Much ado about plenty

Early this year, my pastor asked us to try something for a year and judge for ourselves what we thought about it. I wasn't particularly excited because it meant alot of work but i did it because it was something that i had been thinking about but wasn't sure how to go about it. She asked us to ditch daily devotionals and try studying the raw word of God for ourselves. She advised us to try the yearly bible plans at the back of most bibles and kill 2 birds with one stone by finishing the bible in a year and meditating on what God has to say to us directly instead of focusing on someone else's words. I turned to the back of my Bible and whispered "wahala dey" when i saw the morning and evening verses because i knew it wouldn't be easy. I love my quiet times with the Lord but studying the word at night was something i had never really practiced.

Anyway, by the second week of January i made up my mind to try it and it was on of the best decisions i made this year. I have been a christian all my life but there are stories i have never heard and things i probably wouldn't have known if i didn't dig for myself. Heck, i didn't even realise that Rahab and Naomi were in Jesus' family tree. Most importantly, God spoke to me EVERYDAY! With devotionals, if i was running late and had the time to read only one thing, i would always pick the devotional over the bible and go through the day with someone else's words as my soul food. But this year i had no option, it was either the Bible or the Bible and i couldn't jump any days or nights i missed because it was a straight study of Matthew to Reveletions in the mornings and Genesis to Malachi in the evenings and i didn't want to miss anything. It has been alot of work but it is fulfilling and enlightening,

The Bible says somewhere in the old testament that the word of God does not return to Him void so please, just pick up your Bible next year and let God minister to you. If there is something you don't understand even after prayer, take note of it and ask someone spiritually mature to help you. I am not against devotionals at all and if you find yourself not studying the word gabadaya because you're not motivated for whatever reason to pick up your bible then please, go back to your daily guide but give studying the word for yourself a try and see what the Lord will do.

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Biko, don't make worshipping God a horrible experience for anybody. If you decide to go to church without taking a shower then please use some deodorant and teist a peist! And no matter what state you meet a restroom, if you decide to use it instead of running for your life then please realise that it is your responsibility to leave it looking clean. As children of God, people shouldn't walk into the restroom and see our business all over the place. Thank you very much. I'm very sorry if i sound like a bitter leaf christain but there is no way to sugar coat some things.

I love you guys very much and i thank you for the love and support you show after reading my posts. Your comments, emails, bbms and tweets mean the world to me and i'm grateful for the oppurtunity to be a vessel. May God bless you and your family as we cross into the new year, may He show you what His plan is for your life and may the things that matter to Him be the things that matter to you.

Guest post on G.R.I.P My Grand Habitat

Swimming in circles

Sharks feed on their own when they bleed. There are no second thoughts when they smell blood, they just head out for the kill!

Dolphins on the other hand swim in a circle around the hurt (dolphins and humans) to protect them from predators. They either swim around the human while (s)he swims to the shore or swim around the hurt dolphin AND occassionally push it up for oxygen. It's the most amazing thing.

Most of us are like sharks, we eat one another alive! We are constantly on the look out for anyone to mess up so we can point our fingers in their faces and constantly remind them of how they have failed and how their misfortune is as a result of their past sins and bla bla bla. But we really should be like the dolphins, helping each other up and leading one another to God and the love of Christ. Galatians 6:1-2 Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself  lest you also be tempted. Bear one another's burdens, and also fulfill the law of Christ.

There is no room for self-righteousness, it is never about us and how perfect we are but about the hurting/lost and God. If God could forgive David and still call him a man after His heart then who are we to hold people's sins against them? Especially since we're no different one way or the other? We need to swim in circles around one another for the love of them, for the love of us (one good turn) and for the love of God. Jame 5: 19-20 Brethren, if anyone among you wanders from the truth, and someone turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save a soul from death and cover a multitude of sins.

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I shared a message on The Early Risers Conference (TERC) 2 weeks ago based on the book The Prodigal God by Tim Keller. It is an amazing, awe-inspiring interpretation of the Parable of The Prodigal Son and what i shared is just frosting on the cake. Please listen to it and then look for the book or holla at me and i'll send you my copy in the mail if you promise to read and pass it on (books are for sharing not keeping, lol).  TERC is at 5am EST every friday and it'll be a pleasure to have you call in +17124320175 code 210524. Enjoy...

I'll marry him for you!

Me: Mummy, it's getting too much. Shei it's my party? I should decide how big or small I want it and I really don't want a big party

Her: Do you realise this is the last party I'm paying for?

*my heart skipped a beat*

Her: And 21 is a big deal so I'll have my friends inside and you'll have your friends outside. You can throw your little party while I throw my big party

Me: *laughing and falling on the bed* why are you even throwing a party? What if I don't want your friends here? It's my birthday, right? And if we're fighting this much over my 21st birthday party what will my wedding be like?

Her: Uwuh! (Tiv exclamation) You won't have a say there! You're having a big wedding and I'll take care of everything. Matter of fact, if you're too lazy to go to the wedding just stay at home and I'll marry him and bring him home to you!

My mum is crazy like that. The talk of parties and weddings bring out a hilarious side of her that you can't help but love. She is my God-rep on earth, the strongest person I know and I absolutely love her.

That conversation happened a couple of years ago and it makes me laugh every time I think about it. I doubt that she can remember saying any of those things so Chiki I hereby command you to print this post and send it to her :p

It's my mum's birthday today and I miss her very much. I'm sure she'll have her friends and my aunts over, buy a big cake, get aunty Elizabeth to pepper some sexy chicken and fresh fish and just have a ball at home. Chei! Walahi, i miss naija!

Mummy, I love you, miss you and thank you for all you've done for me

May God continue to bless and keep you safe

Kolomentality... it runs in the family!
Goofing off in the kitchen before my 21st birthday party

Plastic smiling for the camera cos we couldn't wait to get back to the party.
This was at home and not in a studio by the way *side eye*

How are you guys doing? Please say a quick prayer for my mum today and have a wonderful day :*

Silence, togetherness.

Togetherness

 

I miss Family Worship Center, my family and friends. I miss the companionships but more than that I miss the fact that I won't be questioned if I decide to get 'stupid' here. I mean, I definately don't like people all up in my business but I also hate knowing that if I drove home with a Bugatti Veyron (i totally googled "most expensive car in the world" for this) tonight no one would question me or atleast send me on a guilt trip. I can I magine doing that to Fam's house, after jumping up and down she'll say something along the lines of "Dooshima, I know your mum spends on you but she'll never buy you a Bugatti. I know that if you could afford it, which you can't, you wouldn't get one for yourself. And I know too well that you don't have any guys lavishly spending on you so from whence cometh this sexy thang?" Normally, I would hate this but the truth is, togetherness, companionships and fellowships keep us all in check. Sometimes, the fear of open rebuke is stronger than the fear of God but (I think that) if it keeps us from sinning then it's not so bad 'cause it brings us closer to fearing God. Ok, maybe it doesn't but it keeps us on the right track and that's my point.

 

Silence

*Please don't close the page if it gets overwhelming, i promise it'll make sense somehow*

You know how Barnabas, Simeon, Lucius, Manaen and Saul left Antioch to spread the gospel in the book of Acts with Mark as their helper ba? No? Oya keep up! Mark was Barnabas' cousin and also their helper on the trip but somehow, he got distracted or couldn't handle the persecutions and left the brethren. Luke (the writer of Acts) didn't give a reason why Mark left, matter of fact the only reason we know that there was a falling out is because in Acts 15:37-38 he wrote "Now  Barnabas was determined to take with them John, called Mark. But Paul insisted that they should not take with them the one who had departed from them in Pamphylia, and had not gone with them to the work".  Was Mark homesick? Was he one of the Jewish Christians who couldn't handle the fact that salvation had come to the Gentiles? Or was he just upset that authority had been moved from his cousin to Saul, the horrible convert? No one knows, we only know that he left his companions when they needed him the most.

Word must have gone round but it is also obvious that he was later forgiven and accepted back into ministry because Paul wrote in Colossians 4:10 "Aristarchus, my fellow prisoner greets you, with Mark the cousin of Barnabas (about whom you received instructions, if he comes to you, welcome him) and in 2Timothy 4:11 "Only Luke is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, for he is useful to me for ministry".

 

 

Togetherness in silence

The point i'm trying to make with all this bible study -which is highly inspired from my Bible Study Fellowship (BSF) bulletin by the way- is that if you pay close attention you'll realize that Mark's sin was not written anywhere. Luke and Paul's silence made it possible for Mark's ministry to be restored. How would we percieve the gospel according to Mark if they had exposed him? Would they even have published his account?

 

Silence is graciousness. Not telling our family and friends details of someone's mess up gives room for reconciliation, it won't hurt to be a little graceful even through the bad times. It makes it easier for the sinner to return and it definately helps in 'saving face' when/if we reconcile with the person. This is where fragility meets strength and power. The grace to forgive and the strength to stop sinning even when people have lost faith in you can be found on the cross. Christ died for you and me so that we wouldn't have to worry about being weak anymore. There's hope, peace and salvation on the cross, reach out and grab it.

Thanks to Rhapsody Phoenix  for the One Sweet Blog award and Jemima for the Versatile blogger award, i really appreciate it :*

Update

Sup guys? I'm sorry i keep apologising for abandoning the blog but blogging is beginning to seem like such a long thing these days. I'm not sure what's wrong 'cause i have so much to say, so much to be grateful for, so much to share but somehow putting pen to paper just doesn't happen anymore, literally and metaphorically speaking. Usually, i write loads of stuff in my jotter then pick one to type and share but i haven't scribbled anything in longer than i dare to remember so this is straight from my heart to my keypad. Yikes!

Aaaanyway, I heard this on the radio one day and it caught my heart. I can't remember exactly what the guy said but it spoke volumes to me so i'll cut it, mix it, share it and hope it speaks to you too...

When you're going on a journey to somewhere you've never been,

 there are 2 things that you MUST take along with you,

a map and a bottle of water.

No matter how much stuff and food you pack,

you'll end up in trouble without your water and map...

If life is a journey, Jesus, the Water of Life and the Bible, our guide to salvation,

why then do we travel without them?

Looking back, i never really had hard times before i gave my life to Christ but then again, i never really had profound peace. The joy and peace that comes from knowing that no matter what happens God has got your back is better than all the money in the world 'cause guess what? He'll give you the peace, joy AND money. Jehova-Jireh toh bad!

*Joshua 1:8-9 This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night, that you may observe to do all that is written in it. For THEN you will make your way prosperous and you will have good success...do not be afraid...for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.

P.s

I wrote 2 guest posts and forgot to share Dear Future Husband and I was here , enjoy. Mwah!



Thus far...

I'm not where I want to be but I'm not where I used to be

 And I just want take a break to say... 

Thank You Father for bringing me thus far.

Slow Fade

The journey from your mind to your hands

Is shorter than you're thinking

Be careful if you think you stand

You just might be sinking

It's a slow fade when you give yourself away

It's a slow fade when black and white turn to gray

Thoughts invade, choices are made, a price will be paid

When you give yourself away

People never crumble in a day

It's a slow fade!

*Casting Crowns - Slow fade

I've been fighting with some demons for a long, long time. Sometimes, i think i'm winning but deep within i know that if opportunity presents itself, i'll fall flat on my face. It takes not just courage and support to break bad habits, it takes the grace of God. The spirit is always willing to do what is right but the body is almost always weak. It may take a while but bad habits/addictions are breakable, 2Timothy 1:7 says "For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind". We've been blessed with the power and sense to breakaway from sin/addictions and though old habits have been said to die hard, they die eventually if we keep starving them.

I'm not 'clean' yet but i'm close and that's mainly because i have found Grace and also because it is not a substance abuse (and it's not pornography o, lol). People with substance abuse on the other hand need not only our prayers but also our tough, undying love. Addictions are little demons that crawl up your brain and cloud your every judgement. People with addictions know they need help and most times, they know where to get it but the yearning for a quick fix is always stronger than the need for a cure, that's why most of them never break free. And that is also why interventions are the best gifts you can -try to- give the people you love who are struggling with addictions.

Pasted below is a beautiful tribute written for Amy Winehouse by Russell Brand. Yes, Russell Brand! That seemingly crazy man with the wacky sense of humour is also a very smart man and good writer. Please read, (be wowed) and try to reach out to anyone you know struggling with a(n) addiction(s). God bless you

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For Amy

When you love someone who suffers from the disease of addiction you await the phone call. There will be a phone call. The sincere hope is that the call will be from the addict themselves, telling you they’ve had enough, that they’re ready to stop, ready to try something new. Of course though, you fear the other call, the sad nocturnal chime from a friend or relative telling you it’s too late, she’s gone.

Frustratingly it’s not a call you can ever make it must be received. It is impossible to intervene.

I’ve known Amy Winehouse for years. When I first met her around Camden she was just some twit in a pink satin jacket shuffling round bars with mutual friends, most of whom were in cool Indie bands or peripheral Camden figures Withnail-ing their way through life on impotent charisma. Carl Barrat told me that “Winehouse” (which I usually called her and got a kick out of cos it’s kind of funny to call a girl by her surname) was a jazz singer, which struck me as a bizarrely anomalous in that crowd. To me with my limited musical knowledge this information placed Amy beyond an invisible boundary of relevance; “Jazz singer? She must be some kind of eccentric” I thought. I chatted to her anyway though, she was after all, a girl, and she was sweet and peculiar but most of all vulnerable.

I was myself at that time barely out of rehab and was thirstily seeking less complicated women so I barely reflected on the now glaringly obvious fact that Winehouse and I shared an affliction, the disease of addiction. All addicts, regardless of the substance or their social status share a consistent and obvious symptom; they’re not quite present when you talk to them. They communicate to you through a barely discernible but un-ignorable veil. Whether a homeless smack head troubling you for 50p for a cup of tea or a coked-up, pinstriped exec foaming off about his “speedboat” there is a toxic aura that prevents connection. They have about them the air of elsewhere, that they’re looking through you to somewhere else they’d rather be. And of course they are. The priority of any addict is to anaesthetise the pain of living to ease the passage of the day with some purchased relief.

From time to time I’d bump into Amy she had good banter so we could chat a bit and have a laugh, she was “a character” but that world was riddled with half cut, doped up chancers, I was one of them, even in early recovery I was kept afloat only by clinging to the bodies of strangers so Winehouse, but for her gentle quirks didn’t especially register.

Then she became massively famous and I was pleased to see her acknowledged but mostly baffled because I’d not experienced her work and this not being the 1950’s I wondered how a “jazz singer” had achieved such cultural prominence. I wasn’t curious enough to do anything so extreme as listen to her music or go to one of her gigs, I was becoming famous myself at the time and that was an all consuming experience. It was only by chance that I attended a Paul Weller gig at the Roundhouse that I ever saw her live.

I arrived late and as I made my way to the audience through the plastic smiles and plastic cups I heard the rolling, wondrous resonance of a female vocal. Entering the space I saw Amy on stage with Weller and his band; and then the awe. The awe that envelops when witnessing a genius. From her oddly dainty presence that voice, a voice that seemed not to come from her but from somewhere beyond even Billie and Ella, from the font of all greatness. A voice that was filled with such power and pain that it was at once entirely human yet laced with the divine. My ears, my mouth, my heart and mind all instantly opened. Winehouse. Winehouse? Winehouse! That twerp, all eyeliner and lager dithering up Chalk Farm Road under a back-combed barnet, the lips that I’d only seen clenching a fishwife fag and dribbling curses now a portal for this holy sound. So now I knew. She wasn’t just some hapless wannabe, yet another pissed up nit who was never gonna make it, nor was she even a ten-a-penny-chanteuse enjoying her fifteen minutes. She was a fucking genius.

Shallow fool that I am I now regarded her in a different light, the light that blazed down from heaven when she sang. That lit her up now and a new phase in our friendship began. She came on a few of my TV and radio shows, I still saw her about but now attended to her with a little more interest. Publicly though, Amy increasingly became defined by her addiction. Our media though is more interested in tragedy than talent, so the ink began to defect from praising her gift to chronicling her downfall. The destructive personal relationships, the blood soaked ballet slippers, the aborted shows, that youtube madness with the baby mice. In the public perception this ephemeral tittle-tattle replaced her timeless talent. This and her manner in our occasional meetings brought home to me the severity of her condition. Addiction is a serious disease; it will end with jail, mental institutions or death. I was 27 years old when through the friendship and help of Chip Somers of the treatment centre, Focus12 I found recovery, through Focus I was introduced to support fellowships for alcoholics and drug addicts which are very easy to find and open to anybody with a desire to stop drinking and without which I would not be alive.

Now Amy Winehouse is dead, like many others whose unnecessary deaths have been retrospectively romanticised, at 27 years old. Whether this tragedy was preventable or not is now irrelevant. It is not preventable today. We have lost a beautiful and talented woman to this disease. Not all addicts have Amy’s incredible talent. Or Kurt’s or Jimi’s or Janis’s, some people just get the affliction. All we can do is adapt the way we view this condition, not as a crime or a romantic affectation but as a disease that will kill. We need to review the way society treats addicts, not as criminals but as sick people in need of care. We need to look at the way our government funds rehabilitation. It is cheaper to rehabilitate an addict than to send them to prison, so criminalisation doesn’t even make economic sense. Not all of us know someone with the incredible talent that Amy had but we all know drunks and junkies and they all need help and the help is out there. All they have to do is pick up the phone and make the call. Or not. Either way, there will be a phone call.