The musings of a wandergeselle about faith, literature, music, dancing, culture, food, travels, art, fashion, photography, life experiences, and everything in-between from journée to journée.
I never thought that blogging will take me this far. Or should I say, how my faith has brought me this far. For yes, if there is one sole reason why I decided to put up my blog last October 2012, a month after my altar call, it is to be the “megaphone” of my faith – spearheaded by unfavorable events in my past that led to my salvation and now, this blog.
There was no apprehension. I felt that I had to do it – I need to write, not just to clear unresolved issues but more for the love of writing and sharing. I have shared in my previous articles why I had this passion to write and share. It came from my hunger for learning, knowledge and wisdom.
Before, I was hungry for the wrong kind of wisdom. It was this blog that led me to pursuing the right kind of wisdom and knowledge – that which is everlasting, firm and true. I would not exchange it for anything. For I must admit, it was that kind of wisdom that this blog came to life and is now thriving.
What I posted did not come from me per se. They were all knowledge passed on to me too. And my Teacher instructed me to use whatever He will give me to keep this blog alive – tapping my interests, skills, life experiences and God-given opportunities.
I am GRATEFUL.
To my God, to WordPress, to my past, to my faith, to my partner in life, family and friends, to my spiritual family, to my fellow bloggers who were bold in actively sharing their faith through social media and including some that this world offers in between, and to the organizers of Bloggys 2015 for all the opportunities to share my thoughts and my faith through writing.
To God be the Glory!
I am claiming MORE FRUITFUL BLOGGING YEARS ahead, by His Grace and through His Name.
Let’s continue giving Him the honor and glory that He deserves. 🙂
Discipleship is a lot like social networking in modern times except that the former is Christ-centered and the latter talks about anything under the sun. In social networking, topics could range from anything to anywhere whereas with discipleship, the topics could be about anything too except that the conversations all have one common major theme and everything is being related to God.
But what is most common between the two is that you establish a relationship with different people. This brings me to my current situation now. I used to wonder or let’s say I far too often wonder why circumstances have brought me to a position wherein I am not in a cubicle or a room doing an office work or I am not following a certain routine though I am and I consider myself a young professional.
Priorities and circumstances never went as clear and as smooth as they can be. There always are conflicts, heavy decision making and a lot of pondering. But then again, through all those myriad of swimming thoughts came the answer that I never considered before: God wanted me to do something at this point which would require me to be flexible in terms of time and commitments.
It was clear to me what my mission was: to share. If I am tied with an 8-hour job, I’d have no time to share all of these. And in my case now, I can only maximize social media. But then again, it was social media that brought me opportunities wherein the possibilities of networking is endless. It is like there is no stopping it once you get started. And I see those opportunities as a wonderful avenue to connect with people online and offline using my faith and introduce them to it.
Step 1: Choosing the subject/finding your mission.
Right now my water loo is in the area of relationships. It is the cross I am carrying daily and yet I know I cannot let it hamper the mission set out for me. I cannot let it occupy my thoughts 24/7 because I need to focus on my mission and get it done.
But I know too that my water loo was given to me for a purpose and this purpose is exactly this mission I am set out to complete in His perfect time. I want to give God the glory because if it is not because of Him, I will still be the Tin who is so generous in giving curses, the Tin who is so full of sarcasm, who speaks nothing else but mostly of insults, the Tin who is quick-tempered and the Tin who is nothing but a cynic.
My fiance knows this kind of person. And I know why God gave a person like him to me. My fiance would remind me that I am a completely different person when my old self would come back at times that there is a conflict. It jolts me back to reality, the Spirit convicts me using my fiance and it sets me back on the right track again. I repent, pledges a re-commitment to change by His help and I would tell my fiance that if it wasn’t for God, the person he witnessed is the kind of person he gets to deal with every single day.
Because I cannot change on my own. That is why I surrendered my life to Christ because I needed a Savior who will take me out of the darkness. I’ve tried it on my own but I failed. I needed someone who is powerful enough to overcome anything, even death and there is only one person who can do that: Jesus Christ.
Step 2: Do the actual sketch after putting the basic lines/in the process of doing the mission refining what needs to be refined.
I am just grateful I was already saved, my past no longer has a bearing and I am no longer stuck in it. I may slide back every now and then but the conviction is already there. And it is this conviction that made me seek for forgiveness instead of letting pride win. God uses people to change you and apply what you learned from Him. Without these people around you, there is no basis if indeed you have changed or not. It is only through God that the flames of the darkness within you can be extinguished.
Putting out that fire is the drive that you will now use to continue your mission and you now know that there is no stopping you from getting it done. And that is because of God’s love and your love for Him. You cannot go out in the world if you don’t have it in you.
I took the risk, I accepted the challenge, I signed up for the mission not knowing what will transpire nor having the assurances I’ll be successful. All I know is that God will prepare me along the way.
I just have to and I should always keep in mind the task laid out ahead of me and consider getting it done by all means. I challenge you too as my beloved readers to seek God’s mission for you and stand up for it, pursuing it by all means.
My sharing the gospel is intentional. It is not for popularity nor to appear as the good, blessed, perfect girl. I am not that. Because my Fb, Instagram and Twitter accounts all serve as a testimony of my walk in faith through ups and downs. Not just the good stuff. 🙂
Bible verses and quotations on faith rarely get people’s attention. That is our culture and that is why the more that faith should get a voice on social media.
If you are a believer, share your faith. What we are afraid of is that when we make a mistake again, we might not be credible enough in sharing the gospel anymore.
But here is my challenge:
Did God tell us that our mission is to back down when plans fail and things go bad? Would God want us to hide behind the sins of our past and live in fear and condemnation? What if our failures are the work of the enemy to hinder us from fulfilling God’s mission for us? Who will we give the glory, God or the enemy?
2 Timothy 1:7 NLT
“For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.”
I do not intend to tell the world about the second coming of Jesus in a way that most people know i. e. placards with those words written on it, preaching about how sinful men are, that our time is short, etc. for back when I was still a non believer, I used to treat them all nonchalantly with a little bit of contempt, cynicism and scorn. I may have received it that way but I didn’t know that the seed was already being implanted.
I believe those who preached the Good News this way in the past were God’s disciples called to do exactly that at that time. Now, I believe, God has a different set of tasks to the newly saved believers to continue the mission that those before us have left in our charge now. There was no social media at that time. 🙂
I don’t need to tell people anymore of what they already know – Jesus’ second coming is near. What I intend to do, on the other hand, is to share to people how it is to prepare for that second coming and the things that most people clearly do not understand. These are the things that are far too basic, far too common and yet most commonly misunderstood and oftentimes disregarded.
Which leads me to the concept of this very simple word: LOVE.
Love is the overused word in the dictionary that permeates with everything. It goes on with a lot of definitions, given in a whole lot of different contexts and manifested in a whole lot of different actions.
So why this word?
I may not understand how everything is interrelated in the following series of events that I will discuss but all I know is that they all centered on one common theme which is LOVE and I have to share them all because the Spirit has prodded me to.
Scenario 1
I lead a small bible study group in church of young, single, female professionals.
Scenario 2
I am in a relationship now and engaged to a fellow Christian.
Scenario 3
Dreams, signs and wonders.
For Scenario 1, it started through my coaching group when our coaching leader assigned chapters of The Purpose Driven Life to each one of us to discuss. It was my first time to read the book. I believe God intended I read it just now. It is this book that spearheaded my passion in fulfilling the mission that Christ has left for us to do. I used the chapters on missions as our discussion platform for my small group. Which led me to buying my own copy of the book but I ended up buying a different but somehow similar book also by Pastor Rick Warren called “Better Together: What on Earth Are We Here For?“.
Better Together by Ptr. Rick Warren
And it was also through this book especially with the first few chapters that led me to the concept of LOVE and what it means in God’s eyes which I am now discussing with my bible study group. To quote some passages:
“Life is all about love and developing relationships – with God and with other people. You may succeed in many areas, but if you fail to love God and love others, you’ll have missed the reason God created you and placed you in this planet.”
“Real love is placing the needs of others before your own. It is making your problem, my problem…It is giving to another without any guarantee of getting anything back. It is giving others what they need, not what they deserve. Although love can create feelings, love is not a feeling. It is a choice, an action, a way of behaving, a commitment. Love is sacrificing for others.”
I remembered a few days back, I saw one status update on my Facebook news feed that really touched me. I wanted to share it at that time but something held me back so I just saved the link. I didn’t know that I would be needing it now to emphasize more of the passages I have written above. It is a short film entitled “Blind Devotion.”
And this will lead us to my Scenario 2, my relationship with my fiance. He is not as devoted as I am, but I can feel that the seed is already there. God gave him to me at a time that both of us did not expect. I was a patient due for eye surgery and he was the nurse. Our love story started there and the rest was history. But as times passed by, we went through what every couple would go through – conflicts, happiness, rage, patience, forgiveness, hurt, pain, joy, laughter…every emotion, every situation – we went through them as a couple. We have been together as a couple for only a year but we have learned so much about each other, how to value a relationship and having God in it except for this: LOVE as how God would define it.
Then came a point I wanted to give him up, he wanted to give up too. We talked but still ended up together. Then he asked me this question, “What is it that makes you stay with me though I have hurt you so many times, you have suffered so much for me, I have made so many mistakes, I keep on failing you and yet you always forgive me? I want to know why.”
I was silent for a time and this thought came to me and I explained why I am like that to him is because of God and my love for Him. God loved us so much He gave us His only son, Jesus Christ, to die on the cross for our sins though we do not deserve it. I told him I want to honor my God that is why I want to honor the commitment and honor him by learning the art of God’s love expounded in 1 Corinthians 13.
This happened just yesterday and when I woke up today, I read my devotion of the day in Our Daily Bread and I broke into tears, because it was an affirmation that I said the right thing to my fiance. This was the bible verse:
“Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?”
Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.” – Matthew 18: 21-22
March 6 Devotion: ODB
God has forgiven us. So we, too, should forgive those who sinned against us. To quote yet again passages from “Better Together”:
“Jesus says we are to be to one another what He is to us. The love of Christ is self-less, sacrificial, and submitted to the Father’s will. His standard of love is personal – reaching out to the undeserving, looking past their faults and into the desperate needs of their hearts.”
This kind of love now leads us to Scenario 3 – dreams, signs and wonders. I have been having dreams about me and my fiance the past several days which are bad dreams that dealt with my fears of him doing what he is not supposed to do and yet I felt they were all too real in those dreams. I always wake up with a heavy feeling until this morning.
My dream was about my fiance and I and we were supposed to board a bus headed for Baguio City but we got separated because of the huge crowd of commuters. I hopped in on a van instead and was surprised to see my ex boyfriend inside. We chatted for a while but then I noticed the destination name plate of the van and it was headed for Laguna (both my ex and my fiance now reside there). I asked the driver to stop then hurriedly went down the van and waited beside the road for a bus to come along headed towards Baguio City.
Then came a group of women who looked familiar walking towards me but I haven’t seen them yet in real life. Found out they were also headed for Baguio City so we waited for a bus then when one came, we boarded the bus, which was like a 12-seater, and there were only a few of us inside. Then that’s the time I woke up.
The night before, one of the verses in my devotion was Matthew 13:36. I read it but was too sleepy I didn’t understand it clearly. When I woke up today, I felt the urge to reread the verse but I forgot the verse so I randomly chose Matthew 13:3 which led me to the parables. It was all about the harvest and almost the entire chapter are highlighted in red which I don’t normally see in the bible app that I am using. So it means, the chapter I am reading is very significant.
The Parable of the Farmer
It is not a coincidence that my Discipleship 2015 training in church tomorrow has a key verse which is all about the harvest and the ministry that I volunteer in, which is a community outreach ministry, has a training on Urban Farming come this Sunday.
Neither it is a coincidence that after my devotion when I woke up today and checked my phone, I got a notification from a friend of mine regarding a video that she shared with me on Twitter. Here it is:
I cried after watching it. Because I now know the significance of it all. Everything is now crystal clear to me. It is indeed near. And what God was telling me the past days about love is that it is this kind of love that we need to exert to bring more people closer to Him despite of the conflicts and the differences.
“God says we must DECIDE to love one another. We’re to love other believers regardless of how we feel about them or how unlovable they may appear. No matter how difficult it may seem, we’re to actively, consistently, and deeply love the believers God brings into our lives, our congregations – and our small group.” – Better Together
“As members of God’s family, we must choose to love, not who to love.” – Better Together
And I believe this is the message that God wanted for us to understand now. The second coming is near, the more that we have to exemplify what Jesus did extending His love not just to His disciples but to those who are least likely to be loved. Just like the way that God is using my relationship with my fiance to master having that kind of love that is of God’s and not our worldly definition of it. I have been stumbling upon random verses from different books in the bible that have his name in it since last week, which is Joseph. I even joked my fiance our first baby boy will be named Zaphen derived from Zaphenath – Paneah which is the Egyptian name that the Pharaoh gave to Joseph when he appointed him as leader of his officials. This was one of the bible stories I read just a couple of days ago.
The story of Joseph, the dream interpreter.
I now understand why God gave him to me – I am being prepared for a mission and as my mate, he too is being prepared by God because the time is near for the harvesters to harvest this land. My interpretation of my dream today was very overwhelming, I wept. I wept because I know what it means – the message is very clear.
My fiance and I are due for a road trip with his childhood friend and his girlfriend to Baguio City over the weekend. I have visited the place countless of times and it was during one of my hikes at La Trinidad in Benguet, a province in Baguio City, that I was completely amazed by God’s bountiful and beautiful creations at its best. I was on top of a very high mountain after a treacherous hike and what I saw in front me was what I called in my previous article as “heaven here on Earth” because you see nothing else but a sea of clouds. And for me, it was very symbolic of my faith. The treacherous hike, wherein I almost fell off a cliff, was a matter of pain, suffering, life and death. But if you were able to overcome it all, the Kingdom of Heaven is waiting for you above, on top of it and no amount of words could describe how it feels to be there.
Last 3/3 marked my 3rd year since I got saved as a Christian last 3/3/13. The movie Son of God was released on that date too. And this coming 3/13, which falls on a Friday, I have a great feeling it is going to be a significant date as well. The verse regarding the parables can be found in Matthew 13:3 too. Most of my daily verses that I encounter came from the Gospel of Matthew. I did my research and the Gospel of Matthew is considered by scholars as the summary of Jesus’ ministry. It tells of Jesus sending His disciples to preach His Gospel to the whole world. It is also one of the four canonical gospels and it connects the old and the new testament. (wikipedia.org) I know for a non believer you will say it is all coincidence. But I say, as a believer, they are all signs from the Spirit.
Which led me to wonder on these passages written in that chapter:
“That is why I use these parables,
For they look, but they don’t really see. They hear but they don’t really listen or understand.” – Matthew 13:13
After these revelations, I only wept. And in between sobs, this was all I could utter in prayer:
“Lord help me to make them understand. Teach me to love them like how You have loved us.”
My brother is one of my spiritual mentors. He was the one who introduced me to the church and eventually to my faith. I know God appointed him to be that and I can attest through the role that my brother is playing in my life right now. He gave me a planner last year by Paulo Coehlo which contains quotations on life and faith. Each month has a designated character trait and last Christmas, he gave me the same planner. And now I know why. For this month, the character trait is this: COURAGE.
March: COURAGE
And this is the quotation for today:
“The only sin is a lack of LOVE. Be brave, be capable of LOVE, even if LOVE seems a treacherous, terrible thing. Take pleasure in LOVE. Take pleasure in VICTORY.”
The Valkyries by Paulo Coehlo
This may be the longest post I have written here on WordPress but I know every word here is all God’s plan because the mission for us all is starting to get clearer and He requires us to act on that mission. 🙂
Paulo Coehlo Planner 2015, The Holy Bible, Our Daily Bread, Better Together – my daily meal. 🙂
This pot of flowers is not your ordinary pot. Why? Because what makes these flowers fascinating to me and special is the idea that they have stayed fresh though they have been picked out from their stems and now floating in what I call a temporary life support system – the pool of water. 🙂
Which made me think of love.
“How can you love if you are afraid to fall?”
Nah, I am not going to talk about the sweet moments just like how love articles are all about. I am going to talk about the other side of love – when you fall. That is, the pain in loving caused by none other than the conflicts.
Conflicts are experienced by all who is in a relationship. Even married Christian couples go through conflicts. I, for one, experienced a conflict at the onset of our relationship. Well, the enemy does not choose a particular timeline nor a particular couple to attack. Everyone gets their own dose.
But I will not be talking of conflicts here in a manner wherein I regard them as a failure. In fact, I just want to share how these conflicts helped me and my boyfriend build my faith in God and establish trust in our relationship.
Now, TRUST is my biggest waterloo. I feared it. I have no courage to have it. Most especially in relationships. Doubts are my greatest enemy.
I almost came close to giving up because of constantly having doubts and not having trust. The reason why I came close to giving up is because I did not trust God fully that He will always be there to guide us in the relationship.
Until I came to a realization whether I should let the conflicts ruin or build my faith. God has a reason why He gave you that person to love. It is up to you if you are to accept it as something good or bad. Differences will always be present because no two persons are ever the same. There will be personal struggles in keeping the purity and holiness intact inside the premises of the relationship. Temptations will be on the rise.
But then, we all love happy endings and yet we know too that love stories are never complete without the trials and suffering. In fact, they are what makes the ending happy, when you come out victorious over them by constantly asking God for guidance and protection.
But the question still remains: Will you let the enemy win?
I cannot. I cannot let my doubts, the conflicts and personal struggles ruin the beautiful promisesthat God has for our relationship. I have to trust God so I can gain trust in the relationship. Believe that it is not you or your boyfriend/husband who will run the relationship but it is God who will be the center of it. Continue to grow and learn from mistakes and strive to be at the right path.
Most of all, choose God and choose love. If you love the person who is willing to do everything for you, you know what to do with that love as how God would want you to. Cherish it. It is God’s lovethat saved us all through His son Jesus Christ freeing us from the chains of our sins.
I am extremely grateful to God for having this relationship. It is God’s blessing that I was given a man who has an open mind and a willing, teachable heart patient enough to understand. Who chose to encourage than condemn, who chose to be gentle than to offend, who chose to be relenting than be stern, who chose to accept than judge. But most importantly, a man who chose to love and follow God than give up.
(I will always be grateful to you, baby. Thank you and I love you so much!)
As I end this article, I would like to leave two quotations – first would be what I learned from the Love Series of Victory entitled It’s Not That Complicated and the other, a bible verse.
“Love will not be complicated if we understand that love is a decision and not just an emotion.”
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is LOVE.
1 Corinthians 13:13
Like the flowers floating in a pool of water, loving requires the decision and the need to stay afloat though circumstances would posit you to be out of your comfort zone, out of your original life support system. The relationship is the flower and love is the water that feeds the relationship, that nourishes it.
Yes, decide that love is enough. That God is more than enough. 🙂
The Journeyman's Moments 