Thought for Today

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Psalm 91

¹ Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High
    will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.^[a]
2 I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress,
    my God, in whom I trust.”

³ Surely he will save you
    from the fowler’s snare
    and from the deadly pestilence.
⁴ He will cover you with his feathers,
    and under his wings you will find refuge;
    his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.
⁵ You will not fear the terror of night,
    nor the arrow that flies by day,
⁶ nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness,
    nor the plague that destroys at midday.
⁷ A thousand may fall at your side,
    ten thousand at your right hand,
    but it will not come near you.
⁸ You will only observe with your eyes
    and see the punishment of the wicked.

⁹ If you say, “The Lord is my refuge,”
    and you make the Most High your dwelling,
¹⁰ no harm will overtake you,
    no disaster will come near your tent.
¹¹ For he will command his angels concerning you
    to guard you in all your ways;
¹² they will lift you up in their hands,
    so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.
¹³ You will tread on the lion and the cobra;
    you will trample the great lion and the serpent.

¹⁴ “Because he^[b] loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him;
    I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.
¹⁵ He will call on me, and I will answer him;
    I will be with him in trouble,
    I will deliver him and honor him.
¹⁶ With long life I will satisfy him
    and show him my salvation.”

The verses in bold are the ones that are ministering to me in a special way. God is watching out for us and protecting us. He is Sovereign and even the current uncertainty does not diminish His hugeness.

Monday Motivation

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A little faith in the hand of a big God is Powerful!!

Three (maybe, four) thoughts on Grace

At Church we are covering a series on Grace and so far the study has reminded me of two things that I would like to share today.

The definition of grace is “unearned, unmerited and undeserved kindness and favour of God.” Grace is free and has all to do with God and His love for us a sinful, unfaithful and undeserving people.

Sometimes we forget this meaning and so it’s the third thing that we often forget and so I thought it wise to begin there. Now onto the things that I have actually learnt.

1. No sin is bigger than God’s grace. There is nothing that we can do that will set us apart from the grace of God. Because if there were, it would negate the very definition of grace.
2. We have to accept this grace on our own behalf. In that sense it’s personal but it’s also possible that you can reject it and miss out because we choose the penalty (death – the wage for sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ [Rom 6:23]) over and over again.
3. Lastly, due to our nature, we can get very transactional with God. If you do this, I will ….  I thought I didn’t do this but I see that I quite often do this I still bargain and negotiate and try to “please” God so I am slowly learning to rest in His completed work and to be still.

I pray that I continue to meditate on these truths always.

Monday Thought

⁴³ So the Lord gave Israel all the land he had sworn to give their ancestors, and they took possession of it and settled there.

⁴⁴ The Lord gave them rest on every side, just as he had sworn to their ancestors. Not one of their enemies withstood them; the Lord gave all their enemies into their hands.

⁴⁵ Not one of all the Lord’s good promises to Israel failed; every one was fulfilled.

Joshua 21:45 (NIV)

This year’s study of BSF begun with the book of Joshua and I am in awe of God and His faithfulness to His Word and His Character. God never lies and He can be depended on always as we see in these three remarkable verses above. I can trust God with my present and future cares, wishes and thoughts. He can be trusted.

I have also learnt about obedience through Joshua’s response to God’s commands. He was swift in His obedience and He always trusted that God would come through for him and the Israelites. How was he so sure? Because he abided in God’s word and spent time in prayer such that he knew what to ask, how to trust and how to obey. I want that, don’t you?

 

 

Sunday Reads

• Grandparents are the bomb.com
• Teaching your kids the bible.
• Trusting God through suffering.
• Marriage advise for young women.
• Bringing your full self to work, even your weekend / after-hours self.
• Humans are versatile and multi-dimensional.
• I enjoyed Africa’s a Country posts during the World Cup on racism in France
• … and the fear of a black France.
• Planting food in your home garden.
• Would you live in a house without a kitchen or re purpose the room if you never cook?
• Memoirs from North Korea

Recipes

• Cooking with tuna.
• Cauliflower stir-fry with quinoa.
• … and another one pot quinoa pilaf recipe.
• Egg-free ice cream.
• Chickpea And Coconut Korma Curry With Pumpkin.
• Cooking with cream 

 

Tuesday Tunes

Some mellow songs to soak in …

 

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid. John 14:27 (NIV)

Want to be Successful?

⁷ “Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the law my servant Moses gave you; do not turn from it to the right or to the left,that you may be successful wherever you go.

⁸ Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.

⁹ Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.” (Joshua 1:7-9)

True success is found in meditating on the Word of God and in carefully obeying His precepts. I will be honest and say that this is not how I often think of success but my prayer is that for the days to come, this is how I would view it and by the grace of God attempt to live my life out like this.

Transformed by God, for His Purpose

Romans 12:1-2

Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. 

We recently read this at BSF and here are a couple of thoughts that I would like to share with you.

1. Our response in sacrifice, follows God’s mercy to us, former sinners who now believe in Him, receive righteousness. and therefore belong to His family This is the right and reasonable response. Have you consciously made this choice to belong to Christ’s family?
2. A living sacrifice signifies that it is a voluntary choice, continuous and implies a death to self. All Christians are called to die to self daily, take up their cross and follow Christ.
3. Something holy is something consecrated and set apart. What we offer to God is different from what we offer to anyone else. This particular thought struck me because we live in a very secular world and I struggled to think of those holy things that I only set aside for God.
4. The verse speaks of either the pattern of the world or a renewed mind. It is truly binary. God will not be mocked and we cannot fool Him by adding on anything to His word. Off the top of my head, I think of ancestral worship, superstition, witchcraft, modern/ humanistic thoughts. None of that compares to God, it is the world or Christ’s way.
5. Ultimately,  we all struggle with discerning God’s will. What is God saying, what does he mean, what should I do …? All of this is never easy or obvious but this verse makes clear that it is found by abiding in God’s presence and dwelling in His word, only then  will one know His good, pleasing and perfect will.

Be Blessed!

Sunday Reads

“To all the little girls out there,
we will set fire to this world
that steals your childhoods
and stops you from being
everything you want to be,
and build you a better one from the ashes,
the kind of world that treasures you
for all your powerful capabilities.”

– Nikita Gill, Women’s March 2018

• Improving your productivity when you work from home.
• Books on female friendship – I immediately got Sula, Toni Morrison.
• What some people will do to get married to the person of their choice.
• Helping your children to read the Bible.
• I would like a friend that keeps me accountable.
• I have been having Presidential Dinners.
• Tough circumstances but very important lessons for Christians in the Marketplace.
• Chimamanda on motherhood.
• I love me some “This is Us“

Recipes

• Wanna try this butternut, beans and enchiladas
• I think I am on a Mexican tip
• Another yummy mushroom recipe
• Healthy vegetarian recipes.
• 20-minute vegetarian curry.
• If you like to make burgers at home.

Sunday Reads

• This Nobel winner started a fund to help women deal the fact that they are disproportionately more likely to take care of children after hours.
• Imagine being old and dying all alone? Well me neither.
• Would you buy groceries that are still OK but past their best before date?
• Bible reading plans if you would like to get through it in one year.

Recipes

• Yummy chickpeas, broccoli and coconut.
• A week of chicken meals.

Building an Active Faith

UNWAVERING

Romans 4:20-21 NIV

Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God,  being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised.

Like Abraham, I want to face the truth of my circumstance and not flinch in face of them but to maintain my eyes on the focus on the truths of His promise and His character.  I want to have an active faith that clings desperately to God.

 

Why I Believe

This is the reason why I am a Christian. Truths I have been reminded through the study of Romans in BSF.

1. We are justified through faith because Jesus died for our sins and was raised for our justification (Romans 4:25). The great exchange: His life for ours; His righteousness for our sin.
2. Knowing this saves me from striving for salvation. There is nothing I can do to save myself., I am powerless to do this. If I do not accept this truth, I strive and try to work at my righteousness through works. All I can do is accept this free gift of salvation.
3. Christianity makes all men equal. Before salvation we were all sinners, after salvation we are all justified by faith. No one’s sin is greater than the other or the utter worst; none of us is more righteous once we have believed. God views all men as equal.
4. As a believer, I know what I am saved from (the penalty of sin which is death) and what I am saved for ( eternal life) and while here to do good works that God has prepared in advance for us to do (Ephesians 2:10).
5. While we wait for the day when we will be taken up to meet our Lord and Saviour, we have the Holy Spirit as a seal and a promise. He also reveals all truth and teaches us all things righteous.

So do you believe, and if you do not, will you tonight ask Him to be your Lord and Saviour (Acts 4:12 / John 14:6)?

A Thought for this Monday Morning

⁸ The Lord is compassionate and gracious,
    slow to anger, abounding in love.
⁹ He will not always accuse,
    nor will he harbor his anger forever;
¹⁰ he does not treat us as our sins deserve
    or repay us according to our iniquities.
¹¹ For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
    so great is his love for those who fear him;
¹² as far as the east is from the west,
    so far has he removed our transgressions from us. (Source)

Psalms 103: 12  reminds us that God forgives fully and removes our sins from us as far as the East is from the West. This truth came up recently when I  met a friend to discuss the bible studies that we had both done separately over the BSF break, her Hebrews and me, James.

A theme that separately came up for each of us is belief and how it is also possible for us as believers not to take God at His word and put in caveats that are not there OR that limit our overall ability to enjoy the time spent with Him. And this way, practice unbelief. In my specific case, this came through in the area of prayers. For others in my life, I am able to pray big prayers and believe on their behalf that God is who He says He is and that He can do what He said He will but somehow somehow in my case my faith is muted and I doubt that He will do what He said He can. So my pal rightly asked me: “what’s that about?” And in that moment, I was reminded of the verse that exhorts fathers not to provoke their children to anger by how they treat them (Ephesians 6: 4 NLT).

We often approach God based on our earthly experiences rather than step out of those and experience Him as the eternal Father who loves perfectly. Who has been perfectly revealed through His son Jesus Christ (Heb 1:3) and His living word (the Bible).

This contrasts with the devil who speaks from both sides of his mouth. On the one hand he is the father of all lies (John 8:44) and in the other, the accuser of brethren (Revelation 12:10). However, we also know that Jesus has fully overcome the world on our behalf and though we will have trouble we should take heart and have peace (John 16:33). This means that I can overcome this burden of shame and this fear of intimacy with Christ due to past sin by entrusting my all to Him and believing fully in Him. Additionally, I know that Revelation 12:11 talks of overcoming the accuser through the words of our testimony. By what we declare and what we state can we be renewed and overcome his lies about us, God’s children.

Questions to Ponder

1. In what ways do you struggle to take God fully at His word?
2. What are some of your personal life experiences that hinder the development of a childlike faith in God the Father?
3. How will knowing this truth of Christ now impact how you approach Him in faith?

Prayer

Lord we thank you that you are eternal yet unchanging, that your word is true and that you can swear by none but yourself which further encourages our faith in you. Forgive me where I have doubted your word in how I have acted, thought or spoken. Help me always to trust in you ( in the following specific areas of my life ) and believe even when my old self wants to doubt. Teach me how to hold onto my faith unswerving and this way to bring glory and honour to you. I thank you that you are a good Father who gives good gifts to His children and who forgives us fully and does not hold our past sins against us.

Concluding Thoughts from the Book of James

It is quite funny how we can pick to do something and then later find that God had actually purposed for us to learn from that experience. Well, I picked James as I had just finished doing John and wanted something light for the BSF break. How very wrong I was as James turned out to be the very thing I needed to continue with the lessons learnt from the Book of John.

What character traits of God did I see?

• God as sovereign, ordering all my plans and in control of my future.
• God as Judge. Reading James 5, I learnt that the coming of Christ is imminent and that in all my plans I have to remember the eternal plan for mankind’s salvation.
• God as transformer who is able to change me from my fallen self through to the daughter that He would have me become.

What actions/thoughts do I need to stop?

• How I use my tongue. 
• What wisdom do I rely on, Godly or earthly? (James 3: 13 – 17)
• Are my works an outer demonstration of the faith that I profess? ( James 2: 14 – 26)

How has the study encouraged me?

• I was encouraged by the fact that by abiding in Christ and remaining in His words and teachings, I will grow.  This was brought out through the likening of God’s word to a mirror. (James 1: 22 – 25)

²² Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. ²³ Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror ²⁴ and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. ²⁵ But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it—not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do.

So be encouraged!!

Something on my heart

How can small groups deepen their faith?

Encourage your group members to choose a verse or passage of the Bible that illustrates:

• A way they would like to grow in Christlikeness.
• A promise they need to remember.
• An attribute of God’s person they want to know more deeply.
• A precept they want to apply to an area of struggle, pain, or temptation.

Sisters, Jesus is not your Cheerleader

And, to be clear, Jesus does encourage. He offers words of strength to the weary and comfort to the hurting. In a world where we so often feel we don’t measure up, we need his encouragement daily. By focusing on only part of his message, however, I’m concerned that we’ve reduced Jesus to a spiritual cheerleader. And, in turn, that’s what we’ve become to one another. We offer words of affirmation, but not rebuke; words of forgiveness, but not repentance. We rightly celebrate his grace, but often forget to mourn our sin.

How to win the war for your mind

Take your thoughts captive and examine them closely. Bring them into submission. Consider the fruit. Then fight back with gospel truths. This is how we go to war.

When we don’t love the Bible

What can we do when we’re unmoved by God’s love and the gospel’s power?What can we do when we’re unmoved by God’s love and the gospel’s power?

Good lovemaking is about God

You can have the best spouse on the planet and enjoy the most fulfilling sex life imaginable, and still this fact remains: if our hearts are not satisfied in God, they will never be satisfied. Spouses can be wonderful helpers, but they are sorry saviors. The best way to have a blessed sex life is to delight in the God who gives the gift. Jesus is always better than any gift he gives you, including sex in marriage.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sunday Reads

• A guide to eating out in Cape Town.
• Black hair done beautifully.
• I would love this app when I become a mom.
• Oh dear,these two conversations, one and two.
• Please note the following before heading to Kampala.
• For book clubs that also like to pop bottles here’s a guide.
• I might have found out this year that poppy in poppy seeds is the same poppy in heroine.
• Books by Christian authors of colour.
• How death inspires us to live.
• How to get out of the season when you do not feel like reading your Bible.
• On practising hospitality.
• Some more on hospitality.
• This essay on the interplay between widowhood and food touched me so deeply.
• What makes a piece of chilli hot?

Recipes

• 22 ice cream flavours to try.
• More ice cream.
• Do you want to bake cakes?
• This coffee drink sounds yum.

 

 

Sunday Reads

Source

• Some of the narratives driving Kenya’s election.
• 17 strategies for the workplace.
• The place of the woman in the church: two similar views. One and Two.
• Stunning pictures of Ethiopia.
• ​Some amazing things to say to your dad
• ​On home and identity within Nigeria.
• You are better than you think you are.
• Wearing hair scarves.
• How many bible chapters do you know?
• Did you/did you not take your husbands surname? I didn’t/ haven’t.
• On praying for the salvation of lost family.
• I’ve been to one of these five cities.

Recipes

• 15 cakes to bake

Little things Wednesday

via

This week I am grateful for so many little things of a personal nature to me.

• My two little nephews – one is 8 years old and the other is just over a month old. With all the talk of a royal baby, it’s hard not to be grateful for the two that are related to me.
• Feeling more and more integrated with the new team at work and being involved in office banter.
• Had two difficult conversations that went very well actually.
• After three weeks of planning, I FINALLY MADE IT BACK TO GYM!
• Went to St Georges Parktown this past Sunday. Love that Church.
• The opportunity to participate in a very practical and uplifting bible study with a friend in Nairobi.
• Job 37:14: Listen to this, Job; stop and consider God’s wonders

So what caught your eye this past week?