of her husband." Naomi is like the poor widow in Luke 21 who gave her last two copper coins to God; she gave up the only thing she had left--friendship--so that they might live.
I believe that this selflessness, in the midst of utter loss and despair, is what converts Ruth. Ruth sees Naomi's love and selflessness in her despair, is moved by the Holy Spirit, and decides then and there to be a Christian. "Where you go, I will go, and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God." What an amazing thing to do, to devote one's life to the God that took away her husband, brother-in-law, and father-in-law; Naomi must have been an amazing witness to Ruth.
As a result of Naomi's love and selflessness, Ruth does the same. She leaves the comforts of her homeland, her culture, her religion, and her family. But not only that; by moving to Israel, she welcomed poverty, racism, violence (2:9, 22), and even a lifetime of loneliness.
Naomi gave up everything for Ruth, based on her faith in God. God took everything away from her, yet she didn't cry out against God or curse Him as I probably would have; instead she responded with faithfulness, loyalty, love and selflessness. This brought Ruth to God, and prompted her to act in the same way, as she gave everything up to be a friend to Naomi.
I believe that this story moved God's heart. It sure moves mine. This story is a portrait, a foreshadow of the Gospel; the story where God Himself gave up everything to be our friend. I think it was so cool to God, and so close to His heart, that not only did He restore the worldly things they lost, but He also put them in the lineage of the kings: of David, and ultimately, of Jesus.
I'm so selfish sometimes. I'm going through some difficult things right now, but my hard times don't come close to Naomi's or Ruth's. Heh, and I'm sure I whine about it much more than they did. I hope that someday I will be as faithful, loyal, brave, loving and as selfless as Naomi and Ruth.
| | |
| I often have difficulty getting up in the mornings; I'm often seized by fear and dread because I don't want to face the day ahead of me. Years ago when I was still in the business field, I thought it was due to the fact that the work I did felt meaningless. "If I have a more meaningful job," I thought, "I'd have a more meaningful existence, and therefore I'd be more excited about facing the day." However, even though I have a "meaningful" job now, I still have that fear and dread.
How did Jesus face the days in front of Him with such poise? He knew that He had to suffer and die in order to be the Savior, the hero, He was called to be. With that in mind everyday, up until the day He died, He carried out His purpose with boldness and perfection. Jesus must've had some pretty sick quiet times.
I want to be like Jesus. I want to save people like He saved me. I want it so badly I could cry. But the little load that I do carry feels too much for me. My spirit is willing, but my flesh is unbelievably fallen and incompetent. I'm in need of a Savior just as much, if not more, than the sheep I serve.
Hosanna.
***
I can't get over the thought that my freedom, my friendship, was more important to God than His own life. What a crazy line in the song "Salvation is Here." It's in the bridge and sung only once, but what an amazing thought.
"Salvation that died just to set me free."
I want to walk in that freedom. I think that if I can touch this concept, if I can just touch the hem of His cloak, I'll be healed, and I'll be able to face the days ahead.
| | |
|
