My Testimony

Every time I think about how God has graciously saved me from a life of sin when I was so stubborn in my rebellion against Him, I am amazed by His grace and mercy and overwhelmed by His unconditional love.   As I learn more and more about God’s infinite holiness, His attributes, and what was accomplished on the cross by my Lord Jesus Christ, I cannot help but fall more and more in love with Him, and be all the more willing to submit my life into His sovereign care and trust Him with every aspect of my life. 

I was born into an unbelieving family.  Growing up, it had never crossed my mind that I would become a Christian.  I knew I wasn’t a perfect person, but I didn’t think I was a bad person either.  I was relatively a good gal, I listened to my parents most of the time, got good grades, did volunteer work, and like to help others, etc.  Basically, I felt that I did not need a Savior, or even know what I needed to be saved from.  I had no idea how deeply I was in a life of sin.  I did not know that being angry with someone, unwilling to forgive someone, pride, and the list goes on and on are all sins before an infinitely holy God.  All of these were abominable to Him, regardless of how society views them.  Regardless whether it is a white lie (no matter how “innocent” one may think it is) or murder, sin is sin.  And the wages of sin is death.  But luckily, God provides us a way for eternal life, “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:23) 

Throughout my life, God has been planting seeds so that when the time was right, my heart would be softened and be impacted by the gospel message.  Fast-forwarding to college, during this time, God has enabled me to see the sinfulness of my heart and how hopeless that I am without Him.  No matter how hard I try, I can do nothing apart from Him, everything that I strive for or have done in the name of good, was all in vain because they were all self-motivated and done only to receive the approval and praise from man. 

So during freshmen year, I was beginning to become interested in Christianity, so I joined the Asian-American Christian Fellowship (AACF).  One of my goals was to see why Christians were so different ;  I didn’t know what it was back then, but when I was singing in a youth choir, I noticed the peace and joy in the expressions of the people in the congregation while they were singing praise songs at church, so this made me curious to why they would have this peace and joy.  My second goal was to make friends because no one from my high school was a Revelle student.  I got incorporated into the group rather quickly, and I had wanted this Jesus in my life too.  But in retrospect, I know that my desire was not to truly submit my life to Christ, but was motivated out of a self-seeking purpose-- I wanted to be accepted by other Christians.  I began serving in various ministries and gauged my spiritual well-being with how many things I was involved in within the parachurch ministry.  I was only Christian by name and did not live a life that strives to glorify God in every aspect.  Even though my actions were self-seeking and only nominally done in God’s name, God was gracious in leading me to Lighthouse Bible Church, where I slowly learned biblical truths and began to change my way of thinking. 

Thankfully God corrected my way of thinking and truly caused repentance to occur in my heart.  It was later, during my sophomore year, which I realized that without a repentant heart and turning away from my sins, I cannot become a true believer in Christ.  For Christ said, "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." (Matthew 16:24)  This meant that I need to deny my sinful ways and to purse a life of holiness through Jesus Christ.  Transformation had to occur in my thoughts, actions and motives.   It was as if God had turned the light bulb on, I finally understood that I was going about trying to live a Christian life the wrong way.  I had defined how a Christian should act, say, and pray through my secular perspective, not upon biblical principles.  Thankfully with the help of the Holy Spirit, the pastors’ diligent teaching, private devotionals, and Godly role models at church, I was able to reconstruct what it means to be a Christian and live a Christian life based on Scripture.  God continues to teach me what it means to take up my cross every day in the most humbling ways.  Though I do not do this perfectly, I rest assure knowing that my sanctification lies in the hands of my Creator.

Don't Know ASL?

Some of you may know of my passion for ASL =).  Normally, when I try to share some ASL humor, people don't understand it because of their lack knowledge of Deaf culture, ASL, and the basis behind Deaf jokes.  But today, as I was just watching random videos in ASL, I stumbled upon this.  This is a video of Keith Wann, a CODA comedian.

I'm sure all of you will be able to appreciate a good laugh even if you don't know ASL.  Enjoy!!