Category: Faith

Posted on

My House of Pain

Well, I finally moved on from my “clear liquid” diet, that started last Wednesday night, to a “low residue” diet to rest my colon from my infection caused by diverticulitis. Not the best and most exciting way to lose weight, but I’ll take it. I’ll do anything to get rid of the pain diverticulitis flare-ups bring! If you don’t know what it is, I hope you never need to experience it yourself. I used to think I had a high pain threshold… until diverticulitis.

I’ve been punched, kicked, elbowed, tripped while running full speed on a rough concrete basketball court, hit by a rock on the eyebrow, hit by a a piece of coral thrown from the beach (No thanks to my brother :)), slid and cut my feet and toes on sharp pool tile (Pansol memories), hit my head on concrete after fainting while laughing (it happens), stepped on a four inch piece of broken softdrink bottle while running in “Beach Walk Sandals”, unfortunately rammed my wrist down (full-force) those diamond shaped steel spikes on gates (In my defense I was trying to catch a falling Macopa first. I was hungry.), punctured my right foot with a piece of “Dragon Sandals” inside by stepping on similar steel spikes, and voluntarily paddled and hit by the hardest types of wood and bone on all possible sides of my body. Yet none of these match the pain a “flare-up” brings.

What’s it like, the pain diverticulitis brings, you may ask? It feels like having several “inflamed and infected” wounds across your abdominal area where your stomach meets your waist, plus the sensation of someone’s elbow rubbing into these wounds without warning and the pain is a CONSTANTLY sharp, stabbing-type feeling… except that it’s on the INSIDE of that area, right where the colon is. I’d rather have an external wound than an internal one.

My wife asked, “So it’s like a C-Section wound that’s inflamed and infected while our eldest son continuously props himself up using his elbows ON the wound itself AND it’s on the other side where topical medication can’t help?”

Close. Except for the sharp, stabbing-type pain when something needs to pass, which I found out is almost every 10-15 minutes, yes it’s pretty close. 🙂 You know that pain on Paul’s side that he references in some of his letters? This may be as close as I get to that.

Posted on

Tolerance Is A Two-Way Street

If you desensitize the public (through a savvy, encompassing PR campaign that immediately labels those who stand up against the cause as bigots, for example), you can make anything “normal”, legal and acceptable.

Most people will tolerate everyone else; until you disagree with them that is.

  • You’re called a bigot if you don’t support allowing “mothers” to choose to murder the defenseless unborn (like the kind of murder that Dr. Gosnell and ALL abortion clinics globally do regularly).
Posted on

Being People of Action, Not Just Intention

With the water rising, dark clouds still coming and the spectre of spending the night floating in flood water; the man was sitting on his rooftop praying for God to rescue him. In the past 15 minutes a flash flood had filled the house up, water on the brink of the roof. With dusk quickly turning into dark, the hopes of a rescue were slim at best.

Then out of the gray horizon, cutting through the pouring rain, a rescue boat arrived! The man refused to board the rescue boat saying, “God said he will rescue me. Go on and rescue others. I am safe and trust God’s promise.” So the rescue boat left with its rescuers bewildered by the man’s choice. Two hours later, with the water above and beyond the roof the man was sitting on, a rescue chopper spotted the man clinging for his life on the flimsy Aluminum TV antenna. The rescuers were rebuffed, yet again, by the man with the same words he confidently spoke earlier, “God said he will rescue me. Go on and rescue others. I am safe and trust God’s promise.”

An hour later the man found himself fighting to survive in the raging river-like flood waters. It finally overwhelmed him and the man found himself being interviewed at heaven’s gates. He asked “Why did God not rescue me? I held on to his word faithfully and trusted he would rescue me from the flood.”

“I sent you the people in the rescue boat and you refused their help,” God began. “I figured maybe you needed a bigger vehicle to rescue you so I sent the people in the chopper yet you refused their help as well.”

If you use Social Media Sites, you’d be accustomed to seeing posts that request for prayers and praying for miracles to happen. You would usually also see comments that support the poster that the prayers will be answered or the miracles and blessing will be theirs.

This got me thinking.

If I simply pray and not “respond” and “take action” to what my higher power may be telling me, then my offer and actual prayer is an empty gong. If I can “BE” and take action but choose NOT TO, for whatever reason, then I am a hypocrite.

“I’ll pray for your kids healing.”
“I’ll pray for your intention/blessing.”

If I don’t act on the urging of God on something I can make a difference in, then I’ve not really done my part. Say a devastating flood hits and people need your presence and whatever used clothes you can afford to let go of. If you say “I’ve said a prayer for them” instead of being a living extension of God and be a response to the prayer people are waiting for, then you too have not done your part. The act of being an answered prayer to someone is better than the act of simply praying for someone else. If you can help and make a difference in other’s lives, you should do it.

Posted on

I Want More Tuyo, Kamatis and Itlog with Rice, Please

I have to admit, I have a new found appreciation and love for the simple things in life. You have to if you have nothing else. See, some of my clients’ delayed payments and postponed schedules have made quite a dent in my business’s cash flow. Almost 4 months worth of dents. So we’ve had to “tighten the belt”, both literally and figuratively, as we learn how to live with less than we have come to expect for the past several months. We are now stripped down to the bare essentials.

As an entrepreneur, nothing can be more daunting than the reality that the Electric and Water company don’t give a hoot about your cash flow “situation”. They will not hesitate to pull the plugs and put on the stops immediately. That’s part of the entrepreneurial challenge for startups like mine. And I love challenges, which explains why I’ve learned to not be “too high” or “too low” and keep a balanced demeanor when making decisions. This is not something you learn in a classroom folks. I have enough real life experience, not theories, to consider myself as having a Doctorate in Dealing With Challenging Situations.

You see many people speak of poverty from what they learn watching or being with other people before they play savior and swoop in to save the day. Few have actually lived through even “temporary poverty” where you are made to decide on choosing food for your family OR payment for the commute going to school for the kids. Pay the water bills or buy some milk.

And considering we’ve only “stripped down” in the last 2 months, so I know its nothing compared to those who may have lost hope and nothing to look forward to. I still feel blessed.