BLESSED

2013 is definitely the most meaningful year of my 25 years of existence. This year is when I felt most blessed and also the year I had to face major life changing events. To simplify my experience, I had to face the four elements (fire, wind, water, and earth) on a single year alone not to mention getting married!

At the start of the year, Twinkle and I were already very busy preparing for the biggest day of our lives - our wedding. May 5, 2013 was the date set for it and the two of us were really feeling the pressure from all the preparations and finances needed for it. It was indeed very challenging and stressful but the Lord never fails.  The wedding was more than what we asked for. It was something we know we could never have had without God’s grace, my awesome friends, and of course last but not least our super loving family. It was indeed a day I would never forget and I will forever be thankful to everyone that helped us!

Twinks and I already decided that once we get married, we must leave our parents as commanded by God’s word to “leave and cleave”. We already had a little amount saved up after the wedding thanks to the gifts from our beloved family and friends. We were just about ready to move out and find a house or room to rent. However, on May 22, 2013, a very unfortunate accident happened. Our house caught fire and along with it everything we saved up including the gifts from the wedding. So literally we had to start from scratch. But deep in our hearts we were still at peace because we knew that we have a big God and the Lord always has a greater purpose for everything. That time we knew not what He wanted for us but we just kept our faith strong and trusted in God’s promises through His word.

My mom found and rented a new place for her and my siblings to live in and decided to have a “house dedication”. During the night of the dedication, it suddenly rained heavily which cause the 1^st floor of the newly rented house to get flooded. Some of our guests got stranded and some of our new things also got soaked in flood water. We had to do another clean-up the day after but I could never forget the feeling I had while cleaning, I felt very blessed. Blessed that were finally complete (since my mom was out of the country during the fire) and that in spite of how serious the accident was, all my family members were safe.

The last two major events I faced was the 7.2 Magnitude earthquake that shook the entire Visayas region and also the wrath of Super Typhoon Yolanda (the strongest typhoon ever to make landfall). I was thinking of how to describe or share it to you with words but nothing comes into my mind except this line, “I thought it can only happen in the movies”. I do hope that you’ll never be able to experience something like that in your entire life though because it really is traumatic in some sense.

Whatever challenges in life we are facing or we may have to go through is something we totally have no power about. Everything that happened to my life this year reminded me of how our lives are just finite and may be taken away from us at any moment. Twinkle and I have just been so blessed that we have the Lord Jesus Christ to go through every challenge with us. As 2014 is nearing, I just wish everyone a super blessed New Year in Jesus name. =D