One day, a student of mine approached me to say that her mother too was diagnosed with a myoma years back.  Her mother took an herbal food supplement called green barley.  She suggested that I try it because the results may be the same for me as I was also diagnosed with a myoma in November 2010.

I thanked her but thought nothing of the suggestion.  My gynecologist has given her medical verdict that surgery was inevitable.  For my part, I had no strong feelings for or against surgery.  My body does not belong to me, after all.  It is the temple of the Holy Spirit: my body belongs to God by his right as creator; and my body belongs to God by his right as my redeemer.  To have surgery or not is a matter of God’s will: did God want me to have surgery?  Did he prefer to cure me without surgery?  I submitted these issues to God in prayer.

While praying for it, it dawned on me that I would need five things:  I would need a competent surgeon whom I can trust; I would need to find a hospital that doesn’t charge too much (the private hospital I inquired from said that a hysterectomy would entail an expense of about P80,000.00); I would need to get a medical clearance from a cardiologist; I would need househelp while I undergo surgery and while I recuperate; lastly,  I would need to save enough cash not only to pay for the surgery, the medications and the follow-up tests but also to tide me over while I recuperate as I cannot immediately go back to work after the surgery.

God gave me the first two things:  I found a doctor I trust, I found a hospital with reasonable fees.  However, I have not yet obtained a medical clearance from a cardiologist; I have not yet found a suitable house helper; and I have not yet saved up enough cash.

The cardiologist who examined me was confident that I would get a clearance but he also told me that I should just wait and not have the surgery instead.  He is very conservative and he says that I should wait for menopause because a complete hysterectomy will cause premature aging and expose me to the risk of osteoporosis and heart disease at such a young age.

So many people have approached me asking me to try out their herbal products.  Only one succeeded in selling me her product–the mother of my student.  Now that I think about it, it was not the scientific  facts she presented to me, it was not the testimonials of the other people who allegedly have been cured of various diseases, it was the personal testimony of the sales agent herself  (my student’s mother) who suffered from the same symptoms I was suffering and had proof that her myoma cleared up.  All the time I had been buying bottle after bottle from her, she encouraged me to see my OB-Gyn regularly and get ultrasounds regularly so that I can see for myself whether or not the herbal remedy is helping any in the alleviation of the symptoms as well as curing the ailment.

True enough, some symptoms disappeared. Some of the areas where endometriomae were noted later on showed up in the ultrasound as “clear.”  The myoma has slightly decreased in size.  My my menstrual cramping is all but gone.  I have empirical basis for taking the herbal food supplement:  I  don’t take it to be cured, I take it for relief of symptoms.  If in the event that my ailments  are cured and my physiological conditions are corrected, then that would be a bonus indeed.

One other friend who also sells herbal food supplement was obviously miffed when she learned that I had bought herbal food supplements from the mother of my student. She asked me why I had not bought her products instead.  I thought about it.  I did not buy any of her products because she simply sold too many different products.  She keeps selling products that to me seemed “faddish” and made therapeutic claims that were too good to be true.  As far as I can remember, she has approached me with about ten different products at ten different times.  If she truly believed that just one of her products was effective, she would stick to selling just that one. Either she didn’t really believe that any of her products was effective, or she’s just another salesperson who cares only to sell her products without thinking of the welfare of the buyer. Thus, she sells products as long as she perceives that those products are acceptable to the buying public, but when interest in the product wanes, she will shift to selling other herbal food supplements.

Also, this other friend keeps telling me that her products were “maganda” or “magaling” but she has never told me that she had such and such ailment which was diagnosed and that taking just one of the  herbal food supplements she was selling had cured her of her ailment.  In other words, she had no personal testimony of the curative effects of any of her products. To my knowledge,  I have never heard her say that she regularly takes her products.

Taking this experience and applying it spiritually, faith that is blind is not faith at all. Christian faith is anchored not on hopes or beliefs, our faith is anchored on the sure Word of God.  Faith must be based on scriptural facts, or else, one’s faith is just a profession.  When we share our faith, it is easy to tell people of the benefits of believing in Christ or reading the Bible, but if we have no personal testimony of a changed life, no personal testimony of a changed mind-set, no personal testimony of integrity and the willingness to forego the pleasure and company of others if it meant disloyalty to Christ or a watering down of the Scriptures, then our faith is a mere profession.

If our faith is just something we have been reared in our homes to believe in, and it is not something we have experienced to be true in our lives, it is just a religion and it is just as good as any other religion.  The only difference between us and others of different faiths is that Christ calls us not to a set of rules to live by or causes to uphold, Christ calls us into a personal relationship.  A person who claims to be a christian cannot speak highly of Christ to anyone unless that christian has an intimate and vibrant relationship with Christ himself.

It is for this reason that Jesus Christ in Acts 1:8 says “ye shall be witnesses unto me” instead of saying “ye shall be witnesses of me.”  Being a witness of Christ means that one has seen him and heard him.  This is similar to a witness in court who can only testify of things he has perceived with his own senses.  But when Christ says that we shall be “witnesses unto me”  it means not only that our christian testimony be based on personal knowledge of Christ or personal perception of Christ through the use of one’s senses, it also means that the christian has such an intimate personal relationship with Christ that his personality is indelibly impressed with Christ.

I have observed myself: when I went to the United States as an exchange student, I was so cut-off from any Filipino association that I quickly began to talk like the Americans I was living with.  When I came home to the Philippines, my personality bore the indelible impression of my stay in the United States: I spoke differently (not just the accent but also the way I used words), I saw the world differently and responded differently to situations.  My stay in the United States altered my personality.

Such is the power of Christ, when we become related to him by salvation, when we grow in the Word and in His grace, our personalities are altered.  It happened to the disciples.  They had the reputation of being crude, ignorant and unlearned fishermen, but after they had been with Jesus, they spoke with boldness of spiritual truths that no mere religious education can produce.  It is so with Jesus, tell me if he is truly your friend, and  your manners, your language, your choices, your reactions, the way you view the world,  everything about you will be ill-suited to this world because this world hates and denies Christ.

The reason why our soul-winning efforts are so blandly received is that we come across as people with a product to sell.  Our product is superior and life-changing, yes, but we have packaged Christ that he seems to be just another “product” we christians “sell” to others.  But let the person of Jesus Christ so permeate our beings that we become a mere shadow of who we used to be, then people will not be able to dismiss us.  Such is the power of a personal testimony.

How is your personal testimony?