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If we haven't once asked ourselves if we used 'too much grace,' then I'm not sure how much we are trusting Jesus.

5 Loaves, 2 Fish and 5,000

This event in the Bible has been stuck in my mind for a while now. If you do not already know, the event takes place where a multitude of over 5,000 men not including women and children, gather to a deserted place to hear Jesus, then Jesus takes what seems minimal (the 5 loaves and 2 fish) and multiplies them to feed the crowd and even has some leftovers! We see this story as a great miracle that Jesus provides for all our needs and then some, but what we don’t know is this story also tells that Jesus can use us even if we are broken, and hurt.

To get an understanding we need to know the events that happened before they even got this location, prior to this, the disciples were out performing miracles and then learned about the beheading of John the Baptist by King Herod. After hearing the news, the disciples went out to get the corpse of John the Baptist and buried him.(Mark 6:24-28)

Soon after Jesus knowing about the struggle of the disciples and tells them “Come aside by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while.” (Mark 6:31) The disciples are pretty down at this point and want nothing more to do but just rest. As they move to the deserted place, a multitude, of over 5000 hear about Jesus moving into this location and follow them. Jesus saw them and “was filed with compassion” and taught them and the last thing the disciples wanted to do was ministry after burying John the Baptist. One of them disciples speaks up and tells Jesus ““This is a deserted place, and already the hour is late. Send them away, that they may go into the surrounding country and villages and buy themselves bread; for they have nothing to eat.” (Mark 6:35-36) Jesus being Jesus, tells them the disciples “you give them something to eat.” Sarcasm was obvious with the disciples and they tell Jesus “shall we go and buy two hundred denarii worth of bread and give them something to eat?” Obviously not enough money to feed the 5,000. At this point the disciples are frustrated and want nothing more to do with the crowd.

As we know the rest of the story, Jesus asks for what they have with them, which are the 5 loaves and 2 fish. Jesus takes them and multiplies them and the disciples hand out the food to those in the crowd. So as we know Jesus works miracles, and in impossible situations such as feeding the 5,000 but Jesus can also use the broken.

As we know the disciples thought they were going to be alone, in a deserted location and able to relax and grieve for the lost of their friend. Brokenhearted and weary, the last thing they wanted was a crowd to interrupt their rest. The 5 loaves and 2 fish in this story represent the things that are left of us. After the hurt and the beating sometimes we believe we do not have enough in us to complete the work of the Kingdom, or to go on through life. I just want to let you know that Jesus takes what little you have in the 5 loaves and 2 fish, and can multiply it to reach 5,000 plus leftovers! So whatever you have left in your tank, whether it the little faith you have left, the little hope you have left, I want you to give it to Jesus. Whether you think what you have is insufficient for God to use, I want to let you know that Jesus can take what that is and use it beyond what your mind can comprehend. My prayer is that whatever little you think you have, Jesus will take it and make it extraordinary. Through this you can be a part of something greater than yourselves.

Stop look for signs in the world and start looking in His Word.

Between Good Friday and Easter is proof that God works miracles in silence.

What’s new?

I’ve been stuck in what seems like a state of limbo. I’ve been asking God for new revelations, a new beginning in my life, or just to get me going to a new direction, nothing crazy, maybe a little to the right or to the left. So far nothing has come, and then it struck me.

Old revelations can become new again.

I thought always thought I needed to advance like world does and go to the “next step” spiritually. But I’ve found myself where I always have. I particularly was not disappointed in God, but in myself thinking I wasn’t trying hard enough or I wasn’t spiritual enough, I was receiving nothing new, just the same old things. I’ve come to terms that revelation of God’s love and grace I’ve encountered in the past is what I really needed, and what I will always need. I was saved by the undeserved favor called grace, and the same was I was saved, I will be sustained. God is the same yesterday, today and forever and in fact, He can say the same thing to you 100 times and it will always feel like the first. I’ve made the mishap of trying to do things and push myself into new territory with no luck, when all I needed to do was rest on His finished works and soak in His unending love and grace. Then when God decides it’s time to move, it will be Him that moves me, not me.

“Now God has us where he wants us, with all the time in this world and the next to shower grace and kindness upon us in Christ Jesus. Saving is all his idea, and all his work. All we do is trust him enough to let him do it. It’s God’s gift from start to finish! We don’t play the major role. If we did, we’d probably go around bragging that we’d done the whole thing! No, we neither make nor save ourselves. God does both the making and saving. He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing. “ - Ephesians 2:8-10 (MSG)

...being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.

Philippians 1:6

I grew up not being the most talented person. I couldn’t sing, I couldn’t dance, I wasn’t the smartest and was incredibly awkward (things don’t change.) I never was a good talker, I was incredibly lazy and lacked severe motivation for anything in life. I remember going to bed with thoughts of what am I doing with my life, and what direction am I even headed. The thoughts of self-worth and what I even contributing to the world, to friends, to yourself? This was about 11 years ago in middle school. I cannot say I have overcome all these things or thought but I can say God is there and has brought me a long way. The first time I ever noticed Him, I remember walking out of my house, looking at the trees and noticing them greener, breathing in the air and noticing it cleaner, and the same sky I’ve been looking at every day has become bluer. Everything just felt better. If you know me, most of the time I’m chill, relaxed and seem to have no problems. I am the latter though and sometimes things still do pop up from the past in my head, or even new things arise. I can tell you this though, when you put God in the situation everything becomes better, and I’ll never forget that day that the things I looked at without much wonder, the things of everyday life, such as the trees and the sky, became exceptionally more colorful and beautiful. When God is put into the situation, the things that once seem “normal” become extraordinary, they become colorful. When you notice God in the situation you just feel better, and you see the beauty in it. Sometimes we become so used to things we see everyday, we forget how wondrous and carefully sculpted life is. So whatever you are going through, if you feel like you are just constantly faced with the same thing, the same problem over-and-over in life, I pray that God will bring you to a place where He enhances beauty in your life. His hand has been there all along, sometimes you gotta let God in and take a look at God’s viewfinder for even a second and see how God see’s beauty and things worthy.

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace.” - Matthew 11:29-30 (MSG)

“Joy to the World”

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Not your usual 'joy to the world' 󾔗󾔠 woooosh! merry Christmas!!

Posted by Jemimah Faith Roño on Sunday, December 20, 2015

I used to be afraid of failing at something that really mattered to me, but now I'm more afraid of succeeding at things that don't matter.

Bob Goff, Love Does

Dear David,

Today mark’s your one year since you have been promoted, how is it in heaven?!

I can’t believe it has been a year already since you left us here on earth. Time seemed to have flew, and we just want to let you know you are remembered and left a stamp here. I once again thank you for the faith that overflowed and leaked toward others that you probably unknowingly poured out, I appreciate in the years that you battled brain cancer, in times that were tough, you persevered and appreciated life in a way that encouraged all of us. You taught others to truly live each day as if it were their last. Each and everyone one of us worry about the future, whether we admit it or not, but thank you for teaching us about the beauty ‘today’ brings, about capturing the present moment. You continually inspire those around you to always look at the best in people and situations.

I can remember when you first went back to church and was eyeing Jel. I remember our first double date when you were courting Jel, we went to Philly and drove us to get cheesesteaks. I remember the time you drove Jel, Roxanne and I went to our very first Awakening Conference. I can recall the time in Bible study where you first had symptoms of numbness in your body, and Tita Lourdes advised you to go the hospital to get checked, that is when they found the cancer, astrocytoma if I am not mistaken. I remember when you first had chemo and lost your hair, or the time you forgot who Jel was and she cried to us during one of our Friday meeting’s because she was so heartbroken. I remember your humor throughout your battle with cancer, or the times Jel was still mean to you even though you were sick. I remember your wedding and how you limped down the aisle in tears. I remember when you were hiding that Jel was pregnant with Jael, and all you can do was smirk, smile and laugh when people asked about her if she was pregnant. I remember all the way to Jael’s birth and visiting you one last time in the hospital before hearing news of your departure a few weeks later.

You encouraged us all, and still do. I believe God introduced me to you to a part of your life where I witnessed the changes of your physical self detiorating but your spiritual self soaring as high as can be, and which one was the priority. The stories of you telling the doctor to “watch and wait til God heals you” all the way to your last days in not remember anybody, but when asked about Jesus you replied “my Savior” without hesitation have really impacted the way I view life and taught me where to place importance in, that is in Jesus. I believe Jesus sustained you before and during your sickness and is still sustaining you now after your healing in heaven. You taught me to believe that Jesus is enough in every situation, good and bad. You may not have been close to me like you were with other people, but it just goes to show the impact you made regardless the distance. Once again, thank you for everything and all you did, rest easy in paradise brother.

- KCT

Glorious Ruins

The song Glorious Ruins by Hillsong has been on repeat for the past couple of days. The title itself is an oxymoron, meaning they are completely opposites in terms of definition, Glorious Ruins. When I think ruins, the first things that come to mind are destruction or disaster. Our first instinct of ruined areas is to abandon them, but God sees something else in ruins, He sees beauty and His first instinct isn’t to run away from it but to embrace it. There are days when I feel inadequate, not good enough or unqualified. Not for any particular reason but because it’s human nature that those feelings come. So even though you may feel messed up or broken, remember God works in that to turn it into beauty. He knows your thoughts and your situation. In situations that may take the life out of you, He can revitalize you. As we came from dust from the ground, God knows how to work with things that can get messy. If you are like me and have worries or doubts, simply know that God is with you in the messiness. There’s something mysteriously exhilarating being in a place where you don’t know where you or what you’re doing with life, but you have this Jesus guy tell you “it’ll be alright just follow me, I gotchu”. I’m not sure if you like being blind-folded into surprises but let us see where this journey of faith takes us.

“I’ll walk through the fire With my head lifted high And my spirit revived in Your story And I’ll look to the cross As my failure is lost In the light of Your glorious grace.” - Glorious Ruins by Hillsong

Just some old writing I found that I am throwing away but want to store.

This was roughly 4-5 years ago. Still holding onto the dream, God willing!

News flash

Recently, my motorcycle slid and caused me to fall and scrape my knee on a slow turn, my motorcycle and I are fine, as I was able to ride home safely from where I slid. I thank God that I was not going at ridiculous speeds and that I sustained minimal injury. There has been many events and occurrences that can say that the devil is working double-time, and that enemy is doing this and that. Well as a Christian, we can say it is obvious that all these are correct. As for me, being observant as I am, that sometimes we fall into a trap where we continue to mention these acts of the enemy that he has been doing the whole time. The Bible mentions that the enemy comes to “steal, kill and destroy,” so it is nothing new on what he is doing.

I think we need to change our perspective. News flash! Satan is defeated, Jesus took our place from wrath, punishment and condemnation that we deserved. While we live in Earth, things will happen, as we continue to living in our imperfect state as humans, we need to realize that evil is prominent in this world, and that we really can’t escape it. Of course the devil is working overtime, but don’t give him a mention! Instead let us continue to dwell on what is ahead, and set our eyes on things not of this earth. Let us give mention to what Jesus did, and our hope of heaven, in all aspects of life. Satan is like the guy on the stands booing your every move as you play the game, just ignore it. As soon as you look or tell him to shut up, then it’ll be going his way. Just play your game in life, Jesus is the coach. Things will happen, but I’d rather shout praise to God in all situations than even shame the devil, he doesn’t even deserve our breath! In all things thank God, and look to Jesus, don’t let the haters get the shoutouts. When you win, you don't care what the losing team will say, you already got the victory, so let's talk like it!

“Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” - Hebrews 12:1-2

Detour Ahead

I am writing this from more a personal standpoint to where I am currently in my life. So as most of you know (I expect my readers actually know me) I graduated from a Bachelor’s Degree in Nursing roughly over a year ago. I have then worked in two facilities, a subacute/nursing home and I currently work in a hospital. I have worked about 3 months in the nursing home before I transferred over to the hospital, which I will approach my 8th month working at the end of this month. This brings to almost a year of working as a Registered Nurse. So in the start of my career, you could ask me how do I like nursing, well to be honest, I don’t, at least at this moment.

After completing school and passing my NCLEX, which I thought was the hard part, I was ready to start my career as a nurse and my life as a young professional. Being a nurse just sounds good from the get go, 3 day work weeks, flexible scheduling, great pay, which you get most of if you work in ideal situations. I started work, and finally bought things I wanted, bought a car and other purchases the money never really mattered to me, even though it was more than I ever made. All these things and for some reason I still did not receive job satisfaction. I first worked at the nursing home which I knew I would be there temporarily, and I knew I wanted to go to the hospital so when I got accepted into Trinita’s I thought my attitude about work would change, but it didn’t. Maybe this first year of nursing made me realize that this might not be the career for me, or I haven’t found a place I particularly like (Tryna get an OR position.)

Now I am not trying to bash on nursing, it is a great career choice for those who are made for it. Not everyone can handle the stress the environment brings, being around critically ill people all the time. I chose nursing in the fact that I do like helping people, and I like seeing people get better but I know I can do that in a better way rather than at the bedside of nursing. If you are like me, you want to rush the process and go to the next best thing. At times, in life, we could be at a place or situation that we know is not meant for us but we’re there. That is how I feel right now, at this time, where I know my current situation is not my best situation, I need to remain thankful for the position I do have but not be satisfied of where I am now. God has a plan, there is no such thing as wasted time. It is just a detour, like in life, there maybe a problem with the road you thought was the best, so detours are setup to get you to your destination. This is just a detour for me, and whatever you may going through, trust the signs God gives you when detours happen because life doesn’t have GPS, so let’s trust Jesus to get us there.

“For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.” - Jeremiah 29:11

How’s your condition?

I just got out from work, and toward the end of my shift, one of my coworkers complained she was shaky and feeling somewhat dizzy. It was nothing new for her, I have worked with her and it has happened to her previously, as a nurse, I ask her medical history and her family history, usually diabetics are shaky so I questioned if she had a family history of diabetes. She said yes and went about her work, until the charge nurse asked her and we actually checked her blood sugar, which ended up being lower than average. That is when things went down hill.

We ended up giving her juices to spice up her sugar, but it came to no effect as brought her to the nurse’s lounge. She was increasingly getting anxious, and though I have seen her like this before, being aware of her condition causes her to go in a downward spiral. She ended up crying and was later brought down to the ER because she was developing pain.

I believe this is like us when we are in Christ. Though we are redeemed and made righteous in Jesus, having consciousness in our sin can cause us to doubt that and cause us to have increased anxiety and eventually plummet into believing “we are not good enough”, or “I messed up and I need to work my way out of this mess” attitude. Having the security that we are in Christ. and that Jesus makes us right and not us can bring us to just living a better life. Let us always remember our standing in Christ and that God see’s us blameless, without sin, not because of our effort but because Jesus took our place. My coworker had some blood taken from her to test her glucose and found out it wasn’t up to par to standards and had an abnormal reading. Spiritually speaking, if we had our blood tested it would sin-positive but Jesus replaced our blood with His by shedding it on the cross so we could be sin-negative. So when you see your condition, look to Jesus because He took your place, be conscious in Him and not sin, only then you can live a life free of blame and experience true spiritual freedom.

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” - 2 Corinthians 5:17

All or none

All or none is a principal I learned about in college anatomy and physiology. It is based on something called action potentials that occur in the body which are responsible for activating certain nerves or muscles when they occur. An action potential can only occur if a threshold is met by a stimulus, it does not matter how strong the stimulus is, but the threshold just has to be met to have the action potential occur at full force. If the threshold isn’t met even by a decimal, it won’t occur, but reaching of the threshold no matter if you are right on the dot or through the roof, an action potential will occur. At least that is the gist of it, it has been a while so my physiology might be off!

In relation to life, we often have this threshold we have yet to reach for our own [action] potential to occur. We are close to reaching a period of trajectory where we are fulfilled by life joy’s but we fall short. Have you ever felt like one more push would’ve gotten you to a better position in which you are right now? We all have reached threshold on some wrong areas of our life, and went full on onto something we did not want to happen. Other times when we want to do what God wants for us, we often fail and left without result. I believe in order to reach ultimately, our purpose and calling is cliche, but it is to trust in Jesus and not to trust in our own strength. To have Him as our stimulus and reach our action potential, to reach the potential that only He can see in all of us. Jesus is the only one who can take us over our threshold into new territory where we soar, above even our own expectations. We end up doing things we thought we couldn’t do before, we go places we thought we’d never end up and we end up doing tasks and assignments we thought were only for the bigger and better people and not ordinary people like you and me. It is all just a matter of trust that Jesus can take us there past our threshold, by simply accepting His love as a stimulus, and knowing that it is by His Spirit and power that we can live life full force.

Jesus is ready to take you, are you all or none?

“God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us.” - Ephesians 3:20 (MSG)

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