My grandmother died August 26, 2009.  Her passing away is another death encounter in our family that I have experienced in a matter of a decade.   As I have written, death is not an enemy. It is neither a friend.  It will always remain a mystery.  And death no matter how it will come, will never be easy on my part.

I guess I will never be healed from the pain eversince I experienced the first death encounter in our family.   I just hold on to what my faith is telling me.  The crucified and glorified Jesus conquered death.  And despite the pain, this reality brings in a bigger joy.

Recently, I chanced upon this new site that encourage pray partners.  I think it is a good idea to pray for others.  In this way, people hold on to each other keeping the living presence of Jesus.

I pray for the repose of my grandma’s soul.  I know the rest of the family is praying for her too.  Just as she is probably praying for those she left behind.

Exemplary Work Attitude

Abba’s Child Science School presented an Award of Recognition to some of its students for displaying an Exemplary Work Attitude in performing his or her tasks during its closing program for 2009.

Unlike traditional schools, this award is not gauged on the student’s academic standing only but his or her total attitude in his or her being a student for the year.

The rationale behind this award is to recognize that a person at the end of his journey as a student and joining the workforce, finding a job and sustaining it does not entirely depend on his academic rating in school.

At the end of the day, the success of the person depends on his work attitude.  This is a novel way of recognizing the efforts of the students and parents as well who are partners in the children’s educational upbringing and orientation.      

Congratulations to all the people who are involved in one way or another in the school year that was!

blooming in spring...

It seemed like yesterday when a total stranger found me on skype and sent me a picture of France which showed trees, road leading to nowhere, houses all covered in thick snow.

Now, spring is here. How time flew, ran and passed me by like a gust of wind. Now, renewal of things and life are in the offing until summer. Until, time again shall turn cold.

The stranger has also gone his way after sharing a glimpse of his world. Ice has melted, people are rejoicing for spring.

Hope…beginning …blooming forth…rushing in…almost like spring.

Just like freezing everything, see if time will not stand still...

However, when everything is done and we were on our way to the Church, time can run so fast and we arrived late as usual if I may say so. “Time runs so fast!” I concluded. My eight-year-old child commented in a nonchalant way, “Is it time which runs fast or are we too slow, Mom?”

Well, it took me several days before the message of my child really hit me. Of course, time has its own pace. Indeed it runs fast for people who moves slow. It runs fast for people who delay things. It runs fast for people who dawdle. It flies for people who procrastinate.

Time runs fast, for instance, for people who wait until the government wakes up and changes its corrupt practices. Before they know it, their country is already very poor. Time runs fast for people who put on hold serving God reasoning I can serve when I am older. Then, before they know it, they are too old to serve.

A colleague plastered this statement which says, the bad news is time flies, the good news is you are the pilot. I realized that if time runs fast for people who are slow and slow people get to be the pilot, then it could only mean bad news.

We can choose to be the pilot…we can run our lives the way we want it too. We can move slowly or we can race against time. We can either lose or win. However, there is another choice. The freedom to offer the wheel to God and let Him be the pilot of our lives.

See if time will not stand still…

Just a little something to share with everyone.  My little girl…her name is Karhyll.  She’s God’s gift to me and everyone who knows her. She graces the header’s image.

Coupon codes, discount codes, promotional codes are your internet ticket to freebies, cheap buys, better deals and more.  Some internet shopping aficionado would really go out of their way in search for these coupon codes. Others just ignore these offers though.

I was going through the best promotional codes I can get my hands on and a thought just entered my head. I realized that the air I breathe is like a coupon code. Let me take you to my musing about this.

I learned a unique breathing exercise recently from a yogi.  The old man taught me to breathe in with an interval of thirty seconds and breathe out for another thirty seconds. The whole cycle of breathing in and breathing out has to be a minute.  It can be difficult especially for a person like me who is not accustomed to being aware that breathing has to be done this way.  I am used to gulping air whenever and however which way.  In fact, I never even paid attention to it.  

However, according to the old yogi, right breathing regulates almost everything in our body to give us access of control.   This exercise if appropriately done can assist people in controlling their emotions, concentration, physical balance and mental vitality.

For instance, people who go through meditation can have more stable concentration and relaxation in the process.  This is because of the right way of breathing.

On the other hand, people who are really in a highly-stressed atmosphere, breathing out emphatically will prove to ease and calm whatever hormones which trigger such high emotions.

Well, these are those things which I do not really pay attention to.  I think most people do not really pay attention to the air they breathe or the way they breathe it.

We are so used to hearing the cliché, what counts more is for free or the best thing in life is for free.  We tick off in our fingers the things which are for free. One of them is air. This is the freebie, the better deal that God has offered mankind.  They are the more meaningful bonuses to the beautiful things that we already have.

I can almost imagine man in his nothingness shopping.  He points to his body.  God gives it to him.  He points to nature.  God provides it to him.  He points to another being.  God graces him with the other. He points to more and God graciously gives more. Then, God thrusts out coupon codes without man asking for them.  God thrusts out freebies and better deals. These coupon codes are even better than what man has asked for.

Alas, the air I breathe is like a coupon code.   

Promotional codes, discounts codes, coupon codes  are companies’ enticement to increase sales of their goods and services. These are also part of their marketing strategies to thank consumers for their continued patronage.  Other companies also have these to sell overproduced and overstock goods so as not to put anything to waste.  These coupon codes may be manifested through freebies, cheap buys, discounted prices, free shipping and other better deals.   

Given a hypothetical situation, if you went online shopping for life, you get two coupon codes.  One coupon code says, your life on earth will be long.  Time is your freebie.  You can experience the dropping of your last molar.  You can witness the golden wedding anniversaries of your friends’ offspring.   However, you will live alone and die alone.

Another coupon code says, your life on earth will be short.  However, you will be showered with people and family who love you.   You will experience how to laugh until you cried.  You will witness how it is be hugged so tight.  Love is your freebie.

Now, what coupon code will you want to have?

Nobody can live forever.  However, nobody wants to die young.  The way products pertaining to keeping young and healthy selling like hotcakes in the internet is enough to prove that most people value life.

They say love makes the world go round.  What kind of life will one have without love?  Loving is what living is all about.  Pauline readings would say that everything has to be rooted in love. Life has to be rooted in love.

Just like one’s ordinary coupon code,  there is just no right combination for everything.  One can never really have them all.  For instance, if you want an iPod, you can have it with a coupon code with all accessories for free.  However, shipping is not for free because you leave a universe away.  Then, other items get to have the promotional codes for free shipment.  Yet, those items are not what you want.

You want to live as long as you want with all the love that you can get.  However, there can be bolts and nuts along the way.  And you are prompted to think, “I probably did not get the best buy there is!” One tends to forget, that there are times when you cannot have your cake and eat it too.  However, it does not mean you settled for less. 

Both life and love has offered more than you think you will ever have if you just get to see the bigger picture. This is regardless of whether you have it short or you have it less.   The mere reality of being alive and being loved is a better deal in itself.    

An idea struck me last night. It is about the message of the crucified, glorified Jesus to repent and change one’s ways.

I was thinking I would like to evangelize to sinners like me. I would like to address people who stumbled in life for whatever reasons they have. I want to address separated, unwed, single parents who earlier in their lives engage into pre-marital sex and marriage without really thinking about the repercussions. I want to address rebellious teenagers who think that being different is cool and hip. I want to address people who think they can be independent and live without a God.

I isolated these group of sinners because I have done those things and have been there. In fact, I am still struggling with particular failures as a sinner at present.

I thought, “How will I evangelize to them?”

I came up with the basic answer, “What do you tell yourself?”

I told myself that I accepted the crucified, glorified Jesus as my personal savior first and foremost. Then, I did not do anything much after that. It was the crucified, glorified Jesus who did most of the work. The moment I accepted him, days after that, I felt his connectivity and living presence in my life. In everything I do, I felt Jesus is alive and I am living the life of the holy spirit. I felt his love.

It is because of this love that slowly I want to become good. It is because of this love that I want to strive to become better. It is because of this love that I may change.

This is what I tell myself. This is what I plan to tell those who are just like me. I do not want to argue. I can not defend my position. I can only tell from my own Christian faith experience.

For indeed, nobody loved me as a sinner or a bum except the crucified, glorified Jesus.

Consider this syllogism:

The devil needs less.

He who needs less is rich.

Therefore, the devil is rich.

I have proven recently that such a syllogism is true. The past few days, I have been feeling restless. I was trying to find out why. I could not point my finger on it. I recalled the recent events in my life to pinpoint what was wrong.

It has been more than a month now and a lot of things happened. In a nutshell, we were robbed. I lost few things which were important to me. I had a falling out with a friend for reasons I could no longer remember. I missed an important date with my brother. The water pipe in our house broke down. I was in dire need of money and nobody had enough to lend me.

But to this date, I am surviving. I am still doing my regular routine. I still have friends and a family. And I attribute it to the crucified, glorified Jesus.

Somewhere in all these, I was feeling a certain kind of restlessness and heaviness.

It was the other day when I burst into tears and realized what was wrong. The root cause was the robbery incident. It had more impact on me than I thought.

The day, I discovered about it, I dismissed the whole thing. I did not react the way I should. I did not panic. I did not cry. I did not even feel the loss. I did not report the incident to the police. I simply moved on with life thinking God will give back what I have lost. And I thought that was quite alright and admirable on my part. I thought it showed strength.

I realized that I bottled up my real feelings the day I found out about it. What I truly felt that day was fear. I was scared. I DID NOT KNOW WHAT TO DO. I went on with life as if nothing happened as I had mentioned.

From that day on, every difficulty I had which I was able to surpass were surpassed blindly. Deep within me, I felt alone and scared and did not know what to do. The little fear and the nagging feeling of not knowing what to do which I did not even acknowledge were there, blocked my connectivity with the crucified, glorified Jesus.

The devil needs less. The devil needs little. He only needed to implant a little of fear, anger, ignorance, hopelessness, passivity, hostility. These made the devil rich. He is rich. The devil needs little of these. They are even negligible. However, these disconnect us from God. He feeds on these. He survives on these. He is becoming filthy rich by the minute.

The devil needs less…he who needs less is rich…therefore, the devil is rich.

Dear Jesus, I come to you today
longing for your presence.
I desire to love you as You love me.
May nothing ever separate me from You.

I felt the loneliness of man in a child…

I usually leave my child home alone at night when I go to work. I have the graveyard shift. This particular night, I felt her loneliness of being left alone. And the loneliness of man penetrated through me.

It did not help when I looked at the vast vault of the sky and felt my own minuteness and helplessness. I felt man dislocated and disunited from the wholeness of everything.

I felt the solitary existence of man broken from the whole of nature. I felt his disconnection from the other, he calls his brother, his sister. I felt his alienation from God. I felt the loneliness of man being separated from HOME.

Then, I think of the crucified, glorified Jesus. I felt his love towards my child. He loves her more than I do. I felt that love exploding and filling up the emptiness of such alienation and loneliness.

The crucified, glorified Jesus after all reconciled us back to the Father. What has been broken is now healed.

He has given us himself. He has given us peace… Christic Peace.

I went my way to work bringing with me home and my child who will never be alone…