And They Were Called

There's a stirring in the Spirit, there's an urgency in this hour. - from God is Moving, Hillsong United

Last Saturday my family and I went to hear mass (we always hear the anticipated mass for it's impossible to make my dad get out of the house on a Sunday. It's like his body shifts to "SLOTH" mode every Sunday). Anyway, the Gospel for the week (from Mark 1: 14-20), as well as the readings, all tackle one topic: servitude and the call to serve.

It was the sermon that really caught my attention. The priest talked about why, of all people, Christ chose fishermen to be one of his first disciples. He talked about some qualities of a fisherman:

• Work's time is inconvenient
When they go fishing, they don’t usually go to the waters when it’s bright and sunshiny. They leave at the most ungodly hour, when most of us are fast asleep. This nature of their work entails a lot of sacrifice on their part.

The same goes for us Christians. True service to the Lord is when we do it at the most inconvenient for us. I’m not saying that we be masochists and let our service affect the rest of our lives (now He won’t want that, either). It is the sacrifice on our parts to go out of our way, our busy schedules, and give some time for God.

It’s hard to sacrifice something, unless the one whom you’re gonna do the sacrifice for is someone very dear to you, at the very least. Yes, sacrifice requires love. Love for the one you’re going to do the act for, and letting go of another thing/person that you equally love. What’s the point of sacrifice if that thing you’re letting go off doesn’t matter to you that much anyway? It’s more like a ‘good riddance’ thing rather than true sacrifice.

• They go to the fish, not wait for the fish to come to them
Have you seen a fisherman fish from the beach? Chances are the only fish he’ll catch are dried fish drying out in the sun.

Just like them, we, as servants of Christ, should be the ones to gather the people and bring them to Him. We can’t just sit there and wait for the fruit to fall (remember the story of Juan Tamad and the guava tree?) We should go out there, share with them how great and wonderful the Lord is and, by His grace, make them realize the same thing.

• After catching fish they go back to the shore, guided by the lighthouse
After the fishermen have had enough catch for the day they go back to the shore. For the more sosyal fishermen they are guided back to shore by a lighthouse.

It’s important for us to remember that when we get to bring people to the Lord all praise and glory should go to HIM, not to us. Just like the fishermen going back to shore guided by the light of the lighthouse, so should we be going back to the source of everything, guided by His love and grace and Word. That’s what differentiates religion to cults, the priest said. In cults, it is the leader of the group that gets all the credit, turning into a very bog fans’ club. Religions, all glory goes back to God.

That’s one more trait of a servant that we must all have: humility. Let’s all be humble enough to realize that, even though it is US who did the work, in reality it’s still the Lord: our bodies, our energies, our intellect, it’s all from Him. It was He who sustained us, it was He who guided us, it was He who put the words into our mouths and movements in our limbs. That’s why we cannot boast of all our good works, as St. Paul iterates in his letters, for it was the Lord who worked through us. We are mere instruments. We are vessels that, if we chose to empty ourselves, can be filled by God’s Spirit to be used for His greater glory.

Come after me and I will make you fishers of men – Mark 1:17

Since a serious entry's still brewing in my head...

Your Birthdate: July 24

You understand people well and are a natural born therapist. A peacemaker, people always seem to get along when you are around. You tend to be a father or mother figure to friends, even to those older than you. You enjoy your role, and you find that you are close to many people. Your strength: Your devotion Your weakness: Reliance on others for happiness Your power color: Lilac Your power symbol: Heart Your power month: June

What Does Your Birth Date Mean?

Lingering

Have you been hurt so badly then after a few days that feeling is still there, piercing you? It sucks big time, doesn’t it? You want to run away from that feeling but it keeps on following you. It’s like a shadow that’s attached to you. The worse part of this all is that you’re a person who can’t let go easily, can’t get over something that quickly. The pain lingers, making itself at home in your heart.

It is true what they say, when you’re hurt by the ones you love, it sucks more (ok it’s not exactly verbatim, but you get my drift).

This is such a test of faith for me. How much I am willing to submit to His will. I can’t do this on my own…

Being a Loser

To be "loser" means two things: either you're a failure, the most uncool person on the planet (and that's the most popular definition of the term), or you're someone who, literally, lost something.

It is hard to lose something that is very valuable. The more it is hard to lose someONE whom you hold dear in your heart. As much as we would want to avoid it, it's inevitable. Sooner or later, something or someone has to leave our lives.

And I am a person who has a hard time adjusting to loss. I become very attached to things easily. Three years ago our helper at home found a week-old baby maya bird on our porch. It looked so yagit: featherless, skin-and-bones, just like those day-old birds they sold by street food vendors, sans the seasonings. We suspected that it fell from the little maya nest that its mother built in between the small gap in our roof, just above the porch. Being the little sappy girl that I am, I took pity on the little bird and took care of it until the helper can put it back to its nest. I made a little make-shift nest for it, fed it bits of cooked rice and gave it drink. After three days my mom told me that it's time to return the bird to its nest. The night before the birdie's homecoming I cried in my room. I grew attached to the breathing balot chick.

Ok, that was just so... simple. And I guess that's what my fragile feelings can handle. I haven't really experienced loss on a large scale (unless you can consider losing two cellphones in the same year, but that's not counted). Never experienced a romantic heartbreak (it was I who did the breaking, bad Marley). Relatives have died, but I wasn't that affected coz I wasn't close to them. They're not really that 'valuable' to me.

Just recently I have become a loser. I have lost a friend, a sister, and a KGmate (oh, let me clear myself: she just left the community, she didn't die or nothing bad happened to her, praise God!). Of course we're still friends but the whole idea of her leaving us was something that is hard for me to accept. Once I have been used to having a person in my life, it's hard for me to let go (just like with that little birdie). Especially a person whom I have shared a lot with, one of the few whom I managed to open up to (when I am pretty secretive). I hated the fact that she will have to leave me; has our friendship no value to her?

As I battle with my inner bitch as to why people leave me (having a bit of Peyton-syndrome here), I realized something: I am such a selfish little brat. Once again it is all about me, me, and me when it’s not supposed to be that way. When things go well I have bright sunny days, but when things go wrong I go a-moping and a-complaining.

If it was God’s will for her to leave the community, then He has better plans for her. Malay ko ba naman sa mga plano ni Lord? Only He knows when, where, how and to whom things will happen, and most importantly, why. His ways are not my ways. Deal with it Marley.

Then I remembered Lani shirt, with the big, bold white letters saying L-O-S-E-R. And the verse after it: Matthew 10:39 - If your first concern is to look after yourself, you'll never find yourself. But if you forget about yourself and look to me, you'll find both yourself and me. (The Message)

I am supposed to be a loser – lose everything I hope for, dream of and desire for. Lose all of these so that I may have a lot of free space for God to fill in. “Lose yourself, and I’ll take its place,” says the Lord. And what has I become? Such a selfish, bratty, sappy cry baby that has no one to think about but herself. It shouldn’t be that way. I should be happy for my friend that she has been growing fast in her spiritual life, and that wherever God brings her, it’s because He has a plan for her, a purpose for her being there and not with us. Though it hurts to be away from someone you love, I bet what I’m feeling right now is nothing to what God must’ve felt when the Son has to leave His side to save mankind.

Year-end Thanksgiving

Year-end Thanksgiving

Though most people wrote about resolutions and their insights, musings, regrets, complaints, whatever during the past year, I will be writing about the things I have been absolutely grateful for in 2005. I have a lot to thank for, anyway :)

The past year has been a year of changes for me. Change in environments, change of friends, change of status, change of residence even. Though changes abounded, I still retained friends of old and even re-discovered things and people I thought I have long ago lost.

I turned 21 last year. For most it’s a big deal for this signals one’s entrance to adulthood. Here one can make decisions on their own without need for parents’ consent, a time when most are employed and earning their own money, a time when they live on their own. I am no exception; in fact that’s how I imagined myself to be when I turn 21.

This was made possible by the fact that I finished college last year. Graduation was one of the best things that happened to me, not only because I finished in a school known for its high educational standard (which I was so afraid of not meeting at first) but because it was the end of one phase (schooling) and a start of another (employment). I chose not to go to graduate school agad ‘coz I wanted to experience working (plus I have been studying since I was 2½, I want a break).

Speaking of which, I am thankful for my job. I have always wanted to be in advertising but He brought me in another direction. Though my acceptance of the job happened so quickly it took some time before it sank in that I am employed, I do not regret my decision. Action & Fitness only started this year and though the road was bumpy (very bumpy) at the start, things are slowly getting better (the fact that the mag was just starting made me stay). I am thankful for a nice editor, who is ever so patient with me. I am thankful for my colleagues who make my work environment, well, fun, to say the least. I am thankful for Christian bosses who, despite the busy goings-on in the office, never forget the One Who makes everything happen.

I am thankful for my sisters-in-Christ, we who fondly call ourselves the S.S. (as in Super Secret what the letters mean). My friendship with Lani and Zy started and deepened because of our common love for God and our search for Him. Our fellowship with other Christian sisters has been wonderful and brought us closer to Him. Though we may be experiencing different trials now, both in our personal and spiritual lives, our sisterhood have what kept us, well, sane.

I am thankful to be part of a Catholic community where I have discipleship and fellowship with other believers. I am thankful for my KG – my facilitator and my KGmates – for the sharings and insights, blessings and prayers and lessons I get from them. I pray that they got the same from me as well. For the new friends I met and made in community, as well as those whom I have re-kindled after my absence, I thank God for them. Though my journey to joining the community wasn’t easy (for a whole lot of reasons), it was what He wanted me to go, and go I did. What lies ahead for me here? Only He knows.

I am thankful for my housemates, for re-discovering my high school friends, for allowing me to live on my own. I have been searching for a new place to stay in, where everything’s accessible and fits my budget, and Cubao was the place. It’s near the office, near the community center, and prolly (God-willing), near my law school. The people I am with have been the most fun and patient and generous and wonderful people to share one roof with. Our friendship which was started in high school was deepened now, after years of separation in college.

I am thankful for my parents, for being supportive of my decisions, albeit with much loving advice. They know what is good for me, having been “there,” yet they allow me to commit my own mistakes and learn on my own. I am learning so much, and still learning.

Now all the serious stuff has been thanked for, I thank for the simpler things also, like CSI Sundays, One Tree Hill marathons, for discovering that Desperate Housewives is a good show after all, for the two-month vacation after grad before I got employed, for working, though for a short time, for a friend, for discovering that I can still be a rocker, at my age, for the wonderful Christian music out there, especially the Indie artists, for spontaneous movie dates, college crushes, prospective GBs, Singles’ Socials, animated movies which Lani has dragged us to watch with her, the 6th Harry Potter book, the 4th Harry Potter movie, discovering the Chronicles of Narnia, free movie premiere tickets, Starbucks afternoons with my colleagues, musician friends and their gigs, finally going to Singapore with my family, nearly filling up my Starbucks card and high chances of getting that elusive planner after so long, SoulStop and fellowship with Atid, internet chats and making friends with people overseas, for my online best friend, for my longest crush of all time who has become a good friend (and hopefully has no idea that I crushed on him, and maybe has some feelings left), for fun, hyper, God-fearing cousins who are so quick in growing up, Burgoo lunches and coffee shop talks with the S.S., hamsters, ducks, rookies and coffee and a panda with a pet dwarf named after a famous painter, for blogging and personal web pages, for donuts-and-bagels talks, tear-jerking love stories, for the location photo shoots and cover shoots, press cons in posh hotels and picking out clothes in the mall, finally learning to use the Mac, for being not quite a fashion victim, for the cute guys I’ve seen everywhere, for rocking worship every 4th Friday of the month, for the new people I meet (in work, in community, in events, wherever), for my first-ever adventure race and finishing 5th among 15 teams, for the good reviews on A&F, for my intro to photography and graphic design, for multi-tasking, the menial tasks I did at the start, for all the good, and bad, things that happened to me in 2005. I may not have reached 2006 if not for those.

For all the people who really made an impact in my life the past year, you may or may not know it, but I thank you from the bottom of my getting-fat-coz-of-all-the-holiday-foods heart. I hope that I get to show you my gratitude. Here’s to more fun and sad times, and everything for God’s greater glory. Cheerios!