Banana

Frozen chocolate-dipped banana on stick

Oohh, one of my favorites. As much as possible, I try to make it to a point to buy some. It's sweet and makes me happy - the chemicals from banana and chocolate. Grab some. =)

Regrets

Aren't we allowed to regret?

All people regret and regretting is dependent on our decisions. Oftentimes, we regret because of wrong decisions - joined an organization, did something wrong, said something. We even regret when we make a good or/and right decision. But yesterday for me was a regretful day.

It was already 3 am that I went to sleep since I had to be busy about a paper that wasn't mine. I mean, I volunteered making a paper that wasn't mine and for my 19 years of existence here on earth, I haven't really made a paper that wasn't mine. I mean, paper, you know, personal ideas. Yet because I pitied that person, I volunteered, which the topic by the way was out of my field. And so I was still unproductive though I slept late. Before I slept, I even tweeted that I had to be in the school to work things out (e.g. thesis, etc.). And then I closed my eyes.

When I opened my eyes, my mom asked me if I'd go to school and talked about our financial status. I brushed off her statements since I was still sleepy that time. I finally woke up from my senses and realized that it's already late in the morning, 8:30 am to be exact. I hurried up, checked my twitter, ate breakfast and so on. I realized that I still hadn't prayed and read the Bible. I am by the way a Christian. And so I prayed and read the Bible and that took me almost two hours. Then I went to my laptop and realized that:
-unfinished paper
-CHEM 160.1 lab reports
-It's already late and I had to be in the school at that time.

And so let's click the fast forward button and I found myself contemplating about the paper, chatting a few people including someone who said things that broke my heart, and starving (no lunch). It was 11:00 am.

I finished the paper, without giving my best at around3:30 pm, still starving, and filthy. Wa pakoy ligo at that time.I then realized that I was very, very unproductive. I wasn't able to do the things that I should do, first. The sadder thing was, I wasn't able to overcome this. This was one of my problems this semester that's why I did not get very good grades. Emotions, oh but I hate emotions. My classmates were already contacting me, since our teacher asked for my presence. Some were tweeting about subjects and I was nervous since I was not still settled with that subject. Fear consumed, anxiety, and so on.

But then again, the throne of grace never fails. I went to a place and decided to unload everything to Him - the unworthiness, the despair, the regrets, the hatred, the hurts, and the worries. Crying out to Him was not enough, it was also being humble before Him that made me free from the said negativities. Praying is purging. After I prayed, it was as if I'd been set free from captivity after a long time. O His sweet grace, mercy, love.

Perhaps, we are allowed to regret. Yet, after we regret, we learn something. Things happen for a reason. We commit mistakes but it is more important to learn and change. I learned that it takes humility to say no. You cannot keep on saying yes to things and end up regretting. Regretting will do you more harm than good. Last thing, decision - it breaks hearts, it builds up, it restores, it can heal, everything. Our decision determines our own condition or the people around us. It's always best to not just think before we decide, but pray. Is the door that is wide open opened by God or by you? REMINDER:

There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.

-Proverbs 14:12

Purging

"..to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit "

-2 Thessalonians 2:13

Speechless.

Doggone

I miss playing with him. Nope, he's not dead. I'm just busy. 

Of emphasis

Column: Science and religion aren't friends

By Jerry A. Coyne

Religion in America is on the defensive. [ =( ]

Atheist books such as The God Delusionand The End of Faith have, by exposing the dangers of faith and the lack of evidence for the God of Abraham, become best-sellers. Science nibbles at religion from the other end, relentlessly consuming divine explanations and replacing them with material ones. Evolution took a huge bite a while back, and recent work on the brain has shown no evidence for souls, spirits, or any part of our personality or behavior distinct from the lump of jelly in our head. We now know that the universe did not require a creator. Science is even studying the origin of morality. So religious claims retreat into the ever-shrinking gaps not yet filled by science. And, although to be an atheist in America is still to be an outcast, America's fastest-growing brand of belief is non-belief. [ =( ]

But faith will not go gentle. For each book by a "New Atheist," there are many others attacking the "movement" and demonizing atheists as arrogant, theologically ignorant, and strident. The biggest area of religious push-back involves science. Rather than being enemies, or even competitors, the argument goes, science and religion are completely compatible friends, each devoted to finding its own species of truth while yearning for a mutually improving dialogue.

As a scientist and a former believer, I see this as bunk. Science and faith are fundamentally incompatible, and for precisely the same reason that irrationality and rationality are incompatible. They are different forms of inquiry, with only one, science, equipped to find real truth. And while they may have a dialogue, it's not a constructive one. Science helps religion only by disproving its claims, while religion has nothing to add to science.

Irreconcilable

"But surely," you might argue, "science and religion must be compatible. After all, some scientists are religious." One is Francis Collins, head of the National Institutes of Health and an evangelical Christian. But the existence of religious scientists, or religious people who accept science, doesn't prove that the two areas are compatible. It shows only that people can hold two conflicting notions in their heads at the same time. If that meant compatibility, we could make a good case, based on the commonness of marital infidelity, that monogamy and adultery are perfectly compatible. No, the incompatibility between science and faith is more fundamental: Their ways of understanding the universe are irreconcilable.

Science operates by using evidence and reason. Doubt is prized, authority rejected. No finding is deemed "true" — a notion that's always provisional — unless it's repeated and verified by others. We scientists are always asking ourselves, "How can I find out whether I'm wrong?" I can think of dozens of potential observations, for instance — one is a billion-year-old ape fossil — that would convince me that evolution didn't happen.

Physicist Richard Feynman observed that the methods of science help us distinguish real truth from what we only want to be true: "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool."

Science can, of course, be wrong. Continental drift, for example, was laughed off for years. But in the end the method is justified by its success. Without science, we'd all live short, miserable and disease-ridden lives, without the amenities of medicine or technology. As Stephen Hawking proclaimed, science wins because it works.

Does religion work? It brings some of us solace, impels some to do good (and others to fly planes into buildings), and buttresses the same moral truths embraced by atheists, but does it help us better understand our world or our universe? Hardly. [ =( ] Note that almost all religions make specific claims about the world involving matters such as the existence of miracles, answered prayers wonder-working saints and divine cures, virgin births, annunciations and resurrections. These factual claims, whose truth is a bedrock of belief, bring religion within the realm of scientific study. But rather than relying on reason and evidence to support them, faith relies on revelation, dogma and authority. Hebrews 11:1 states, with complete accuracy, "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen." Indeed, a doubting-Thomas demand for evidence is often considered rude.

And this leads to the biggest problem with religious "truth": There's no way of knowing whether it's true. I've never met a Christian, for instance, who has been able to tell me what observations about the universe would make him abandon his beliefs in God and Jesus. (I would have thought that the Holocaust could do it, but apparently not.) There is no horror, no amount of evil in the world, that a true believer can't rationalize as consistent with a loving God. It's the ultimate way of fooling yourself. But how can you be sure you're right if you can't tell whether you're wrong?

The religious approach to understanding inevitably results in different faiths holding incompatible "truths" about the world. Many Christians believe that if you don't accept Jesus as savior, you'll burn in hell for eternity. Muslims hold the exact opposite: Those who see Jesus as God's son are the ones who will roast. Jews see Jesus as a prophet, but not the messiah. Which belief, if any, is right? Because there's no way to decide, religions have duked it out for centuries, spawning humanity's miserable history of religious warfare and persecution.

In contrast, scientists don't kill each other over matters such as continental drift. We have better ways to settle our differences. There is no Catholic science, no Hindu science, no Muslim science — just science, a multicultural search for truth. The difference between science and faith, then, can be summed up simply: In religion faith is a virtue; in science it's a vice.

But don't just take my word for the incompatibility of science and faith — it's amply demonstrated by the high rate of atheism among scientists. While only 6% of Americans are atheists or agnostics, the figure for American scientists is 64%, according to Rice professor Elaine Howard Ecklund's book, Science vs. Religion. Further proof: Among countries of the world, there is a strong negative relationship between their religiosity and their acceptance of evolution. Countries like Denmark and Sweden, with low belief in God, have high acceptance of evolution, while religious countries are evolution-intolerant. Out of 34 countries surveyed in a study published inScience magazine, the U.S., among the most religious, is at the bottom in accepting Darwinism: We're No. 33, with only Turkey below us. Finally, in a 2006 Time poll a staggering 64% of Americans declared that if science disproved one of their religious beliefs, they'd reject that science in favor of their faith.

'Venerable superstition'

In the end, science is no more compatible with religion than with other superstitions, such as leprechauns. Yet we don't talk about reconciling science with leprechauns. We worry about religion simply because it's the most venerable superstition — and the most politically and financially powerful.

Why does this matter? Because pretending that faith and science are equally valid ways of finding truth not only weakens our concept of truth, it also gives religion an undeserved authority that does the world no good. For it is faith's certainty that it has a grasp on truth, combined with its inability to actually find it, that produces things such as the oppression of women and gays, opposition to stem cell research and euthanasia, attacks on science, denial of contraception for birth control and AIDS prevention, sexual repression, and of course all those wars, suicide bombings and religious persecutions.

And any progress — not just scientific progress — is easier when we're not yoked to religious dogma. Of course, using reason and evidence won't magically make us all agree, but how much clearer our spectacles would be without the fog of superstition!

Jerry A. Coyne is a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolution at The University of Chicago. His latest book is Why Evolution is True, and his website is www.whyevolutionistrue.com.

Willing spirit yet Weak flesh.

Dr. Welthy E. Villanueva, M.D.

Sa kabila ng kanyang stage 4 breast cancer, hindi nagpapigil si Dr. Winky na ipagpatuloy ang kanyang misyon sa mga kabundukan bilang isang manggagamot at sa kalaunan ay naging tagapagdala na din ng edukasyon para sa mga batang katutubo na salat sa karunungan. Sa kanyang pakikitungo sa mga katutubo, isinuong niya ang kanyang sarili sa panganib maging sa mga nagaantabay na dagdag na karamdaman gaya ng pneumonia at malaria. Subalit ang mga ito ay di naging balakid sa kanya. Hindi rin nito nagawang igupo ang kanyang katawan na ipagpapatuloy ang nasimulan.

Kasama ng ilang mga kakilala, umaakyat sila ng bundok at tumatawid ng 16-30 ilog marating lamang ang mga lilib na tribo ng Batak. Sa una’y ang hangad lamang niya na maipaaabot ang medikal na serbisyo subalit nahabag ang kanyang puso sa lantarang panloloko sa mga katutubo ng mga taga-patag kung saan ang kanilang lupain ay naipagbibili sa mga ito kapalit ng isang radyo lamang. Dito umusbong ang kanyang pagnanais na magdala ng mga boluntaryong guro upang maturuan ang mga bata ng basic education. Sa una’y inakala nilang magiging maayos ang daloy ng klase sa mga bata subalit napuna nilang nahihirapang unawain ng mga ito ang leksiyon dala ng gutom. Kaya naman sinabayan din niya ito ng feeding program katulong ang mga boluntaryong guro bago magsimula ang klase.

Sa di kalaunan, nabuo niya ang Heavens’ Eyes Tribal Missions na ang layunin ay makapagbigay ng edukasyon at maipamulat ang maayos na pamumuhay at kalusugan para sa komunidad ng mga katutubo sa Batak. Nakikipag-ugnayan siya sa mga tribal communities, GOs at NGOs para maisakatuparan ang mga adhikain nito. Ang ilan sa mga pondo ayon kay Dr. Winky ay kadalasan bigay lamang mula sa mga kaibigan at kakilala. Mula sa programang ito, may ilan na din nakapagtapos ng sekondarya mula sa School of Tomorrow Accelerated Christian Education Curriculum nito. Sa taong ito ay malapit na din mairehistro sa SEC ang Heavens’ Eyes Tribal Missions at si Dr. Winky ang tumatayong Administrator at Direktor.

Sumusuka at nanghihina ng labis si Dr. Winky mismo sa kuta ng mga katutubo subalit ni hindi ito naringgan ng ano man reklamo at bagkus ay patuloy pa din na nagserserbisyo.

 Her humility melts my heart. Despite the pain and her weaknesses, she still serves. As for me, whenever I feel tired or something, I lose my servant heart. She is indeed a great reminder to everyone; our weaknesses should always be the source of our strength.

Being nominated is already a big deal. Yet, for those who are blessed with her life, please ENCOURAGE her:
http://bayaningpilipino.abs-cbnnews.com/peopleschoice

A Thankful Heart

We have a lot of reasons to be thankful, and sometimes, it requires time, wisdom, and a change of mind. After praying yesterday, I've realized that God has been so gracious in my life. The people that He has entrusted to me are blessings, answered prayers. I totally don't deserve them - if I have to look at my efforts in reaching out to them before they came into my life, I'd flunk the subject. Yet He, who is always good, entrusted these people to me. One thing I lacked, I forgot to thank Him completely. I realized that the complete gratitude that we can offer God is not our words, but our attitude, on how we respond to the blessings. As a sign of gratitude, I should love them more, serve them more, more and more.

What kind of receiver are you?

"You can pray for anything, and if you have faith, you will receive it."

-Matthew 21:22 (NLT)

We pray whenever we need something. Some of us agonize in prayer, some offer their tears and some pray unceasingly just to make God answer their prayers. But granted that the prayer was answered by God, since God is so willing to bless us (read the Bible), what will be your reaction to it? 

In reality, the measure of one's heart and attitude is not only through testings or trials, but even in successes and answered prayers. When God grants our requests, some, or sadly, most of us have reactions that depict the selfishness of our very hearts. That even includes me. And some of us, after receiving God's blessing, forget to thank God.

1. It's because I prayed.

True that when we pray, miracles will happen. Changes will happen. Problems will be solved. Requests will be granted. But that is because God is so good, and that He has wonderful plans for us. His will is good, perfect, and pleasing. Our righteousness doesn't change God; our righteousness comes from our faith in Christ Jesus. Daniel 9:18, We do not make requests of you because we are righteous, but because of your great mercy. It's not about you praying, it's about goodness. God grants because He is merciful, gracious, loving, and willing to bless His people. Sometimes, we don't have to really defend our cause to God. It is by simply admitting our weakness and focusing on God's power that we fully exercise our ability to pray and commune with God. We pray because we are humble, that we believe in God, that we worship and offer Him our praises. 

Perhaps it is good to boast the fact that we are praying. Perhaps, prayerful people are better than those who do not pray. But the point is it is always about God. And He knows no favoritism.

2. No thanks.

Apostle Paul said to the Colossians that they should devote themselves into prayer, being watchful and thankful. God deserves praises on answered prayers. And even on unanswered prayers, still God is worthy to be praised because of His great mercy. Remember that His will is perfect for His people; He never plans for us to be harmed. Thus, inability to thank God means selfishness. Sometimes we are so consumed with our joy that we tend to forget about His blessings. Are there things in your life that you can consider as blessings from God that you did not thank of?

3. Out of Focus.

Gifts come in various forms - size, shape, quantity, quality, etcetera. A child who wants a cake for his birthday may receive a cup cake instead due to health issues. Yet most of us tend to focus on our expectations so much that we neglect the blessing that is in other form. Case in point: finances. When God does not answer our prayers regarding our finances, we grumble and complain immediately. But don't you think that God is still worthy to be praised since we are still healthy, still able to earn money? Paradigm shift is the key, parekoi.

Now, praying without faith is merely self-talk. And when we do this, there's a greater chance that we'll lose our focus in God and instead boast in ourselves. And, whether our prayer is granted or not (perhaps it will take time, tomorrow, the next day, next month or year, or decades), we should always give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus (1 Thessalonians 5:18).

1 Thessalonians 5:17

New International Version (©1984)
pray continually;

New Living Translation (©2007)
Never stop praying.
English Standard Version (©2001)
pray without ceasing,
New American Standard Bible (©1995)
pray without ceasing;
International Standard Version (©2008)
Continually be prayerful.
GOD'S WORD® Translation (©1995)
Never stop praying.
King James Bible
Pray without ceasing.
American King James Version
Pray without ceasing.
American Standard Version
pray without ceasing;
Bible in Basic English
Keep on with your prayers.
Douay-Rheims Bible
Pray without ceasing.
Darby Bible Translation
pray unceasingly;
English Revised Version
pray without ceasing;
Webster's Bible Translation
Pray without ceasing.
Weymouth New Testament
Be unceasing in prayer.
World English Bible
Pray without ceasing.
Young's Literal Translation
continually pray ye;

The Task of a Leader

"Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.. And we urge you, brothers, warn those who are idle, encourage the timid, help the weak, be patient with everyone."

-1 Thessalonians 5:11, 14-15

Every person is a leader; every person has the capacity to influence others. Some may not have the "qualities" of a leader: outspoken, confident, wise. But I'll tell you the truth: the moment that you have influenced a person to buy a food or sit or not to commit suicide, or not to study, or do something, then you're already a leader. Why am I telling this? Because leadership is basically influence, and thus, everyone is a leader.

But leadership aside, whether you are a pastor, a youth pastor, a student leader, a parent, a gang leader, or the president of any organization, we should remember and live the verses above.

1.Encourage one another.

A lot of people love to encourage other people: Oprah, Sharon, Willie Revillame, etcetra. But in reality, there are also people who love to discourage other people. Was there a point in your life that you were so discouraged or sad that you influenced a person to be sad too? To encourage is to give courage to those who are weak or full of fears. To encourage is to bring life, not sadness, not despair, not even pain.

2.Build each other up.

You cannot build without foundation. If you want to build a person up, you must know the very foundation that the person needs. For example, Christians, to build them up, must be deeply rooted to Christ, not to anyone, not to anyone principles or philosophies. Biologists are founded on biology. The roots must always be identified. A relationship won't last without proper foundations.

And when we build people up, it means strengthening them. You don't strengthen people not just in one aspect, but in all. When you strengthen a person in one aspect only, that person will lose balance, and later on will fall. Just imagine a building being built up on one side only. Do you think that building is lovely to look at? Or will it be able to withstand earthquakes, strong winds, etc?

3. Warn those who are idle, encourage the timid, help the weak, be patient with everyone.

This is the most difficult part of being a leader. If I were to sum the words up, I'd write the word: patience. Leaders should be patient with people. When you know that a person is timid, encourage him patiently. You cannot let durian bear fruits immediately; some would take time. You must tend to its needs, etcetera.

But why do people hurry? Because they forget about their objectives and focus on the current process. They lose focus on their vision and instead focus on the things that are currently happening around them.

When we warn, we warn patiently. We encourage patiently. We help patiently. There is such a thing called individual differences; you can google it if you like.

And if we think that these things are impossible, then try thinking about Jesus a Friend, Savior, Lover, Leader, Pastor, etcetera):

⁶Who, being in very nature^[a] God,

      did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,

 ⁷but made himself nothing,

      taking the very nature^[b] of a servant,

      being made in human likeness.

 -Philippians 2:6-7

If you think you are a friend, then try to be like Jesus. If you believe that you're called to be a leader or pastor, then try Jesus.