It’s been an insanely busy few weeks, so much so that blog writing, or even writing for that matter, has kind of fallen by the wayside. Sometimes I wonder if I’ll forget how to write the way I usually do if I stop doing it long enough. Or whether I’ve lost the desire to blog for the sake of writing about my life.

Not only that, my system has been giving me massive problems — freezes, extremely slow (and frustrating) performance, weird errors — that even simple things like watching a video on YouTube or scrolling through the list of updates on Facebook are severe tests to the patience.

Ministry work has been increasing exponentially, and it’s been nothing short of an acceleration considering that I wasn’t serving at the beginning of the year. A short talk with Cheryl as we taxied home after Darrell’s birthday dinner made me see how it’s just going to get even more exciting with new responsibilities and opportunities to grow even more. God is just pulling me out of my comfort zone and putting me in situations where I’m constantly coming to this place of being absolutely certain of my inability. Learning how to lean harder.

Really, this life is not my own to live. Naturally speaking, it’s an irreconciliable concept to practical living; shouldn’t I be looking out for myself? Isn’t it my responsibility to my family and loved ones to put my interests first? Why should anyone put themselves out there or put their lot in with a seemingly archaic system for the sake of establishing a cultural identity or community-based support?

But the truth is, these aren’t the right questions.

The real issue, I reckon, is that even though in my circumstances I am brought low, seeing whirlwinds in what I thought was an iron-clad friendship and realising that ‘enough time’ is such an alien concept to me, I want to know this: am I still able to praise God and to walk each day with His joy and peace?

Maybe, some days will seem that everything is a little too much for me. But my prayer is that my response to that question will always be a ‘Yes’.

“They will be my people, and I will be their God. I will give them singleness of heart and action, so that they will always fear me for their own good and the good of their children after them. I will make an everlasting covenant with them: I will never stop doing good to them, and I will inspire them to fear me, so that they will never turn away from me. I will rejoice in doing them good and will assuredly plant them in this land with all my heart and soul.

This is what the LORD says: As I have brought all this great calamity on this people, so I will give them all the prosperity I have promised them.  Once more fields will be bought in this land of which you say, ‘It is a desolate waste, without men or animals, for it has been handed over to the Babylonians.’ Fields will be bought for silver, and deeds will be signed, sealed and witnessed in the territory of Benjamin, in the villages around Jerusalem, in the towns of Judah and in the towns of the hill country, of the western foothills and of the Negev, because I will restore their fortunes,  declares the LORD.” Jeremiah 32:38-44