Resonance

Category: Commitment

  • Speaking the Truth in Love

    Speaking the Truth in Love

    But speaking the truth in love may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ:
    Ephesians 4:15 KJV

    The only thing deeper than truth is love. Love and truth are the most misunderstood, most controversial, most misinterpreted yet the most needful. There can be differences between anything and everything because of truth. In the same vein, there can be similarities between anything and everything because of love. Both are the web that ties and chains all things as unending and complex as the universe itself. Both are the most unknown, yet the most searched for.

    There is a difference between speaking the truth in love and loving to speak the truth. People normally offend others with their words and justify themselves by saying, “but that’s the truth”. The truth is never meant to hurt but heal. Disappointment hurts but Hope restores. That’s the Truth. There is difference between the Truth, and the emotions in which the truth is expressed. Hear me well! So if something is true and you say it in a rude way, you have communicated the truth in death. Don’t use the truth to hurt. Stop expressing the Truth in envy, bitterness, anger, jealousy etc. The only right way to communicate truth is in love.

    Speaking the truth in love is not the extreme too, where the truth is sugarcoated and made to lose its essence. That dilutes the truth into lies. You cannot love someone more than God. Godly sorrow leads to repentance. What we are saying is, communicate the truth with your mouth from a heart of love. There’s a place of pure genuine integrity where the truth expresses itself perfectly in Love. That place is Abba’s heart. In fact, that’s where all people are; in Abba’s heart.

    Love is the Ultimate truth. It is the beginning and the end. It is both the source and the focus of truth. Therefore, truth outside of love ceases to be truth. Just like everything else in the natural order, truth has boundaries, not limitations. The boundary of truth is love. Love is what protects the cell structure of truth. Love is truth. If there was no love, there wouldn’t be a need for truth.

    When someone who speaks the Truth in Love speaks, everyone always loves to listen. Not because there is a showoff of wisdom, but because there is this Love we can all connect to. That is what Abba Father created all things to be. Everything that has breath gives life. Life is not only given in sexual reproduction, but in other forms of production and reproduction, especially in our words.

    The Wise Man says;
    What you say can preserve life or destroy it; so you must accept the consequences of your words.
    Proverbs 18:21 GNB

    Whenever you hear something doctrinal and it puts you in fear and shame or it grips you like a force of bondage, then you didn’t hear the truth. The Truth ALWAYS liberates you. It sets you free from your own thinking; your own limits; your own restraint.

    When you hang around people who are broken, our compassion makes us feel and understand what they think, but that doesn’t mean that we should take up their mindset. Compassion becomes perversion when we reduce our convictions to embrace the crooked. Christianity is not a calling into isolation, where we isolate ourselves entirely from people due to their negativities; poor, broken, rude, hot-tempered, gay, bully, or naughty. Christianity is not compromise of convictions either.

    If no isolation at one extreme, then no compromise at other extreme either. People hang out with the poor and then develop a negative attitude against the rich. Pastors accept everyone for who they are, even homosexuals, and then develop a theology that supports homosexuality. How are you bringing light when you become darkness?

    Hanging out with people who don’t believe in godly values doesn’t mean we have to take up their conviction. It is wrong to avoid gays because you’re the help from God they need. But it is equally wrong when we try to defend their stance as though it is right. That is NOT compassion. That is compromise.

    You don’t have to change your convictions to love a homosexual. You’re not even helping the homosexual when you change your convictions. Jesus had great compassion for the lady who committed adultery and was about to be stoned. Jesus didn’t condemn her. Neither did He support her. Love is NOT Incompassionate compromise. Love is uncompromising Compassion.

    The Truth always operates in Love. Truth spoken outside Love breeds fear. Fear breeds slaves and self-righteous hubris. Truth spoken in Love breeds freedom and hope. Freedom breeds joy and peace.

    Love takes no pleasure in evil but rejoices over the truth. 1 Corinthians 13:6 ICB

    Just as I have spoken the Truth in Love to you, may your every word produce and preserve life all around you. I love you ♥

  • Consistency as a Divine Virtue & the Scary Inconsistency of Humans

    It’s yet another night. I’ve been sent to buy something, and I decided to take a stroll with Bezalel, my guardian angel. He almost always follows me everywhere I go, for he was sent to me the very day I was born to help me accomplish God’s plan for my life. That night I asked him, “what message does Heaven have for me today?”. Bezalel decided to share an observation angelic beings have made concerning humans. “We are surprised by your inconsistency. In Heaven, everything is consistent. Nothing ever falls out of place.” I can’t say same for earth.

    It’s true. When you observe animals, you’d be surprised at how consistent they are. They basically do the same thing around the same time everyday. No holidays; no sign of laziness; no sign of boredom; no complaint. So when something is wrong, you’d quickly notice. Imagine a bird feeling too lazy to fly today. Imagine a cock not being in the mood to crow. Have you seen an ant give up? The thought of it sounds absurd. How about a peacock not proud of its feathers? Or a human not in the mood to work?

    Bezalel was right. Humans are ridiculously inconsistent. It’s not a matter of just getting tired of things, it’s a matter of not being able to carry out something till it’s accomplished.

    This is a long read but can you simply and consistently read till the end though you don’t feel like it?

    Animals and trees give consistent praise to God. Trees wave in awe of Him. Birds chirp and tweet of His goodness. Dogs bark at the smell of His sweet aroma. And then there’s humans. He promised God something last two months but he doesn’t care about it anymore. She is feeling reluctant to even read the Bible nowadays. He doesn’t see the need to attend church services anymore. She is in a good season so her prayers and praise have drastically reduced.

    So how do we stay consistent in the things that matter?

    First of all, do realise that God is consistent. His character is flawless. Until you believe the consistency of God, you would find it very difficult being a Christian and walking with Him. He is consistently in love with you, consistently watching over you. He is consistently caring for your needs.

    This is the meaning of unconditional love. Love is consistent. Anything that stops or shifts in the wake of conditions is not consistent. I have given you one key of Consistency. Anything that is unconditional has infinite potential to be consistent. God’s love is not based on conditions. That’s why His love is consistent. Every excuse arises from a condition that stops the flow of Consistency. Think about it.

    Consistency or Consistent Inconsistency

    Always be joyful. Never stop praying. Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.


    1 Thessalonians 5:16‭-‬18 NLT



    Though the word “consistency” does not appear even once in the Bible, the above verse captures it wholeheartedly. “Always”. “Never stop”. “All”.

    Start small and be consistent till the end. It’s better to start small and be consistent than to start “boom” and stop before it even begins to count. Consistency is not about what you have to do. You already know all those things but don’t do them. “I have to start exercising.” “We have to communicate more.” “You have to open up.” “I have to go on a diet. My stomach is getting bigger.”

    Consistency is about breaking instructions, tasks and have-to-dos into smaller, simpler tasks that can be done for a long time to come. Start small. The little things will add up. It is better to eat two bowls of rice everyday for a year than to eat 365 bowls in two days. Both sum up the same number of bowls but one is healthier, more realistic and natural. The thing about consistency is that there will always be something we are consistent with or consistently doing. That’s right! Your habits. Therefore, it’s either one is consistent or consistently inconsistent. There’s always a routine to everything we do, and it will shock how long you’ve done a particular activity in your life.

    I’ve given you another key. Consistency is inevitable. You’ll always be consistent at something. These are your habits. Your second nature. Things you do with minimum logic and effort. So the question is not whether you’re consistent or not. The question is, “what are you consistent in doing?” Have you noticed that we are mostly identified by what we are always consistent with? “The girl who is always laughing”. “The guy who comes to sit here on Tuesdays”. “The guy who knows how to write.” What do you choose to identify yourself with? Be consistent in that!

    Thessalonians 5:16‭-‬18 shows us things we should always be consistent at; praise, prayers and perseverance. It’s not a suggestion. It’s a command. You cannot be a victorious Christian without being consistent in these. They are not one-time events. There are lifetime commitments.

    The Secret of Individual & Cooperate Consistency

    “…for you know that when your faith succeeds in facing such trials, the result is the ability to endure. Make sure that your endurance carries you all the way without failing, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.”


    James 1:3‭-‬4 GNT

    If you faint in the time of adversity, your strength is small, Proverbs 24:10 says. Trials don’t come to destroy you. They come to reveal you. That’s why I’m talking about what you consist of. It is what is within you that will enable you to stand firm.

    To be consistent, don’t rely on motivation and emotions. Rely on purpose and necessity. In other words, don’t do stuff because you feel like it. Day one, you will feel like it. One day, you won’t feel like it. Whenever you push yourself to do something though you don’t feel like it, you develop endurance. Read the Bible verse from James 1:3-4 again. When your endurance carries you all the way without failing??…that’s consistency!

    Consistency is from the Latin word “consistentia”, which means “standing together”. The singular form of the word, “consistentem”, means to stand firm. This illustration of a tree being “consistentem” in the midst of the storm, or the entire forest “consistentia”, really captures the root meaning. It’s all about what it consists of. Before we can stand together, we must individually be able to stand firm. So the first question is, “what are you made of as an individual?”.

    Aside from the individuality, God is also interested in the cooperate group. Inasmuch as God is going to judge us individually, God will also judge us based on the groups He placed us in. If you can stand firm individually, it is your duty to support others in need in any way you can because our destinies are interconnected.

    In Revelations 2 and 3, Jesus commended and rebuked churches as a whole, not individuals. The cooperate group is also important. Your Consistency must drag someone else along. It shouldn’t be just you. In fact, it is much more easier if the group is checking up on each other to keep on being consistent. We both know how important this is. May God help us. It’s about time God taught us how to be consistent 🙏

    I love you ❤️

  • Systems of Creation & Rest: the Kingdom of God

    God created the world in six days and rested on the 7th. Why would the Omnipotent God who can create everything at once take His time to create the world in six days? Because He is a God of Protocol and Structure. He created time for the purposes of processes. He does not live in time and is not bound by time. Therefore, His work in time is preplanned, protocoled, structured and executed. He never skips any process whatsoever. Until we understand the protocols of Heaven, we will doubt the Omnipotence of God.

    In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Since the creation of the heavens is of no direct benefit to us now, the details of creation are focused on that of the earth. See, not everything is given to us to know. What is secret belongs to God. What has been revealed belongs to us. You can easily waste your life acquiring strange knowledge that will not benefit you in any way.

    Knowledge is good but not all knowledge is relevant. Sometimes what you know stops you from knowing what you ought to know. The most difficult people to bring to light are those who have studied darkness. Stay away from reading extra-biblical and occultic books. If it’s not relevant to the Gospel of the Cross of Christ and the Kingdom of God, it’s not for you to know in this age. Selah!

    Wherever you find formlessness, you find darkness. Wherever there is a void, you make room for darkness. In every relevant area of your destiny and life, never leave room for even doubt. Speak the Word of Light into that area. Fill it all with the Light of the Word. So you see…on one hand, you can be swindling in the deepest darkness (if your light is darkness, how deep that darkness is) when you meddle in needless study of “darkness”.

    On the other hand, the very areas where you ought to speak light, you may have left unattended. You may be studying doctrines of demons. Meanwhile, the corridors of your soul that need attention are encapsulated with gross darkness. Seek light! Any form of ignorance in an area you ought to know is a foothold for the kingdom of darkness. What you don’t know will be used against you.

    In the creation, we see an alignment. The first day corresponds to the fourth day. The second day corresponds to the fifth day. The third day corresponds to the sixth day. On the first day, God created day and night so that on the fourth day, He could create the sun to govern the day and the moon to govern the night.

    On the second day, God separates the waters above from the waters below so that on the fifth day, He could create birds in the waters above and fish in the waters below. The same pattern is seen in the third and sixth day where God created the land on the third so he could create land creatures on the sixth. He also created seed-bearing trees on the third so He could create seed-carrying humans on the sixth.

    What does this teach us? A system that works first of all creates its environment before creating its product. God created land before creating land animals. Do the opposite and you will create products into a void. This is why the first thing you need before you create anything is Light. Be enlightened.

    If you lack Light, things will remain without form. How does one activate the Light into gross darkness. The pattern is clear! It is a partnership between the Spirit of God and the Word of God. This partnership brings life into a situation, just like that of the dry bones in Ezekiel’s time. This Life is the Light of men.

    We are really like a tree as Psalm 1:3 says. We are synthesized by Light. In His Light we see Light. Photosynthesis is the process of making food with light. We feed ourselves with light. The more light you have, the more you shine away the darkness in secret places. The very first we are compared to are trees and it’s not a coincidence at all. Like trees, we are planted in Him, deeply rooted and stemmed from Him.

    Like trees, we carry seeds and are fruitful. We are pruned and watered by the Word. As trees, we grow roots first. The leaves are what make photosynthesis possible. Have a structure that makes receiving from God always possible. That’s how you grow. The deeper the depths, the higher the heights. The tree system is the most self-sustaining in the whole earth. Every company that builds its structure like a tree will be sustainable; take root, one simple stem, complex inner networks, many branches, surplus fruits.

    Also, a system that works is one that creates an environment and then creates a government to overlook the enabled environment. It is not a system if it is not governed or overseen. There is no sun and moon for the first 3 days of creation. Scientifically, we think it’s not possible because what causes day and night is the rotation of the earth around the sun. However, the main reason God created the sun was to govern the day.

    Check Genesis 1:16. That means the sun is to make sure that there is daytime. What a God! The sun tells the time of the day, the moon tells the day of the month and the constellation of the stars tells the month of the year. These lights are for signs and seasons. Even time is governed in God’s system. What system have you created without government?

    God did not rest until He created the ultimate steward; a man in His own image and likeness. He could have chosen to create man first and make him observe how He created the world. As aforementioned, that detail was irrelevant to His purposes for man. He chose to create a miniature Heaven on Earth before creating His Image and Likeness to steward it.

    One of the worst mistakes you can make is to choose a “governor” and not give any mandate. Any employee who does not know the vision of the company will only work to get paid. Yet, we have church members who know nothing about the tenets of their faith. Eve failed because of inadequate information about the mandate. The devil exploited her ignorance and brought in darkness. You are not at rest as a creator if your followers don’t know the vision and mandate.

    So you see? Until you create a structure that governs your works, you cannot enter into rest. In rest, you stop working while your system works for you. If only you could read more, I would have shown you the systems God put in place with the Tabernacle of Moses. You have ignited your spirit with fire and you are wondering how people stay on fire for the rest of their lives? They have set up a structure to keep them continually ablaze.

    You want to be consistent and yet you are leaving so much to chance. Diligence is not by lack. It is sustained by systems. Set up structures. Creating an atmosphere is difficult. Sustaining it is even more difficult. Set up structures. What structures have you put in place to put you at rest in a particular matter?

  • Parenthood 202: How Fathers Make a Difference in our Lives

    This is not the most fatherless generation in history. Many generations lost millions of men on the battlefield. Fathers went to war and never returned. Some who returned were better off dead; fatally wounded and had a lot of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder to deal with. Some were deaf from the recurring sound of bombs. Others were too weak to recover from taking too many bullets. There have been many fatherless generations.

    This generation is the most fatherless generation that didn’t lose its fathers to war. In the USA alone, 19.7 million children – which is about 1 of out every 4 children – live without a father in their home. About one-third of Black Americans grow up without a Dad in their home. It’s a fact even from the experiential level, that there is a “father factor” in nearly all social vices.

    With the rise in extreme feminism, many women are gradually leaning toward having no man in their lives. Women are also complaining about double parenting, where there is a father figure in the house but he’s virtually useless and the woman takes double responsibility for running the home. The truth of the matter is, women have an inner craving in them for a male figure in their lives. Someone to protect them, at the very least; someone to direct them; someone to lead them. A girl’s bond with her father greatly affects her relationships with other men.

    Though some men may have failed women in a lot of ways, women must realize it’s only a ripple effect from men not having a father figure in their lives. Lecrae Moore said it better in his song, Just Like You;

    I got this emptiness inside that got me fighting for approval because I missed out on my daddy saying, “way to go”,

    Ain’t get that verbal affirmation or know how to treat a woman, know how to fix an engine,
    To keep the car running

    So now I’m looking at the media and following what they feed me,

    Lecrae Moore – Just Like You

    Fathers -lessness: A Generational Curse

    Our relationship with our earthly father also affects our relationship with our Heavenly Father. In 2001, Jennifer Hamer did research that showed that many African-American youths did not know how to approach their father when in his presence. Thus, if your father is more like a boss, you’re more likely to view God as a boss. Likewise, your relationship with God will likely be a very personal one if he’s a close friend.

    Even if there’s further research to prove that single parenting is equally as good as having two parents around, single parenting is not something to wish for. Single mothers are one of the poorest populations, many of them vulnerable to homelessness. In the United States, nearly half (45%) of single mothers and their children live below the poverty line. It’s not as easy as rich single mothers may make it look. The struggles that single parents face are greater than those in two-parent households.

    Moreover, it’s a generational curse. Men with absent fathers are more likely to become absent fathers themselves. Women with absent fathers are more likely to have children with absent fathers. Further research has shown that growing up without a father can permanently affect your brain. With society on the brink of collapse, the need for a father – not a perfect one, but one who will be there – is more important now than ever. Society will only flourish if matriarchy takes its place by patriarchy, not when the former overthrows the latter. Either of them will fail without the other.

    Be grateful to have a father and father figures in your life. They represented the Father and the fatherhood of God in your life. The enemy’s plan to eliminate fathers from society worked in America, and we all saw the dire effects associated with the rise of LGBT, abortion, gender-affirming surgeries and the lack of common sense. We shouldn’t sit down for this to be replicated in our society. We must honour our fathers, cherish them, celebrate them, remember them, and raise many more sons into fathers.

  • Parenting 101: 7 Things About Parenthood You Haven’t Noticed

    If you’ve never been a parent before, you think it’s easy to be a parent. Kids are the most expensive entities in the world. The most troublesome, stubbornest little cute pieces of burdens, actually. Yet, parenting is the most rewarding work in the world. No salary, no monetary gain (in fact, the most costly financial decision anyone could make), no guarantee and yet it is what makes all the difference in the world. Here are 7 things about parenthood you haven’t really noticed, even as a parent.

    1. It is the ultimate sacrifice

    There’s nothing in this world that’s going to bring you more joy than bringing someone into this world and watching them grow to become great. This is more than being the one who gave out the money to a brother who won the lottery or the one who supported a friend till they made it to the top. This is pouring out your life and soul and resources into another life. Parenting is the ultimate sacrifice, a different feel of love, and until you’re a parent it will never make sense.

    2. It requires your best life

    If you’re going to be a parent, it’s going to take the most and best part of your life. It will take not less than half of your entire life on average. Therefore, if you fail as a parent, you should know that it’s going to be the biggest regret of your life. This is not to scare you but to give you a certain kind of perspective. A big aspect of your purpose in life is directly tied to parenthood.

    3. It should determine your spouse

    If you’ve been picturing a “happy ever after” with the love of your life, well, don’t forget the kids. In fact, if anyone asked for my opinion concerning who to marry, I’d say choose someone who’d help you raise a happy home. It will be about the two of you for a few years. The rest of the years is mainly about the kids. Many rich successful people at the end of the road usually say that they wished they had spent more time with their family.

    4. It’s a lot more complex than you think

    Many say to themselves, “I’m awesome. I came out just fine. I’m going to raise my kids just like how I was raised. Except that I’m not gonna do these 5 mistakes my parents did and then my kids are gonna come out much better than I did”. No, it doesn’t work like that. It’s like saying you’ve been watching videos on heart surgery and you were smart enough to notice about 5 mistakes the surgeon did. Therefore, you can perform heart surgery. It just doesn’t work that way. In fact, parenting is much more complex than heart surgery. There is no fixed way of going about things. That’s the nature of relationships.

    5. Knowledge cannot be compared with experience

    Though you’ve been around and have been helping your parents in their parenting, you probably didn’t notice how they really make it work. You may think you can dance when you’re watching a dancing tutorial till it’s actually time to dance. That’s what I want you to understand. It only looks easy because they did over and over, but doing it over and over is the hard part. A lot of trial and error has gone into it. Parenting ain’t easy. If you think life is hard, try being responsible for another life.

    6. There is no perfect parent

    So appreciate your parents now that they are alive and be proud of them. Don’t hold that “entitlement attitude”; you’re-my-parent-so-you’re-supposed-to, I-didn’t-ask-you-to-give-birth-to-me bullshit. Parenting is not like running a business or having administrative duties, it’s a lot more complex than that so don’t make it too hard for them. They are doing their very best. Don’t wait till it’s your turn to be a parent to really realize this. Of course, they are not always right. So are you. Not always being right is completely normal. No need to make a big deal out of it and use it against them.

    7. It has a ripple effect

    As human beings, we usually replicate what we have been exposed to. Your parents are raising you in many ways like how their parents raised them. Funny enough, you are going to raise your kids surprisingly in many little ways like how you were raised. We don’t know any better. I’m not talking about what we know. I’m talking about what we’ve experienced. So if you want to raise your kids in a much more excellent way, be intentional about it and start now.

    It’s a good person that becomes a good parent. It starts by being a good child. So I edge you to break any generational curses and pass on the generational blessings. If you want to be appreciated as a parent, appreciate your parents. Let them know they have done well.

    I love you ❤️

  • Balance: The Essential Universal Principle that Holds Life Together

    Art and science. Logic and emotions. Work and play. These words are not opposites but having the two creates a design principle of the universe: balance. This principle is not that everything should be balanced but that everything IS balanced. This is because balance is not a matter of choice or preference. Where there is no balance, there is destruction; a break in the cycle of resurgence where everything just swirls into depletion and nothingness. It is the basic ingredient of existence.

    Balance: Perfection’s Best Kept Secret

    Balance: Perfection’s Best Kept Secret

    Perfection is a scary word for many, really. Use it three or four times in a sentence and someone will definitely give you a lecture of how things can’t be perfect. True! We are not powerful enough to control the balance of ups and downs, highs and lows or even foreknow if the good will outweigh the bad in any decision we make. The power to make things perfect is not even 5% in our hands. There will always be a margin of error.

    However, perfection simply means complete. Have you seen how the earth revolves around the sun using the sun’s gravity? That’s perfect! If it were slightly lower by even an inch raised to the power of an inch, our earth will rotate slowly away into the “nothingness” of space. If it were slightly higher by the same margin, the earth will rotate slowly towards the sun until it was completely burned up by the sun’s harmful radiations. Do you see that balance?

    That’s not the only example in nature. I could talk about reproduction and childbirth, atmospheric pressure, the human brain, the cycle of nitrogen, the food chain, and so on. The good part about all this is; we haven’t discovered a tenth of all there is to know about the universe. Yet, we see it clearly. A lot of what we call perfection is balance at work. Perfection can choose not to exist and we’ll be perfectly fine. The day balance leaves office, hell will break lose. Balance is literally what’s holding hell from breaking lose.

    Balance: the Shortcut to Consistency

    Balance: the Shortcut to Consistency

    Life is so unpredictable, and all we feed our brains from social media is how inconsistent and messed up one thing or another is. It was only a matter of time until someone popularizes the idea that there’s no such thing as consistency. To be honest, consistency really sounds like a cool word for perfection. It would have been easy to sell the idea that it’s as unrealistic as perfection.

    Guess what makes consistency possible? It’s not sheer will power or motivation or even knowledge. We all can know what to do and still watch ourselves not do it. We ride our consistency on the shoulders of motivation till it exhausts, then we’re more inconsistent than we were before. Consistency is more about holding something together, keeping it going like a cycle. You can’t force it.

    Of course, there are no shortcuts to consistency. However, what makes consistency consistent in the long-term is balance. If you keep your hands up for like forever, it’s called punishment. If you keep your hands up for 2 minutes and bring it down for about 45 seconds so you could keep it up again for 2 minutes, it’s called exercise. Creating that balance is what makes you consistent. You don’t have to beat yourself up.

    balance

    Work, but don’t kill yourself working. Rest, but don’t be lazy. Have some days off. Resurgence, remember? If you don’t balance exertion and rest, either of them is bound to destroy you. As aforementioned, where there is no balance there is destruction. Balance keeps you in a cycle to keep on keeping on.

    So keep on keeping on, baby ❤️

  • Planning Your Life : Practical Reasons Why You Need To

    Nobody is rich in time or poor in time. Everyone has 24 hours every day. Your dream is only a wish until it has a plan. The secret to success in life is the effective management of time and change. The principle key to management of time and change is planning.

    Planning is the most important principle of success in life. You were created by God to live life; not for life to live you. Life simply changes through time. The primary key to regulating and controlling change is planning.

    Time is present anyway. Planning is giving time purpose. The best way to predict the future is to invent it. Even God has a plan, how much more you. What I like about God is that He always exceeds our plans (Jeremiah 29:11). But if you do not have a plan, you give away your life to chance; life will toss you anywhere anyhow.

    Do not plan your life independent of God’s purpose. Synchronise your plans with God’s purpose. Proverbs 19:21 says, “Many are the plans in a man’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails”.

    Remember, your daily plans must bring you closer and closer to achieving your life’s purpose.

    P.S. This information is from Dr Myles Monroe and not the author’s own words.

  • New Year, Old Me: Do You Still Need to Make Resolutions?

    Everything is subject to diminishing returns under the sun. If you keep making New Year Resolutions and your lifestyle reset to default after only a few weeks, it only makes sense that you’ll get tired of making such Resolutions. The motivation with which people made Resolutions have died down in recent times. Now, basically, everyone is in the “I’m just there”, “let’s see what happens” mood.

    We all know there’s very little difference between the last day of the previous year and the first day of the current year. In other words, if you were in debt, were broke or stupid, you probably still are. Nothing has really changed in your situation. The only major difference is that the majority of the world has agreed that it is a new year. The fizzles of new year Resolutions die as the year goes by, and our behaviour resets to “factory settings”.

    Some even say that there’s nothing new about this year. Nothing shows that anything has changed. We all decided that today is the new year. That’s all! Some people even use a different calendar and to them, it may not be a new year. An example is the Chinese, whose New Year will fall on February 1st.

    Tapping Into The New Year Energy ✨

    Is there a need for Resolutions at all?

    Of course, there is. “You’re under no obligation to be the same person you were 5 minutes ago”, Alan Watts said.

    However, many miss an important step preceding resolutions: evaluations. At the end of every year, every institution holds an end-of-year meeting to calculate their profits. They evaluate their actions and decisions to determine what they did right – so they continue – and what they did wrong – so they re-strategize.

    Let’s all pretend like it’s just a new year like we already are. It is necessary that you self-evaluate. The days go by too fast for daily self-evaluation. After every month, however, self-evaluation will let you know if you are on track with your life goals or not. The year evaluation serves as a bigger picture to see the results of your minute actions and inactions. After the evaluation, re-solutions are made to make the most of the current year. So it’s rather systematic, not built on feelings of motivation and hyper-energy.

    new year resolutions - if you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there

    If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there. If you don’t define what success in life means to you and how it will look like, you wouldn’t have a yardstick to determine how whether you’re on the right path or not. It’s easy to know how far you’ve come because it’s all in the past. And oh!, how well we know our past. It’s the future we are all uncertain of.

    As you have already heard time and again, the best way to predict the future is to create it. Evaluate your life. Know where you want to go. Re-evaluate your life with time to know if you are on the right track or not. Make Resolutions to keep doing what is right and quit doing what is wrong. This is the purpose of Resolutions.

    Why You Need to Rejuvenate and not Restart in 2024

    Small Steps Everyday

    Understand where Resolutions are in the equation, and it will be simple for you to make them and keep them. “What if I fail like I did last year and the year before that, and the year before the year before that?”. If there was no failure, there wouldn’t be any need for Resolutions. Know this and know peace. So when you fail, don’t restart. Continue!

    Just as we “pretended” that today is a new day of a new year, you can pretend that each day is special to you. You have each day you awake to resolve the pitfalls in your life. Each day is a new year to do good, be good and live good. Remember, it is the individual trees that come together to form the forest. It is the little drops of water that make a mighty ocean.

    small steps every day - resolutions

  • Don’t Give Up Now: If Only You Knew Your Future

    Don’t Give Up Now: If Only You Knew Your Future

    If only you knew how glorious your future is, you wouldn’t be perturbed by the prevalent winds of the present. If only you knew how glorious your future is, the past would remain what it really is; the past.

    One mistake we often do is pick our present static state and put it in a dynamic future context. Why wouldn’t we be so anxious?

    Hard times make us appreciate the good times. Sad times gives us the experience of learning to do things at the right times. It’s not that we only tend to appreciate things when we lose it, but that we can only understand fully in retrospect.

    It may be hard but don't give up now

    That is why it is necessary to have a testimony. Testimonies are prophecies of possibilities. Have you been through a difficult time where you thought you had hit rock bottom but somehow you came through?

    If only you knew how painful giving up is, you wouldn’t have made it an option. It’s better to do your best and fail than to have never tried. There are some things that a person must learn on his own. A person grows up when he is forced to overcome hardships. The best in us will never be revealed until we have come between a rock and a hard place.

    Things change; hold on and don't give up

    Some things don’t change while others always do. Some things will change no matter what you do. Others will never change unless you do something. That is why you must never see “giving up” as an option when it gets so hard. Don’t allow your mind to tell your heart what to do. The mind gives up easily. The mind resorts to our instinctive most immature self when we are hard-pressed.

    Let the convictions of your heart be the decisions of your mind. One reason people resist change is that they focus on what they have to give up, rather than what they have to gain. The minute you think you wanna give up, think of the reason why you held on so long.

    At the end of the day, it’s not only going to get better; you’re going to get better. If only! If only you knew that one day you’re going to look back and be grateful that you didn’t give up, you’d work so hard to bring out the best in you.

    I love you ❤️

  • Be More Engaged & Less Attached: Living Rent-free from Negative Attachments

    Be More Engaged & Less Attached: Living Rent-free from Negative Attachments

    The more attached you are to someone or something, the more expectations you have for him/her/it. You’d expect a reciprocation of every affection and effort. Do good to others, not so they will reciprocate it, but because YOU want to do good. Love someone, not so that they will love you back, but because YOU choose to love the person. More people are broken, not just because they chose to love someone, but because they expected similar reciprocation. The easiest way to rid yourself of such expectations is to break such attachments.

    In the local sense of the word, attachment signifies a complete reliance on an entity such that the end of that entity is doom on your part as well. Consider an attachment to a firm; the firm takes advantage of your expertise and at the end of the day, chooses to pay you whatever amount they deem appropriate. They may choose not to even pay you. After all, the firm existed without you and will definitely flourish without you. You need them, they don’t. They can therefore use your need for them to their advantage. I may seem to be exaggerating but at least you get the picture.

    Goodness cannot be taken advantage of. It is insecurities that people take advantage of, and such insecurities mean you’ll forever be a slave to what you’ve wrongly attached yourself to.

    The irony of it is, the very thing you have made your life is what is causing you death if you fall into such a trap. Who have you fallen so much in love with? What have you become so vulnerable to? What has charmed you? Has it made you so blind and desperate that it is slowly eating you up? Is it worth fighting for or you’re just being insecure? Instead of fighting all signs, why don’t you just face your fears?

    Engage yourself. Engagement is balance. The value given is the value received. It is togetherness so strong that it’s tantamount to oneness. There is a coming together. Working together. A sharing. No one-way traffic. It’s a win-win situation. None is thinking about taking advantage, rather giving honour. There’s no strife. No insecurities that the other isn’t reciprocating similar effort. Each other’s weaknesses are made up for. Each other’s keeper indeed. When one is separated by distance, misunderstanding or even the vicissitudes of life, the other doesn’t suffocate. A tear is shed and life moves on.

    When someone or something gets in the way of such engagement, especially one of importance, necessity and/or mutuality, it is not viewed as one coming to compete with the relationship, whether it’s family or close friends. Because in engagement, we are not slaves to ourselves. We are not entangled, we are connected. Each entity is self-reliant and interdependent. This is the kind of relationship we ought to have with one another, with the environment, and with the universe.

    Be more engaged and less attached

  • Fake Friends Leave, True Friends Stay?

    Fake Friends Leave, True Friends Stay?

    Put yourself in this scenario; Imagine you are in an emergency. Think of people you can call. Those are your real friends.

    I used to think this way until I read the exact same idea on the internet. To me, it wasn’t a nice confirmation. It was rather a time of contemplation. There are those who will call me in such a scenario that I can’t call if I find myself in the same scenario. It doesn’t mean we are not friends. We are just not that type of friends. The “scenario” concept is just theoretical. In reality, it’s more complicated than that. It would be therefore detrimental for you to put those who would respond to your emergency in the special category and label all others as fake friends.

    No matter how hard you try, whether you are the most approachable person in your workplace, the funniest guy in the world or the most famous entertainer, we all have a small circle. It’s not small just because there are more people outside it than there are in it. No! It’s small because no matter how hard you try to expand it, it will remain small. The more people you add to your small circle, the more likely some others in the small circle will leave. No one has a small circle of 50 people. The goal is to expand your acquaintance circle. That circle can take everyone in the whole world. Expanding the small circle has a great limitation; it can only hold about a dozen people at a time. This leads us to a major misconception that needs to be tackled;

    MYTH: FAKE FRIENDS LEAVE, TRUE FRIENDS STAY

    Perhaps we’ve all had a “friend” we really thought was our friend till a situation came up. After cutting off the person, we see quotes like these on the internet and we find it so relatable. First of all, no matter how many times the universe is involved, we ultimately choose our friends. We can become acquainted by accident sort of, but no one unintentionally becomes friends with someone by chance. If anything at all, you made an effort to intentionally communicate with the person, which is essential for the growth from just an acquaintance, to being a close friend.

    When someone is in your close circle, there is that feeling of “best friends forever”, “you and I against the world”. Though seemingly unrealistic because we do not know the future, it’s necessary that that phase occurs and y’all live in the moment and enjoy every phase of it.

    The truth is, some people are gonna leave your inner circle with time. Not anything so personal. It’s just that, life happens. Of course, not all your best friends are gonna be best friends with you forever. Y’all became friends at one phase in your life and may move on when another phase sets in. That’s just the way it is. The truth is, once you’ve been friends with someone through the thick and thin, it doesn’t matter if y’all don’t talk or see each other often; in your hearts, y’all are still friends. In fact, such a friend may even die but you can remember them in your heart for the rest of your life. Are they in your inner circle? No. But they used to be. Such people are in what I call the “good friends” zone.

    Am I saying that there’s no such thing as a fake friend? No! All I’m saying is, friends come and go. Real friends. And that is absolutely okay. For some of us, life is gonna take us away from our families and they are gonna leave our inner circle. But they will forever hold a special place in our lives regardless. Truth is, you’re gonna meet your once best friend one day, exchange pleasantries, catch up on the good old times, share memories and then move on. Were they fake friends? No. Not in anyway. We just should’t expect someone to be there for us all the time. It’s beautiful that our journeys criss-cross and we meet people who forever make an impact on our lives, but always remember, we all are on our own individual journeys to our destination. One day, our paths may literally separate us. We should simply know that that path is gonna connect us to many other people who may choose to walk with us as well.

  • Choosing to Stay Pure in a Sexually Immoral World

    “If God didn’t want us to have sex before marriage, He would have given us our sexual organs on our wedding days”, says the fool who refuses to think deep. No boss will pay you a salary on the first day of employment. No tree will bear fruit on the first day of planting. Besides, people in ancient times used to be given in marriage soon after their puberty was discovered. The point is, no one is stopping you from enjoying sexual pleasure. God is rather preventing you from tremendous destruction.

    With great freedom comes less safety. Thus, the need to keep sexual pleasure within the safety of a commitment. If you’ve been involved in sexual immorality of any form before, you’d realize it has a really high addictive power. You can get addicted to porn for the majority of your life, fornicate every weekend, masturbate when the opportunity presents itself and lust continuously after someone almost every day. In fact, it is the highest sin one can commit (because it is a sin against your own body: 1 Cor 6:18) and the one that can permanently destroy your life the most.

    Yet, let’s not give it all the credit. It is not the most powerful force in the world. It is not the strongest drive. It’s not even the most addictive. Evil always looks like the winner when compared to good. That’s why I like what 1 Peter 1:14 says. Some versions use the word “ignorant”. We were ignorant. That’s why we kept going back. We thought the edge is too strong. That’s why we give in to it all the time. We didn’t know any better.

    So how do we live above that? It’s simple, not easy. We need to live as God’s obedient children. God will never lead us into temptation. If we find ourselves in one, His Voice will be loud and clear on what we must do. See it this way; it is more difficult to hear God’s Voice and still disobey. For His Voice will keep ringing in our minds and hearts to flee, to stop, to not venture, to expose the darkness, to unhide the secret sinful life. For no sexual sin can exist in Light.

    If you have never indulged in one form of sexual immorality like say, fornication, don’t fancy those who do. Don’t judge them either. In a few years to come, you can find yourself in a similar situation as theirs, if not even worse. If you have made up your mind to keep yourself until marriage, keep that mindset intact. Don’t let anyone convince you otherwise. Don’t let anyone belittle your virginity to you. Even rags have value, how much more wedding dresses.

    If you have dirtied yourself before and you feel devalued, get up from the mud and keep going. It’s not the end of the journey. This may not sound encouraging but there are far worse temptations awaiting you. There are bigger mountains to climb. Don’t let this hill look like it’s the end of the road. If you don’t even care anymore because you’ve gone too far and you’ve been in too deep, I’m here to tell you that it’s not too late. The prodigal son was competing with pigs to eat but the day He returned, His Father gave him the best robe, put a ring on his finger and got sandals on his feet. These three things represent his royalty, authority and dignity. In just one day, he was completely restored and he never went back.

    This post is for you. It is exactly what you need to hear right now. There is still hope. Grace is still available. There is still enough power, to stay pure in a sexually immoral world. I love you ❤️