As you many know by now, Marissa and I returned from Bantayan Island to Talisay in Cebu a few days ago. It was one of the most fruitful experiences of our lives and the doors of opportunity continue to open every day since we returned. Already a great outpouring of support from those who have read our recent post on the new Ministry Opportunity on Bantayan Island have started to come in. We received immediate financial support within hours of the posting of the article and video on this web site, as well as Teach The Word.com.
To those who responded so quickly, thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your loving help. We return to Bantayan Island on January 19th to give away your gifts to the people. We can’t wait to see their smiling faces and tears of joy as they realize that someone far away in a corner of the world they know nothing about, really cares about them.
In our friendship with the people of Bantayan Island, we were struck by the fact that they have such great peace and genuine joy despite possessing very little materially. When the Lord first created us, He sat on the central throne of our heart that had no equal with anything else in human life. There were no other distractions from things, there was no desire to posses anything else except God. He was all and more than enough to satisfy the deep desire of the human heart.
Those who are the blessed poor, no longer are slaves to things and the worry of how to keep them. They accomplished this not by fighting to get, but by surrendering the hope of ever having. Becoming content with where and what they have, they have found peace.
As they were now free from possessing anything, they realized they really had everything, they have a peace and joy over being content.
Abraham was nearly 100 years old when his life long dream of having a son finally came true. the Lord waited until it was completely and humanly impossible. When there was nothing that Abraham could do, that is when the Lord did it all for him. As Isaac grew into a young man, the love and delight of having his longed for son became a danger to Abraham. When the love that Abraham felt for Isaac was greater even than his love for his God, something had to be done.
The Lord commanded Abraham to take Isaac up on a hill an offer him as a sacrifice. Imagine the war that raged in the old man’s heart and mind. How could he give away the one thing that meant everything to him? In a night sweat perhaps, tossing and turning without sleep, Abraham arose and determined that no matter what the cost, he would do what the Lord said and take Isaac to the sacrifice.
As Abraham approached the hill, he turned to his servants and told them that he and the lad Isaac would return shortly. Apparently Abraham understood that in order for the Lord to complete His promise to make Abraham a great nation, He was going to need to resurrect Isaac from the dead after Abraham offered him up to the Lord.
Imagine that. Abraham believed in the resurrection of an only son who was greatly loved by his father, in order to see the fulfillment of the promises of God.
Just as hundreds of years later, the Father of all fathers allowed His only Son to go up the same hill and He did not withdraw the sentence of death from Him. Abraham learned that it is only in releasing everything that one can truly have everything.
The Lord allowed the suffering old man to go all the way to the point of thrusting the knife into his son before he stopped him and said: “Now you know Abraham that I am first in your life, you can keep Isaac, there is no need to slay the lad…”
Now Abraham was ready to be greatly used by God. Having given away everything, he was now rich. He still had all of his many animals, his wife and Isaac was by his side, but now he possessed nothing. Therein is the greatest theological leasson of all. The lesson that the blessed poor of Bantayan Island have already understood..
Only by counting everything else loss, can a person really find peace. For the souls on the Island, there is very little talk of “Mine” or “My”. As it was now with Abraham, so also has it been to the souls of Bantayan Island. the sense of possessions was external and unimportant.
The world might say that Abraham was rich but he would only smile. There is no way to explain to someone what it is like to go through the loss of everything only to find that you have lost nothing. For the Bantayan Islanders, for Abraham, and for all who have learned this valuable lesson in life, the real treasures are inward and eternal. There is no equal to the blessedness of the poor. For they posses something those of us who have so much, find hard to understand.
Jesus said: “Blessed are the poor for theirs is the kingdom of God…”
This is why I believe that our ministry to the people of Bantayan will be so fruitful and yield such a great harvest of human souls. They already have the humility that poverty affords, and there is very little to distract or impede them from opening their tender hearts and allow Jesus to live inside.
May all of us who have so much, find the same blessedness of having so much but being possessed by nothing but our pursuit of the presence and love of God in all of our life.
Rob Robinson
