Hope for Hannah

Hannah Carmelle Estrada Banua 

I first met Hannah in my first class of PE with the sophmores in Yap, Micronesia. I tried to calm down the noisy groups of students who were huddled together and somehow hold their attention at the front of the class room for an intro before being able to take them out onto the field to warm up. I was nervous but trying not to let them see my hands shaking and my voice trembling. "Guys, show some respect!" came a high pitched yell from the back of the room. Immediatly the room was silent and all eyes were on me. They had listened and obviously respected whoevers voice that was and I was able to get through my starting lesson without any problems. That voice was Hannah. A leader from the start, she always had a story for me or a smile on her face with a cheery "Goodmorning Miss!" Hannah always gives 100% in everything she does. With an amazing muscial talent I would often walk into Highschool chapel and see her leading out in song service or strumming on a guitar after school as she waited for her siblings. Yap is not a wealthy island and her family (who have come from the phillipines) struggle to keep her and her two other siblings in Adventist education. She is a straight A student and also works part time at her familys small shop downtown Colonia. She is a brillant senior now having graduated from Yap SDA school a few weeks ago. Now ahead of her lies the impossible task of attending medical school in the phillipenes.....impossible on her own, but with your help she can pay the $1,000 / year cost for her to attend AUP (Adventist University of the Phillipines) and become a doctor as she dreams. This is a fraction of what university costs in the states but it can go a long way in helping Hannah and her mother finance her future education. (Adventist University of the Phillippines this is the school Hannah is applying for) 

Jane (Hannah's younger sister) and Hannah 

Hannah has amazing musical talent 

With some friends at school

Hannah has such a joy for life!! :)

These are Hannahs words: 

I'm Hannah Banua, I'm 18 years old, and I'm from the Philippines. My mom, siblings, and I came here to Yap in order to be with my dad who's already been here to work. I've attended Yap SDA School for over 8 years and I have been an outstanding student there,always performing very well with my academic skills. I am also a diligent and competitive student. I have received high honors in elementary and all through out high school.

With my dad earning $800 a month, and with my mom's business that has been down for almost 3 years now, being able to support all our financial needs with school has been difficult and has become a great struggle for me and my family.
All my life I have dreamed of becoming a doctor. When I got to middle school I learned that in order to become a doctor, one must study for at least 4 years of college and another 6 years for med school. It devastated me because that means I'll have to go to school for a very long time, which also means paying a lot of money. I promised myself that I will become a doctor someday. Ever since then, I did my very best in school and making the most in everything I do. I would make my parents proud and made sure that I could help financially. My sister and I applied as a working student --working every after school-- to help pay for our tuition. It paid for $1.00 an hour but it didn't last long when one of our teachers was brutally murdered. My parents made it clear to themselves that it wasn't a safe and secured place for me and my sister to be at. Somehow, we paid our dues little by little over time.
Aside from all the struggles I go through everyday, I like to brighten up people's day. I am a joyful person and I like to make people smile, and helping them in any way I can. Two of my most favorite thing to do is to play the guitar and sing. I also like writing and spend most of my time doing it. I plan to go to college and earn a Bachelor's degree in Medical Laboratory Science which is a field of study that provides knowledge in examining body tissues and fluids to help determine and aid the diagnoses of different diseases on a person. I want to have the skills to conduct different medical tests and manage medical laboratory procedures done on patients. I am determined to finish college and someday become a degree holder. I believe that this course will help me prepare for medical school someday if God willing.

I want with all my heart to see this young womans dreams come true as she strives to work for the Lord daily in all she does. 

If you would like to help fund Hope for Hannah please email me at sophieanderson@southern.edu or call me 905-579-7160. I am in contact with AUP and will give further information on making donations to Hannah directly to AUP through your local bank. 

The funds are wired directly to the Adventist University of the Phillipines under Hannah Banua's name are secure in being sure they are directly used for her tuition and expenses. 

I will keep a update of the funds recieved and how close we are to covering her start up $500 registration fee. 

Loving without expectation

It hit me like a brick this morning. 

“Expectation is the root of all heartbreak” – William Shakespeare. 

This is a concept I’ve heard often and it is also said,

 “Our biggest disappointments in life are unmet expectations."

So what do I EXPECT from my life and more importantly from others I care deeply about?

I am reading the book “Captivating” by John and Stasi Eldridge and came across a life changing catalyst chapter this morning as I thought about the struggles I’ve been going through the last few months.

“When you love, you love with everything you’ve got.” Someone whispered to me in a crowded room. “I know, I love too much and now it’s backfiring on me,” was my tearful response. But this morning I see it all in a different light. When a meaningful and important relationship starts it is based on GIVING LOVE. A few years ago a friendship began. It was based on my want for this person to be FULLY loved. There were no selfish expectations of what I WANTED; I simply wanted to see them happy and free. I poured my heart into healing and helping, wanting nothing more than to give them all the love my heart could possibly pour into another human being. So when did that all change? The heartbreak came when I began to look at the relationship from my own disappointment and unmet “expectations.” Personal pride and selfishness begin the downfall of a relationship and this I know to be what I stepped into and fell away with. It began when I stepped into selfishness. It's a regret that has brought a lot of hurt and something I wish I could take back. On page 143 of the book Captivating it says,

 “To possess true beauty, we must be willing to suffer. Women who are stunningly beautiful are women who have had their hearts ENLARGED by suffering.” 

I immediately stopped reading. It sank in deep. Suffering is meant to enlarge our hearts, not cause us to shut down or put up a wall against those who may hurt us again. It is however making the heart bigger to understand those around us and the hurt-filled world we live in. Reminds me of the word “Empathy.” /ˈempəTHē/ Noun: The ability to understand and share the feelings of another. Synonym of sympathy. So the question I ask myself, 

Why am I so hard on an individual for not fulfilling MY needs or love cup when that is NOT what relationships are all about? and are those needs even reasonable? 

 To go back to the start and see what my ultimate goal was in the first place for the other person is pivotal. It was not to gain love in the way I wanted it but to support and love the other person where they are at and see them in pain, only wanting to alleviate that pain any way possible. The devil wants us to be constantly disappointed by the rejection or even just being let down by the people we love. But the goal is not to receive, rather it is to give. So giving love and pouring our hearts into other people is not a weakness or a character flaw, it is what we expect in return that can do the most harm. It is the selfish expecation of the heart that will end up hurting the other person we are trying to deeply love. To stop loving is to be afraid of not being loved in return but 1 Peter 3:6 says, “Do not give way to fear.” And it is mentioned in the bible 365 times “Do not be afraid” one for every day of the year.

It is summed up perfectly, unselfishly; love at its core in 1 Corinthians 13:4-7:

Love is patient

Love is kind

It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.

It does not dishonor others, it is NOT SELF-SEEKING

It is not easily angered

It keeps no record of wrongs

Love does not delight in evil but rejoices in truth.

It always protects, always TRUSTS, always hopes and always perseveres.

“God does not always rescue us out of a painful season. You know that he does not always give us what we so DESPERATELY want when we want it. He is after something much more valuable than our happiness. Much more substantive than our health. He is restoring and growing us in eternal weight of glory (have yet to understand this part…). And sometimes ….it hurts”. - Stasi Eldridge, Captivating

Yes, sometimes it hurts so much emotionally that it can cause physical pain yet at the same time at least there is a purpose for the hurt. It is to enlarge the heart. Makes me think of The Grinch in the movie The Grinch that Stole Christmas when at the end he is in terrible pain because his heart grew three sizes that day. It is hard to go through the loss of love however the heart must grow with time, not shrink from pain.

“The scariest thing about distance is whether they’ll miss you or forget you.” 

There it is again. Scary. Fear. I fear being forgotten by someone I could never forget. But that is not my battle to fight. Lives are lived as individual and I must accept someone else may move on with theirs, find happiness in someone or something else, and for me to be okay with that. Strong enough on my own two feet to know I am STILL worth loving and fighting for no matter what. I now realize to love someone is to let them go. This sounds contrary to popular belief, wouldn't you cling to someone if you love them? If their happiness involved me and I am included in their giving of love then awesome, if not then that is not my place to hold and handing that persons hear heart off to someone else to love and care for is the ultimate form of love. 

“The best things in life are unexpected because there were no expectations” –Eli Khamarov

Sometimes you have to realize you are not a part of someone else’s happiness and trying to force your life into a form of theirs will only create their unhappiness along with your own heartbreak. If you really LOVE them, your only goal is to see them happy, with or without you. (A lesson long in coming:( Which brings up another point I have really been struggling with. Jealousy. But not jealousy of talent, or looks or possessions but rather the type of jealous heart that wants to be loved in return. The heart that has difficulty seeing their place in someone else's life being filled by someone or something else. A selfish heart. It is very hard to watch someone you love, pour their love into somone or something else but if that is what makes them happy, UNCONIDTIONAL love would be overjoyed that they are finding fufillment, even apart from me. 

"Our focus needs to shift from self-protection to the hearts of others. We offer Beauty so that their hearts might come alive, be healed, know God. That is love."

This might be a completely different subject but its spring boards off another point of the endless striving to be happy, in relationships, in life, in all we do. 

“What screws us up most in life is the pictures in our heads of what it’s SUPPOSE to be.”

 This world was made to be perfect, for us to live in perfect harmony so that is exactly what our hearts long for. But we will never have that here on earth, so catch the phrase 20/20. Paul says it perfectly when he states, “I have learned to be content”. He does not say I have learned to be HAPPY, but content. So why are we striving so much to be happy if this earth is not what it was suppose to be. No it is a matter of being content with the discontent of our lives. We can expect trials but it does not mean that life cannot be beautiful. To have a peace that passes understanding, because with logic we should be discouraged, depressed and unhappy with this life, it is NOT what GOD created us to experience.

So this requires Trust. Trust in a God who has said we are beautiful and WORTH so much to Him that He would die on the cross just for you and you alone. Me and myself alone. Beauty is truly not only skin deep, but also rather a soul that knows, believes and TRUSTS that they are unique and IRREPLACEABLE to someone.

In Summary: “Act without expectation” –Lao Tzu. Love is selfless. Love without expectation. You might be surprised 

I hate publishing because it means personal accountability even when I do not always feel it. When I want to go back to selfish desires and love.....however it must be a part of life and growth.