365 days later... an oddyssey for 2009 and a question for 2010

I haven't made it a habit to make any resolutions, and I never planned to start now. Maybe a story or a question will do. Let's start with 365 days.

365 days. Yes it's that long. Let me tell you about it.

I thought of the perfect present for me for Christmas. Not that I believed that Christ was born on Christmas. Rather, I find that the season is appropriate to give myself a gift. Several people told me that sometimes one should indulge and treat oneself after one heck of a work load. One of those people was me.

Yes, I took the liberty of giving myself a gift. I planned it carefully. I saved up for it actually. It’s something I needed badly so maybe it was as well.

To those who know me, you might have guessed that it was a book. You’ve guessed it right. You really know me. It is a book, a very important one, too. It’s something that I really wanted since graduating. No, I really wanted that book even before I graduated high school. It was around 3rd year or something.

So this was my chance. I waited for a long time.

I wanted a Bible.

Not just any Bible. A Bible from my own blood, sweat and tears, I can identify anyone from our church or any other church who could give me a Bible the moment I asked. But I really wanted something that I would treasure because I bought it. This ought to be the perfect gift for Christmas for me now that I have a job. I waited long enough for this.

I browsed around the bookstores even before December. NBS, Powerbooks, Fully booked, even Booksale. I wanted to find the one that would definitely suit my needs, something really applicable to my current sinful condition – the depressed, and hopeless sinner type.

It’s the perfect gift, isn’t it?

It probably is.

That was last 2008.

Whatever made me hold back on buying a Bible at that time was entirely forgotten. It took 365 days – 381 to be exact for me to get a hold on that elusive Bible. It was like a treasure that took forever.

Shame on me.

In the span of 365 days, I bought a cellphone, an mp4 player, new parts for a desktop computer and many other things – but not a 450pesos worth of a Bible. A real shame, I was able to buy all those expensive things, but never the one thing that would get me at least one step closer to God.

I was able to buy the BIble. At long last, it took a long time. Just before 2010 started, I went out and made a great decision to buy the long sought after BIble. It's nothing grand at all. Just a regular Bible that I could call mine.

The experience made me wonder, how easy it is to make a split second decision to buy gadgets that we coveted and other material things that we wanted – not needed. Yet we forget to forge the strongest link with the person who could give you more than those things many times over.

But what could we humans do? We are sinful as it is. How could we make the decision to strengthen our relationship with God more than the things on this world?

We have another 365 days to think about it and probably change it.

HAPPY 2010!!