“I Am that I Am”

I recently watched the movie, The Shack, and I may or may not have cried like a baby throughout the whole movie. I won’t spoil it on here but I definitely recommend watching it because I got a fresh perspective on who God is.

I have spent most of my life trying to figure out God. I always thought I could just put Him in a box because it’s easier that way, kinda like describing food or shoes. There’s always one or two adjectives to describe those but boy was I wrong. God is so infinite there is not enough adjectives to describe Him. How do I know this? I experienced Him.

Let me try make it clearer in a more practical example of how one of my recent weeks went.

Monday: I was so tired and kept dragging myself. I didn’t want to wake up early to go to school, I didn’t want to run any errands nor did I want to engage myself in any social activities. However, I did anyway. How? Because God became a life coach real quick. He says in Proverbs 6:4- “Don’t put it off, do it now! Don’t rest until you do.” Who knew a verse about procrastination and laziness, such simple issues of life, could be found in this great book. He also says in 1 Corinthians 10:31- Whatever you do, do it like you’re doing it for God. These verses didn’t supernaturally give me an industrious spirit, they gave me strength to fight the laziness and get things done.

Tuesday: Someone was rude to me at work when I was being nothing but kind and helpful to them. I had a couple choice of words I wanted to tell them since I was so angry. However, God switched to guidance counselor mode and reminded me of the verses in Galatians 5: 22-23- For God has given us a spirit…of self-control. I walked away, took a couple of breaths and calmed down later. I am not magically fond of this person now but I learned to look at the bigger picture. I reminded myself, hurt people hurt people. So I have no business adding any more hurt to this person’s life by using harsh words. I moved on.

Wednesday: It’s getting to mid-week and I get tired of my routine- work and school. I start feeling like I need someone else to do life with because I don’t want to do it alone. I know I’m not ready for a relationship yet but I start to second guess my decisions- “Had I said yes to that guy I would probably be happy now” God shows up as my good friend and reminds me of Songs of Songs 8:4- Don’t awaken love before it’s time. He wants to teach me what true love is and what a real relationship looks like through Him. He reminds me of how He shows it to me everyday through my personal relationship with Him and other people included. He comforts me and tells me He knows how I feel but He is still taking care of all my baggage so I don’t take it to someone else. He created love, relationships and marriage. He is all of it. I should therefore rest in the fact that He has a good plan for me not to withhold these things but to share them with me. He urges me to be patient until He is done working on my character. He adjusts my focus back to Him and tells me that I should seek Him first and everything else will be added unto me (Matthew 6:33).

Thursday: I’m off to work and I get overwhelmed again with the workload. I start complaining and being ungrateful. At this point, other people’s needs don’t matter because only mine are important. I actually become rude to some extent. I ignore people and I retract into my bubble. I become selfish. God then becomes a parent. He has to remind me of the “house rules” and my “home training”. He has to put His foot down and be straight with me because that’s the only way He can get through my stubbornness. He reminds me of Matthew 5:13-16- He says that I am the salt of the earth and the light of the world that people need to see so they can see God in me shining bright as day. When I allow myself to forget that and start acting like a spoilt child with my little tantrums then my Dad has to step in and remind me to act right. He counts on me to represent Him well and this involves discipline. I can’t just do whatever I want. So I stop being such a baby and come back to my senses. He says it’s okay to be overwhelmed and get discouraged but I need to remember that I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me (Philippians 4:13). So pick up right where you left off, do what is right and keep going because I am with you, He adds.

Friday: I go for youth praise and worship practice at my church and I have no idea where to begin. My team is looking up to me on where to go because I am their leader. I feel insufficient and unqualified to be merely standing before them but God comes again and becomes my teacher. He quickly reminds me of 2 Corinthians 3:5- “It is not that we think we are qualified to do anything on our own. Our qualification comes from God.” He tells me to hear Him and not my voice. He then starts to give me ideas and insights. All of a sudden, I can hear wrong notes and fix them, I can find harmonies, I can re-arrange a whole song and I can teach my team as they teach me. These things don’t come from me, they come from Him. So I thank Him.

Saturday: It’s been a long week and I just want to relax. God comes again and He becomes my grandfather. You know how grandparents are, they are always trying to spoil you or make you fat with all kinds of food. Yep! that’s my best description of God on this day. He reminds me of how much He loves me, how He chose me, how I’m purposeful, how I’m worthy of the best things in life and how He wants to pour all His goodness into my life. He completely showers me with kind words and tells me I’m the reason why He can turn heaven upside down for me. I’m reminded of John 3:16- a simple verse that is the embodiment of our faith. “For God so loved the world…(finish here). He says not one bird falls from the sky without Him noticing. He knows the number of hairs on my head…this is how valuable we are to God (Matthew 10:29-31). I rest in His presence and sleep a good night.

Sunday: I go to church. I prepare my heart to lead the youth into worship. I feel so unworthy of standing in front of people because I know I sinned. He then becomes my Saviour. He tells me to look at His scars and be reminded that He already made payments for the debt of my sin and that I am righteous in His eyes. The Holy Spirit overwhelms my heart and I feel at peace. Service runs accordingly and I say my thank you,s. I go meet up with my lovely group of friends for lunch afterwards. Everyone is full of genuine joy and laughter, even God decides to be funny too. We start to laugh about our weeks and enjoy each other’s company. We encourage and lift each other up. God tells me to look around and see all that is His and the happiness it brings me. I then recognize true friendship that only comes from Him and I count my blessings. He helps me fix my eyes on Him and I am ready for the next week.

God is many things. He is limitless. You can never fit Him into a single box. I hope this gives you peace when you feel like you can’t understand why the Bible says all these different things about Him and you’re trying to make sense of it. He becomes whoever you need Him to be in different situations. You just need to know Him to understand this. To do this, you need to allow Him to be involved in your life so you can experience Him. That’s really it.

Your move.

 

Choose Life

“We are sad to announce the death of….”

Unfortunately, I have heard these words so many times especially towards the end of 2015 to date. What breaks my heart the most is the fact that it is young people dying. I cannot express enough how grieved my spirit has been this past year by this. One day you’re having a pizza party with someone, the next you’re choosing their favourite outfit to bury them in. Not to mention the pain of the deceased’s parents. My heart can’t take it, I just can’t.

Whether you believe in God or not, you cannot account for your future. You can plan for it but you cannot confidently say you know you’ll be able to carry out those plans. I have always said this, you cannot obtain results of an experiment you won’t perform. I mean, you cannot say God is fictional if you haven’t invested your time in learning who He is. The beauty that is the Christian faith is that God gives all of us free will. He will never force you to believe in Him. He says in Matthew 11:15, “Whoever has ears, let them hear.” “So then why are Christians so hell-bent on talking about their God so much?” If I had a penny for the number of times someone asked me this, I’d be a multi-billionaire. We are “so hell-bent” on spreading the gospel because we have been commissioned to. We do so in obedience. God intended that we spread His light in a world of darkness, that’s the gospel. This is why God placed different personalities in us. There are charismatic Christians, mellow ones, outspoken ones etc. He wanted to make sure everyone is accounted for. However, if you approach God’s Word with a closed mind expecting nothing, I guarantee you, faith will not magically fall on you. In fact, you will always ridicule faith because it will sound like pure nonsense (I’ve been there). Yep, faith beats logic my friends.

God had warned me about my lifestyle in 2015. He made it crystal clear that those who don’t follow Him will be swallowed away by the world and He will not be there to protect them. “Oh really? I thought He is a ‘merciful’ God you Christians say. If He was truly God then wouldn’t He save them?” Well, my answer, God is indeed merciful but if you deliberately choose to not believe in Him then He will just let you be. He will never impose. He says it is your choice. The Bible says, “…that whosoever believes in Him.” This means, if (a condition) you believe in Him. This is where the devil comes in. He takes advantage of your perception of this condition. “Oh I guess I don’t have to do this then.” He sees an opportunity to create confusion, to encourage bad decisions and move you as far away from God’s light as He can. This is why you have to make your decision to root yourself deeply in God’s Word so that when the devil tries to trick you into going out that night, you don’t end up in that car accident and die without receiving Christ into your heart. Therefore, if you’re reading this, I implore you to seek God. Find out who He really is. Get a Bible and read it- What is God saying about my life? Who is He? Why should I trust Him?

As for those who already know the Truth and believe in it, pray! Pray hard! Set aside time to intercede for our generation. (That’s what I’m doing right now actually). Did you know that our great God listens and answers? He loves His children so much and values our relationship with Him that He will hear us. Moses interceded for the Israelites when they got bored with God and decided to worship a golden calf. God was so angry because He couldn’t believe these same people He had delivered from Egypt would dare do such a thing. When Moses prayed on their behalf, God forgave them (Exodus 32:30-35). Ask God to guide you on how to go about enlightening your friends who need God. He says in Jeremiah 1:8, “Don’t be afraid, for I will be with you and I will protect you.” Also read Deuteronomy 31:8. Remember who is in your heart and who resides in your temple. He will give you wisdom and the right approach. God is faithful and when He says He will be with us everywhere we go, He means it.

My prayer today: May God soften your heart to His Words. May He open your eyes and ears that the obstacles the devil had put up to prevent you from receiving God’s Word be broken completely. May this generation turn back to Him. May He increase our appetites towards His Word so that we remain safe and protected under His wings. May He comfort the afflicted and restore peace to everyone who has lost someone. May His presence flood your heart and give you a new perspective. May God protect us everywhere we go. This generation will not die but live. This generation will choose life in God. Amen.

“But You Are Missing The Point”

First day of the spring semester at my school but I survived the holiday hangover. It took everything in me to show up today. Those who know me would tell you that I am definitely not a morning person. Nevertheless, I have to get my degree somehow right?

Today my point of focus is on something that God revealed to me as I watching There’s More to the Story- Pastor Steven Furtick. By now, you are probably aware of how fond of this preacher’s messages I am. Before I get to it, I wanted to address something that many people have asked me. What do people mean when they say, “God spoke to me about this” or “God revealed something to me”? I used to ask this question myself until I got to experience it. This is a whole blog post in itself and I’ll expound on it later but here’s a synopsis. First, you don’t have to be qualified for God to approach you. Secondly, God talks to us in different ways like through our friends, pastors, your own conscience or through the Bible. However, to hear Him you have to be attentive. Clear your mind of distractions and things that block your heart from God like being too busy and “not having the time.” So for me in this case, I took some time away from everything and the content of this blog post just popped up in my heart as I was attentively listening to the pastor speak.

To give you context, pastor Steven here was talking about how God has strategically placed things in our lives for Him to make sense to us. He gives us a story to tell because we remember. If He always showed up every time we call Him we would easily forget but when we experience things, we remember. If you have a scar on your body, you can easily tell the story of how you got it but if a wound already healed there’s nothing to show and you wouldn’t remember. This message stirred me up so much. I have so many responsibilities ahead of me this year and they all feel scary. I keep saying to myself, “I’m too young for this” or “This is way out of my comfort zone”. Thing is, I do know God can help me through everything and I had convinced myself this was faith. While it is, it is not enough. So I asked God, “How much more do you want me to give? I can’t have this enormous faith you ask for when I know right after I say ‘Amen’ I will go back to all these responsibilities I’m praying about in the first place. I find security in not hoping too much because that means I won’t get disappointed so how much more are you going to ask for God?” I literally said this out loud. All of a sudden, I had this feeling of reassurance. Which is really what I needed. He said, “I understand you’re worried. I know you because I created you but you are missing the point. Before you even came to me, I saw this day coming. I already knew your plans and I knew this time would come. I know it feels like a huge sacrifice to give up the security of setting low expectations and trust in me who you do not see. I also know you’re a practical person and that’s why this is a big test for you. If you truly ask yourself why you feel insecure in leaving your responsibilities to me you will see that it’s because part of you doesn’t trust that I will show up for you. When have I not been faithful? Haven’t the things you used to pray for so fervently come to pass? When have I never kept my Word? Don’t miss the point. All I ask for is your heart. I want you to completely submit yourself to me. I am not a man that I should change my mind or trick you into submission only to kick you further down in your weakness. I have nothing against you. I know you live in a world where money and worldly success seem more important but I have something better. I promise you this, you fix your eyes on me and everything else will fall in place. Yes, including all those responsibilities you’re so worried about. I do not have you wait to humiliate you but to teach you to trust me.”

Mind you, I was driving when this happened. It’s like I was lost in time, like I wasn’t really driving. After I heard this in my heart, I even took a wrong turn haha! I felt so loved and reassured though. This is what inspired me to write this post because I feel like there are other people who need to hear, well, read this. This promise He made to me is the same promise that is in His Word, the Bible and is accessible to everyone, not just me. Read Jeremiah 29:11. So don’t think, “Oh well, good for you. It must be nice.” In fact, after hearing this I felt like I was meant to do this post for someone else as well.

Don’t miss the point. Don’t miss out.

Song of the week: Trust you (lyrics)- Hillsong Young & Free

Peace, love and salted caramel shakes!

 

Happy Birthday MLK!!

Hi,

Don’t know about you but I have been having an interesting week from settling in at my new job to my health being compromised, regardless, here I am and I’m grateful to God.

Anyway….

Got to love Martin Luther King Jr. day!! Technically, his birthday is on the 15th but oh well. This man will always be at the top of my list of the few humans I consider to be my heroes. I don’t care about the politics behind this holiday and why it was set but I’ll be a positive sport and take it as it is. If I’m being completely transparent, I always get mixed emotions on this day because in as much as it’s MLK’s birthday, I also remember one, James Earl Ray who was charged with MLK’s assassination. It’s just bitter-sweet sometimes, depending on the year. I was just from watching an episode of the TV series “Black-ish” (Hilarious by the way) and in the episode, the main character, “Dre”, addresses his colleagues about how he was taking the presidential election results. It was so touching. You can watch the snippet of the episode here—>Anthony Anderson Monologue “Black Resilience in America” (Post Election) [Blackish]. We all have our opinions on our current president but I’m not here to discuss politics. Rather, I’d like to pose a question, “what would MLK do?”

I’ll leave you off with one of his famous quotes,

“I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.”

So I hope we can all move forward in unity, not just as black people, but as human beings.

 

Peace, love and salted caramel shakes!

“But You Don’t Understand, They’ll Judge Me”

Hi ya!!

What a lovely week I’m having! Just secluding myself from things and taking time to understand what I believe in. Often, I’ve found myself believing in some things just because they are the right things to believe in. Do you even know why you believe in what you believe in? Do you understand it? It sounds like a simple question but really ask yourself, deep down where you never look, there your answer lies.

I grew up in a christian household where I learnt all these things about God but I always had gaps in my understanding of the faith, it’s true essence. I now know, when this happens, maturity starts. I used to think that the church I was going to had failed in teaching me, which was not the case. If it wasn’t for these gaps, I wouldn’t feel the need to fill them. (side note: I got confused for a second there with the ‘feel’ and ‘fill’. Shout out to my primary school English teacher, Mr. Fred Kiiru!) Without these gaps, I wouldn’t be able to ask questions and want to seek answers. This has played a gigantic role in the maturity of my faith in God.

Funny short story: I didn’t even know what the word “Christian” really meant. I honestly grew up knowing it was just a name for people who go to church on Sunday. I was probably in my teens when I found out that it meant- belonging to Christ. At first, I didn’t feel the weight of this word until I started to experience Christ for myself and finally discovered what the whole fuss was about.

BUT….there’s a BUT….

Being a Christian [belonging to Christ] doesn’t mean we are perfect. I was once a non-christian. I have seen things from both perspectives and thing is, so has every other Christian. We were all at a place where we needed saving. So what’s the difference? Are Christians better than other people? If you thought this, like I did before, I’m going to ask you to level with me and hear me out. The difference between a Christian and a non-Christian is that, a Christian believes that he/she can no longer hold on to the burden of their sin because Jesus Christ chose to take up that burden on the cross to express His perfect love for us and to give us a hope and salvation. God knew we would not survive if we were to carry the weight of our sins on our shoulders. He loves us so much that He said, “Here, let me help you with that. That seems heavy.” This, however, doesn’t mean we are immune to sin. When Jesus died on that cross, He died for the sins you committed yesterday, those you are committing now and those you will commit tomorrow. He is not here to condemn us for what we did wrong but to save us. He says that Himself, clearly in John 3:17. Many of us like to read the famous John 3:16 verse, which is good, but to fully lock and load that verse you have to finish off with verse 17. Why does He say this? Because He knows you are human and you are bound to make mistakes. If you didn’t make any mistakes then you would be God and there would be no point to your existence. It is through those mistakes that you grow and God builds His empire/army. So if someone comes to you preaching a bunch of things and you end up feeling like you’re condemned or like you have no place in Christianity, do yourself a favour and just CTRL+ALT+DEL them from your life. For those who missed that, I’m saying they are not representing what God stands for. Note: This amazing gift given to us is only contingent on you admitting that you’re broken and you need saving. If you feel like you got it all on your own, it’s not that God doesn’t love you, He will just let you do it your way because He will never force us to believe in Him. He has given us the free will to choose. He gives us all the things we need then poses the challenge to us of choosing whether you want Him or not. His greatest wish  though, is that you choose to submit to Him and ask Him to show you how to live in a way that is pleasing to Him. He is always waiting on you. I kept running and running away from God until I couldn’t run anymore. Did God stop loving me? Oh no! In fact, He never showed up so strongly in my life before like He did when I decided to choose Him. I felt like He was saying, “Took you long enough, I have been expecting you!” Nothing else could ever make me feel at peace like He has- not money, friends, my parents…nothing! This is why I’m vouching for this.

With this knowledge now, if you’re not a Christian and you’ve had this perception that you can’t get saved because you’ve committed ‘too many sins’ to be forgiven. Or you feel unworthy to be accepted by Christ. You may even be a Christian and you feel like these other Christians are just ‘too churchy’ and you can’t keep up. I want you to know those are thoughts packaged by the devil himself straight to your conscience. Oh let me tell you something, if you thought the devil comes in a red suit breathing fire from his mouth with a gruesome appearance, you thought wrong. The devil comes in the form of discouragement, despair, fear, doubt, impure thoughts. It’s sounds like a ‘thing Christians say’ but it’s the truth. We have free will and we own our actions but also, the devil knows what God is about. He knows God is about hope and healing our brokenness and that’s why he will encourage those thoughts that you have when you think, “This whole Christian thing is too good to be true. You want to tell me that I get a clean slate just by accepting God to be my Saviour? That sounds like a superstition. God, but you don’t understand, they’ll judge me. I was out in the club last night and here they are praying. They’ll look at me wrong. This is not for me.” Once you start thinking this, the devil convinces you it’s true and that’s how people refuse to get saved.

So my challenge to my fellow Christians is, we have the truth in our hearts but we all know where God took us from. We need to stop acting like we don’t know what sinning is. We are imperfect people. Let’s stop showing the world just the “good” side of our faith- going to church, looking all presentable and prayerful and start to show that we are as relatable people as them. That we are people still under construction. That we know what it is to get drunk on the weekend and go to church with a hangover, that we know what addictions are, that we know how hard it is to stay faithful to God when battling depression and suicidal thoughts. I’m not saying it’s now okay to sin. I’m just saying let’s stop making them feel judged and condemned to come before God by giving an impression of how perfect we are. God has changed things in me with time. It’s a process folks! From saying faith is ridiculous to coming on here and writing this blog post about how my life has never been the same again. I can’t even recognize myself. It’s not because of my doing but because I let God show me how to change. I used to feel like ‘church stuff’ was boring . I recall my mom turning on some Pastor Joyce Meyer and I would just feel like my day has been utterly ruined. BUT….with time, I started to get curious and God would reduce my appetite for going out every time and now I can’t wait to listen to her! Do I want to listen to sermons all the time, oh gosh no! I’m still human. I may want to sleep or do something else instead. The difference now is that  I’m getting better at involving myself with God. My appetite for God’s Word increases as I assert myself to at least try to listen then it changes from listening to one a day to three to five to 10…you catch my drift.

Rome was not built in day, the adage goes, but one thing I know, they started with one rock on day one.

Lovely weekend folks!

Peace, love and salted caramel shakes.

Faith Vs Delusion

As I embrace my wonderful streak of happy days, helloooooooooooo!!! I wish I could just embed my joy into this post. I’m not happy because my life is perfect, don’t get me wrong. I’m happy because I rest easy as I continuously spend time with God and learn things about Him. Which leads me to my post today. Are you having faith or are you delusional? I’m not insulting you if this applies to you, so just hear me out. Let’s talk, communicate if you will.

One of my all time favourite songs to listen to is Here Now (Madness) by Hillsong United (Click on the link and have a listen. Worth every second of it). My previous post title was actually inspired by it and today I’d like to borrow another line of great magnitude from it- “Faith makes a fool of what makes sense.” We, Christians, believe in a God that we may not physically see but experience. He manifests in everything around us. It’s like the wind, you don’t see it but you know it’s there as Brian Houston puts it. However, there were some things that I believe have been revealed to me to bring my attention to and I thought it would help someone else by putting it on here. I am a practical person therefore I shall put it simply as follows:

Faith: A problem arises and you get scared. Instead of running into turmoil, you speak to your problem, as I talked about in my previous post, and sleep at night knowing you’re not alone. This is because you know somehow you’ll come out of it in due time with God by your side, holding your hand. The story that pops up in my heart is that of Daniel in the lion’s den (Daniel 6:1-28) If you don’t know it here is a quick summary: It was during the reign of king Darius, Daniel had gained favour with the king and was appointed to be an administrator in his kingdom. The other administrators started to get jealous of Daniel’s success because the king wanted to promote him as a reward for his exceptional qualities. These administrators set up Daniel by convincing the king to pass a decree against worshipping any god or human being, manipulating him by saying it was in accordance with the law of Medes and Persians (their legal system at the time). The king had no choice but to agree. These administrators knew Daniel would always worship God so they knew he would break the rule. The punishment for going against a decree, at the time, was to be thrown into a lion’s den. The king liked Daniel but had to stay impartial and threw him in the den. The administrators were happy because they thought Daniel would be eaten by the lions.(PS: This level of pettiness is out of this world). Despite what they thought, Daniel trusted God in His situation and God sent an angel to shut the mouths of the lions and he got out unharmed. Afterwards, the king decreed that everyone worship the God that saved Daniel from the lions and threw the jealous administrators in the den instead, as their punishment, where they were torn apart even before they made it inside the den. God didn’t kill the lions, He could but He didn’t. God didn’t provide an escape route for Daniel. Daniel was still in this petrifying situation but still trusted God. (imagine being in a den of hungry lions..boy oh boy! would I have passed out and went into a coma!).

Many of us, including myself, are always quick to despair and lose our faith especially when God doesn’t take the situation away from us. We forget the God we serve. He is the God that created the heavens and the earth. An omnipotent God who is not intimidated by our little problems. Yes, little. Do you want to know the best part? (I was going to tell you anyway). He says He is in us. HE IS IN US!!! That means we already have the power to overcome our fears. God is practical. He knows very well, since He created us, that we will get scared. So He’s not saying “Don’t be scared.” He knows you are and will probably always will be. You’re human. He is saying “Don’t let worry win.” As pastor Steven Furtick says, “Christ is in me, I am enough. So inhale His presence and exhale peace.”

Delusion: By now you already know what delusion is. If you don’t, this section is just for you. Delusion is thinking that because you have faith you can pray to God before you sleep and wake up to all your problems gone- all you debts forgiven, no one gossiping about you at work, that money that was stolen from you just magically returned to your bank account. C’mon folks! I fall victim to this so I’m talking to myself too. We need to wake up from these delusions of thinking God is a magician. Would you have ever learnt how to ride a bike without falling all those times? Would you have ever matured from crying about your legos and barbie dolls as a child if you didn’t have to suck it up and share to being an adult that you now know to give to those who lack? We need to stop praying for these problems to go away and depressing ourselves but ask God to carry us through them as we learn what there is to learn. No matter how twisted that sounds.

To put the icing on the cake, let me bless your week with a link to this powerful video: I Can Handle It . My favourite line from the video is: “Faith doesn’t take the fear away, it teaches me to fight it.”

Lovely weekend ahead folks!

Peace, love and salted caramel shakes!

 

It Makes No Sense but This is Grace!

Hi there!

Today I woke up with variegated emotions. Reason being, I had set out my day to be productive but ended up wasting most of it sleeping. In this month of January, I had made the decision to spend more time with God and limit my time on social media since I’m always glued to my phone. I know, such a typical millennial I am yeah? On the other hand, I have the HR department at my new job totally give me a hard time with my on-boarding process. I mean, it is one thing after another. They are either missing a document or just needing more info on something. All these thoughts felt taunting because they would interrupt my date with God which ultimately shook my focus and cost me hours I could’ve learnt something. Nonetheless, all was not lost. I am writing this post after watching what I would consider the greatest message yet. It is by one of my favourite speakers of all time, Pastor Steven Furtick. This guy is just loaded with the Word of God. I know this for a fact because every time I listen to him, I always feel hopeful and strengthened in my faith. This is exactly what ministry is about. I just love listening to Him. Here’s the link to his message, you’re welcome>>Good Morning Midnight | Pastor Steven Furtick<<

“The proof of the power in the presence of God is not in the absence of the attack but the ability of the believer to withstand it. Just because God is for you doesn’t mean that you won’t have anything come against you. In fact, it almost guarantees that you will. The greater the calling, the greater the conflict. The greater the anointing the greater the attack.”                                                        -Pastor Steven Furtick

In summary, Pastor Steve here was talking about that time when Paul and Silas had been locked up and they began to pray, but at midnight, there was an earthquake and their chains broke loose. Instead of taking the easy way out and running away, they led the prison guard who had locked them up in the first place to Christ and he got saved (Acts 16:22-34). I don’t know about you but I’m the exact opposite of Paul and Silas. I am the founder of the run-away-from-your-problems club. I see a problem and I will look for every possible way out just so I don’t have to endure it.

But wait, there’s more…so God said.

This mindset is starting to change. It’s starting to change because things are different. Now, I have faith that rests in my heart and activates like a superpower when a problem arises. Before, I would ignorantly call it my own grit but oh no sir, it’s by God’s grace I even have this power, power to endure. See, God said, when you accept Him into your life you become one with Him (1 Corinthians 6:17). Did you read that? Please let that sink in. He said we become one with Him. THE one and only God. That means, he entitles us to His things- that includes hope, faith and ability to endure hardship. This verse Matthew 8:25-27 popped up in my heart as Pastor Steven was speaking; it was during a storm and Jesus was napping. If it was me, I would have drawn water from the sea and poured it on Him, like are you serious dude? You’re sleeping when we are about to drown? But Jesus hit the disciples with the, “Why are you afraid? You have so little faith.” You know, all calm and composed because what can intimidate Him right? He got up and rebuked the wind and waves, and suddenly there was a great calm. The disciples then said, “Yo! Who is this man that even the winds and waves obey Him!” When we allow God to be at the center of our lives, we have access to this power.We can speak to a problem and tell it to sit down and chill as you wait for answers from God on how to turn it around and better yourself. We are no longer intimidated by the problem. We are at peace as God takes us through it. It may not disappear like magic because God is not here to prove His power to you but to make you better in his image and likeness. So stop wishing for an easier way out (as I tell myself this) and start asking God to hold your hand through it and to make you gain from it. To give you the power to stand face to face with it and not flinch. He has great plans that are not to harm you but to give you a future and a hope (Jeremiah 29:11). This is how my faith has increased. I got better at activating my superpower [faith] and literally speaking to my problems and saying, “You may scare me but you will not scare the God in me.”

Challenge of the week: I have started making flashcards of memory verses for every situation e.g During crisis- Matthew 8:25-27. The goal is to memorize them so that when a problem arises I have the Word of God embedded in my heart to back me up as I rise to the challenge. I challenge you to try it!

Have a great week ahead folks,

Peace, love and salted caramel shakes!