Chinatown Respite Night

This photo collage made with Smilebox

First Launch:

• 1 guest speaker
• 1 volunteer trainer
• 6 volunteers
• 5 children with Autism, 1 child with Down's Syndrome

Praise God!!! :)

This is how God is glorified-- not through our focus on who is strong or who is weak, but through our focus on God, who strengthens both parties to give and to receive... Disability Ministry is not about reaching out to the weak, but about being interdependent with one another in God.

- Toni Kim, staff at Park St. Church

An attempt to update

1. I've moved!

I now live with 4 other girls who go to different churches around Boston. We live in a 3 story house near Porter Sq in Somerville (across the Charles River from Btown).

This is 3 of them sitting on the roof outside my room.

I really like my roof.... Nowadays it's a bit too cold to hang out there. Until April! *salutes*

This is an over exposed photo of me & my roommate Julie. We share the top floor.

Upon seeing this photo, Julie notes, "Hm, I look white. "

She's really chill and nice... I'm comfortable saying that I'd rather share the attic with her than live alone =P

This is all of us, celebrating the Fall season haha...

Most of us are grad students. Steph (far right) actually moved out yesterday and Janessa just moved in. People come in and out of Boston v. quickly.

2. Boston is really pretty...

My (super organized, fun & inspirational) friend Ada and I took an 1 hr long cruise around Boston a couple of weeks ago.

This is my fav... you may have already seen in on fb.

This one was actually taken on Labor Day last year (2009). It is a shot Good Harbor Beach near Beverley, MA.

Boston will start to get really cold soon, though.

... I might have to start dressing like this again. This was when Teresa, Julene, and Jae came to visit me in January!! <3

Everyone says this past winter was actually abnormally mild....... ??? -__-

3. School is....

... well, I try to be optimistic.

Regardless, I am definitely thankful to be in school and living in Btown :-)

Here are some of my buddies from school. Let's just say that we know each other's bodies pretty well at this point........ yes, our curriculum helps.........

Art's 25th

Celebrated a Art's 25th last night in home-made togas. (Living out a college-esque moment never personally experienced?)

As Jen brought out the cake, everyone sang "Happy Birthday" in the lowest pitch and slowest beat possible.

"Haaaaaapppy birrrrrrrrrrrrrrr-thhdayy toooooo Arrrrrrrr..thurrrrrrrr...."

Derek: this is more like a funeral dirge...

"Haaaaaaaapppppyy birrrrrrrthhdayyyy tooooooooooo youuuuuuuuuuuuu...."

Tim: and welcome to your mid-twenties...



Hm, mid-twenties... I want to say it still feels far away......

Mother Teresa's Crisis of Faith

Jesus has a very special love for you. As for me, the silence and the emptiness is so great that I look and do not see, listen and do not hear.

— Mother Teresa, September 1979

Neuner would later write, "It was the redeeming experience of her life when she realized that the night of her heart was the special share she had in Jesus' passion."

"The tendency in our spiritual life but also in our more general attitude toward love is that our feelings are all that is going on," [Kolodiejchuk] says. "And so to us the totality of love is what we feel. But to really love someone requires commitment, fidelity and vulnerability. Mother Teresa wasn't 'feeling' Christ's love, and she could have shut down. But she was up at 4:30 every morning for Jesus, and still writing to him, 'Your happiness is all I want.' That's a powerful example even if you are not talking in exclusively religious terms."

Martin [...] counterproposes her as the heroically constant spouse. "Let's say you're married and you fall in love and you believe with all your heart that marriage is a sacrament. And your wife, God forbid, gets a stroke and she's comatose. And you will never experience her love again. It's like loving and caring for a person for 50 years and once in a while you complain to your spiritual director, but you know on the deepest level that she loves you even though she's silent and that what you're doing makes sense. Mother Teresa knew that what she was doing made sense."

The particularly holy are no less prone than the rest of us to misjudge the workings of history — or, if you will, of God's providence. Teresa considered the perceived absence of God in her life as her most shameful secret but eventually learned that it could be seen as a gift abetting her calling.

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1655415-1,00.html#ixzz0pTaWPM00

Taking pictures

is an investment. Purchasing the equipment and editing the photos is one part of it. And then there's the real-time investment of removing yourself from the moment to capture it, preserve it, and share it.

I miss taking pictures.

There's something about moving to a new city that makes me hyper-aware of myself and everything going on. I don't know if it's the particular city or the life-stage I'm in that breeds a very non-complacent culture. I mean this in the most neutral way possible. There's always a driving force-- be it student loans, brand name degrees, poverty in the neighborhood, or the Boston Red Sox-- that keeps people on the go, thinking and rethinking what to do next, what's worthwhile, what makes most sense, and what would bring us closer to our goals. That's the way I've been experiencing much of life in Boston, anyway-- purposeful and angsty.

So it's been a full year, and I've decided that I like it here. I'm extremely grateful for the opportunities, the growing sense of community, and the inevitable exposures to people very different from myself. Living here has unveiled layers and layers of insecurities I never knew existed-- insecurities that drive me to question and listen for God in ways that I never would have from a place of familiarity and complacency.

Will the angst remain? Who knows-- it's only been a year. And who cares-- the journey's been worth it.

Happy Anniversary, Boston! And cheers to another year to come.
This year, I would like to take some pictures.

Is God Sovereign Over Human Disability?

Yes he is. He tells us so in Scripture:

Then the Lord said to (Moses), "Who has made man's mouth? Who makes him mute, or deaf, or seeing, or blind? Is it not I, the Lord?" (Exodus 4:11)

As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" Jesus answered, "It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him." (John 9:1-3)

To be clear, God's sovereignty doesn't mean he merely permits disability. These verses show us that he sovereignly intends it, both for his glory and for our good—"that the works of God might be displayed."

With that in mind, what do you think about this expansion of Psalm 139:13-16? I've added some additional descriptors in italics to bring out what we really mean if we believe that God is sovereign over disability:

For you formed my inward parts with Down syndrome;
you knitted me together in my mother's womb without eyes.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made with cognitive challenges.
Wonderful are your works in creating me without limbs;
my soul knows it very well though my ears will never hear a sound.
My frame was not hidden from you as you made me with Apert syndrome,
when I was being made in secret with autism,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth without Hexosaminidase A.
Your eyes saw my unformed substance with spina bifida;
in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me with cerebral palsy,
when as yet there was none of them.

* * *

For more biblical and visual proof that God is sovereign and good in designing disability, check out Krista Horning's new book Just the Way I Am.

from http://www.desiringgod.org/Blog/2394_is_god_sovereign_over_human_disability/

Highs in Life

When large Black women smile and greet me, “Heyyy shu-guh!”

Fresh baked cookies

Excellent haircuts

Sense of accomplishment

Having someone to talk to when feeling completely alone

Connecting with someone on a deeper level... depth in relationships

White daisies

Pink and yellow tulips

Being missed

Genuine words of affirmation

Chocolate milk

Playing badminton (slicing)

Cello music

Communion with God

Hope

Empowering individuals and communities

Compassion that unifies

Knowing how to pray for someone

Growth/progress

Clothes I can wear for years

Calculating tip as fast as I can

Fresh sangria

Korean BBQ

Missing people

Juicy oranges

Fresh/ripe fruits

When passages/concepts suddenly/finally make sense

Dreaming about what could be and brainstorming realistic ways to make it happen

Sense of family/community

Funny moments I can replay in my head repeatedly

Truth that transforms

Music that moves

Clean dishes

Biking downhill

A sense of purpose

Nature

Reading on the T

Remembering little things about people

Learning about things that are important to other people

Picnics

Photos that capture the moment

Thinking about Jesus

Making sure people don’t feel left out

When different groups of friends meet and genuinely like each other

Cooking with or for people

(Long) emails from friends/family

Google and Wikipedia

Letters

Completely honest and meaningful conversations

Sharing what I love with people around me

Swings

Trust

Reconciliation

Freedom

Restored value in brokenness

Simplicity

The bigger picture

Roasted almonds

Hot milky drinks

Getting back up and pressing on