Code of Faith

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, not so much because of the writing style or the exotic stories. I was enthralled at how God worked in miraculous ways among the Balangaos. This gave me a glimpse of how the Holy Spirit is still at work, just as He worked among the first century church. As the Bible Believer church grew, there were many parallels to the early church as they began to be mission minded.

Joanne Shetler devoted twenty years of her life to translating the Bible into Balangao. Even that ministry was sidetracked over the years as God decided to explain the Word in real-life ways. She dealt with cultural issues, death, evil spirits, and countless trials of faith. As she translated, she used deaths and other major events as teaching opportunities. She used her medical training to help women during pregnancy and others with basic medical needs. She translated and shared her life with these people, and as the Spirit moved her along, she acted.

One event that stands out to me was when she had an Elijah moment with the spirit mediums. The spirits were tormenting Benito’s son. Benito was a new believer and Joanne saw this event as an attack against him. The spirits had lost their hold on him and were fighting back in whatever ways they could. Joanne mentions many times that she did not like dealing with spirits but this one day I believe she had been empowered by the Holy Spirit to confront the powers of darkness. She grabbed Chalinggay, the medium and removed her from the house. Then with boldness and faith declared to everyone assembled, that God would prove himself more powerful than the spirits. However, this Elijah moment was not confined to this one experience. It continued for several days.

The next Sunday, Joanne went to apologize to Chalinggay for her rudeness. As she sat there, she was moved to confront Chalinggay about her empty life spent in service to the spirits. During this time, Joanne also spoke boldly to Forsan, another spirit medium. Both mediums were tormented physically for several days. However, with prayer and more teaching both women turned from the spirits to the Living God and were delivered both spiritually and physically. Through the supernatural work of God in those three lives, the Word began to move forth in power.

This book was humbling. It showed me how God can use one person who is willing to obey and persevere. The best part was that this did not occur 2000 years ago in Rome or Asia Minor. This occurred less than forty years ago in the Philippines. This shows me that God is still at work and wants to do this around the world.

The following post was written while I sat in class earlier tonight.

I’m sitting here bored out of my mind. My professor is attached to the old style of teaching. The teacher stands at the front of the class and talks for hours on end while using an old overhead projector. For some unknown reason, the software on his computer will not work with the projector. I find that hard to believe. Projectors are atheistic when it comes to software. Their job is to display images, not whether a computer is running Office 2007 or not. Anyway back to my rant.

There is no class discussion. No one is asking questions. I look around the room and I can count on one hand, the number of people that are actually engaged in this lecture. Most people are doing what I’m doing. We wait until the professor moves the paper and then we copy down the next fews words. Then we go back to our secondary tasks to keep us occupied. It will be another 10 minutes before he moves to the next section on the transparency. I think one guy is watching tv on his smartphone. It doesn’t help my mood that the paper I had written for tonight became corrupted and I lost the entire paper. Yes, I waited till the last minute to write it and print it out. Regardless, I would have lost it because I saved it to my USB drive.

Why is this professor reinforcing these one-sided teaching techniques to those who will be going out to continue the education process in our churches? Not everyone learns best by having someone lecture to them for 2 and a half hours. I learn best by taking things apart and working with my hands. I learn visually. I learn by discussing. It’s no wonder I have a hard time getting motivated for classes like this. Lectures and papers are the course du jour in school. I understand that at times you have to suck it up and do what’s required of you. However, it feels like a contradiction to be taught that we need to include all the learning styles when we teach yet they refuse to practice what they teach.

I have been freed my bondage. No longer will I deliver pizzas on the weekend. I gave my supervisor my two-week notice last weekend. She wrote on the calendar that I would work the next two weeks. I steeled myself for the next two weeks and continued my work. Yesterday, I stopped by the store to check the schedule and my boss told me that I was taken care of. When i asked for clarification, she informed me I was free. I simply needed to stop by in a week and pick up my last check. She also requested that I stop by from time to time to say hello.

This week’s events are a culmination of a year of praying. I started at Fielder Road in August of last year and for a few weeks I worked over 50 hours between both places. That forced me to cut back my hours to just Friday and Saturday at Pizza Hut. If it had not been for my financial situation, I would have left Pizza Hut then. As the months passed, I resigned myself to working both jobs. As this summer drew to a close, I began to look at my financial situation again. If I cut back in a few areas I could afford to work only one job. But I still debated it. I enjoyed the people I worked with. I also felt that I wanted to quit for only selfish reasons. Then the semester began, and I got a clearer understanding of the workload. With classes and work there was no time for homework let alone a social life. That is when the paradigm changed. Previously, I had wanted to quit for convenience and comfort. Now I needed to quit in order to fulfill my class requirements.

After I gave my boss the news, I began to have questions. “Was I doing the right thing?” “Am I leaving behind a ministry that God placed me in?” I knew I needed to quit but I could not shake those nagging questions. The questions continued until last Saturday night. My shift was drawing to a close and there was a plethora of jobs needing to be done: wash dishes, fold boxes, prepare chicken wings, cut pizzas, and answer the phone. I froze for a moment, attempting to make a decision. Each task was important and needed to be done, but I could only do one at a time. It was in that moment that the Lord gave me clarity and a peace about my decision.

Just as with all the tasks at Pizza Hut, I have many tasks that I can do and are all good. However, I can only do so many. Since I moved to Texas to go to seminary, that task ranks near the top. I have one job that can pay the bills and another that would have left me lacking financially. I chose the job that would not bankrupt me. This doesn’t mean that I won’t miss the people and the extra money, but sometimes life requires tough choices. And you can only juggle so many things before things get dropped.

I have never had success with dating and relationships. I always run into (I am not exaggerating when I say always) the “let’s be friends” speech. After that line, I tend to spend a few weeks in a mild depression trying to get over my anger and frustration. I mentally replay the events trying to determine where it went wrong. In the end, I do not come to a satisfactory conclusion and I find myself swearing off relationships. Then after six months to a year, I meet someone else and the vicious cycle begins again. It takes weeks or months for me to get up the courage to ask a woman out. Instead of taking a risk, I am content to passively sit by and “wait for the right moment”.

I have a close friend that I asked out. This occurred after several months of intense internal debate and prayer. We went out a couple of times and then she told me that she had some things she needed to work out. The fatalistic part of me instantly began to think the worst. The other part was trying to hope for the best and was failing miserably.

Therefore, I fell back into my passive ways. I did not ask her out again and I did not inform her of my intentions. I rationalized it as giving her space. After about a month, I realized that I needed to talk to her, regardless of the outcome. So I set up a time to meet with her over coffee. I had spent weeks praying about this. I knew I needed to take the initiative but I was afraid that it would go badly.

As the day approached, I became increasingly nervous. Then I received a phone call from a friend that would throw me for a loop. My friend informed me that there was a miscommunication between a mutual friend and me. It was severe enough that our relationship was in jeopardy. Because the miscommunication was between a female and me, I began to doubt everything. I began to worry and play through all the worst-case scenarios.

Now, normally I would continue to worry until I became sick. However, this time as I came to the end of my rope, I prayed. I had others pray for me and I quoted Scripture to help focus my mind. I understood that I could not fix any of this. So I let go. When I wanted to worry, Paul’s words to the Philippians came to mind.

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

As the days continued to pass, I knew I needed to be proactive but I did not know how it would end. Despite that, I was at peace. I had not experienced a peace like this before.

Sunset found me across the table from my friend. It took me close to an hour to steel myself to say what I wanted to say. I shared with her my desire to continue seeing each other. She expressed to me that she saw us as simply friends. And there it was again. Not the desire to listen to the blues and live in a secluded cabin. No, it was that same peace. I had no reason for why it did not work out. There was no mental replay.

I was content in the situation. I still had a close friend and life was good. It is hard to put into words. I can only attribute it to coming to the end of my rope. I turned to God for help instead of trying to fix it myself. And the outcome was unusual. I came to the end of my rope and found a foot of rope where there had been none.

I have been a registered voter for over 11 years and have had a driver’s license for over 14. Until last week I had never been called for jury duty. So this past Wednesday, I got up early and dressed up. My friend of mine joked with me that if I dressed up like a preacher, they might dismiss me from the jury. I arrived downtown and signed in at the court house. I was given a Juror badge and a page describing the process. About 10:30, we were told that one case would be going to trial. There was a total of 36 prospective jurors who filed into the courtroom. The case before us was a misdemeanor case. The defendant was accused of not using her turn signal while turning left.

The prosecutor began Voir Dire, which is the interview process. He asked us whether we could make a judgment based on only one witness and without any snazzy evidence or testimony like you might see on CSI. The prosecution finished their questions and the defendant, who was defending herself asked only one question. We were excused while the jury was selected. After about 15 minutes we were brought back into the courtroom. They began calling names of those that would serve on the six-person jury. They had worked their way through five people and one person was ahead of me. “Pick him, pick him, pick him.” Then they called my name. Oh well. The other 30 people were dismissed and the judge began by giving us instructions. Next came the opening statements and then the officer’s testimony. After the cross-examination, the defendant asked to give her testimony. After she was cross-examined, the prosecution called the officer back in to clarify a few points of his testimony. The closing statements were made and we were excused to begin our deliberation.

No one wanted to be the jury foreman so I volunteered. We took a preliminary vote and it was split. One gentleman adamantly stated that the police were out to get this woman. Within ten minutes or so, he flipped and stated, “I’ll call her guilty and we’ll just give her a $5 fine.” Another woman decided to change her mind as we continued to talk through the case. The final person decided to change their vote as well. Then there was the issue of the fine. I was already thinking something low but not $5. One gentleman was thinking $100. The adamant man became frustrated. “I will cancel my flight and stay here all night. I’m not going to charge her $100.” I just think it is funny that he would so quickly cave on his convictions of guilt but would fight tooth and nail over money. We decided on $20.

We returned to the courtroom and I sat in the end chair. I’ve watched enough Law & Order to know that is where the foreman sits. The judge then asked if we had reached a verdict. Again, all those courtroom shows came in handy. “Yes, we have your honor,” was my reply. The judge read the verdict and we were released. They gave us a nice certificate commemorating our civic duty and a voucher for our $10 payment.

I have to admit that I am happy we were not deciding a felony or capital case. I don’t like conflict and tempers were getting ready to flair over just a turn signal. I also just don’t like having someone’s fate in my hands. Granted, it wasn’t a felony but there were consequences of her actions and of our verdict. It also felt awkward convicting someone of something that I have been guilty of myself. I came at this from a different point of view. Every time I have been pulled over, I have been guilty. I have not been involved in a situation where I was innocent and the police were attempting to harass me.

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”