Pastor Armando C. Borja

The most important thing that happened to me

At the age of ten, I started to feel the emptiness and loneliness of my life. This awareness started when my mother had to leave us in the Philippines in order for her to work abroad. It was a very painful experience for me and my only sister who is younger than I. Perhaps my mother had no choice. My father lost his job and my mother can't stand seeing us suffer. So we grew up away from our mother and under the care of our grand parents. But still we missed our mother so much and longed for her love and care. I believe that God permit this to happen to prepare my heart to receive the gospel. During those times of loneliness and longing for my mother's love, God made a way to satisfy my heart with his love. God used my mother's cousin in whose house believers were gathering for Bible study. She approached us while we were busy playing and invited us to join a children's Bible class. We went with her and in that children's Bible class, the most important thing happened to me. I used to hear stories about Jesus but only then, in that Bible class that God impressed on my heart why Jesus died on the cross. At that time, in March 1980, through the help of our Bible teacher, I asked the Lord Jesus to come in to my heart. I knew that Jesus came in and poured His love to my heart that thirsted for love. Since then I have been growing in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. Praise be to God!

My Philosophy in the Ministry

My philosophy in the ministry will not go beyond what is written in the Bible. A minister of the Gospel must love the Lord far more than anything else because the feeding of the Lord's flock can be effectively and sincerely done if the minister is motivated by his love for the Lord and His flock.

He must be like the good Chief Shepherd who is willing to lay down His life for His sheep. He must first watched himself by maintaining in his life the virtues of a church leader described in the Bible and then watched the church of God which He purchased with the blood by leading, feeding, teaching, disciplining and protecting them as one who will give an account to God. He must never forget that he is a gift of God to the church and his job is to "equip the saints for the work of the ministry" (Ephesians 4:12) so that through ministering one to another the believers might all come to maturity in Christ and be truly free to walk in the Spirit.

How the Lord called me into the ministry

My ambition before was to be an engineer. That's why when I got into college, I chose that course but as I grow in my Christian life, my love for the Lord and the Bible was becoming intense. God put the burden in my heart to serve Him and His people and to win lost souls for Christ. Then I realized that the desire to serve Him and to minister to people was God's way of calling me into full time ministry. I prayed about it and asked the counsel of mature Christians. The more I listen to the preaching of God's Word, the more I desire to be a minister of the Gospel. Then I finally submitted to the calling of God. I left my engineering course and decided to enter a Bible seminary to be trained for the ministry. Since then God was continually making clear to me His calling until I graduated with the degree of Bachelor of Theology.