Twenty

So I sit here at my computer about two hours away from turning twenty and many things come to mind. Specifically how fast these past two decades have come.  I am just thankful for being alive it makes me so happy to have been well just living.  I just think back to the past years when I grew up never knowing from day one what type of man I was created to be. Striving always to win to be the best that I could but also being scared and timid. These past two decades have been full of mistakes and blessings but man how blessed I am to have met EVERYONE on my facebook (as cliche as that may be) but man every single friend going from elementary school (i still remember the third grade play, youth soccer with all the guys, field trips, handball battles, pokemon cards, and just growing up) to middle school (playing on the school team, the 8th grade lip sync, getting cool with DK, breaking out of my comfort zone, going to church for the first time) to high school (dumplings and samosas, to all the teachers, to leadership, to moving churches, to coaching soccer) finally to college (meeting the homies for the first time in the suite, the IV video where I found an awesome community, getting sick, anxiety attacks, God moving, newfound friendship). 

Events as the time where I got sent to the ER after a guy landed on me in soccer and missing my spinal cord by 4 inches and if he landed there I would have been paralyzed. To being so lonely at school having really no community until I was invited to CCIC and where I found acceptance. To me being scared of having jerks as suitemates or just guys who party and dislike me, but instead I found the best group of guys I could have ever lived with.  To playing music with a group of four guys in high school where I just had a great time just fooling around and having companionship.  To being lonely in middle school and just trying to fit in with the rest of crowd acting like everyone else when I realized that the guy next to me trying to get "cool" too would be my best friend.  To being timid, quiet, and nervous of meeting new people but putting on a mask in high school that showed the opposite so I could be the person I "wanted" to be. But then just receiving acceptance to be the quiet calm person I was created to be. And that people want to get to know me and that I am cool :).   

So many blessings but I think back to every single person, people all the way from elementary school, kasha, rosa, tyler brown, margaux, daniel and michael lu, jason yang, becky yen, hermes huang, kenta, matt whitehill, matt wilson, john adams, dylan gantely, max stager, kathy hu, ram sachs, DK and more.  

To middle school, justin bui, derek chen, andrew kahng, jiwan, omid, alex chieh, trevor, serena cheng, tim jon, conroy tam, bobby mclean, tal yogev, ben kohl, sameer tharakan, matt marshall, alice jih, kevin bernstein and more.

to high school and then onto college where so many people came into my life. Just a few names came to mind but man thank you whoever reads this for being a part of my life for a second, a minute, an hour, a day, a week, to a lifetime.  Man I love you guys and I am so happy to have met every single person. I am so happy to be blessed with such an awesome group of people to have traversed life with. You all changed me, molded me, shaped me, helped me, grounded me, taught me to fly, encouraged me, more than you will EVER know. Thank you Jesus for life to the fullest, thank you for love to the fullest, thank you for friendship to the fullest. I hope everyone has an awesome winter break continue to pursue friendship and companionship to the fullest you all have great futures in store I KNOW IT! It is going to be a great next twenty years and more :)

Princes and Princesses

So I was reading The Supernatural Ways of Royalty by Kris Vallotton and Bill Johnson...man and that book is really dense I could not even get past the first prologue it was so good. So pretty much he mentioned that we all were meant to be princes and princesses in God's eyes. He used the example of Moses and how he grew up in the kings palace so he could learn how to behave in front of royalty. He grew up being respected, listened to, and most of all with confidence. With that confidence he did all the amazing things that he was called to do because he of that confidence in who God made him to be and become.

For me I have felt semi-bad growing up in a house where I was listened to, loved exceptionally well by my parents, encouraged, supported, and well of in terms of money. I looked around and saw my friends and peers without that stuff and I thought I couldn't be a good person or Christian or something because I had it too well. I had this image in my head that a follower of God had to be suffering and laying it all down before God and that like the person had to live in poverty and stuff facing trials and pain everyday.

But now it is becoming more and more clear that God has created me to be a prince and that just blows my mind. I am created to share love with the people around me and that I am meant to walk in confidence not in despair waiting to be punished or to suffer. I am created to walk around just being who I am with all my quirks good and bad. And well heck God wants to use me to do cool stuff and that is just pretty cool. I still need to think about this concept of royalty and stuff but man its definitely a new fresh thing to "chew on". (pun with my last name)

So the on top of this mind blowing topic of being royalty and not like a slave who walks around disheartened (thats what I kind of related humbleness to in the past, just suffering and pain) I went to a Christmas party the other day for my church. And well I just love little kids, or youth in general :). And they had a kids choir ranging from ages 5 all the way to 6th grade which I think is eleven or so. I saw some of these little kiddies two weeks ago during thanksgiving but it was another story to see them on stage. It was not the fact that they were harmonizing (which was pretty bomb) but man when they were just singing about love I was like dude....those are the next princesses and princes CMON now! I was almost brought to tears, those are the kids that God wants to touch, he wants to be their best friend, their daddy, their homie, their playmate, he wants to treat them like ROYALTY! For some reason that blew my mind completely... God sees those little children as world changers...they are five but man I can already see the potential. I was so encouraged I just wanted to walk over to them and just be like HEY YOU ARE GOING TO CHANGE THE WORLD.

So the main part of this post is talking about a little girl named Faith who is a daughter of one of the moms at the church. She is a little cutie and was really shy before, well at least to me because I am such a towering intimidating figure :P. But yeah so yesterday she sat down next to me and we had a conversation which for one I was thankful for and secondly was surprised she opened up so much to me. She shared that she saw me walking in and also that she knew all the kids in our youth group by name and she was talking about the new people at the Christmas party that were sitting behind me. I NEVER knew she observed so much of what was going on because she was so quiet. She told me about her life and reading and doing things at school and man it was pretty sweet. Then I asked her what she would like to be when she was grown up. And guess what she said......a princess....that BLEW my mind because I was thinking about royalty and how God sees his daughters as princesses. And it hit me that as little kids well alot of little girls want to be what? princesses of course. God sees her as a princess who is loved, important, and is going to do great things and I got an awesome glimpse of that last night. And cool enough thats who she wants to be HAHA.

So lets continue loving those little ones so that they can be crazy world changing royalty when they get older :)