The Time is Now

The Time Is Now

 If ever you want to reach your dreams, there’s no better time and day than to start NOW.

The steps to reach your dreams.

Dream and believe that you’d have your dreams now. It’s going to happen soon but deep in your heart, believe it’s coming true not someday---but now. If you believe your dreams are coming true now, the sooner you’re going to receive your gift for believing in your dreams.

Pray for your dreams and the things you want to do. Spend time to talk to God about your dreams. When you fear the Lord, He will shower you with knowledge and wisdom. “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge but fools despise corrections,” the Bible reminds us. God’s wisdom through fearing Him would empower you to accomplish the things you want to do.
When you’ve finally decided what you really want to do, make a road map on how you are going to reach your dreams. In your road map, cite the specific things and ways you are going to do to get to where you want to go. 

Consistency and sticking to your life plan will make a difference. Remember one cliché that reminds us to be like a post stamp sticking to the mail until it gets to its destination. The illustration is simple. For a kid to be a doctor he must study hard; believe that he’d be a doctor. After many years of believing and studying as a student of medicine, he would eventually be a doctor. If ever a person wants to be a doctor and on his way to becoming a doctor, he encounters problems, difficulties, challenges and lots of things to study and memorize; to pay and processes to undergo through—he gives up. He eventually shifts course. He can’t be a doctor.
Think: The time is now to believe and act on the fulfillment of your dreams. You must use your head, not your heart when it comes to your dreams. Many people were not able to have their dreams come true for falling in love. 

Keep reminding yourself. Too much thinking will lead you to destruction. To have focus, always remind yourself using notes, boards and stickers.

Nutrition is another thing we must not forget. Many people work hard but they tend to forget giving enough nourishment to their body. So the body becomes weak-- or suffering or even up to the point of getting hospitalized. Along with nourishing your body, you must take time to relax and exercise. You must consistently do all these things. You must not also abuse your body of too much working. You must be aware that there are also diseases that go with working too hard. Cancer due to stress is one of the worst diseases you might have—should you ignore this warning.
You must not live by bread alone is a reminder from Jesus that your body will soon die so you must also feed your soul. And you do that by reading the Bible. You must nourish your soul as well. 
Begin with an end in mind. Start and finish the things you do.
Most of the people are trapped in problems or of things that hinder their growth. Here are some of the hindrances to reaching one’s dreams.

No faith at all. If you have faith in God—and faith in your dreams, soon you’d have what you believe in. The Bible reminds that if you just have a faith like that of a seed of mustard, you can have what you want especially if it’s for something good and Godly. If it’s evil, sooner or later, your plans and dreams would be destroyed. Our God is an awesome and powerful God. He can do anything in favor of you once He gets pleased of your life.

Vices. Addiction to something hinders you to grow. If you can’t stop yourself from doing something that’s making yourself less productive, you are just wasting your life spending time in them. What are your vices? Your decision to stay away from them will make a difference. If you can’t stay away from Facebook knowing it’s consuming most of your time and energy, why not give it a quit? Youths would usually think more on love—in having love life for they think it’s making them feel whole. But it’s the other way around. They feel less loved because of focusing too much on love with the opposite sex. Youths should think that their days should be spent in improving themselves. This is their time and chance to explore the things that could give them good future. Youths should study; go to churches where salvation through Christ and God’s love are being taught.

Laziness. Being successful needs hard work. If you want to be more successful, you have to be more hard working. “A lazy person should not eat.” It’s what’s written in the Bible.

Procrastinations. If you can do it now, don’t say, “I’ll do it later.”
Lack of vision. Having no vision of what you want to have, what you want to be, where you want to go is another problem. If the vision of your dreams is clear, I am sure your days are going to be full of hard work and perseverance. Someone who wants to build his or her body-built well would surely be in the gym for more hours trying to lift even hard objects in the gym. Someone who just wants to be known for being in the gym always-- is another thing. He/She will have different result. A poorer one.

Lack of education. You must be educated in the things you want to go into. A person who wants to have fishball business should be knowledgeable in making delicious fishball and sauce. He/She must know where to get capitalization. Where to situate his business. Is it enough for him/her to have just one stall? The business would flourish depending on the businessman’s vision, training and education. Education is not always the thing you do wherein you have to go to school. Educating yourself is just simply making yourself knowledgeable in something you really want to do. 

Circle of Influence. The people around you also help or break you. You must choose who you want to be with. They affect your decision making. They may also inspire or pull you down. Some people are so determined and focused with their dreams that no one could change their decisions and plans that make them successful. “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers,” Psalm 1:1 reminds us.

Lack of wisdom. God may confuse you to bring you into despair and hopelessness, into defeat and failure for not obeying Him. For being hard-headed. For being rebellious. Psalm 1:1-6. “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked nor stands in the way of sinners nor sits in the seat of the scoffers. But his delight is in the Law of the Lord and in His Law, he meditates day and night. He shall be like a tree that’s planted by the streams of water that yields his fruits in its season and its leaf does not wither and whatever he does shall prosper. The wicked are not so but are like the chaff which the wind drives away.” 

Lack of action. It’s easy to dream but the problem is, “Do you act for the fulfillment of your dreams?”

Lack of focus. Nowadays, there is too much destruction that hinders you to do what you are supposed to be doing. If you’d just focus, you’d discover that there are many things you could actually accomplish. The morning you wake up, what do you do first? Christians are expected to pray, read the Bible and reflect on the 
Word of God before anything else. The same routine is still applicable before sleeping. 

Finishing one thing at a time will help you to accomplish many things in the end. Nowadays, since you want to do many things, you don’t finish them all. You just start them.  

ACT NOW!

TO GOD BE THE GLORY!
Up Next: The Time Is Now Part II

Sponsored by: www.GodisLovePublishing.asia, https://payhip.com/b/Olt1

#Mindstep 8: OPTIMISM

Watch your thoughts, they become words.

Watch your words, they become actions.

Watch your actions, they become habits.

Watch your habits, they become your character.

Watch your character, it becomes your destiny.

I am writing this blog entry because nowadays I am having hard time coping up with the negative thoughts. It’s making me feel worthless so I want to speak about it so as to find ways to get out of this mindset—and be of help to others who might be experiencing the same thing.

First, let’s inhale and exhale. Let’s inhale the positive and exhale the negative. Let’s keep doing it until we feel good deep inside.

I want to believe how we are raised up contributes on our becoming optimistic.

Yesterday I watched videos of terrorists teaching kids to kill so I concluded they might become violent, heartless when they grow up.

What we input in our mind affects us. Remember, no one would be thinking on our behalf—we just get influenced by others.

How do we develop optimism?

Since we are unique from each other, we look at life differently.

When it’s dark, we may see ghosts around when all along there’s no—or we may see light despite darkness.

Here are my suggestions on how we can develop optimism.

1. Find quiet time/meditation to find out the cause of our pessimism.

As a Christian, I believe pessimism is rooted from sin. Anything bad that we think about is given to us by satan. satan wants us to think and feel bad about ourselves. This bears bad fruit and so we get to share something bad to others.

Proverbs 28:13 states, “He who conceals his sins does not prosper, but whoever confesses and renounces them finds mercy.”

It would be good to share our burdens/sins to anyone we trust. This will help us release what bad is deep inside us.

Galatians 6:2 shares, “Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.”

2. Seek God.

Matthew 6:33 reminds, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you."

Everything we need like forgiveness of sin, blessings, etcera is from God so we must seek Him FIRST. He is the source of everything.

But sometimes we ask ourselves why do we feel far from God? It’s because of sin. Psalm 66:18 says, “If I regard wickedness in my heart, the Lord will not hear.” God is a loving Father so He tells, “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more(Jeremiah 31:34).”

How do we receive God’s forgiveness?

1 John 1:9 is telling us, ”If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from unrighteousness.”

3. Surround ourselves with good, positive people.

One of our natural tendencies as a human being is we get easily influenced. That is why it is very important that we choose good people to be with us since they are one of the sources of our experience where we get our learning from.

Proverbs 13:20 warns, “He who walks with wise men will be wise. But the companion of fools will suffer harm.”

4. LAUGH IT LOUD.

I remember, there was a time our school missionary pastor would always ask us to just laugh, laugh out loud. During our morning devotion, he would give us time to just laugh out loud. All we had to do was laugh.

Here are the benefits of laughing:

-Laughing lowers blood pressure.

-Reduces stress hormone levels.

-Fun ab workout.

-Improves cardiac health.

-Improves T cells.

-Triggers the release of endorphin.

-Produces a general sense of well-being.

source: http://life.gaiam.com/article/7-benefits-laughter

Proverbs 17:22 tells, “A joyful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.”

5. REMEMBER: Optimism is a choice.

At the end of it all, the choice is ours if we are going to live in pessimism or optimism. When we choose pessimism, we also invite negative things in our lives. If we choose optimism, we are claiming God’s blessings and goodness.

“Delight yourself in the Lord; and He will give you the desires of your heart.” –Psalm 37:4

The last life lesson I learned about optimism is that it directs us to a better life. When we keep thinking of bad thoughts, most probably bad thing will happen to us. So why don't we just think of good, beautiful thoughts so we experience God's great love.

TO GOD BE THE GLORY

Sponsored by: www.GodisLovePublishing.asia

#Mindstep 7: FORGIVENESS

Whenever I feel guilty of my mistakes, I always remind myself about the story in the Bible, John 8:1-11, but I realized I still can’t forgive myself. Most of the time, I still feel guilt deep inside.

John 8:1-11 tells about a woman caught in the act of adultery and according to the law of Moses, she must be stoned to death. But Jesus knew they were trying to trap him with what He would be saying so Jesus said, “All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone.”

 Growing up, I thought I was always wrong since I would always tell myself, “I feel guilty so for sure I am doing something wrong, “ until I constantly developed guilt. I believed that’s right since people should always feel guilty for us not to do wrong. Now I think I had very poor self-concept.

Today I woke up feeling so tired, down and burdened. It’s a new day God gave me but I was feeling negative so I tried to contemplate on this matter. I tried to ask myself what’s keeping me feel like that.

         
I knew the answers but I just wondered why there’s heaviness in my heart and mind. I really wanted to cry but I couldn't. I wanted to release the negative feeling. I couldn't.

 I ended up watching the airstrikes vowed by the king of Jordan against ISIS(Islamic State of Iraq and Syria). I felt the love of King Abdullah to Lt. Moath al-Kasasbeh when he emphasized that the shedding of the blood of the pilot will never be wasted and that Jordan will fight until her last drop of oil. That’s how I understood what I read. When I watched the brutal burning while the pilot was still alive, I had goose bumps thinking what kind of people could they be that they've lost their hearts.

When I think about the killing of the 44 soldiers by the terrorists here in the Philippines I ask myself what kind of world are we living in? If this world is chaotic and my heart also can’t find rest, how can I survive always feeling bad about myself? How will I feel good?

I tried to pause and think about my life.

           
I thought about the bad I’ve done. When I started to feel the tears running down from my eyes, I stopped myself by thinking of the good things I’ve done. “You’re not that bad,” I told myself, “FORGIVE YOURSELF.”

            
I’ve realized I always feel guilty because I don’t forgive myself when all along God has already forgiven me when I accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. God knew the nature of people. That we are all sinful. So He gave His only begotten son for us to be renewed. II Corinthians 5:17 reminds, “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed, behold, the new has come.” I want to emphasize the word BEHOLD. I realized I always feel guilty because I don’t behold, I don’t claim God’s forgiveness.

            
If I would always feel guilty thinking of the bad I did in the past, how can I embrace the good things God wants me to experience in the days ahead? I am a teacher so what good things can I teach if I feel and think bad about myself?

            
For once, I asked God’s forgiveness. I prayed.

          
I wrote the good things I do, I did, I’ve done for me to appreciate my existence. I will share them not to boast myself but to make myself stop thinking I am worthless. I want to appease myself by thinking even if I work extra hard for my life, it’s God’s grace that’s giving me good life.

            
Here are the points I wrote:

        
1. I worked really hard to finish College. I had many sleepless nights just to make both ends meet when I was struggling financially. And it took me ten years to finish College.

            
2. Some of my students(foreign and local) trusted me their secrets, they take me as their good friend. Two of them are my best friends.

           
3. Some of my students are the hardest to teach but they stay with me as friends/best friends.

            
4. I work hard as a teacher.

          
5. I share the good news.           

            
I think God is just using my life so I want to let Him use my life for His glory. I may not be perfect but I remember before graduating from College, I even went to Korea just to find God’s purpose in my life--if He really wants me to be a teacher. I prayed hard just to find the answer. After two months of staying in there, God brought me back to the Philippines. Now I am the head teacher of our school. Sometimes, I feel I don’t deserve it but I know God has a purpose.

            
James 3:1 states, “Not many of you should become teachers, my fellow believers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly."

            God has special plan for all who believe Jesus Christ. God doesn't want us to be burdened doing His will on us. He wants us to be happy and we have to claim it. He wants good life for us -->that’s His promise. God promised it so we must believe and claim all His wonderful promises.
       
Deuteronomy 31:6 “Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the LORD your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.”

         
If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. --I John 1:9

         
And we know that in all things God works for good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 

                                                                                --Romans 8:28
       

Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.

                                                                                 -- I Peter 5:7
   

So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.                                  --Isaiah 41:10

      

John 11:25-26: Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?

 

TO GOD BE THE GLORY

 

 

 Sponsored by: www.GodisLovePublishing.asia