Healing the Enemy's Ear

 

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I do believe that timelines matter in the Bible. For example, did you know that Jesus' last miracle was healing the ear of the High Priest's servant that Peter had cut off while Jesus was getting arrested? (Matthew 26) I repeat - Jesus healed the ear of the guy who was arresting him. Then Jesus turned to Peter and said, “Put your sword back in its place..for all who draw the sword will die by the sword." (Matthew 26:52).

I believe that the sword Jesus mentioned here is metaphorical to anything that we can potentially use as a tool to hurt people who we think are hurting Christ. Peter's loyalty to Christ at that time was a little bit unstable and wordly. However, Jesus wanted Peter to stop using his loyalty and affection as a weapon and instead, take it to a higher level in terms of treating others - even his own enemies, for the sake of the Gospel.

In today's world, especially due to the ease of knowing what everyone is up to, it becomes easier to spot our potential enemy - people who do things we don’t like or people who are on the other side of a political or moral issue. I am as guilty of it myself at times and I want to be very honest here but I see a disheartening trend going on among Christians - which is the seemingly hateful compulsion to defend Christianity as a religion in public platforms instead of spreading the Gospel and living it out. I see a trend of Christians losing opportunities of sharing the Gospel and making disciples in exchange for gestures of “defending the faith” or pushing back against persecution. It becomes even worse when politics is added to the rhetoric.

I feel like many of us are losing touch with what Jesus really wants us to do in the last days. I don't believe he wants us to spend most of our time expressing our anger on social media because Starbucks refuses to write "Merry Christmas" on their cup or to keep posting memes that Christianity is under attack. Of course it is. It has always been under attack but the last time I checked, Jesus wants us to make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:18-20) which is the last thing He told the disciples before he went back to heaven. If someone you love was leaving on a really long trip, wouldn’t you regard their last message as the most crucial, if not, the most important thing for you to remember and do? Jesus wants us to "simply share the Gospel, by the power of the Holy Spirit and leave the results to God" (credits to Campus Crusade for Christ). In fact, the Apostle Paul said, "When I am with those who are weak, I share their weakness, for I want to bring the weak to Christ. Yes, I try to find common ground with everyone, doing everything I can to save some." (1 Corinthians 9:22)

I am convinced that God can pretty much handle himself. He already knows that so many people couldn't care less about Him. He can handle the rejection and He is not surprised by it. Now, I believe that what He wants us to do is not to “nurse His wounds” and angrily defend Him against those who reject our message. Our job is simply to share it and love those who reject it, anyway. I like what Charles Spurgeon once said, “The Gospel is like a caged lion. It does not need to be defended. It just needs to be let out of its cage.”

 

 

God Still Speaks

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One of the most popular ways for people to battle all sorts of trials in life is through PRAYER. Praying is indeed powerful and even Jesus engaged in prayer as he went through his ministry. However, Jesus DID NOT ONLY pray, he also listened to his father. Jesus read scriptures. In fact, everything he did was for the fulfillment of it. It is good to resort to prayers to gain wisdom, or loneliness, brokenness, emptiness, to express hurt and confusion and feelings of insecurities. However, praying is only one part of the equation. To win life’s battles in the long run, we have to be totally equipped with other tools to victoriously live the Christian life. In this day and age, we talk to God through prayer and he talks to us through the Bible. Without the latter, the believer would have nothing to hold on to, nothing stable to rely on. It’s like shooting a bullet without the gun powder. It’s like endlessly talking to a friend without reading the letters they have been sending to us. It would be absurd that all along, we have been missing out on life, on the very messages we needed to hear because we have failed to take the privilege of listening to God through His Word.

 I cannot overemphasize enough what the Word of God has done in my life. When I was a sophomore in college, I went through a major relational crisis that hit me so badly, I was almost ready to pack up my stuff, call it quits and just go back home. However, one person shared one Bible verse with me that changed my mind completely. JUST ONE BIBLE VERSE. And two years later, I graduated with a degree. There was also a time when I was so afraid of one of my college professors that I would always feel anxious to go to school, then in one of my personal daily devotions, I encountered this Bible verse: “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Instead, fear the one who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” (Matthew 10:28)

 Forgive me for being blunt but we simply cannot know God without reading His Word on a regular basis, without making it a reference point in all areas of our lives. “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,” (2 Timothy 3:16). To me, life has many compartments and aspects but our spiritual life is not one of them. Our spiritual life is not a compartment - it is the central driving force that defines us. We have to pray according to truth, otherwise, we would be spending the rest of our lives praying about something that God has already answered 365 times.

        “Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, but whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night. That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither—whatever they do prospers.” (Psalms 1:1-3)

The Well is Deep

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After listening to the Gospel of John being narrated in the movie I was watching yesterday, I saw a few points with fresh eyes. One of the things that struck me the most was this line from the famous woman at the well: “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? (John 4:11)

         This was her reply when Jesus said: "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” Apparently, the woman had no clue who she was talking to and I was struck by her attitude because it reflects human tendency to be unfamiliar with what Jesus is capable of doing. "YOU HAVE NOTHING TO DRAW WITH AND THE WELL IS DEEP." More often than not and whether we are aware of it or not, there are times when it is hard for us to believe that Jesus could satisfy our deepest longings, that he could understand our suffering or change some bad habits or heal our wounds. For some reason, we refuse to believe that Jesus could go that deep.

 Beloved, Jesus is capable. More than you will ever fathom. And He means it when he said, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” (John 4:13-14)

Unschooling

 

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I might be in trouble for sharing about this raw passion but I am starting to become attracted to the idea of unschooling, a subset of homeschooling, which is basically the concept of following the child's interests that eventually lead to science, literature, music, history and all the things that interested people before anyone thought of them as subjects (Stevens, 1994).

 At this point, the idea still sounds a little bit odd for me - but that's because like many other normal human beings I got schooled under a regular education system in my country, plus I spent four years studying how to teach English and Literature to high school students at one of the best universities in the Philippines that specializes in teacher education. During my senior year, it had just been recognized by law as "the Country's National Center for Teacher Education". I was and still am very proud of that. I enjoyed learning about teaching - strategies, philosophies, the whole shebang and was just a decimal point to graduating cum laude. I love teaching with my whole being, however, there is something about the "general idea of schooling" that turned me off. In fact, I remember feeling utterly depressed during my practicum days because I started to develop doubts about the profession I thought I wanted. My experience handling 80 kids in the classroom for a few weeks made me start really questioning classroom disciplinary practices, routines, the need for standardized tests and the seemingly absurd idea of shoving content into the kids' throat. It felt like school was a constant struggle for everyone involved. Despite of this, I applied for a job as a high school teacher at a private school right after I graduated. That was some experience I would never forget. I made some friends there and learned many things but my internal struggles were simmering underneath my performance on the job. Somebody asked if I wanted to eventually teach at a public school (which is usually considered a better route for most teachers in terms of pay) and I said NO. The idea alone was depressing for me. Somebody asked if I could see myself becoming a principal someday and I said NO. I just could not stand the system. I quit my job and worked as a writer the following year. It was not so much about policies and the politics involved as it was about "schooling" in general and the idea of making square pegs fit in a hole, about the imposition of subject matter to kids who will most likely forget half, if not 70 percent of it. I felt like we were wasting a lot of time. But before I proceed, I just want to make it clear that the university where I graduated is a really great school and my professors were excellent. My paradigm shift has more to do with the concept of "schooling" in general as opposed to a specific institution. I also know that even though I feel this way, I also know that as imperfect as it is, the education system has still worked for some people and has produced successful individuals. In addition, I would like to make it clear that I still believe in higher education, that some people should spend many years studying a specific field like medicine and law. I am talking about educating children, toying with a few "what ifs": What if we follow George Barnard Shaw's advice and let kids pursue knowledge rather than let knowledge pursue them? What if we allow children to focus on who they really are and spend more precious time on what they are inclined to and what they are good at? What would our world look like if everyone spent their childhood this way?

        Fast forward about 10 years later and we decided to be a homeschooling family. We have many reasons why we have chosen this path and one of them is the decision to take sole responsibility of what and how our kids will be learning. We want to shape their minds according to what we think they should learn - not what the government thinks they should learn. However, I have had serious doubts about our choice. Even though, more and more families are starting to homeschool, we are still the minority. As soon as school started for all the other kids last September, that was when it hit me: Instead of feeling left behind, I have to embrace this journey and seek out our tribe and make friends with like-minded homeschooling families. I have to relearn strategies, think outside of the box and apply what I learned in college, and customize it to my son's needs, personality and interests. I have to make learning fun and interesting for him.I have to teach as if the world is our classroom and learning is a natural part of life.

        Life has no guarantee and I might have another paradigm shift in a year or two. But at this point, I couldn't agree more with what John Gatto said during his acceptance speech for the New York City Teacher of the Year Award in 1990: "Schools were designed by Horace Mann ... and others to be instruments of the scientific management of a mass population." We want to give our children more than that. Teaching as many as 20 kids at a time seemingly sounds more efficient, while concentrating one's time, skills and effort into just a child or two seems a bit excessive. But are my children worth all of that? I am going to say yes to that.