In 1980, the BCBP came into existence in response to the Lord’s call to bring Christ into the marketplace and win the businesses and professions for Christ. This year, by the grace of God, we are celebrating our 30th Anniversary as a community.

We cannot help but marvel at what the Lord has done through the years – growing the BCBP from a single breakfast meeting in Makati 30 years ago into what it is today, an evangelistic community with chapters and outreaches in most of the commercial centers of our country and even in California, USA. Indeed, this is a time to rejoice and celebrate God’s goodness and faithfulness through the years, a time to thank the Lord for His steadfast love and generosity.

However, while the Lord has been faithful through the years, have we been faithful to His call for us to win the marketplace for Christ? Have we gone out of our way to invite and evangelize the businessmen and professionals who can make a difference in the marketplace in our respective areas? Have we made ourselves available to serve Him when / where He called us to serve? Have we given the Lord our best in terms of our time, talent and resources?

During our BOT/ Mancom meeting held before our 30th National Anniversary celebration in Davao City, our Area Managing Directors confirmed that the BCBP is currently having a leadership crisis in a majority of our Chapters and Outreaches nationwide. Some Chapter leaders are serving beyond their term while other leaders are just transferring from one leadership position to another due to a lack of new leaders to take over. Some Chapters that used to be strong and vibrant have grown tired and have lost the passion and zeal to evangelize. Although, there are also some Chapters that are stronger and more vibrant today than they were before.

What is the reason behind this leadership crisis in our community? One major reason is that many of our leaders, although still serving, have somehow lost their personal contact with our Lord Jesus Christ. Many of our leaders no longer have the intimate personal relationship with our Lord Jesus. We still pray, but the regular quality time alone at the feet of Jesus, to be nourished and nurtured by our Lord, has been lost.

Our Lord must be so concerned with the current crisis in our BCBP Community that He decided to speak to us very clearly during our 30th National Anniversary Celebration in Davao. In the 22 years that I have been attending our BCBP National Anniversary celebrations, I do not recall the Lord speaking to the whole community as clearly as he did during our 30th NAC in Davao. With the whole BCBP Community coming together as one people to rejoice and celebrate God’s blessings of the past 30 years and to recommit ourselves to be faithful to His call for us to win the marketplace for Christ, the Lord honored us by being with us and speaking to us clearly during our celebration: unless you have a personal relationship with the lord Jesus Christ, you cannot be a Christian businessman or professional and you cannot win the marketplace for Christ. In other words, unless you are connected to the Lord Jesus and have the spirit of the Lord Jesus in you, you cannot be His disciple and you cannot bear fruit for the Lord.

The Lord is clearly telling us to go back to the basics – the essence of being a Christian is an intimate personal relationship with our Lord Jesus Christ. We learned this during our BCLP but many of us have either forgotten it or taken it for granted. The most basic and most important commitment we have in our commitment card is our daily prayer time and scripture reading time, our time alone with our Lord Jesus – time to develop that intimate personal relationship with our Lord Jesus Christ. Again, many of us have taken this for granted resulting in our becoming disconnected from the Lord.

Brothers and sisters, the Lord has spoken and has given us the direction on what our priority should be. Let us heed His voice and go back to the basics. Let us give priority to establishing an intimate personal relationship with the Lord Jesus, remaining focused and connected to Him and becoming more and more like Jesus each day.

My prayer is that when we come together again as one BCBP Community to worship and praise the Lord on the occasion of our 31st National Anniversary, the Lord will see a stronger and more vibrant BCBP, full of passion and zeal in fulfilling the Vision and Mission that the Lord has given us.

May our Blessed Mother lead us all into an intimate personal relationship with her son, our Lord Jesus Christ.

GOD BLESS THE BCBP!