Thoughts and Other Things

For as long as I’ve read the book of Jonah, my focus was on Jonah (the book is titled after him after all). I would love to say I was studying the book when I discovered some of the things I’m about to share, but ministry and adulting just isn’t that glamorous. I was doing what I call a ‘rush job’ (where I desperately plead with God to speak to me minutes before leaving for service because I was held up by other ministerial duties throughout the day) when God pulled my attention to the sailors in the story. For the first time I realized how they suffered as a result of someone else’s bad decisions, all because they allowed him to board their ship. Pondering upon this, I concluded that some of the tough consequences we have to put up with aren’t even a result of our decisions, but a result of being connected to people who make poor decisions. This calls for us to really make an effort into evaluating who we allow to enter our lives. These men knew very little about Jonah. All they ...

While working with the young men from our youth group at the construction site over the weekend, one commented that if you want people’s attention, talk about relationships. This came about as we discussed the poor response to a discussion we had had the previous night on mental health. So, I thought I’d test this hypothesis. I want to adopt the concept of not being unequally yoked to talk about a common downfall in relationships: being unequally invested. A couple can have many differences and a number of qualities and values in varying proportions, but investment into the relationship cannot be one of them. Unlike shareholders of a company, one cannot hold more shares in the relationship than the other. If one values the relationship more and puts in more into it, they run a high chance of being used and abused. The concept of ‘unequally yoked’ is rooted in 2 Corinthians 6 where the bible states that believers should not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. Paul says this on t...

As a regular baker and cook, I’ve learnt that every ingredient is key to having the end product come out as promised. I made lasagna recently and substituted a few ingredients and added a bit of my own. Though it tasted good, it didn’t really look like the picture. I was most disappointed in the topping because instead of using a mixture of two types of cheese, I just used one, cheddar, so it was annoyingly bright yellow. From last week I’ve been pondering on how the same applies with God’s instructions. If what he promised is what shall be the end result, then we need to follow instructions. And not just some instructions, or the majority of the instructions, but ALL of them. I need to follow what God says about believing him as much as I listen to what he says about the way I use my mouth. I need to follow instructions pertaining to how I treat others as much as how I treat my body. No instruction is less, it all works to bring me to the promised result. In his Word, God literal...