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Understanding the Bible

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Many years back, in middle school, I was handed a tiny New Testament book, which is the other half of the Bible, beginning with Jesus coming into the world and God’s message that spread like fire after the death of Jesus. Although, I must add, the other half of the Bible, the Old Testament, written before Christ was born into the world, foreshadows His birth and purpose.

I kept the New Testament in my room, not intending to read it. We had a Bible at home, which was gigantic and heavy. It seemed to just serve the purpose of decoration for the coffee table. No one ever read it, just opened it to look through, the rest of the time, it collected dust.

There was a time when I opened up the tiny New Testament sitting on top of my radio. It was a hard time for me, one of those emotionally heart aching times when It felt like things were never going to improve. It was a King James Version, the hardest version to read with the old English. After trying to understand the few versus I read, I got frustrated and just threw it, and questioned, “Why God?”

My recollection of Bible reading was just watching both of my Grandmas read it. I always thought it was something to read when one gets closer to potentially passing away. I didn’t hear a testimony from either of them about what it does for them and just assumed it was preparation for them before leaving this earth.

Many years I spent without knowing the treasure it contained, that it is like a guide for life. It has been said that the BIBLE stands for Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth and that it is. It reveals who God is and answers life’s questions. Although it’s been written decades ago, the words still apply to life today.

The Bible holds the message of faith hope and love, which remains. There are many theories and philosophies about life, but the Bible holds the truth. When something it true, it can never be denied. Of all books, the Bible is the only one that actually reads the reader. It goes hand and hand with a relationship with God. I’ve heard many say that they’ve read the Bible so many times and they cannot understand it. It’s not just any book. It doesn’t matter how intelligent someone might be, the message speaks to the soul, not so much the mind.

When I first started reading it, I had others interpret it for me, but I questioned their perspective of the message behind the words. I question what sounded contradictory. I question Jonah being eaten by a fish and the donkey speaking to a man. There are many stories in the Bible of the miracles of God, but from a world that looks at a dependency on God as a weakness, pride and self-righteousness can be a blindfold to the truth.

It wasn’t until I restarted my prayer life and kept seeking God and His truth and who He is, that the Bible, the Word of God started to seek me. The situations in my life, the confusion or trouble I was facing would be eased as I opened up to the perfect verse in the Bible. When the eyes of my soul started to open up and I started to realize that God is actually speaking me through His word, it started to make sense. Over an over again, consecutively, I would open up to the few words I needed to read at that exact moment. I could no longer deny His existence. I could no longer deny that God didn’t know me by name.

It took me walking out of a totaled car, after God was telling me about it two weeks before it happened and even that morning, that I finally realized who He is. That He loves me. God loves the world as said in John 3:16, “God so loved the world that He gave His one and only begotten Son so that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life.” A year later I fully surrendered my life to Him and was baptized. That day I opened up the Bible and for the first time, I could clearly understand the scriptures. Although some passages can be straightforward, there are many that can only be comprehended by the spirit and not the mind.

I pray that anyone questioning the meaning behind the scriptures will start on the path to finding the truth, to seeking out who God is and eventually come to the point of realizing that God is love and He knows your name. I would suggest finding a Bible study to join. I pray it would have a good leader strong in interpretation of the Word. The book of John is usually a good starting point, then there’s the book of Romans and Psalms. There are churches out there with small groups/Bible study groups to sign up for through their church website. May this is a a starting point for many to start walking in the truth and the light of God.

Thankful in a Storm

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It’s Thanksgiving Day and something is resonating within me that’s pulling me in completely opposite directions, faith or fear. Despite the distress in my soul, I’m thankful with hope for the future. About ten years ago, I thought I might die. I remember crying out to the Lord in my distress. That night I had a dream that I was carrying a backpack full of currency from around the world, later realizing that I was an old lady in my dream, around the 70s. God knows I’ve always had the desire to travel the world before I leave this earth. That dream was a confirmation that I would be fine and soon after, physically, I was fine.

There’s been many times in my life where I’ve felt so blessed, walking on clouds with everything working out for me, but life always has it’s storms, some that can drive one to the ground just waiting to die, but I can honestly say that if God’s hand wasn’t there to pull me out, I’m not sure where I’d be today. Even in the toughest times, I know that I’ll get through it because my life is in the hands of a good God.

I’ve had my share of lonely times having spent some holidays alone, feeling like the world is against me or completely misunderstood. Even though harsh seasons come, the sun will eventually come out. At times it feels like the hard season will never end, but I have to trust God through the season, even if it doesn’t make any sense. I know He’s shaping me through the flame as fire pulls out the impurities of gold making it rise to the surface.

What I’m most thankful for today is my Lord and Savior Jesus, without Him, I would be dead on the inside, lifeless, empty and without hope. Because of Him, I don’t have to fear the future as He will give me the strength and tools that I need to take on the storms of life as they come and always be my backbone. I’m thankful for life and good health. I’m thankful that during uncertainty, I can put my faith on a faithful God full of mercy and grace.

I pray that HOPE, JOY and PEACE will come to anyone struggling to be thankful today, but to have hope for the future and to know that they’re not alone, God that you let them know that you are there with them and that they are loved by you, God that you would let them see the light after the storm and bring healing to their soul. In Jesus name.

Covid News Sources

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If you read though the news, you’ll find that many news sources talk about how President Trump downplayed the virus. When you’re shutting down flights into this country, that’s obviously something big, sometime actions speak louder than words, but society these days would rather have words (Biden) than action (Trump). We had a shelter in place & had to wear masks, but why are people still acting like he didn’t say enough? He didn’t need to emphasize and focus on it as done by many news channels.

Many people don’t understand this. They think he’s killing people because he didn’t emphasize how contagious is it, but why would anyone rely on Trump for that information. He’s not a doctor! He’s not the news. Dr. Fauci said enough about the virus already. If that wasn’t enough, MSNBC was already working hard to scare the hell out of everyone. Doing all they can to make everyone think they’ll die from it no matter your age or how healthy you are, as if the odds are that high. According to COvid-tracker there are about 6 million covid cases. Almost 3 million that have recovered and almost 200 thousand that have died.

I’ve heard it one too many times coming from the mouth of others that, they stopped watching the news because they didn’t want to live constantly afraid. So why do people expect the President to be a news source or Doctor to scare the hell out of everyone? Wouldn’t people want a President who’s hopeful of things getting better rather than a Doomsday President? Either way, it’s our duty to take care of ourselves.

To Love not Dictate : My Testimony

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For as long as I can remember I always felt in my heart that God exists, but my thoughts of who He is changed throughout the years.

My first experience of God’s answered prayers was when I was five years old. We were locked out of our house and as my Dad went to try to find the way of getting the spare key, it started to rain. As we were all standing underneath the eave outside in the rain, I felt a push to pray for it to stop raining so I looked up to the sky and I asked God to make it stop raining. Shortly after, it did. That could’ve been a coincidence, but interestingly, I can never forget about that moment.

My parents were Catholic and forced my siblings and I to go to church. I felt like it was a waste of my time, as I could be at home watching my favorite cartoon TV show, the Simpsons. Eventually I was forced to go to Saturday school at church for classes that would lead to being “confirmed.” I went religiously, but instead of learning, I slept in class. I never got confirmed. Actually, I stopped going. Somehow I convinced my parents to stop bringing me.

Even if I stoped and my “confirmation” didn’t happen, I still reached out to God, but not with repeated prayers or what I read from a book. It was a normal conversation. It didn’t make sense to pray in repetition it’s like talking to someone repetitively…that’s annoying, that’s not a real conversation. I kept on having conversations with the Lord for years until my freshman year in college when I started an anthropology class. I didn’t realize that my faith was dwindling and I wasn’t praying much. That same semester I met a girl named, Yanni who asked me if I know what the meaning of life was. She invited me to church and from there, I met other women and studied the Bible with them. I was so surprised at the words in the Bible. I’ve always read the King James Versions and never understood the old English, but studying with others helped make the meaning behind the words clear to me & started to gain an understanding of it.

They seemed to emphasize sin and confession and to me it seemed like I needed to submit my life to Him because I was too weak to stop myself from sinning. I started to hide myself from theses women as I felt they were pushing bible studies on me without even asking if I wanted to or not. So I ran away from them and as I continued to read the Bible, I kept seeing contradictions. I made an attempt to not turn my life over to God but looking for words that I can use to justify not following Him. Living for God in my perspective was about living a tight path with dos and don’t rules. I didn’t want to live like that. I wanted to stick to the idea that I have full control over my life, but not too long after, I realized that I don’t.

I went to University in the South Bay, but lived in the mid-Bay Area. My commute to school took about 30 minutes. For two weeks I felt that I was going to get into an accident. Every time I felt that I would pray for God to protect me. Then one morning I woke up to take a placement test at school. As I was getting ready to go, I felt a push to dress with sturdy clothes so I wore my denim jeans, a hooded sweater and most importantly, my boots with a thick sole.

As I merged into the freeway, there we’re a few cars closely surrounding me. As I turned the wheel back and forth, my car spun around with each turn. It wasn’t raining but somehow, I seemed to have lost control of my car no matter how I turned the wheel. There I was, thinking I had full control over my life. When I realized that I didn’t have any control over my car, I reached out to God, surrendered control to Him and put the protection of my life into His hands. I saw my car going straight to the tail end of a van and letting go, I prayed, “God, please protect me,” then shut my eyes.

I don’t remember feeling much after that except my car tumbling around and a heavenly embrace. All sounds disappeared around me except for the sound of chimes. When my car stopped tumbling , it landed upside down and when it stopped moving, the sounds around me came back, the traffic and everything else. I opened my eyes to shattered glass everywhere and hanging from my seatbelt upside down. I moved my legs to step on all the shattered glass on floor of the freeway. With sturdy boots, my feet were heavily protected. As soon as my feet touched the ground, I was able to release the seat belt I was hanging from.

Shortly after I got out of the car, there were people that came asking if I was ok. A man put a blanket over me to help with the shock. Eventually the paramedics came and the people that were there to help me disappeared. I don’t even remember them leaving, but as soon as the paramedics arrived, they were nowhere to be seen. I still wonder from this day if some or all where angels.

I remember being in the back of the paramedic van. There was one man in there, telling me how my condition was a miracle, that car accidents similar to the one I’ve just been in, usually result in death or in critical condition, usually an eyeball or brain left behind on the freeway.

When I got to the hospital, they tested my urine for internal bleeding. The results showed that I was completely fine. The only marks I had were tiny red dots on my hand from the broken glass and small bruises on my knee that hit the steering wheel. The doctor said it was a miracle, as did many other people involved. My car was totaled. The van that my car hit flipped to the side. The couple inside was perfectly fine. Thank God!

This was a turning point in my life. While I was on the freeway being interviewed by highway patrol, that was my first proclamation that I was going to follow Christ from now on. That moment helped me to realize that God does not want me to surrender to Him so I can live a life of do and do not, but the truth that was made clear was that He loves me and that I don’t know what’s best for me. My surrender meant God taking my hand at times I’ve gotten off the wrong path and leading me back to the path leading to life, joy, peace and love. Who am I to doubt the one that created me. He knows me more than I know myself.

Several months later, I gave my life to God through baptism & I’ve never been the same. After I got baptized, I see, feel and hear the Lord with me. I’ll never forget sitting at the park the day after and instead of my mind being filled with life’s troubles, all I could hear around me was nature: the birds singing, the water moving and the leaves swaying in the wind. That was the first time I felt God’s peace and when I stepped out of the totaled car that day, that was the first time I felt God’s love for me & my faith came that day as I realized that what the Bible says about His love for us…is the truth. His love is as a Father to His child in a pure and incorruptible way.