Friday, October 14, 2016

My Family Away From Home

    Family....What does it really mean? Ever since I was a kid, I wanted to go out of my comfort zone. When I was in elementary, I often go to scouting camps outside our school, maybe even outside our region, just to train myself to become independent. Even during my high school days, I went to a high school that is more than 20 kilometers from our municipality. I boarded at my aunt’s place during weekdays and went home during weekends. Those times, I realized that true enough, there’s no place like Home.
     I am an adventurous person. Whenever I’m at our place, most of the time, I am outside. That’s who I am. Haha. It’s not really my thing to just stay inside the house and do nothing, as much as possible, I want to explore everything and everywhere that I can go to. Yet, I can’t go far away because I’ll miss my family. That’s why when I went to college, I don’t know how long will I survive to a school which I am not familiar to. Yes, at first, I do not know what CLSU is. I just took the exam without knowing what course I will choose. And Praise God! I passed. Maybe God has different plans for me than that of mine.
     The desire of every freshmen student who lives far away, in my opinion, is company or family. Everyone needs family in a place where their real family cannot be with them. Some went to fraternity, sorority, organizations in their colleges, and many more, just to look for the comfort, the family they wanted. Me, hmmm, I did look for those things, but I was blinded by my own interests. Not knowing what God’s plan for me, I too joined college based organization but quit later because of dissatisfaction, even in the university ROTC-Officers but quit again because of failing subjects. None of these feels like family. During hard times, I tend to solo every problems that was given to me, and no one wants to share the heaviness of those problems. I cried out to God, “Lord, gusto ko ng mga makakasama na di ako iiwan!” Then, a miracle happened.
     I went to this youth service with a friend, and there I felt peace while worshiping the LORD. There’s this one organization that is moving or the hands and feet of the Church to reach out the Students of CLSU in order for them to encounter and know the plans that the LORD God had in store for them. They are called LASO or Lakas Angkan Student Organization. If you saw them for the first time, they just look like normal students playing, laughing, studying, but when you get to know each and every one of them, you have missed something about them. Each and every member of LASO is not just an ordinary person, but all of them are supernaturally chosen by the Lord to lead this generation. They may have different personalities, but they have one goal. True enough, they are noisy, funny, “matitigas ang ulo at makukulit”, but what makes them unique with other organization and people, is their Love for the Lord. No other people can do or share the love of the Lord to others than those who have encountered His love.
     I joined LASO not because it is easy to get in there (believe me, it’s not. Hahaha) but because I know and I believe that God wanted me to go and be part of it because He wanted me to have this family. To feel like I’m not always alone, that I have a family too away from home. But I’m not always for fellowship eh, I wanted to glorify my Lord and Savior with the help of this organization. We may not look like much, but we believe that when God is with us, we have everything.

Dear LASO Members, Officers and Alumni,
     Kahit alam ko na sobrang kulit natin minsan, I believe that God created this organization for a purpose. To tell you honestly, it was the power of God that brought me here to this organization, it is not even on my own will. But when I saw how God moved in this organization, there is no way that I’m going to let go of this chance to serve Him through LASO. I know that there are times na hindi tayo magkasundo sundo, but I believe we can change all that. Paulit ulit nating dinedevotion yung we are of one body, the body cannot work if hindi nagfufunction yung ibang parts. Kaya I know na we can do better than this.
     The way we are acting now, I don’t think God wants this. It is still not enough. But I believe that one day, we will achieve that disciplined person that we want ourselves to be. Continue to chase after Christlikeness and never stop until you’ve achieved perfectness. Seems so impossible diba? No, it is not. For God created us in His likeness. God is perfect, therefore we can be perfect if we strive and chase after the holiness of God.
     My brothers and sisters in Christ, we must be the leaders that God wants us to be. I am writing this not because I wanted to be famous or anything, but God wants me to remind you that all of these things, is not about us. It’s not about how we do well on those performances that we are having, it’s not about how well we memorized the bridge to life or how many verses we have memorized, but it is about Him. It’s about the power of God that is at work in each and every one of us. It is about His great love that is so uncontainable that even those who have freshly encountered His love already wants to share it to others. That’s what God wants. Let’s not focus on how we can change the lives of people, but let us focus on how God changes their lives, maybe we missed something important. Haha. Anyway, continue to be a disciple and a leader at the same time. And oh! I almost forgot, the Holy Spirit reminded me that we are Ambassadors of Christ, by Ambassador meaning, we represent Christ. So before doing anything, we must ask ourselves, if Christ was in my situation, will He do this? A simple question yet has a great impact on our lives. Continue to shine His light upon this world, and we know that our work is not in vain.

God Bless You all :)

Sincerely Yours,
Dan Drexel Dela Cruz

No comments:

Post a Comment