Month: July 2014

I find that sometimes, I have really bad trust issues. A couple of weeks ago, I first started realizing that I have this problem when my hair was getting really long. If you ask any of my close friends, they’ll confirm that I hate what my hair looks like after a haircut (even if half the time, it doesn’t even look bad)… and so I avoid haircuts as much as possible.

2+ weeks ago, Kuya Kyle offered to cut my hair… It took a few offers since I didn’t trust him to cut it (hehe sorry mentor), but I let him cut it eventually. That’s when I first realized that I don’t trust people enough, especially if there’s a possible outcome that I don’t desire.

If you ask anyone that I’ve served with, they’ll confirm that it’s easy for me to trust others in service, but hard for me to let go of my plans and trust God with His. In this TNC season, it’s honestly been such a struggle for me to keep my cool.

I just want to take this time to honour Nikki Dionisio, Kevin Solis and Sab Espina. Working with them in the Accommodations Team is truly a  rewarding and humbling experience. Praise God for you three!

Sab and I were saying that being apart of this team is also kinda scary. We can’t help but worry about drivers and hosts and time and etc. There’s only so much the two of us can do to help Kevin and Nikki because we’re not from Vancouver. As a team, we’ve encountered so many obstacles and we’re heavily relying on our Vancouver counterparts to bring us through. I’m humbled every day because as my worries are heightened as the days grow closer to TNC, I realize that I simply need to trust God. His voice is so loud and so clear when He says, “I am faithful. Have more faith in Me.”

Like the haircut that I’m so afraid of because of what I’ll look like afterwards, there’s so many situations that can lead to undesirable outcomes. And that’s what scares me. Except The Lord is calling me to look past these fears because whatever the outcome of the situation, it will be desirable in the end because The Lord’s plan is always desirable.

Oh Lord, how Your beauty reaches out in the simplest forms and how Your heart beats so explicitly in timing, help me trust that You have everything under control in this life and let me put all my hope in the greatness of Your promise. Amen.

PS. Ask Kuya Kyle how my hair turned out.

Believe it or not, this whole reflection happened because I owed my friend $25.

There have been so many times when I felt really loved by the Lord because I felt Him provide for me. The absence of a firm relationship with God led me to my unbelief in providence but I didn’t believe in coincidences as well. Everything was just too good to pass up to chance but I couldn’t accept that Someone was in control of everything that’s happening. I was a mere passerby, grateful for what I’m receiving but not accepting that He is the one to thank.

As I grew deeper in my relationship with God, everything that I have, all that I had and all that I am, I know it’s all because of Him. All that I have and will receive is because of His love for me.

So I owed my friend $25. I was sad because it resulted to me having to take it from my monthly budget allotted for food. I was contemplating on whether I’d just account the $25 as an added expense and just withdraw another $25. I ended up just accepting that I’d have to spend less on food. The next day, after a work meeting, my boss said that she has a gift for all of us for all our hard work so far. Long story short, I received a $25 gift card from Tim Horton’s! How can I not believe that the Lord provides? He gave me no more, no less. I had Timmy’s food for a week and a half but I cherished every white choco macadamia cookie, yogurt with berries, bacon and egg muffin, and every sip of my green tea.

I started thinking of all the little things that reminded me of the Lord’s providence. As I dug deep through my memories, I couldn’t help but smile and thank the Lord all over again. Here are some of the things I remembered:

1. I was going to commute all the way from Delta to Burnaby for the RYC Victory Party. My co-worker and I shared about our plans after work then I found out she’s going to Burnaby two blocks away from Central Park! So I got a free ride YEY!
2. One time I left my earphones at home. I was so sad because at my old job, I’d get so sleepy when I start working on my projects. Then my boss randomly came up to me and gave me brand new earphones that he just got that day. YEY!
3. I was on the way home from work. I was very smart to base the weather on what the previous day’s weather was. But living in Vancouver, I should have known better. It was pouring and I battled the rain with flats on, no jacket and no umbrella. As I was impatiently waiting for the bus, a sister from my home chapter came up to me and shared her umbrella with me. Share an umbrella, win a friend. YEY!

Oh man, the Lord is so good to me. He knows my every need and provides for me all the time. His goodness will never be unknown to me anymore.

Lord, I steady my heart on the ground of Your goodness. You are the source of my joy. Amen.

So, just to keep things short and sweet, I had the opportunity to go on mission 10 hours North to Prince George to conduct a youth camp…boy was it providential especially after pondering on it up to today.

The Family Ministries was always been a blessing to where ever it is able to flourish. But I myself was not convicted completely yet just because of my own curiosity/ignorance/pride etc etc.

Anyways, after this camp, after seeing the activeness of young couples for Christ and new Youth for Christ…at the end of the camp, the Lord really revealed something to me.

He answered why we are the way we are as a family ministry, youth ministry etc etc.

and He made me ask myself, “Who am I to say that God doesn’t work through _______” could be the games, the prayovers, the worships etc etc…its true. Just like  St. Thomas, the answer was in front of Him the whole time. The Lord works to reveal Himself in every little thing.

I am convicted that God’s plans for me is to serve the youth through the Family Ministry of CFC. Praise God! The Lord is great!

 

Deo Gloria

I wrote before in this blog about culture of mission, I remember then someone asked me, “Kuya, what’s your dream for the next 20 years of CFC Youth and SFC True North?” I replied that I dream of a community  were mission is a culture. Let me add that I am excited to see that  going on mission, sharing the joy and love of being with and for Christ becomes natural to us. I dream that as mission becomes a culture, every member is consciously being and bringing Christ wherever they are. They are doing the work of the Lord not because it is required but because they are genuinely happy!

Lord teach us to dream big for You and Your mission and let it be done according to Your will. Amen.

 

“But where sin increased, grace abounded all the more“

Romans 5:20

This passage suddenly spoke to me in my thoughts and my mind.  Thinking and pondering on my past mistakes and sins, and even my most recent ones, I look back and see God’s mercy and grace at work.  Now, for anyone to read this passage on its own, one might be confused as to what it truly means.  One might be tempted to say, “oh okay, so the more sin, the more grace, so let’s continue to sin!”  But this is not the message Paul is relaying, as he also says:

“What then are we to say?  Should we continue in sin in order that grace may abound?  By no means!  How can we who died to sin go on living in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life”

Romans 6:1-4

So don’t let this passage make you think that we are free to sin, and that we are encouraged to sin, so that we might receive more of God’s grace.  I think what Paul is trying to say is that we are all sinners, yes we sin everyday, yet in this struggle of sin, in this hatred of sin, no matter how much sin is present, God gives us His bountiful and amazing grace, this grace which ABOUNDS all sin, which COVERS all sin.  Paul is trying to tell us, that yes, we are sinners, but we should not simply give in to sin, but we must strive to get rid of it, we must hate sin, and aim for perfection, as Jesus said, “be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect.”  Yes, we will never be perfect and sinless while we are here on earth, but that should not stop us from aiming high, that should not stop us from running the race, this race of faith.  In this race, yes, there may very well be bumps along the way, possibly some hills, maybe even mountains to climb, we may fall here and there, but let not those moments when we fall discourage you from getting back up and running the race, do not be discouraged!  We are encouraged to press on forward …. we are not encouraged to fall, we are encouraged to finish the race!  To keep pressing forward, to keep our eyes on the prize, anticipating the prize in Heaven.

So as we reflect once again on this passage, “but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more,” let us be ENCOURAGED by His LOVE, His GRACE, His MERCY, which covers all our sin, and let us be renewed by His great love for us, and may His Love FUEL our hearts, into spreading this LOVE, His LOVE, to everyone around us.

May God be praised.

a week or two ago, I decided to paint my nails. I don’t usually do it because to be honest, I’m not used to it. The reason being is that the school I attended in the Philippines for about 10 years emphasized simplicity. with that core value came a bunch of rules regarding how we were to dress while in school – no hoop or dangling earrings, only a wristwatch or a bracelet can be worn, applying nail polish was strictly forbidden, and a bunch of others meant to emphasize simplicity, modesty, and austerity in appearance.

I was almost done when my brother came in my room. I asked him how my nails looked and he said they were okay; they looked really blue. all I could see, however, were the imperfections – smudges of nail polish and all sorts of small, mundane things which can be fixed thanks to the wonder that is the nail polish remover. he said I was worrying over nothing because as he so kindly said, no one would inspect / look that closely. all that the people would see is the colour blue.

later that night, I realized that as sad as it was, the way I looked at my nails is how I sometimes look at myself – full of imperfections and flaws (which is a natural thing to do, I know). but what tends to happen is that I focus on my smudges and flaws to the point where I lose sight of the good that other people see in me, the good that I know is within me, and the fact that like the nail polish remover, I can still do things in order to better myself.

at the heart of it though, I think what bothered me the most was the realization that most of the time, I’m hard on myself. I find it hard to forgive myself for things that go wrong even if they’re fixable. or worse, even if I know it’s not my fault because it’s beyond my control and nothing I do can alter the situation.

I don’t know what it was but I became sad thinking about my situation (which makes me laugh now because ew, it sounds so pathetic). i realized it’s subconsciously affecting me even if I don’t say it openly and  for some reason, I had this inkling to re-read my old journal and through the random page I opened, God spoke to me clearly. the journal took me back to something I wrote in September 2013 – a few days after our cluster’s discovery camp. I was asked to do the first talk which was called through the Father’s eyes and written on my journal is this:

Sab, even if other people see you as a flawed and imperfect person, and you yourself come to believe that because of what they say, the Father still sees and will always see you as His child who is to be taken cared of. you are worthy of love. you are worthy to be loved. nothing you do or can’t do, for that matter, will ever change the way He looks at you.

with that though, I have to remember to recognize the fact that there will be days when it’s hard and tough and everything will just be unbearable. when all that I can resort to is to get angry at myself for things that aren’t even of my own doing. but even so and all the more when that happens, I should strive to seek not only the good in me but God Himself because in Him and through His love, I can feel and be whole once more. His grace and mercy makes me smudge free, so to speak, and it’s up to me to believe in that so I can see myself in that light too. that night, through the smudges in my nails and what the nail polish remover can do, I was reminded of how great God is. because even if we ourselves have given up on our very being, He has not and will never do so.