Kung Fu Panda Night

Prepare for Awesomeness.

TGIF! My friends and I watched the most-awaited Kung Fu Panda last Friday. Guess how many of us lined up during the opening day? Fourteen... yes 14! It has long been planned to watch the movie together. We were looking forward to seeing it that my mailbox contained a lot of email with this subject: KUNG FU PANDA.

We decided to watch it at Glorietta...then we changed it to Greenbelt 3...but since it was on a Friday, and we were beleaguered with time and traffic, we ended up with Greenbelt 1. Well, I couldn't imagine fighting for 14 tickets on a Friday Night at Greenbelt 3, could I? Unless I did some reservations but you see the movie was at 8:50PM and together with Richlyn, I arrived at 8:05PM. No way we could get 14 tickets!

And so the Kung Fu began. Along side with me (from the left) were Klaire, Rich, Sah, Pia, Roche, Tin, and Len. The row before ours was occupied by Greg, Joel, Lulu, Honey, Jai, and Mau.

The cinema was filled with laughter. Po (the Panda), chosen to be the mighty Dragon Warrior instead of one of the Furious Five (Tigress, Monkey, Crane, Mantis, and Viper), the took our breath away. He was sooooo adorable. And he was such a dreamer. Though he was no master in marshal arts, he had the biggest heart...who was to fight against Tai Lung. We were also moved by the conversations of Master Oogway and Shifu on destiny and believing in someone.

Well, I don't want to elaborate so much on the story as you can also read then in the reviews and other sites, but I'd like to share on the principles that reminded me of my own destiny in the Lord Jesus Christ and as being "master shifu" to others, as I was reflecting on the conversation Oogway and Shifu had.

In our faith-journey and our desire to be an influence to others, God consequentially and as part of His plan, brings people in our lives. Some we may like. Some we don't. Not even an inch. But as Christians we ought to accept and love one another, despite of our differences. We must learn to see them through God's eyes and with Christ's heart. As leaders, we must look beyond the physical appearance of the person, seeing not only who he is but more of what he can become.

It takes hard work to train people, to raise them up, to care for them, to impart to them what you have learned, and most especially to live and die for them... but the patience, strength, love and resources that we need will not come from us. Remember that we are just channels of all good and perfect gifts that God has for them. And as we learn Jesus' way of raising up His 12, we will also commit our lives unselfishly to those people God wants us to raise up and yes, grow with. A teacher's greatest joy is to see his student grow to be the person God has intended them to be...not only to discover his potentials but to victoriously achieve and use them.

Shifu failed to see what Tai Lung (his first disciple) was becoming... he was blinded by his love for him. Yes, he could have been the greatest warrior with all the marshal arts disciplines in the history of China but he became evil and his master failed to correct him, to discipline him from the inside. You see, character building is one important element in raising up men and women...especially in faith. It requires brokenness and testings so that not only the worst of the person will die but also the best be brought out and lived. We can find many stories in the Bible how God would "break" the leader's heart, allowing him or her to go through challenges and difficulties so that the person will have more faith in Him and learn His wisdom and ways.

In our quest for our destiny and purpose, we don't only have Kung Fu fighters as our heroes today but if we read our Bible we will discover a number of stories of great faith-heroes that can inspire us to dream big, fight and win the battle, and ultimately live out the call for greatness.