Thoughts and Other Things

I recently taught a message I needed to hear more than any of the people I was ministering it to. It's title was "Take Cover" and was based on Psalm 91:1-2 which says: " He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, "He is my refuge and my fortress, my God in whom I trust ."' Over the past few years, my health has not been what it had been growing up. I hadn't been back at the hospital since my birth. And the only thing that took me to the doctors office had been frostbite in my teens. But every since starting my journey in early adulthood, I've had some challenges regarding my health. I had recently gone for a check up and my world had been shaken up by the doctor's report, before I remembered this text. As I  watched things fall out of place as my earth quaked, as my eyes started to blur, as I started to loose my balance at the ground that shook beneath me, a small distant ...

I was telling a friend about a recent visit to my university campus to return library books. I was going on about how nice it must have been for the students who I passed in the study halls to be so close to campus. They were sitting in groups, pen in hand and laptops in place. I didn't have study buddies, I navigate myself through the courses. Goodness, even my "laptop" (it only works when it's plugged into a power source) isn't cooperating. I almost have to fast to get it to operate so I can type assignments. My friend stopped me in my tracks and said: "some of them probably looked at you and liked what you have". They probably thought how nice it was to have your own car to drive to campus, to have a job to fund your studies, which aren't your first qualification. I was immediately taken back to something that had been in my heart that very week, I wrote to you about it, gratitude. Another element of an attitude of gratitude (which we said keep...

The older I grow, the more grateful I am to have had and still have both my parents, but sometimes, you wouldn't know by the way I  complain about them. I was going through my baby album and couldn't help but cry when I realized that those two people were with me through every stage of my life. They were the consistent factor in all the photos. Some faces came and went away, I couldn't identify some, but these two faces, as much as they changed through the years, were always there. That's the life I've lived. And I am not one bit guilty to have lived it that way. I don't know why but sometimes people like me are sometimes made to feel guilty to have lived life so pain-free. We're made to feel that we haven't really lived life because we still have a home to run to. And I in no way underestimate the pain of loosing a parent or the challenge of living life without one, I cannot imagine what it must be like. But as much as those that lived and live life ...

I love it when God intercepts while I'm speaking, it's the fuel to my fire, my evidence that I'm not alone. I get such a kick from teaching His Word, I never have a doubt when I'm up there that this is what I'm purposed to do. I've said before that I know this is it because of the way it responds to me. That's how I define passion, not only doing something you love, but doing something that loves you, that responds to you, that bears fruit at your touch. Last night, while dealing with the curse of sin he opened my eyes to this truth: you cannot redeem something you've cursed. I was passing by Genesis 3 when He said this. I've always admired how He didn't curse Adam but the ground instead after he sinned, but never went far enough to learn why. God didn't curse Adam because He had it in His mind to later on redeem him. Of course this didn't mean that Adam could walk away without facing the consequences of what he'd done, but it also ...

With the rise of black women embracing their "blackness", some of us have been left behind, especially when the discussion moves from hair to skin complexion. I don't know about other so called "yellow bones" (I hate the term by the way, it makes no sense, there's no biological relation between pigmentation and bones, anyway), I feel kinda left out on "melanin monday" and feel it would be a bit weird to post a selfie with the hashtag #melaninpoppin because, well, my melanin ain't popping much. But I don't believe that makes me less "black" or less "African". The English word 'melanin' originates from the Greek word 'melas' which means 'black'. Biologically, it is defined as the pigment that gives human skin, hair, and eyes their color. Dark-skinned people have more melanin in their skin than light-skinned people have. And Melanin has it's share of advantages, not only does it offer protectio...

"Start now. Start where you are. Start with fear. Start with pain. Start with doubt. Start with hands shaking. Start with voice trembling. But Start." I don't know who said these words, but I know they were right. This is my 100th post and those words resound in my head as I recall how this blog came into existence. I was introduced to Blogger in July 2011 when I had to do an assignment that required a blog. I had first had exposure to blogging the previous year, in my first year, again through an assignment in Greek. Then we only had to comment on an existing blog. In my second year, I had to create my own blog where I'd conduct a survey, it was titled Marriage and Ministry and I never got any feedback from anyone who came across it, if anyone ever did. I passed my assignment and forgot all about the blog. Two years later, after multiple rejections from publishers, I was suffering from self-doubt, I wondered if my writing was worth reading. That's when I reme...

My ego works overtime, a cause of most of my frustration. Ego is defined as 'a person’s sense of self-esteem or self-importance', it originates from the Latin for 'I'. For some odd reason, ego is usually given a negative connotation in every day speech. That couldn't be further from the truth since the synonyms of ego are 'self-respect, self-conceit, self-image and self-confidence'. Back to my overactive ego. I cannot stand being in one-way relationships, I'm too conscious of myself to be in a relationship where I only give and never take. I just can't. I think I've written about the different ecological relationships before, but my memory stinks (and repetition never killed anyone anyway). Competition is the simple one, its multiple organisms fighting for the same resources. The competition may or may not lead to interference but it's a given that the more similar two species in a community are, the more competitive they are with each ...