My God is NOT DEAD. He is SURELY ALIVE.

This past weekend has been a-maze-ing. Friday thru Sunday of consistent passion for Jesus Christ in the event of Passion268 Atlanta, Georgia/Fort Worth, Texas 2011 is something I will never, ever forget so long as I live.

It is my study break right now, so bite me :D

Anyways, back to passion 2011. It was such an awesome experience. First, I would like to thank YG, Youth Generation Church, and especially Adrian Rojas, who have bestowed me with the opportunity of attending passion this week. What I really LOVED about it was the fact that we could fellowship with other christian denominations and worship our Lord together without clashing heads. I mean, when it comes down to it, there is not just one “right” christian denomination, or religious affiliation. We are followers of christ, and that is what is important. I met so many lovely people at this event, my awesome red community/family group, and the many other random people that I ran while walking. Mostly, I got to hang with marlise, ryan, bradley, kenny, adrian, and the rest of YG a lot. I also got to witness the mighty preaching of pastor Francis Chan. I loved his message so much, that I bought one of this books called “Crazy Love” and apparently it is CRAZY, heh. So I cannot wait to finish that novel. Aside from that, what I really, really did notice about him was the fact that he was genuinely in LOVE, like serious LOVE, with Jesus and the Lord. I saw that “crazy love” that he had for Him.

That is something I want for myself. I want that “love” that will keep me up all night, keep me excited, and keep me pumped and most of all…keep me happy because God knows how unhappy and sad I’ve been lately. So I am now in this process of attaining this love. Listening to Francis’ message made me realize something. Something important. All this time in my life, I thought I had everything figured out, lined up, and organized. What I realized, especially with the Bible and Francis’ message, was that I really had no idea what I was doing. I was lost. And with that, I will testify my awkward jogging epiphany I came up with this past friday.

So, once again, the gym was unfortunately closed again due to the home show that I did not even attend. oh well, so I decided to take a jogg around the lake near our campus. It’s the same route we ran three times for the 5k. Anyways, on this jog around the lake, I took my usual path 5 times around the trail—with the wind breeze on my back, easing my jog, smoothly-paved dirt pathway that the school made. I also left my water bottle and towel at the usual spot that nobody would find around the train, this spot marked my stop/10 s rest point. So, on my last sprint, 5th lap, acround the lake, I decided be a little dike and spontaneously turn around and run the track on reverse.

What. A. Big. Mistake.

Not only did I not recognize this pathway, but also for some odd reason, it was a lot more difficult to track this pathway. The wind was blowing strongly against my face. The sun was searing and sweat was pouring. I got intensively dehydrated. I ran into a pile of thorns and thistles that inflicted pain onmy ankles from latching onto them. It was tortorous. I had no wind to ease my running, no smooth pathway, the blinding sun scorched me, and I just could not recognize where I was going.

Although it was that still same path that I took for jogging, but reversed, when it came down to it:

I was lost.

Then it made me think about my spirituality. Like my usual normally FORWARD pathway on the familiar track, my Adventist “denomination” was something that I was always something that I had somehwere down the list of priority. In all honesty, God was not my first priority. So while being familiar and just going with the mindset that, yeah God sent His son Jesus to die for me blahblah that is nice and all, but I do not have time to worship because I am apparently “too busy” all the time. That was just a bunch of lame excuses. Until passion and even until I attended this university, I did not realize how ignorant and dumb I was. Just how blind I have been. People couldn’t see Jesus in me, they saw me as one of those other public school kids who had no strong ties to God. So what had hit me was, as I dared to run reverse, to take a dare and a challenge to do something unfamiliar, I ran into trouble. In life, I was used to being home bound, having no life what so ever outside of my family. Then, during high school, even as I moved away from home, I began doing stuff I know I should not have been. I knew better, but did I care? No. i wanted to fit with the “in crowd.” So as I did these arbritrary things, I fell into a midst of chaos. I became bitter that I attended swau, I wanted to join a fraternity. I wanted to party. I wanted to go to the Unveristy of Texas Austin, but for all the wrong pathetic reasons. I became also bitter to my many friends who have stood by my side, and I just hated, hated, judged, critqued everything that I saw. It was the evil anguish inside of me that made me into an ugly person. These “things” were the piles ”thistles” and “thorns” that I had managed to run into during my reverse jogging dare.

I hated all of it. I was beyond annoyed, I was ready to be DONE with all this anger, contempt, loathing, and everything building up inside of me. Until i realized one day:

that I do not have to always be this angry, this sad, this upset, this frustrated, this furious at everyone and everything. Neither did I have to be this conceited, this annoying. I had enough about myself.

I prayed to God about it. And I realized that I NEEDED GOD BACK IN CONROL OF MY LIFE. And, sure enough, especially in my prayer with Him and with this past passion weekend, I realized many things. On my challenging reversed trail I still remembered at the end of this odd path, there was that thirst quenching water bottle. That “thirst” I had was for Christ, God, and the Holy Spirit alone. It was not because I was just physiologically thirsty and dehydrated. I was runned dry of God. I came to the point in life where I had let my sins dominate and not God. But upon completing this challenging road, the strong wind daring me not to come back, the sun screaming on my face, daring me to die in defeat, I ran and ran for that water, for God and did not GIVE UP because He has always been there for me. And just how our bodies are composed of about 70% of water, so is God a vital part of of our lives. Every breath you take, every breath I take, every breath that is exhaled and inhaled, that is done all because of the amazing works of God. Without Him, I might as well just be dust on the earth.

And without water, I might was well just go on and die.

So, I have made this realization that I most definitely need to change. I need to become a loving-man-of-God, not a bashful, conceited, selfishl individual. I finally, finally, finally..
chose to LET GO and to LET GOD.

I have chosen to let go of all my old wants and desires, and immoral wishes. I know it is easier said than done, and there will be many challenges down the road. But just knowing that I am giving myself to God and to work on being humble just makse me…happy. Typing this blog is making me happy with every second. Even with all these challenges and difficulties, I know that God is there with me, and that with Him who could possibly be against me? I have no fear anymore. As long as I am alive NOW, HE WILL BE MY BASE/BOTTOM OF HAPPINESS. HE WILL BE MY NUMBER ONE. AND HE WILL BE THE ONE I LOVE. the one I truly….truly

Love…

this is my declaration.

Neil Sagrado