PASSION 2010

 He is real.

Sorry guys! I've been pretty busy lately so my Passion 2010 experience blog post was delayed. But the wait is over! Sooooo those four days were pretty eye-opening. Honestly, at first I said to myself, "Why am I here?" I am SO not a morning person, so it was REALLY difficult for me to stay awake. No sleep = super cranky Sharon. I went back and watched the sermons online. Listening to the speakers that spoke at Passion 2010, I was really amazed at the messages that they gave. My assigned family group (somewhat equivalent to a small group) met in the morning before the A.M. main session and after the P.M. main session, and the dicussion helped me so much. For me, personal one-on-one talk helps me a lot after sitting in a 22,000 people crowd for 2+ hours because I can ask questions and converse deeply. There was a Brazilian guy named Fernando and a Czech Republican girl named Eva in my group, which was pretty cool! It was really encouraging to see people all over the world come to Atlanta for this conference. I had barely traveled 40 miles to come to this place with a hopeful heart but a grudging attitude. But nonetheless, I have learned quite a lot through Passion 2010.

1) God is real.

     I would say that this was the biggest lesson learned for me. I always had doubts about God and Christianity in general. What if God isn't real? What if this is all a hoax? Am I wasting my life following Jesus? But John Piper's message made God seem so real to me. The principal matter of this message was the fact that God is God-centered. In word of extremity, God is an egomaniac. Yes, confusing, isn't it? If God loves us, gives us grace and mercy, saved us from hell by giving us his one and only Son, did everything so that we could live, then why is God only concerned about His own glory? Because God is the only true pure and holy "thing" in this universe. If God didn't love himself, then it would be unrighteous. Every time we sin, you are choosing that sin over God's glory. And we are so insignificant compared to the infinite and glorious God. In John Piper's words, "our foundation of our salvation is not our worth but God's infinite worth. There is no sturdier foundation." We can only come to the fullness of our joy in His greatness.

²³For all have sinned and   fall short of the glory of God,  ²⁴and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. ²⁵God presented Him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in His blood. He did this to demonstrate His justice, because in His forbearance He had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— ²⁶He did it to demonstrate His justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus. -Romans 3:23-26

I had an epiphany. All of a sudden, God seemed so real. What God would not be self-centered on His own glory? But what God gives us grace through His own glory? What God made a sacrifice so precious and of His own for tainted humanity? God's love is incomprehensible.

2) Be fearful of God.

Francis Chan touched on this briefly during one of the breakout sessions. I think a big reason why I don't exalt or revere God enough is my lack of fear of God. Yes, He is loving,caring, merciful and magnanimous. This one-sided God is advertised mostly for the sake of evangelism and discretionary intention for the younger generation. But God is wrathful and jealous God. And I need to recognize that. If I don't trust in God fully, I will be eternally damned as morbid as that sounds.

I think Passion 2010 has really helped me: the Word-filled messages, the family group discussions, the heart-touching worship, the big encouragement of involvement in helping the Word of God reach every corner of the world. When I came back, I couldn't wait to share with my friends what I had learned.

So Jina, my best friend and I, went thrift-shopping the day after I came back. By the way, I got some really cute stuff I'd like to show you guys, but something is wrong with my Bluetooth connection for my phone camera so I can't send the pictures to my laptop. As soon as I fix it, I'll update. Anyway, afterward Jina and I met up with April and had a four-hour-long talk about God at Hansel & Gretel. Crazy, eh? But I loved every minute of it. I am so so so thankful to God that He has given me this opportunity to discuss intensely about God-related things with friends who I had never even dreamed of conversing with about this subject. It brought me great joy to share what I learned at the Passion conference especially to my once non-Christian friend. It is truly amazing to see how much my close friends have grown in Christ.

This blog post is getting long enough. I have updated the rest of the photos from Passion 2010 to my flickr photostream. Oh and it snowed in Georgia today! I took pictures but still can't get them onto the computer :( I'll fix it soon!

-예수님  닮은  예닮