What is Real? Part 3: Real Adventure
REAL ADVENTURE
You may now be wondering how can you make your life and your time worth while? Well, life is an adventure and the short time that we have makes it even more exciting and fun!!!
Psalm 90:12: Teach us to number our days, that we may present to You a heart of wisdom.
Here, Moses is asking God to teach him how to spend his days right. If we cherish our lives and treasure our time, we should also be asking God to teach us to number our days and to give us wisdom as we make choices.
Reality Check: During your personal time with God, do you ever ask Him how you should spend the day? Or do you just go ahead and say, “Ok, God, these are my plans for the day. Please bless each one of them and just make the day cool for me!”
My Story: I was your age when I started asking God what I should do with my life. When I entered university, I got side-tracked by a lot of things, including ideologies, philosophies and things that sounded cool to me then. I started to rationalize things, thinking that I am really a smart girl! I thought I could explain everything logically. There’s always a reason for everything. There’s always a perfect explanation for each thing that happens on earth and in my life. I had no use for faith because it’s just a weak and dumb person’s cop out. I was mistaken. I reached a point where I couldn’t explain what was going on in my life. I slid into depression and nothing was making sense. Until one night, while I was all alone in the house, I thought of killing myself. On my way to the kitchen to get something to slash my wrists with, I found my Bible (I have not read it in a long time) on the kitchen floor. I still don’t know how it got there but there it was. It was almost surreal that I heard a gentle voice telling me, “Pick up your Bible and read it.” I wanted to ignore the voice but it became louder. I’d like to believe that it’s God’s gentle voice calling me back to Himself. I took my Bible and opened it. I came to Romans 8:35-39 that says nothing and no one can separate me from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Then I turned to Hebrews 11:1 & 6 that says, Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him. At that moment I realized that I was wasting my life and time on things that didn’t really matter for eternity. I asked God to help me spend my days on earth wisely and for His glory. I listened for His voice, asked for His guidance eagerly through my devotions, through my Sunday School classes, even through youth camps. I was once where you are now, a young person, attending youth worship and waiting earnestly upon God. By the time I graduated from college, God has shown me through His word, circumstance, conviction and counsel of mentors that He is calling me to be a cross-cultural missionary, a writer and an artist. At first, I asked how can these three come together? Now, I know.
God brought my husband Mang, me and our son Lian Ed to Davao City to serve among Muslim and inner city urban poor communities. Recently, we had the Taytayan Youth Art Workshop and Exhibit. I helped facilitate this project and two of my works were also put on exhibit. To date, I have written a book and have contributed several articles in five devotionals. I am currently editing our team’s book which we hope to be published next year.
You may be sitting there, still wondering how can you make your life and time count? What practical things can you do? Let me give you some ideas:
Our team, the Malikha Urban Poor Team, has a huge space for short term volunteers who can come from anywhere between one month to one year and do any of these things:
--assist in the pre-school
--tutor Muslim and street children and youth
--teach guitar, keyboards and voice lessons to the youth
--teach crafts and arts to the youth
--play basketball or other sports with the youth
--volunteer in medical/dental outreaches
--pray, give, go
If you want to know more about these real adventures, don’t hesitate to approach me later or drop by our blog http://tubaobrigade.blogspot.com or our website www.taytayan.org.
What is real? God’s presence is real. Your existence is real. Your life is real. The short time you have in your hands is real. Death is real. Whatever you do in Christ is what makes your life and your death real. One life, it will soon be past. Only what’s done for Christ will last. That’s real!
You may now be wondering how can you make your life and your time worth while? Well, life is an adventure and the short time that we have makes it even more exciting and fun!!!
Psalm 90:12: Teach us to number our days, that we may present to You a heart of wisdom.
Here, Moses is asking God to teach him how to spend his days right. If we cherish our lives and treasure our time, we should also be asking God to teach us to number our days and to give us wisdom as we make choices.
Reality Check: During your personal time with God, do you ever ask Him how you should spend the day? Or do you just go ahead and say, “Ok, God, these are my plans for the day. Please bless each one of them and just make the day cool for me!”
My Story: I was your age when I started asking God what I should do with my life. When I entered university, I got side-tracked by a lot of things, including ideologies, philosophies and things that sounded cool to me then. I started to rationalize things, thinking that I am really a smart girl! I thought I could explain everything logically. There’s always a reason for everything. There’s always a perfect explanation for each thing that happens on earth and in my life. I had no use for faith because it’s just a weak and dumb person’s cop out. I was mistaken. I reached a point where I couldn’t explain what was going on in my life. I slid into depression and nothing was making sense. Until one night, while I was all alone in the house, I thought of killing myself. On my way to the kitchen to get something to slash my wrists with, I found my Bible (I have not read it in a long time) on the kitchen floor. I still don’t know how it got there but there it was. It was almost surreal that I heard a gentle voice telling me, “Pick up your Bible and read it.” I wanted to ignore the voice but it became louder. I’d like to believe that it’s God’s gentle voice calling me back to Himself. I took my Bible and opened it. I came to Romans 8:35-39 that says nothing and no one can separate me from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Then I turned to Hebrews 11:1 & 6 that says, Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him. At that moment I realized that I was wasting my life and time on things that didn’t really matter for eternity. I asked God to help me spend my days on earth wisely and for His glory. I listened for His voice, asked for His guidance eagerly through my devotions, through my Sunday School classes, even through youth camps. I was once where you are now, a young person, attending youth worship and waiting earnestly upon God. By the time I graduated from college, God has shown me through His word, circumstance, conviction and counsel of mentors that He is calling me to be a cross-cultural missionary, a writer and an artist. At first, I asked how can these three come together? Now, I know.
God brought my husband Mang, me and our son Lian Ed to Davao City to serve among Muslim and inner city urban poor communities. Recently, we had the Taytayan Youth Art Workshop and Exhibit. I helped facilitate this project and two of my works were also put on exhibit. To date, I have written a book and have contributed several articles in five devotionals. I am currently editing our team’s book which we hope to be published next year.
You may be sitting there, still wondering how can you make your life and time count? What practical things can you do? Let me give you some ideas:
Our team, the Malikha Urban Poor Team, has a huge space for short term volunteers who can come from anywhere between one month to one year and do any of these things:
--assist in the pre-school
--tutor Muslim and street children and youth
--teach guitar, keyboards and voice lessons to the youth
--teach crafts and arts to the youth
--play basketball or other sports with the youth
--volunteer in medical/dental outreaches
--pray, give, go
If you want to know more about these real adventures, don’t hesitate to approach me later or drop by our blog http://tubaobrigade.blogspot.com or our website www.taytayan.org.
What is real? God’s presence is real. Your existence is real. Your life is real. The short time you have in your hands is real. Death is real. Whatever you do in Christ is what makes your life and your death real. One life, it will soon be past. Only what’s done for Christ will last. That’s real!
posted by grace gaston-dousel | 12:31 PM
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