It’s been a good three weeks since the SFC 15th ILC took place in Clark Pampanga. Up to now, I still can’t help but look back and wonder how all of those things happened. After the conference, people from all over congratulated me and the team for a job well done. In all honesty, I cannot and will not claim responsibility for the success of the Conference for truly it was the work of God above all manifested through His commandment to us, which is to “love one another as I have loved you.”
The Challenges
What a lot of people may not know is that the ILC team started very late. It was only in October that we started really to form the team. The previous months were spent talking to people, and waiting for decisions whether to stay with CFC or move on to the other group. When the dust settled, so to speak on who would be left behind among the SFC FTWs, we realized that we really lost a lot of people and most of those who left were those we had expected to rely on for the ILC.
Among the first to heed the challenge was Dict Jadulco who immediately said yes to being the Event Head when I asked him. Only after the ILC did I learn from him that his yes was a leap of faith and that in many instances during the course of the planning of the ILC he questioned why he had said yes in the first place. He shared how he would wake up in the wee hours of the morning because of the anxiety brought about by the ILC. He and his wife, Babes would use this time to pray together. He really lost a lot of weight during these past months.
Forming the team was the next challenge. Even if we assigned all the remaining SFC FTWs to head two committees each, we still would not have enough people. Next to rise up to the challenge were our fulltime brothers and sisters from YFC who headed most of the major committees. It was a difficult situation as these people had fulltime work for YFC and still had to do extra work for SFC. There were instances when I personally doubted if they could do both work and not suffer from the physical strain in the process. People were already starting to get sick.
Soon after, the FTWs from abroad started to come home. Eventually, we had more people to help out, but still we didn’t have the luxury of time with us. The mission volunteers stepped up in an honorable way. They took on major roles as committee heads as well. SFC Sector Coordinators, Cluster Heads, and other leaders volunteered to help in the PFO aspect of the conference.
The Lord was already giving me a preview of how He would direct the ILC. But still I had my doubts.
Panic Time
On December 26, 2007, we had an emergency meeting with Dict and our respective spouses. We had grossly underestimated the budget for the venue. Actual cost being charged to us for the use of the venue was 10x as much as we had budgeted, leaving us short of around P2M for the conference. We had targeted 4,000 delegates for us to break even. At that time, we had only 2,500 registered delegates with the 2nd deadline already up. While we had sponsors in mind, they were far from being closed in any way.
I was already contemplating on changing the venue or worse, postponing the ILC for a later date, say in 2009. My treasury background was telling me that the ILC was not a feasible activity from a financial point of view. But what Dict said that night opened my eyes again to what I failed to see, “Tito, ipagdasal natin ito ng husto.”
And so I did, with more faith. As the ILC drew closer, I would also wake up in the middle of the night with my own bouts of anxiety. This was made worse by problems I had in the office. What comforted me was the thought that somewhere out there, someone was also having difficulty sleeping because of the ILC, and that these people would be praying. In the stillness of the night, I too joined them in their prayers.
HIS Calming Presence
When the final theme of the conference was revealed to us by the Lord, @Home, Singles in God’s Heart; I knew He was already in control. The theme captured everything that we had envisioned the conference to be. It was a reunion for all Singles where love is what will bind all of us together. The best place where we can find this is @Home.
Two weeks before the conference, I was already at peace. I no longer woke up in the middle of the night. There were still a lot of problems but I knew they would be in good hands. We got the final design of the stage 10 days before the conference only to find out that because of the complexity of the design, it would take at least a month to do justice to it. Worse, someone was using the venue the weekend before and we could only start on the stage 7 days before the conference. Deep in my heart, I knew it could be done.
On the day of the conference itself, I knew I was @Home. The atmosphere was festive, and homey. The Spirit of the Lord was overflowing that I could feel it in the air. It was in the talks, in the sharings, in the workshops, in the worship, in the mass, in prayer time, in the picture taking, in the competitions. The Spirit of the Lord, manifested through His love, was @Home in all of our hearts. Never was there a conference where I cried so much, not because I was in any way sad, but because of the overflowing love of the Lord felt through the love of the 6,000 people in Clark. It was truly an extraordinary experience of love.
God`s Victory
The conference was God’s victory. He showed how He can use ordinary people to do His work. Most of the ILC team members were first-timers who had no previous conference experience. Most of the team was multi-tasking, doing other jobs also for the Lord.
He showed that we needed to relate to one another in love. One thing we have institutionalized in the SFC Council meetings is to start each meeting re-affirming our love for one another. It was the Lord who led us to this simple, but powerful act when He used Tito Ernie Maipid as an inspiration to love one another before anything else.
He showed us the true meaning of family. It was our brothers and sisters in the family ministries and other programs, YFC, KFC, Handmaids, Servants, GK and of course CFC who helped in one way or another. Being @Home is being with your family.
Now we begin
The challenge is sustain the push created by the ILC. Long after the euphoria is gone, we should be able to use what we experienced to allow us to come out stronger.
When the pressure of office comes back, when the bills start piling up again, when the fight with our parents or siblings cannot be resolved, then we do what He told us to do, “Love one another as I have loved you.”