Facing the Giants

"There were two farmers in the land, and there was no rain for a long time. Because of that, the prayed real hard for a rain to pour down in their field. However, it turns out that only one of the two prepared the field for the rain. So, who was the real Christian to you?"



Sebuah kalimat yang cuma diucapkan sekali dalam film ini, Facing the Giants, yang baru-baru ini saya tonton bersama-sama dengan teman-teman. An interesting film, not a holywood level of film of course, but touching lives of all people who watched it. This was actually a great film to me. And a great blessing for all of us who watched it together.


Satu perenungan pribadi dalam hatiku waktu saya menonton film ini adalah, betapa seringnya kita berdoa dan berdoa, memohon berkat Tuhan, memohon pertolongan Tuhan, memohonkan kepadaNya supaya kita dilepaskan dari pencobaan. Tetapi Tuhan tidak (langsung) menjawabnya. Dan terlebih lagi, itu membuat kita bertanya-tanya, dimana Tuhan? (pertanyaan serupa yang dibahas buku 'Where is God in te messed up world?' yang baru-baru ini saya baca.. will be discussed in another time) Ujung-ujungnya kita patah arang.. mempertanyakan Tuhan dan kehendakNya.

It is funny that we humans are so weak. We don't see the true meaning of "perseverance" and we think more of "Our wish" rather than "God's will". We even sees God in our point of view, not by who He really are. We want Him to be what we wanted, but we missed the fact that our will is smeared by our sin. We are created for His glory, which made us and binds us to do what He want us to do, not do our version of "we think that it's what He wanted to do because it's comfortable for us". We rejected the idea of who God is that is different from what we wanted Him to be, showing how self centered our life really is.

"If we play (American) football to win, so what? We will be discussed over a period, and what happened in five or more years? No one will actually remember. If we play only to win, then it shows how self centered we are, how useless the philosophy of our (American) football"

Saatnya kita berbenah diri.

Sudahkah kita bertanya pada diri kita: Apakah kita sudah melihat Tuhan sebagai Tuhan yang benar-benar Dia? Apakah kita menuhankan Tuhan versi yang kita inginkan, tanpa melihat apa yang menjadi kehendakNya dalam kehidupan kita?


"If we win the game, we praise God. If we lose, we praise God. Winning or Losing, we do it for God. It is my hope to be able to become a blessing, a testimony to everyone around us, how great our God is"



Wow

We know, theoretically what to do. Tapi melakukannya dan mengetahui adalah dua hal yang sangat berbeda. Mengakui kedaulatan Tuhan dalam kehidupan kita, dan menyerahkan segala daya upaya kita kepadaNya, kedalam tangan dan kehendakNya. Melakukan segala sesuatu dengan 100% atau malah 110% karena kita melakukannya untuk Tuhan dan bukan untuk manusia, apalagi diri kita sendiri. That's what God want us to do!

Knowing, being, doing -- knowing is not enough. The scribes and pharisees knows about God, His propechy, the Messiah. They knows He did miraculous things that was never been performed before, beyond any imagination. Yet, they didn't believe in Him as a Messiah. No. The choose not to believe in Him. They don't want to accept Him as Messiah. The 'messiah' in their minds was someone strong. A royal family. A general that set them free from Romans. Not a saviour that will die on the shameful cross to atone for our sins. Even Peter was once disillusioned by this view. And guess what Jesus said after hearing it.

Let's do what God want us to do. What our reason for living, what we are here for.

Soli deo Gloria

thanks to Septian who worked and insisted so hard for the movie screening =)