THE LORD IS WITH US
Bicol Relief Operation 2007
By Atty.Cesar R. Vidal



2,500 gift packs were prepared. But 2,600 were actually distributed!

Who provided the additional 100 packs?

In January of this year the employees of the P.J. Lhuillier Group of Companies, moved by their innate kindness,voluntarily raised a total of more than half a million pesos to buy basic items for distribution to  families devastated by the recent typhoons in Albay. As usual, the Lhuillier Family, through the President of the P.J. Lhuillier Foundation, Inc., Mr. Jean Henri Lhuillier, gave a counterpart of twice the amount raised by the employees, or more than one million pesos. Thus, a total of more than one and a half million pesos was made available for the Bicol Relief Operation!

Our Foundation staff and some volunteers from the Legal Services Group of Cintree Management Services, Inc. proceeded to buy the items to be placed in 2,500 packs intended to be distributed to 2,500 families. Each of the 2,500 packs contained 10 kilos of rice, 24 pieces of assorted grocery items and one Cebuana Lhuillier t-shirt, with a total retail value of around P600.00. Since the two vacant 3-storey townhouses we borrowed for packing could not accommodate all the items to be placed in the 2,500 packs, we first packed approximately half of said number and loaded the same in the first 10-wheeler truck of the Philippine National Red Cross (PNRC) who agreed to transport the items to Albay and to help us distribute the same to 2,500 families they have chosen from their list of affected families. We then proceeded to pack the remaining items and loaded the same in the second 10-wheeler truck. To our great surprise, the total number we counted, including the first batch, was 2,600 packs! We thought that we just committed a mistake in the counting. But it was already impossible to conduct a recount. So, we directed the PNRC personnel to proceed with the transporting of the packs to their headquarters in Albay where we agreed to meet on January 30, 2007 for their actual distribution.

Assisted by PNRC personnel, we proceeded on January 30, 2007 to distribute the packs to our unfortunate brothers and sisters who were jokingly complaining of the weight and volume of the packs. According to the PNRC, our gift packs were the largest and the greatest in number and value ever distributed by a private institution!

From early morning to late afternoon, we distributed our gifts but still we could not finish it. So we left the remaining packs with the PNRC who still spent four additional days distributing the same. After which, they submitted to us the list of the family beneficiaries.

The list indicates that the family beneficiaries came from 22 barangays  of 3 cities and 6 municipalities of the province of Albay. We were shocked to see that the total number of packs covered by the distribution, with available names of beneficiaries, was 2,600!

It was impossible for us to have committed a mistake in the number of items we bought since it would have entailed coincidental mistakes in all the 26 items we placed in the packs. And a review of the receipts showed that indeed the numbers of items we bought were good only for 2,500 packs. It was likewise unlikely that the PNRC committed an error in the counting since we ourselves made identical count before the 10-wheeler trucks left for Albay. And how can the list of the names of the actual recipients of the packs lie? The inevitable and only logical conclusion was: the Good Lord had performed a miracle by adding 100 packs to our 2,500 packs!

I was somewhat frightened by the realization that I have just experienced a supernatural phenomenon. The feeling even heightened when my memory and imagination instantly brought me back to the somewhat eerie feeling I had during actual distribution when informed by the local folks that the public places we were then using were the same venues used in piling up, for identification, the truckloads of our dead brothers and sisters who were retrieved from the avalanche of boulders and sand which engulfed the once happy communities of my provincemates. But all these unpleasant thoughts and feelings were easily erased by the much stronger thought and feeling of happiness and fulfillment on realizing that, no doubt, the Lord God was not only watching us when we implemented our Bicol Relief Operation, but He was, in fact, working with us! And, surely, He was happy with what we were doing!

The Bicol Relief Operation would not have been possible if not for the contributions of my officemates and of the Lhuillier Family so I felt it was my duty to relay to them the miracle. And I also felt that it was not mere coincidence that the Lord God performed the same in this year when we are celebrating the 20th Anniversary of our Cebuana Lhuillier Pawnshop. It is my firm belief that it is the Lord’s way of telling us that He is also with us in our twenty years of helping our needy brothers and sisters. So I formally relayed the miracle to everybody through an Anniversary Message which I e-mailed to everyone and which is reproduced in pages 15-16 hereof. He categorically confirmed this through His miracle of the additional 100 packs. But it is now all up to us how we shall react to such miracle. We can ignore His gift of actual presence and, like the chosen people of Israel, deny Him once more and again condemn Him to death (His death in us). Or, we can wholeheartedly accept Him in our hearts and be continuously inspired to help others by the thought that HE IS WITH US!

THE LORD IS WITH US!
(An Anniversary Message)

I am Atty. Cesar R. Vidal, Chief Legal Officer and Group Head of the Legal Services Group of Cintree Management Services, Inc. and Executive Trustee of the P.J. Lhuillier Foundation, Inc. I have been with the P.J. Lhuillier Group of Companies since May 21, 1996, or more than 11 years now.

On the question of “(w)hat things I want to be retained at Cebuana Lhuillier despite any changes that may occur in the future,” my response is: at least 3 things, namely:

First, the deep adherence to and genuine and sincere practice of corporate social responsibility by the Cebuana Lhuillier Group of Companies, as shown by the various projects undertaken by its P.J. Lhuillier Foundation.

Second, the deep and genuine concern for the welfare of the employees by their employers, the Lhuillier Family, as shown by the various benefits received by said employees from their employers which are superior to the benefits received by other employees from their respective employers.

Third, the positive traits of the employees. I can name at least four.

Thirdly, the employees’ deep spirituality. Many of our co-employees, especially those I seldom meet, have been telling me that they continue reading the bibles I gave them a long time ago and share the same with their families at home. And in their offices or branches, they find inspiration in reading the book Purpose–Driven Life during their spare time. An employee from the Fiscal Compliance Division even told me that when their house got burned, he was able to save only one thing: the bible I gave him.

The fourth positive trait of the Cebuana Lhuillier employees is their  genuine  concern  and  care for those in need. This is best exemplified by the fact that everytime I solicit donations for projects to help our needy brothers and sisters, the response of the Cebuana Lhuillier employees is always overwhelming! In fact, in my last e-mail soliciting donations for our Bicol Relief Operation, we were able to raise more than half a million pesos from the Cebuana Lhuillier employees. Imagine that? More than half a million pesos through a simple e-mail from a nobody like Atty. Vidal! This can only be possible because of the employees’ genuine concern and care for those in need!