Author: Gloryyah

What kind of King?

We live in an age when Christians have moved from one extreme of being looked at as nonentities and fanatics to the other extreme of behaving like celebrities. Some pastors move around with security and convoys, completely inaccessible to the flock they are to shepherd. For many, it is an abomination to do menial jobs and to serve (apart from within the four walls of the church and in the view of the pastor, of course). We have allowed one thing which our God hates to take us over – pride.

Self-assessment

As another year begins to wind down, different folks approach the last few weeks and days differently. Some focus on the expectations they had at the start of the year and launch a feverish attempt to ‘wrestle’ the things yet to be actualized from God’s hands before December 31st (regardless of whether or not He actually promised them these things or whether or not He gave them a timeline for their actualization). Some enter into a season of thanksgiving, focusing instead on the things God has done for them in the course of the year. Yet still, some take stock of the year to assess what they achieved in the year with a view to charting the course for the coming year.

Our hope

Yesterday, I was reminded about the enormity of God’s love for us….for me.

As we sang and cried out, “Holy, holy”, I marvelled at how such a holy God who dwells in unapproachable light and who clothes Himself with light loves us so much that He did all He could to make it possible for us to come close to Him. What indescribable love!

That wasn’t enough, apparently. The Holy Spirit wanted to make it really sink in so an old song by Amy Grant was sung – ‘In a little while’. The chorus goes thus:

In a little while, we’ll be with the Father
Can’t you see Him smile?
In a little while we’ll be home forever
In a while
We’re just here to learn to love Him
We’ll be home in just a little while

“Can’t you see Him smile?”…..

Broken, yet whole

Hi.

It’s that time of the year again.

It’s time for Alabaster Box 2019.

Living without the worry of money

“The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want.”(Psalm 23:1, NKJV)

I can’t speak for the multi-millionaires, but generally speaking, I don’t think anybody is immune to the worry of money. There are those times when money is running out way before your next salary or business income is due; or when there is a need greater that what you can afford, especially if it’s a dire need with a deadline. The natural reaction is to worry about it. Sleep goes out of the window and the wheels in the brain start working overtime trying to find a solution……trying to answer the question: “How can I get some money now?” Money is the unit of exchange on this side of Heaven, so the more we have of it the better off we are. Right? Wrong!

I guess the bigger question is: Is it really about (having) money or about having our needs met?

Who Owes Who?

There seems to be a general mindset among some Christians that because we have ‘given our lives to Christ’, He owes us. And what does He owe us? Well, every desire of our heart, of course! It is a sense of entitlement that needs to be addressed.

Let’s be honest. What is the one thing we all are entitled to?

That’s right…. death. Why?

“For the wages of sin is death,….” (Romans 6:23)

Yet Somebody died in our place so we could have life and that more abundantly. It would seem to me, then, that we are the ones who owe God. Even in instances where a human being saves another from death by jumping into the street to knock them out of harm’s way or rescuing them from a burning house or vehicle, the one who was saved feels eternally grateful and at the service of the saviour. How much more should we feel eternally grateful and eternally at the service of Christ who saved us from death both here and hereafter.

Undercover Agents

A lot of us have watched movies about spies (also known as undercover agents). A spy is a person employed by a government or other organization to secretly obtain information on an enemy or competitor. So they have their mission and in order to carry it out, they take on an identity which they live out such that nobody they relate with knows they are spies. They blend in with other people, working a normal job, with a family….on the outside, your everyday folks but in reality, something else.

It occurred to me one day that we are like undercover agents. We belong to families, go through the different phases of life here on Earth, perhaps marry and perhaps have children, get jobs or run businesses, etc. but underneath it all, we are on a mission. All the things I just enumerated are done as we blend in because we are IN the world but it behoves us to keep our focus on our mission and not get caught up with these things because we are not OF the world.

God’s Solution for Nigeria

In this election season in Nigeria, if there is one verse I have heard quoted a lot, it is

“if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”
(2 Chronicles 7:14 NIV)

I sat down to look at this verse properly and I thought to share my thoughts on it in the hope that we will actually do what God would have us do to get the results we all seem to want – change in our country.

Ascribing Worth

Every object has it’s intrinsic worth/value. However, it will be ascribed a different value by different people. To a poor child in the slums where the football they play with is made of rolled up paper, a real, rubber ball would be of immense worth. Yet that same ball would be regarded as nothing by a child who has all manner of toys as his heart desires. None of this changes the ball’s intrinsic worth (or market value).

In thinking about how we ascribe worth/value, I was able to come up with the following:

1. Value ascribed because of scarcity: