for an eternal weight of glory

"may your blessings be many

but not what you hoped they'd be."

- pray/ Kendall

a couple of things brought me to this place of realization - maybe enlightenment, if i may put it that way - and of being bowled over by God's wealth of tender faithfulness and goodness and of just... being amazed by how He orchestrates life; yours and mine, and how He yearns to open the eyes of our hearts and minds to Him.

2 corinthians 4:7-12, 16-18:

"But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you... Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."

just yesterday, Ian posted this song "Prayer" by a Kendall on facebook and i thought it was a great song but didn't really think about it that much but this one line "may your blessings be many but not what you hoped they'd be" kept resurfacing in my mind. but what struck me the most was what the preacher, francis chan, said: "we're always praying "God, change things" rather than "God, change me". we want God to change our circumstances and take away all these pain, all these trials, all these hardships rather than God's plans: "no, I wanna put some of these things in your life and you need to be praying for yourself to grow through these things."" at the same time, i was also pondering about how i would respond if people were to ask me how God has been real to me and i thought... God has never been more real than in moulding my character and being present in all of it.

as i look back in my life, i realized that i've asked God for many things - as how francis chan puts it, unbiblical - like a better grade, better looks, to be smarter, to have a better family etc etc but He never did. instead, He blessed me with blessings that are intangible (blessings that are not what i thought they'd be), things that have an eternal weight of glory - moulding my character.

we ask God for better families, perfect homes, relationships and easier lives when that only teaches us thankfulness on a superficial level and i am so... guilty of that. but for a family that has been through thick and thin together, that has persevered through trials and weathered storms and seen what's ugly in each member and yet still persists to love, to grow in understanding and appreciating each other - that's learning to love unconditionally. and that is itself, an eternal weight of glory. i think God is teaching me to see beyond the bad to see that there's a lesson to be learnt within it; to be refined.

these blessings come after trials, after we go through a season of pruning -- that we're able to see that God is at work in each of our lives and that all of us are being "worked" to attain that eternal weight of glory - a character and faith that's worth far more than gold. therefore, we always need to work at our salvation and to see more than ever the depravity in us that needs the redemptive touch of Christ. to remember and realize that God disciplines the ones who He loves and because of that knowledge, we can walk through our sufferings and be certain of an eternal hope that doesn't diminish.

that our many blessings will not be what we hope they'd be but they'd be blessings of eternal weight of glory that transcends beyond the superficial.