Keeping the Focus
Posted by ACDA in Featured Articles on 03 24th, 2011 | no responses
Keeping the Focus
By Edwin Estioko for Compassion International
In an overly crowded squatter colony known to harbor pimps, prostitutes and drug pushers, a young lady stands out to prove that in her life, the difference is Jesus.
She is Charmaine Buenaventura, 18 years old, a registered child at Capitol City Alliance Church (CCAC) student center in Quezon City. While other young women in her community hang out and experiment with drugs and their bodies, Charmaine elects to stay at home.
Home for Charmaine is a tiny and humid two-room wooden shanty inside a crammed, dark and damp neighborhood. To get there, her visitors must navigate through a narrow, unlit alleyway with heads bowed to avoid hitting the wooden beams and electric wires dangling low above their heads.
“I would rather stay at home because the teenagers around me are so rowdy, disrespectful and have no focus in life,” Charmaine explained.
“I am proud that my daughter is like that,” said 58-year-old Gerrita Gallardo, Charmaine’s mother. “Other girls her age hang out very late in the streets and engage in promiscuous activities.”
One of Charmaine’s childhood friends and neighbors got pregnant at the age of 15. “I do not judge her,” Charmaine said, “but I did advise her against having relationships and she did not listen.”
Geritta knows this community quite well, having lived there for more than 20 years already. She believes that about 8 out of 10 young women get pregnant before reaching the age of 18.
“God said marriage is sacred. I first need to have God’s blessings before I will be with a man,” Charmaine explained her belief. “Everything has its consequences, especially the bad things. I don’t want to displease my God.”
Charmaine explained that being a sponsored child with Compassion has a lot to do with what she believes.
“At the student center,” she explained, “we are spiritually oriented to be like Christ. We go to care groups that watch over our spiritual growth.”
The CCAC student center is a ministry of the Capitol City Alliance Church, a partner of Compassion since 1986. It is one the largest student centers in the Philippines with about 196 registered children. It provides trainings in discipleship and spiritual growth, as well as practical life skills that would allow the children to excel in all areas of life. Children come to the center every Saturday and Sunday for Bible classes, worship meetings, fellowships, skills trainings, seminars and even school tutorials or simply to be among friends.
“Our children are well known and liked in their communities. People can really see the difference,” said Lito Roque, center director. “Our young ladies are respected as godly young people, as well as the young men.”
Charmaine is one of the youth leaders at the student center. She handles two youth groups and plays the keyboard at church. Her favorite activity in the center is the youth camps where “we are regularly challenged to commit our lives to the Lord.”
She also enjoys writing and receiving letters from her sponsors.
“Their letters show their love and care for me. They constantly tell me that I am their daughter in Christ,” Charmaine said.
Her sponsors are Andrew and Hillary Deary in the United States.
Charmaine wants to be an accountant someday. She wants to be successful in life so that she can one day help her mother and return the favor. Gerrita is a single mother.
Having raised her three daughters all by herself, she reflects on her life and hopes that she had met the Lord early in life, as her daughter had.
“I became a mother at a young age, and my husband left me because we were very poor,” Geritta explained. “But I never left my children.”
Her husband left them 18 years ago and she raised her children by offering manicure around their neighborhood. She doesn’t know any other way to earn a living. She still manicures today and earns P200 for every customer.
“I have hopes that Charmaine will follow a different path,” Geritta continued. “I always remind her that as a Christian and a sponsored child, she should always be different from other teenagers. I tell her, ‘Not because you live among criminals you need to live like them.’”
Charmaine believes that the main difference in knowing Jesus is that she has learned to be obedient “just as Jesus was obedient to his Father.” She said, “I obey my mother, study well, and keep myself pure. My mother always knows where I go. She won’t see me hanging out wasting away my time on senseless things.”
Charmaine will graduate from college in April and hopes to find a job quickly.
“Life is difficult and I don’t want to lose focus,” she said. “The student center helps us focus on spiritual things.”
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