In 1979, while working in Foster Wheeler Engineering Corp., my co-worker showed a picture of her daughter. I borrowed the picture from her and told her that I would make an oil painting based on it. I ended up making two oil paintings of her daughter - one for her and one for me. I couldn't bear to give away a beautiful portrait without my own copy of it, so I made two, as a solution to that problem.

I remember that the two paintings were alike but there were still notable differences beween the two paintings no matter how much I tried to make them the same. Just like in God's creation, no two people are exactly the same, even identical twins are known to have their own unique features. 

God made each one of us unique. So we should not compare our selves with someone else because each of us has his own unique features. So be your unique self. You are distinct and interesting that way.

medium:oil

$ NOT FOR SALE

Autumn season always fascinates me. The leaves, although they surrender to the cold weather and die during this season, they exude their most vibrant colors.

When one follows Christ, he bids us to die. Die to ourselves. Die to certain deaths - death to pride, death to lust, death to gambling, death to alcohol, death to dissipation, death to lies, death to worldliness, etc. These deaths make us all the more beautiful in His sight. 

medium: oil

$ NOT FOR SALE

I used to like the songs of Billy Joel a lot. And we had to do a project of redesigning an album jacket, so I chose to redesign the album jacket of Piano Man.

The Bible says that God is the potter and we are the clay. Sometimes, we undergo some changes which we don't like. But if we trust the God who designed and created us, we should not worry about the things that He allows to happen to us because they are just a necessary part of his perfect plan for us. Sometimes we experience trials and sufferings, and I call them "interruptions in life," and I mean that in a positive way. God sometimes interrupts our activity or allows these interruptions so that we would not forget to make Him as the central figure in our lives. These interruptions are part of his design in our lives so that we would know Him and His love more, among other things.

Is God the apple of your eye? We were actually designed to woship Him.

We had this project for a movie called "El Norte" and we had to watch the movie in order for us to conceptualize a design. It was a sad tale of many Guatemalans, who wanted to come to the "land of promise" and they had to go through Mexico and then cross the border. In the process of fulfilling that dream, they had to go through many difficulties and sufferings, even death.

I recommend that you see it, especially, if you are an immigrant. I could think of the sad plight of all the Filipino "TNT's" (Tago Ng Tago which means overstaying tourists or people without legal papers who "keep on hiding" so that they won't be caught by immigration officials). In their illegal stay here, they are abused in so many ways and taken advantage of. They are even abused by their own countrymen. 

To those who were born here, you might not have the idea that to a lot of people from all over the world, America is their dream. They want to live in America (i.e.,USA) for America means prosperity and countless opportunities. To them, America is a land of promise and a land flowing with milk and honey.

America has been so blessed by God because it was founded on God and the word of God. It is supposed to be a nation under one God. Now, it is a nation under so many gods and sometimes under no god at all.