How do I eat this orange?

Ok moved to Costa Mesa, have a new job in the gaming industry, working with very talented people insane amounts of hours week days and weekends... Some times is hard not to feel lonely, some times is hard to invest in people and not having a car doesn't make things any easies

But God is God, Jesus is Good. Despite of not having a car anymore people that I beryl know and some others that are becoming good friends have helped me to move around. I got a free bike that helps me to get to work with in 10 min and the most important is that after all I am debt free and in one piece.





My answer to the title of this post is: I don't know, one more time I have no other choise but to throw myself in your hands of mercy. My good Jesus, I need you not because you are my last choise but because you are the only choise, although I some times forget about it.

Please keep my heart safe and my intentions pure so that I may know you more, love others as you want me to love them and to be that man that one girl out there needs me to be.

Life is good

In the after today post I was not really sure what was going to happen with me, two months later I am living in a different city, with a different job, working on the things that I have been wanting to work on for so long. I am happy, trying to build a new network of friends that is not easy with 10 hours of work every day... but I am happy.

Thank you God for all you have blessed me with; help me to be a good steward of all you have given me.

God's intervention

Wow, I can not believe it has been over a month since I last posted anything.

There is so much that has happened in this last month and ten days!! God has been very good to me, and he demonstrates his love in that even though I am a great sinner Christ gave himself as an atoning sacrifice so that I could be in peace with God the Father, in relationship with Him and guided by the Holy Spirit. He does not take his sacrifice lightly and I have experienced that he does not only gave himself, but he intervenes many times in my life so that I would not sin against him. These interventions many times comes with pain, but I do know that is because God loves me and cares about me rather than thinking that he is a "bad god" that stays far away and does nothing.

I love you Lord, every day of my life I want to say this in a very hones and sincere way, every day of my life I want to recognize that I need you.

Juanma

After Today?

" I've got a funny feeling that I'm gonna go away
I'm gonna face my future, gonna try to make the grade
I've got a ways to go from here and
Vision doesn't seem so clear but
Praise God He's got a plan and
Understanding isn't my place

After today I'm gonna come face to face
With a new world who knows I'm feeling this way
I've got a ways to go from here
I'm gonna overcome these fears but
Still I'm gonna need Your hands of grace... "

I have to love this song, it is just how I feel, not knowing the future and having to throw myself in his hands of mercy, and GRACE is my constant prayer and need, I am finding out so much joy in it!!

I love you Lord because in the eye of the storm there is peace and you are more real than ever :)

Un Año Despues...

Hoy hace un año la conocí, hoy hace un año me enredé y hoy hace un año consideré por primera vez que era posible estar con una mujer.

Sus ojos no me cautivaron y su cabello no llamó mi atención, fue su ternura y su carácter lo que me cautivó. Y hoy, un año después de que la conocí, todavía pienso en mi último gran amor. Pero esto no lo pienso con un sentimiento en mi corazón, solo con un deseo de que las cosas hubieran sido diferentes para los dos.

Una vez me pregunté a mi mismo: "será este el día en que te podrás proponer?", sería este el día en que tomarías la gran decisión que cambiaría mi vida?

Pero aquí estoy una vez mas, recordando, solo en mi habitación y sin nadie en mi futuro tan solo deseando que las cosas hubieran sido diferentes.
No me encuentro triste, solo pensando, recordando y deseando, sabiendo que mi futuro esta en las manos de Dios, que Jesús tiene un camino preparado para mi en el cual ya estoy caminando, este camino en el que estoy aprendiendo cada día que lo necesito y que no puedo estar sin él. Si he de sufrir solo espero que en medio de mi aflicción yo pueda estar en el, fortalecerme en él para que en mi debilidad él pueda ser glorificado.

Extrañándote, pero agradecido por que he crecido y he aprendido.

Juanma

When something comes

For those who are in Christ, all the things that come our way are not the wrath of God but rather his mercy. Thank you for the things that you send my way. I understand your mercy is over me, thank you because you deliver me of things that are not good and are not meant to be for me, and you will give me those that you have prepare from eternity!

Looking forward to all the things that come from you.

Small group comments

Some notes from an email to my small group...
...
Matt Chandler has a great sermon series on the cross, more practical than the things that we talked about yesterday. It helped me to do a lot of introspection, ask myself hard question that helped me to understand where I am in my walk with God.
The Cross Part 1 - Glory Thieves
The Cross Part 2 - A Response to Thievery
The Cross Part 3 - A Second Response to Thievery
The Cross Part 4 - Vocabulary of the Cross
The Cross Part 5 - Of First Importance
The Cross Part 6 - Standing

- Dig Deeper:
We got into some complex topics yesterday, and I think it is good that we are opening our eyes to who God is, what Jesus work, life, death and resurrection means, and hopefully understand that there is more to God that we can ever comprehend in our mortal life. My purpose was not to teach you or pretend that you were going to understand a lot of what I talked (I am still learning and understanding), but to put it out in the table to hopefully awaken the curiosity in you to want to know more about these topics. The following are some resources that might help you out.

Jesus died to reveal God
Death by Love

There are many more good resources on the doctrines of Atonement, Propitiation, Regeneration, Penal Substitution, Ransom and ultimately that Jesus died to reveal to us God. The Cross is a beautiful Joule with many sides! Let me know if you want me to point you to some of these resources.

- Tough Questions: "Does God really send people to hell?"
We also touched a topic on Predestination even though I was not planning to head there. This is a topic that I am not trained to talk about (though I am for predestination) but I know that it need not divide churches or Christians, but need to be treated as discussion topic and a secondary issue. The next are different sermons on predestination and a small book by C.J. Mahaney on Election, the one I like the most is the Mark Driscoll one because he does a great introduction on the history and the different views of this doctrine.

Mark Driscoll
Predestination: Duck, Duck, Damned? (mp3)
Notes from Vox pop network (Website)

John Piper
Called according to His purpose (mp3)

Duane Smets
Suffering and the Glory of God - Part VI(Need iTunes)

C.J. Mahaney
Sovereign Grace and the Glorious Mystery of Election (14 Page Free Book PDF)

"Would you have the guts to get in the car?"

This is just a simple phrase a that came up from a movie where the cute and hot girl gets into the lame kid's car. At the end of the movie and after a lot of action and drama she says to him "I am very glad I got in the car that day with you".

I wonder what would be of our life if we take more often the decision to get into that lame kid's car, if we give a chance to those who might not look like have one. I do not know. I have probably done that to a few people, I know I have, and a many have done it to me.

Once again I find myself in this situation where I'm wonderint the why? And all I can hear is "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." My weakness!

So I will not boast in any strength I could have, but in my weakness, because it is right here, right now that I truly get to grasp the knowledge that I need Him more than I would ever know.

Faith

"It is given to us by God the Holy Spirit, and until we have it grace can not be ignited in the souls of men." (Matt Chandler)

But what exactly is faith? Hebrews 11 says that faith is the assurance of the things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

And what is hope? It is a state of discontentment. If we hope for more money some day is because we are not content with what we have right now. If we hope to some day be married is because we are not, if we hope some day to have a job is because we don’t have one. If we are not content is because we know there has to be something better, something beyond our reach and we want to have it. Discontent is the hope that there is something more, that there is something greater, that is unseen. Faith is such a beautiful thing because when this hope becomes a desperate cry that we need Jesus, that He is so much bigger and that only in Him we can find true life and meaning we draw near to Him.

Don’t you think that the worst thing that can happen to you is to be content, to be rich, and to have peace? With contentment in your life you do not have that hope that is the foundational piece of our faith.

By faith death is not an enemy, but it becomes our friend and just like Enoch we will know that the whole purpose of our creation is to be next to Jesus, we know that when we die we would go home where we belong.

By faith we have the capability to follow the absurd just like Noah did by making an Ark so big like no other in his time, far, far away form the ocean. What are some absurd’s in your life right now, God will lead you and give you the freedom, the faith and the hope for the things not seen so that even if it seam craziness to the world we will attain, just like Noah did, the inheritance of the righteousness that comes by faith, so that we might believe in God, walk in His will, so that we can find joy and purpose in the forward progress of the gospel in our life.

Fear not to embrace discontentment as a friend, and may God make you restlessness push you into him and in him be able to find the assurance of the hope that put us in this path, in this life, in this faith.

------------------

Check out the sermon on faith in Hebrews 11 from the http://www.thevillagechurch.net/

Letter to a friend

This is part of a letter that I wrote to a friend that I made while traveling, she ask me what did I learn from traveling, to what I answer the following:

In Seattle I had the opportunity to interact with the owners of the Hostel Seattle, young couple with a great heart, I told them about the Mars Hill Church and gave them a Bible and a indie rock Christmas CD before I left my first time there. When I came back they had send a few of their travelers to the church which they loved!! Non Christians sending people to the church, that is incredible.


In Minneapolis, after Pipers sermon I had the opportunity to write a simple Christmas letter to family and friends highlighting the importance of Jesus birth, life death and resurrection and I encourage them to remember the true meaning of Christmas, I prayed that God would work trough such a simple thing such as an email and so far I have gotten great feed back from believers and unbelievers. Minneapolis was altogether a wonderful experience.


Through out the trip God blessed me with great people, like you and the guys from group and many more in Seattle, I come to realize that you are all very solid people that still struggle in life but love Jesus with all of your hearts, this is so encouraging to me, you have no idea.


This is just a few of the events that happened over the course of my trip, I had the opportunity to share of Jesus with believers and non believers, family and friends and some how I see it as "Juan' s first missionary trip". I understand, and had the opportunity to experience the strength of God through times of temptation, of loneliness and exhaustion. I felt that I did not spend a lot of time in prayer, but I realize after listening to the Pipers message yesterday that I did pray more than I though and it was not something that I initiate, and with a few tears falling from my eyes I thank him for the great honor of serving him, for sharing with others, for all the stories, for all the people, for all the prayers that I recognize that did not came from me, and some how I can not understand why did he allowed me to have such an amazing trip because I am no worthy of such a blessing, it is a humbling experience because I know that non of it would have been possible apart from Him.


Now I come back to the same question, what did I learn...

God is alive, He provides, He is merciful, He creates situations where I get to share of his love and goodness with and without words, His word is beautiful and precious and I should read it and study it more, I have true brothers and sisters all over the place, Faith does get renewed, I am a sinner and God works despite of me, my testimony is important, I should be honest and real with the guys of my group when we restart it at the end of this month, every thing I do I should do it for the Glory of God, men all over the place struggle with similar issues than me and we should talk about it openly and encourage each other to repent and cut the sin in our generation, I discover the profound desire to respect and love woman (sisters and non sisters alike) and in the process of doing this honoring God and my future bride, I am learning what real manhood is and where to find it: in Jesus Christ... Most of this things I already knew them, but to live them is a very rich and powerful experience.

You did not have to read all, but if you made it to the end... :-)

God Bless you and thank you for being part of my amazing story!

In Him