Monday, June 05, 2006

Emerge Conference 2006

The Emerge Conference 2006 was definitely the best conference ever. Filled with games and many exciting events. But the most wonderful thing was the strong presence of God.

The session that impacted me the most was session 6, the finale of the Emerge Conference. Pastor Kong was speaking about how Jacob walked with a limp and the apostle Paul having a thorn in the flesh. He even said that Sun, pastor Phil Pringle, Ulf Ekman, Dr Ar Bernard and even pastor Kong himself suffered from some form of weaknesses in their life which God never took out of. These great men and women walked with a limp in their life despite their great success.

As he was preaching, his words pierced straight in to my heart. I identified with a thorn in my life that I had been struggling with for a long time, since I was a kid. I was rejected by my friends and even by people in my family, people that I really love. Even after I gave my heart to Jesus and started to serve Him in the past 2 years, this limp in my life continued to torment me. I prayed and cried out many times to God to beg Him to take away this root of rejection in my life. But it is still here. It hurts very badly from time to time. But recently, it has gotten much worse.

As I thought about this during the service, Pastor Kong asked: "Can you still love God? Will you carry on to do God's will? Can you continue to serve the Lord?"

As I was praying today and asking the Lord to deliver me from this, He led me to the Scriptures in 2 Corinthians 12:9 : And He said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.

As I read that part of the verse again and again, I felt the love of God beginning to wash over me. God uses my weaknesses to make Himself strong in me!

Though it hurts, I will not give up. When I am weak, you are strong. You are the light in the dark days of my life. Youwill never leave me nor forsake me. Your love is sufficient.

No comments: