Tag Archives: lent

Formation

Sweetly Broken

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Today we have a special post from guest blogger, Brandon Chuang (Ken’s son). Brandon is currently attending optometry school in Boston. His post is a timely one as we head into Lent – a season of self-reflection as we consider our own sinfulness that led to Christ’s death and crucifixion.

Luke 7:47

“Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven–as her great love has shown. But whoever has been forgiven little loves little.”

I love the NIV version of this verse. I feel that it perfectly captures my greatest struggle, acceptance of the full extent of my brokenness.

We’ve all had those piercing moments. Those moments where the weight of our transgressions comes crashing down on us. It could be something from the past, triggered by something you saw while casually perusing social media. It could be falling, yet again, into a pattern of sin you swore off so many times. These are largely the ways in which it’s manifested in me, but it could be anything.

The past two weeks have been 2 of the most emotionally and spiritually difficult weeks of my life, and I don’t want to minimize that. I’ve been barraged with sins from my past that I’d swept under the rug unknowingly. It’s not that I didn’t confess them to God and ask for forgiveness, but I never let my heart experience just how vile these sins were. I made excuses to minimize them. “Everyone goes through this, it’s a normal struggle.”

My constant coping mechanism stems from this idea that, “I’m not that bad of a person.” This can also be referred to as, “I don’t need that much of God’s grace.” And it has worked as a temporary fix, temporary being 25 years of life. However, as I’m growing older and continually being faced with the magnanimity of my sins both past and present, “I’m not that bad of a person” really doesn’t do it anymore.

These past two weeks, God has been forcing my hand, and I could no longer defend myself. “I’m a really, really, broken, messed up person, and there’s no excuse for all these things I’ve done.” In that moment, the standards I’d set for my life and my self-image were shattered… Yet it was this “crying out” that opened my heart to even more of God’s forgiveness and love, it was what He was waiting for.

We need to understand the degree of our brokenness to fully understand what God’s love and grace covers and redeems. And let’s be clear on one thing, I do NOT fully understand my own brokenness. I don’t think I ever will until I see Him face to face, but I firmly believe a tell-tale sign of maturity is the deepening of our understanding of our own sinful nature, coupled with the further surrendering of our lives to “the One is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine.”

Only when we have been forgiven much, can we love so boldly.

It’s been 3 days since that desperate cry. Already, I feel myself reverting to my old ways. It’s okay. I know it’s a process, a lifelong one at that. I want to encourage you, friends, to fully embrace your brokenness, knowing our God redeems and restores us.

I recently re-uploaded Sweetly Broken by Jeremy Riddle to my Spotify playlist as a reminder of these past 2 weeks. “At the cross You beckon me. You draw me gently to my knees and I am lost for words, so lost in love. I’m sweetly broken, wholly surrendered.”

I pray that these words mean more and more to me every day, and I hope they bless you as well.

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Conversation #2: Desires

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There was a saying popular among me and my closest high school friends whenever we did something outrageous. It was our universal explanation for the inexplicable. Accidentally suicide in Super Smash Bros.–”I do what I want!” Attempt a half-court shot in a 5-on-5 basketball game–“I do what I want!” Out of nowhere, punch a friend in the nuts–“I do what I want!”

This terribly self-indulgent, but terribly fun, practice came from a 2002 episode of South Park that I do not recommend watching. In it, Cartman goes on the talk show Maury, pretending to be an out-of-control teen in order to win a prize. In order of atrociousness: “I had sex without protection; it’s my hot body–I do what I want!” “I slaughtered five baby seals with my bare hands this morning–I do what I want!” “I digitally put Jabba the Hut back into the original Star Wars movie–I do what I want!”

The scenarios above seem outrageous, but if we take a step back and strip down our actions, “I do what I want” is at the base of almost everything we do. Even something as simple as choosing what to eat for breakfast can be boiled down to the question: “what do I want?” Is it convenience? McDonald’s. Is it health? Oatmeal. Is it time? Nothing. Is it pleasurable taste? Small children.

Lobster

(That was a joke.)

 

The question of desire is especially apparent when we find ourselves in the tension between immediate and future consequences. In most cases, the more immediate gratification wins the race. (How many of us have procrastinated and then severely regretted it at the end?) However, somewhere along the line of our lives, we’ve also been taught to play for delayed rewards. We do things that we don’t want to do because we want what comes later even more. The most familiar examples are studying and exercising. We don’t want to do these things, but we want the future benefits we think they will bring us. One way or another, we are still following the maxim, “I do what I want.”

Therefore, it is important for us to consider how desire motivates our actions. Living in a world that is constantly vying for our desires, we need to carefully examine our habitual actions. We shouldn’t make the mistake of thinking private actions like watching pornography or indulging in sweets aren’t a big deal. They have the devastating ability to enslave us to gratifying our immediate desires.

Desires is a subject especially relevant for those of us who are fasting through Lent. As often happens, “who’s going to know?” or “what’s the big deal?” pop into my head during this season. However, when they have, it’s helped to ask myself, “what is it that I really want?” This is why I think it’s a great practice to physically write down the desires that we wish were more central to our lives. Going back to the lookbook and seeing the words “to affirm one another” “to pray more,” “to be more present in the community” is more than just a reminder. It is one of our first lines of defense against a world that is constantly bombarding our attention with advertisements, both overt and subliminal. It is a billboard of the ways the Holy Spirit is working in us. It is a prayer that says, “God, make it so that when ‘I do what I want,’ it is what you want, too.”