Joyful

I'm feeling quite happy at the moment. A lot happened this week - things around me, inside me, things done for me, things I had to do. But yeah, I'm pretty happy and thankful right now. After chemistry lab today I got to share the Gospel and just talk about God and His awesomeness and life and what I believe in with my lab partner Sterling for like, over an hour. I was soooo excited! It's actually been on my heart for a while now to share with him the Gospel and my faith, but for some reason it never really happened until this Friday afternoon. So I thank You God for answering my prayer and making it finally happen. we talked about many many topics: sin, creationism, God's fairness, 2012, joy peace purpose contentment true love eternal life... one thing that I really got to share and expound on was happiness vs. joy. In light of what I've been experiencing (and also what we've been studying through the Beth Moore study on fruit of the Holy Spirit), it was pretty neato to share with him the difference between the two - how happiness depends on our environment and things that happen to us, but joy is everlasting and not contingent upon our externals... that even though we may be sad, we can still have joy in our hearts, or we may be momentarily unhappy but we're able to get over that and move on because we have joy in Christ Jesus. Here I also tied in hope in Christ and also the great great reassurance of knowing that we are LOVED by God... that nothing can separate us from the Love of our Father - not even life nor death, angels nor demons, height nor depth, not even SATAN or anything else in this entire world can separate us from the Love of God. (I showed him Romans 8:38-39)

I feel really happy and encouraged by God that I got to share with my lab partner and am glad that he's interested and asking many questions and seems very open to hearing. Of course I pray that he'll hear all this and RECEIVE this gift and believe in Jesus so he can also experience this eternal joy and relationship with God that's only possible through Jesus Christ. I'm looking forward to Part 2 of our conversation next week, too, since we had to end short because he had an eye appointment. Just got off the phone with one of my leaders (he's also my EV-ing buddy on Berkeley campus on Wednesday afternoons) and shared with him what happened today; the both of us are very encouraged indeed! :)

I'm also really thankful (and joyful!) that I'm doing better than Tuesday hehe. Feel more recentered on Christ, though I still have my struggles here and there. I'm just so enamored with Jesus and all that He is to me, all that He's done for me, all that He will do for me... just absolutely amazing and beyond description. I'm His BELOVED! Oh yeah, in Russian class on Wednesday we learned how to say "beloved" in Russian: любимая (pronounced "lubimaya") -feminine, the masculine is любимый (pronounced "lubimuy"). I loooove that word, so much that I wrote it on my hand with a heart (although my Russian teacher said that it's a term that's rarely used because it's very antiquated and old and people just say "bf/gf" or "spouse" these days). I was telling my friends Tammy and Victor one time that I sorta want a tatoo that says "beloved" haha to always remind me that I am forever God's beloved.

I'm also reeeeeally thankful for Wednesday night after Large Group! I received help on graphing on Excel, I was fed, and I was driven home... and earlier that day I was sort of feeling sickly/nauseous but definitely much better afterwards. So much undeserved grace from God. Ahhhh I feel so blessed :)