My good friend Jaira Panerio texted me earlier with a message that shook me, and it literaly gave me shivers and tear-jerky eyes because I just realized how God can empower me to do great things according to His calling for me!
So without further ado, here is the message and I’m sure that God will use this message the way He used Jaira to send me this wonderful text!
Jacob was a cheater,
Peter was short-tempered,
David had an affair,
Jonah ran away from God,
Paul was a murderer,
Gideon was insecure,
Miriam was worried,
Thomas had doubt,
Sarah was impatient,
Elijah was moody,
Moses stuttered,
Zaccheus was short,
Abraham was old,
and Lazarus was dead.
Now, what’s YOUR excuse?
Can GOD use your life or not?
GOD doesn’t call the qualified, He qualifies the CALLED ONES!
Just want to greet you all a happy and blessed new year!
Forget those mediocre “new year’s resolution” because change only comes from within, and it can only come from One True Lord and Savior! So if you haven’t accepted Jesus in your heart, then you can do it now!
I will leave you with this bible verse that really changed me forever, and again happy 2012! New year, new hope, new opportunity, and another chance to serve God!
“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” 2 Corinthians 5:17
This season the message is simply this: let us not forget why there is a Christmas; it is not about the gifts or salary bonuses or parties and whatever happenings, it’s not even about a fat guy going down one’s chimney and giving out gifts to nice children.
The reason there is Christmas is because Jesus Christ, the Son of God, came here with us in the form of the flesh! So don’t take out the “Christ” in Christmas because He is the only reason why we celebrate it!
So for this Sunday hear a short part of Christmas message from Dr. Charles Stanley of First Baptist Church of Atlanta.
God bless and once again, merry blessed Christmas!
Are you dissatisfied? Rid yourself of the practices that are killing your contentment. Here’s InTouch Ministries Daily Devotional about Finding Satisfaction.
I saw this one on Everything In Budget just now, and you’ll be the judge if this dude is a power tripping legend or just an over-the-phone dork.
I’m a previous Call Center Agent (ehem, Technical Specialist) and I take pride of my former job. And believe me, this is NOT the easiest job in the universe. However, there are just some customer service reps who don’t take their job seriously.
“…identify your identity”? What? Dude? Give me a break! Make sure your grammar and enunciation skills are that good alright!?!
Do you know the common thing about the shepherd who lost one sheep out of his 99, the widow who lost one of her ten coins, and the father of the Prodigal son?
All of them proclaimed and joyfully told everyone that they have found the one which was lost!
Lesson? Our God in Heaven celebrates for one lost soul that is found! Have you ever thought about how God rejoiced when you were found?Have you ever found one for Him?
Today I want to share this animated video of Philips, Craig & Dean song “When God Ran”. This is the month’s theme song of our church, and the message of the song is so powerful (not to mention the cool animation!).
Love the song especially the way it blessed me today! God-blessed Sunday to all!
ONE BIG NOTE: By the time I’m researching about the artist and the song, it was plain that Philips, Craig & Dean were Pastors of their own respective churches. But i found an article on Mediafire stating that :
The popular singing group “Philips, Craig and Dean” also deny the the Trinity and serve as ordained ministers in the Oneness Pentecostal denomination, which many label as cultish.
Whether it is true or not remains to be seen. Coming from a Fundamental Baptist Church, in which we believe in the Doctrine of Trinity, this is a bit of a problem for me. Well, I’ll try to search for more facts about them and try to update this post.
I know that I will not be the first one to write about John Newton, the one who wrote the hymn “Amazing Grace”. But still I would like to share his life story and how it touched me and how thankful I am to God to use John Newton’s life to encourage others, like me.
John Newton was a former sailor, who started to sail the sea with his father. He then became a sailor for a ship that do slave trade, trading goods for slaves in Africa and selling them in England and other countries. But his character was, according to his autobiographies, is a despicable one, and he is a problematic sailor for his crew. In fact, many times he was punished for his antics. He suffered from kinds of punishment, and there were even a time that his colleagues left him starved to death, imprisoned him with chains just like the slaves they carry on board, and there was a time that he was left by his crew in Africa, at this time he wrote on his journal “once an infidel and libertine, a servant of slaves in West Africa.”. According to his Wikipedia entry, “Newton gained notoriety for being one of the most profane men the captain had ever met. In a culture where sailors commonly used oaths and swore, Newton was admonished several times for not only using the worst words the captain had ever heard, but creating new ones to exceed the limits of verbal debauchery.”
But his conversion came unexpectedly. On March 10, 1748, a violent storm hit their ship and it was so violent that he thought the ship would not make it. After hours of effort of the crew emptying the ship with water because of the storm, Newton exclaimed “If this will not do, then Lord have mercy upon us!”. After being exhausted by the experience, Newton pondered to himself what he had said and the Revelation of God for him started at that near death experience.
Newton considered this date as the anniversary of his conversion. It was also said that since then, he avoided profanity, gambling, and drinking. Although he continued to work in the slave trade, he had gained a much amount of sympathy for the slaves. His journal entries revealed that his conversion was not immediate, he wrote “I cannot consider myself to have been a believer in the full sense of the word, until a considerable time afterwards.”
After his stint with slave trade sail, he started to teach himself Latin, Greek, and Theology. And by then he had the chance to work as the Curate of Olney, Buckinghamshire.
I was very impressed with his own words about his life experience. In his journal he wrote:
“How industrious is Satan served. I was formerly one of his active undertemptors and had my influence been equal to my wishes I would have carried all the human race with me. A common drunkard or profligate is a petty sinner to what I was.”
It was in Olney where he wrote “Amazing Grace” which was included in “Olney Hymns”, a collection of poems he and writer William Cowper wrote to be used in their prayer meetings. Now the song is widely known and was used even in secular purposes. And I am very blessed indeed that I can now listen to this song because for me, it is not just a hymn that we sing inside the church, it was a living testimony of a wretched man who was lost but was found with the Grace of God!
Here’s the complete and original hymn that John Newton wrote (it was originally entitled “1 Chronicles 17:16–17, Faith’s Review and Expectation”).
Amazing grace! (how sweet the sound) That sav’d a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found, Was blind, but now I see.
‘Twas grace that taught my heart to fear, And grace my fears reliev’d; How precious did that grace appear The hour I first believ’d!
Thro’ many dangers, toils, and snares, I have already come; ‘Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far, And grace will lead me home.
The Lord has promis’d good to me, His word my hope secures; He will my shield and portion be As long as life endures.
Yes, when this flesh and heart shall fail, And mortal life shall cease; I shall possess, within the veil, A life of joy and peace.
The earth shall soon dissolve like snow, The sun forbear to shine; But God, who call’d me here below, Will be forever mine.
And for my favorite version, here’s Chris Tomlin’s video with clips from the movie “Amazing Grace” (which actually included John Newton in the story):
*Note: I used a lot of references for the life story of John Newton and the story behind the hymn “Amazing Grace”. Credit goes to them that first wrote about the topic and all the Glory is to God alone!
Just a few minutes ago, we here at our house was stunned by an earthquake. It has been a while since I’ve felt an intense earthquake like that.
According to @cesdrilon from her tweet, it was a 6.0 magnitude quake that has an epicenter somewhere in Zambales, and I’m located in Caloocan! Now imagine that…
I was studying my Math when I felt my seat shaking and heard that some of our furniture are making this odd noise, and believe me, i was really stunned that I suddenly forgot what’s the answer to the math problem I was about to solve!
The only words that I mumbled after the earthquake was “thank You Lord, we’re safe…”
And after that earthquake, I suddenly thought of my blog and just realized now that it has been half a year since I posted something. That quake gave me a ring in my head, literally.
Anyways thank God we here and most of my tweeps were safe and I do pray that no one got hurt.
On the other side, i thank God also for reminding me that I still have my blog here to work on and share my thoughts and His Words, even if it took an earthquake for me to realize that.
Well, sometimes God really does send earthquakes to us to remind us of Him and our duties.
