#1 Compliment three people every day!

To my daughters,

I have been listening to Mr. Dan Miller a life coach and an online mentor for me anak. He recommended that I start reading “Life’s Little Instruction Book”. In this blog, I will try to explain on how to be a better person. Always remember, that you can have everything you want and need in life, if you will just help other people get what they want.

#1 Compliment three people every day!

When I wake up in the morning, I always make it a point to say good morning and I love you to your mom. Please make sure to say one good thing to yourself, talk to yourself that you are going to be awesome, going to be great and that you are going to have a blessed day. The second person you can give compliment to is your sister. When you wake up, please say good morning to your sisters. Lastly, you can compliment me or your mom. Better yet, compliment the first ten people you see in your school, compliment them regardless of their position in your school, whether they are the principal, janitor, cafeteria lady or your classmate. What you sow is what you reap. If you sow a compliment, you will get a compliment in return. If you sow a smile, you will get a smile back. So your assignment for today anak, give compliments generously…

Love,

Dad

Greatness in YOU!

There is actually a greatness within you. As a Christian, we all have the authority to declare increase or decrease in our lives. In other words, are you expecting God to bless you or to curse you?

I was just chatting with a facebook friend of mine and he said that he wants to change his career in order for him to take care of his family. Another friend of mine, posted a picture of his possible new car. Both of them have not gotten it, but they are now declaring what they want to be and what they want to have.

If we go around telling other people, “Well, I will not meet my quota or sales this year,” or “I don’t think I will get promoted.” Or “I will never get better, I will always be sick.” At the hospital that I work, there are always two patients that I see, the one that wants to get better and one that wants to just get sick all the time.  I am not saying they want to be sick, but they choose to be sick and not to take care of themselves.

God said, why don’t you take your limitations off? Why don’t you believe in Him and go out each day with an expectation of increase, promotion and blessing. Expect and choose joy instead of sadness, peace instead of conflicts, and praise instead of despair… Keep the faith my friends!

Stop Thinking and Start Fishing!

If you have seen the movie the Son of God, there was this scene that Jesus was on the beach and talked to Peter while putting away his empty fishing net. Jesus walked over to him and asked if He could join him to fish. Peter told him, I have been out all night and I haven’t catch any fish. I am a fisherman and there are no fish out there right now!

Sometimes in life, we know too much! Sometimes, we tend to know a lot and be a so called expert! Sometimes our own intellect can keep us from God’s best. If you will listen to the so called experts in life, they will talk you down. They will try to give you a defeated life. My mother, when she consults her doctor, the doctor will say she is sick, when in fact she was not. When you watch the news, it will say that USA is a struggling country, when in fact, it is still the land of milk and honey and that everybody has equal opportunity to grow and succeed. I know it is always to have good information, but you don’t have to dwell on the negative report. Look at what and how God can change the situation.

Going back to Jesus and Peter story. Jesus was able to convince Peter to go out again and fish. It may not make sense to Peter, he may have not understand it. But he believed Jesus and went out again. It looked like it was a waste of time, but sometimes we have to realize that God is in control of everything, even the fishes! I think that is the attitude we need to have. Stop believing the negative report and start believing God’s report and start going out there and fish!

Dream Another Dream

I still believe that God has plans for you. His plans for you is to bless you and keep you. He has placed greatness inside of YOU! I’ve been reading a book titled “Put Your Dream To Test” by John Maxwell and it says there that you have to keep dreaming. I have this friend, who just can’t get out of his comfort zone. I encouraged him and told him he can do it, all he has to do is take a leap of faith and take one step at a time. He started as a waiter of a small town restaurant, then he moved to another restaurant to be a supervisor. Guess what, he is now a store manager, he didn’t even finished college. What am I saying here my friend, we all have dreams and desires we want to accomplish. But so many times, life has a way of stealing it. We will go to disappointments and adversity. But never stop dreaming.

I want to encourage you today to keep dreaming and get the fire back! Start speaking victory over your life. Be positive, start going to church, and get around with people who believes in you. Keep the faith my friend!

Lead or Follow?

Have you been in a group where everybody wanted to be a leader? Everybody wanted to lead? Everybody wanted to be the boss, the big man, the one who calls the shot? If not, congratulations! You are in a perfect world! Lol…

Anyway, I attended a church last Sunday and the pastor explained how leadership is such an overrated word nowadays. In school, they teach you how to be a leader. At work, they encourage everybody to have a leader in each team. In sports, somebody has to be the team captain or the leader. And even at church, they teach you how to be a leader. I have read books about leadership and I believe this is also the reason why I am in my position right now. But I also believe that being a Christian, we don’t need to be a leader. We just need to be a follower. 1 Corinthians 11:1 and Matthew 16:24 states that we need to be follower of Christ. It didn’t say we need to be a leader for Christ. It just clearly states to follow Him. The ultimate leader, boss, manager, team captain in our lives should be Jesus Christ and we need to follow him.

In order for a basketball team to win, there is a coach, team captain and several different positions such as center, forward and point guards. Not everybody can be a coach and a player at the same time (except for Jaworski or Pacquiao), nobody can play all the positions. Guess what, somebody has to learn how to follow the coach or team captain. What is the key word there? Follow…

Don’t get me wrong here, being a leader is good. But when it comes to the church, I believe we need to be followers. I myself have been a leader at church and at work. But most of the time, I have lead the people in the wrong direction. Jesus didn’t recruit leaders in His ministry, He recruited followers. This culture that we have right now has created too much leadership obsession. Everybody just wants to be the leader and the voice of their team.

So if you are a leader right now, I suggest that you throw away all your leadership manuals, books and titles. The day has come for us to be a better followers.

Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ – 1 Corinthians 11:1

Then Jesus told his disciples, “if any would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me – Matthew 16:24

The Bridge @ Rockwood REHAB Team

We know that God did not send his son into the world to be its judge, but to be its savior. Christ was born on Christmas day to give us life and to set us free!

So in line with that, The Bridge at Rockwood REHAB Team have decided to give this Christmas season. Yes, the Rehab Team gives out all year long by giving the best rehabilitation services they can give to our residents, but this year is different. The REHAB Team decided to help the Typhoon Haiyan Victims in the Philippines.  Instead of celebrating it with a fancy celebration, they decided to help and donate.

With the leadership of the Rehab Manager Ms. Tessa Perkinson, OTR, the REHAB Team collected a total of $540.00 equivalent to approximately Php 20,000.00. The Team will donate the said amount to a certain Filipino Family and will make their Christmas a better one. 

This Christmas season, decide to be like this team. Decide to be a blessing, decide to give, and decide to be the hands and feet of God. 

Merry Christmas!!!

And in behalf of the Filipino people. Thank you very much The Bridge at Rockwood REHAB Team for your help!

Help!!!

My conversation with Jett

I got a message from my friend from Leyte City, Philippines about what happened to them during the super typhoon Hayain. He told me about his ordeal. He lost his house, personal possession and two aunts. The good news is that both his children are safe and is now recovering from that horrific event.

2 Corinthians 8:7 says ⁷  in complete earnestness and in the love we have kindled in you^[a]—see that you also excel in this grace of giving.

Jett's House

Photo (AP David Guttenfelder)

Paul said in that verse that “excel in giving!” Because it is in giving that we receive more! Every time we give something out, we have extra hands to receive blessings. God has blessed you not to keep that blessing for yourselves. He has blessed you to be also a blessing to others. I am now asking your good heart to bless this friend of mine. I know some of you have already donated to institutions, organizations and even went home to donate their time. But I am asking you now my friend to excel in giving. I am asking you to be the hands and feet of God to bless this friend of mine.

Let your heart’s desire to be a blessing, to leave other people better. I don’t care if you donate a $1.00, $10, $100 or $1,000 all I ask for is for you to bless other people in order for you to be blessed too!

Education

My daughter was asking me yesterday why I am still studying. I told her that learning is never ending. The moment we stop learning, we are dead. I saw a post at our work and it says “Education is not preparation for life, education is life itself. –John Dewey.” And a lot of people suffer from refusing to learn. I have encountered a lot of people who are envious of my position at work and I tell them to go back to school and earn it! A lot of people have reached a certain level in life that they just cruise after high school graduation. They will stop reading a book, stop learning and start complaining about life. They think, I’m done with school and I have a job and just start complaining about my life. But God never created us to reach at a certain position and then stop reaching higher? Whether you are 8 years old or 80 years old, God has a plan for you. That is the reason why I am actually back in school and finishing my doctorate degree. That is the reason why I push my wife to go back to school and finish her nursing degree and that is also the reason why I push my children to learn more every day, learn music instruments and read books for life is a never ending lesson. The key here is to take responsibility for your own personal growth, attend conferences, go online and get continuing education courses, attend church activities, listen to good audio and read books! So what are you waiting for? Go back to school!

I CAN'T!

A lot of people’s mindset are programmed by the people who are around them. Their parents, friends, co-workers, boss and love ones. They can be either good people or bad people. But some of their words are very limiting. And as long as you believe what they say about you, their words will be limiting you. In our house, me and my wife makes it a point to remove the word “I can’t,” because the more you say you CAN’T, the more you will never be able to do it. I like how their piano teacher supports our beliefs. She would always encourage my children to be the best they can be in playing the piano. As long as you keep believing what other people say about you, they will be limiting you. One of the secret to break those limitation is to change your mindset, change what you are saying and start meditating on what God says about your life. God said He will bless you, God said He will take care of you, God said He will get you out of that situation. As you meditate on His word, you will eventually get past of those limitation set by others. People may have spoken bad words over you, but the good news is that they don’t determine your destiny. You are not what other people say who you are. You are who God says you are!

Asking and Seeking.

 I have a confession to make, I haven’t been praying lately to God. I’ve been working so hard that I tend to forget to have a quiet time. Most of the time, the only prayer I get to have is when I go to my kids room and tell them to pray. Often times, I will hear them asking for something like toys or clothes that I can do something about. But just recently, my kids Alyssa and Akeisha started asking God to let Zeyah the youngest of them all to be able to attend their school. Here in this area, pre-kindergarten is only for the less fortunate. People who have higher incomes (yeah yeah, I earn so much!!! Lol) are endorsed to Day Cares who can afford to pay them. One of the reason why we wanted Zeyah to be in that Pre-K school is that it is the same school were her siblings go to. When we visited for the registration day, they said she cannot attend due to certain income brackets, they said we shouldn’t expect and we are on the waiting list etcetera etcetera. Well guess what, last minute they called and said that Zeyah was accepted and she should come and go to school this week. My children told me that their prayers were just answered and that God is just so awesome.  The situation has touched me and my wife that we realized how prayers are so important.

A lot of times, it is easy to think we are not supposed to ask from God, a lot of times we just go along with what is happening and forget the importance and meaning of a good and sincere prayer especially from a child. The Bible tells that God longs to give the desires of our hearts and give His blessings to you. Actually, God has said “You don’t have because you do not ask!” Every time we ask God for favor, blessings or provisions, you are training your faith. When you pray, make sure you ask it sincerely and with faith. It is very important to have an attitude of faith and expectancy. If you want to move God into your lives, you need to believe in Him! He has given you everything you need to be successful in life. Your Faith!