STRAIGHT FROM MY HEART

By: Rev. Arnel Tan

Thank you all for your prayers… I had a very busy week. It all started as DXFE celebrated its 39th-year anniversary. We also launched with DXFE listeners, a partnership with the Office of the Ombudsman, for “Operation Red Plate”. This is our response to the rampant misuse of government vehicles. Then we had the prayer gathering of the young people from four different denominations here in our church. Looking back, there’s no way I could have gone through all of these events without your prayers! Thank you all for remembering me in prayer.

The response of the whole church to the needs of the fire victims of Baranggays 31 and 76 is truly a wonderful sign of grace and unselfishness. Praise God! It’s not easy… when you start looking at the world that ‘God so loved’, the more it assaults our hidden selfishness… when we begin to love the world that ‘God so loved’, it becomes even more “disturbing” when we go to the next step of loving… and that is giving. As God so loved the world, God gave, and as we love the world that God so loved, we too, as a church, learns to be unselfish. This time, every time we hear the fire truck’s siren, we hear a call for prayer and unselfishness. We now slowly see OTHERS more than ourselves. The journey is challenging. Let us all depend on God as we take steps to obey Him.

I can only preach at the 7am service today, as yesterday, I celebrated my 23rd year of ordination. Praise God! He is faithful! I will be speaking at the UCCP church of Toril at 10am and then at 2pm, at Times Baptist Church, where I was ordained 23 years ago (Feb. 19, 1989). It’s an opportunity for me to look back and marvel at the Glory and goodness of God through the years of ministry. Somehow, preaching to other congregations is both an adjustment and a learning experience for me. It is an adjustment because I’m not in my home church,… refreshing, because I can see how God is at work in a different setting different from my expectations. Thanks to Pastor Cezil Perales who will be preaching this Sunday for 3 services, let us remember him in prayer. The journey is long, let’s remember that prayer reveals God’s plan… prayer prepares us to take a long-term and low-profile ministry for the Lord!