Eden Health

                      It was one night in May when my older son had just turned 18. I wanted to pray but did not know what to pray for or what to say. So that night I was struggling about whether to pray or not before I went to sleep. It was actually already past midnight and if I would state it correctly, it was already morning-around 2 A.M. But then I remembered a verse in the Word of God that says that if we do not know what to pray for, the Holy Spirit would help and teach us what to pray for.  So I finally knelt down to pray and asked the Holy Spirit to teach me what to pray for. As soon as I said those words, an impression came to me. I was impressed to say: Lead me and my children not into temptation but deliver us from evil.  As soon as I finished the words, another impression came to me. I was impressed  to say especially for my older son, Mike. Then I thanked the Lord and went to sleep.

                The next day, I went to work and was busy and I forgot about the events of the previous night.  Months later, I was talking with my husband and he was telling me that some of the close friends of my son, Mike were in trouble. They were being accused of rape by one girl.  I asked for details and he told me that my older son went out of the school campus together with his close friends who happened to be his classmates, too. They turned 18 years old that year and so they were required to register so they would be able to vote in the elections that was  held that year.  My husband gave my son a gate pass which allowed him to go out of the campus but the pass also stated that by 5 P.M. he should be inside the campus.  So my son and his friends went to register and after that did some activities together. They also planned to spend some hours of the night having a party of some sort.

                They rode in the car of one of his classmates and they were headed somewhere. The car happened to pass by the gate of the school campus and my son just asked his friend to stop the car and he went down and went inside the campus.  He did not go straight home but went to the house of one his friends who had a computer and they did some homework together.  He went home late that night but the whole time he was inside the campus. At around 11:00 P.M. that night, one of his close friend’s parents went to our residence and asked my husband if my son was home. My husband told them that he was not home yet.  The couple went back home thinking that my son and their son were together inside the campus. My son finally went home before the clock struck 12 midnight.  At 2 in the morning, the parents of my son’s friend went to find my husband again and informed him that their son was not home yet.  My husband informed them that mike, our son, was home but their son was not with him.  So they woke my son up and asked him where his friend was.  He said he did not know because he went inside the campus early and their son stayed with their other friends outside the campus and had a party.  At 3 in the morning that same day, police men came to the residence of my son’s friend and informed his parents that their son was being held at the police station because of a rape complaint of a girl that they were with that night. My husband and son were so thankful that my son did not join his friends that held a party and got drunk and were accused of rape.  I was very thankful, too, when I heard about it.

                Two weeks after I talked to my husband  about the party-rape incident, he informed me that my son’s friend paid 230,000 pesos to get out of jail temporarily.  Since they were well-off it was not hard for them to raise the amount.  When I heard this, I was thankful more than ever that my son was not included in the group that was accused of rape and the reason was that we would never have raised that amount to get him out of jail.  I asked my husband when the incident happened and so he told me.  After talking to him on the phone, I thought about the incident and I suddenly realized that the time I was praying for my son on that May morning (when I did not know what to pray for and the Holy Spirit impressed me to pray…Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil, especially my older son) that was the time when my son got down from the car and went inside the campus, thus preventing him from joining the group that was accused of rape.  As soon as I realized this, I went on my knees and with tears rolling down my cheeks I thanked the Lord for His goodness and mercy for our family.  In the hour I did not know what to pray for, He impressed me to pray for my son, because He knew what situation my son was in but I did not know. He knew that my son needed a mother’s prayer to save him from evil.  The Lord is so good and kind and He had always showed His mercy in all my experiences with Him.

                I was chatting with my son, mike, just the other day and I was telling him about this particular answered prayer of mine.  When I started telling him about it, he actually told me that he has forgotten about the incident because that happened about ten years ago. When I finished telling him about it, he told me something that only confirmed how powerful a prayer could be. He said that at that time he really decided to join his friends for the party. What he did not understand was why he asked his friend to stop the car when they were at the gate of the school campus, went down the car and then went inside the school campus.     But after hearing about how I prayed for him, he said, he now understands why he went down that car that day although it was later than the time he was supposed to go inside the campus. He was so thankful that I prayed for him that day and asked me to keep praying for him.  He also understands more than ever, the power of prayer. The book, “Thoughts From The Mount of Blessings”, says these (and I quote):

              The prayer, “Bring us not into temptation,” is itself a promise. If we commit ourselves to God we have the assurance, He “will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.” 1 Corinthians 10:13. . . . 

           Christ will never abandon the soul for whom He has died. The soul may leave Him and be overwhelmed with temptation, but Christ can never turn from one for whom He has paid the ransom of His own life. Could our spiritual vision be quickened, we should see souls bowed under oppression and burdened with grief, pressed as a cart beneath sheaves and ready to die in discouragement. We should see angels flying swiftly to aid these tempted ones, who are standing as on the brink of a precipice. The angels from heaven force back the hosts of evil that encompass these souls, and guide them to plant their feet on the sure foundation. The battles waging between the two armies are as real as those fought by the armies of this world, and on the issue of the spiritual conflict eternal destinies depend.

            To us, as to Peter, the word is spoken, “Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not.” Luke 22:31, 32. Thank God, we are not left alone. He who “so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16), will not desert us in the battle with the adversary of God and man. “Behold,” He says, “I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you.” Luke 10:19.

(Note: A few years later after the incident, the girl confessed that she was not raped but it was just a frame up in order for them to extract money from Mike’s friends.)

         When my children were still very young, we used to go out on Sabbath afternoons to go see nature and at sunset, we did our worship in the midst of nature.  One Sabbath afternoon we went by Roxas Boulevard near Cultural Center of the Philippines.  At this time, I was having problems   and I was kind of depressed. 

        As my family and I sat on the grassy area around the Cultural Center of the Philippines, my children tried looking around the area and looked at the plants and the other people who were there. It seemed that everybody just loved to come breathe-in the sea breeze then stayed to watch the splendor of Manila Bay’s Sunset.  My children were not aware of my emotional state at this time and I tried hard not to show my feelings to them because I did not want them affected.

        As my children were looking around, I spotted not far from where I was sitting, a plant with white flowers and it smelled sweet, too.   But there was something unique about this flower.  It looked like it was neglected because it grew under a thorny plant and I mean  thorny.  But this plant seemed not to mind its environment and it just grew and bore the white sweet-smelling flowers and they looked gorgeous, too.  As I was looking at this plant with the white flowers, there is a passage in the Bible which came to my mind.  That passage in the Bible talked about the lilies of the field and how they grew pure and white and beautiful in spite of their environment and the wisest man that lived on earth never compared to their beauty.  It showed that there was Someone who took care of these flowers and so they grew beautiful even when their surroundings were not that favorable.

        As I sat there pondering on this, I was encouraged and it lifted my spirit.  To me it seemed that the Lord was telling me that no matter what the circumstances were— whether thorns were present or not,  I should not care so much about the situation but have faith that He is always there sustaining and caring for me just like He cared for this plant that grew under the thorns. He was telling at that time that no matter what the circumstances are, I should be like those flowers- pure and sweet-smelling.

                Have you ever tried praying and asking God to help you?  A lot of times I do.  I’m sure you do, too.  However, there is one thing I do when asking God to help me.  I tell Him exactly what to do. Let me illustrate what I mean with a true to life experience.

                It was one of my days off from work and on those days, I did errands for my parents.  This particular day off, I went to buy groceries for my parents and they needed so much that I had a hard time carrying everything.   I had a cart where everything that I bought was. It had wheels so all I needed to do was to pull the cart and I did not really have to carry the groceries.  The problem was I took the bus to go to the grocery and go back home.  It had been no problem for me in the past but this particular day, I was really feeling weak and I felt I could not carry the cart up to the bus.  As my habit was, I talked to the Lord and asked Him for help.  I said, Lord I feel so weak today and I could not carry the groceries up the bus.  So please help me by either making this cart lighter or making me stronger.  I know nothing is impossible with you and either one of what I asked you could be done if it is your will.  Can you guess what happened?

                The Lord answered my prayer but not in the way I asked Him to.  As I was waiting for the bus, a Hispanic guy who I never saw before came and as soon as he saw me, he started talking to me as if I was a long acquaintance.  This happened in May right before mother’s day and we talked about mother’s day.  He told me that the Mexicans celebrated Mother’s Day every 10^th of May instead of every first Sunday of May as the custom of the people here in the states. He told me that his car was in the repair shop and that was  the reason he was taking the bus going home. He could actually get another bus going home and it would take him shorter time to arrive where he was supposed to go but he said today he wanted to ride this particular bus to get home because he could nap on the bus. When the bus finally came, he offered to carry the cart of groceries up to the bus for me. Being young and with a good physique, that was really not a hard thing for him to do. When I arrived at my bus stop, he carried the cart down for me, too. 

                 It was after I got home that I realized that the Mexican guy was the answer to my prayer.  I put the Lord in a box, limiting the answer to my prayer. I forgot that the Lord has many wonderful ways He could do to solve my problem.  He did not make me stronger nor did He make the cart lighter, He sent someone to carry the load for me.  Yes, the Lord uses ordinary people to answer our prayers instead of creating miracles. 

                 Do you put God in a box, too, just like I do?  Let us remember that the Lord is kind and merciful and He has a lot of ways He could do to help His children when we are in need.  He knows just what is best for us. So let us not put Him in a box. Let us trust Him for with God nothing is impossible.

 PROVIDENTIAL OR COINCIDENCE?

                We had just transferred residence from Mindoro to Metro Manila.  My family’s stay in Mindoro had been a blessing to my children because they learned to eat natural foods like boiled bananas and sweet potatoes instead of cookies and candies.  They actually looked better physically although their skin is darker in color due to exposure to the sun.  While in Mindoro, they loved to go to the river and played in the water while I hand washed the clothes in the river.  It was in Mindoro that I had experienced to eat “Lanzones” and “Rambutan” for breakfast and I really enjoyed both since they ripened in the tree and were just freshly picked. This made them really sweet.

                Being in Metro Manila again meant looking for a job since my oldest child was ready to go to school.  Being a Nutritionist-Dietitian, I really wanted to work in the hospital as a dietitian.  So one day I decided to visit Manila Sanitarium and Hospital (the hospital’s name then) and went to talk with the Chief Dietitian of the hospital.  She happened to be one of my former teachers when I was studying and in fact, she was the person who encouraged me to major in foods and nutrition.  I told her that I was there to apply for a job and she said that my going to apply was very timely since someone was planning to leave.  So she directed me to the personnel department and I went there to fill up an application form.  The Chief Dietitian promised that she would take up my application with the hospital board and would call to inform me about the result.

 Before I shifted to this course of study (foods and nutrition), I was  taking a Bachelor’s Degree majoring in Medical Technology.  I was already in my clinical year (the last year of the course before graduation), when the head of the laboratory department of the hospital told me that they were waiting for me to graduate from medical technology because they wanted me to teach in the clinical division.  At that time, the news did not appeal to me.  I should have been glad that I was assured of a job after graduation but I did not want to teach not because I don’t like teaching but I dislike the paper work that go with it (making tests, checking tests and then computing grades based on the results).  This news actually pushed me to shift to foods and nutrition.  Because there was just a few students taking a course that majored in foods and nutrition at Philippine Union College (Adventist University of the Philippines, now), I figured that it would take me three or four more years before I would be able to finish my studies at that school.  So I transferred to Philippine Women’s University and took my Bachelors Degree in Foods and Nutrition there. I was able to finish in two and a half years.  It was after my graduation that we went to Mindoro.

                While waiting for an answer to my job application at Manila Sanitarium and Hospital, I decided to go visit my former teachers at Philippine Women’s University.  I saw my former teacher in clinical dietetics and was currently the assistant dean of the School (PINFST) at that time.  As soon as she saw me she informed me that they had been looking for me coz they have a job for me.  She asked me to fill up an application form for a teaching job in the university. Without hesitation I told her that I do not want to teach. She challenged me and said: “Do you think you are that good that if you applied you are assured you are going to get the job?”  Well, that kind of put me in my place and to pacify my former teacher, I filled up an application form but did not really intend to get the job. So what I did was to give a phone number to contact me that was in Pasay City when in fact I was living in Caloocan City.  It was the phone number of my nephew that lived in an apartment and I told him to just relay messages that were for me. 

                Every once or twice a month, my husband and I would go to Pasay City to visit relatives, and on those occasions, I would drop by Manila Sanitarium to get an update on my application.  At this time I had prayed to the Lord to guide me and lead me to the job that He wanted me to do.  In the times that I had visited MSH, nobody updated me regarding my job application in spite of the fact that I go to the dietary department of the hospital.

                In one of these visits to Pasay City, we went to the apartment where our nephew lived and we found that our uncle who lives in Mindoro was there for a visit.  The permanent residents of the apartment itself were not there because they all went to school.  Since we have not seen our uncle for some time, we spent time updating each other.  There was a lull in the conversation, and no one was talking, and at that moment, the phone suddenly rang.  Since I was sitting near it, I picked up the phone and answered it. To my surprise, the call was for me.  It was a call from Philippine Women’s University asking me to go there because they wanted some information from me.  So I went and supplied them with the information they needed.

                After a month, my husband and I went to Pasay City to visit relatives again. I passed by MSH and was able to talk with some of the staff at the dietary department. No one said anything to me regarding the job application I submitted to them.  So we proceeded to the apartment of our nephew again.   When we entered the apartment, no one of the residents were there and the only person that was in the apartment was our uncle from Mindoro, the same one we talked to before.  Again we were talking, then a lull in the conversation occurred, the phone rang, and surprisingly amazing, the phone call was for me again and they asked me to go to PWU. I was so amazed with the event that happened. It was an exact carbon copy of the event that happened a month ago. The call from PWU, was for me to go and sign a contract because I was accepted to teach there.  I went because the event that just happened then was I thought a sign from the Lord that He wanted me to teach at PWU.

                For weeks, the event that happened and which led me to accept the teaching job at PWU, had been always on my mind. The question that kept running in my mind over and over was:  Was the incident coincidence or was it providential.  For two events to happen exactly the same way was too much of a coincidence, as far as I was concerned.  Dear reader, if you were to judge, what would you think the event was? Was it Providential or was it a coincidence?

                A week after I signed a contract with Philippine Women’s University, I met one of the staff of the dietary department of the hospital and she told me that for weeks now they had been looking for me because I was accepted to work in the dietary department of the hospital as a dietitian.  This incident only confirmed that the Lord did not really want me to work in the hospital. He wanted me to work at Philippine Women’s University as a teacher — a job I was running away from.

                As I worked at PWU, teaching foods and nutrition subjects, other questions ran through my mind. I was asking myself why the Lord wanted me to teach at PWU, when I wanted to serve Him in our own denomination — our very own hospital MSH.  Years later, those questions of mine were answered.

 THE SUMMER TRAGEDY (A Second Chance to Life)

                I Just finished grade four and I was on a summer vacation.  I went home to my hometown in the province of Pangasinan.  As a habit, I still went to the fields and the meadows alone and enjoyed nature, gathering those small flowers and making a bouquet out of it. I still loved to observe the butterflies flitting from one flower to the other and sometimes there would be a bee competing with the butterflies for the flowers.  I still loved to watch the dragonflies and an occasional grasshopper hopping among the plants. I observed though that there were lesser butterflies and dragonflies flying around in the meadows. I still loved the gentle breeze blowing on my face and through my long hair. At this time I have also learned to admire the tall lofty trees especially if they bore fruit that are good to eat. I still loved to gaze at the big blue sky and watch the shape-changing white clouds. I still loved to sit under the trees and meditate, talking to the Lord in my mind, appreciating nature around me and thanking Him for the peace and quiet I find alone in the meadows.

                One day during that summer vacation, I was playing alone and was getting red hibiscus flowers from a plant that was growing by a barbed wire fence. The fence was so old that it was really full of rust. While reaching for one flower I accidentally scratched my elbow in the rusty barbed wire fence and it bled a little. It was really an inch-long scratch but very shallow. I was playing with dust, too, and I wiped the blood from the scratch with my dirty hands. I was very young then and did not really think about rust and tetanus. To me it was a very small scratch that I did not tell anyone about it. The next day, the scratch looked red and pus formed around the scratch but still I did not tell my mom about it. In the afternoon of the next day, soldiers came for a bivouac in one of the woody hills near my home. To welcome these soldiers, some of the residents went to visit them. My grandmother went to welcome them and I tagged along because I was curious to know what bivouac was all about.  When we went home, I was not really feeling well. I was running a fever and I felt cold and tired so I went to one of the rooms in the upper floor of the house.  I felt so cold in spite of the summer heat, that I took a thick blanket and covered myself as I laid down on a mat on the floor.

 At this time my aunt wanted to learn how to drive and my dad consented to teach her. The car was ready and they were just waiting for the spare tire to come before they started. While they were waiting, they heard a loud scream coming from one of the rooms of the house and they came rushing up the stairs to find out what was happening. 

When I was lying down trying to get warm and trying to sleep, I felt my jaws were locking and could hardly open it, and I got so scared that when I had the chance to open it I screamed at the top of my voice. When they finally came to me, I told them I felt so weak and my jaws were locking, so they carried me downstairs and used the waiting car to rush me to the hospital in town. After the doctor examined me and found out about the scratch that I had on my elbow, he gave me an anti-tetanus shot and he said that if I was brought to the hospital just ten minutes later, I would have been a goner.  I stayed in the hospital for almost a week and while there, I was so grouchy because every sound made me nauseaus. The simple rustle of a plastic bag being opened made me want to throw up so I told everyone to get out of the room and leave me alone.  I could never forget about that summer when I almost died. To me it was a second chance to live and I am very grateful to the Lord that He spared my life.

As I looked back at that experience that summer, I couldn’t help but think:  Was the waiting car a coincidence, or was it providential?  Did the Lord inspire my aunt to ask my dad to teach her to drive so the car would be ready to take me to the hospital?  I guess I would never know the answer to that until I come face to face with the Lord and ask Him.  But at that time I did realize one thing—the Lord spared my life for a purpose.

 AS A CHILD IN THE MIDST OF NATURE

                When I was still very young and was not yet going to school, I loved to be alone and go to the fields and meadows to look for the wild flowers and the butterflies, to observe the grasshoppers and the dragonflies. I loved playing with other children, too, but being alone especially in the midst of nature was a special treat for me. Nature fascinated me even when I was still very young.  It was fun looking for those small dainty flowers with different colors and their leaves of different sizes and shapes. The flowers were so small and dainty and their purple, white, yellow colors always made me admire them so much. I never understood why the small little things fascinated me more than the bigger things as far as nature was concerned.  I loved to gather these small flowers of different colors and create a bouquet out of it.  I would sit under the shade of a tree and look at the bouquet studying the different parts of the flowers and wonder why they differ from one another and yet they all look lovely. When I get tired of looking at the flowers, then I would stay where I was seated and look up the big, blue sky. As I gaze up the sky, I observe that there are scattered white clouds of different shapes. But unlike the flowers, the clouds change their shape every minute and it was fascinating to watch them change their shape.  I also loved to watch the butterflies flitting from one flower to the other and in my young mind I would think that these butterflies love to kiss and smell these flowers just like I do. Sometimes, I would see dragonflies and again I observe that they are of different sizes. Some are really huge, some are not so big and there were dragonflies that were so small that they resemble a needle and those specially fascinated me.  The colors of the dragonflies vary. Some were green with yellow splashes, some were red, some were blue and there were those who were orange in color. What I loved about the Dragonflies was the challenge of being able to catch one of them. While watching flowers and butterflies and catching dragonflies, I also enjoyed the breeze blowing through my long hair and these made me kind of sleepy. I could spend hours looking at nature alone and I would never get bored. I forget the time when I am in the midst of nature. In fact I forget to go home and eat until somebody comes looking for me and tell me to go home and eat.

                Being alone in the midst of nature made me stop and think how wonderful the world is and that I am very grateful that there was Someone who made it. Even as a young child, I learned to talk to the One who made the world in my mind and ask Him how He could make those very small flowers and how come everything comes in different colors, sizes and shape. I thanked Him for the peace and enjoyment I had in the midst of nature.