Create In Me a Clean Heart

“let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water." Hebrews 10:22

          This past month, the Lord has been doing a major work of cleansing my heart.  When I received Jesus into my heart many years ago, I became a new creation according to 2 Corinthians 5:17.  On that Sunday morning of October 21^st 1995, things became new and the old was gone.  When bible says the old is gone and behold all things have become new, what does that actually mean?  Does it mean that all of a sudden I have now been completely cleansed/sanctified?  I don’t think so.  What happened was justification (I received a right standing with God) but the work of sanctification had just begun.  As I was thinking about it, the Lord gave me a picture of a house whose old tenant moves out and a new tenant comes in.  Jesus became the new tenant of my heart but he had a lot of cleaning to do.   When I first moved into the house I live in right now, I did some major cleaning but even at this point there still areas I am yet to clean.  When it comes to cleaning a house, there are areas we clean almost every day like the kitchen.  Then there are others we clean maybe once or twice a week.  Then things like windows get cleaned only after so many months.  And depending on how much dust there is around, some areas get dirty as soon as they are cleaned.  That is the same with our hearts.

At the National Museum
of the Royal Kingdom
of Cambodia

                        

         Salvation (justification, sanctification and glorification) is a work of grace.  It is not by works lest any of us should boast.  Yet Paul tells in Philippians 2:12 to work out our salvation with fear and trembling.  Then he goes on to add that it is God who works in us to will and act according to his good purpose.  That for me has meant that I yield my heart to the Holy Spirit to do the work of cleansing (sanctification).  As I was praying the above scripture this past month, the Lord did more than I had imagined.  He did more than cleanse me from a guilty conscience but went deeper into the recesses of my heart and shed light on things I needed to deal with in his presence – things I would have never thought of on my own.  Here I was concerned about gaining more language vocabulary and learning more about the Khmer culture and never anticipating that the Lord will do a thorough ‘work’ in my heart.  There are issues and burdens and attitudes and hurts and hidden faults, some of which I had carried from childhood, which I had to lay before the Lord.   I know the Lord is not finished with me and I am so humbled even as I write this because I know this could not happen apart from his grace.  I am reminded of David’s prayer in Psalm 51:10-13 where David was praying for a clean heart and in verse 13 he says ‘then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will turn back to you.’  David knew that before he could teach transgressors the ways of the Lord, he needed his heart to be clean and his mind to be made pure and his joy of salvation to be restored. 

•  Pray that I will continue to let the water of his word to cleanse me.  Pray that God himself, the God of peace, will sanctify me through and through. That my whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. (1 Thes 5:23)

• Pray that God will continue to equip me mentally, spiritually, linguistically, physically and emotionally for that work he has called me to in Cambodia.

• Pray for the Cambodia.  Pray for rain.  They are predicting a drought this year.  Also, pray for the rain of the Holy Spirit, that the knowledge of Lord will cover Cambodia even as the waters cover the sea.

Open Doors; Open Hearts

“And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains." Colossians 4:3

Inside a Pagoda (Buddhist Temple)
when we went for a burial of a friend of
my friends' father

As a Daniel learner*, apart from learning language and observing the culture around me, one of the other things I am required to do is to read about the Cambodian history.  In January I started a reading marathon of reading one book a week and it has been heartbreaking to read about the Cambodian history.  When I was reading Killing Fields Living Fields by Don Cormack, there were times I would put the book down and just cry.  The book focuses on the history of the church in Cambodia but also mentions what the whole country went through especially during the Pol Pot regime.  Before Pol Pot in April 1975, the church had grown to about 10,000 believers only to be trimmed down to about 200 believers at the end of that very dark period in Cambodian history in 1979.  And like the terror they went through was not enough, the church underwent another 10 plus years of persecution from the government being denied

freedom of worship and some of them being put into prison because of the name of Jesus.  One thing that encouraged me as I was reading is that God is Sovereign over the nation of Cambodia and He is not blind to what they went through in the hands of the fellow countrymen.  What the devil intended for evil, God turned it for the good of the church in Cambodia and used it to save many people as many of them started to question their Buddhist beliefs and came to find answers only in Christ.

My language teacher and me during a cultural visit  to a school. Unfortunately we went on a day when there  were no pupils.

My language teacher and me during a cultural visit 

to a school. Unfortunately we went on a day when there 

were no pupils.

A typical Cambodian countryside home

         

One thing I thank the Lord for right now, is that the doors for the gospel in this country are open.  That does not mean that the Cambodian Christians still don’t go through persecution in the hands of the fellow countrymen – whether direct or indirect.  The other day I asked my Khmer friends what is one of the challenges in sharing the gospel in Phnom Penh and they said it is closed doors.  They explained that in the countryside, people live in community and there are no gates or high walls.  What that means is that people are accessible unlike here in the City of Phnom Penh.  Also, with the horrific things the country/people of Cambodia have gone through, it is only obvious that their hearts become untrusting and suspicious.  But who can blame them really?

 Therefore: -

• Pray with me that not only an effectual door of ministry be opened but also that the hearts of the Cambodian people be opened to the gospel.  Pray for all who are serving here in Cambodia – ministries and churches.

• Pray that the believers in Cambodia will unite as one and join hands to see the Kingdom of God come to Cambodia.

• Thank God for an open door to my neighbor’s house who has continued to help practice language and even taught me how to make one Khmer dish.  Also thank God for the grace he has continued to give me as I learn the Khmer language and culture.  Pray for more opportunities to interact with Khmer people.

*OMF term for those who are learning language and culture before they launch into their respective ministries.  It was adapted from the book of Daniel.