Celebrate joy!

One of the questions I get asked most often in working in full time ministry is: "Do you get paid?" The person who asked me recently works in the insurance industry and is raking in millions a year so it's not surprising that was her top-of-mind query. I am not sure if I should be offended but I just remembered  smiling and answering "yes, it's actually a lot like a company." And it really is, guys! I am not sure what goes on in their minds after that but another question we get asked too often is "When is your off?" -- knowing full well that church is in full swing during weekends.

If there's Wong Fu Production, then there's The Ming Thing. It sounds like a meme for something but Ming is actually the name of the Malaysian brothers who founded the production -- Ming Han and Ming Yue. :) Ming Han:   Along my thesis year in my degree (my final year), I randomly decided to vlog about the horrible carpark situation in my university at that time. That required me to start a YouTube channel that I randomly named “dmingthing” because it rhymed with my name and “themingthing” was taken, so I had to use “d” instead.   Amazingly, my first vlog did amazingly well. I had a few thousand views overnight for a totally new channel (which was very very surprising). I tried a two more vlogs and it was at that time I got contacted separately by two different people, Raffi and Bryan. They were both pretty good videographers and both offered to try making videos with me.    The rest was pretty much history. I've only seen a few videos of theirs and it's...

Yes! That's right, after a year of hospitals, sitting in clinics, going through chemotherapy... my dad is cleared of cancer! We were declaring God to be cancer-free after his last chemo session last year but the doctor detected something in his lungs last December. And we have to wait 3 more months to find out what exactly is that in his lungs because it was too small to find out at that time. And I remember sitting there in the clinic, devastated as his oncologist says words that I was hoping not to hear any more -- ct scan, medicines, and possible chemotherapy are in the horizon once again. It was as if things were on repeat and the doctor seemed to be right -- we are in this for the long haul.

There are days when I just really feel tired. Sundays are our busiest at church and last Sunday, while I was figuring out what's wrong with our ID system, and I was eyeing the laptop and asking it what's wrong with you in my mind -- a woman approached me. She asked me what type of Christian church is our church. I smiled with whatever smile I could muster and said that it's born again. This is me that day.

As promised, here are more photos of our hiking trip last month. Aside from the two mountains we were able to climb (lakas! Haha! ...Which were actually just beside each other :)) , we also dropped by Layong Bato River wherein we washed our sweaty and muddy feet. When you have been walking for miles, you don't know how refreshing it is the moment you dip your feet into the water. You just want to bring out soap and shampoo if only that were allowed.  ...and buko juice is love! We were asked to carry at least 1 liter of water, which is not enough if you suddenly decide to climb two mountains instead of one (we did not think this through, guys)... So grateful that they sell buko juice upon descending Mt. Apayang for our thirsty throats.

The mountains were beckoning -- so we planned a hiking trip to Mt. Talamitam in Nasugbu Batangas. I almost didn't make it on this trip -- because I have been coughing like crazy days before. But good thing both my democratic parents and my stubborn will were at work on the eve of the trip so I was able to go! Hooray! We were all beginners so we were glad to take on the 3/10 difficulty level of the trail. When we arrived at the campsite however, the guide was happy to offer us an upgrade (nasa sales ka ba dati kuya?): Climb two mountains, instead of one, for the price of P500! Are we up for it?

Been so excited when I found out that Isa Garcia published her first book! I was a semi-stalker of her blog when she still had one and her words just resonate to you long after you read them because these are words filled with meaning, hope and truth.