Spilled milk and Crumbled cookies

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You know what one other god that we easily worship? Its name is PLAN. Planning is good. It is wise. God actually advices us that we plan. It is when we box Him with our teeny plans that things start to mess up...beginning with our hearts. 


When we set our hearts on our plan, sometimes it tends to loom large over us obscuring our view of God. We intently follow it with our gaze even down to the ground when it spills or crumbles. The spilled milk and the crumbled cookie aren't just masters in making us cry. They also dash our hopes and make our attitudes rot.


Still, we refused to move on. It was a very good plan after all and every thing has been set. So much has been invested, so much has been sacrificed. We so worship our plans that it's hard to take our eyes off 'em--barely noticing the figure of the bigger One at the backdrop whom we have long stopped looking at the moment our plans became big, the One who's more than able to rebuild what's destroyed. 


Perhaps sometimes that's what happens. God judges the other gods in our hearts. Perhaps that's why He destroys something because it blocks our view of Him. Or perhaps He takes it away to give us an opportunity to experience something way better than our own plans.


I hate to be a prisoner of my own plans. I want to be free! Free to dream, free to plan, free to be frustrated, free to move on, free to be excited for new things over old ones, free to hope for greater things to come.


Wouldn't you love that freedom?


God invites us to cast our anxieties on Him, to commit our plans to Him, to trust that when things go wrong He can work things out for the good of those who love Him.




And I am freed every time I take His Word for it.




"Lord, teach me to find joy in spilled milk and crumbled cookies. May I see them as an opportunity to experience your doting kind of grace that will make me cry out, 'It turned out better than I could imagine!'"

Weekends

I had a wonderful weekend! 

The most important thing that makes a weekend wonderful for me is RELATIONSHIPS.  Just like my friend Light said, my language of love too is bonding time.

Saturday, I went to the Dedication Day of my friend, Lovely's first baby and I got to see the girlfriends I kept from the past.

With Lovely

With Dean

Sunday lunch I was with my small group. We had our regular session at Mcdo.

Afterwards, we moved to Chatime to celebrate a surprise Scrapbook Birthday Partea of Max, Yanyan's only daughter.

Then I ran off to QC, well, cabbed my way to QC to make it to my cousin Tep's music recital which she herself arranged.  She's the girl on the right wearing a yellow top, giving last-minute instructions to the kids.

This is the WAMES family (except for Iqui who's squatting on the floor) 

Ninong Wenzel (left) is the one who taught his family music. After years of family training and practicing they were able to put up their own music tutorial center.  

Last night, I learned that Tep is pretty much the one running the center now and she's only 22 years old! I am so impressed i want to sleep over to get myself updated on her life. 

I'll definitely blog about it. :)

After a quick after-recital dinner, I cabbed my way to Podium to catch up with these beautiful ladies who were part of a small group I joined at work.

I got home at 3am. 

I couldn't remember the last time I went home at this hour. I used to feel thankful finding everyone asleep because I didn't want them seeing me wasted and reeking of alcohol and cigarettes.  Last night as I switched on the lights, I felt thankful too but a different thankful. 

I literally "aww'd" inwardly as I saw them sleeping heavily, blankets tangled on their bodies.

I can feel God being so generous to find everyone (except for my sissies who were at work) tucked safely at home. 

And I had a quick but strong rush of realization for the nth time about how much God has tremendously transformed my life.

:)

"I came so they can have real and eternal life, more and better life than they ever dreamed of."

John 10:10

Lovely

I attended my friend's child's Dedication Day.  I don't see this person regularly and in the last few years I only saw her once a year so I made it a point to go to this occasion because she means a lot to me. 


She was so busy mingling with guests so I sat at the corner and quietly finished my meal.  But as I was watching her, I felt slightly overwhelmed as I recalled the past.  How much this person has done for me sort of sank in again. 


Sometime in your past there's a person who listened up to the wee hours of night at some curb whose silence was occasionally disturbed by a Taho vendor.


A person who always shared her lunch and refused to eat when you promised yourself to be shy because this lunch-sharing has been going on for weeks now because you were struggling financially.


That person who was perfectly content watching you as you "roll with your cooler friends" 
but always ready, as in I-got-your-back ready, when the cooler friends walk away. 


Who sat still as you incoherently cried out all the pain...and never left even if you have told the story five times that night.


Who invited you to stay at their already crowded little home when you've nowhere else to go.


Had nothing and still gave the little money she had stashed in her closet.



Lovely, isn't it?


That's right. She is Lovely.




Lovely is the kind of person who seems to live her life operating on this specific task from God: 






Show this person that I love her.




(And although this post is about Lovely my friend, I couldn't help but linger on that last thought. God is so like that. He sends people to us, people who will love us.  It sounds cliche of Him, right? Well, think of it this way. Would you employ so many people to serve and love a person who wronged you in every way? I doubt it. But God is like that. He makes His sun rise on His enemies as well.) 




I want to be a Lovely too in other people's lives. I want to have a heart like she does. 

Maxine's Scrapbook Partea

Marianne's unica hija is celebrating her 12th birthday. 

She wants Maxine to be surrounded with mighty women of God and be given words of wisdom as she prepares for teenage years.  So Marianne rounded up the small group and invited Maxine along just like old times.  

She didn't tell her that it's not just going to be a small group session. Winks!

We had lunch at Mcdo first and did our small group session there

Van printed some of Maxine's facebook pictures

We chose the picture that will symbolize our advice for her.

I chose Max's pic with her mom and dad and encouraged her to always cherish her family even during impatient moments.

I like Charmaine's picture (bottom-center)  She gave an advice to Max to always keep her feet on the ground. :)

We didn't expect Maxine's eyes will sweat. :)

 

Maxine and me.

Ps. I'm so craaazy about Chatime!

With momma

Praying for Maxine

Prayer spot

Living in the metro is so noisy. There are hundreds of distractions a day. It's so hard to tune out all these noises to hear His voice.  I always imagine a life that is simple. There's no pressure and stress to become the person that the culture forces you to be. 

A life where there's no oil film, lip gloss, facebook, Blackberry and charger, podcasts and wifi, savings, travel package, new restaurants, Electricity bill, etc.  I didn't say I don't want them.  I only mean that without all these other things that stimulate our other desires, it would be so easier to wholeheartedly desire God. 

There's a dimension of time and space wherein I believe prayer and worship are not complicated and not dependent on circumstances.

But here in the metro, it's so noisy. 

That's why when I close my eyes and meet with my Maker, I disappear to this place.

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The gift of Small Group

photo by maryann

I praise God for how our small group evolved! We're no longer contained in that mini table in a cramped starbucks. A small group friend is indeed a lifetime gift. We don't cherish that gift by polishing it with an attendance. We cherish not the session but the person--

• being interested in the going-on's of her life
• rejoicing when it's time to rejoice 
• mourning when it's time to mourn
• rebuking in love
• ..but would rather win the person and not the argument
• building her up enthusiastically
• encouraging her dreams
• ..and especially who she is in Christ
• and at the end of the day talking to God about her. 

In other words, RELATIONSHIP. :). 


I'm a product of small groups.  The existence of a spiritual family in my life puts me in a strong current that leads to God.  It becomes the trend in my life. It feeds the majority of my brains with the things of God. It's my training ground and my relaxing ground.  Because the battlefield is really outside the Church. In fact,I can't imagine how many times I have come crawling back to my small group--wounded, torn, shaken, confused and discouraged. In life there's only one thing that we need to remember to fight a good fight and keep the faith: who God is.


But we all always forget.


That's why I am so thankful that this group is strategically placed in my life by God to regularly remind me of who He is.


There's really nothing magical about this group. We may be just a bunch of ladies who care about each other just like any other groups out there, sure. 


But one thing, one very important thing holds us up together. And that's Christ Himself.


Apart from Him, we'd crumble as easily as a piece of Polvoron dropped on the floor.




So if you currently have a small group, cherish them, love them, they are a beautiful gift from God. 


If you do not have a small group yet, I encourage you to pray to God for it. Community is God's idea. And when it's His idea I guarantee you that there are plans and promises that He will bring forth through it. :)

"And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near."

Hebrews 10:25