How Has Urbana Changed the Way You Live?

Benjamin Lau's answer to the question.  How has Urbana changed the way you live?

There were two main things I learned and has changed the way I live.

During a session on unity, Michelle Higgens stated that “indifference is neither hate nor love”. We cannot be indifferent about the stories of this world. If we are to be family, we must listen to everyone’s story and engage. Coming back from Urbana we had a chance to debrief with our pastors about this topic and they really helped me understand that the first step in developing a community within our church is to be thankful of the current state of the people. Though I could easily point out all the things we could improve and made me ungrateful of where people were at. In order to love and be in unity, I realized I needed to first accept people as they are no matter where they are at in their walk. Through accepting people despite their inequities, I am now able to share my life and engage intentionally with them.

In another session about missions I was reminded that there are also times when we forget the true meaning of missions. “there are some who manufacture the heart for missions but miss the heart for Christ. Missions is not your life, Christ is! Missions is the overflow of your love for Christ” - David Platt. I realized I was once guilty of this. I began saying to myself “missions is our life” when I forgot that actually Christ is. By defining my life as Christ it made me love Him that much more. Without Christ everything I did was meaningless. God changes people from the inside first then it is outwardly expressed and the outward expression also contains missions. The outward expression of my love for Him has led to things that I would not normally do, like intentionally meeting new people and sharing things I wouldn't normally share.

Please continue to be praying for Ben as he pursues Jesus at SFU.