2020: Fortune-Tellers Are A Hoax

Boasting About Tomorrow 

Now listen, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money." Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, "If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that." As it is, you boast and brag. All such boasting is evil." (James 4: 13-16)

Hiya folks, whoever is reading this right now. If there is anyone, consider this my warmest hello to you.

It is mind-blowing how a lot (and I mean A LOT) can happen in just a few months. And by a lot I mean: a change in my line of work, a person who I did not expect to mean SO MUCH to me become my boyfriend, all of that under the backdrop of a viral pandemic of a global scale that has sent every country in quarantine for a few months (still is) that might also change the course of life for the human race as we know it. I'll break them down for you in the next bits.

As some of you know, I have now put to rest wearing my all-white hospital uniform and scrub suit for a while as I have ventured into a new line of work that is Conduent. Flashback November of last year, after months of being despondent for how slow the turn-about of my US application and the increasing pressure at work because of the severe understaffing situation at the ICU, I made the heavy decision (and after much prayer), to resign from work. I had no intentions at all to apply for a new job, let alone in the sorts of Conduent. I was blindly optimistic that things would turn out for the better come December of 2019. 

But as with what the verse above tells us, we never know what awaits us in the future. The visa bulletin, instead of keeping up the pace, has retrogressed to almost more than a year. And it has been like so for months on end. I was at the deepest moment of my life then. I thought I could not sink any deeper. But then, my relationship with a distant friend of mine whom I have been talking to all these years has turned sour as the months passed by. When it rains, it pours. Remembering all those things, I cannot imagine where I would be if God has not kept me sane with his steadfast love and mercy. Lamentations 3 has been like my hope-sustainer during those times. God's word has been my anchor through life's greatest storms. The goodness of God being my comfort and assurance that this will all come to pass.

And it did.

Working at the company, God has provided for us bountifully. The Lord has been so gracious to us. I have been able to provide for the needs of my family using the strength and skill that the Lord has given me. With all that he has given, I am careful to give him back every praise and thanks. With the sweet reminder of his word regarding material riches of this world:

"Do not trust in extortion, or take pride in stolen goods

though your riches increase, do not set your heart on them." (Psalm 62:10)

Not only that, God has given me a kind of love that I could only say it is by grace. By grace, because I don't deserve it at all. It came at the most unexpected time, in the most unexpected place, and from the most unexpected person. His persistence and perseverance countered my hesitations and reservations. He climbed the walls I put up. He cared for the people I care for. He made it clear that his intentions for me is serious and I admired him for that. God has taught me a lot of things in our friendship-turned-relationship. I came to know about sin and grace, about forgiveness, about what being salt and light meant, about what it means to be a light of the world, and how deep the mercy and grace God has for sinners like me in Christ Jesus. I thought I knew a lot of theology but applying it into practice with another sinner who is also in need of Christ just as much as I do is a whole different thing. I get to practice that everyday with Nico.

As it is, the Philippines is currently on the 4th month of quarantine due to Coronavirus-19 (COVID-19). The world has changed a lot ever since it was declared a pandemic sometime on March 2020. We started working from home. Social distancing. Non-essential businesses closed. We are fined for not wearing a mask and for not bringing quarantine passes when going out. I don't know what this would mean for us on a personal level, like our applications to the states, and the world as a whole. If there is anything the last few months of 2019 and the rest of 2020 has taught me, it is that you can never foretell what the future holds. But praise God, no matter what happens, He is still in control of everything. No matter how the nations are in scramble, God is still in control. The Author of the universe, HE who holds the stars in their place, who sets up rulers and takes them down (Daniel 2:21), sits enthroned on the heavens and laughs and scoffs at those who device plans in vain (Psalm 2:1-4). The Holy God who hates sin and loves righteousness, made a way for us sinners to be reconciled in peace with Him by providing for us His Son as a perfect sacrifice, that those who believe in Him will not perish with this world, but insted have eternal life.

The worldhas always been in its weird state already since the Fall of mankind to sin and it has been a downhill ever since. The year 2020 only made it even stranger. With all that being said, a quote from one of my favorite authors, CS Lewis, who was also the author of Narnia comes to my mind:

"Has this world been so kind to you that you should leave with regret? There are better things ahead than any we leave behind."

Truly, there are far better things waiting for us in Heaven. Christ paid a lofty price for us to be admitted there. It took his own flesh and blood, the Son of God, died a humiliating and excruciating death, on a cross, took our sin upon his shoulders and paid it once and for all. For what? For many reasons but also this: John 14 starting at verse 1:

"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, trust also in Me. In my Father's house are many rooms; if it weren't so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going. I am the way the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."

 Reader, are we all looking forward to this promise of our savior Jesus? Where are you banking all your hopes in? Remember, this world is perishing, together with it those who reject the salvation from sin that Christ offers. Like what the above texts tell us, we don't know when our time on earth is up. Are we ready to face our Maker? The only way to be ready is to repent (and keep repenting) and put away your trust in your own self-righeousness and place all hope of forgiveness unto His Son as our savior now.