Tag: God’s best

Past, Present, Future

I just finished cooking one of my favorite dishes, “escabeche” that my mom is really good in making and I can’t really nail the taste I was looking for. It’s not like this was my first time making it. So, I’m just hoping there will be a miracle when I eat it for lunch tomorrow that the taste would turn out the way it should be. Lol.

Just trying to write something (while FRIENDS playing in the background)  for my first blog entry for 2016. I haven’t really done a lot of writing last year and I’m hoping I can do more this year. My 2015 really passed by so fast (yeah, cliche) and all I can think every time I look back is work was just crazy busy. Well, it was good crazy busy. I’ve learned so much at work and there were a lot of character-molding that happened. It was good. 🙂 (Now, I remember I need to do my self-performance assessment! Later on that…)

Anyway, so how was your 2015? I hope it was awesome for you too. I remembered I also did some hiking during summer. I believe that was one of the highlights of my 2015. I was able to push myself for more physical activities, the most memorable one was the 20km (up&down) hike to Garibaldi Lake. It was so tiring but the view on the top was just so worth it! It was breathtaking! But it might take awhile for me to go back. Going down just killed our knees! I can’t wait for our hiking adventures this year! My church friends and I have been starting to plan for it already.

Speaking of church, it’s been an amazing journey as well for the church planting movement of CCF Vancouver that I am so privileged to be a part of. A lot of relationship building, ministries slowly growing and the most exciting is we are moving finally to a new venue!!! Just thinking about how this started last 2014 and now things are slowly happening, it’s such a privilege to see how God is just working. Indeed, God wants a partnership with us, the followers of Jesus to do this amazing work of transforming lives.

Life is great, right?! It’s never a smooth one. But we still choose to continue living and hoping that it will get better each day. Not sure if you can speak the same, but for me, as long as I have Jesus in my life, no matter how big or small the giants I am facing, I just know that He will carry me through. And He always does. Because that’s who Jesus is. He keeps His promises. He never fails.

I have so many things that I look forward to this 2016. But I don’t know if those things will happen this year. I’m just letting God work it out for me if He allows it. If not, then, I’ll just have to trust that He has better plans than mine. After all, God sees the future. I don’t. So, He knows best.

How about you? What are you looking forward this 2016? I hope that you will also be able to entrust God of whatever plans you have for this year. We can only do much by our own strength, but God can make the impossible things for us if He wants to. I have big plans this year and I don’t even know if I’ll be able to sustain it. But, I’m taking a leap of faith that if God allows this, He will be there every step of the way. I hope you will also be able to take a leap of faith when God asks you to and obey when God doesn’t want you to. After all, as I say, He knows best.

I hope you will have a life changing 2016!! And, I hope that you will make God not just be part of it, but the Author of your 2016.

But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.

God bless friends! God loves you!

With love ❤ ❤ ❤ ,

Princess Pepay

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A PORTION of my 2015

Don’t trust what you see. Behind those nice, happy memories are also the painful, sad ones that we just don’t share through photos. 🙂

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Promise that Always Satisfies

Yesterday, you saw someone changing status to just got engaged with a photo of her big diamond ring.

Today, you attended a wedding of one of your college girlfriends.

At the wedding, one of your couple friends shared that they have a baby coming.

Then, you,  a single woman and not in a relationship starts asking, “When will my time come?”  Or, “Will it ever come?”

For the next hours, thoughts would just be filled of what if’s, who and what could be’s. Sometimes, a little longer, days.

Until, thoughts would slowly fade. Life becomes normal again.

Then, another announcement comes in. And it goes the same cycle again.

You can have a lot of different reasons of why it hasn’t come for you yet.

But truth is, there is always only one answer that can satisfy you.

God knows your heart. He knows your desire.

And being satisfied that He knows, you once again resubmit to Him that your time will come.

You once again surrender to Him, knowing that He is writing your story.

Then, you go on living your life for Him, trusting that the best is yet to come.

You hold on to that promise, believing that God is faithful to complete it.

God is writing

It’s getting COLD

Aside from the weather, I think I’m getting cold towards writing. I haven’t written anything for more than a month! And nothing is coming out at all. No thoughts, no ideas, no nothing. And now I kinda miss it. Which is a good thing.

A lot has been happening especially at work. Project demands all at the same time. But work is good. I still get to go home early and I don’t need to bring work at home. So, it’s really good.

I’ve been having my weekly discipleship group with amazing girls. Just being with teenagers makes me appreciate more the kind of discipline my parents had brought to us when I was their age especially on education. And I’ll be forever grateful to my parents for that.

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Aside from that, I’ve been helping out in our Kid’s Ministry which I really enjoy. The kids at church are totally awesome. They know so much about the Word of God even at their very young age (4-6). Kudos to the parents! Indeed, learning about God should start at home. And these kids just bring out the little child in me. Games, games and more games!

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I had the privilege as well to volunteer at a Soup Kitchen in First Baptist Church in Vancouver downtown. Every Tuesday, volunteers would come to help prepare meal that will be served to the homeless people. It’s truly an opportunity to show care to the community and hopefully share God’s love to these people who need not just physical food but also spiritual food that lasts.

And, I have a new goddaughter! Beautiful and precious baby girl. Her name is Skye Angela. I’m so honored to be asked to be her godparent.

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So why am I telling these things? Sometimes, I just have to put some major happenings in my life to writing just to remind me that even if I can’t have everything I wanted, God continues to give what’s best for me. And I can never find any reason to complain because regardless of what I have or what I do or where I am, God is my reward. He satisfies me. He is enough.

One milestone I have this week is I’ve decided that I will stop waiting. I’ve been praying that someday God would bring me to that person that He has prepared for me. But then I realized, I got too focused on waiting for that. It’s kinda exhausting to wait for something that is really uncertain. With that, I have decided to stop waiting and to just purely trusting God on what He has for me today and tomorrow. And because of that decision, I actually feel better because now I’m more focused on what I can do with God and for God and for other people. I’m done waiting on uncertain things.

I’m going to live this life BIG for God! Now, I’m praying that God would really use me or make me usable in helping share the gospel especially to those who haven’t heard it at all. I’m currently reading this book of Bill Hybels, “Just Walk Across the Room” and I am so encouraged especially about personal evangelism. I realize how important relationship building truly is especially in this culture. You just can’t approach somebody and shove to his face the Bible. It will never work. I realized that God would really provide opportunities for us either we plant the seed, or help that seed grow. Whichever phase God would use on that specific person’s walk, it is just a matter of obedience for us to do it.

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With this, I’m excited that God would really give me such opportunities to be able to help someone know more about Him.

As I say, I’m going to live BIG for God! Pray for me 🙂

“The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.”  Matthew 9:37

“I am your great reward.” – God  Genesis 15:1

Pressured to DATE?

When you are surrounded with people who are married or dating, it can’t be helped that they will have that tendency to match you to other single people they know. Since I moved here in Vancouver, I felt like I could not find my own circle. Back home, I have so many single women friends who are of the same age as mine. It somehow felt good knowing that I was not alone in the journey of being single and in waiting. Here, I feel like I’m the only single woman left in the world! Crazy, right?

Not that I get offended and pressured by people, it’s just that sometimes, how people act makes me feel like being single is a disease that needs to be cured. When in fact, being able to maximize the single life is one of the best blessings an individual should be grateful for. Those who married young, those who wasted their single years or those who could not wait and kept dating to think that eventually the right one will come – they will never be able to tell how blessed and amazing it is to live an abundant life of being single.

I’m writing this to encourage all women who are in the journey of waiting and trusting that one day God will bring you to the man that He has prepared for you. There are times that I ask God if I should lower my standard, or if my standard is too high. However, God’s answer is always –  trust in ME, just trust in ME. Just as how God answers my specific prayers for other things in my life, how can He not answer my specific prayers for that person that I’ve been praying for to be my lifetime partner? After all, this is not really about me getting married or about that person whoever he may be, but even this aspect of my life has always been about the Greatest Author of my life, the Heavenly Father. And I hope that person also has the same thing in mind.

Just one of these days, when I was praying to God about this, He reminded me of what I just need to do. God spoke to me through Psalm 37:4 – “Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart.” 

I tried to define “delight” in the manner on how God wants me to delight in Him, here’s how I defined it:

  • embrace God’s presence
  • intimacy with God
  • hunger for God
  • seeking God in every moment
  • love God above anyone or anything
  • obey God
  • follow Jesus
  • be Christ-like

God reminded me that as long as I just keep myself soaked in His presence, He’s gotten my back on everything in my life including that person He has prepared for me. With that, I just told God, “Glorify Yourself through my love life.”

And you know what’s amazing about God as He let me wait on Him, He allowed me to experience a life that I never imagined I would have. That’s how great and amazing God is. He is not cheap, He gives what is best for you and me.

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So if you are waiting for your God’s best, don’t lost hope.

God is at work and His timing is always perfect.

 

Waiting is Grace

Beautifully Waiting

I got to answer one of the questions during our small group icebreaker activity.  The question is, “How did I experience God’s grace in my love life?”  I could not give a fit answer as I’m not in a relationship but it reminded me of something very important.

I know I’m not alone in the journey of waiting and for sure a lot of single women like me would agree that waiting is never easy. In my own season of waiting, I have failed so many times. This is not just in the context of waiting for the “right” person but in all other areas of my life that God had asked me to wait.

Why did I fail? Because I thought that getting ahead of God would not really cause much trouble. Because I thought I will be able to handle it. I thought I could be in control. And…

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