Marriage and Beyond

Before this site screams issues of abandonment, I’m going to write a quick post on what has been keeping me busy these past days. I have been in my lonesome in our make shift work station since yesterday. The hubby and I would usually write our respective articles at the same time from different computers. I am trying to be as occupied as I can, so that time will just fly until he’s back. Keep him in your prayers, will you? He is in Palawan with a team from Houston, Texas. He is leading the team as they go into schools to present the Breaking Point program to hundreds of students.

As for me, aside from keeping constantly in touch with the hubby, keeping house, taking care of my little guy while doing some online tasks which includes discreetly promoting a couple of my other blogs, like what I did the other day. I also have been doing my own research on how effective diet pills are. Continue Reading »

A handful of young people from the church are on their way to graduating from our discipleship material. This program gets them to learn more about the faith and more importantly allows them to understand why we believe the things we do. At the end of every lesson they are to quote three to five corresponding memory verses. When they are all done with the ten lessons, they will have completed memorizing thirty five key verses from the Bible.  You could just imagine the volume of print out we do every week. This is aside from the printing the hubby has to do for his manuscript and the church bulletin.

Being the young church that we are, we actually had to come up with a Christmas offering for some things that we need in the church. One of the things we were able to buy was a printer. After having used our personal printer for some time, our church was finally able to purchase a printer of its own. A prime consideration when the hubby and I were out canvassing for one was the cost of Printer Ink. This is where PacificInk comes in. Over 200 brands are on sale at prices up to 70% less than what printer manufacturers charge. This will help us a great deal as we figure out ways to economize to minimize operating cost.

As we open up the church during weekdays as Jive Youth Center, we hope to more than just do some scholarly tutorials, have them play table tennis and darts, or even make the place available for them to hang out in. We also hope to connect with them, even as we placed key people to be in charge of the center. We hope to get the message across that they belong and we want to connect with them.

The hubby recently just found a site to download movies wherein we could get a hold of good, clean and fun films that can be of entertainment for the middle school students who will swing by the center. Continue Reading »

“Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.” Hebrews 10:25

We had a blessed worship service at church this morning. How about you, how did your day go? I am so happy to report that a handful of our church members are faithfully going through the discipleship program. It did take a while for this to take off after having been launched a few years back.

The above verse is included in the “Church Membership” Lesson of the discipleship material. It just thrills me how the members are moving up from becoming baby Christians even as they choose to be equipped with the foundations of the faith through this program.  Seeing them grow and nurture their relationship with our Savior encourages my heart.  Most of those who have graduated are the ones equipping the new ones.

If you are in California and you want to find a church in Rancho Santa Fe, you might want to check out this emergent church called Horizon Christian Fellowship. Their address is 6365 El Apajo Road, Rancho Santa Fe, CA and their Senior Pastor is Dr. Bob Botsford. He is part of the Advisory Board for the Billy Graham School of Evangelism.  Check out their “I Want a Better Marriage” series and visit Horizon.org for more information.

One of the major things that I do in the ministry as I partner with the hubby, is counseling. It can be the most overwhelming tasks in the church ministry. Even as overwhelming as it is, it can also be the most fulfilling as I see through the years how the people under my care are ushered into a better life that the Lord has got in store for them.

The very concept of counseling can be scary to a lot of people. I have seen a few who would start but would withdraw from it before they are ready. But I encountered more than a few who, despite the many struggles, have passed with flying colors and are actually the ones discipling the younger generation. This encourages my heart to press on.

If you are anywhere near Ottawa, you might want to check out Counseling Ottawa. This team understands the confidentiality that is between the therapist and the counselee. More than just being educated, compassion is needed for you to be able to work through the issues you are struggling with. Continue Reading »

On August 10-13, we will be taking Breaking Point’s high school program to Palawan, together with 9 local volunteers and 18 volunteers from the US. This is the second out-of-town missions trip for Breaking Point Foundation Philippines and on this trip, we will be bringing along our stage equipment, sound system, 2 way radios, costumes and classroom workshop materials. We are still ironing out details of the target schools and churches we will be working with but it is never too early to ask for prayers for this missions trip. We hope that our brothers and sisters in Christ would include this in their prayers.

A fun shot of some of the youth who attended our worship service last night.   Most of these young people are faithful attenders and a couple of them are student officers from one of the high schools in Makati that we do outreach at.  We joyfully report that two from this group quoted their discipleship lessons and are actually waiting in line to get their next  lessons printed.   We almost ran out of ink!  We can only hope that we have those Vista Print coupons to save up on ink costs.   It was an encouragement to everyone when one of our members just got awarded with her Bible and certificate of completion after having memorized thirty five verses from the Bible and quoted them all during the service last week. 

Today is again one of those long days for me. I would have to admit that I have some kind of a writer’s block these past days. For the past six months that we have had this domain, this is the first time that I felt that dry spell to blog. You wouldn’t exactly call the day that started “exciting,” on the contrary this is something that I dread every single time - doctor’s visit.  Neither is this something anyone can call a “date”. But since the hubby was also scheduled to see the doc, then we went together. It was fun and a break from the usual headache of going through traffic and later waiting for the doctor. Today’s doctor’s visit was something else. Believe it or not, there was not a glimpse of traffic on a rush hour Friday. Best of all, the doctor was the one who waited for us this time! You will have to admit, this is something else!  ;-)  Talk about raining when it pours. I love this day! For some reason, I also got a total turnaround on how I felt about not being able to access the internet. It used to be that I would get fidgety when I don’t get to blog, which explains the many entries I usually have in a day.  This time around, it was different. It was totally fine with me.

After seeing the doctor, we took care of ministry in our church in Makati. This photo shows one of the more interesting things that happened as we met with a group of student officers from a nearby high school who came to our church to inquire. It was a total blessing that after years that the hubby went back and forth to that school to propose a Breaking Point program that would also serve as the church’s outreach, this time around it was the school asking for our assistance through these student officers. The president was very particular about having our group tackle drug prevention. In fact, he has mentioned it a couple of times. It is not an unusual problem anymore. In fact, I believe there are a lot of young people out there who have got to get themselves into drug treatment program. Continue Reading »

Presenting SBC-Makati’s Praise Team. The hubby is leading the worship, Eloisa sings back up. Ric on the drums, Manny on bass guitar and Bok on lead guitar. This team has really improved a tad since they started. Praise looks good on you, people! Keep rockin’ for the Lord!

Having had moved houses at least five times since the hubby and I got married six years ago, I always let out a sigh of relief whenever the thought comes that we now have our very own place-no more relocating from here and now. Except of course, if our family gets called to go some place else for missions. We are indeed grateful that we are given this blessing of having a place of our own.

Hopefully in the next few months we are off to relocating again, but this time it’s the local church the hubby pastors. We are still praying for the best deal and the best place that the Lord will lead us to. Moving can be a physically draining experience. For one, packing up is not really an easy job especially when there are tons of books and church stuff that we need to carefully box and then the unpacking of stuff and getting settled. We definitely have to get a hold of reliable movers’ services.

For residential, corporate or international relocations, you might want to check out Boston Movers. This team is Massachusetts’ oldest and most reliable moving company. Imagine facilities for art storage that are climate controlled to make sure your collectibles are well stored and taken care of, and that’s not even half of it.

My Sunday was tiring but a blessed wonderful day for me. All the issues that came my way could really sap my energies off me. In the morning I got to talk to one of our elder members who recently found out she has cancer. Afterwhich, issues with some of my girls that got me stunned. I love them dearly. I rejoice as well even as we all together claim John 8:36, “So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”

The Lord alone helps us through the ministry He has put us in and I also hope to make myself more available that’s why I have been religiously taking in my medications and multivitamins, but for some reason I forgot to take them before we left the house yesterday morning. Recently I have been into Supplement Reviews, looking for the best one to complement my cause towards a healthful lifestyle. I am currently trying out two good ones, plus regularly juicing both fruits and veggies. We are also taking out most of the preserved stuff off our weekly roster of meal schedule.

Today, for our youth service, our senior pastor helped us transport high school students from Gen. Pio del Pilar National High School to our church/ youth center. We would have bought a bus for sale that we can use for transporting students if we had the funds. Too bad it was raining so we didn’t really need a bus to transport the eight visitors we had from the school we reached out to. But it was all worth it because there were three who made commitments for Christ in our youth service today.

Today the hubby is scheduled to do an ocular inspection of the prospective place for transfer of the local church that he pastors. The place is not much. In fact the most it could sit is around fifty people. But it has three upstairs rooms which could be used for Sunday School that could even serve as rooms for the future pre-school facility that we have planned to put up to cater to the kids of our church members. It is really hard to be able to get a good location with the best price in the area. But we remain hopeful.

We are praying that the Lord will give us wisdom and confirmation if this is the place for us. Aside from it being a real downgrade in space, the location is the most ideal that we have seen by far, very accessible to say the least. It is practically a stone throw away from the school that we are tying up with for a regular outreach and follow up program. If it would be it, then I am sure our church family will be more than glad to pack our bags and fill those moving boxes. We continue to pray even as we anticipate the best place God has in store for our local church to transfer to.

We are planning for a missions trip at Palawan in August of this year and as we make preparations we will be needing enough funds to make an advanced trip to scout the schools and churches Breaking Point will be working with. I hope we could just do telepresence, a high-definition video communication method over a broadband connection, to save us lots of time and money but that kind of technology isn’t available here and to the people we will be talking to yet.

This coming week we will be presenting the Breaking Point high school program in Santolan High School in cooperation with our mother church’s youth ministry, Sold Out Live, and in Gen. Pio del Pilar National High School in cooperation with our church’s youth ministry, JIVE Youth ministry on Monday, June 16 and on Friday, June 20, respectively. We will be showing the program to the morning and the afternoon shift students of both high schools.

I remember the first time Breaking Point officially launched its program in the Philippines, we had t-shirts made for the volunteers to somehow appreciate their sacrifices for the organization. This year as we venture into lots of programs, I have though about giving shirts to the volunteers again and maybe even Personalized T Shirts. Continue Reading »

This is one of the treasured photos of us mothers in the retreat we had last Monday. Our acne-free face gracing the fine blue water of the pool. These two are sweet and prayerful ladies that have ministered to me in the last three years. All three of us don’t really know how to swim, this is why we lingered in this kid’s pool more than that of the adult’s aside from the fact that I have a legitimate excuse because I was attending to my little guy. It would have been more fun if the other mothers in the ministry were able to join us that day. This is really something that we have got to regularly do as a team.

taken just before we left Boso-Boso Highlands Convention Center

group picture taken after the round up  (calendar planning, vision casting, worship and devotion time)

worship and prayer time

water fun!

The hubby and I are taking our ministry workers out on a day out!  Alongside the planning for the year ahead for the church, we plan to have them have a great time.  These are all volunteer workers, youth and adults. This is the least that we could do to let them know their partnership in the ministry is appreciated and for us to be able to have one vision in the ministry.

Right after our summer youth camp entitled “Heroes: Ordinary People with an Extraordinary Calling” many young people, both new and old, came back to our church and the free summer workshops we conducted in May helped facilitate this. We offered free basic lessons on how to play drums, guitar and also a free workshop on basic acting and mime. A lot of those who participated in the workshops naturally made the church a place to hang out where they practiced the new skills they learned. All these this helped bring young people in to our youth center.

Right now we are venturing into fundraising for some stuff to put in our youth center. Stuff like table tennis nets, rackets, ping pong balls, dart pins (we have a ping pong table and a dart board already). These stuff can help us to create sports fundraisers this coming school year and hopefully help bring new young people in to our youth center. We know that church fundraising can be a big task but with help from friends, people who have helped in the past and with God’s faithful provision, we can be assured that these needs in our youth center will be met.

I am officially off my leave from the ministry. I have been practically out of touch to the girls I have been discipling and counseling for the last couple of months because of my health issues. The brief greetings during the times that I meet them in church do not suffice, I know. But with my worsened health problems during those months, there was nothing much that I can do. Now I’m back in business - God’s business, that is.

It’s never easy. It can actually be draining sometimes. Frustrating to say the least. But even as I press on doing what I should do, it helps me to get my spirituality checked. More than what God can do “through” me, He is interested what He can do “in” me. Even as I get burdened with stacking issues of these girls, I leave everything to the Lord. I saw His faithfulness in the past, in the lives of other struggling young people and these girls have the same God as those previous girls that were under my care then. They have now soared and are now passing on discipling the next generation. This is one of the hopes that keeps me going. No matter how bad things are for them, I choose to battle with them. But ultimately, they make that choice of victory in the Lord or be defeated by their circumstances. May the Lord bless their hearts as they keep on their faith and I pray for wisdom and guidance as I lead each of them.