As some of you may know I have accepted a position form NAVAIR to work on military related field work. Currently I am located in a small town by the name of Ridgecrest out of middle of no where, or in other term, in a middle of a desert.

While I was about to leave Santa Barbara many have asked me why take such a position when if another opportunity in SB may show up, or even a job in LA where I can rejoin my home church in HOC while I have done service in both. My answer is quite simple, God called me to be there, and I am going to answer Hes calling.

The first significant calling I received was to attend UCSB for my college career. Although in the eyes of many the results doesn’t seem that miraculous, I had no significant role play in the church in SB, I was not heavily involved in fellowship, nor did I accomplish anything significant thats worth while to Christiandom.  However, I have to admit that through these 4 years, God has moved me in a drastic way in terms of Christian knowledge and attitude.

I will have to admit in High school I was not a mature Christian, I say this because I handled many things in my own way merely picking up Bible versus and prayed that the Holy Spirit will guide me while I fought for the glory of God’s kingdom. There were many incidents that some might recall such as the Prom issues or the Hacienda Heights home group leadership issues. I can say today that many of the arguments that I made that time are still Biblical, and I will still abide to the things I have said, however, many things were executed out of merely human emotions, where as the time I personally treated these human emotions as the influence of the Holy Spirit

Some might recall again that I was a somewhat serious blogger on Xanga until my freshman year in college. I was quite happy about my status as a blogger when Jaeson Ma refereed me as the “crazy xanga dude”. But slowly the blog became device for me to express bitterness towards the church, and knowing that it was not beneficial for me or for the readers, I decided to quit.

Recently my father mentioned to me that I should keep the old stuff that I wrote, simply because it demonstrates how different I have become since then. I have to agree, because experiencing God’s calling for me in SB in many ways have made me understand many things about Him that I was never exposed to. And now, since I will be experiencing the 2nd calling for my life, I have decided to start this new blog, and hopefully, it will be enjoyable as my Xanga for those dedicated readers and also beneficial for Christians like my brother Eric Chang’s theological oriented blog.

So for the first post, I will like to write about my life in SB, because I believe that it is the missing puzzle from the old xanga to the new tumblr.

After praying sincerely for God’s will to be done on me as a servant, there was a clear calling for me to go to UCSB. That time I have been having many political issues with several people in HOC, and I have to say I was in a low point in my spiritual life.

Heres how everything started.

Being a disciple of Caleb Lin, and due to the different opinions on wheater the members from HOC that attended UCLA should help Jaeson Ma’s student ministry on campus or establish a UCLA homegroup that will function independently from Jaeson Ma. My discipler Caleb Lin left HOC and became a really dedicated leader for the Passion Church ministry. Since I was still in High school, I couldn’t do much but to cross my fingers hoping that I will end up in UCLA so I can at least contribute and help out Caleb. However, one thing that ticked me off was when many of the leaders in HOC decided to go to Prom. Of course, theres nothing in the Bible that says that its prohibited (Despite theres many hints that we shouldn’t) . But for me I had one thought that eventually lead to me becoming a Anti-HOCist. “If Caleb Lin was still here, this won’t happen.”, (despite later on during a trip to San Diego, Caleb himself has prove my theory to be false). This mind set later on developed into “I will finish this fight for Caleb Lin”

As you can see, Instead of Jesus, Caleb Lin was in the picture, so of course the story didn’t have a happy ending (sorry Caleb Lin fans, reality is often cruel). And I was pretty much striped away many opportunities to lead or serve because my actions has disrupted “unity” in the church.

So while I was pondering about the idea of “unity” during my years in SB. In the begging,  I disliked the idea of “unity” merely because it seemed to be a tool used by the church to make everyone follow the leaders. And in my situation, the leaders by going to prom was wrong, yet they used the idea of “unity” to shut me up, when I clearly had scripture references and a great Caleb Lin quote that should be inscribed in stone : “Will you be ashamed of yourself knowing that Jesus is in the midst of Prom, watching you dancing to unglorifying music, worshiping vain beauty, and wasting money satisfying your own flesh instead on the poor?”
So I abandoned the idea of “unity”, to me it was a handicap, it prevented me from doing whats right in the eyes of God just to make everyone else happy.

I was still Christian, but I pretty much stop going go to church, because I wanted to study other aspects of Christianity that the church was afraid to talk about because it might harm the “unity” of the church. Subject such as High criticism, The protestant ideals, Calvinism, Jewish history and many others. Through these studies, God became a clear picture, and many things in the Bible (especially the Old Testament) all made sense to me, and I found my self slowly becoming more mature in the Christian faith by basing my thoughts more on theological fundamentals instead of my own emotions.

Then came a sudden opportunity for me to spend a couple days with Caleb Lin and Jaeson Ma in UCSD, it was a good time, and for me it was like getting out casted from HOC, but through divine appointment God brought me to the guys that appreciate my opinion on Christian church politics (even though I was rejected from UCLA, which made me depressed for a while). And I was encouraged to do something in UCSB, so I thought about join a fellowship and see if through service I can make a difference for God.

But it was very disappointing. seeing the fellowship on campus actually made me appreciate the people at HOC even more. For some reason, many of the leaderships here were into secular culture, and for me it was stumbling, it was worst then the idea of Christians going to Prom. For me, it was very distracting when people start to talk celebrity gossips and similar junk right after a sincere prayer meeting, and within a few months I have given up on being a member with the same idea that I have to be “unified” with the body, when the body itself in many ways was stumbling me.

But when one is helpless with a desire to still serve God, God often makes surprising ways for people. At my down times I received calls from different people from HOC, and in amazing ways my bitterness towards HOC dissolved without myself noticing. And in the mean time I met many respectable people in SB that provided me an opportunity to serve at the SB Chinese church.

I have to say that the members of the church were more Christ oriented then fellowship members in a way that the conversation were not as secular. Despite that  sometimes the songs that they play in the car still disturbs me, but everyone had a heart to serve our Lord, and many of them lived a Holy spirit driven life style which can be observant in the way they discipline themselves.

It was through the services I begin to understand what “unity” meant in God’s eyes. There were many cases where I almost got into fights with other brothers in church. topic such as predestination or whether the Holy Spirit was with Christ or not during His death on the cross. But slowly I have realized I did not have to do everything they want me to do in order to be “unified” as a body. All that matters was that we are doing what we do for the sake of Jesus, and let the Holy Spirit do the rest.

A memorable incident was when my friend and assistant pastor asked me to do Chinese translations for him. Besides being both Redsox fans(trust me, I used to dislike him but after finding out he was a Redsox fan made us friends, I think this is also a divine joke that God set up for me). We were pretty different in many theological beliefs (Hes Armanist and I’m a Calvinist, kind of like Yankee Redsox rivalry), and I myself disagreed with certain parts of the sermon that I was going to translate. But 2 days before hand, we went together in lunch, not to have a debate on whose right or wrong, but to pray that we can be used as vessels for the sake that Christ’s name is glorified.

Really simple idea, theres is no right or wrong, merely who has a better relationship with Jesus.

Now unity meant something different to me, now it is not about me following what the church says without thinking about theology, but to put aside my beliefs as a Christian for the sake that Christ maybe glorified. a hard concept for me to following when I am a Christian who stress on having correct Christian fundamentals and theology. But it is through services like these that I see great impacts when the Holy Spirit uses people that put themselves aside to make Christ glorified.

So following 3 years of self studying and 1 year of minor church service. instead of being where I wanted to be, I was able to equip myself in knowledge and understanding, rather in preaching or service. and through God’s grace, I received a calling to the desert within days after graduation.

I like the desert despite all the negatives people may see. Because maybe I’m a Old Testament lover, because when God is about to use someone for something great, they always go through the desert. and for me, this is not just something spiritual, but physical. and I am thankful for everything He has planed to make my stay in the desert possible and challenging.

With everything I have said, I hope that my desert experience will be something not so much that I have accomplished, but what God has been doing to shape me as a servent.