For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life. - John 3:16

Most of the time I tell myself to be humble always even in those times that I know I should be proud of myself for achieving something that’s difficult. But sometimes, no matter how I try, I can’t always resist to the temptation of boasting myself when someone displeases me or when I know a person who I thought to be more skilled than me, but actually he wasn't. Sometimes in our music class, when our professor discusses a simple topic and most of my classmates do not understand but I do, I couldn't help not to boast myself silently. (I’m not a very expressive person). I kind of brag because the topic for me was just easy to comprehend yet the others did not get it.

There was also one time when I finished my recital last March. The piece I played was technically really hard to play but I managed to play it clean for I did my best in practices. When I finished, I stood up and looked to the audience with my head held high as I heard there loud applause. The effect that it brought was that I tended to feel like I was at the top of the food-chain. Feeling like I was the best in my field. Then I became blinded by pride. However, as time passed by, I suddenly became aware that I was already turning out to be a boastful and bossy person. Things around me were slowly crashing down and beginning to tear into pieces as I continue to feel like a boss myself. I was afraid that I might lose my good friends, families and love ones. So then I tried to humble myself but my pride won’t let my “humility” win. Then on, I kept reminding myself over and over of what a friend of mine told me about a Bible verse in Proverbs 27:1-2 that says, “Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring. Let someone else praise you, and not your own mouth; an outsider, and not your own lips.” This really helps me get back to the right direction of being a good servant of God and a good person to others. Also, this serves as a reminder for me to humble myself. It is in the second reading today, in Philippians 2:6-11, “Christ Jesus, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death — even death on a cross.”

Never forget that sometimes we just tend to be unaware that we become boastful of ourselves when we gain something that others don’t have. By having those things we sometimes think of ourselves as “chuy, kapa, ayus, gwapo, gwapa, hawd, pro” or whatever you may call it. Let us not forget that all the things we have right now will never be ours if not because of GOD Who gave it all. Let us humble ourselves. Let us not be boastful of our own good deeds. Because things will always be better if the one we boast is not ourselves but Jesus Christ, our GOD who provides all our needs. Let us lift Him up for in Him there is eternal life.

Nowadays, as far as I know, there are three people in this world who claim to be the Messiah, that they are Jesus, that they are the appointed son of God. Well for me, there will only be one whom I will never stop believing to be the Messiah. And He is the One who descended from Heaven and who had ascended into Heaven, and He is Jesus Christ our God and our Savior.

Believing and entrusting Jesus Christ our lives has never been easy. In Christ, we are bound to face troubles, distresses, brokenness, sadness, loneliness, misery and hardships in life. I believe that Christ knows that the only way to teach us to learn, to see, and to appreciate the littlest of good things is through experience. Well, how can we ever learn to see the positive of things if we do not experience first the negative ones? I mean, how can we ever know that we are happy if we haven’t experienced the feeling of being sad? How can we know that we have more if we never experienced having less? And how can we say that we are lying down in green pastures if we haven’t experience living in misery? I agree that hardships in life are like death, it’s inevitable. To always find what’s good in life is what Jesus Christ taught us. All I need is to never stop believing in Him and to pray to Him. I will lift Him high and I will boast that Jesus is my God.

In John 3:17, “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him”. Jesus saves us by showing us how to love one another. We can listen to each other’s stories, share our own hurts, and lift each other’s spirits. And in John 3:15, “that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him." The risen Jesus lives and saves us in our love for one another.

- Adrian Karl Alvarado