Tag: JESUS

FEED MY SHEEP.

I’ve been thinking of different ways to approach this topic that has been on my heart. It has taken me this long to formulate my words and my thoughts. This will be a short read, and I am sure this won’t be the only time I talk about this. But my heart has been grieved of late, so much has been happening on a global scale and in my little world. It has been hard to talk about it in a way that doesn’t cause offence to others. I don’t pretend to even know what it takes to be in a position where you are shepherding God’s flock, so please, if God has placed you in that position, please don’t receive what I say as arrogance or that I think I know everything, because that is not true. I know nothing. I don’t know what it takes to be in such a position, and to be honest, I would never want to know because that is not my calling. But what I do have, which is a gift from God, is spiritual descernment, and I see things before others see things at times.

I love being a part of a community, I love fellowship with my brothers and sisters, and I love church. I know not many people can say that because of things that may have been experienced being apart of the body of believers, and although my journey with others hasn’t always been smooth sailing, I have been hurt by people many times already. But I am mature enough to know that the actions of others aren’t a reflection of the God I love and serve, but an accurate reflection of man’s ability to be weak in flesh. This is why we need Jesus! The Good out weighs the bad, and experiences that aren’t pleasant will not turn me away from serving others. But, I can say that from a place of spiritual maturity. It’s to be expected that when we gather together at church, it is filled with believers at different stages of their faith, some new, some old, some unsure. But coming together and doing life together, we are meant to walk with each other, helping others to become more mature in faith. Church is meant to be a place where we can get fed, where we are helped, and given the tools meant to make us more mature in spirit. Yes, we have a responsibilty to ourselves to feed and cultivate our faith because in the end when we stand before God, we will have to answer for our lives and all that we did with it, and we will not be able to blame a soul for our lack. But God has given us people to guide and teach us. This is why church is so important.

When I became a Christian at the end of 2019, my coming to faith was a direct result of the power of the Word of God! In me reading the bible diligently everyday for a month, well it was more like 4hrs of bible study everyday, my mind was being renewed without me even realising what was happening, because I never intended to find God reading the bible, my intention was to prove God wrong instead. I didn’t start out in church. It was just me and my friend doing bible study every day over the phone because we lived in different countries. I became spiritually mature very quickly because I let the word of God renew my mind and build my faith. ROMANS 10:17 “SO FAITH COMES FROM HEARING, AND HEARING THROUGH THE WORD OF CHRIST.” My story was different. We were in a time (the pandemic) where there was nothing to do because the world had shut down. Now, the world is very much open, and many will not have the time I did to do what I did. So people come to church when they want to explore and find out who God is. This is why the church is so important.

The church has a responsibility to feed and help you to become spiritually mature. But that doesn’t seem to be the goal amongst (some) churches today. It seems that they are more and more becoming consumed with numbers in seats and making money. Although those things are not inherently bad, if that becomes the main focus rather than genuine conversion to Christ, there may be a problem. Having a packed out church may make you feel good and stroke your ego as a leader, but what good is it if it is not cultivating a relationship with Jesus? If people are attending week after week, and month after month, but still can’t tell you who Jesus is, or they have no conviction in their heart that they are living away from God, then it’s quite possible you have created a feel good centre instead of a church! You don’t want to give the people attending the truth, in case you lose butts on chairs. Or worst still, you don’t think the word is sufficient enough because you don’t think the people attending the church can handle the truth, so you make it more palatable? HOW DARE YOU!! HEBREWS 4:12 “FOR THE WORD OF GOD IS ALIVE AND POWERFUL. IT IS SHARPER THAN THE SHARPEST TWO-EDGED SWORD, CUTTING BETWEEN SOUL AND SPIRIT, BETWEEN JOINT AND MARROW. IT EXPOSES OUR INNERMOST THOUGHTS AND DESIRES.”

You can think of all the amazing ways to fill your church, but it is all for nothing if it is not centred on the Word of God. Jesus has to always be at the centre of it all. It doesn’t matter if fewer people attend because they can’t handle the unfiltered Word of God. If the truth hardens their heart, then they were never chosen. It is God who does the growing of faith. It is the Holy Spirit who brings people into the revelation of Jesus, not us. We are but vessels that are called to be obedient and share the good news. The people who are meant to respond will do just that!

Jesus asked Peter three times to feed my sheep. Peter, who Jesus made the rock on, which the church was built. He wanted the flock to be attended to, to be brought into spiritual maturity so that they could go on and carry out the task of making disciples. That is still the same for churches today. You can’t expect the flock to become spiritually mature if you withhold the only thing that will bring them into full maturity! 2 TIMOTHY 3:16 “ALL SCRIPTURE IS BREATHED OUT BY GOD AND PROFITABLE FOR TEACHING, FOR REPROOF, FOR CORRECTION, AND FOR TRAINING IN RIGHTEOUSNESS,” notice it doesn’t say to entertain, make you feel good, or tell you what you want to hear. Everything about it makes us reflect on ourselves, search our hearts, and most importantly, turn away from our own desires to carry out the desires of our Father in heaven. It helps us to become righteous!

I think you get my point, so I am gonna wrap this up. This isn’t every church. There are many good churches out there. But it’s a slippery slope, and it is definitely something we need to keep watch from entering our churches. Many are falling away because of it. Leaders, you have a great responsibility. Many souls are under your watch and care. I pray that you will do well in your calling, for not only do our lives depend on it, but your life depends on it also. God bless you all.

HAS THE CHURCH LOST THE FEAR OF GOD?

The once saved always saved debate, is what led me down a winding road, that took me on a journey that kept leading me back to this question, have we, the church, lost the fear of God? After a recent trip to visit my family in the USA, my aunt who I vividly remembered being a christian all her life surprised me when I witnessed certain behaviour and speech from her, far removed from what Jesus requires from us as his followers. It’s funny because the last time I saw her, which was before the dreaded pandemic, I was not a believer. I remember her calling me to her bedroom and asking me to get on my knees and pray with her and a friend who was on the phone. I will never forget how awkward I felt bowing my head. And as I listened to their feverent prayers to God, I kept thinking, when would this be over! Although I obliged my aunt out of respect, that memory never left me, and I can’t help but feel it was a seed that had been planted. That was the last memory of my aunt, a memory that built her up in my mind as a prayer warrior, a woman of God who had an unshakable faith. So, in my excitement to come back 5 years later, now a woman of God myself, I couldn’t wait to connect with my aunt in a way that I had never before!

We did connect in a new way, but it was just not how I envisioned it would be. I spent the first few days “correcting” her (her words), reminding her of what it meant to be a follower of Christ. But in me doing that, it brought us closer than ever, and we had long conversations about faith and her understanding. God used me to remind my aunt that He should be feared and his grace not taken for granted. Because of my own reverence for Him, it ignited her fire for the Lord, which had been smouldering for years. That was when the first thought about the lack of reverance for God came to mind. I know there are plenty of people like my aunt who have been believers for years, and for whatever reason, their faith has become habitual, instead of something you live for daily. People claim to know God, but they don’t exhibit His nature, for the bible says we should be holy because our father in heaven is holy! But how can you fear the Lord if you don’t even know Him? My aunt didn’t read the word like she should, and she could only digest a verse, never a whole chapter. This explained why she misused and misunderstood scripture. It’s hard to understand the word without any context. If you can’t understand scripture, I would think it would be hard to understand who God truly is, His nature, and His love for us! Of course, without that important information, it would be hard to revere Him.

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PROVERBS 9:10 “THE FEAR OF THE LORD IS THE BEGINNING OF WISDOM, AND KNOWLEDGE OF THE HOLY ONE IS UNDERSTANDING.” When I think of having fear of the Lord, I don’t see it like the fear of an abusive partner. It’s like the fear and respect you have for your parents. When you respect and fear your parents, you watch what you do, you stay away from doing things they prohibit you from doing, because you know that there will be serious consequences if you are not obedient. You respect them so much that the thought of disappointing them would break your heart. But the most important part about that relationship is knowing that they truly love you and want the best for you. They are your safe place! To me, that is the fear of the Lord! Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom because when you fear Him, you abide in Him, and when we are obedient, all things work in our favour! To know Him is to understand life!

I had been reading the book of Acts, and there seemed to be this theme of fearing God that kept jumping out at me. First, it was in chapter 9 verse 31, when it said the church became stronger as the believers lived in fear of the Lord. I started to think about the churches in the west and how lukewarm some (not all) appear to be. I started to think about self professing christians who didn’t even think church was necessary, how they lived like non believers, like the God of the bible was just a fable. I even thought about my church, how not every member was truly submitted to God. This is not me casting judgement, but me pointing out what is just a fact, not every believer fears God! Without fear, it’s hard to be an effective Christian. How do we successfully carry out the great commission in Matthew 28 without the fear of God? When our life is on the line, it’s only then we seem to remember that God is real and not to be played with. It’s in those times we promise God that we will be better if He would only give us more time! Why do we need to be brought to our knees for us to start taking God seriously? How do we translate that moment into our lives daily? I will never forget watching an old sermon with this Ugandan preacher sharing his encounter with God. I spoke about it before, but it convicted me in a way I had not experienced before. It was watching that sermon that brought me the fear of God. The way I crumbled and cried out to God for forgiveness, knowing how unworthy I was! I feared that He would not be pleased with me when I stood before Him, and the thought of eternal separation left me feeling fear like I had never known before. I bottled that fear, and every so often, I like to remind myself of it.

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I started writing this post at the end of May so I could be on time to post in June, but God has been giving me nuggets of information and I have felt the need to take my time and listen to what the Holy Spirit is trying to tell me. It’s been clear that He has been trying to teach me the importance of fearing God. Sunday, I sat in my church and listened to one of my pastors give a great message, which seemed to lead back to fearing God. God is so intentional and has a way of affirming His message. We visited the book of Haggai, who was a prophet. I know I haven’t studied this book before, so I wasn’t that familiar with it, but oh, how it spoke to me as clear as day! In a time where God resided in a holy temple, His temple was lying in ruins and had not yet been rebuilt, for the people kept saying that the time had not yet come to rebuild the house of the Lord. So God gave a message through the prophet Haggai to the govenor of Judah and the high priest HAGGAI 1:4-6 “WHY ARE YOU LIVING IN LUXURIOUS HOUSES WHILE MY HOUSE LIES IN RUINS? THIS IS WHAT THE LORD OF HEAVENS ARMIES SAYS: LOOK AT WHAT’S HAPPENING TO YOU! YOU HAVE PLANTED MUCH BUT HARVEST LITTLE. YOU EAT BUT ARE NOT SATISFIED. YOU DRINK BUT ARE STILL THIRSTY. YOU PUT ON CLOTHES BUT CANNOT KEEP WARM. YOUR WAGES DISAPPEAR AS THOUGH YOU WERE PUTTING THEM IN POCKETS FILLED WITH HOLES!” He then tells them to go to the hills to bring timber so they can rebuild His house because the Lord wants to take pleasure in it and be honoured.

HAGGAI 1:9 “YOU HOPED FOR RICH HARVESTS, BUT THEY WERE POOR. AND WHEN YOU BROUGHT YOUR HARVEST HOME, I BLEW IT AWAY. WHY? BECAUSE MY HOUSE LIES IN RUINS, SAYS THE LORD OF HEAVEN’S ARMIES, WHILE ALL OF YOU ARE BUSY BUILDING YOUR OWN FINE HOUSES.” When you continue reading, it goes on to say that the people FEARED the Lord when they heard His message. It was fear that brought them into obedience. And when they feared God, He said, “I AM WITH YOU.” We no longer have temples where God resides because we have become the living temples. God resides in us! So when I read that scripture that morning, it hit different. Why is His house in ruins while we worry about our life and what we have? We need to make ourselves right with God. We have been spending time worrying about the wrong things. We neglect Him, like He isn’t the Lord of Heaven’s Armies! That’s why we are not satisfied. That is why we don’t reap what we harvest. That is why we don’t see growth the way we should. We are too focused on ourselves and have neglected to give God the honour He deserves! We have lost the fear of God! I think that’s why God is so intentional by repeatedly referring to Himself as The Lord of Heaven’s Armies. Someone who holds such a title deserves all the respect and fear we can muster!

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It’s time to start living like we believe what we read in the bible, instead of using it as a motivational tool when we need a pick me up. When we start to live like God is real, we start to rebuild His temple. We have His Spirit that resides in us, the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the grave! And He deserves to live in a home that is fit for a King, He deserves the best! And when we give Him what He deserves, God is honoured! Look at Cornelius, the Roman army officer in the book of Acts chapter 10. He was a devout God-fearing man, and He lived that way by giving generously to the poor, praying regularly to God. He didn’t know the Gospel and didn’t know of Jesus, but God received his prayers and gifts to the poor as offerings. Because of this, God saw that He would receive the Gospel through Peter because you can’t have the Father without the Son. ACTS 10:34 THEN PETER REPLIED, “I SEE VERY CLEARLY THAT GOD SHOWS NO FAVORITISM. IN EVERY NATION HE ACCEPTS THOSE WHO FEAR HIM AND DO WHAT IS RIGHT.”

We know Jesus, but can we say we are devout God-fearing believers? Do we live doing what is right in the eyes of God? These are hard questions that I have to ask myself. I so desperately want to be accepted by God. People strive to be accepted by man, but that is a waste of time. This is why the bible says we should work out our salvation with fear and trembling, because the day when you become sure of yourself and your standing with God, is the day when the enemy enters your gate. PROVERBS 28:14 “BLESSED IS THE ONE WHO FEARS THE LORD ALWAYS, BUT WHOEVER HARDENS HIS HEART WILL FALL INTO CALAMITY.”

HEALING VS GOD’S PLAN.

Is it me, or are the months flying by before our eyes? May has been such a busy month. Most of it was spent in the USA with family, so this post is coming in just in the nick of time! The topic of conversation is something that I have been wanting to talk about on this blog ever since I heard the news of a beauty influencer, by the name of Jessica Pettway who passed away in March due to a misdiagnosis of fibroids. She was someone I had watched and followed over the years, but ever since I went on a somewhat permanent social media hiatus, I had been out of the loop and missed that she was even sick. So when I saw the news that this 36 year old had passed away leaving behind her husband and two young children, my spirit was disturbed, and I couldn’t shake this sadness. I learned that she was a Christian, and during her cervical cancer diagnosis, she had made public videos declaring that she believed that God would heal her and this would be part of her testimony. Sadly to say that wasn’t the case. The more I thought about it, the more disturbed I became. I thought to myself, what does something like this do to someone’s faith? I have no doubt she prayed with her family for healing, and others prayed for her. The bible says that the prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective. Jesus even said that if we pray for anything and believe we’ve received it, it will be ours!(Mark 11:24)

So if we pray for healing and don’t receive it, what does that mean? I thought about non-believers who would have followed her and seen her faith despite her diagnosis. I am sure they would have been inspired by her courage, maybe even pursuaded to believe in her God. What would they think about God now that she was gone? I struggled to make it make sense as a believer! But even in my disappointment and sadness for her and her family, I was 100% certain that God was still good! I just didn’t know how to explain it to someone, and that bothered me. Nobody even asked me or challenged me about it, but I knew that if I was ever in a situation where I still had to explain the goodness of God through tragedy, I would have found it hard to, and I am always reminded of the need to be able to explain the reason for the hope that I have.

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I was then reminded of my mum, who has suffered from rheumatoid arthritis which is a long-term condition that causes pain, swelling, and stiffness in the joints. As she gets older, the pain seems to be more intense, leaving her at times unable to attend to herself without assistance. I remember when she first became a Christian. I think she thought that she would not suffer and God would heal her. But as time went on and her pain intensified, she began to question God’s goodness. She didn’t even have to say it, I knew she felt it. It was almost as if she believed that God was punishing her, or worse, that God didn’t care for her like He did for others. I didn’t blame her for thinking that. If you don’t understand who God is, you won’t see Him as a good God when you go through your trials. The bible doesn’t say that life will be perfect when you accept Jesus into your heart. We live in a fallen world under the influence of the evil one. All you have to do is turn on the news or scroll social media to see the injustice in this world. But what the bible does promise is eternal life and peace. A peace unlike the peace given from the world. This peace that comes from Jesus is the peace that keeps us afloat in a turbulent sea. JOHN 14:27 “PEACE I LEAVE WITH YOU; MY PEACE I GIVE TO YOU. NOT AS THE WORLD GIVES DO I GIVE TO YOU. LET NOT YOUR HEARTS BE TROUBLED, NEITHER LET THEM BE AFRAID.”

I asked my pastor what he thought about it, and he directed me to Job from the bible. Job was a man said to be blameless in the eyes of God, a man of complete integrity. He feared God and stayed away from evil. God had blessed him with a large family. He was the richest man in his entire area, yet he still gave offerings to God. He never let money corrupt his heart. Then, one day, Satan came before God and challenged Jobs character, claiming the only reason why he feared God was because of all that he had. If God took it away, then Job would curse God. So God allowed Satan to test him, with only one condition, that Satan was not allowed to harm him physically, but he had free reign to do whatever he wanted with whatever he possessed. Of course, Satan did his worst to Job, killing all his children and taking away his riches by killing his livestock, farmhands, and servants. In all of this, Job did not sin by blaming God, instead he fell to the ground in worship and said JOB 1:21 HE SAID, “I CAME NAKED FROM MY MOTHER’S WOMB, AND I WILL BE NAKED WHEN I LEAVE. THE LORD GAVE ME WHAT I HAD, AND THE LORD HAS TAKEN IT AWAY. PRAISE THE NAME OF THE LORD!” It was clear that Job understood who God was. Then I started to think about if I understood who God was, could I have that same conviction as Job?

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I’ve always heard that it’s never good to plan too far ahead because God might suprise you. God’s plan for your life might not always be in line with what you plan for your life. We can pray for a long, fruitful life here on earth, but that is not guaranteed. Sometimes we forget that we are here for a short time, this world is not our home. Our assurance comes from knowing Jesus and the promise of eternal life for all who believe. If God takes us back to Him early, could that mean that our work here on earth is finished, or are we to take it as punishment? Job remembered that everything he had, God had given him. Even in his grief, he still knew the goodness of God. Ultimately, as a believer, we want to submit to our Fathers will. His way is always better, even if we can not see it at the time.

I started to think about what life actually meant to me. How attached I was to the things I knew and the routine of my life. If I got sick and God didn’t heal me, would I curse God or praise Him anyway? Then I started to think about my life before I knew Jesus. How everything was dark and meaningless. If I had been sick then. Never knowing Jesus. Dying in my sin. Forever separated from the Father! I felt a wave of fear and dread come over me. I realised that God will always be good because He called me to Him, and He chose me. He saved me from death. Jesus paid the price I couldn’t by shedding His blood for me. He has given me more than I could have ever dreamed of by that one act alone! For that reason, God will always be good! If I get sick tomorrow, God is good. If I lose a loved one, God is good. If I lose my job, God is good. If I lose my home, God is good. GOD. IS. GOOD. PSALMS 34:8″OH, TASTE AND SEE THAT THE LORD IS GOOD; BLESSED IS THE MAN WHO TRUSTS IN HIM!”

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If you are a believer, death is not bad. It’s the people that you leave behind that suffer the most. But the comfort we have is knowing that we will not be separated from them forever. It is just a short time. If we are still here on this earth, that means that we have an assignment to complete, and we have a purpose. Going home to be with the Lord is exactly that; going home to a place that Jesus prepared for you. How beautiful to know that is what awaits you. How comforting for a family like The Pettways who are left behind. Maybe they might not see it now because the grief is still raw, and we that are left behind have to sort through life and find a new normal without the ones we’ve lost. But I pray that they find the peace that surpasses all understanding. I pray that they draw closer to God PSALMS 34:18 “THE LORD IS CLOSE TO THE BROKENHEARTED AND HE SAVES THOSE CRUSHED IN SPIRIT.”

Through the good times and the bad times, God will forever remain good. Whatever you suffer through now, whether it’s sickness or struggling financially, whatever your trial is, just know that it will not be forever. When we enter into heaven, there will be no sickness, no tears, no pain, just joy! Our riches await us in heaven, so keep your eyes focused on things from above! My wish is to be like Job. Someone who, when grief, knocks at my door, I will fall to my face and declare through tears, “I came naked from my mother’s womb, and I will be naked when I leave. The Lord gave me what I had, and the Lord has taken it away. PRAISE THE NAME OF THE LORD!”

THOU SHALL NOT JUDGE?

This month has been a whirlwind of emotions, feelings, and thoughts. I started off the month knowing what I wanted to talk about, but after a conversation that was a constant trigger to me, I decided it’s time I got something off my chest! Every day, we make decisions in our lives, judgement calls as some may refer to it; the key word being judgement. We are all guilty of it in some shape or form. Sadly, I am noticing this growing trend amongst “Christians” who are condemning other believers who cast judgement, picking scripture out of context to enforce this narrative that only God can judge. This same narrative, I hear from non believers who like to throw scripture back at christians (the same scripture taken out of context) telling us we have no right to enforce our views upon them. To be honest, they kinda have a point. But when I hear my brothers and sisters in Christ using this same argument, I get angry!

I have noticed a pattern. When Christians don’t like being “judged,” it’s usually because they are doing something they shouldn’t and don’t want to be called out on it. The call of our flesh is strong, and when we like how our sin makes us feel, we don’t want to come out of it, so we make excuses of why it’s good and convince ourselves that God wouldn’t care about it, we even go as far as saying that we are being led by the Spirit! When someone tries to tell us that we are wrong, we use scripture out of context to make ourselves right and the person trying to help wrong. Once you get to that place, it’s a slippery slope, and you often see people start to descontruct and fall away from the faith. Christ is the best thing that happened to me, but its not easy to walk with Jesus, especially when we live in a world that promotes the love of self and encourages you to do what ever you want if it makes you happy. It’s the opposite of what Jesus tells us. I know the stuff that I did before I found Christ was what made me happy, but it saddened and angered God. Because I don’t live for myself anymore, there is a lot of things I do that if I am honest, I don’t want to do all the time, but my desire to please God is why I do it. Every so often, we have to ask ourselves, who are we living for?

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So, let me just start by saying we are not called to judge non-believers. God will judge them fairly when the time comes, so when they shout from their mountain tops that we shouldn’t judge them, I make them right. They don’t know any better. They don’t have the Holy Spirit leading them in the ways of the Lord. We are to be compasionate, like our Father in heaven.

1 CORINTHIANS 5:12-13 IT ISN’T MY RESPONSIBILITY TO JUDGE OUTSIDERS, BUT IT CERTAINLY IS YOUR RESPONSIBILTY TO JUDGE THOSE INSIDE THE CHURCH WHO ARE SINNING. GOD WILL JUDGE THOSE ON THE OUTSIDE; BUT AS THE SCRIPTURES SAY, “YOU MUST REMOVE THE EVIL PERSON FROM AMONG YOU.”

I guess I could leave that verse right there and go about my merry way, but let’s go deeper. Paul addressing the church of Corinth about sexual immorality going on within the community is pretty tame to what we see happening within churches today. But his judgement still stands today for us as believers. He was what some would call harsh and definitely would be amongst those condemned as being too judgemental in todays standards. But he stood on business as the young folks like to say. He had no problems calling out sin and enforcing church discipline. If Paul thought it was good to do it, why is it so hard to do it today? Why do churches run from correction? Correction is good. There are so many good verses in the bible about the wisdom of correction, one of them being PROVERBS 3:11-12 “MY CHILD, DON’T REJECT THE LORD’S DISCIPLINE, AND DON’T BE UPSET WHEN HE CORRECTS YOU. FOR THE LORD CORRECTS THOSE HE LOVES, JUST AS A FATHER CORRECTS A CHILD IN WHOM HE DELIGHTS.” These verses are a comfort to me. They humble me and keep me at my knees before God. One thing is certain, we will always need correction, and I will always welcome it!

This world has started to affect the churches. This idea that we can’t call something wrong is causing us to become luke warm. The fear of losing numbers has overtaken the fear of God. Churches have become a money cow and pastors refuse to risk being out of pocket, so they prefer to stay silent and make the Word more agreeable. Now churches have become motivational ted talk centres that refuse to mention the word “SIN.” So, now, when the Word clearly instructs us to pass judgement and correct, we are being told that it’s not christian-like. We are being silenced by our very own community! You can’t make this up!

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MATTHEW 7:1-2 “DO NOT JUDGE OTHERS, AND YOU WILL NOT BE JUDGED. FOR YOU WILL BE TREATED AS YOU TREAT OTHERS. THE STANDARD YOU USE IN JUDGING IS THE STANDARD BY WHICH YOU WILL BE JUDGED.” I am sure we are all familiar with this verse. This is a popular verse used not only by believers but also non-believers to enforce the narrative that we can’t judge them. The mistake often made is to stop at verse two and not continue reading. We are not told not to judge but to be careful how we judge. There is a correct way to do it, which we rarely see done successfully. When done incorrectly, it is dangerous and damaging to ones faith. I have heard many stories from fellow believers who have been hurt and left broken by it. So when they find themselves in a situation that would call for correction, they tend not to be responsive to wisdom and are usually left triggered and become very defensive. Judgement becomes a bad word, and correction is never accepted. We all fall short of glory, that’s why we need mercy and grace daily. The Word tells us we are sinners, imperfect beings with bodies who still respond to the call of sin. We all have different struggles, but they are still struggles all the same. When we serve the one who is perfect and Holy, anything that falls short of that standard is sin. It would do us well to remember that when we cast judgement on others, and that is what the verse in Matthew continues on to say. Before we judge others and point out their short comings, make sure your house is in check first. MATTHEW 7:3-5 “AND WHY WORRY ABOUT A SPECK IN YOUR FRIEND’S EYE WHEN YOU HAVE A LOG IN YOUR OWN? HOW CAN YOU THINK OF SAYING TO YOUR FRIEND, ‘LET ME HELP YOU GET RID OF THAT SPECK IN YOUR EYE,’ WHEN YOU CAN’T SEE PAST THE LOG IN YOUR OWN EYE? HYPOCRITE! FIRST GET RID OF THE LOG IN YOUR OWN EYE; THEN YOU WILL SEE WELL ENOUGH TO DEAL WITH THE SPECK IN YOUR FRIEND’S EYE.” Jesus doesn’t tell us to not help our friend, but to make sure we sort out our own problems so we can see better to help our friend! Because the measure we use to judge our friend will be the same measure used against us.

Maybe this is all a sign that we are not reading our bibles enough. Have our feelings become the ultimate decider on what is true? These are things I often ponder when in conversations with fellow believers. Everybody wants to do Christianity their way. Why has following the Word become outdated and irrelevant within the faith? The flesh seems to be winning over the Spirit these days. The Word is good for instruction, rubuke, and correction. We should be as dependant on it as we are oxygen, for it is life!

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GALATIANS 6:1-3 “DEAR BROTHERS AND SISTERS, IF ANOTHER BELIEVER IS OERCOME BY SOME SIN, YOU WHO ARE GODLY SHOULD GENTLY AND HUMBLY HELP THAT PERSON BACK ONTO THE RIGHT PATH. AND BE CAREFUL NOT TO FALL INTO THE SAME TEMPTATION YOURSELF. SHARE EACH OTHER’S BURDENS, AND IN THIS WAY OBEY THE LAW OF CHRIST.”

Are you gentle? Are you humble? When you are helping your brother or sister, what is your heart saying? We are called to do everything in love, and that includes our righteous judgement. Our judgement should be helping to bring people back into repentance, but instead, we are bringing condemnation without grace or mercy. That is wrong. I would never respond to that kind of correction because it is not fruitful. What is beautiful about the bible is that we get clear instructions on how to deal with these issues within the church. From dealing with someone who is repentant to someone who continues to live in sin. We have the blueprint in our hands, and that is definitely the goodness of God. Some instructions may seem hard and even unfair, but we serve a God who is fair and just, and we have to trust that His way is good and right. PROVERBS 12:1 “WHOEVER LOVES DISCIPLINE LOVES KNOWLEDGE, BUT HE WHO HATES REPROOF IS STUPID.” Please don’t be stupid.

I could say so much more on this topic and use many more verses of scripture, but you could see it all for yourself if you only picked up your bible more. The lack of knowledge amongst Christians is gonna be what destroys us. We are called to judge the body of Christ, the church! If you as a believer have a problem with that, then I would ask you to do a heart check and ask yourself who’s voice have you been listening to, because it sure isn’t our Father in heaven. Stop letting your feelings be what leads you. Go back to the Word and find out what God says about it. So when your brother or sister comes to you about something you are doing, you will know whether it is from God and is true. Judgement is helpful, and correction is good!

HEBREWS 12:11 “FOR THE MOMENT ALL DISCIPLINE SEEMS PAINFUL RATHER THAN PLEASANT, BUT LATER IT YIELDS THE PEACEFUL FRUIT OF RIGHTEOUSNESS TO THOSE WHO HAVE BEEN TRAINED BY IT.”

GRATITUDE.

It feels like we are flying through the year. It’s March already! This is the month where we celebrate what Jesus did on the cross for us. I chose to call this months post “gratitude” because sometimes I think we can easily forget the magnitude of the cross and what it meant to have Jesus defeat death. As followers of Christ, we sometimes get caught up in the cycle of life; looking after the family, working but never feeling like it’s enough, making sure the kids get to school on time, wondering why the cost of groceries keep going up but your money stays the same. So many things can weigh us down, and we forget about the power of the cross! We start to complain about life being hard, how everything is bad, bad, bad! We come to church on Sunday feeling the stress of the week, singing the worship songs on auto pilot, and trying hard to listen to the message given and resonate with the words spoken. We stop living like we believe God because life is just too hard!

Well, I am here to tell you that life is hard! In fact, Jesus never said following Him would be easy. The bible tells us that there will be trials and tribulations that we must endure to the end! Even Psalms 23 tells us that we will walk through the valley of the shadow of death! What sets us apart from the rest of the world is that we don’t walk through times of danger, scarcity, and the unknown alone, for God is with us! He is the cloud by day and the fire by night, and He goes before us and follows us. Because of God’s love for us, we don’t need to fear or be weighed down with anxiety because life is hard. Our strength to endure comes from the Lord.

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Sometimes, we can be guilty of thinking too much about what we don’t have, feeling like we are being punished because the desires of our hearts have not been met. We complain, and we obsess about what we feel we lack, and we forget about what we already have, the best gift of all; salvation! We complain so much that we become ungrateful. We act like spoilt kids when we don’t get our way. What saddens me is that we have become entitled when we don’t even deserve all that God has sacrificed for us! God gave us His one and only begotten son as payment for our sins. Jesus knowingly gave His life as a ransom for us. He chose to die a horrific death because He knew that was the only way we could ever have a relationship with God. God gave us the ultimate sacrifice, and here we moan when we don’t get what we want! God doesn’t have to do another thing for us! He has done enough already, but he still blesses us, even though we are ungrateful, because we serve a good God who loves us like no other!

Often, we find ourselves walking a thin line between the standards of the world and the standards of God. We live in a world opposed to the message of the Gospel, and we can sometimes get drawn into what the culture tells us we should have, instead of what God wants us to have, the two can often be very different! PSALMS 37:25 “ONCE I WAS YOUNG, AND NOW I AM OLD. YET I HAVE NEVER SEEN THE GODLY ABANDONED OR THEIR CHILDREN BEGGING FOR BREAD.” This verse has stuck in my head of late, and I think it has been a powerful reminder that I have everything I need. I haven’t been anxious about anything in particular, but I think it’s verses like this that keep me humble and thankful. They remind me of how blessed I am! There was a point where the things I didn’t have became almost like an idol in my life. One of my desires was to have my own house, the idea of living alone became the most important thing, so important that I became sad when I saw others living the life I wanted, what I thought I deserved. I almost started to think that maybe God was punishing me because my dream felt unattainable. It made me ungrateful, and I stopped noticing all the ways God was blessing me in my life, I just took everything I had for granted. Then, one day, God revealed my heart to me, and I was repentant! Every morning, I opened my eyes to see a new day, and I was grateful. Every day, my body didn’t fail me in some way. I was grateful. Every day, I never had to worry about what I was gonna eat, I was grateful. Every time I never had to stress about my bills, I was grateful. Every night I went to bed, I knew I had a roof over my head, and I was grateful. All the things that seemed so small and insignificant, I knew somewhere out there someone else was not so blessed. When I realised what I had made an idol of, only served me, I felt selfish. Now, don’t get me wrong, I am not saying it’s bad to ask God to fulfil the desires of your heart, He pretty much tells us to ask, and we shall receive. But it becomes an issue when our hearts desires become a stumbling block for us. MATTHEW 6:33 “SEEK THE KINGDOM OF GOD ABOVE ALL ELSE, AND LIVE RIGHTEOUSLY, AND HE WILL GIVE YOU EVERYTHING YOU NEED.” Notice it say’s NEED, not want!

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Since the begining of man we have been ungrateful, and it all started on that fateful day when Eve convinced her husband Adam to consume the only fruit forbidden to them, because she was conviced by the serpant that God was holding out on them, when the reality was God had given them Eden, He had given them everything! It really is in our nature to question the goodness of God, to be unsatisfied. But yet God still overlooks that part of us because of the depths of His love for us we will never comprehend! So He hatched a plan, a plan He already had in motion before the fruit was consumed by the man and woman in the garden. He knew the nature of man who He created, a flaw you may say, but it was the only way He could create us to exprience love, love that came from having the freedom to choose. So He honoured their choice to be separated from Him and banished Adam and Eve from Eden, cursing the land as punishment. From that point on, men grew evil and cold, murder tainted the land. But God watched on reaching out to those who still called on Him. Until the only God fearing man remained, and God instructed Noah to build an ark because the evilness that grew angered Him, and He saw that nobody but Noah and His family were righteous enough, so he plunged the earth back into the depths of the water He seperated it from. Starting again, the great reset.

As the land became dry and life began to spring from the ground, God made a promise with a rainbow to Noah, never to flood the earth again. As man once again populated the earth, so did evil. But God still remained faithful to those who were faithful to him, His chosen people Israel. But even Israel would fall into temptation time and time again, so God would choose people and raise them up to prophesy on His behalf. But still, Israel were hard headed and refused to listen. Then He sent them the law through Moses, a law that was meant to show them their sin, a law that they could never follow because of their nature, a law that was meant to bring them to repentance, but never did. All this setting the stage for His plan to save us from our sin, the plan from the beginning. Then, one day, a child was born, a virgin birth, concieved by the Spirit of God. Gods plan wrapped in flesh, His promise now a reality. The child named Jesus full of wisdom grew into a man, and this man filled with the Holy Spirit preached a message of repentence. He called on all who knew they were sinners, and He taught them about the Kingdom of God, about faith, hope, and love. He healed the sick, raised the dead, and freed the demon possessed. He was God incarnate. Come down from His mighty thrown to be a lowly servant to an ungrateful nation. He was the plan from the very beginning. He knew we would never be able to make ourselves right. We failed every test given, and we could never pay what was owed. So He chose to pay our debt for us. Jesus drank the cup that was given, and He gave His life on the cross, beaten, humiliated, disgraced, nailed to the wood born of a tree, a reminder of a tree that once produced fruit forbidden to man.

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But death was not the end, Jesus defeated death, and on the third day, the tomb He was buried in was now empty! Jesus is alive! Sending out His disciples to spread the good news to all nations, He left us with the gift of the Holy Spirit in His absence, promising to return for His final judgement. Now that He paid our debt, we all recieve the free gift of God’s grace, and all we have to do is repent and accept Jesus Christ into our hearts as Lord and saviour, believing in the finished work of the cross. This is what reconciles us back to our father in heaven, and that is all He ever wanted, not to have us separated from Him. It’s the greatest love story ever told! And because I accepted Jesus, I get to be a part of that love story. Eternal life is something that I find hard to fathom, but it is mine, and it is worth more than gold! Salvation means we are being saved from something and that something is judgement, the wrath of God when Jesus returns. God never breaks a promise, so rest assured, judgement will come. The question is, where will you find yourself?

PHILIPPIANS 2:10-11 “SO THAT AT THE NAME OF JESUS EVERY KNEE WILL BOW- IN HEAVEN AND ON EARTH AND UNDER THE EARTH- AND EVERY TONGUE WILL CONFESS THAT JESUS CHRIST IS LORD, TO THE GLORY OF GOD THE FATHER.”

So this is a friendly reminder that God has given you everything, He has given you Jesus! He has given you everything you need, and your treasures await you in heaven. So keep your eyes focused on things from above. Everything else is just noise. Tune it out. It will give you contentment when you have abundance and contentment when you lack. Be grateful because you are saved! And that is more important than anything on this earth. God bless you all, and Happy Ressurection Sunday.

SINGLE BUT NOT LONELY.

Since it’s the month of February, the month when us singles are reminded of our singleness, I thought, why not do a post about being single as a Christian. If you scroll back to my first year of blogging, I spoke about my celibacy and my desire to follow God and abstain. I had just grasped the importance of purity, and I was all in! Coming from a world that encourages sexual liberty and freedom, you can be sure I was waist deep init before the Lord saved me. So, for me to then decide to go cold turkey was a big deal, and cemented my faith because I was truly convicted that sex outside of marriage was wrong. I am happy to say I have never stumbled in that department, I still remain celibate on my journey. Speaking over the few years with other Christians, it’s been very interesting to see how they feel about dating and celibacy. It became very clear, very quickly, how not all were as convicted as me. Now, I understand that the desires of the flesh can be strong in this area, so it takes a strong will to live a life of celibacy when we live in a world where everything is overly sexualised. But God gives us this instruction for a reason, not because He hates us or doesn’t want us to have fun, but because He wants and knows what’s best for us! I definitely didn’t need convincing of this because I could look back at my promiscuity and see the damage it had done to me spiritually, not to mention physically. I could have avoided so much trauma and bad life decisions if I had only done it His way instead of my own, but you know what they say about hindsight!

I used to be the queen of online dating when I was in the world. I always wanted relationships and was on a constant pursuit of love. But because of the lack of value I had for myself, I found myself in situationships promising the boys sex in exchange for love, as the boys promised me love in exchange for sex. A very poor transaction that is still in circulation today. So of course, when I became a Christian, I still wanted a relationship but now I had to do it differently, so I joined up to the Christian dating sites thinking that it would be very different this time. Oh, was I wrong! There were a lot of non Christian “christians,” and a lot of guys were just looking for a “good” girl. When you have to start asking guys who Jesus is on a christian dating site, you know you have a problem. It all became very triggering, reminding me of my past life, and I felt like God say “leave online dating alone.”

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So here I was back to square one, wanting a relationship but being unsuccessful in finding one. I felt the Holy Spirit nudge me to find out what it meant to be in a relationship, a healthy God breathed relationship. It occurred to me that I had no idea! I still had a worldly view of what a relationship was, what a role of a husband and wife was, what marriage was! I had to go back to the word of God to see what He said about it. When I truly understood Gods view of marriage, I got scared and decided maybe marriage wasn’t for me! Just like we have to die to ourselves when it comes to the Lord, I realised I would have to do the same with my husband, and that made me uncomfortable. It seemed hard, and I couldn’t understand what I was getting out of it. The word “submit” kept creeping up, and the idea of it felt wrong! Submission wasn’t the bad guy, but my warped idea of submission was. The culture had defiled the word and its meaning. God showed me that being a Christian was centred around submission, and I had to submit to God first! And that was what I had committed to do. So, if I could submit to God, He also required me to submit to my husband. If I had a problem with that, I clearly still had some work to do when it came to submitting to my Father in heaven. I knew then that I had no business looking for a relationship until I got the most important relationship right first.

Sometimes, our desire to find a partner can almost become an idol in our lives. We become willing to throw wisdom aside in our impatience, forgetting that the Lord’s way and timing are always better. We become so consumed with no longer being single, no longer being treated like the sad spare wheel among our married friends that we stop listening to His voice, we stop including Him in the selection process in fear that He may turn away the only person that has shown us interest in what seems like forever. We start to entertain the wrong people, then find ourselves in compromising postions down the line, that all could of been avoided if we just trusted in the Lord our God and not leaned on our own understanding. GENESIS 2:18 THEN THE LORD GOD SAID, “IT IS NOT GOOD FOR THE MAN TO BE ALONE. I WILL MAKE A HELPER WHO IS JUST RIGHT FOR HIM.”  God never wanted us to be alone. Finding someone to become one flesh with is the way God intended it. But in this evil world we live in, where satan is working overtime to draw us away from God, we have to be vigilant and don’t let our desires become more important than pleasing our Father. 

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1 CORINTHIANS 7:32-34 “I WANT YOU TO BE FREE FROM THE CONCERNS OF THIS LIFE. AN UNMARRIED MAN CAN SPEND HIS TIME DOING THE LORD’S WORK AND THINKING HOW TO PLEASE HIM. BUT A MARRIED MAN HAS TO THINK ABOUT HIS EARTHLY RESPONSIBILITIES AND HOW TO PLEASE HIS WIFE. HIS INTERESTS ARE DIVIDED. IN THE SAME WAY, A WOMAN WHO IS NO LONGER MARRIED OR HAS NEVER BEEN MARRIED CAN BE DEVOTED TO THE LORD AND HOLY IN BODY AND IN SPIRIT. BUT A MARRIED WOMAN HAS TO THINK ABOUT HER EARTHLY RESPONSIBILITIES AND HOW TO PLEASE HER HUSBAND.”

Paul talks about singleness as being a gift. Not because he believes everyone should remain single, but because of the relationship singleness cultivates with God. Being single is a time we can grow in our faith, a time to get to know Jesus and understand who we are because of Him, all without the distractions that relationships bring. It’s a time to ground ourselves in Him and His word, a time to mature spiritually. When we become affirmed in Him, we start to date better. Why? Because we start to operate under His will instead of our own. We hunger to please Him, so we honour Him in our choices. Satan struggles to turn our heads because the Lord has our hearts. Bad relationships draw us away from God. Good relationships draw us closer to God. It’s like that one friend who, every time they get into a new relationship, you never hear from them again until they find themselves back to being single. That’s us when we are not grounded in God. When we marry, our priorities change. As the scripture says, we have earthly responsibilities. In the end, we are here to serve. God first, then each other. We sometimes get confused and become self-serving. Our flesh is constantly crying out to us to put ourselves first. But it’s the Holy Spirit that guides us away from ourselves. If we allow the Holy Spirit to guide us in other areas of our lives, why not in our dating?

I know that when you get to a certain age, dating seems impossible. To be honest, I feel like I might have a calling to be single because at 41, my dating life is non existant. My desire has always been to find a husband, have the kids, and all the trimmings that come with it. This time of celibacy and growth in the Lord has renewed my mind on marriage, and now I feel more ready than ever to submit! I actually can not wait to find that man who I can wholly submit to because they wholly submit to God! They have to love the Lord and be willing to love me like Christ loved the church, I mean, He did die for the church. It doesn’t get much better than that! But at the same time, I am willing to wait on God, I don’t feel pressured. Even if a husband is not what God has for me, will I curse Him? will that make Him not good? of course not! God is good regardless because I have eternal life in His son Jesus! It would only mean that God wants me undistracted because I have kingdom work to do. I can still find joy in that!

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So, am I lonely? The answer, in short, is no. When I was in the world, I felt the seasons of loneliness, the longing for someone to love me. It was an intense sadness. But I truly found love when I found Jesus. He took my loneliness away and gave me a feeling of completeness that I never knew I could experience by myself. This is the most content I have been single… ever! Like I said, I still would like to be married, but that desire is not the same, and I feel more neutral about it. If it comes, I will be happy, and if it doesn’t come, I will be happy. My desire to please God is greater than finding a husband. I want to be intentional about everything I do, and that includes dating. I don’t want to date for the sake of dating. I am not sure what that looks like for me, but I feel sure for now that it doesn’t include online dating just yet. 

To all my singles out there, have patience and trust God with your heart. He will not break it. Let God fulfil you instead of looking for someone else to do that. If you want to date, then date! But keep God in your dating, He always knows best. Remember to test the spirits and look to the fruit they produce. If you don’t want to marry, that’s fine too. Being single and serving the Lord with all your heart is not bad. It is a beautiful thing! So don’t let this season get you down, focus on God, and pray about what you want. Be specific. It helps you to know what you actually want in a partner. Trust that in His perfect timing, when we pray for good things that please God, He will fullfill and we shall receive!

THE CULTURE VS THE WORD.

Is it still acceptable to say Happy New Year? 2024 is only nine days old, and it has gotten off to a wild start in terms of the Church and what I have been seeing in the media. God is definitely not playing with His Church! Jesus is coming for His bride, and He requires her to be spotless! As saddening as it has been to see leaders fall off, in one way, I’m happy because I want false teachers to be exposed and their minsitries to be put to an end. I’m sad because the number of people whose faith will be scattered because of these accusations. It reminds me of the parable that Jesus gives in Matthew, about how the servants eager to pull up weeds, were warned that in doing so would result in rooting out the wheat as well, and because of this they should let them grow together until the harvest.

Now, we see churches with no reverence for God, treating places of worship like the club. It is getting out of hand, and honestly, I am upset! Instead of the pursuit to please God, it has now turned into the pursuit to please the culture. I hate the word “culture” because, to me, it means the world. The culture will be the death of you! The culture tells you that God’s way is wrong, the culture tells you to live by your flesh! So, in order to please the culture, now, we have to change the Word of God to fit the way of the culture. Now, we say the Word of God is outdated, and we have to speak in the way of culture so that we can draw the culture in. Remember, we live in an inclusive world, so not only are we changing the standards of God to fit the culture, we are affirming what God says is sin to be inclusive of the culture. Now, the Church looks just like the world. Again, I say the culture will be the death of you!

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JAMES 4:4-5 “YOU ADULTERERS! DON’T YOU REALIZE THAT FRIENDSHIP WITH THE WORLD MAKES YOU AN ENEMY OF GOD? I SAY IT AGAIN: IF YOU WANT TO BE A FRIEND OF THE WORLD, YOU MAKE YOURSELF AN ENEMY OF GOD. DO YOU THINK THE SCRIPTURES HAVE NO MEANING? THEY SAY THAT GOD IS PASSIONATE THAT THE SPIRIT HE HAS PLACED WITHIN US SHOULD BE FAITHFUL TO HIM.”

God is so clear in His Word, and the fact that people twist it to fit their evil desires makes me sick. We are in the time when people have itching ears, and instead of humbling themselves before God, they instead search for “teachers” who speak to the desires of their flesh. There is no fear of God. Instead, they fear the loss of popularity or the riches that aligning with the culture brings. They sing praises with their lips, but their hearts are far from God! Because we live in a world that esteems man higher than God, this mindset trickles into our churches, and now these leaders have gone from being the mouth peice of God to God themselves! Now, bibles remain unopened, and people carry it as a prop to Church, and instead, whatever is preached at the front of the Church becomes the Word of God. Without the knowledge of God’s Word, we perish! The bible talks about a great falling away, and it’s honestly not hard to see! With people deconstructing every week (it seems), it is clear that the heart issue behind it all is evil. People no longer want to be Holy. They no longer want to be righteous. They just want to be happy and do what feels good! The bible warns us of our evil hearts and how our desires can not be trusted. But because the people don’t open their bibles, they think God is leading them and can no longer discern the voice of God. They say, loosen up, don’t be so serious, stop being a judgemental Christian! Well, I say judgement starts in the house of the Lord! We are called to give righteous judgement. Yes, there are ways to do it, but we must do it all the same.

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God tells us to live decent lives for all to see because we belong to the day, He also tells us to not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness but rather expose them! So why participate in things that look evil? All to draw people to your church? How about we draw people to Jesus? What we have to do to get people into our churches is what we will have to continue to do to keep them! If Jesus is not what is pulling people into your church, He definitely won’t keep them! So you can’t boast about your numbers of Church antendees if Jesus is not even invited to the meetings!

God set us apart for a reason! We are the salt of the earth, the light of the world! We are different! Why would you want to look like the world? People of the world should look at Christians and see Jesus. If we look like the world, we have now lost our taste, and as the Word says, if salt loses it’s taste it is useless. The time of persecution draws near, and the real chosen ones of God will be left standing! The culture will ask us to choose. We can’t serve two masters. Some people think they can have the culture and have God, but we serve a jealous God who wants an exclusive relationship with us. MATTHEW 6:24-26 “NO ONE CAN SERVE TWO MASTERS, FOR EITHER HE WILL HATE THE ONE AND LOVE THE OTHER, OR HE WILL BE DEVOTED TO THE ONE AND DESPISE THE OTHER. YOU CANNOT SERVE GOD AND MONEY.” 

If you are a part of a church that looks to the culture instead of Jesus, run for your life! Your very soul depends on it! If the message preached at your church doesn’t direct you to Jesus, run for your life! It’s time to find a new church. God left us His word for correction, for instruction, to teach us, and to equip us to do every good work. It’s not an outdated book that needs a refresh to make it applicable for 2024. It is truth, and it is unchanging like the mighty God we serve! 2 TIMOTHY 3:16-17 “ALL SCRIPTURE IS INSPIRED BY GOD AND IS USEFUL TO TEACH US WHAT IS TRUE AND TO MAKE US REALIZE WHAT IS WRONG WITH OUR LIVES. IT CORRECTS US WHEN WE ARE WRONG AND TEACHES US TO DO WHAT IS RIGHT. GOD USES IT TO PREPARE AND EQUIP HIS PEOPLE TO DO EVERY GOOD WORK.”

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I’m very passionate about the Word of God if you can’t tell. My fear, when I became a Christian, was being led astray. I believe the Holy Spirit revealed the need to know the Word when I became a believer, so I immersed myself in the Word, and because of the renewing of the mind, my faith became unshakeable! I was all in as soon as I accepted Jesus into my life, and I have never regretted that decision. The enemy has never been able to lure me away. With new years, come new year resolutions. I decided not to do any, I just want to be open to whatever God has for me this year. But a suggestion to you reading this little blog is to open up that bible collecting dust that every year you keep promising to read more. If you are a believer and you read your bible regularly, may God continue to burn that fire within and keep you hungry for His Word! If you are unsure of what you believe, and you stumbled onto this post by God’s divine appointment, this is your calling to go and read one. I know you see what is going on in the world, I know you have questions, I know things don’t make sense. Trust and believe what will make sense is the God breathed words written in that ancient book that people have told you is irrelevant!

I don’t know where 2024 is going to lead us, but wherever it leads us, stay true to God and know that He will keep us safe and hide us from whatever scheme the enemy has for us. Stay prayerful because I believe this year will require it more than ever. Let’s await with eager anticipation for all that Jesus has for us this year. We got work to do!

1 THESSALONIANS 5:19-23 “DO NOT STIFLE THE HOLY SPIRIT. DO NOT SCOFF AT PROPHECIES, BUT TEST EVERYTHING THAT IS SAID. HOLD ON TO WHAT IS GOOD. STAY AWAY FROM EVERY KIND OF EVIL. NOW MAY THE GOD OF PEACE MAKE YOU HOLY IN EVERY WAY, AND MAY YOUR WHOLE SPIRIT AND SOUL AND BODY BE KEPT BLAMELESS UNTIL OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST COMES AGAIN.” Amen.

BE GOOD SOIL.

We made it to the end of the year! And what a year it’s been. I hope 2023 has been good to you. As we approach the last weeks of the year, it got me thinking about growth and the kind of Christian I want to be, going into 2024. I think it’s something we should always be asking ourselves! The bible tells us that we should work out our salvation with fear and trembling. To me, that means I need to constantly check myself and my faith because faith without works is dead. We have to become doers of the Word, not just hearers! When we first hear the good news of Jesus, we all experience something that seems to take root in us, a hope that we never knew before. Initially, we feel this change that takes place, and we desire to be the person that we were created to be. But what happens after the Word is planted within us? Do we just go back to life as we know it? Do we let the world continue to consume us?

The bible says that if we love God, we must obey his commandments. Obedience is very important in our relationship with God. Our relationship with God is much more than just turning up to church on a Sunday. We can’t treat God casually and think that our relationship with Him will grow with minimal effort on our part. The closer we draw to Him is, the closer He will draw to us. Honestly, it’s the same with any relationship we have. What we put in is what we get back. If we don’t tend to the people in our lives, our relatonships with them would never grow deep. So why do we struggle to tend to our relationship with God like we do with our friends or our partners? The parable of the sower has been on my mind of recent. I think I have firsthand seen different examples of this parable this year, and it really resonated with me. It can be so easy for the enemy to come in and snatch away God’s Word, for many are called, but few are chosen. The parable talks about four different kinds of people who hear the Word. This post, I hope, is to help you figure out what person you are! And if you are really looking to see growth in 2024, I pray that this will help you to tend to your relationship and grow closer to God!

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MATTHEW 13:3-4 HE TOLD MANY STORIES IN THE FORM OF PARABLES SUCH AS THIS ONE: “LISTEN! A FARMER WENT OUT TO PLANT SOME SEEDS. AS HE SCATTERED THEM ACROSS HIS FIELD, SOME SEEDS FELL ON A FOOTPATH, AND THE BIRDS CAME AND ATE THEM.” The first person who hears the Word is like a footpath. The Word can not take root because there is no soil. This means that this person lacks understanding when they hear the message of the Kingdom of God. Because of this, the evil one comes and snatches away the Word from that person.

MATTHEW 13:5-6 “OTHER SEEDS FELL ON SHALLOW SOIL WITH UNDERLYING ROCK. THE SEEDS SPROUTED QUICKLY BECAUSE THE SOIL WAS SHALLOW. BUT THE PLANTS SOON WILTED UNDER THE HOT SUN, AND SINCE THEY DIDN’T HAVE DEEP ROOTS, THEY DIED.” The second person who hears the Word is like shallow soil. This person immediately recieves the Word with joy and for a short time will seem like there is potential for growth in their walk with God, but because they don’t have deep roots, they don’t last long. They fall away as soon as they have problems or are persecuted for being believers.

MATTHEW 13:7 “OTHER SEEDS FELL AMONG THORNS THAT GREW UP AND CHOKED OUT THE TENDER PLANTS.” The third person who hears the Word is like a bed of thorns. This person hears the Word, but very quickly, the message is crowed out by the worries of this life and lure of wealth, the wanting of everything under the sun. Because of this, the Word is unfruitful.

MATTHEW 13:8 “STILL OTHER SEEDS FELL ON FERTILE SOIL, AND THEY PRODUCED A CROP THAT WAS THIRTY, SIXTY, AND EVEN A HUNDRED TIMES AS MUCH AS HAD BEEN PLANTED!” The fourth person who hears the Word is like good soil. This person hears the Word and understands it. The Word becomes deep rooted within them, and they bear the fruit that produces a harvest that is beyond their wildest dreams. 

Now we have gone through the different kinds of people who receive the message of the Kingdom, which one are you? 

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I can not stress how important it is to tend to your “Garden”, make sure you are good soil. Make sure there is nothing that is gonna uproot what has been planted. Being a believer makes you fruitful. There is an expectation for growth to see a harvest! We can not be believers who are unfruitful. The message of Jesus is meant to change us from the inside out. The Word of God renews our minds. It causes us to want to live a Holy and righteous life, it changes our hearts and our desires. When we are truly changed, we work for God’s kingdom, not because we have to; because our works don’t save us, but because it is a result of our faith, our faith produces good works. 

This world is a trap. It promises us so much but really has nothing to offer us. The bible promises us that if we seek the kingdom first, everything else will be added to us. More than our minds could ever comprehend. Knowing that God doesn’t lie, we can trust that His Word is true, He will do what He says!

Put God first in 2024. I promise you that you won’t regret it. Get rid of whoever, or whatever, is holding you back from drawing closer to Him. Think about the things that have happened in your life since first hearing the Word. The fire that was set a blaze when you first discovered who God was and what that truly meant to you. Now, see all the birds that have been devouring your seeds. Whether it’s dressed up as a new job opportunity, or a new relationship, something that on the surface can seem like a God send, is usually a distraction from the enemy to take up more time, the time you planned to use to initially spend time with God in your secret place or to attend that bible study you promised yourself. I promise you, God wouldn’t bring something into your life that takes you away from Him. MATTHEW 6:24 “NO ONE CAN SERVE TWO MASTERS. EITHER YOU WILL HATE ONE AND LOVE THE OTHER, OR YOU WILL BE DEVOTED TO THE ONE AND DESPISE THE OTHER. YOU CANNOT SERVE BOTH GOD AND MONEY.” This world is always pushing us to want more, to see the having of things as what makes us worthy. But the more we have is, the more we desire. It’s this endless cycle and pursuit of happiness that causes us to turn away from our creator. But remember, all these things we chase are temporary, but what God offers us is eternal! 

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As we prepare for the obligatory New years resolution, I encourage you to add God to your list. God has a plan for all of us. Some of us are walking in His plan already, and the fruit is plentiful. God bless you if you are good soil! May your crops continue to multiply. If you recognise that your soil needs some help, then seek out the farmer, seek out God, and ask for His help! Spend time with Him in His Word, He will water you. Ask your community of believers for help and advice. Make a conscious effort to remove a distraction and replace it with God. Create the habits that draw you close, and He will draw close to you!

Thank you for reading and journeying with me this year. I pray that this blog has blessed you as much as writing it has blessed me. May the good Lord continue to bless you, and may you always remain hungry for Him! As we prepare for the festivities of Christmas, let’s never forget the reason for the season, JESUS! Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! See you in 2024.

FISHING IN YOUR POND.

I have spent the last few weeks talking and thinking about what it means to be a Christian and my purpose; the point of it all! It has led me to have some interesting conversations with other believers, who have made me delve deeper into understanding why we even exist. We all know about Jesus, and we all know that because of Him, we are reconciled back to the Father through the wonderful gift of grace, which cost nothing but our faith in Jesus Christ, and His death on the cross to absolve our sins. Hallelujah, we cry! Salvation is ours! But what next? Now, we work out our salvation on the narrow road, trying, and at times failing, to resist the temptations placed in our way by the evil one, all while we try our best to keep our eyes focused on Jesus! But what next?

While that might seem like work enough, it doesn’t end there. If I am honest, I have spent the last four years worrying about MYSELF, MY walk, MY struggles, MY growth, and MY relationship with God. Don’t get me wrong, that is exactly what I should be doing, but God requires more from me. I have learned to love God with all my heart and all my soul, but now it’s time to love my neighbour as myself! Part of loving my neighbour is sharing the good news of the Gospel, something that I haven’t been doing as well. It’s easy to meet fellow believers and talk about the goodness of God. It takes no effort to engage with each other when we share our love for Jesus. But when we have to explain the reason for our hope to someone who has no idea of who Jesus is and often has no interest in finding out, our mouth suddenly becomes dry, and we stumble on our words, praying that we don’t get asked something theological because we don’t have all the answers! When I think about sharing the gospel, most times I picture myself standing on a street corner, talking loudly about Jesus to strangers who look at me like I have lost the plot, or shout out abuse at me. The thought alone doesn’t make me want to run and grab my bible and make my way to the local town centre. The first thing this fear highlights is my pride, my worry of how I will be perceived by others, or just my fear of persecution. A reason why I am forever reminding myself of 2 TIMOTHY 1:7 “FOR GOD HAS NOT GIVEN US A SPIRIT OF FEAR AND TIMIDITY, BUT OF POWER, LOVE, AND SELF-DISCIPLINE.”

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I then told myself to slow down and take one step at a time. I asked myself, what does sharing the good news of the Gospel really look like for me? Then, my sea suddenly became a pond! All this time, I was picturing myself talking to strangers, and my sea felt too big and overwhelming! Now, I saw all the people I knew, whether friends or colleagues, and now my sea turned into a manageable pond that wasn’t as frightening! It’s no secret that I live for Jesus now. I am constantly reminded of how much I have changed, becoming someone seen by some as wise and full of truth, and others, as a former shell of myself who is no longer fun! Well, you can’t please them all, and that’s fine by me. My faithfulness to God’s word, and how my faith gets me through lifes difficulties, has made it easier for me to naturally get into conversation about what I believe, but I know I haven’t been intentional with most of those conversations.

MATTHEW 28:18-19 “THEREFORE, GO AND MAKE DISCIPLES OF ALL THE NATIONS, BAPTIZING THEM IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER AND THE SON AND THE HOLY SPIRIT. TEACH THESE NEW DISCIPLES TO OBEY ALL THE COMMANDS I HAVE GIVEN YOU. AND BE SURE OF THIS: I AM WITH YOU ALWAYS, EVEN TO THE END OF THE AGE.” The great commision Jesus left to His disciples in His day is also for His disciples today! And if you have accepted Jesus Christ into your heart, then you too are a disciple. We have a mission to go and make new believers and teach them to obey God’s commands. If you have wondered what your purpose in this life is, then look no further. You have found it! Too many Christians do not think this is their resposibility, they think this is reserved for others, but no, we all have a job to do. We need to stop living a life that is dead, wake up! You have risen from death into life! This new life you have been given is not to be wasted. It’s to be fruitful, to be made to be a blessing to others. It’s not about what God gives you, and what you can take from your brothers and sisters in Christ, but instead, it’s about what you can give to God and how you can meet the needs of others! This is why churches remain stagnant because people only attend, thinking about what they can get from it or what the pastor can do for them. Only a few come thinking about how they can serve the church. When we attend church thinking about how we can serve others, only then will we see and start to live out what it truly means to walk with one another, the Christian who is devoted to each other, the ones who love and do life together, true brotherly love!

So now that you know your calling, what will you do about it? Because in the end, if we are only hearers of the word and not doers, we are only deceiving ourselves.

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The topic of evangelism has been coming up at my church recently. My church wanting to equip the flock to be able to carry out the great commission has been very enlightening for me. Like I said before, the idea of sharing the Gospel filled me with fear. But now I see it so differently. I was reminded of the story in the Gospel of Luke chapter 8, when Jesus healed a demon-possessed man and sent the demons into a herd of pigs. After the man had been healed, as Jesus was preparing to head back to the other side of the lake, the man begged to go with Him. But Jesus said no. LUKE 8:39 “NO, GO BACK TO YOUR FAMILY, AND TELL THEM EVERYTHING GOD HAS DONE FOR YOU.” SO HE WENT THROUGH THE TOWN PROCLAIMING THE GREAT THINGS JESUS HAD DONE FOR HIM.” Imagine wanting to follow Jesus and his disciples, but being told no, but instead, to just go and tell the people you know, your family, about the great things God has done for you!? Wow! This really blew my mind and made me think differently about what evangelism meant. All the time, I thought it meant that before I could do anything, I had to become a scholar overnight, having read all 66 books in the bible. I thought I had to understand everything in the bible so that I could debate anyone who challenged my faith! I definitely wasn’t a scholar, and I know I didn’t understand everything, I’ve only been walking with the Lord for four years, I just wasn’t qualified! But Jesus says you are qualified because your testimony is your good news! He says, “Go and tell your family about what God has done for you!” You don’t have to be a scholar. You don’t have to know or understand everything. So what, if you meet someone who seems to know more and wants to challenge your belief, because the one thing they can’t debate is your testimony, your experience with God! You will never lose talking about what God has done for you.

My church challenged me to be able to give my testimony in three minutes. It really was a challenge to condense it because I am a natural born waffler. But I mangaged to, and now I will be able to share it with people without fear of losing their attention, and giving them the highlights opens up the door for questions and genuine interest. I really encourage you to do the same. So start with your family, share with your friends, your colleagues, work your way down the list of the people in your life, and before you know it, it will become so natural that you too will be going through your town proclaiming all the good things Jesus has done for you!

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When Jesus says, follow me and I will make you a fisher of men, all we need to do is make our way to our own personal ponds, our family, our friends, the people that we have V.I.P access to in our lives, and fish! Keep talking and sharing about the goodness of God, pray for them, and live a life that is holy and righteous. Live a life that speaks of Jesus, and just let the Holy Spirit do the rest. You will be surprised when you ask people who they think Jesus is. The answers will make you realise how misimformed people really are. My mum came to Christ through me and my walk with God, I know this works, God used me without me even knowing what was happening!

So be encouraged, my brothers and sisters. Your testimony is unique. Your testimony is powerful! Go and share what God has done for you confidently and boldly! And remember, you can be sure of this, that He is with you always, even to the end of the ages.

Thank you, Lord, thank you, God, for you are good, for you are love

Forever faithful, full of grace, God of mercy in this place

King of kings, Lord of all, the Alpha and Omega, my cornerstone

The right side of the Father, where you wait, my advocate, who prepares my place

The hearts of men, you know them all, no river too wide, no mountain too tall

Nowhere to hide, for all things you see, from the beginning of time to eternity

Then, one day, when it’s time to rest, I’ll sit and hope I’ve done my best

Faithful servant, righteous and true, is who I hope I’ll be to you.

Cerise Vidal.

ADULT. CHRISTIAN. FRIENDS.

The last few weeks have been such a struggle for me in the area of friendship. A lot of past trauma has resurfaced, things I never knew I held onto. I know I have posted about navigating old friendships when you become a new believer, but let’s talk about friendships within the body of Christ. I have, and I am still learning so much when it comes to friendships as a believer. But there has also been a lot of unlearning I have had to do, and that has been the most challenging part because having to deny your flesh is very hard, especially if your flesh desires to cuss someone out or simply just tell someone to shut up!

To understand where I am at, it’s important I take you back to who I was before Christ. When it came to friendships, I was always super picky about who I let into my inner circle. I always knew a lot of people, but I was very good at grouping them into “social” boxes. Certain people were good for certain things. But the ones that stayed close to my heart, the ones I truly considered my friends, I could count them on one hand and I had known them for more than 15 years, so these were the people I trusted wholeheartedly. Although this may seem very wise to you, and of course there is wisdom here, I was very guarded, and it was because I had been hurt at the tender age of 18/19 by these two girls who I thought were my friends, but ended up stabbing me in the back over money. I was heartbroken! Then a few years after that, a school friend that I spent every waking minute either talking on the phone with or hanging out with, behaved so badly on my birthday, the one day I expected them to show up for me. We were never close after that, and that hurt me. Those events changed me, I honestly was never the same again when it came to people. The people I let in close to me always hurt me, and I couldn’t trust anyone. So I built these walls around me so I wouldn’t get hurt again. Now, anyone I let into that space had to really earn it. I wasn’t about making new friends. I might have thought you were cool, but you stayed outside the wall, and I grouped you in boxes instead. In time, I became more introverted, an introvert who presents as an extrovert. If you weren’t in my inner circle, I found it a chore to make time for people, and if I did make plans, I would always be more concerned about when I would be able to go home. I found it all very draining. But it is very draining when you are constantly making an effort to be on guard all the time. It’s hard withholding yourself from people.

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At the ripe age of 41, these past events have still been haunting me. They have shaped the way I relate with people. To be honest, I forgot about these things. They were so expertly hidden from myself that I didn’t even realise I was still dealing with the hurt until a recent event triggered this mine bomb to explode. The way God is always making me look deep within myself is just a testament to His love for me. Just when I think I have seen all there is to see, He reminds me that I am still a work in progress. When Jesus commanded that we love our neighbour as ourselves, I never anticipated how hard that would be for me. Oh, how easy it is to love the ones who love you the way you love them. But what happens when the love and consideration you show to others are not reciprocated? COLOSSIANS 3:13 “BEAR WITH EACH OTHER AND FORGIVE ONE ANOTHER IF ANY OF YOU HAS A GRIEVANCE AGAINST SOMEONE. FORGIVE AS THE LORD FORGAVE YOU.” But we cry out “No! They don’t deserve it. Lord, you see how they hurt me?!!!” but He whispers in your ear softly, with all the love and compassion of a Father “Forgive as the Lord forgave you.” And now the real battle begins between your flesh and your Spirit.

Bearing with each other in love would have felt weak years ago, and I would have been too prideful to stand for any of this. I would have been the first to let you know how I felt without any consideration of the words I used. Letting people treat you however they want and still have to grin and bear it in love?? To me, who walked hand in hand with the world, this would have been foolishness! 1 CORINTHIANS 1:18 “THE MESSAGE OF THE CROSS IS FOOLISHNESS TO THOSE WHO ARE PERISHING, BUT TO US WHO ARE BEING SAVED IT IS THE POWER OF GOD.” To keep my heart from closing up to people, I have to remind myself of God’s grace for me and all I have done to Him! yet in His mercy, He has chosen to forgive me, His love for me makes it possible. And it’s the same love He calls us to have for each other! It’s not easy, but it’s important. I have had to deny myself to the point of tears. It’s been a true battle, but I have won, and I have come out the other side healed! My teenage truama is no longer hidden. The enemy can no longer use it against me. Instead, God gets all the glory!

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Friendships are important! They are necessary! But wisdom is needed in how we go about them. Unfortunately, in my lack of wisdom, I have learnt some hard lessons during these few years as a believer. The first lesson I learnt was that just because someone is a Christian, it doesn’t mean they will be a friend without fault. If I am honest, when I became a believer, I expected to find friendships easily, thinking everything would be smooth sailing. I learnt very quickly that wasn’t the case. We all fall short, and we all need help. Not one of us is perfect. That is why we need to keep close to the one who is; King Jesus! COLOSSIANS 3:12 “THEREFORE, AS GOD’S CHOSEN PEOPLE, HOLY AND DEARLY LOVED, CLOTHE YOURSELVES WITH COMPASSION, KINDNESS, HUMILITY, GENTLENESS AND PATIENCE.” As we walk hand in hand with each other, how we do life together should not look like the world. Our friendships should not look like the world. How we respond to each other should not look like the world, for we have been set apart from the world! We will experience hard times with each other, and some days, it will be harder to pick up your cross and die to self than others. But in those times, remember that you are holy and dearly loved. Put your pride aside and humble yourself. Remember grace and mercy, and know that God sees it all and He will deal with His children, the way a good Father does with love and discipline. Don’t let the actions of others bring you out of the new nature that God has given you!

The newest lesson I have learnt is that it is ok to have inner circles within the body, as long as it’s not born out of truama. The best example of an inner circle is Jesus. In the Gospels He had twelve disciples, but He always went off with Peter, John, and James. He loved all the disciples, but He had an inner circle. The three were privy to certain experiences. They were sworn to secrecy, and they were trusted. I don’t know what made them special, but I don’t think that matters. I think it’s a healthy model of what friendships can be. Too many times, we can feel like we need all twelve to be in our inner circle, but that doesn’t make an inner circle, it’s just a circle. Just like there are family members we are closer with, the ones we are distant with don’t cease to be family because we only see them twice a year! My mistake was that I put too many people in my inner circle, so when I felt that I had been hurt, I automatically wanted to throw everyone out of my circle, I didn’t know who I could trust to be there. I started to feel overwhelmed and drained because I had gone back to withholding myself from people because I no longer felt safe. But I recognise that was just an attack from the enemy! God showed me I needed to use discernment in this area, and after a little shuffling around, I now feel peace, and I am back to being open, no longer withholding.

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I know I have shared a lot of negatives, but there are way more positives to having friendships within the body. no matter what age, finding friendships is not an easy task. At 41, finding new friendships has been an experience. The people I am blessed to have in my circle have become so important to me! I literally need them to keep my head above water when life gets difficult. I understand the importance of having people who are like-minded lovers of Jesus in your corner! These are the people who will speak into your life with words of wisdom, these are the people who will cover you in prayer, these are the people who will hold your hand and walk along side you through difficult seasons, these are the people who will encourage you daily! I didn’t think I would find these connections at my age, people that I can truly be vulnerable with, without judgment. People who love me enough to correct me in love when I need it. Thank you, friends, you know who you are! I am truly grateful.

ECCLESIASTES 4:10 ” IF EITHER OF THEM FALLS DOWN, ONE CAN HELP THE OTHER UP. BUT PITY ANYONE WHO FALLS AND HAS NO ONE TO HELP THEM UP.”