no.247 140102 Thank you for the morning prayer

White hot chocolate trio!

I woke up early in the morning for the New year's morning prayer. Thankfully a friend of mine was going as well, so he picked me up on his way to church. The focus of this morning's prayer topic was "Love one another." It felt like it was a continuation from last year as John 15:17 says "And this is my command: love each other."

I didn't think it was that difficult to love each other. But I was only thinking about my family and friends who also love me back. I didn't think about  others. I think I just went blank after realizing that I  have to love beyond the ones who love me. How do I love my neighbour? How do I love people that I pass by on the street? And most of all, how do I love people who have hurt me?

In my prayers, I say I want to be like Jesus. I want to love like the way He loves me. I know my love is not comparable to His love, and no matter how hard I try, I can never give that kind of love to others. I just can't because I will never comprehend God's love for me. It is beyond what I can measure. I pray that as I hope to develop more Christ-like characters in me, that I will share Christ-like love to others. Also, just as my pastor had mentioned this morning, I want my church to be the place where we are not only passionately in love with God, but also with each other so that when non-Christians see us, that they will notice something different about the worldly love. Since my church is big in number, I want to start in small groups. I guess preschool department is small enough to start since we're down to five teachers and one pastor. I want to encourage my fellow teachers as I share my devo this Sunday before the preschool meeting.

The new year's early morning prayer will last until the 18th of January. I can't promise that I will be there every single day (in fact, to be honest I know I won't be there that often), but I would like to try to go twice more at least. It was so tiring today because I didn't get that much sleep last night. However I enjoyed my time praying with the church in the morning. I trust that God has listened to our prayers, and He will answer each of them in His perfect timing.

Right after the prayer meeting, I came home and found my self taking a short nap... which then made me even more tired because I just couldn't wake up from that sweet nap! I had no choice but getting up because of the preschool meeting at church. Since the EM at my church is undergoing a major change in the new year, we had to clean up and move some stuff around to get ready for coming Sunday.

On the way home from church, my preschool pastor, my co-teacher and I decided to take a little detour. It was a nice girl time with the teachers, as we talked and shared about our life experiences as we all stand in different stages of life. It was nice because we're always so busy with the children on Sundays and we barely get to talk. Relationships are God's blessings. I am so blessed to have Christian friends and Christian mentors around me with whom I can share about my life in a deeper level than how much I can share with my non-Christian friends. I thank God for these relationships that He's blessed me with in my life, and I thank Him for the new relationships I will have and grow in this new year.