London, 1743.
"Messiah", a musical masterpiece by George Frideric Handel, was about to be performed in England for the very first time. The Biblical narrative put into music and harmony filled the air of the auditorium that day, slowly weighing over those who hear it: nobles, important members of Parliament, businessmen, even the King of England himself. As the first notes of the triumphant Hallelujah Chorus rang out, the king was so moved that he rose to his feet and stood as a gesture of honor. And as the people found the monarch standing up, everyone in the audience also followed suit and started standing up. Soon, the entire host was standing as the be series of Hallelujahs filled the auditorium. It would soon become a custom for future audiences all across the world to stand whenever the Chorus is performed.
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"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." Love is a universally-accepted thing. It is something every person—man or woman, Christian or Muslim, atheist, agnostic or otherwise—strives to obtain. Love is something we all know about and yearn for.
To love at all is a privilege, and we think it’s an amazing privilege that the presence of love for one another is what Christ intended to be the main distinctive of the Church. But nowadays, the terms “Christian” and “love” somehow to do not necessarily intertwine that much anymore. The world would even more likely relate Christians with rules, bigotry and even hypocrisy. In as much as we deny, we would find these tags more or less true, hurtful to our egos as it may be. If we’re claiming that Christ is real, if we’re claiming that He indwells in us – which is a radical claim – then we ought to look different. We ought to live lives so exceptional that one is left without a natural explanation. Now, all of us could go find ourselves a mirror, stare at ourselves at the face and ask: "Is this even possible?". Somehow, we know that left to our own capacity, the love we could extend would only be limited to our own selfish interest. There are always two sides in every celebration: the thankfulness and gratitude as we look back and the excitement and expectation in moving forward. As we at Joy in Christ would be celebrating another anniversary this September, it is our hope to not only for us to look back with grateful hearts, but to be motivated to move forward, as well.
The Church (with the capital “C”)’s existence has always been about Jesus and will be always be because of Jesus. All that we do is fueled, motivated and propelled by Him. And so, we considered this as we looked for a way to best capture our theme this year, “Advancing God’s Kingdom”. We hope to not just create another graphics set; we hope to create a meaningful campaign to work with for times to come. To do this, we decided to play with the idea of flags this 2016. There is so much history and symbolism within flags, with each element imbibed in each one carrying a depth of meaning and deep significance. When the first official Philippine flag was raised more than a century ago, along with it came a flood of emotion and pride, as it signified the birth of a sovereign nation and the identity of the Filipino people & the first Asian republic. Each element in the flag carried meaning, from the Sun and Stars, to its red, white and blue fields. |
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