Visions of A Robot

My name is Vincent Bantigue. This is my attempt at a street photography blog. Please feel free to leave feedback.

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Rowland Heights, CA. December 24th 2013.

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Manila, January 27, 2007. Taken during the Santo Nino (Baby Jesus) Festival.

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San Juan, Puerto Rico. April 2013.

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Excerpt:

"Imagine if money were food. (Don't worry, money is much better than food.) The wealthy man has silo after silo full of grain. Meanwhile, thousands of people are poor and starving. "I built up these vast stores of food over my career as a trader. Although I could never eat all of the food they hold, it gives me great personal satisfaction to gaze upon them and reflect on my own success. But don't worry," says the rich man, "upon my death, all of my food holdings will be distributed to the poor." The people cheer his generosity. The rich man lives fifty more years. The poor starve to death each winter.

Just as the rich man could have saved the starving poor by giving them his food now, so could the rich save thousands of lives now by collectively funneling their vast resources to those in need. Society does not expect them to do that, and so they don't. In America, having, holding, and hoarding great wealth carries no shame. It is considered one's personal prerogative. The implications of all of the lives that that money is not saving as it sits in the bank are not treated as real considerations. But they should be. Starving is starving is starving."

link to full article.

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Excerpts:

"So, on one hand, the disappearance of belief within the most relevant literary form of contemporary culture is a worthy cause for reflection. On the other hand, this is, perhaps, the novel’s destiny. It is the form of an unbelieving epoch, even if it took a few centuries for that latent feature to surface like a whale in the swimming pool of contemporary culture."

"The universal laws that undergird the worlds of other literary forms - the epic, tragedy and comedy, poetry - are absent from the world of the novel, a world built on the isolating particularities of time, place and the individual.Yet the pursuit of these universalities, or at least some of them, constitutes both the novel’s form and function. To tell a story is to search for meaning in defiance of the current odds. It’s an act of spiritual apprehension. It’s a leap of faith."

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Interesting article about a possible solution to the debt ceiling problem:

"Today, New York Times columnist and Nobel prize winning economist Paul Krugman wrote that President Obama should be "absolutely" prepared to mint a one trillion dollar platinum coin and use it to pay the government's bills."

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Excerpt from the article:

"In our honest efforts to “engage” the culture around us, seeking to change people’s lives by the power of Christ, we can quickly slide intomerely consuming. After all, in this millennium, information and trends move so fast, the minute you conquer one, there’s a new one right behind it. We can spend our days keeping up with the latest fashions, bands and hip places to eat and drink. Before we know it, we’ve put all our time and efforts into keeping up with culture, and when someone asks us for the hope we have in us (which they won’t, unless they see it), we won’t have an answer."

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A short piece by Jon Bloom of Desiring God Ministries reminding us that God's grace overcomes our guilt and shame.

Excerpt:

I think one reason is similar to why God included Tamar, Rahab, and Bathsheba in the lineage of the Messiah and why the first recorded person to whom Jesus self-disclosed as the Messiah was the woman at the well: to illustrate that Jesus came to take away the horrible shame of sin and bestow the greatest honor on undeserving sinners. Jesus removed the scarlet letters these women carried around and made them heirs of the kingdom—daughters of the King!

And if your trust is in Jesus, that’s exactly what he does for you. Before God you wear no scarlet letter for any past sin anymore. Jesus takes away your sin. It is gone. You are clean. There is no lingering surprise and horror before God’s throne. Only honor bestowed on the children of God.

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Afternoon rush hour in Ho Chi Minh City.

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I don't want to be defined by the work I do

I want to defined by the work done to me. The work of Jesus on the Cross to save me from my sin and guarantee me eternal life with Him and the Father.

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Excerpt:

China believes that Christianity is responsible for much of the historic success of Western Europeand the United States, said Dr. William Jeynes, senior fellow of The Witherspoon Institute in Princeton, N.J., during a presentation at the Family Research Council on Tuesday.

But while the Chinese government is open to Christianity, it also “wants to control Christianity.” Those in authority are very much aware of the Church’s role in bringing down the Berlin Wall and advancing democracy in the Soviet bloc.

“They view Christianity as a belief system that if not controlled will potentially overthrow the government,” said Jeynes during his lecture titled, “God, China & Capitalism: Is Christianity in China the Key Ingredient for Economic Success?” “But on the other [hand], they see that if you try to oppress Christians that it could lead to this explosion as it did in Eastern Europe and [they could] lose control that way.

“So they want Christianity for the benefits but they want to control it, and that is the balance they are currently trying to achieve.”

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Many in the Chinese government, said Jeynes, believe that Christianity might be China’s best hope to establish morality as well as economic prosperity. Immorality is so “out-of-control” in China that a Chinese leader confided to him that if one were to randomly call someone from the Beijing phone book and offer the person $2,500 to come to a hotel room for sexual relations, then one out of three strangers would agree.

“The Chinese believe that if the level of immorality that exists today, sexual immorality especially, persists, then the economic strength of the country cannot continue,” said Jeynes. “So they very quickly want to teach morality, especially to the young before their economy might indeed collapse.

“It is not that they embrace Christianity with the most pure motive,” Jeynes noted. “A lot of their motive is it is good for our country, the morality of the country, and if we want economic prosperity to continue we need to have a more invitational approach to those who are Christian.”

Found via http://www.persecutionblog.com/2011/05/scholar-china-notices-link-between-christianity-us-economic-success.html

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Thought provoking words about how Christians in America typically look at risk and the place it plays in our faith. This is something I have been thinking about for a while. It's a very personal question for me: I often ask myself the question, "am I so risk-adverse that I miss out on what God wants for me? Choosing the safe route in all my decision making?" I know we are all of little faith, but is my faith little in this particular way? I'm putting this one out there.

I am thinking about this right now in light of Pastor Keith's message yesterday during Pastor Mark's ordination. He talked about Joseph's life and how God brought him to a place of servitude, a low place, preparing him to become one of the greatest leaders in history: putting him in a place of humility before lifting him up. I wonder how much of that was 'risky' for Joseph? He was a brash young man, as Pastor Keith said, and instead of doing the risk-adverse thing and keeping his dreams to himself and not inciting any of his brothers' wrath, he went ahead and almost got himself killed.

Then again, perhaps this is too man-centered of an analysis of Joseph's story. The point of Joseph's story is that God is sovereign and it teaches us to trust in that sovereignty. So, perhaps it's not about evaluating how risk adverse I am, but about evaluating how much I trust in God.

(via "Risk-Averse Christianity" Is a Lifestyle-Affirming Civil Religion - Desiring God)

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Reflections

It is finished. I am at Incheon International airport right now and we are going to board our flight back to LAX in about 30 minutes. 5 cities in 2 weeks and I'm ready to go home. As one of our sisters in Korea said about the number of cities we visited, 'that's crazy'! I agree. In fact, that's why the last post may have sounded a bit negative. But my intention was to be as transperant as possible. It wasn't as bad as it sounded, I was just typing it in the heat of the moment at the airport I guess.

However, I don't want to give off the wrong impression, so I'm going to clear it up here: despite being challenging, this trip has been a HUGE blessing to me, having unique experiences and meeting people that I have done so much for His kingdom, but more importantly, being able to see what God's doing here. I am humbled by the sheer fact that God allowed me to go on this trip, and am very excited about what He has in store for my church, AMI and Asia. I can't wait to share about everything God has taught me, but at the same time feel like I do have a big responsibility ahead of me. I know I need to really pray, seek wisdom, and depend on Him these next few weeks, months, years as I move forward from this point on.

I have been journaling and want to write out some of my reflections here in the next couple weeks, but I wanted to start off with one thing that stuck out to me which one of the Pastors on this trip said during our debriefing session: Don't overestimate what you can do and don't underestimate what God can do. Simple words of wisdom. This will be my prayer for this week, as I think and reflect about what to do moving forward after this trip.

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Home Stretch

Flying to Korea in about an hour. V was great. I felt like I got to know it a little better than the previous country, maybe because more people spoke English, and in some slight way, it was culturally and environmentally more similar to my own homeland: The Philippines. Despite the high humidity and more bug bites, I felt more comfortable here.

One thing that stood out to me in my short time here is how businessmen here really live out their faith in the marketplace. It's one thing to talk about this, and another thing to practice it. I want to say the businessmen and professionals here are better at doing this compared to the ones in the U.S. Some examples: they mentor younger businessmen, teaching them to do business as Christians, and meet in accountability groups in order to support each other in the fight against the temptations they face regularly. I just don't see or hear about this in the U.S.

Personally, I'm tired, irritable, slightly homesick and antsy. But this trip is not over and I realize this is the home stretch. Please pray that God will sustain my energy and focus throughout the rest of this trip. Thanks for all your support during this trip.

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the queen of fruits

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lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path

Throughout this trip I have been talking and praying about opening my eyes to what God is doing in Asia. In the second country now and for sure God has opened my eyes to things, and revealed a lot about His world and what He's doing.

However, I think I'm beginning to realize- it doesn't mean anything if I don't know what to do in response. Yeah, I know that there are opportunities, open doors and growth to be a part of, but what is the next step.

Now that my eyes are open to what He's doing here on Earth, I have to slowly turn my gaze upward, towards Him. It's so counter-intuitive because we think that since we see these things we know what to do, where to go, when to act. But the reality is, we are still limited in our vision, and we have to look to Him to guide us. This is my prayer for the rest of this trip: Psalm 119:105. 

"Your word is a lamp to my feet

and a light for my path."