#EVERYDAYJESUS provides!

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Sometimes when we are just too frugal and “economical”, we often think that we are being wise spenders or may be reserving something for the rainy day. The real truth here may be that we are not seeing Jesus every day.

Pour exemplum, if I have just one sachet of tomato paste and four cups of rice, and I know that in every way, two cups of rice is just enough for the day for me, and that one sachet of tomato paste is just sufficient to give me a decent pot of jollof rice for dinner, if I decide to divide that one sachet of tomato paste into two equal halves because I want to reserve a half for the remaining two cups for a “tomorrow”, such that my pot of rice of today becomes what my mother calls ‘win the war’ ( food for survival), then I have simply denied my trust in Jesus as my constant supply.

When Jesus taught His disciples to pray, He encouraged them to ask for their daily bread. He was simply trying to teach us to trust God, Abba Daddy for a one day at a time life.

In the Old Testament, God was called Jehovah Jireh because on the mountain He provided. This is to say that Jehovah Jireh knows how to provide just when we need it. Today, He has not changed His nature but He just changed the relationship with us that makes Him provide. Yesterday, the children of Israel found it difficult to learn that character of God, which their father Abraham learned. They always saved some Manna as a reserve for the next day against Jehovah Jireh’s instructions. They had trust issues and that was very repulsive to Him.

Today, He has become Abba Father, our Daddy. Jesus taught that if corrupt human daddies do well at giving, then our Father should do best. He supplies our needs according to His riches in glory through Christ Jesus. In fact Jesus taught that food, clothes and the like should not be part of what we should ask for because Daddy knows that we need them, we should bother about seeking His kingdom and His righteousness because all the other survival necessities would follow. Today, Jesus is asking us to trust God our Father and His father for supply and abundance every day.

Nevertheless, Jesus does not encourage waste or gluttony (remember the gathering after feeding the 5000 to their full). He wants us to enjoy every day, if we have a natural reserve, we may keep them naturally for the next day, or we could share if necessary, but we must not pass ourselves through a miserly miserable life in the name of being wise- even if that is wisdom, then it must be the wisdom of the world.

Every day Jesus provides just as we need it!

Sometimes when we are just too frugal and “economical”, we often think that we are being wise spenders or may be reserving something for the rainy day. The real truth here may be that we are not seeing Jesus every day.

Pour exemplum, if I have just one sachet of tomato paste and four cups of rice, and I know that in every way, two cups of rice is just enough for the day for me, and that one sachet of tomato paste is just sufficient to give me a decent pot of jollof rice for dinner, if I decide to divide that one sachet of tomato paste into two equal halves because I want to reserve a half for the remaining two cups for a “tomorrow”, such that my pot of rice of today becomes what my mother calls ‘win the war’ ( food for survival), then I have simply denied my trust in Jesus as my constant supply.

When Jesus taught His disciples to pray, He encouraged them to ask for their daily bread. He was simply trying to teach us to trust God, Abba Daddy for a one day at a time life.

In the Old Testament, God was called Jehovah Jireh because on the mountain He provided. This is to say that Jehovah Jireh knows how to provide just when we need it. Today, He has not changed His nature but He just changed the relationship with us that makes Him provide. Yesterday, the children of Israel found it difficult to learn that character of God, which their father Abraham learned. They always saved some Manna as a reserve for the next day against Jehovah Jireh’s instructions. They had trust issues and that was very repulsive to Him.

Today, He has become Abba Father, our Daddy. Jesus taught that if corrupt human daddies do well at giving, then our Father should do best. He supplies our needs according to His riches in glory through Christ Jesus. In fact Jesus taught that food, clothes and the like should not be part of what we should ask for because Daddy knows that we need them, we should bother about seeking His kingdom and His righteousness because all the other survival necessities would follow. Today, Jesus is asking us to trust God our Father and His father for supply and abundance every day.

Nevertheless, Jesus does not encourage waste or gluttony (remember the gathering after feeding the 5000 to their full). He wants us to enjoy every day, if we have a natural reserve, we may keep them naturally for the next day, or we could share if necessary, but we must not pass ourselves through a miserly miserable life in the name of being wise- even if that is wisdom, then it must be the wisdom of the world.

Every day Jesus provides just as we need it!

#EVERYDAYJESUS wants me to mean it!

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This morning I and rummies got ready to leave for lectures-we all had a long day ahead. We wanted to look the best that we could, you know most girls like to look good. Lipsticks were busy, eyeliners popped eyes, mirrors had many things to say, shadows, fragrances, talcum, rouges, were taking turns to make their contributions. And of course wardrobes were either functioning or malfunctioning as all the dresses pleaded for a chance to get picked for the day’s outing.

Soon the activities were dying down because we started leaving the room for lectures one after the other. I and one of my rummies were left and she had been talking with the mirror over and over again- I did not listen to their conversation anyways. It was almost immediately that I heard her say “Favor, tell me that I look nice”. Without thinking I replied “you look nice”. Then came the accusation “you never meant to say that, you just told me that I looked nice because I asked you to”. Without thinking again, I told her I did as she told me to and that I did not expect her to complain. I was shocked when she said “I AM HURT”. I was taken aback. I learned a lesson.

Jesus is a lot like us, or like her. He is totally man yet totally God. He hurts when we do things simply because we think the Bible demands them from us rather than because we were dying to do them. Pour exemplum, if I read my Bible and pray just because it is a Christian rule or duty, then Jesus would hurt because I don’t really enjoy the ‘us’ time. I was merely doing what was necessary. On the other hand, if I take out good time to study the Bible for myself and talk with Him because I really love to learn from Him and because in fact, I just can’t get enough of Him, then do I believe that He like any man, would feel loved and wanted. Jesus is just too gentle to demand things like studying the bible, and praying from us. Doing those things does not make Him love us more but in doing them we avail ourselves the opportunity of seeing things the way He sees them. Jesus wants us to do things when we are ready to, and because we really love to- that is love!

I wouldn’t be happy if my spouse struggles to spend some time with me simply because ‘they’ say he has to. I would just feel like I am a really boring person to be with. Jesus is not too far from being like me- he is still the Son of Man. Every day, Jesus wants me to mean it!

“If you love me, you will obey what I command.” John 14: 15 (NIV)

Email to Wole; Five nights ago

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Wole,

I’m sorry I didn’t get back to you immediately after the counseling session. A follow up was necessary. Do you still remember the story I told you during the counseling? And do you still remember I told you I wrote the whole incidence in my diary and that I’d email it to you? Well this is the excerpt from my diary. I hope you find it useful.

…………………………………………………………………………………………

The night turned to day and then it was night again, today’s night, so much like the others. A hazy feeling of shame lurked my mind. The same usual feeling. Will it continue like all the other nights?  I was still laid on the bed, my fingers pulling through the short hairs on my head, hot tears rolling down my face, sniffing back the phlegm that was running down my nose.  I had given up all I spent eighteen years building. Eighteen fruitful years of my life had come crashing just like that, in a night, five nights ago.

It had always been my tradition to keep bad company at arm’s length. I still hear daddy’s voice very clearly, when he’d quote the bible and say, “bad company corrupts good manners’’. He had also taken time, so much time to sit me down and talk to me before I left for the university. He had warned me to avoid bad boys and girls, and had always promised to support me and make sure I lack nothing. This promise he kept even till now.

As I wriggle on the bed even now, I am so much filled with shame and dismay. The memories of last Friday refrain from leaving my mind. I still see Joke, lying beside me with nothing but my black polo covering her body. The smiles, the red lips, the made-up face I now find scary, the long nails. Why didn’t I see all these all along? Why didn’t I see what they symbolised? I probably was blinded by lust. In a moment, I had lost consciousness and forgotten everything I knew, my identity as a child of God, my background, my eighteen years of sweet fellowship with God, my life.

It started on a Sunday morning at church. The brightly fair slender lady, who led praise and worship that Sunday, was not the usual girl we were accustomed to every Sunday. Hers was a peculiar style of singing. The way she blended her Yoruba accent into her high pitched soprano voice was dazzling. I knew there was something more to her. At least at the moment I was content with the fact that she was beautiful and a good singer with a mellifluous voice. Those were dazzling and unusual qualities.

After service that Sunday, I had proceeded to go and shake hands with her and of course tell her how wonderful her voice was. She called me by name to my amazement, and told me my department. In fact she called the names of two of my classmates. We got along well and it seemed we were friends even before we met. I think I walked her back to her hostel that day.

Joke was determined to be my friend because I remember, after that Sunday I never really made efforts at keeping the friendship, but she did. She was the one who saw me later that week at the bible study and requested for my phone number. She was the one who called every night to say good bye to a “just a special friend”, it was she who remembered that last Friday, was Val’s day, and all of those things. Of course, I’m not blaming her, not at all. It was she who introduced the goodbye hugs. And it was I who saw nothing wrong in any of these. Let me take my own portion of the blame.

Last Friday, the Val’s day, Joke insisted she’d come visit me in my room. To me, it was okay, after all we were friends, from church, and we’ve been friends for some time. And it’s okay, come on, what are friends for? So I cleaned my room, laid a cleaner bedspread on the bed (the very one I’ve now stained with tears and mucous), got drinks in the fridge and made everywhere comfortable.

The Joke of Friday evening was not the Joke I’ve known. She wore a black gown, heavy make-ups, long nails, and….and yes, the gown was very tight and cleavage revealing. I didn’t seem to hate that. So I welcomed her, we spoke for long, laughed, stared at each other and exchanged smiles. Somewhere along the line, she pushed the window and the darkness was revealed into the room. The day had crept silently into the night and it was way into the night. Joke suddenly realised that she had to get back to her hostel, then she realised again that the hostels would be locked already, and then again she realised that the porter on duty that day was Mrs Ali. Of course, all of us who had female friends knew Mrs Ali. She was one of the porters in charge of Bello hostel. She was mean, rude and crude. All the boys who went for Belloship had once or twice encountered her. She was well known.

That night, Joke resorted to passing the night at my place, this was five nights ago.

As the night went on and we kept talking, Joke began to feel uneasy in her gown and demanded she needed to change, but to what?

“Ah, what’s there?” was the reply. “You can easily give me one of those your big polo shirts, or long sleeved shirt, as long as it’s big. But I prefer a polo shirt; I’d be freer in it. And then you can go out while I change. I won’t take long.”

The ease with which she sounded should have suggested to me that she was used to sleeping over at guys’ houses, but I wasn’t thinking. How else did she know that big polo shirts would do, and several other things. I gave her a black polo top and made for the door.

“You don’t even have to go if you don’t want to, let it not be that I’m asking you out of your room, making you uncomfortable. Lol.”

“You don’t mind if I stay?” I asked. “Seriously I don’t, is it not your house, I should be the one going out not you.” She replied. I went out all the same as soon as she started undressing.

A voice called out to me few minutes later telling me she was done. I went into the room to see her sitting on the bed thighs fully exposed. My body at this time had understood the full gist and was already reacting. The urge to resist Joke was not there. Perhaps I’d wanted it too. Like a lamb to the slaughter I went to the bed, so easily.

It is five days past now but I’ve not been myself since then. I’m crying and praying but it was real, it happened, it was not a dream. I had sex with Joke, five nights ago on this same bed. I fornicated.

The feelings of shame have not left me since then although I’m remorseful and have prayed for forgiveness. I’m writing and I’m crying because I know that things are not the same any more. For the Bible, I’ve become like a piece of bread. I’ve lost my life to nothingness in vain short-lived pleasure. I don’t know about Joke but she’s gone and I haven’t heard from her since Saturday morning when she left the house.

…………………………………………………………………………………………

Here is the truth about what really happened to me. That very Sunday when I first met Joke in the church, my heart began to lust after her. I’d thought everyone was holy, at least in church. But there was I, looking at a lady leading the worship and lusting after her. I think the real truth about it was the moment I began to look at porn pictures in Gbenga’s phone gallery. And then maybe those moments when I downloaded them myself, deleted and re-downloaded again. But somehow, it didn’t start in church, that Sunday.

So as time passed and I and Joke got to spend more time with each other, I’d always come back thinking over the hugs and then the words she said and wishing I really got more than the hugs. I was really giving the devil a foothold in my heart and in my life. Those days when every SMS she sent meant the whole world to me and I’d spend hours reading and rereading all built up momentum for that Friday night. No wonder it was so easy for me to give in.

So Wole, your story is not too different from mine and may the Lord help you to overcome like I’ve done. I am praying for you and will call you in due time. Remember you are now a new creation; old things have passed away even Vera.

Cheers!

Kunle.

BUILD CAPACITY

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I did a little study on the dynamics of child birth and I postulate that pregnant women fall into four different categories during delivery. The first category includes those who experience seamless delivery. These women can almost not feel the pain during delivery, not for the absence of it, but it becomes insignificant to them. The second category includes those who feel excruciating pains during delivery but somehow manage to push through to delivery. The third category includes those who feel excruciating pains but do not have enough strength to push through to delivery, but enough to stay alive to probably conceive again. The fourth category includes those who cannot bear the pain of delivery and hence throw in the towel.

Two things find commonality among these groups; Ability to conceive and Birth pains. For you to get to your PUSH point, you must have conceived and by consequence anticipate delivery pains. What determines the category you fall in is the capacity you have built during your pregnancy period. What you do during your pregnancy period plays a key role in your delivery period.

If you must have a safe and sound delivery of the greatness that is inside of you, you have to build capacity. Your pregnancy season should be a season of capacity building. I know you hope to be on the big stage tomorrow, build the capacity you need today. Don’t just loaf around and wait for the big stage, make use of the little ones you see now to build the capacity you need for the big stage. Without capacity, the big stage will swallow you. Capacity gives you strength to PUSH through to delivery.

I know your big stage is yet to come. I know you have those big ideas growing in your mind and yearning for expression. But I want to challenge you today to invest in capacity building. Study, read books, attend seminars and workshops, listen to people who will help you expand your ability to think, and strive to acquire relevant skills. Go for knowledge and information that will equip you for the big stage. Delivery becomes seamless for the man who has built enough capacity.

“If you faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small” Prov. 24:10 (KJV).
  
#THE PROCESS

Please share with others and let it bless them as it blessed you

Stay blessed.       
  

©TRANSFORMING WORDS SERIES
(Transforming the World through the Word)
http://www.transformingwordseries.wordpress.com

#EVERYDAYJESUS is Immanuel

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I think I am a really busy person-busy with necessary business: I am a final year student in her last semester so that spells STUDY and PROJECT! I am also a start-up entrepreneur, you may not find it necessary but for me, purpose and life needs funding- if you understand what I mean. I am committed to a local church because that is part of my responsibilities. I am also human therefore I need to eat, sleep, launder for ‘me’ and also ensure that I don’t become an “I”. I am also a girl who loves looking good so I need some time for that every day. And oh, I have lectures to attend, and guess what, the lecturers swept the official time table under the carpet. Also I have found myself, so I have to always speak up- I WRITE! And ultimately, I am a Christian therefore my spirit needs word grooming every day! That is what I survive on.

I have just 24 hours just like everyone else, therefore I have to plan every day, the day before and of course updating my to-do list every night. I make plans everyday but sometimes, some things wouldn’t just go as planned.

The pressures of my great everyday busyness formed my every day cares.

My project is really slow now because my research samples are a bit funny- human breast milk! Getting them is really not a joke. I am not even done with chapter one- that is if have a chapter one now. I have to complete and defend my project come mid-July- this is June already. I also have to contribute my daily quota to the Kingdom by writing and living.

Oh how I plan and work at my daily schedule diligently but how things choose to move pretty slowly, my project for one. In fact today, I had to re-adjust a letter I wrote to a hospital just after being delayed for three days by my department to get it endorsed! I mean I don’t have all that time.

Well, somehow I discovered that I was unruffled and unstressed by my many stress. I was and am still rested. I have learned to rest on the truth that that He is IMMANUEL to me, the God that is ever with me. I also stay on the truth that I have JESUS, the saving God. He didn’t just save my soul, He saves my day every day. In fact His job description is saving me! He is still saving situations for me daily.

I am comforted by the truth that I am His care. He loves me more than I love myself therefore He understands the urgency of my needs and cares so much more than I think I do. I love the truth that He will never, ever leave me or abandon me in any mess. I don’t like to mess up but even if go messy, He shows me mercy. Cleaning up my mess is not my business but His. I am His business. Yahweh has infinite methods of doing the same thing.

God never depends on our action or inaction to work things out, He depends on my trust for DADDY! He is Abba father, and daddy never lacks a plan so I think I am safe!

Cast all your anxieties upon the lord for He cares for you- 1 Peter 5: 7(NIV)

…And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”- Matthew 28:20b (NIV)

 

I TRIED

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I tried friends
I felt surrounded but loneliness abode
I was looking for acceptance
Expectations were too high
*I stood no chance
Disappointment…
Loneliness…
Neglect…

I tried music
It worked…
For a while
The songs that always seemed to capture my feelings
Made me feel all the more*
Disappointment
Loneliness
Neglect

I was sinking
Spiralling into depression
I was merely existing
No reason to live

Gloom

Then, stained glass, pulpit, pews.
I found Him.
I’m dead now
Yes, He took over my life
The depression, loneliness, neglect cease to exist
I have a reason to live
No need to grieve
I feel so full of life

Let me do the introductions…
Meet Jesus
My friend, my brother
One like no other
The Lord of lords
Who opens doors
The ancient of days
He does what he says
The beginning and the end
Yes, He’s Godsend
And
You are
The one who needs Him
Just three steps
I believed
I received
I had faith
I tried?
I tried no more
It’s not too late.

Adewunmi Ifejesu
Official CAP Team Poet