Welcome to PuertoRicans.com

Professor Manuel Hernández Essays Collection Email: mannyh32@puertoricans.com Website http://www.geocities.com/mannyh32/ or http://www.editorialplazamayor.com/autores/manuel_hernandez.htm http://groups.yahoo.com/group/latinoliterature (Yahoogroup for the discussion of literature and education) For additional: HC-O1, Box 8552, Luquillo, Puerto Rico 00773 or e-mail. mannyh32@puertoricans.com Dec 6, 2007 -New Book Presentation - The Birth of a Rican - By Manuel Hernandez-Carmona

Latino/a Literature Seminars

Manuel Hernandez has given seminars on how to integrate Latino/a Literature in the English Classroom in cities across the United States, Puerto Rico and Mexico. He is willing to visit your school, community center, corporation and institution and share his view on this new literature. The literature can serve as a bridge for further literary analysis and can help students improve their scores on city, national and state testing requirements.
(Click here for curriculum vitae)

Living the Kingdom 7
By Manuel Hernandez-Carmona copyright 2008
mannyh32@puertoricans.com

Within the Kingdom of God , there is peace, justice, joy and
power, but it takes a giant leap of Faith to live a kingdom life without
“naturally” seeing where you are going. The natural and ordinary in all
of us wants us to see and touch; the supernatural strives to reveal
itself and encourages us to receive and believe beyond what is
physically tangible. God told Abraham, "Leave your country, your people
and your father's household and go to the land I will show you. I will
make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name
great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and
whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be
blessed through you. So Abram left, as the LORD had told him; and Lot
went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from
Haran .” (Genesis 12:1-4, N.I.V.). Without naturally seeing, Abraham
obeyed His Father. God is like that; he demands obedience. Living the
Kingdom requires obedience.
The Kingdom of God is gained through Faith. Abraham received
ever-lasting and eternal blessings because he believed, walked and lived
by Faith. It is not a matter of when and how, but a matter of now. When
Jesus resurrected, he gave a command (mission) to his disciples, “Then
Jesus came to them and said, All authority in heaven and on earth has
been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations,
baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And
surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Matthew
28:18-20). If God’s children are to receive His ever-lasting and eternal
blessings, it is not difficult for you and me to understand what we need
to do. But to do that, we must go beyond the ordinary four walls in
which we have enclosed ourselves.
God’s children today dwell on programs, rituals and man-made
positions that stray away from His mission. His children cannot be
constrained by traditional paradigms that foster spiritual immobility.
Daniel was a prophet and advisor to a world leader. Esther was queen of
the most powerful nation in her time. Mordecai, Esther’s cousin became
the second most powerful man on earth. Abraham never had one home and
lived like a pilgrim but was feared by Kings and Queens alike. David was
a Pastor and became Israel ’s most beloved King. How about us? The
Apostle Paul traveled around the world and fulfilled God’s mission even
when physically imprisoned and exiled. Close to 50 percent of what God’s
children read (The Bible, New Testament) today was written by a man who
had to have an encounter and make a leap of Faith and bury his
self-righteous and religious past.
For some inexplicable reason, we have misconstrued the mission.
Millions of dollars are spent in constructing coliseums while millions
of children die of hunger and malnutrition every year. The Kingdom of
God is not physical but spiritual. We are looking into ourselves instead
of “making disciples” in the nations. This is not about a cult or a
sect; it is about moving and doing and carrying out His will. Jesus
himself taught us how to live the kingdom when he said, “Going a little
farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, "My Father, if
it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as
you will."(Matthew 26: 39).

Manuel Hernandez, a contributing columnist to HispanicVista.com (www.hispanicvista.com), lives in Puerto Rico where he teaches school. He has a B.A. and MA Teaching English. He is candidate for a PhD. He has just published a textbook titled, Latino/a Literature in The English Classroom (Editorial Plaza Mayor, 2003). For more information, e-mail him at mannyh32@puertoricans.com For school orders, go to www.editorialplazamayor.com for more information or call 787-764-0455 For a complete bibliography: email me at mannyh32@puertoricans.com