Gratitude to various people who have equipped me in their own respective ways

There have been various people I have come across within the past 10 years or so who have, both intentionally and unintentionally, equipped me to learn the particular skills that they possessed.

As this year comes to an end I got a little reflective and realized that I owe a lot of gratitude to these people whom God has used to cultivate certain traits in me with. There have been many areas that I have grown in that I have learned by virtue of studying from a variety of people in my life who had their own unique craft.



In no particular order, here are some of them:

1)Overcoming self-consciousness in potentially awkward situations. Learned from Sam Hui, my best friend in highschool.

This is something that, in my opinion, can't be learned (at least fully) from books. The reason why I think that, is that this trait is something that pretty much most sane human beings would want to possess. Who in their sane mind would not want to overcome the psychological-straightjacket of self-consciousness in "awkward" situations that typically render the average person socially paralyzed as to how to get oneself out of the "awkward turtle" situation? We have probably all told ourselves at times to "not be self-conscious!". Yet many of us still have this problem despite telling ourselves not to have it. It is not an ignorance problem.

I am incredibly blessed to have hung around this individual a lot in highschool. He had absolutely zero-shame when he encountered (and sometimes engineered) awkward moments with people. I have no idea how he did it, and still does it, but he seems to have a forcefield around his mind that makes him immune to being paralyzed by the socially-induced fear of other people's opinions of doing "stupid"/"weird"/"strange" things. And it rubbed off onto me as I hung around him a lot in highschool. This is a trait that is caught more than it is taught, and I see how my social interaction is highly influenced by all those highschool years of being molded by him.

One anecdote. One time, as he was doing his homework in the hall, either he or someone else accidentally spilled the juice in a juicebox onto his schoolbag. He stopped doing his homework, used his mouth to suck the juice off of his schoolbag, then continued doing his homework. All in front of others. He wasn't oblivious to how weird people thought he was. He was aware of it alright. But he's just... him. His forcefield is strong. He acted as if he was the only person in the hall too. Respect.

2)Growing in the art of verbal expression and the skill of articulation. Highly influenced by my first-year-university crush and Joseph Tam.

Before and up to highschool, I didn't really care about developing my skills of articulation and up until then, language was used merely for utilitarian purposes and I was oblivious to the intrinsic value of verbal-craftsmanship. Then, I fell for a girl who was really articulate with her words. When I stalked her blog, I fell in love with her language as well. I really admired her linguistical competency that was so expressive of her very dramatic adolescent experiences. I then endeavoured to overcome my linguistical limitations and to learn how to speak/write more elegantly, eloquently, expressively, and poetically.

Then Joseph Tam, a friend of mine who is just crazy with his language skills, helped me sharpen my craft more. Being very forthright in his corrections and advice, he helped me improve in my journey of becoming a wordsmith.

9 years later, I am so indebted to these 2 individuals who helped me develop this craft. With each increasing year, I have realized more and more the importance of effective communication and how word-choice and word-usage is so important and influential in human affairs. Glad to have developed this craft.

3)Critical thinking with a Christian worldview. Ravi Zacharias opened the door to this.

Although I don't know Ravi Zacharias as a personal friend (I have only shook his hand twice, I think), he was the one who "opened the door" to the world and glory of Christian thinking. Before I encountered him, I never thought that thinking and learning could be fun. It was only after encountering him that I fell in love with loving God with my mind, critiquing things in society taken for granted, defending the Christian worldview intellectually, and just learning more about God and the world through a Christian lens. It was fascinating! It still is!

4)Putting a label on and developing the spiritual gift of "culturally relevant parable making". Jan Johnson helped me develop my theology of culturally relevant parable making as well as inspire me to grow in it.

Through her, I realized that Jesus was doing this all the time. He usually would not give culturally irrelevant analogies to illustrate spiritual truths. When I read the words (paraphrased) that Jesus could take any everyday object in your culture and tell you truths about the Kingdom of God through it, that just opened the door to putting a label on this gift and developing it. Although this gift is not explicitly mentioned in the several lists of spiritual gifts that Paul writes about in his epistles, since Jesus was doing this all the time, I think it is one. I now believe that, since Jesus would not give Korean analogies to Jewish audiences, or African analogies to roman audiences, if he were physically with us today, he would not (at least primarily) give Jewish or Greek analogies to our contemporary North American audiences.

I did think of culturally relevant analogies to express spiritually discovered truths before, but Jan Johnson helped me to put a label on it, gave me biblical basis for it, and inspired me to grow more in it.

5)Reading people. Irene Wong, my co-leader in East Asia.

Before, I wasn't that good in reading people. A lot of it was hit or miss. But God blessed me with a co-leader while being a missionary in East Asia who was naturally gifted in reading people. She showed me the importance of it, and gave me some starter tips of how to grow in it.

That inspired me to do my own research and practice more. I researched Paul Ekman as well as other psychologists who have devoted their entire working lives to studying body language and facial expressions. I have grown a lot in it due to this help.

And I am becoming more and more convinced of the value and premium of being able to read people well. I am significantly better than how I was doing before thanks to Irene and others.

6)Charismatic listening to the Holy Spirit. Colin (don't know his last name) and Francis Jean.

Since I grew up Baptist, I didn't know how to train myself to listen to specific verbal messages the Holy Spirit had to tell me. I mean, I did feel impressions from the Holy Spirit about some things before, like conviction of sin, desire for the Great Commission to be fulfilled in certain parts of the world, and general growth of intimacy felt with God. But I never was able to hear very specific verbal messages from the Holy Spirit about the present, the future, my classmates, my friends, myself, strangers etc.

Colin opened the door when he first prophesied on me in November 2010. Then I kept asking him for practical advice/wisdom in this area of the gift of prophecy. Then through a friend, Francis demonstrated more of it to me and gave me practical tips as well as a workbook that has helped herself a lot in this area. And this workbook has helped me a lot too!

Without these (and others) I wouldn't have grown in this trait!

There are just some of the areas I feel that God has blessed me to grow in that I am severely indebted to him for. Through others, God has equipped me in various areas to be better in any future ministry as well as just to become a better blessing to those I want to serve in Christ.

Thank you Lord.