Encounter Weekend 2015

This is not my first time to hear about Encounter God Retreat or EGR. I’ve heard it many times and I have an idea what it is about. I actually attended one EGR but I only attended few sessions and wasn’t really interested about it. I know it is good and the experience will be awesome. I will be talking about my experience last July 24-26, 2015.

                I was very excited about the thought of encountering God and going on a retreat. My year has been a tough ride for me, I’ve been through a lot of painful situations for almost a year and I feel like giving up. Despite the fact that I go to church every Sunday or attend youth service during Saturdays and I even devote myself in attending “lifegroups”, I feel every ounce of pain every single day. I feel so drained in all aspects of my life and I am in the point of my life that I just want to give up and I even prayed to God to just get my life, to just let me die. Have you ever felt that?

                There’s this one experience that when I went home from a friend’s house and as I seat on my bed I cried, not knowing the reason why, I just wept. It’s the hardest thing for me, not knowing the reason why you’re sad or why you feel so empty after a very good day. As what I usually do when I feel sad, I just let gospel songs play and deep in my heart I am crying out to the Lord “Lord, what is this that I am feeling, why am I so sad and why am I crying”. I heard this still small voice. “You need ME(GOD)”. I then questioned God, “Lord I’ve known you since I was a child, I know that I have you.” Then He whispered, “You need ME.” Then I cry out to Him and decided to give my all to Him.

                The struggle didn’t end there, there’s this one thing I hardly surrender to the Lord, I am afraid, I don’t know what to do, all I know is I am letting God take control but I am also trying to get the wheel from the Lord. Then I was invited by my “lifegroup” leader to attend EGR. I know I need this, I know through this I will learn more of Him. So I did, but hindrances came. I am hesitant to go there alone, I am hesitant because I am thinking of what other people me think about me when I go there. Deep in my heart I know God is telling me to go and trust Him. I even had a thought that after this everything will be fine, breakthroughs are coming. So, with God’s help I overcome myself and my fears and dragged my feet to the church.

                The first night was fun and I learned a lot of things already, though for me some of the teachings for the first day were quite familiar already or my mind is telling me that I already know such teachings. I pray to the Lord and ask Him to get rid of that mentality in me. Second day, I learned and I was reminded of God’s love, God’s sacrifice for me and the things that He can do in my life. Third day is how I can live out those promises and love that Jesus Christ prepared for me and I then received His gift, the Holy Spirit. I am so glad with that experience and I am just so overwhelmed with what the Lord let me experience and what He gave me, His words and also his great gift and love.

                I am indeed blessed. I can’t even explain the real feeling that I had. It was all worth it and I do hope and pray that every day I will be reminded of the things I’ve learned and I know that this will be a great start and this is the start of everything. I am now new, renewed and born again by my Lord and savior Jesus Christ. This is my spiritual birthday and I have decided to follow God after this Encounter with Him, this is a very new and unique experience for me despite the fact that I was born in a Christian family and I even grew up in the church and been surrounded by church workers, but this one is very unique and very overwhelming experience for me. To GOD be all the Glory! He is good! He is Almighty and He is the only one true GOD! 

Where HE Leads ...

     Have you been thinking about the things that you do? If you're doing things right? If God is pleased with what you do? If you are being helpful to those people around you? 

     We wanted to help other people, as people who wanted to please God we wanted to be a blessing to others, we want to show others what God can do in our lives, we want to be useful for God's glory, but we are quite skeptical how or when or where. 

  "This pleased the people very much. In fact, everything the king did pleased them!" (2 Samuel 3:36) 

       In this passage David has been through tough situations since he has just begun being the king, he seek God for the things that he do and he is God's anointed one. Yes, like David, He chose us, God chose us, He anointed us, yes, again, God anointed us. Wherever He placed us, whatever He allows us to do, He will let us prosper, He will let us do the things that pleases the people around us, but most of all He will let us prosper over the things that He planned for us to fulfill.

  "But thank GOD! He has made us his captives and continues to lead us along in Christ's triumphal procession. Now he uses us to spread the knowledge of Christ everywhere, like sweet pasture." (2 Corinthians 2:14)

       Once we accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior and we are fully convinced that He is the sovereign God and let Him rule over our life, He will captivate us, He will use us according to His great plan of using us for His greater glory and triumph. Where He leads us, it will always be a sweet pasture, we will be fruitful and we will fully accomplish His will.

   The question is, how? Well, we should first acknowledge God's sovereignty  in our lives. We should live out the faith He has given us, trusting the path He will lead us and doing what He asks us to do, go towards His flow. Allow yourself to be captivated by Him and be under His control, don't try to control things but allow God to control you for you to see His lead. 

Where HE Leads, There HE Is!

Obedience ...

     The hardest thing to do is to obey, especially when your wants are contrary to what is asked for you to do. Obedience can sometimes be confusing. You are to think whether it will benefit you or it will just cause you pain. But what is it like if we obey? What is it like if we strive to obey everyday and just forget what we want, just obey?
      As a teenager, it is very hard for me to figure out when to do things and when things should not be done. I find everything confusing, I find everything irrelevant. Through all that I've been through, there's this one thing that I have learned and it is to obey.
Obey even if it may seems to be worthless,
Obey even if it seems to cause you pain,
Obey even if it seems like everything will fall apart and
Obey because there is no harm in following that still small voice in you.
We often not obey because we don't want to exert so much effort, as long as we are happy, we just want to stay just like that. In my case, I've been in a long time relationship, in my heart i know for sure what I want and that i want to spend the rest of my life with that person. I've been searching for the real meaning of love, I've been looking for people that will certainly love me and take care of me. I cannot say that I found it in the wrong places because honestly, I felt and knew what love is. However, like Abram in Genesis 12, God tested me if I will leave my native land for His great plans for me. I refuse most of the time, I am happy with what I have, where I am and what I am doing, I feel like everything are blessings so why would I leave? Why would I surrender all these things if it is the only thing that i hold on to and the only thing that I have? It is hard, so hard. God did not give up on me, He keeps on reminding me to just follow Him, obey Him and I will see that His plans are bigger, better and wonderful.
     Changes are painful, changes are hard and it really takes a strong person to face it. It may give you the wrong thought of questioning God if those are really His will and plan for your life. It is, compromising will just cause us even more pain and destruction but obedience and going with God's blueprint in our lives will reveal His greatness and His plans for us. It may be painful and very uneasy from the start but it will all pay off for God does what He promised, He is faithful and just, His words are true and we can depend on Him 100%. Just try to come to Him in a prayer and ask Him to direct you and allow you to really obey in Him. Remember it takes a leap of faith, open mind and ready heart to do it. :) God bless!

Is it really the People that makes the culture of the Greeks or is it the gods and goddesses.

Ancient Greek culture has been remarkable to the people due to the Greek’s interesting beliefs and practices. Through Homer, the author of Illiad and Odyssey which has been the two major epic in the Greek mythology depicted the life and the culture of the Greeks. Every part of the epic series of Homer revealed the Greek’s beliefs, pride and achievements, and values and customs.

  In Homer’s work (Illiad and Odyssey) we can see how fate and destiny were differentiated. Their gods and goddesses were the ones who dominated their fate but their destiny is up to the person himself. It also shows how important it is to be favored by the gods especially during wars or problems in life. Like what Agamemnon did, he sacrificed his daughter’s life just to be favored and like what Telemacus did, he sacrificed for him to be favored by a god as he was looking for his father. Greek culture can still be observed nowadays, one of its great example are our strong faith and belief to our God and strong personality through life’s circumstances. For them to achieve their goals it is their faith and their love and faithfulness greatly help them through life.

   Overall, it tells that it is their gods and goddesses whom has the power over their culture and their lives. Through Homer’s work which captures the ancient Greek culture and which imparted to us the greatness of their culture shows that it can never be lost in the a man’s life and that it can be passed down through generations.

Invincible Achilles?

   

  What made Achilles a legendary warrior of the Trojan War? His mother Thetis immersed him to the river which granted Achilles immortality.

Achilles was known to be one of the finest warriors in the Greek Mythology and the strength of the Achaeans. Whenever he reach the battlefield no one can bring him down, instead they are all being deceived by Achilles’ immortality. He was famed by his incomparable skills and being excellent in every battle, due to these he was said to be a god which can never be defeated.

People call this star by the name Orion’s Dog.

It’s the brightest of the stars, but an unwelcomed sign,

For it brings wretched mortals many fevers. (22.40-42.220)

With a cry, old Priam struck his head with his hand, then,

Reaching up, with groans, he called out, pleading with his son,

Who was still standing there before the gates, firmly resolved to fight Achilles (22.48-49.220)

   In these paragraph shows that Achilles was feared by his enemies, besides being an immortal he is a brutal and merciless warrior. He deceives all his enemies and put each one down roughly. He slaughtered them, let them be eaten by dogs, let them be sold and butchered them.  

Achilles doesn’t know that it is not only his opponents was deceived by his immortality, by he was deceived by it too. He never thought of his downfall instead he think of how to make fun of his enemies’ downfall. Just like his mother Thetis there’ll be negligence along the way, his mother forgot to immerse Achilles’ heel that causes to be his weakness.

During the final battle Achilles was shot in his left heel with a poisoned arrow, which finally killed him which tells that after all his winnings and being proud about it, still he has his vulnerable part that causes his downfall. It certainly means that in every challenge or battle in life you need to strategize and find a way to know the Achilles heel of your opponent or a situation in order to win or to succeed.

My Heroine :)

For me my Mom made a very remarkable thing to the people around her. Her name is Annalisa Okanoue. She’s the best among all mothers, sisters, friends and daughters.

   A best mother because she makes sure to attend her children’s needs. She has been a good mother to me specially, though she’s miles away from me she make sure to give my necessities. She even makes sure to show her love and care though distance separates us.  She is a great sister to her siblings, though they all know how successful she is but they can still ask her help whenever they needed it especially through financial support. I admire her for loving her parents so much she see to it to give what my grandparents need and she make sure that she can provide them a luxurious life while they are in their last stage of their lives. She worked so hard for the whole family; everyone in the family can seek her help.

   She is so pitiful with anyone who’s experiencing hardship in life. She never hesitates to help those who needed her assistance and she’ll give everything even her last money just to be able to help. Everyone admire her for being s Cheerful Giver. People around her love her so much; she has been a good true friend to everyone. She never found it difficult to make friends, other than being humorous she never ever let her friends down.

   I know she’s tired from working so hard though we never hear a single complain from her, but we can see how she strive hard for all of us though in her age it’s not that advisable to work all throughout the day but for her to be able to supply our needs, she’s pushing herself. The least we can do is to pray for her, pray for unending joy, pray for continuous strength and God’s protection en everything she’ll do. I know God has a great plan for a heroine like her! J

Good Start will turn Everything Well

“Encourage and assist each child to strive for academic excellence and to make excellence his/her way of life” one of the mission of TAYTAY UNITED METHODIST CHRISTIAN SCHOOL. TUMCS which has been known in the whole province of Rizal as one of the great school that offers a high quality education. TUMCSians were pushed to be independent, resourceful and trained to showcase the knowledge that has been brought out from them. In every school competition, the competitive spirit of the students was evident. Being excellent in everything is the goal of the TUMCSians and it is because of the training given by the school.
    Going to school or learning inside the school is the students' training ground. Choosing one contributes a lot on what the students might be in the future. It does not depend on how expensive the school is, but on how the school molds their students accordingly.