… from Andrew Lee, who, I’m so jealous to learn, studied Latin in high school:
“O Mea Culpa”! which is a melodramatic way of saying, “My bad.” I like saying this in an Italian accent because it makes me feel like a character from “The Godfather”–perhaps like one of the women who must quietly suffer–or hysterically sob–while all the men slaughter each other and use them as pawns. (incidentally I was very impressed by the quality of The Godfather I, though horrified at the carnage). I’ll bet Maria (I think that’s her name), the sister of Michael Corleone, wanted to say this when she learned that her phone call led to her brother’s death.
“Te amo” which means “I love you” in both Latin and Italian. I find this prettier than French’s “Je t’aime.”
Languages I wish I knew:
-Korean (because everyone at work and most of my students speak Korean, and because it’d make me more socially acceptable in such circles; also most people at my church are Korean)
-Italian
-Latin-because many English roots are derived from Latin and I’d be more skilled in the use of words if I knew it.
-French-I wish to learn it more. Perhaps I’ll live in France or Italy someday. I love how the French language sounds … If the English language is a practical shower using a Dial soap bar, the French language is like taking a sumputous strawberries and milk scented bubble bath. (Ok, if that’s not a pedantic attempt to show I can make metaphors, I don’t know what is.^^)
Can men and women be friends? That is, people you invest time in, apart from the incidental times you see each other at church or work-related gatherings.
Most of the older Christians whom I respect emphatically say “No.” Survey says: non-Christian men will only be friends with a girl if they want more than platonic relations with her. “Truly Christian” men will be friendly and cordial to girls at social gatherings, but will not try to hang out with her one-on-one. Overall, the consensus among older Christians is: when guys invest time and sacrifice for a girl, to develop a more intimate relationship, they always want to be more than friends.
I disagree, and this isn’t because I, as a girl, am able to spend platonic time with guys without feeling titillated at the reality of our anatomical differences. When I say “platonic,” I mean that romantic chemistry is so nonexistent that I wouldn’t be surprised if we turned out to be genetically related. Perhaps what they meant was that guys almost always want to be more than friends, an idea I can’t dispute. The main reason I disagree is because I have met such a guy who is only a friend, and I’m sure others like him exist.
One guy I know has said that in our culture, interactions which ought to be simple have been complicated. Though he didn’t say this, I started thinking: what if I had not grown up in American 20th century society, but in some remote village? I started wondering: how much of what we believe about gender is conditioned into our brains by our culture, and how much is actually truth?
For instance, the movie “When Harry Met Sally” posited that men and women can’t be friends. In general in movies, those who seem to be just friends inevitably end up having feelings for each other. But perhaps movies don’t reflect reality, but just cater to people’s longings for a romantic ending. How much success would a movie make if a guy and girl just remained friends throughout the whole thing?
I saw “When Harry met Sally” as a college freshmen, and ever since then I started being more suspicious of guys who are friendly toward me. But when I was younger, in high school and before, most guys fit into the broad category of “people who happen to be physically different.” Sure I had my crushes, but first and foremost, guys were just other people. After the movie, I started buying into the lie that it’s natural to see every guy as a romantic potential, and doing otherwise means you’re repressing your feelings. I started to classify guys according to the following:
-Donkey (no romantic potential, esp. as Donkey is only into feisty lady dragons who almost kill his friends)
-Shrek (initially no romantic potential, but could later morph into romantic potential).
-Prince Eric from the Little Mermaid, the almost 2-D ideal mate
Rather than seeing people of the opposite sex as 3-D humans, our culture, as evidenced by magazines and movies, promotes obsessively evaluating their value/romantic potential. I don’t think this is a healthy attitude to have.
But I know plenty of guys who might think their girl cousins are good-looking, but aren’t romantically attracted to them. So if all of us were transplanted to a remote village that is insulated from American cultural ideologies on gender, perhaps we would see non-attractive members of the opposite sex with the same level of romantic interest as relatives.
But this brings me to my next point: This rule enforced by many conservative Christians that guys and girls shouldn’t hang out one on one unless they are courting/dating with serious intent. As one person has said to me, “I don’t see why girls and guys would want to hang out with each other one-on-one unless they were romantically I don’t believe in casual dating.” I believe this person was sincere and perhaps this is true of individuals in the older generation.
But to expect others to adhere to that rule, with the assumption that if they don’t, their motives are impure, is legalistic. The key thing is that the person should be fully convinced of the purity of their motives, and is not ignoring the voice of God due to his/her desires for emotional intimacy. (And of course, if they’re hanging out all the time and calling each other constantly, that does not seem wise).
***
“Time to clean house”
It’s time to throw out all the junk that’s been cluttering my mind, time to detox myself from the emotional toxins I’ve let into my system.
It’s time to start obeying that initial, gentle, sweet voice that tells me to do something or not do something, rather than rationalizing my actions with my mind, justifying the actions of the flesh. Truly, the mind cannot comprehend the things of the spirit. The Spirit tells me one thing, and my mind simply cannot accept it. But no matter … the mind lags behind the Spirit, as Tozer has said, as a child lags behind his father.
I really have not shown much faith in God in the past. It has been so important to me to do the things which make sense to my intellect. I have sinned by trusting in my own understanding, rather than trusting in God and His character. I confess that I still have fear about where faith will take me. But it’s time to stop listening to the skeptical voices of others around me, time to start hearing His voice and being willing to take risks. I know He’s a good teacher. He won’t put me through a test that’s too great for me to pass. He’ll give me the smaller more manageable tests before the Mt. Moriahs.
I haven’t been putting God first for the past couple months. It’s time for that to change. I have to sever my attachments to everyone and everything in this life that is encumbering and entangling me, distracting me from fixing my eyes on Jesus, author and perfecter of my faith. How foolish I was to think I could dabble in the darkness, toy with fleshly entanglements, and not end up weak, tired, and disappointed. How foolish I was to count earthly things and relationships my treasure, instead of seeing eternal things as the true treasure worth pursuing.
There’s nothing noble or admirable whatsoever about being a Christian. The Christian who walks by faith knows that nothing s/he does is actually sacrifice for God. It may seem like a sacrifice from the limited perspective of this world, but in light of eternity, where we will be rewarded for our faithfulness with eternal closeness to God, how could we call anything in this life a sacrifice? A Christian simply has been enlightened by God as to what is good for him/her, what is most conducive to his/her happiness and well-being. And the answer to that is simple: to love God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself. Loving Him with all our hearts happens–not by coincidence, but by design of a loving God–to be mutually beneficial for ourselves.
“God cannot give us happiness outside Himself because it does not exist.”
I know God wants more areas of my life than I’ve been giving Him. And it’s such a shock, it’s so … flattering (?) and amazing to know that the God of the universe is jealous for my heart, my deepest affections. I have doubted, struggled to believe it, tried to give my heart to Him, strayed from God and sought to lavish my love and give my heart to others time and again … and here I am, back at the beginning, so to speak, and now … yes, now is the time. Now is the time to try again, to keep trying until my heart is totally and completely His. It may not be easy as it will require overcoming the flesh with Spirit. But I will place my hope in this: He who is in me is greater than he who is in the world.
For years, I realize, this has been the primary craving of my heart: to find someone who would be worthy of my love. I sought people to love and thought one person, then another, might be worthy, but none of them were worthy of the kind of love I wanted to give: worship and total surrender of my being to meeting his every whim. This is why I suffered from such unhappiness. I was only happy when I was in love and my heart was committed–either to a person, which resulted in a heady intoxicated happiness, which was also accompanied by insecurity–or with God, which was accompanied by greater peace, security, joy–a sense of stability and order in my life–and a passion that was not of flesh, but Spirit.
“Man is a worshiping creature,” wrote William Golding. I wanted someone who I could trust with my heart. Not only did I want to adore a person, but I wanted to be able to tell the person how much I adored him. I wanted to express it in a million different ways and in different languages even, to express the inexhaustible measure of my affection, the fact that he could do no wrong. Perhaps I am foolish to think I could love like that, but perhaps not, as His love has been shed abroad in my heart by the Holy Spirit (Rom.5).
I don’t know how this desire will be fulfilled in the future, whether God wants me to love Him or other people with this ferocious consuming jealous love. But I know the answer lies in Him.
Thank you, God … for being good to me even though I have not been good to you.
I’m so tired of being confused. As a friend recently told you, “your problem is that you don’t know what I want.” Or maybe it’s that I want too many things and I can’t have them all.
So today I called this man of God and told him my situation. It was a bit awkward because I don’t really know him, but at this point, I value truth/guidance over my dignity.
“If you want this [thing] more than you want the fullness of God, then …” I don’t even remember how he finished that statement, so stunned was I at how succinctly and incisively he summarized the skeleton, the true nature, of the struggle. It was yet another permutation of God vs. another thing, yet another battle between Spirit and flesh.
Funny how in my head it seemed far more complex than that. Yet it so often boils down to that: What are you seeking first, to enter into greater oneness with God, or something else? Even if that something else isn’t inherently a bad thing, if it becomes more important to you than God, if it motivates you more than He does, then it becomes something that ensnares you:
“For the ways of a man are before the eyes of the Lord, and He watches all his paths. His own iniquities will capture the wicked, and he will held with the cords of his sin. He will die for lack of instruction, and in the greatness of his folly he will go astray” (Prov.5:21-23).
It takes faith to believe that if we give up this temporal treasure, He’ll give us something better in return … perhaps not right away, perhaps not even in this life. Yet faith by definition is not in what you see, but is “the conviction of things not seen” (Heb.11:1).
I’m reminded that every time Abraham acted with meekness rather than a sense of entitlement–letting Lot choose which land he wanted, and refusing the riches offered by the king of Sodom–God reassured him that He was the giver of good things and revealed more details about how He would fulfill His promise. In the former case, He reiterated His promise of great land and numerous descendants, but also revealed his descendants would be as the dust of the earth. In the latter case, in addition to reassuring Abraham of his protection, He also said, “Your reward shall be very great.” Following this, He revealed that the heir would come from Abraham’s own body.
Apparently, as Abraham passed these smaller tests of faith, God rewarded him with more tidbits of information about this future blessing, thereby fortifying his faith and preparing him for greater future tests. I suppose it would not have built his character/faith as much if, say, God gave him a vision that showed in detail how the promise would work out.
And as for me, I am challenged to believe that whatever is given up for God’s sake is rubbish, and if I let go of these fleeting treasures, I will be well-rewarded.
I suppose the dilemma is really quite simple. What do you want more?
The whole world and all its riches and everything that seems pleasing to you …
or oneness with God?
I’m not saying that the true mark of a spiritual person is to be poor and deprived of all pleasure, but rather, the true mark is what you love most–what you desire most.
As he said to me, “We only have a limited amount of energy to expend on people and activities. 100% of that energy should be directed toward pursuing oneness with God. Anyone/anything that disrupts your spirit and arouses your flesh should be completely avoided because whatever arouses your flesh is against the spirit.”
“For the eyes of the Lord move to and fro throughout the earth that He may strongly support those whose heart is completely His.” (2 Chr.16:9)
Today has been a really good day so far … a day full of surprises! Yes, I was spoiled–I mean blessed–by God today. I had the privilege of doing 2 things I really like to do: 1) teaching english, 2) engaging in meaningful conversation about God with Sapna.
Today was my first day at Top Academy, an organization near Bellevue. (Can I just say how much I love Bellevue and wouldn’t at all mind living there? My parents are leaving for a few weeks for SE Asia this thursdsay and I can’t go due to my new job. It hurts as I could’ve gotten a free plan ticket AND stayed at the Grand Hyatt in Singapore! But as soon as I realized I’d be alone for 3 weeks, I really wished I’d a friend who lived in Bellevue who I could crash with … to even frequent the mall is to feel like a member of the up and coming Yuppie class, and to feel that though I don’t have much money in my account, much more is coming my way. Belle square makes me happy, makes me feel the whole world is clean, sweet-smelling, well-mannered, well-dressed, and after doing a bit of shopping and going to a salon, that I’d fit right in. I love movies that show the simpler, sweeter side of life as well–1950’s housewives that are happy, rather than repressed/suicidal–men and women being content and happy with their current station in life. Conflict is what makes for tension in movies, but there’s a certain comfort to the certainty that in the end, all will once again be well).
My class went well. The students are all Korean-American … everywhere I go, I can’t get away from “them” Koreans. They are everywhere, including the church I currently attend (New Covenant Baptist Church). I was nervous beforehand, but once I met the students, I felt they wouldn’t be hard to work with at all, and I was right. All in all, I was pleasantly surprised by how sweet the students were.
Afterward I went to Sapna’s lovely mansion and we talked for 4 hours. Aside from her testimonies, much of the conversation revolved around me.
Here were some interesting things she said:
-that I think like an engineer, more of a math/science person than a humanities person. This was totally a shock to me. I realized that in my desire to rebel from my family’s Asian–and therefore, I thought, repressive, restrictve, soul-sucking–culture, I’ve strived to embrace everything non-Asian, such as all subjects dealing with the realm of subjective human experience and emotion. I love books and films that portray an unconventional point of view, and most of all, books that depict characters who know how to live with passion and great feeling, because frankly … I resented my Asian culture for feeling like a straight-jacket.
I realized I really need to repent for my bitterness against my culture and really against myself, my own attempts to be as un-Asian as possible and to not be tainted by the Asianness of those I associate with. I don’t have anything against Asians. But I, personally, fight against thinking of myself as Asian. I don’t want to be Asian. I want to transcend such fleshly cultural boundaries and simply be me, Tania. What is race and culture after all, but manmade constructs that restrict from soaring to the heights where true self-actualization lies?
But what she said made me think … perhaps I am more like my family than I care to admit. Perhaps I really do think like a scientist, but am just disgusted at the thought of doing something as conventionally Asian as engineering.
While I’ve never naturally gravitated toward math and science, maybe that’s because the humanities helps me attain a semblance of psychological balance in my life. I say a “semblance” because it cannot really cure the fact that I do not know how to deal with my emotions. Because I’ve felt my family and culture tell me not to follow my emotions, I have such a strong desire to both experience and surrender myself to emotions, even to the point of irrationality and chaos. (They say that those who live during war-time like to read books depicting tranquility, while those who live during peace-time like to read books filled with crime, intrigue, and war). To exaggerate, it’s as though I’ve felt like a cerebral masterpiece of a robot who looks at the wild beast ravaging its prey or frolicking instinctively and unwittingly through the jungle, and envies that beast. Oh, to live by instinct, to live and not preflect or reflect, but just to live! To live without thinking, without punishing superego, social conscience, the burden of duty.
-I also shared how sometimes I have this desire, not so much to be loved–though everyone wants that, of course–but to love. And not just agape love. Sometimes I just have this overwhelming tenderness in my heart that is just waiting to find someone. And if I could just lavish my love on someone I would feel more fulfilled, even if that person didn’t reciprocate my affections. And in more than just words. I don’t think this desire is really erotic or even necessarily romantic. I can only describe it as similar to the deep affection I feel for my cat and dog. Instinctively I feel tenderly toward them, want to emotionally nurture them.
I love how facile it is to win the affection of animals. All it takes is a few minutes of petting and cooing their name in that affectionate way, and they purr/coo like they’re in 7th heaven. While you can enjoy deeper intimacy with some people than with animals, I wish we could all be that responsive when someone so much as says our name. If only a hug and a pat could melt our hearts and make us forgive the one who wronged us, as it does after I’ve ignored my cat and dog. Wouldn’t that be nice, if we could be as tender-hearted toward people as our pets are toward us?
hmm … or maybe this is my biological clock’s way of telling me it’s time to have poopy bratty kids who will test my ability at giving endless love?
… another thing Sapna said is that her impression of me has always been “a really soft person who works hard to not seem that way.” I suppose that I simply don’t know what to do with this thing called “emotions.” It seems dangerous to be vulnerable, but the only alternative is depression/repression. When you repress part of who you are, part of yourself becomes depressed–held back from fully expressed God’s glory. And I’ve definitely been that for many years.
Right now I can only imagine lavishing that onto one person. But Sapna told me she thinks that my true desire is really to love many people, and that God will enlarge my heart to be able to do that.
The thing I really appreciate about Sapna is how she challenges people–even just by her lifestyle–to rethink the common conceptions of Christianity. To not passively receive everything the church teaches us, but to look to the Spirit and the Word to know the Truth. For this reason whenever I see her, I come away with a foretaste of greater freedom in my mouth. I realize that perhaps some of my Christian duties have become a bondage. I feel more free to pursue happiness in my life, less bound to always fret about doing the “right” thing.
