bopeep was a lost sheep

Apr 12, '09 7:35 PM for everyone

I came to cebu not to have easy access to dive spots but to fulfill a promise to God. I was thinking this as my friend james and I sat on a banca off balicasag island (bohol) summer of 2004. an avid diver, he was saying I was right to choose being based in cebu since aside from bohol, it is also near apo island off dumaguete. we should go there next, he said. I kept quiet, sure that he would freak out if I said what was on my mind.

You see, the year before, I promised God tearfully that I would leave my 5-year boyfriend and pursue my being an iglesia ni cristo if He made my crippled nephew walk again. A very brave deal I struck, and God responded swiftly. In no time, my nephew was walking about……and I had to honor my word. This, I could only do if I went somewhere far from metro manila where I could find a job. Cebu was it.

My plan seemed simple: first, find a job; then, finish my loooong-pending bible study, pass the exams, and get baptized. Beyond that….it was blank. I had no plan beyond that, really.  The goals seemed forbidding enough.

How to achieve those goals in a place I didn’t know, I truly had no idea. That summer was spent going around in taxis holding a map, and so found out I was NOT in cebu city to begin with (I was in mandaue city instead). The only person I knew in the city was another college friend, and the only people I met were his friends.  Anyway, I did find a job, and should’ve immediately moved on to my baptism. But….i met someone who rocked my world, and decided to put on hold my promise to God.

Can we, mere mortals, put on hold our promise to God? Of course not! but I did and this only shows how arrogant I was. Discovering cebu for the first time, I drank and attended fiestas everywhere, hung out with fun-loving people, dirty-danced, went to videoke bars. It did not help that the people I met knew the best restos and bars in cebu. So there I was, out everywhere, everynight. 

yet God continued to bless me. the following summer, I had an even better job, complete with subsidized dwelling, blackberry, high pay.. Weekends were spent in bohol as a volunteer for a canadian government-funded project. I must have stayed in all the best hotels there that summer. Life was okay. Yet, alone in my room, I felt really guilty. To ease the guilt (see how self-serving I was?), I squeezed in bible studies into my hectic schedule and managed to get baptized. My plan, I thought, was done.

But back to my level of income before cebu, I went shopping every week and bought stuff I did not need. I was also meeting other people at this time, and so was often out dining and drinking. In addition, I kept the cool guy on speed dial, and my ex was asking for a reconciliation. (ang haba ng hair ko) I hung out with gays who daily mouthed vulgar words. plus, because I was in the corporate workforce, it was inevitable that some girl friends carried on affairs or were living in. This went on for almost a year, until perhaps God got very tired of my antics and slapped me bigtime: my nephew lost again his capacity to walk. Worse, he also lost his capacity to speak.

To say that I was scared out of my wits was an understatement. I knew…I simply knew that it was my punishment. Somehow, I found the courage to leave the two guys for good and the crowd I should not be with. How was I able to do this? Simple: I left. I decided to be where my nephew was and ask God for forgiveness. Back in manila, my nephew had been reduced to a mass of bones, and 7 specialists declared he would either die or never recover. It was then that I said: throw me anything, Lord, and I’ll accept it. But if You forgive me, please show my family that your church, which it disdains, is the true one.

The Lord took His time responding but I did not waver. It reached a point when I said, ok, You may take my nephew already; it's my punishment; i accept. It took all of 9 months in confinement before my nephew spoke and stood up again. the doctors were amazed. Immediately, I promised the Lord I will be a very, very good girl and would let His light shine upon my life. As if on cue, a conglomerate in Cebu hired and brought me back. In gratitude, I spent that summer writing blogs on biblical truths and the oneness of God (God is not Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ is not God). 

That’s as far as I went, though. Again, somewhere along the way, I lost steam. It was hard – it still is – to hold on to your faith when everyone else mouths "free will". besides, the fun is with those not understanding the bible. i was weak to stand up for my faith, especially when most people, upon learning I am an iglesia ni cristo, immediately exhibit glazed eyes. And as if God was being sarcastic, the HR top guns asked why I could not facilitate a seminar for frontliners when I was in fact an HR consultant. (do you also meet people who do not know there is a huge difference between a consultant and a facilitator?) I opted to resign at once.

I was back to needing a job, but at least that’s the only thing missing. I am now a practising iglesia ni cristo and I would not waver. Or so I thought. I then accepted the job of managing my friend’s resto, a job he had been offering since 2004. I was paid well, but it was the most stressful job I ever had. it turned out the owner is not my friend but his wife - and the woman has hallucination, paranoia or plain dementia.  Whatever it was, it depressed me as much as it depressed my friend. to top it off, the owner’s praning behavior resulted to resignations so much so that all I did was hire replacements. I soon realized that I was becoming, like my friend, a drunkard.

 

In short, I was a lost sheep once more and my betrayal of the Lord was complete.

Yet God remained merciful despite my filth. He gave me another chance. So now I work in a review center owned by another friend who, by the way, is also often depressed and I hope it isn’t another case of wifely dementia. on the side, I take on consulting jobs, usually referred by manila friends, that is why I have been flying in and out these days. As for relationships, I have closed my mind on these handsome men. They are now my donations to the aspirational female population.   my spare time is spent now  hanging out with churchmates – none of whom gives a damn about dive spots, career, wealth, prestige, sex, affairs, or anything considered common in this world.  :)  It IS a peaceful life. I grant that I should have a more stable source of income - and there was in fact an offer from u.p tacloban.  problem was, i couldn't go there on the schedule they want. but that’s okay. God immediately replaced it with another job offer.

It took me 5 summers to understand the blank in my mind after landing a job and getting baptized. for someone supposedly with high IQ, i sure am a very slow learner (there goes my arrogance). Finding a job, it turns out, is not the major problem (this is my 15^th, after all). you can get a job if you can let go of the perks you are used to. Now I know that undergoing bible lessons is not the only goal – you can have it for 10 years, as i did, but if you do not believe the words of God, then it is nothing. Getting baptized as an iglesia ni cristo can be attained simply by treating it as another project to be completed in 6 months – but the real test of faith comes after.  all these i learned the hard, loooong way.

If my family and friends are freaking out with me now, so be it. The important thing is this: Bopeep was a lost sheep -  but she has been found.