The Encounter (3 Ways To Know If Your Ambition Is From God)

Are you familiar with the “Burning Bush”?

Have you heard of “Moses, take of your shoes for the land of which you stand is a Holy ground.”?

Have you experienced a life changing event where you need to get out of your comfort zone and take a new seemingly difficult path? You struggled but you know that you need to do what you ought to do? (pause for a while)

For forty years, Moses is at the top of his life, he was wealthy, powerful and famous, anything expected for a prince of Egypt. But God thwarted all the events in his life and all of a sudden, in a spur of a moment, he is there in the desert; from being served to a servant; from a palace to a tent, not even having a permanent dwelling. Why these things happened to him?

You know what? It took him another 40 years before the answers to his whys were revealed.

One day, when he was tending the flock of his father in law, he came to Mount Horeb and saw the burning bush. And he was astonished for it was not consumed. God spoke to Moses and gave him an impossible mission: to bring out God’s people, the Israelites, from the bondage of slavery in Egypt.

Moses had a lot of hesitations… he had a never ending “buts”, yet God was so patient with him until he finally obeyed.

And, the rest is history.

This is what I call, “an encounter with God.” A moment in our lives where we need to choose, we need to decide, “to be or not to be?”

My ambition was to become a broadcast journalist, establish a name, joins politics and travel. But God thwarted all the events of my life and I became a full time classroom teacher. I was called to serve. But the joy of being a teacher, the reward of teaching was so fulfilling. Yet, for almost ten years, I had an encounter with God, not through a burning bush or a roaring thunder, but by circumstances.

He wanted me to enter the Philippine National Police. Questions piled up on me… What will I do in to that place? Why the sudden change of plan? I struggled a lot. I cried a lot more. I love teaching, I love being with students, I find fulfilment in moulding them in the way they should be. Why?

One of my college mentors even asked me, “are you in middle-age career crisis?” I was taken aback.

But the mission was given, it was so clear. I have to be there to help the organization to attain its mission. And that is to:

1.    Enforce the law

2.    Prevent and control crimes,

3.    Maintain peace and order; and

4.    Ensure public safety and internal security with the active support of the community.

In short, to SERVE more… What a huge and impossible mission!

Well, anyway, I resigned as a teacher and applied in the PNP. Did I make the right decision? People of my age when confronted with such situation might have a second thought, or even a third thought.  They might doubt if they are doing the right decision. Yet, we can determine if our desire, our decision, our ambition or our career is of the right track. According to Debbie Holloway, our ambition, our work or our decision is right if:

1^st, It Will Ultimately Bring Glory to God. According to Malm, “That does not mean your dream has to be labelled with the Christian fish or cluttered with crucifixes. But it also means your dream won’t reflect poorly on God. For instance, a dream that skirts legal lines and flirts with something unethical is not from God. God will never ask you to do something contrary to His Word. But a dream that demonstrates hope, love, peace—God gets glory in that.”

2^nd, It Will Benefit Others.


“God’s heartbeat is people, and He’s more concerned with how we treat others than with material success. Any work that involves taking advantage of people or capitalizing on someone else’s misfortune is not from God.

3^rd, It Seems Bigger Than What You Can Handle On Your Own.

Everyone’s true vocation will be a challenging and growing experience. “God doesn’t give little dreams. God loves doing significant things through seemingly insignificant people.

I am in an organization ruled by ranks and position. If you are not an officer, you have no authority to speak out even if you are right.  But God’s favor is in His children. Through the work and position He gave me, I was given the opportunity to speak, to stand and to work for what is right and just.

My passion for teaching did not end when I left the academe; God restored it to me by leading people to discover that I am a Teacher. I was given teaching loads and enlisted in the pool of instructors for the continuous study of PNP personnel. I handle training on Crime Reporting, Crime Analysis, Geographic Information System and Public Speaking. And not only that, He even gave me students like the ones I had before, the only difference, they are policemen, they are also professionals so they are more challenging to handle than the young ones.

My ambition to travel was also granted. I was also privileged to travel as we conduct validation of the crime reporting system of all the police stations. I am one of those few personnel who were able to visit almost all the municipalities of the 7 provinces of Cordillera. I was also given invitations to speak and conduct training in some other provinces in the country.

I am sharing these things not to brag but to testify that an encounter with God is a life changing experience. Moses encountered with God brought the Israelites were out from Egypt and reached the Promise Land, flowing with milk and honey.

I was brought out of the academe to serve in the government. All the while, all my dreams, all my desire, all the things that I love doing, are being met by God in my daily encounter with Him.

This article is dedicated to the 44 members of the Special Action Force of the PNP who had a horrible encounter with the enemy on January 25, 2015 at Mamasapano, Maguindanao. Let us keep on praying for justice for them.