Anna M. Aquino

                I try very hard not to be one of those prophetic individuals that are always trying to come up with rhyming catch phrases. I really try not to hear what others are hearing from God about a situation until I know what He is saying to me. When reflecting and praying some months ago about the upcoming New Year I kept hearing “2013, A year things that have been hidden will become seen.”   Mark 4:22 (ESV) For nothing is hidden except to be made manifest; nor is anything secret except to come to light.              I believe that 2013 will mark as a year of things that have been happening under cover will be made manifest. I believe this is a year will things will become evident.             Of course as I hear this there are two sides to this coin. I b...

I have spoken about God Day on these blogs before now. But as I am sitting here typing this only two days away from the biggest most beautiful display of Church Unity and Compassion that I have ever seen. I am so excited to be a part of this movement. Over 100 churches have joined the movement to see 12,000 pairs of shoes put on fatherless children’s feet in downtown Orlando. In those 100 churches from all over the US, there are non-denominational churches, Spanish churches, Russian churches, Korean churches, Baptist churches, etc. On Wednesday not only will the shoes be given but there will be 12 hours of praise and prayer coming from the large arena at Lake Eola in Downtown Orlando. The current best guesstimate of people will be at least 52,000 people there. At the end of the day shofars will blast and a corporate worship service that will be held in several languages will echo through the streets of Orlando. I believe those echoes will also echo through the nation and onto the w...

While I’m not the queen mother at having a stock pile of extra items around the house, there are certain things that I do typically have a couple extra waiting to be used under the sink. My grandmother was the queen mother. True story after she passed away my grandfather didn’t have to buy toilet paper for at least 18 months. (LOL!) What typically happens in my family though is I have these new items waiting under the sink that I know we’ll need and I’ll pick up when their on sale or I have a coupon, and no one but me seems to realize the new one is waiting when the old one is used. So when we run out of an item like toothpaste, mouthwash, or toilet paper most of them come running to me telling me where out or simply they just think we’re out. I try to smile sweetly as I open the cabinet under the sink and find the brand new item just waiting to be used. I know we’re not out. I know the new thing has been waiting. I began to think about this today. Don’t we do the same thing to G...

Last week when I went grocery shopping I bought some apple cinnamon tea. Last night Dan and I decided to break open the seal and try it. Usually this kind of things are right up to our liking, but neither of were a fan of this particular brand. The cinnamon came on way too strong for our tastes. The tea smelled really good and my youngest wanted to try it. “Let it cool off then go for it kiddo.” I responded as I set my cup down. She waited and waited and after tasting it, I don’t think she liked it either but she had an idea. She wanted to try to freeze it to see what it would look and taste like after spending a night in the freezer. So we did. This morning I woke up to, “Mom! Mom! MOM! The tea is frozen! The tea is frozen!” “Yes dear.” I mumbled and went about my morning. “MOM!” She was so excited and beside herself to discover the tea was frozen, and from what she could tell it no longer had a taste. We had to then put it in the microwave to see what it would do. I was ...

As I have mentioned in blogs past, I inherited my grandmother’s Christmas decorations. In those decorations were these three large candles. The problem was these three candles weren’t meant for Florida heat. They were stored in the attic and every year kept getting more and more deformed. So last year I had a grand moment of inspiration and decided to melt the three candles down. I used the same wick to turn the wax into a large three wick candle. It was a bit of a mess, but what I ended up with was and is semi functional. This year when we pulled the Christmas decorations out of the attic I was curious to see how the infamous candle creation had fared. I wondered if I would find a large pile of wax because I know that attic can get very hot. Surprisingly it looks exactly like it did when I put it up there last year. When things or people unite together it just makes the whole stronger. Ecclesiastes 4:12 Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of thr...

I hope everyone had an awesome Thanksgiving weekend. We were a tad on the rough side at our house. I hardly ever get sick. I mean when I was a kid I got sick at every little thing, but when I was in college someone gave me a prophetic word that God was protecting me in the area of my health and from then on maybe I’ve gotten a cold a year, minus the health issues I had after my youngest was born. However the flu from HELL came through my house this last week like a tornado. Dan got it first, and then I did. I am praying the kids don’t get it. After a week of this junk, I’m much better though I probably need a few more naps. We keep standing on 1Peter 2:24 and Romans 8:11. My ‘Night before Thanksgiving’ consisted of me: hacking most of the night trying not to wake up the kids, trying to pray at 4 am when I couldn’t sleep, and boiling hot tea and settling down to drink it only to accidently dump it on my chest and burn myself in the early hours of the morning. While my family had vis...

Yesterday while in prayer I felt the Lord impress upon me to do a family activity. I thought I’d share the experience in light of Thanksgiving being Thursday. I cut five stripes of construction paper for each person and we all had to write on it five things we were thankful for and then share it with the family. As we went around the circle and shared the things we were thankful for, I took each strip of paper and added another link to a paper chain. Each thing we shared created awesome dialogue in the family of things we were grateful for, and our chain continued to grow. What I had felt the Lord saying to me is that this was a reminder that every time we are thankful about something it extends our reach out from just ourselves and into the world. When we start listing the things we are thankful for we stop focusing on the things that are frustrating us, and we can begin to focus outside of our own little bubbles. Jeremiah 30:19 (NIV) From them will come songs of thanksgiving ...

Yesterday Dan and I decided we needed to vacuum under our couch. So in a wave of ambition he started taking apart the sectional, and trying to move it so I could reach in those places that haven’t been reached in too long. It doesn’t matter who you are, we have all had an assorted collection of stuff that collects under our couch that you can’t help but look at it and wonder, “How did that get there?”, or “ Huh? I didn’t know that was there?”, and the “Eww really, KIDS!” I would have never guessed all that junk was under the couch. It certainly didn’t look like it from the outside, but never the less all of that was hidden from my view. As people we live our lives like this. We think that all is well. We spend a lot of time making sure we look good, and truthfully there can be a lot of things going on in the inside. Underneath those smiles, teeth whiteners, and lipstick can be something that isn’t as pretty. We have to learn to have an attitude that we are open for correction. ...

Every year I look forward to giving the testimony of how Dan and I moved to Florida. It seems like such a long time ago yet I can’t believe it’s already been 12 years. Twelve years ago on Monday (Veteran’s Day, God so has a sense of humor) Dan and I piled into the car from my parents’ house in Ohio. I puked all the way here because I was pregnant for our oldest daughter and I hear stress makes morning sickness worse. We had our futon mattress rolled up in the back seat. All we knew is that Central Florida is where we felt God was leading us, so we left. We got to Florida on that Tuesday and on that Wednesday 12 years ago today, God lead us to our church Freedom Life (then Tabernacle) Church and our dear late spiritual mentor and friend got up on the platform and begin to prophesy to us that we were right on time. Through all the craziness we were right where God had called us to be at that season of our lives. It’s funny, when we moved here I expected to only be here for five y...

I’m still in horror and shock from last night’s vote. I woke up with a huge headache and realized it wasn’t a nightmare. Please do not start political fights with me today. I’m a little raw and I think I may need to take a social media fast for the next few days. This election was more to me than two candidates whom neither were ideal choices. I sat watching the elections results roll in and it was like mourning the death of what my country once was. I realize that process has been a slow one coming over the last several decades but I feel as if I’m mourning something that was once so great. Abraham Lincoln said it best when he said,"The philosophy of the schoolroom in one generation Will be the philosophy of the government of the next" As the Lyrics of Carmen’s God in America, so truthfully point out, “So when you eliminate the Word of God from the classroom and politics You eliminate the nation that Word protects.” The truth of that became very real to me last night. I w...

The American elections are tomorrow and I am going to address my fellow American’s today for the blog. If you are one of the many blog readers of mine that are outside of the US, I love you all and I want to encourage you all to be praying for our elections tomorrow. Our nation needs it. To those of you who may read this blog and not agree with me, realize I still love you and we can still be friends. :-) This is my opinion. However God has given me a platform, and I need to use it the way God wants me to or I will be accountable one day before Him. While so many don’t speak out due to fear of losing one’s non-profit status, the Constitution already put in motion that churches and ministries would be tax exempt regardless. To my fellow Americans, For far too long we have held on to some misguided notion that believers didn’t need to be involved in our political process. We like to cling tightly to the notion of separation of church in state when really that was a phrase coi...

If you follow me on Facebook then you’ve probably heard about Dan and my recent adventure with the water heater. Really it was more Dan’s adventure. It amazes me when you own your own home how much your thrust at learning some skills you wouldn’t have learned before like plumbing and carpentry. Our house is 24 years old and the hot water heater had never been replaced. Dan was cleaning out the garage a few weeks ago and suddenly saw that our old one was leaking. He was right we needed to replace it, but really I find that such an adult purchase neither of us wanted to purchase. I would have much rather opted for some sparkly shoes and a new dress, but we had to so we did. When we went to Lowe’s to investigate we learned that it would cost us $400 just to have it installed. Really? $400? The water heater didn’t cost $400. Dan took one look at it, and figured he could probably do it. So we had to rent a truck to get the new one here, only to find out someone had seemingly dropped t...

Several years ago I worked in a jewelry sales job, and learned quite a bit about diamonds. I will never forget the day when this customer came in wanting to know the value of a men’s ring. Now I wasn’t allowed to give people values but I was allowed to give them a guesstimate, and I happily went about my work to do so. I love looking at older estate jewelry and the woman seemed like a nice woman. As her story unfolded it seemed the ring she wanted me to look at had been in the family for over 50 years and it had belonged to her father. Sadly her father had just passed away, and she’d wanted to see what this family heirloom was worth. As I began talking to her I developed a pretty good exchange with her, and I wanted desperately to be able to give her a good amount for her heirloom. She seemed like a nice woman and I felt bad that she’d just lost her father. The ring initially appeared to be a diamond that I could easily guess at a 1 to a 1.3 carat round set in a yellow gold set...

Dan and I discovered on Sunday that our hot water heater was about to breath its last breath and we needed to replace it. As a result we’d moved all the things out from the old one so that we could see if any amount of TLC or CPR could get the old one to work, but realistically the thing is 24 years old and it is getting replaced. We have this big plastic purple plastic toy bin that got moved into my path in all the poking and prodding of the old water heater. So late Sunday night not thinking that the purple plastic toy bin had been moved in my way to get to the washer and dryer, I made my way out to the washing machine with a pile of dirty laundry. I wasn’t paying any attention. I was caught up in my own little world, and I had an impromptu wrestling match with the toy bin. Dirty laundry went flying, my feet went airborne, and I’d like to think that it was me that one that match. However if we count scratches I may have to concede that it was the toy bin. I had scratches and scuf...

My oldest daughter is working on a history fair project and she had to pick a turning place in history and do a project on it. I jumped at the chance to get her to do a project on Vietnam. As many of you know my dad was a grunt soldier in the war and essentially it’s my dad’s story that God used to get me writing. Watching her interview my dad and me has opened up some great dialogue in my house. It’s reminded me yet again why I am so passionate about talking about my father’s story and one day getting my book about him published. I want the next generation to know what happened. It’s something deeply rooted within me. It’s also making me want to dust off my first book again and see if I can generate any interest in it in the world of publishing.It can be easy when you go through life to get so caught up in the current project that you lose sight of the foundational things that are within you. But you need to take moments to reevaluate in life where you are and where you are go...

When Lightning Struck My House I’ve probably told this story before, but I was reminded of it again this morning and some stories are just worth repeating. When my husband and I bought our home we spent more than we wanted. The very first time I walked into my master bathroom I had the biggest desire to start remodeling it. Of course when you buy a new home you think of all the projects you want to do and can’t. We knew it may be awhile until we got to the bathroom remodel. About six months after we purchased the home, we found ourselves at church one night listening to our pastor preach about “praising the Lord in the midst of all circumstances.” Sure that sermon sounded nice and happy, but we didn’t know what was waiting for us at home. Central Florida is one of the top lightning strike capitals of the world, and our home that night was a target. The strike went through my water pipes, and busted them out so that when we got home water was filling my master bathroom. It blew out...

My grandparent’s house growing up had a laundry chute. I can remember thinking that this was one of the coolest inventions ever. You could put the clothes in the chute and they went down to the basement where the washer and dryer was kept. I realize this seems like such a small thing, but it amazed me as a child. The chute was a straight shot to where the clothing had to go. My grandmother used to joke and call it the “magic chute” because the clothes when down dirty but came back clean. Grandma’s laundry chute was a way to have a straight shot to where the clothes needed to go. Likewise prayer is the same way with God. It’s all too often we whine and complain because we want and need the guidance from God and we just don’t seem to be getting it the way we think we need. But to address that question, how’s your “laundry chute” to God these days? Are you seeking his face in the matter or merely complaining about it? Is your chute a two way street or are you merely throwing all the d...

Once while I was in New York City I happened to walk by this woman who I could easily assume she was some kind of heiress or socialite. Her hair was perfectly styled and cut. It was the prettiest shade of grayish silver. Somehow she’d managed to find a fur coat that was the exact shade of her hair. She wore it with a grace as she walked down Broadway. But she didn’t stop there. Her high heeled designer shoes were the exact same color as the coat and her hair, and if that wasn’t enough the dog she was walking was the exact same shade of silver. I couldn’t help but take a moment to look at her. I had to wonder did she go to get that dog on purpose to be the exact shade or was his hair dyed to match. It was an impressive sight walking down New York City for this country girl. On the outside she seemed every bit of a classy woman. This incident was probably 14 years ago, and it’s weird to me that I still remember it. We are a society that looks towards the outside. We assume just bec...

It was a rough morning in the Aquino household today. Last night I had preached in Lake Mary and probably left a little too late, and my kids got to sleep and hour and a half past their bedtime. Though I do think they napped in the car ride home. I felt sympathy for them, so I let them sleep in 30 minutes later than usual thinking they could hurry up and get ready for school. Maybe for one of my kiddo’s that would have worked, but the other one was having issues. It got down to the wire, and I was yelling. We had 12 minutes to go, and I the youngest still hadn’t gotten ready. So I started to help her, and exactly at the last minute we pulled out the drive. I am not of fan of last minute, rushing, freaking out, and getting ready chaos. I like all of my ducks in a row, and I like to have everything ready to go so that when it’s time for something to happen the transition is smooth. While God is NOT a God of chaos and disorder, He does sometimes wait until what you feel is the last min...

Thought I'd send this out to all of you. This interview worked out well, I think. http://youtu.be/XCHK6RnO_2s Have a super awesome rest of your week, and remember God has awesome plans for your life. Get excited.

Yesterday it became apparent that it was past time for us to go through my youngest daughter’s toy bins. Like many children you can easily find an enormous collection of junk. It isn’t usable toys. It’s pieces of broken toys, random art projects, lost crayons, and Barbie Doll shoes. From two toy bins we took out three garbage bags of trash. On a very positive note we were able to combine the two bins into one and did go through a collection of junk where my youngest found long lost items she’d forgotten about and we put a few good items on craigslist. As I plowed through piles of junk I began to think about how these toy bins are so much like our own lives. We can get caught up on doing things in life and forget about all the broken places. We can just start avoiding those random things and push them aside. We can forget to continue to “clean” out our emotional and spiritual closets until there is so much junk that we have no choice because the junk is running over. I remember sin...

This morning when I took the girls to school, I heard on the radio that tomorrow Sept 26th, is “See you at the Pole”. If you’re not familiar with the movement, it’s when they encourage students to meet at the flagpole of the school and pray for their friends and school. As soon as I heard that I was immediately transported in my head with my experiences of “See you at the Pole”. Unless you are a person that has known me for years most have a hard time believing that I was ever timid or shy. The bold girl I am today is a result of the Holy Spirit and years of training me to step out of my comfort zone. But I was not always like this. I didn’t want to stand out in school, and often I was too scared to ever find my voice. I can remember though I got to school early every year for “See you at the Pole,” I was too afraid to ever be a part of the movement. I didn’t want to stand out. I didn’t want to be different. I laugh hysterically now that I was every like that, but I was. When ask...

This morning my whole family was dragging a bit. The “Monday, Monday’s” can sometimes get to everyone. One kid didn’t want to wake up and stayed in her pj’s until the last possible moment. I’ll admit I felt the same way, and it appeared we all needed something to get us going. I opted to drive the girls to school this morning and had a “Mom you’re so silly” moment. I started car dancing to the morning radio while driving in the car line in front of the school. Before I knew it the girls were laughing hysterically at me, and I suppose a few bystanders were too. But it got us all awake and in a much better mood. It’s too bad the dash board blocked my renditions of the “RunningMan” and the “Tootsie-Roll”! Sometimes you just have to have a silly moment. It’s all too often we go throughout out life being so serious. We can’t be so religiously serious all the time that we forget laughter and smiling is a good thing. Proverbs 17:22 A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spir...

For quite some time now I’ve known that a very mighty man of God has been trying his best to get me on TBN (In which again I want to say the Jesus in Him totally rocks).   I’d heard snippets of possible times and it was getting a tad frustrating.   I knew that it was going to work out to be a God thing, but it had been taking a bit to come together.   It wasn’t the fault of TBN, just the all-around communication of the situation.   Well one of the days came that I knew was a possibility of me going over there, and he was going into the interview but I was still slated for a possible later date.   I’ll admit I had a moment.   I cried for about a second, took the phone call telling me such, and then decided I was going shopping.   Maybe it sounds funny to you, but I knew eventually all of this would work out.   In faith I went out and purchased a dress to wear when it would work out.      The next day, while I was working out,...

  We were blessed on Sunday to get to go out to lunch with some pastor friends of ours, and anytime you have kids at a restaurant it can be an adventure. My youngest kept interrupting me talking because she wanted a drink refill. Ok, so thanks for the reminder we really need to work on interrupting. We informed the waitress and I never saw it come. About ten minutes later my youngest starts whining. We mention it to the waitress again, and to our knowledge nothing happens. About another ten minutes later my six year old starts whining. She wants that refill and I’m offering her my drink. About another ten minutes she’s really upset, and that is when I look down and somewhere in all of this the waitress did bring the drink and it was right in front of her. We’ve all done that in life before. We get really frustrated as to why something isn’t happening the way we want it to, and start getting crabby. When all along God says he’s already given us what we need already. 2 Peter 1:...

On Saturday evening I had the awesome privilege to go view the new film with Kirk Cameron called, “Monumental”.  They were having a free viewing at Cornerstone in St. Cloud.  This film had immediately intrigued me.  It’s basically a discovery tour where Kirk Cameron pursues what was the motivation of the pilgrims and what they went through in order to found the United States.  I learned a lot just by watching it. I was never aware that although certain individuals love to quote the whole separation of church and state, Congress actually once printed a Bible and put it into schools.  It’s a beautiful film.  That was very well done. If you know me you’d know that this was so up my alley.  I love God and I love my country.  I have become more and more upset at where I see our country headed and the choices it seems to be making.  I have felt like I’ve been mourning the nation of what God intended us to be, in the last several years. I have f...

When I was young, I spent a lot of time taking gymnastics lessons. I wasn't going to be the next Gabby Douglas, but I spent my time in a gym. When I went to cheer leading all the floor work benifited me. I can remember the gym I trained at had these trainers who used to push us down lower into our stretches. We'd be stretching minding our own business and they'd come over and push us further in the splits. Laugh if you want, but that is painful! Then they'd hold us down in the stretch until a substantial amount time had passed. While it was easy to get irritated when they would do that, today I'm still pretty flexible for a woman in my 30's. Their pushing me to push myself further may have hurt at the time, but made me better in the long run. We all need people like that in our lives. The kinds of people that see more potential inside of you than you see in yourself. We need the kind of leaders that refuse to let you quit, and make you be more flexible...

I've had a few moments recently. I'm not going to start whining. Dan and I are praying about a lot of things, and are trusting the Lord to make a way where we have yet to see one. Sometimes when you get caught up in the rut of rehearsing all your own issues, you can find yourself very frustrated. Have you ever had those days when you are suddenly reminded of the fact your cars need replaced, your boss is annoying you, and your house has something go wrong all in the same day? Its the kicking you when your down days that you often can really feel. If you don't stop yourself from entering into a "woe is me" attitude the next thing you know you'll be in an all-out funk. Sunday Dan and I were talking and all of a sudden I started to say, "Well, so what we're frustrated about x, y, and z at least we have a roof over our head and food in our stomachs. Yes, I complain about wanting to lose weight but we're not on a forced fast.". We began t...

Dan and the girls brought a few more fish into our family this weekend. There was a small cat fish, a freshwater angel fish, and a beta fish that was added to our gold fish. I never knew you could add beta fish to a general population, but I guess as long as the other fish are non-aggressive you can. However, when they were going to buy them it was discovered that the cat fish was way too aggressive, and they would have to put the beta in something else. Long story short it was discovered that the cat fish was so aggressive they had to sequester it and put the beta in the regular fish tank. So this beta fish that has since been named 'Unique' that has spent the majority of its life in a tiny plastic container is now in my 20 gallon fish tank. 'Unique' was a tad freaked out to say the least. What is interesting is many fish grow to the size the fish tank will allow. We've had some of the smallest puniest gold fish grow fairly big in out tank. That happens a ...

I’ve been working very hard on a project that has a very quick coming deadline, and I’ll confess to be working so hard I’ve spent a lot of time at my desk away from daylight. I might have forgotten for a few moments what the outside might look like. Dan and I have been praying about several things regarding our life and ministry and have been seeking His will for our future. While I was waiting to head over to get the girls from school, I stepped away from my desk this afternoon. I looked down to the stepping stone that is right beside our entry way to our home. It’s has a block O on it from The Ohio State University. I remember when my grandmother gave it to me. I think it may have been the year I graduated from OSU, but I don’t know. It was a Christmas present. However my stepping stone hadn’t been tended to in a while. The Florida grass had begun to grow over it and I could barely tell there was even a stepping stone there. It was still there but hidden and away un...

I had a moment yesterday. Call it what you want…a moment, a pity party, a funk, a crying and letting irrational thoughts run wild, or just a need to renew my mind moment. I’m not perfect. Sometimes I have them. I’m a creative dramatic female so sometimes I need to guard my emotions probably more than most. I’m doing better not to have them often like I used to, but I had a moment. I had a really wise woman once tell me once, “that everyone has a moment here and there but the true measure of a person is if they stay in that moment or get out of it and start to renew their mind to the word.” I found myself out in the garage bawling my eyes out over something that was that was really very minor, but because my wheels in my mind were already churning…one thought led to another and another, and before I stopped myself I was crying. Many a times my prayer closet, when my family is home tends to be my garage. Usually it’s the one place I can go where I won’t get interrupted. Af...

Very little is known about Jesus’ early and adolescent years. Many often wonder did he always know what his destiny was, or when did he figure it out? I have always joked that being one of Jesus’ siblings wouldn’t have been easy. I wonder if they ever heard, “You should act just like your older brother?” It makes you wonder what he was like as a teenager, and like many boys he grew up with the goal he wanted to be just like is His Father. As he spent his early adult life as a carpenter and while the Bible isn’t clear on specifics we know that he was a man and like every man he was a man with human emotions. He wasn’t a robot. Jesus was sent to the earth with a purpose and He had purpose. Despite whatever he went through in life, we know through His ministry He never lost sight of that. He always kept his vision focused. If you think about it, whatever the measure He knew His future, His destiny was to die for the sins of the world. But I bet the death & burial part ...