COMING TO AMERICA

The Caloocan church was the place of my true personal development and maturity. This was now the longest stopping ground for me and my family and I gained here the honor, dignity, and respect as a man of God. With Eddie Wheeler's coming, the AMF was torn apart, but he got the most part because he had the money to lure the pastors. Cesar de la Crus, Pol Aguinaldo, were with me to fight Wheeler in court, to get an injunction against him. He manipulated some paperworks and got some pastors to testify for him. I had the lousiest lawyer, and we were a neophyte in court matters. In short, we lost the case. Wheeler succeeded to get the Pasay property and the rest of the 17 churches and he was also getting his hands on the property of Caloocan. I communicated with the leadership in the United States about what was going on and they were not happy with Eddie Wheeler. Hanchey and Willhoite were upset about the whole thing, and they were all on my side. The chairman of the AMF in the US was for the nationals to continue the leadership. But Wheeler had some friends who were also members of the US board. There was bitter division in the US. I was very angry. I thought of getting an Armalite gun to blow up Eddie Wheeler.

But the church in Caloocan continued to do great. As a young pastor I was on fire and full of ambition. I'd listen to the DZAS radio, a Christian radio station, and I admired Efren Pallorina, Romy Dinglas, Malu Javier, Proceso Marcelo, among others, and the president of Far East Broadcasting, Rev. Fred Magbanua. I also wanted to be famous as Greg Tingson, considered as the Billy Graham of the Philippines, and the brothers: Mike and Paul Lacanilao. This time Engineer Dimi Moldez, officer of Meralco, Manila's largest electric company, got converted to my church. He had the connections and some funds. He shouldered the expenses for my second album, "One Day," a song that I composed. We recorded at the Abbey Road Studios in Makati. My first album, "Now Is The Time To Prepare," went well as distributed by Praise, Inc. My connection with other ministries and other churches enlarged because of my albums. Radio stations played my songs and churches sang my songs in their worship time. We recorded my first album in the DZAS studios without any experience. Ruben Pagcanlungan, the guitarist of the recently released Charismatic recording of Gloria Sevilla at that time, helped me. I had the Jesus Miracle Crusade choir of Pastor Wilde Almeda as my back-up. We were so new to this that Roger Padrinao, the DZAS engineer, called us greenhorns. Whatever he said didn't matter. We played and we did what we knew. We had recorded nine songs already and lacked one more song. I sat down while my crew listened to what we did and I composed the song, "What A Day That Will Be." I completed it in fifteen minutes and we practiced it and we recorded it and we completed ten songs in the album. When everything was finished I brought the master copy to Praise, Inc. Johnny Sy, the owner was amazed. "This is the best recording that came out of the DZAS studio," he said. We all praised God for that, especially Venus who was in fasting while we were in the process of recording. The second album, "One Day," was also distributed by Praise. My name began to get circulated.

Seeing what happened in my life from today's vantage point I can pinpoint many things that would prove that God had been there all along programming me into what I needed to become. God sees the end from the beginning and details of His plans are simply the necessary ingredients that have to happen in order to bring about the desired end. I can feel God on the daily basis now because I have known how He had worked throughout the events all taking place in my life and through the years. People talk about a set up when a situation is arranged in order to see something happen to a person or to a program in the near or far future. This truly what took place in my life: God had set me up.

In the very beginning God gave my life back to my mother when I was dying when I was just a very little baby because she promised that she would dedicate me to the ministry. Then, at age eight, I got exposed into the ministry, as a young altar worker. Then I got entangled into the streets as a blacksheep of the family. Then I got taken out from the streets by diverting me into the Bible School. Then Willhoite came. Then I hit the nail with my first sending me out of the house to be talked into going to Manila by Lourdes Depino. Then, in Manila, I got married to Venus, and I became a right hand man to Bro. Willhoite. Then at only twenty-two years old I supervised seventy-two pastors. And then I got to come back to Manila again and then take over the Caloocan church. And then Wheeler came to divide us, which made the leadership in the United States recognized my leadership. And then I recorded two albums.

I came into the Manila scene when I was seventeen turning eighteen. I would be twelve years old in Manila and going thirty years in age when I would get the chance to go to the United States. In June 24 of 1983, God allowed me to set foot in the United States, on my birthday. I arrived June 23 in the evening and spent my night in a run-down hotel in Los Angeles and the very next day, which was my birthday, Rev. Darnell Fletcher of Fontana, California, knocked on my door and introduced himself to me. He got me out from the hotel and took me to a restaurant at lunch time and I told him that it was my birthday. I did not know at that time how the waiters do it in America when someone among the customers is having a birthday, but when they were informed about my birthday all of them came to our table and brought a cake with a candle and they sang me a happy birthday song. I officially turned 30 years old that day. Looking to it now, the hand of God had always been in my life to set me up on an international ministry when at 30 years old, just like the age when Jesus Christ started his ministry formally, he brought me to America. My life was never boring. There was never a boring moment in my system. And even at this time that I am writing my story, God is truly present in my life, setting me up to fulfill His plans for my life, which I believe I am just beginning to see part of its entirety.