Six o'clock, New Year's Eve. I was on my way to Arthur and Vicki's for the typical Asian New Year's Eve hot pot dinner and celebration. As grateful and excited as I was to spend a night with good friends, I became surprisingly very sad that I couldn't be home for the giant hot pot extravaganza at Eric and Kat's. I say it's surprising because I'm not usually a very sentimental person, and while my friends mean a lot to me, I tend not to miss them too much when I'm away. The emotion I felt probably came from a combination of seeing the Instagram photos of the dinner, chatting with Thomas at work, and discovering that Michael, who I didn't see all break, was there.
As I wallowed in self-pity for not being able to hang out with my friends at the huge home-people hot pot party, I was reminded that there is coming a day that I wouldn't have to leave one group of friends to hang out with another, a time where no feast would go unattended. And this was great comfort to me.
So I look forward to the ultimate New Year Party, where we've said goodbye to saying goodbyes, loneliness is only a faint memory, and the food, fun, and fellowship never ends.
As a side note, can you imagine having our hangouts with Jesus? Thomas wouldn't win Nertz every time (unless he was paired up with Jesus), we could all stuff things in Wendy's ears together, and Jesus, James, and Michael would face off in an epic game of pterodactyl. And Jesus won't backstab me in the Game of Thrones game (I'M LOOKING AT YOU, VICKI).
"Ain't no party like a Holy Ghost party cuz a Holy Ghost party don't stop!" - Not the Bible
Showing posts with label Friendship. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Friendship. Show all posts
Thursday, January 2, 2014
Monday, December 30, 2013
To My Spiritually Backslidden Friends
Colossians 4:12-13 - "Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ Jesus, greets you, always struggling on your behalf in his prayers, that you may stand mature and fully assured in all the will of God. For I bear him witness that he has worked hard for you and for those in Laodicea and in Hierapolis."
To my spiritually backslidden friends - my MCCC friends that I see once every few years and my AIV friends that I only see now during weddings - I'm praying for you. For some of you, I've known that you haven't gone to church in years and probably don't even self-identify as Christians anymore. Even though I didn't ask you about church or God because I didn't want to embarrass you or force you to pretend to care, your distance from God continues to break my heart. For others of you, your spiritual regression, though fairly recent, was not surprising to me. And maybe you even knew that I knew (or could guess) that you stopped going to church even before I asked you about it. And then there are the handful of you that surprised me with your renunciation of Christ and his Church, leaving me sad and speechless.
Whoever you are, I'll be your Epaphras. There was once I time that I was physically with you and could make a real difference in your life. But those times have passed, and for most of you, I am no longer in a place relationally or geographically where I can drag you to church or discuss spiritual things. Even though I can't engage you on what I believe to be meaninglessness and futility of life without Christ, I can and will struggle on your behalf in my prayers.
But I must admit that as one guy, I feel a bit overwhelmed - there are just so many of you and I am so powerless! As my mind sweeps through all of your names and faces, I simultaneously mourn and rejoice in my utter powerlessness to change you. Though my heart's combination of brotherly love and a prideful Messiah-complex makes me wish I could make a real difference in your life, the reminder of God's sovereignty and the gift of prayer is my lone hope and comfort.
And so I'll continue to pray. I pray knowing that I join in with the saints who love you and want to see you love Jesus - your mom and dad, your childhood church friends, your college fellowship friends. I pray trusting in the sovereignty and goodness of God, soberly aware that your salvation is not dependent on the number of my prayers lifted or tears shed. And as a weak, immature, oft-distracted, poor-man's Epaphras, the times that I struggle to struggle on your behalf in my prayers may be frequent, but I pray trusting that the same God who took a Lunchables of fish and crackers and transformed it into a feast can similarly transform my unworthy prayers into power spiritual weapons.
And obviously, I post this not to get spiritual high-fives but to let you know that I care, I'm thinking about you, and I'm here if you want to talk.
I love you all. Come home to Jesus.
Caleb
To my spiritually backslidden friends - my MCCC friends that I see once every few years and my AIV friends that I only see now during weddings - I'm praying for you. For some of you, I've known that you haven't gone to church in years and probably don't even self-identify as Christians anymore. Even though I didn't ask you about church or God because I didn't want to embarrass you or force you to pretend to care, your distance from God continues to break my heart. For others of you, your spiritual regression, though fairly recent, was not surprising to me. And maybe you even knew that I knew (or could guess) that you stopped going to church even before I asked you about it. And then there are the handful of you that surprised me with your renunciation of Christ and his Church, leaving me sad and speechless.
Whoever you are, I'll be your Epaphras. There was once I time that I was physically with you and could make a real difference in your life. But those times have passed, and for most of you, I am no longer in a place relationally or geographically where I can drag you to church or discuss spiritual things. Even though I can't engage you on what I believe to be meaninglessness and futility of life without Christ, I can and will struggle on your behalf in my prayers.
But I must admit that as one guy, I feel a bit overwhelmed - there are just so many of you and I am so powerless! As my mind sweeps through all of your names and faces, I simultaneously mourn and rejoice in my utter powerlessness to change you. Though my heart's combination of brotherly love and a prideful Messiah-complex makes me wish I could make a real difference in your life, the reminder of God's sovereignty and the gift of prayer is my lone hope and comfort.
And so I'll continue to pray. I pray knowing that I join in with the saints who love you and want to see you love Jesus - your mom and dad, your childhood church friends, your college fellowship friends. I pray trusting in the sovereignty and goodness of God, soberly aware that your salvation is not dependent on the number of my prayers lifted or tears shed. And as a weak, immature, oft-distracted, poor-man's Epaphras, the times that I struggle to struggle on your behalf in my prayers may be frequent, but I pray trusting that the same God who took a Lunchables of fish and crackers and transformed it into a feast can similarly transform my unworthy prayers into power spiritual weapons.
And obviously, I post this not to get spiritual high-fives but to let you know that I care, I'm thinking about you, and I'm here if you want to talk.
I love you all. Come home to Jesus.
Caleb
Monday, July 8, 2013
July 4th Week 2013 - Good Times with Old Friends
This last week, I went camping with old college friends at Pictured Rocks in the UP of Michigan and then hung out in Ann Arbor before college friends' wedding. It was great to spend so much time with old friends!
Friends are for...
Friends are for...
- Feeding you a soft drink while you drive.
- Helping set up camp.
- Finishing leftover food.
- Manually steering your paddleboat's broken rudder.
- Fending off bugs in the middle of the forest with a towel (Thanks, Arthur!)
- Playing Nertz in the library.
- Reliving old times with you.
- Carrying your fold-up chair for you because you're a cripple. (Thanks, Will!)
- Ironing your shirt for you. (Thanks, Maggie!)
- Dressing up together.
- Lending you a belt that you forgot to wear to a wedding. (Thanks, Jack!)
Sunday, January 6, 2013
Urbana 2012 - New Friends
One of my favorite things about this Urbana was the amount of people I got to reconnect with and the amount of new people I got to meet. I've always loved making new friends, but this time it just felt different. Even though I often introduce myself to people either out of a sense of obligation to make people feel comfortable and welcome or selfishness for being well-known, I've still always enjoyed getting to know new people. But the huge amount of joy and encouragement I got from meeting new people this Urbana was very peculiar and unusual.
I realized that my unusual excitement from making new friends is probably because I really haven't had many of those experiences this last year in Fort Wayne. I've definitely made some friends in Fort Wayne, but I haven't had the opportunity to see someone and chat with them every day, like you might a new college friend. I haven't connected culturally with many people here, and I haven't made a friend with (or even met) a single Asian-American Christian in the year that I've been here. All in all, I've just missed making friends.
And to a point, I even feel desperate. I felt the unfamiliar need inside of me to get to know other people. I really wanted other people to be my friends. And this was kind of new to me. Pardon my pride, but I've thought of it kind of like "You should want to be friends with me, not the other way around, because it's a privilege to be friends with me. Don't you know? I'm friends with everyone! Get in line." Okay that was somewhat of an exaggeration, but still. I've never felt the need to make new friendships, as I already have a solid group of guys around me that I can go to with anything. But through Urbana, and now afterwards, there's been a hunger inside me for getting to know new people, and getting to know them beyond surface level.
This is all incredibly hard to explain, and probably awkward for you to read, so I'll give you a concrete example which may or may not make this entire post more awkward (also depending on who you are). I met a bunch of Duke IV students who were Asian and did Bible study with them in the morning. For me, instant connection. New Asian American friends? I haven't had those in a year! And Christians too? Bonus!! After getting a chance to chat with them a few times during Urbana week, I felt like they were my friends. Like. Friends. People that I'm invested emotionally in, not just random people I met during some giant Christian conference. I took every opportunity to chat with them when I saw them, and I even stopped by where they were hanging out right before Urbana finished just so I could say hi/bye.
If you know me, you know that I'm a "horrible friend", one that doesn't ask about how you're doing often, doesn't share much about my life on my own initiative, and really doesn't make that much effort to stay in touch all the time. But as I've been chatting with one of the Duke dudes occasionally and corresponding with some of the other people I met from their chapter, I've initiated every time and tried to maintain long, quality conversations. And through it all, I can't help asking myself, "What is wrong with me?". This is probably the wrong word, but I feel horribly "clingy", trying to hold on to a "friendship" that I know will more likely than not end up as merely a Facebook friendship. I feel like I need to keep a connection with these people, or I'll lose out on something, possibly because these are potentially the only new friends with "potential" that I'll meet in a while.
For all of you who are reading this that I keep regular contact with, don't feel betrayed. You know that I love you. It's not you it's me. Maybe we should start seeing other people. Okay that last one isn't true. But you I know I love you guys and I know I can tell you guys anything, but that's also part of why this whole issue is so confusing to me. Why do I need new friends when I've already got awesome ones? I think that part of me loves the platonic "thrill of the chase", getting to meet someone new and hear their story, which is something I got to do a lot in college through outreach and NSO but not a whole lot this last year in Fort Wayne.
And if you're from Duke, I don't want your pity! Go on and live your wonderful magnificent lives without me! I'll just write on your Facebook walls after Michigan beats you and wins the NCAA Championship! See you all in heaven!
Okay. This post was supposed to be an exclusively happy one about reconnecting with old friends and meeting new people, as the more introspective and sad ones were going to follow. Oh well. Life isn't always cat GIFS and unicorns. Hopefully the next post isn't as suckily sulky.
I realized that my unusual excitement from making new friends is probably because I really haven't had many of those experiences this last year in Fort Wayne. I've definitely made some friends in Fort Wayne, but I haven't had the opportunity to see someone and chat with them every day, like you might a new college friend. I haven't connected culturally with many people here, and I haven't made a friend with (or even met) a single Asian-American Christian in the year that I've been here. All in all, I've just missed making friends.
And to a point, I even feel desperate. I felt the unfamiliar need inside of me to get to know other people. I really wanted other people to be my friends. And this was kind of new to me. Pardon my pride, but I've thought of it kind of like "You should want to be friends with me, not the other way around, because it's a privilege to be friends with me. Don't you know? I'm friends with everyone! Get in line." Okay that was somewhat of an exaggeration, but still. I've never felt the need to make new friendships, as I already have a solid group of guys around me that I can go to with anything. But through Urbana, and now afterwards, there's been a hunger inside me for getting to know new people, and getting to know them beyond surface level.
This is all incredibly hard to explain, and probably awkward for you to read, so I'll give you a concrete example which may or may not make this entire post more awkward (also depending on who you are). I met a bunch of Duke IV students who were Asian and did Bible study with them in the morning. For me, instant connection. New Asian American friends? I haven't had those in a year! And Christians too? Bonus!! After getting a chance to chat with them a few times during Urbana week, I felt like they were my friends. Like. Friends. People that I'm invested emotionally in, not just random people I met during some giant Christian conference. I took every opportunity to chat with them when I saw them, and I even stopped by where they were hanging out right before Urbana finished just so I could say hi/bye.
If you know me, you know that I'm a "horrible friend", one that doesn't ask about how you're doing often, doesn't share much about my life on my own initiative, and really doesn't make that much effort to stay in touch all the time. But as I've been chatting with one of the Duke dudes occasionally and corresponding with some of the other people I met from their chapter, I've initiated every time and tried to maintain long, quality conversations. And through it all, I can't help asking myself, "What is wrong with me?". This is probably the wrong word, but I feel horribly "clingy", trying to hold on to a "friendship" that I know will more likely than not end up as merely a Facebook friendship. I feel like I need to keep a connection with these people, or I'll lose out on something, possibly because these are potentially the only new friends with "potential" that I'll meet in a while.
For all of you who are reading this that I keep regular contact with, don't feel betrayed. You know that I love you. It's not you it's me. Maybe we should start seeing other people. Okay that last one isn't true. But you I know I love you guys and I know I can tell you guys anything, but that's also part of why this whole issue is so confusing to me. Why do I need new friends when I've already got awesome ones? I think that part of me loves the platonic "thrill of the chase", getting to meet someone new and hear their story, which is something I got to do a lot in college through outreach and NSO but not a whole lot this last year in Fort Wayne.
And if you're from Duke, I don't want your pity! Go on and live your wonderful magnificent lives without me! I'll just write on your Facebook walls after Michigan beats you and wins the NCAA Championship! See you all in heaven!
Okay. This post was supposed to be an exclusively happy one about reconnecting with old friends and meeting new people, as the more introspective and sad ones were going to follow. Oh well. Life isn't always cat GIFS and unicorns. Hopefully the next post isn't as suckily sulky.
Urbana 2012 Posts
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