My Christian walk

Thanks to Abby Hahn on Wordpress.com Before the good news of Jesus' birth, God used to talk to His people through prophets. And just after the book of Malachi (the last book of the Old Testament, just so you know), it is said that God went silent for four hundred years, until the birth of John the Baptist (see  The bible Journey ). Yes, the gap between the Old and the New Testament is 400+ years: 400+ years of people not hearing from God, not even the one prophet they had left at the time (Malachi,  who died around 450 BC ). And all of a sudden, miracles started happening, angels  started visiting and singing, the Holy Spirit began pouring out on people, dreams started to be fulfilled and very old prophecies began coming to pass everywhere. At such a time as then, as no one was expecting to hear from God (and even if anyone did hear from Him, most certainly everybody expected Him to speak through another prophet or the teachers of the law), ordinary people started se...

Thanks to Ngozikaa! on WordPress From this previous article  you might recall that I mentioned that God chose to grow my faith through personal interactions with the Holy Spirit. He spoke to me directly almost every day through dreams, visions, convictions, knowings and His audible voice in times when I didn't have a  pastor or spiritual mentor. With this I found myself heavily relying on the active instruction of God to make any decision in my life, until a couple of years ago when that changed and I could only hear from God through His written word in the bible. You can't imagine how nervous I got every time I needed to make a decision, especially those major decisions, because I was used to God revealing things to me beforehand, and the Holy Spirit advising me on most things; but now, there was nothing, only silence. I cried, I prayed, I fasted, I begged the Lord for instruction, but all I got was a calm silence. Then I realized  that I needed to learn more about ...

Image from www.singleblackmale.org Do you know how cliche it looks when people start a ceremony with "deep" prayer and worship, after which they go ahead to party in a secular manner? Or when you enter a home and you find a big bible at the table, but the people in that home are living like they don't know a single thing about what that bible says? Or when we say a prayer for journey mercies while setting off for a long trip, and there after we start drinking and being immoral along the way? Or when someone wears a big rosary, but behaves like they've never met Christ? Or they have a bumper sticker that says, "Love one another," but they spit hate at every turn they make? I remember holding these conversations with friends as we went ahead to describe other believers as hypocritical Christians.  A few weeks ago, the Holy Spirit, with a heavy sadness, reminded me of a phrase from Enid Mercy's Book, Imitators of God .  " What you say you prioritize Vs...

Photo by imdb on Pinterest In the beginning, God put Adam into a deep sleep, removed his rib and made Eve, remember? Then God brought her to Adam, and Adam exclaimed: "This is now bone of my bones  and flesh of my flesh;  she shall be called 'woman,'  for she was taken out of man." - Genesis 2:21 - 23  Maybe these are not the most romantic words you have ever read, but please stick with me. Adam says to Eve the most confirming, the most secure words ever, he almost breaks out into song, to me those words sound like: "Woow wow wow This is now, Bone of my bone, We are made for each other We compliment each other She shall be called my wife For she was made for me!" Adam is not afraid that he might be wrong, he is not afraid that she might give him the forbidden fruit later, he is so confident in what he is feeling, seeing, knowing, and appreciating that he is able to speak out what he couldn't have possibly known: Eve being made from his bone. These are so...

Image from christiandiary4u.blogspot.com   Being generous means being willing to give money, kindness, etc, especially more than is usually expected (Cambridge dictionary) The difference between healthy and unhealthy generosity is the reason WHY we are being generous, or the reason why we give. "But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you." Matthew 6:3-4 Jesus encourages us to give in secret so that God can reward us, because when we do our acts of kindness for any other reason, we have already gotten that reward, so God can't add us another heavenly reward. For example, we might be giving: to be applauded, to get a better view of oneself, to appear wealthy, to appear better than others or to be seen, whatever the reason is; we don't get a reward from God because we have already gotten that reward of being seen or ...

Bad News | The New Yorker A girl had gone away from home to go to college, and while at college, she wrote her parents a letter that said, " Since I left for college, I've been remiss in writing, and am sorry for my thoughtlessness and not having written until now. But I'll bring you up to date now. But before you read on, please sit down. Are you sitting down? Don't read unless you're sitting down! Well, am getting along pretty well now, the skull fracture concussion that I got when I jumped out of my dormitory window when it caught on fire shortly after my arrival here, is pretty well healed. I only get those sick headaches that I've been having now once in a while instead of everyday. Fortunately, the fire in my dorm and the jump was witnessed by an attendant at the gas station. He ran over, took me to the hospital and continued to visit me there. When I eventually got out of the hospital, I had no where to live because of the burnt-out conditions of my room...

Image Gomeza is a happy girl but she is often confused. Her four older siblings can't stop teasing her, they say she is very light-skinned. The confusing part is that Gomeza's classmates often tell her she is very dark-skinned, and they sure do make fun of her dark skin. Please help Gomeza know if she is dark or light-skinned. Gomeza dislikes vegetables, her mother says that's why she is thin. They say she is the thinnest in the family, with the smallest bed, the smallest shoes, the tiniest clothes, and she’s the one to be carried on the lap while in the family car. Her siblings keep telling her that by her age, they had all already put on some good weight.  Another confusing part is that Gomeza has five best friends at school and they say she is fat. “Gomeza, you’re the fattest among us, you take up more space on the desk!” they complain. Gomeza gets confused again, “Am I thin or fat, someone please help me know what I am!” Gomeza is not a TV-...

In the photo: Zabuli Physically looking good? Why is this even a topic worth talking about? Well, I have some answers here but before we can jump in, let us begin by referring "physically looking good" to "being presentable or appealing": 1. To encourage Christians who put in the hard work to look good; because that way, they help make the gospel relevant to a given type of people. When I was still a teenager, I remember bringing to God an issue that I thought would bother me in my journey of salvation. "God," I started, "I really like being born again, and the amazing gift of eternal life. However, while still here on Earth, I really find the Christian way of dressing and physical outlook a little bit of a challenge."  Most of the Christians I always saw and knew were not looking good at all, to be honest. For example, they wore very unflattering outfits, no makeup on, and had almost the same miserable hair style ...

After high school, I was more than excited to finally grow my hair long (in case you didn't know, most Ugandan schools don't allow students to grow long hair). After a few months into the long holiday (here we normally call it a vacation)  before joining university, almost automatically, I went ahead to chemically relax my hair. No thought into it, it was just what it was: almost everyone I knew straightened their hair with chemicals. Before that, I had thin brownish hair strands, but the situation got even worse when I relaxed my hair with chemicals. The kindest people always made fun of how thin and sparse my hair was while the not-so-nice ones simply laughed off and gossiped away the matter. As if that wasn't enough, the chemicals burnt my scalp  so badly, that each time for retouch I couldn't help tearing at the smell of the chemical relaxers. After yet another chemical burn, I painfully wondered why we had to relax our hair with chemicals. ...

photo: NJlifehacks The "prosperity gospel" is one which acknowledges Jesus Christ as the means to get what we want, and it greatly asserts that Christ is the vehicle to riches, wealth, and whatever else we (materialistically) desire. Whereas the "true gospel" of Christ is that which acknowledges Jesus Christ as the end itself. In brief:  When you receive Jesus Christ, then you've reached your destination. So whatever wealth, prosperity or anything else that comes along with His great promises is a means for you to make his name known to the ends of the earth. It'd be very sad if any of us died before achieving our main goal in life, whatever that might be. To most of us it might be wealth. It is indeed sad, but if you died before acquiring wealth, you would still be okay. But if you died before receiving Jesus Christ in your heart, you would be eternally doomed to hell's flames. I am not saying that we shall...

Photo by David Clode on unsplash.com "There once was a shop selling brains," so goes the story. "The first was an American brain, the second was Chinese and the third was an African brain." "A buyer walked in and wanted to purchase one of the brains. To his surprise, he found out that the African brain was the most expensive of them all, so he inquired why it was so. 'You see, the African brain is the least used brain of them all, right now as you see it right there, it is as fresh as new.' The brain salesman replied..." Have you heard of this story before? It is usually well constructed by a motivational speaker or a financial guru as they try to encourage the African child to be more creative. I believe this story was created to insinuate that most Africans and/or African  countries at large are in a relatively unpleasant position than they would otherwise desire, because Africans do not think , they do not use their bra...

photo; unsplash.com   And he continued, "You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions!  For Moses said, 'Honor your father and mother,' and, 'Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.'  But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is Corban (that is, devoted to God)— then you no longer let them do anything for their father or mother. Thus you nullify the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And you do many things like that." (Mark 7:9-13) The first time I met this Bible verse, it got me thinking:  how many things have been handed down to me that nullify  the word of God? To  nullify  means to make of no use or no value; to cancel out.  This simply means that there are traditions, actions that we have grown up doing and our parents grew up doing that disrespect or undermi...

Photo picked from unsplash.com I pray that before the 7th of April 2020, the world will be back to normal and that this Corona virus will be on its way into the past. Notwithstanding, it is such a pity that some families might not really be able to go back to normal after all this, due to the saddening loss of their loved ones. May the Lord surely strength such, and heal the wounds and the hurt, which only He can do. Since I'm going to be turning another year older on the Tuesday of  7th April 2020, and no doubt becoming a "more serious adult", I'd love to share six things that I wish I had learnt earlier. 1. Life doesn't happen, you make it happen. Most times I used to respond to circumstances, I would plan depending on what I think might happen. If it didn't happen, then I'd simply give up; or if something else interrupted the plan, then I'd run after the new thing. Right now i realize that it is always better to act than ...