A Brave Heart

As I write this, I am listening to my favorite song when I was in Elementary school. It's a really old song, called First Love by Nika Costa. When I listened to that song back then, I wondering if one day I will ever find someone that can make me fall in love just like she describe in her song. The feeling of first love is unforgettable. All you can think is that person, the excitement in life, something you look forward to do. Every now and then I always wanted to feel that feeling over and over again. It's just very relaxing and peaceful to be able to feel that again.

I had struggled a lot for the last couple weeks. I was trying to recognize myself if there is something wrong with me. I was hurt, bitter and unloved. I started being sarcasm with people that say they love me. I was at a point get sick of it. I am so tired to hear that. Then I realized why? The word just a word, it meant nothing. There wasn't an act to it. It just something that people have to say. Words to end a conversation? Words to say because there is nothing to say or because they have to say it?

I kept searching if I can find the justification if that is ok for people just to say it without mean it. Or say it but never act on it. I have no luck to find it. Instead, I found that God told us to love each other, love your neighbor, even love your enemy. Is that possible for you to say I love you to your enemy? I don't think so, the only thing you can show it only by act on it. Acting on something to show them how much you love them. Words come out from the mouth just wasn't enough. I wonder how can you tell someone love you, if she never really do anything for you. I guess it is just like your husband or your boyfriend, they will do anything just to show how much they love you. An act of love.

Do I need extravagant love? A brave heart? A heart that can go through the dimension of love. Just sleeping under my blanket, not to get up in the morning and just dream about it. How fun that could be if I have a day to do it and can be fulfilled by it. ;p

How many women out there actually craving for love? Love that they want more and more and more...a never ending one. Why a lot of people can't understand how important it is to have a relationship? Share they feelings? Is that just me because I don't have family in here and all I can depend on is my friends? Why it is so hard just to spend 2 hours over a coffee one night? A night or two over 365 days? If you say you love them, is that hard to fulfilled? Words can be simple ... Quoting a song from Carol King " Words can hurt you, if you let them, people say them and forget them..." I guess that line of song is totally correct. People can just easily say that and then forget them.

Right now I am taking a big heavy step. A courage to put a step in front of my other feet. I want to have a brave heart. A heart that not just wanting being loved, but giving out my love. Fulfilling my passion that God had put it in my heart so I can love others. By not walking on egg shell anymore, open up a lot of chance for me to serve as myself. I am not worry anymore that I will fall and afraid someone will judge me. Having compassion to others truly help me to see another dimension of love, different side of love itself. It's been a really hard lesson for me to understand, but I think I got it at the end. May be I will try not to complain about it anymore. But I can't promise, I am a human being with feelings after all, and still need that love. But I will not let myself get disappointed with that. I believe that walking with Him, I will find it, someone will come in to my life and make me remember how it is to feel loved.

Arggghhhh...."Tell me Teddy Bear why love is so unfair, will I ever find a way and answered to my prayer?"

" Let's not just talk about love; let's practice real love. This is the only way we'll know we're truly living " ( I John 3:19, The Message )

Fall is Coming

As the month has changed, every time I got out from the train, there is no longer the smell of summer breeze, instead it's a fall breeze. A very refreshing one... It's always reminded me the first time we came to US, our transit was in San Fransisco. Stepping out from the plane, the airport's air smells so good. The spring breeze in the morning mixed with the smell of the fresh brewed coffee. Looks like everybody ready to start the day. For some reason it's very memorable. Can't forget that.

It's 7am and I am already in the office. Still half asleep I think. It's been 2 months since I am working. Still not easy. *sigh*. I wish I can just let it go and work, without have to think about what is going on at home. But well,... I am not complaining, try to understand that 4 years stay at home can't be place in just 2 months. It is definitely take some time.

As usual, my life is full of drama. Sometimes I wish I can ask God to give me a break from this episode. ;p Last week my sitter went back home, her son is sick. Thank God I got the replacement right away. But she can't drive, so I have to go to work super early so I can pick up Jeremy.

Right now I am trying to create a blog just for the kids. I wanted them to have their own story written and be memorable. I will let you know once I published it. I hope it will bring a lot of inspiration and helpful information.

I will try to write again soon. I can't believe time has gone so fast. I hope everyone have a great week.

Wonderful Day

As I reached the top of the street from the metro station, I can feel the nice breeze after couple days of hot and humid day. It is a beautiful morning. For some reason I have a great feeling inside me. Feeling optimistic facing my day and thank God for another new day for us. When I got in to my office, hardly people in there and it's nice. I decided to write and catch up with my journal that I had been abandon for a while.

Every day is special to me. It is always something happened in my days. Never passed it without a meaning in life. I feel that God teaching me everyday on the train while I sit and read and say my prayers. Train is my classroom, it is my devotion time. Time alone just me and God, ignoring people around me.

The past two days I was sick and didn't go to work. The girls and I had a terrible cold. Although I am sick, I valued every moment that I have with my kids. Even just for two whole days. It was precious. We had a great time. When I'm home, no TV all day. We did fun things together.

Lately the kids get in to fight a lot. I started to think that this is not a good sign having kids that keep fighting. So I said to them, let's make the rules in the house. I took a big poster card and let Jeremy and Nicole draw on the cardboard. They need to share. Hahaha....a little after 2 minutes, the fight starts. Gosh.... they yelled at each other... it turned out that Nicole took his part and draw on his part. So I talked to them. It is hard to make 2 years old understand thing. ;p But I think I have to. I said to both of them that they are brother and sister. They need to love each other and help each other. One day they will need each other. I want them to get close to each other. After they calm down, we start to write on that poster board. Start from number 1 ... I draw a big heart and say love .... ( Nicole said : caca! ) we laughed.... so I wrote love Caca, Jeremy and Daniella... I wanted to teach them to love each other. Love your siblings.
And it goes until number 11. Including : Do not fight, do not yelled at each other, clean up the mess, obey mommy and papi, help each other, say nice thing to each other, share things except it is a special thing, no lego on the floor, etc.

Here is how we play it : I made the big poster board to lay down the rules, then I made 8 vouchers, and have tokens. Every child that break the rule will get a token. At the end of the week we count the token, who gets the less token will receive a voucher. In a month, if they are able to have 4 vouchers, they will get a reward. They can buy anything they want for things that less than $5. Of course the big brother is very excited and Nicole had no clue. But she will learn. She has to learn to obey and listen and do positive things. I am glad that now they are thinking before they do or say things.

After that we took a wagon ride. It was fun. I borrowed a wagon from a friend. We are heading to the beach next week and wanted to bring that wagon. The kids loved the wagon ride. Mommy had to work hard to pull the 3 of them. I had a wonderful day. What a precious moment.

I miss my previlage to be able to stay at home. Hope this won't last long and I will be able to stay at home again, or at least work from home.

Have a wonderful day everyone.

Responsible

I know it's has been awhile since I'm blogging. Although I have a lot in mind to write, but I just can't squeeze my time in to writing lately. It is driving me crazy when I can't blog. I think the space in my mind is about to be full soon. ;p I wanted to share some of my experience that I had been going through lately. It wasn't an easy one. Well, since when I have an easy experience. But again, I learn my lesson from this event.

I used to think that every adult know about responsibility. But I guess I was wrong. Totally wrong. Since I have kids, I realized that responsibility is something I have to teach them and plant in to them, so they know what is responsible is about when they grow up.

About a year ago, I met one of Indonesian friend in here. She is a well-known person back home. (or may be not) Although her fame is not through herself, but she had a very famous husband. Anyway, the reason I met her just because I was trying to help a friend that needed her and was looking for her. There is when the contact started.

The first time I met her, I had a pretty good impression. After couple meetings, she introduced me her business to me. It's a jewelry business that I am doing now. It is a good business and I enjoy doing it to be honest. Beside it's making a good profit, I got to do it with my best friend and it's so much fun doing it with her.

After couple months knowing her, she asked me to do her a favor. She wanted to have an iPhone through AT&T but couldn't open one account because she doesn't have - either good credit or no credit at all. I asked her couple time if that what she really need, because if you are not a business woman that needed 24 hours connection, it's just a waste, cause you have to pay monthly fee for that. For single mother with 2 teenagers that are going to college at the same time in the following year, I don't think it's necessary. Well, she insisted that she want one and firm about it. So we trusted her.

The first payment was late. I didn't say anything hoping she will contact me to let me know whether she is going to pay it or not or at least let me know if she will be late. But after couple days passed by, I finally called her because I wasn't hear anything from her. Come to my surprised that she actually more angry than I do. (Isn't amazing?) I starting to wonder....Am I the one that owed her? or the other way around? She gave me 1000 pages of her 'to do' list which I don't care, because, that time I also had a very crazy life. I just had a baby, we just moved to a new apartment. Now, I have to be a debt collector? Anyway, couple days after that, she stop by and gave me couple checks for the next couple months.

This month when the bill is due, I cashed the check. Couple days later while I was checking my bank account, I was so confused why there is a returned deposit check plus the fee. Knowing that it's my checking account to pay the bills I don't have a lot of extra money in there. So I called the bank and they told me that the check I deposited is no good. The account in that bank is closed. My natural reaction was - of course - mad !! Not just because the check is returned, but the fact that I have to pay all the fee and messes my account.

I told her what is happening. Instead of apologizing and promising will pay it soon. She argue with me about it. O my goodness. Can people go crazier than that. She said that she swear that she is always remember to put money on that date, or may be I was cashing it the same time as she paid her insurance for $300. Again...who cares? All I know that the check has been returned. Couple days I haven't hear from her about what she is going to do. So I called AT&T to transfer the account or disconnect it. She was freaked out when we did conference call. Typical of her....excuses are always her best bet. She said I can't afford to pay the deposit because I have to pay the rent, insurance, bla...bla...bla....( I don't know what she is saying anymore, cause with all her lists, I put away the phone). So I said to her...look...relax, just let them process the transfer. If you are not eligible for the account, then we disconnect the service as simple as that. We will pay for it first and you just pay us back. She is agreed to it. That night we disconnected the service and cost us $125 to break the contract.

My husband told me she will not going to pay this. So he said, why don't we just take her iPhone, since she won't be able to use it anyway. Not so much because we wanted to use it. We don't! But he just think this is the fair thing to do. She bought the iPhone for $200 with contract, now we pay $125 to break her contract, he thinks it's fair. I didn't agree just because I wanted her to learn a lesson, being responsible.

The next morning, as I sat on the train to work, I read my bible. That day when I opened my bible it was Romans 2 about righteous judgment. It is about teaching us we need to show His kindness, tolerance and patience because God is our judge, not us. Well, you probably need to read the whole thing to make this connect to the story. Anyway, I felt that God ask me to do this for His goodness. So as soon as I got in to my office, I told my husband that I agreed to do what he suggested. I text that woman telling her that we wanted to help her financially. I said, you don't have to pay us back $125, but it would be fair if we trade with the cellphone. You can pay all the charges divided in to 2 months. But I guess I was wrong, once again, she was mad! Hahaha...........I just laughed this time, I was speechless. I said to God, look, I did my best. I try to do the right thing. But it didn't work. If I was her I will take the offered, because it's only half of what she owed. In total she owed about $300. Look, if she is struggling financially we definitely can talk. But as far as I know, she always make a poor priority. She just came back from Hawaii with her daughter, I know the trip was her reward. But again, you still have to spend some money while you were there right? And if you are struggling a lot, because her kids goes to college this year, wouldn't be a right thing to do just to cash the trip and save the money or pay all your debt. That is what bothering me.

Well, I don't want to go to any further details anymore. Until today it is not solve yet. But again I learned my lesson. God teaches me a lot of things and it made come to the understanding of being a Christian. Being a Christian not just about how many hours you put in prayers, reading bible, attending Christian conferences, church and put your days in to fasting if you do not have the character of Christ. I was angry with God for a little just because this woman put herself so high in Christ. She always attending conferences out of town, she told me how many hours she pray, how long she is fasting, etc. But all of that didn't matter because she is not showing her character as she suppose to be. One night while I was pumping, I feel like God said " Look, if I never let you go through this event, you will end up the same. You can praise and read the bible everyday, but you are not showing my character, it will be useless". I am so glad that God lead me along the way. I did finally realize that as much as I wanted to help people and have compassion and being a woman of influence, but if it is not naturally grow, I will struggling and end up keeping a lot of bitterness in my heart. Again, I have to thank God for this. For He is good and always have reasons for things. Things aren't easy, but with Christ I can go through it.

"But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God's wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed. God will give to each person according to what he has done. To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor and immortality, he will give eternal life " Romans 2:5-7

New Beginning

This morning as I drove to the train station at 6am, I got the chance to see the beautiful sunrise. In front of me as the sun come out from the east, I thanked God as He fulfilled His promised each and everyday. Suddenly, I can feel His presence through the beautiful nature that He created. I can't stop worship Him, as my tears rolling down to my cheek, I take this as a sign for me to start a new beginning of my life.

As you all know that I've been struggling with a lot of things for the past couple months. It wasn't an easy one, yet through God that gave me strength, I was able to passed it. In fact I can see the wonder of His work through the hard time. Relaying 100% everything on Him, was the right thing to do.

He planned everything so well, I couldn't even help myself to draw away from Him anymore. The long commute that I have to go through everyday, gives me a chance to read His words. I have at least 2 hours of my quiet time on the train. I don't like the commute and the fact that it's wasting my time by taking me away from my kids. All I can do is praying for their protection.

Today, I just want to thank God for all He had done in my life. Everytime I turn my head in each direction, I can see Him doing something great for me. He opened a lot opportunity for us. I can't be more thankful to have Him in my life.

Thank you Jesus.

Song of the season

I picked this song because it is really reflecting what I am going through right now. All I can do is waiting. Here is the lyrics...

I'm waiting
I'm waiting on You, Lord
And I am hopeful
I'm waiting on You, Lord
Though it is painful
But patiently, I will wait
I will move ahead, bold and confident
Taking every step in obedience
While I'm waiting
I will serve You
While I'm waiting
I will worship
While I'm waiting
I will not faint
I'll be running the race
Even while I wait
I'm waiting
I'm waiting on You, Lord
And I am peaceful
I'm waiting on You, Lord
Though it's not easy
But faithfully, I will waitYes,
I will wait
I will serve You while I'm waiting
I will worship while I'm waiting
I will serve You while I'm waiting
I will worship while I'm waiting
I will serve you while I'm waiting
I will worship while I'm waiting on You, Lord

By : John Waller

Finally...

I finally walk in to the sanctuary. After a long day and tempting to not going because of the rain, I managed to get out of the door just in time. After rushing the kids having dinner of course.

I was a little late when I got there. There was a baptism going on. It turn out today is a baptism service. I never really excited about going to a baptism service. If I know it will be one, I probably decided not to come. For some reason I thought it is boring. So.... I was ready to hear the pastor preach, and look down to the bulletin to find out how many people will get baptized. And... it was 30 people...hahaha....I thought to myself "great, now I'm stuck" I come to see the baptism of the people that I don't know.

As the service goes by, I starting to enjoy it, specially when I listen to their testimonies, the reason why they accepting Jesus, their life before accepting Jesus, and on and on.... It was awesome. I have my own quiet time to think about a lot of things in that very moment. I have this questions for a long time and finally I found it tonight. People will thing I am crazy and dumb, because it's actually very easy answer and it has the logic. BUT for some reason I never got in to that point, I was blind. I found myself get into more trouble when I draw myself near to God. One time I was at the point that I said to God... "Ok God, I probably just let my life a little normal, and not to crazy about You. Because every time I pray harder and read your words every single day, I end up having more burden and harder things to go through". This time is the same thing. As I am going through the desert, I try to draw myself near God, but it seems like the problems keep coming and never ending. I am almost back off a little bit, until tonight, when I am finally got the answer. The answer makes me decide to stay where I am today, to keep myself closer and closer to HIM. The answer was simply the Satan doesn't like the fact that I am close to HIM.

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Ephesians 6:10-12

Last month I am applying for a federal job. I submitted my resume couple days before the dateline. After a week or so, I got a letter from the agency saying that my application has been rejected, simply because I am not meeting the dateline, my document was late. I was angry, because I worked hard to put all the essay together and whatever they said wasn't true at all. I even keep the receipt from the post office as the evidence that I sent it couple days early. So I called and asked them about my application. The answered made me even mad. This is what they said, " well, this is a government office, it could be get in to the wrong place for several days, sometimes it didn't come right away in to our office. It could be in the mail room. I am like... how in the world should I know that. Aren't you supposed to see the date on the stamp. Anyway, she keep saying that, and I finally had nothing to say. It's not going to change anything and it's not worth it argue about it, because all she know is.... she is right. I pray and I said to God, if this is meant for me and this is for me. It was one of the battle.

I feel that right now God is teaching me to be humble. It's n0t an easy process. It's killing me. Listening to their testimonies today make my first love to God growing. God made me remember when the first time I fall in love with Him. I see things differently. I worship Him, adore Him, do whatever He says. What changed now? I starting to understand a little by a little.

Going through hard time like this is not easy. I need friends to pray for me. I need friends that I can share my burden. I need friends that encourage me. But guess what? It is not easy at all. Most of friends that I know is super busy with their own life, activities, etc. Whenever they called, I only can manage to talk to them 2 mins before they got interrupted with their kids or other things. Usually it ends after... Hi, how are you. Hahahaha.... I started to feel lonely. But then an 8th grader said... when I know Jesus, He become my best friend. I can share everything with Him. Its struck me. I'm like why I never treat Him like one? I shared a lot with Him, but I feel like I treated Him like a scary, intimidated God. Not a loving, friendly and care God. Again...now I understand about being a friend of God. My secret safe with Him, He will never judge me, He will never disappointed me, He will always by my side each and every time I needed Him, He will never walk away from me, He will never too busy for me, He will always there 24 hours for me without interruption, He will never get tired of listening to me. You tell me all the characteristics about having a best friend... He is more than qualified.

God not just teaching me about being humble, but He is also teaching me how to have relationship with Him. I am always in the ministry. Have a ministry. But I treat the ministry as a job, not my passion, not something I do because I love God, but more things that I have to do. That is absolutely sad. Now I understand !!

Thank you God for today. I am not regretting every minute I had in that room watching all the people being baptized. I am hoping next time I see more than 30 people that come to the Lord and accepting Jesus as their savior. What a great gift their received today.