It took me a while to dig out this last group email I sent out lol! I can't believe it's been 5 or 6 years since our last gathering! It feels like yesterday! I just thought of you guys time and time again recently and feel prompted to send you this email! Nothing in particular other than just catching up and share some of my life stories after the small group era:). They significantly transformed my understanding about the good news that I wish I had been spiritually matured enough to share with you during our small group time.

I am always grateful to have known  and spent all these precious time together with all of you. Even though now it does seem a bit crazy to me that, I literately  spent two years helping or leading this small group hahaha. I knew God gathered us for a reason and indeed He has touched our hearts in different ways. However, some of you might have already noticed that, I was quite lost at that time, heavily burdened, and full of anxiety. I took it as an assignment from God to lead the small group, and I felt obligated to live out the so-called "Christian" life to all of you with my own strength. This means sometimes I had to pretend to be someone who I am not. e.g. always loving and overcoming.  God was a distant and demanding master while I was a slave whose only option was to be obedient all the time. I suffered a lot from this wrong image I had about God and I apologize that I might have also passed that wrong image about God to you guys. I remember all my hard work and efforts to please both people and God, only ended in failing, badly. I did not passed my prelim, and my financial and relationship status beat me up to a point that I did not want to be a christian anymore. 

Freedom did not come until I fully understood who I am in God is and who He really is to me.  He has paid the highest price by sacrificing his life on the cross so that I can have a brand new life living inside of me. Because of that, I am priceless, new, holy, powerful and lack of nothing to live out the life He has called me into. This revelation greatly transformed my life not only spiritually but also in the physical realm. I started to have the confidence to ask for wisdom and favor either was retaking my prelim, writing my PhD thesis, or applying for jobs; I started to have the ability to stand firm on my identity and live a joyful life in hope regardless how my job status, relationship status look like; I started to be filled with God's kind of love and love people who offended or hurt me unconditionally and naturally. His love for me never fails and never changes and He is very pleased with me all the time that I don't need to please anybody else. His love is so abundant and without boundaries that I don't need to seek for the transient love from any human beings. He sees my true value and His confidence in me helped pull out the best of me and release my potential to the full. In other words, His death and resurrection has established a new system that we never have to earn our identity through things we do, possessions we own or how successful or charming/influential we are in this world. In this new system, we are no longer cursed by our performance, by the feeling of always lacking something or not good enough! We are, we are good enough because of Him! And that is the good news that the bible is constantly communicating with us from the old testimonies to new testimonies and that is the good news that I meant to but did not have the revelation to share with you before! 

I hope this is not too weird to you lol. Back to the updates, after two years' waiting and receiving all kinds of rejections, I finally found a job in St Louis and will start a new chapter of my life in Jan. I know a lot of you are probably going through different life seasons right now and I want to let you know that you are deeply loved by the all-mighty God, and you are priceless in His eyes, no matter how you are doing. I pray that you are fully aware of your value and unshakable identity all the time, and that will empower you to live a victorious life overflows with freedom and brearkthoughs, supernaturally natural! Each of you are called to a unique plan that no one else but you can fulfill. Known that you have been provided with everything you need to fulfill your destiny in Him, so never never give up!

You are always in my prayers.

I wish you all a very blessed 2018 filled with breakthroughs!

Love in Christ,

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今年的年终终结，嘿嘿 估计来不及写了。2017的最后几天，回旧友，做饭，逛博物馆，狠狠的休息了一阵。2018， 重新出发！