Lessons from the Move

I am blessed to own a house somewhere in Quezon City. Since my wedding day, God has never ceased to amazed us with his provision. I could still remember traveling from Quezon City to the Fort every single day and it would on an average take up 3 hours of my time. That was okay when we had no kids.

When I planted the church at Greenhills my travel time was reduced to almost half. On an average day it takes 45 minutes to travel from my house to Greenhills. So that is only about 1 hour and 30 minutes. On rush hour travel is an hour. I remember always getting tired coming home from work and not being able to exercise regularly and having the strength to play with the kids because the DRIVE tires you out.

In some unprecedented move, one day Thammie and I were discussing about the possibility of moving to Greenhills. Live where you work. It excites us so much so we started scouting for a place. After a month – we found one and we did get the place near our office.

Some people are asking why the move? You live in a house you owned and it is a big house – why downgrade? Why rent? Why live in a place that is not yours? Why go through the stress of moving? Thus this blog to answer some questions and write down the things that God has taught to us and revealed to us in this season of moving

1. You can never exchange time with kids over your own comfort.

- they say moving is very very tiring and stressful and they are right. We have been tired for the past month. It is not easy moving and for us downgrading. We have to give away so many stuff BUT the exchange of being home early, having time to exercise, living near your work and having quality and quantity time with my kids and wife is precious.

2. Embrace your family’s core values even when others don’t understand

(and they may never understand). Someone told us why are you downgrading? And I know even if I explain myself all day they won’t get it because each family has its own values. None is better than the other but that is just how it is. Just like churches have different values – families do also.

One of our core values is MEMORIES. We know that our time with our kids are limited. So we want to maximize our moments with the kids. Pretty soon they would spend time outside the home.

Another thing that Thammie and I wish is that we would build a home that our kids would love to go back to. Now this is priceless. I know a lot of big houses that kids dread to visit. Their memories of the house are fights, anger and unforgiveness. Our dream is to have a house that our kids in the future would love to come back to because we have created happy memories with them.

3. Invest on the bedroom.

This is so crucial. This is where your day begins and your day ends. Make it comfortable for you and your wife. I love our new room. You can see Metro Manila through our window. I plan to have good times with God and my wife in that room.

4. Enjoy the stress.

During stressful times of the move I always remind myself that stress will be gone in a few more weeks. The exchange that we get from the move is something we look forward to. The move gives us more time to be with kids, build more relationship with the people in church, have more hours in our day.