NEXT Conference Day 2 *VIDEOS UPDATED!*

VIDEOS

A brief video of Kevin DeYoung speaking


A brief video of D.A Carson speaking
PICTURES

Kevin DeYoung! Amazing speaker, amazing author, and absolutely hilarious! Read his book "Just Do Something" - short read, tiny book, BRILLIANT content.


Moi! =) For this photograph, I admit I played around with it in photoshop for a bit, I didn't like the lighting or the "spots" on my forehead in the original so I fixed all of that har har har...Behind me is the Baltimore Convention Center


Happy People!


I really like this picture for some reason. It's kind of poignant. Next to the harbor, I see Deborah and Rachel's bibles stacked neatly on top of each other, and that Next button just tops it


While I was exploring Baltimore, I saw this HUGE Barnes and Nobles, Cool!



Saw this cool looking clock tower from behind these metal thingies that fenced around the Baltimore Convention Center, where the conference was held


Deborah and Rachel! (She is wearing one of those rare NEXT shirts)


Bob Kauflin!


Found a new friend! Her name is Deborah. She is Josh Harris' home-school teacher

*Will upload Videos next, keep on the lookout for updates!
Love,
Lily

Sketchbook Pictures

SKETCHBOOK

I know I was going to post up notes, pictures, and videos from Day 1 and Day 2, but I couldn't resist putting some of these pictures I drew from Winter Break up on this blog. I found them in my sketchbook and couldn't believe how ugly those horses are haha jkjk, but I totally forgot I drew a bunch of you guys in my sketchbook and never brought it with me back to Berkeley, so here they are (too bad they're so rough, maybe I'll define it more in Photoshop later), and an unfinished watercolor painting:

Love,
Lily

Next Conference Day 1

CHRIST'S PREEMINENCE

Speaker: Joshua Harris
Focus Text: Colossians 1:15-20



Paul is writing to the Colossians because the Colossians have started to exalt human philosophies and have started to bring Jesus down. But remember:

• Jesus is greater than all things (He holds all things together. The atoms, the molecules, the "stuff" holding together the walls of your house or the tree arching over your roof; Jesus holds it together. One word from Him, and all of it can collapse)

• Every breath we breathe is a gift from God

"Have you been impressed by ANYTHING in this world?...Turn from that and worship Jesus, because He made it and is so much greater." - Joshua Harris

• Jesus is Preeminent! But are you living your life and shaping your life based on the reality that Jesus Christ is preeminent? "It is one thing to say Jesus is preeminent but another thing to LIVE as though Jesus is Lord...Do not say Jesus has ultimately authority over my life. LIVE IT." - Joshua Harris

Focus Text: Luke 6:46-49

"Why do you call me, 'Lord, Lord,' and do not do what I say? I will show you what he is like who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice. He is like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. But the one who hears my words and does not put them into practice is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. The moment the torrent struck that house, it collapsed and its destruction was complete."

Is Jesus talking to Godless people? NO. He is talking to believers, people who go to church, people who call Jesus "Lord."
"It is not enough to give 'lip' service. Is your life in Jesus grounded? When obstacles and hardship come your way, will [your house] stay firm or will it be KNOCKED down?" - Joshua Harris

Points to remember:

1. Come to Jesus. Go to Jesus.
We often come to Jesus on our way to something else. We see Him as a means to something else such as healing, material stuff, peace, car, new home, wealth, liberation from a tyrannical government, etc. But this is the wrong foundation!

"Paul tells Timothy 'remember Jesus Christ!' Does Timothy need to be remembered of Jesus? He's a pastor!....YES he does. We all do. We forget Jesus so easily...It's so easy to think we have come to Jesus Christ but it's so easy to replace the truth with your own ideas and philosophy; with your own desires. Do you want to build your life on a rock? Jesus Christ is our rock." - Joshua Harris

2. The person who's life is built on a rock HEARS Jesus' word.
Most of the time, yeah, we hear about 10% of what other people say. But this should not be the case when it comes to Jesus' words.

"You're in big trouble if the 10% case holds. There is eternal danger." - Joshua Harris. Do not ignore the wisdom of Jesus' word.

"Studying God's word requires WORK...a wise man digs." - Joshua Harris. What this means is that a person who's life is ROOTED in God's word is saved from eternal destruction. Many times we give up reading difficult passages or we no longer find God's word refreshing, or we no longer feel that "emotional thrill or pang" when we read God's word. But as C.J Mahaney says:

"If you want to feel deeply, you need to think deeply."

Most of us want deep, emotional feelings for Jesus (we want this experiential relationship with God) but "feeling built on feeling, emotion built on emotion is EMPTY." - Joshua Harris. "Emotions need to be built on something solid. Something unchanging. And what's unchanging? Sound Doctrine!" The Truth = Jesus. The unchanging truth. (Not something that changes with the weather like that moment you had or some time you cried in the past)

3. We must put Jesus' truth into PRACTICE.
Jesus is talking to believers. "You can know all about Jesus. You could have grown up with Jesus' teaching in your ears. You could have been soaked in his word since you were little, but if you don't put it into practice, you house is built on SAND." - Joshua Harris

Please do not think you're a "rock" person just because you know all about the truth.

--Josh Harris shared his testimony--

And then "Jesus is preeminent. He pushes everything aside. You can't have two preeminent things in your life. You can't say "God, you are preeminent rightttttt alongside my girlfriend heh-heh." - Joshua Harris

His ending words: "You can't truly love your mother, your father, your brother, your son, your daughter if you put them at the center. When you place Jesus at the center, you gain everything." There was a young man who visited Buddhist temples and read the Qur'an, but the closer he got to Pu Sha and Mohammed, the smaller they became to him. And then he turned to the scriptures, and he came to this sudden realization: "The closer I got to Jesus, the bigger Jesus became!.... "

The closer you get to Jesus, the bigger Jesus will get. You might disappoint Jesus many times throughout your life, but Jesus will never disappoint you.

Here is a video during praise with Bob Kauflin:




And pictures:


(The picture above shows the sold-out t-shirts before the Conference even started)


I will post up Day 2 and Day 3 tomorrow. *sigh* so tiredddd.. zzZZzzz
I love you Jesus.

After Next Conference

I am dead tired so I'm just going to post up like 3 pictures and just call it a day. I'll post up notes, videos, and pictures tomorrow.

I bought these three books at the conference:
1) Just Do Something (A Liberating Approach to Finding God's Will) by Kevin DeYoung
2) Humility by C. J Mahaney
3) Sex is not the problem (Lust Is) by Joshua Harris

Above is a bunch of books I'm reading. I have 30 more books on my reading list. I actually finished "The Shack" by WM Paul Young recently. I would recommend this book but I would read it with caution. The author has a huge bias against the institutional church and organized religion, but since the content of the book was amazing, I overlooked that.

I also met a band named "Reilly" at Next Conference. I got to meet two of the members and got my album autographed =) I highly recommend their songs. There's none of that lovey dovey wishy washiness you might see in other christian artist's songs where you can't tell whether it's a love song or a worship God song. Another amazing thing about "Reilly" is that their music has an amzing blend of classical music and rock. The two band members I met, Noelle and Dan (married to each other), are the violin duos on the band. They were really happy to hear I go to school in California. I promised to email them if an opportunity to come to UC Berkeley to give a concert at our church comes up. I'll have to talk to Eunice about that.


http://reillytheband.com

I also got this funny sticker from Next Conference:

Love,
Lily

Conference: Day 2

First of all, I just want to tell you guys that I'm so blessed to have sisters like you. Your comments on my last post really really made me happy =)

Second of all, I'm being challenged and pulled left and right by the messages from the conference (and the sessions). Today Kevin DeYoung and D.A Carson came to speak to us (yesterday Joshua Harris spoke of Christ's Pre-Eminence) about Christ's Life and Incarnation. I learned things I never knew before, and it has made me realize how small I have made my God to be. How easy and manageable I have made Jesus out to be in my mind. Kevin DeYoung's message was like a siren in my ears (Do you really know Jesus? If you have never felt fear or ever felt discomforted by Jesus like the way the disciples felt when Jesus only spoke ONLY three words to a STORM "Quiet! Be Still! (Mark 4:35-41) and the storm OBEYED immediately...you do not truly know him). Jesus commands nature, demons, sickness/disease, and death (Storm, "Legion," the bleeding woman, and Jairus's little girl). Through Jesus....all things were created. The fullness of God dwells in Him. Jesus is God and Lord over all. I don't think I have truly, deeply understood the gravity of this.

D.A Carson's message was also like a needle that penetrated my shrouded view of God. God does not need you and me. YOU need God. God did not create the earth and people so that they can whip out their guitars and sing praises to Him. God is so much from himself, he doesn't need anyone or anything. It was out of goodness that God created us. When John wrote God so loved the world...John wasn't talking about the dimensions of the world and relating it to how big God's love is. God's love is awesome not because the world was so big but because the world was so bad.

**This is just a very tiny synoposis of what I learned. I will post up notes and pictures and videos hopefully the day after tomorrow. The conference ends Tuesday and I've been there basically from 9:00 a.m till 11:30 p.m. (More than 14 hours of just worshipping and praising God. It's been wonderful).

As a side note, I got to shake Josh Harris's hand. I was so speechless to see him just kind of pop out of nowhere and say "Hi," that all I could do was just shake his hand back and just kind of like nod my head in acknowledgement. I was standing next to someone who was Josh Harris's kid's home-school teacher and he saw her and went up to say "Hi" and then saw me and was probably like "Hey, new kid" and just said "Hi" as well. Yeah, even now I'm still a little shocked, and I kind of wished I got to say a little bit more. Man, now I'm thinking what it'll be like to meet Jesus Christ face to face....I think I'll just drop dead or something...okay maybe not drop "dead" cuz I was saved and all but most likely fall to my knees with my head bowed to the floor and never get up.

Anyways, I'm excited about tomorrow. C. J Mahaney and Sinclair Ferguson will be talking during the sessions. Can you believe Convenant Life Church gets speakers like Jerry Bridges and John Piper to come speak on Sundays? I'm excited.

Love,
Lily

P.S Like I promised, I'm taking good notes for you guys! And cool videos too!

Life in MD

What's Happening (Currently in Baltimore, Maryland)

• Tomorrow is the NEXT 2009 conference (Starts at 7:30 p.m tomorrow) So Excited! Can't wait! My mom and I will be driving up to the Baltimore Convention Center. Here's the schedule for tomorrow night:

7:45 pm - 10:15 pm -- Christ's Preeminence: Joshua Harris
10:30 pm - 11:30 pm -- Community Groups

• Here's a picture my mom took of my brother and I before he left for China today (I told him to buy a "I Love China" shirt for Angel and I! *If you want one too, tell me!)
  

• That's all for now! I'll definitely post pictures from the conference tomorrow!

Love,
Lily

Loving the Unlovable

This bible verse really stuck out to me today:

Matthew 5:46 "If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect."

I couldn't help but take a very critical look at myself. I came to this conclusion: I seem to love people only when they love me back. I love this verse so much because it motivates me to fight my natural tendency to distance myself from people I don't get along with or people I don't really like.

But like the verse stated: "What are you doing more than others?" When I'm loving certain sisters, my parents, and my leaders but distancing myself from people who seem "unlikeable" or people with strange personalities (kind of funny considering how strange I am), or coarse people with rough tongues, or selfish, whiny brats who only seem to care about themselves, or the awkward, or the people who love to point out other people's flaws or talk about others behind people's backs, or people who are always suspicious of other people's motives*, etc. how can I call myself "Christian" (Little Christ**) when I'm not doing anything more than what non-Christians do?

*All of these bad characteristics actually describe me. When others display these characteristics and therefore are like me (similar in flaws), I naturally want to put as far a distance as possible between them and me.

But this verse really opens my eyes and it encourages me to step outside my "zone" to reach out and to care for people who I normally don't like to associate myself with. The funny thing is the people who I normally don't like to associate myself with are the people I relate with the most because I am a sinner with many, many, many bad points. Honestly, I see a little bit of myself in everyone's flaws.

As I become more spiritually mature, I hope I never lose the awareness that I am a total, complete sinner but God loves me anyway. Because I have experienced this wonderful love that I do not deserve but God has shown me anyway, I want to show the same compassion to other sinners who don't know Christ or know Christ but is wavering in their faith.

I don't want to become like a Pharisee who says "I thank God I am not like this tax collector..." Or else I'll never be able to relate with other people! Oh how puffed up I would be! Instead, I pray I will have the tax collector's mindset: "Have mercy on me, for I am a sinner." I want to be someone who has ZERO illusion of his/her own merit, so I can truly experience God's wonderful grace, mercy, and unconditional love for me.

Love,
Lily

** C.S Lewis's description of Christians: "Every Christian is to become a little Christ. The whole purpose of becoming a Christian is simply nothing else." (Mere Christianity) - This touches on the last part of the verse "Be perfect, therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect." We got to imitate Christ :)