Jesus Christ is saying: I want to be your Best Friend

This week's post is about evaluating your relationship with Jesus Christ. How would you describe your relationship with Jesus Christ? What do you know about Jesus Christ?

The Holy Spirit would like me to remind you that He would like to have a best friend relationship with you. How amazing is that? Jesus Christ said in His Word that: 

"I do not call you servants any longer, because servants do not know what their master is doing. Instead, I call you friends, because I have told you everything I heard from my Father" (John 15:15 Good News Translation Version)

What does it mean for someone to be one's best friend? 

A best friend should ideally be your closest friend; a special friend that loves you. Your best friend should be the person that you always reach out to. Your best friend should know your likes and dislikes, you should also know your best friend's likes and dislikes. In addition, your best friend will always have your best interests at heart. You will also not want to do anything that will offend or upset your best friend.

Best Friend Relationship with Jesus Christ

Maybe you became a Christian a long time ago and you are not sure whether you have a very close relationship with Jesus Christ. Maybe you have heard about Jesus Christ or you are new to the Christian faith, Jesus Christ is speaking to you right now, He is saying: "Look! I stand at the door of your heart and knock. If you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in, and we will share a meal together as friends" (Revelations 3:20 New Living Translation Version Paraphrased).

Jesus Christ would like you:

• To know Him more than you currently do; He wants you to connect with Him more through the Holy Bible. The Holy Bible will reveal who Jesus Christ is to you. The Holy Bible will give you supernatural strength and godly wisdom. The Holy Bible will teach you all things that will help you to overcome temptations. The Holy Bible will keep your hope in Christ alive.

• To call upon Him at all times - In good times, in bad times, in times of trouble, Jesus would like you to call upon Him to tell Him everything.

• To show that you love Him by behaving in ways that you know that He finds acceptable.

• To feed your mind with things that will draw you to Him and not draw you away from Him - By ensuring your music, TV shows, things that you read, places that you go, things that you do, relationships that you have - all draw you close to Jesus Christ.

• To keep telling people about Him - When last did you share the Good News of Jesus Christ? When last did you show the love of Jesus Christ?

Jesus Christ is standing at the door of your heart, He wants your relationship with Him to be intimate. He wants to be your best friend, He wants to show you more of Him. Are you ready to be Jesus' Best Friend?

Say this Prayer:
Jesus, I invite you into my life and ask that you will be my best friend and companion through my journey in this world.

Have a lovely week!

- Mysses Lafunky

Candy Crush

Welcome to a new week people! Tomorrow, the 21st of August makes it a year to the day when I got the manifestation of a miracle I had prayed about for months. Thank God for being faithful to His word (Isa. 40:8). Last week, I mentioned how we get inspiration from God from the weirdest things. Well so it proved this week, while playing Candy Crush!

Being the "OG" that I am, I’ve always been prejudiced against people that played the game and dismissed it as a waste of time, until I downloaded it and played it. I’m still an "OG!" While playing the game, I began to understand the addiction behind the game. When you look beyond the surface, it's a game that teaches you about faith. Strange right? Well the essence of the game is for you to crush the candy but at the same time, I began to learn about not giving up, no matter the obstacle. Also, about holding on till the end because victory awaits those who do not give up!

"But you, be strong and do not let your hands be weak, for your work shall be rewarded!"

II Chronicles‬ 15:7‬ NKJV‬‬. ‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬

In order not to give up, you need to be a person of faith. Knowing that regardless of the circumstance, we will be victorious but until the manifestation of what we're praying for, you must hold on. You must be strong (Joshua 1:9). You must faith till the end. Remember, without faith, it is impossible to please God (Heb. 11:6). 

As we go into this new week, live a life of faith (Rom. 1:17, Gal. 3:11, Heb. 10:38). Regardless of the circumstance, declare that you are an overcomer! Search God’s word for a promise concerning your situation, meditate on it and remind Him of His promise to you. The bible says that His promises are yes and amen (2Cor. 1:20) and He is faithful to His word. 

Stay blessed! 

Sage

P.S. I’m on Level 117 of Candy Crush, played it multiple times to no avail but I shall overcome. I will faith till I overcome!!!

P.P.S. I’ve passed Level 117!! After multiple attempts for the last one week. Time for my victory speech: At this point, I’d like to thank God for always being there. My mama for believing in me when no one did. Love you mama! I had to edit the post to include this lol!

P.P.S. Listen to this awesome song by Travis Greene titled ‘while I’m waiting’: 

Happy Birthday Myssess Lafunky

May this new year open new doors of blessings, joy, peace, favour and good health for you in Jesus' name. Have a fabulous birthday!


The Editor

Who are You?

There is a popular saying among Christians: "God works in mysterious ways." I just found out that it’s actually not a verse in the bible, shocker 😱. Anyways, God works in mysterious ways and speaks to us in different ways; we just need to be attentive.

So I took my car for servicing recently and while the car was jacked up, I saw how dirty the underside of my car was and in the midst of my shock, I got the inspiration. II Tim. 3:16-17 says that all scripture is inspired by God. So while looking underneath my car and observing how dirty it was, I couldn’t help but compare and contrast it with the outside of my car and how I constantly got compliments on how neat it was, if only they knew how dirty it was underneath. I couldn’t help but think, how many of us look so beautiful and clean on the outside but dirty on the inside?

The Outside of my Car

The Underside of my Car

“But the LORD said to Samuel, “Do not look at his appearance or at his physical stature, because I have refused him. For the LORD does not see as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.” I Samuel‬ 16:7‬ NKJV‬‬. 

There’s a reason why God looks at the inside of our hearts and not the outside. We can make up our outward appearance in order to pretend to the world but we can’t pretend to ourselves and that is who God really wants to see and who He wants the world to see. The person that we see when we look at ourselves, not the image we portray to the world. In doing so, we can then reflect God’s glory to the world 

As we go into this week, ask yourself, who are you really? See what Matt. 23:25-28 says. Are you the same person on the inside and outside or are they different people? If you’re living two separate lives, reconcile yourself with God and ask Him to cleanse you and He'll do it (John 3:16). If you don’t know what to say or how to pray, just read Matt. 6:9-13.

Stay blessed. 

Sage

P.S. Football is back!!!

When Christians Pray: Great Things Happen

Hello Readers & Followers,

It's another Monday! Are you excited to start this new week or are you feeling weary? My prayer for you this morning is that the Lord will grant you divine strength for this new week in Jesus' name.

This week's post is an opportunity for you to reflect on why you pray to God.

Recently, God told me that one of the prayers that I had prayed to Him was prayed out of my normal Christian routine. God told me that my prayer was not from a heart that wanted an answer. Isn't God amazing? The fact that God knows the depth of our hearts and the purpose of why we do every single thing that we do. 

God reminded me that it was crucial for me to pray to Him with a mindset that He will answer my prayers. God's word says that: when a Christian prays, the prayer of a Christian can produce wonderful results (James 5:16 Paraphrased).

Back to you readers, I have a couple of questions to ask you.

Is praying to God part of your daily Christian routine? Do you sometimes pray to God without thinking whether God will answer you or not? or have you just proposed in your heart that as a Christian, you must pray?

David in Psalm 5:3 told God that: "In the morning, O LORD, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait in expectation.”

Check out how David ended his prayer?- "Wait in expectation". David prayed with a mindset that God heard Him and he waited in eager expectation for the manifestation of his requests. 

Peter's Miraculous Escape From Prison

There's a story in the bible in which church folks had gathered to pray for a man named Peter to be released from prison, whilst they were still praying, God had answered their prayers. God had sent an angel to rescue Peter from the prison. After Peter was rescued by the angel, he immediately went to visit his church folks, upon his arrival, a girl named Rhoda met him at the gate, she was in awe when she saw Peter, she ran in and announced that Peter was by the gate. 

Guess what? 
----The church folks didn't believe, in fact they said it was Peter's angel that Rhoda must have seen. This story is a reminder that there were believers from the time of Jesus Christ that did not always have immediate expectations of God answering their prayers (Acts 12:5-17).

The Charge For This Week

When you pray and you can't fathom how God will answer your prayers instantly, believe God and expects to see results as when a Christian prays, great things happen. 

Let's talk, I'd like to know your thoughts about these two questions:

1. Do you normally pray the same prayers until you see physical manifestations?
2. Or do you wait in expectation for the answer without repeating the prayer points?

Enjoy your new week! See you next Monday. 

- Mysses Lafunky

Acrimony: A Review

Be warned, there are spoilers!

The movie starts with a powerful song by Nina Simone that draws you into the first scene. The protagonist and the antagonist of the movie in a court setting with specific focus on the angry and hateful look on the face of the protagonist. Two minutes into the movie, she’s sentenced to attend anger management sessions with Nina Simone’s soulful voice in the background. If you’ve ever been in a relationship, you’ll know it takes no effort to go from love to hate. From happiness to anger and suddenly the person that brought butterflies to your stomach becomes the object of your anger, so the movie goes.

Our protagonist is now in an anger management class and so begins the narration of the movie and how it all unfolded. A story of an innocent young girl and how she met a guy. They fall in love, one things leads to another, everything is perfect (like it always tends to be at the beginning) then they get to the middle of the relationship. You know that part? When things settle into a routine, you begin to notice the person’s fault and all that stuff. So they’re right there in the middle and they start to notice each other’s flaws. One thing about this movie is how polarising it has been. Opinions and reactions tend to be divided across gender lines, so I’ll try to keep mine balanced.

A simple search on twitter will show you all the available reactions to the movie. Two of the most interesting analysis I’ve seen conclude with two things:

1. The guy didn’t fight hard enough. 
2. He shouldn’t have moved on with his life and fought for his marriage even though she’d divorced him.

My question to this then is this: who determines what is hard enough before it becomes stalker behaviour or some other term if this had actually happened in real life? Should you really wait for someone that’s ended their relationship with you and done their best to show you that they no longer want you and would rather tear you down when you try? At what point do you say ok, let me think about me and pick up the broken pieces? So here are my thoughts:

• They built their marriage on a poor foundation. How do I know this? Not one mention was made about their spiritual life or having God as the focus of their relationship before marriage and in marriage, they were never seen praying or even at the least, going to church. Matt. 7:24-27, Jesus gave a parable of a house that was built on a rock and another that was built on sand. Of course, their marriage crashed because it was built on sand. One of the most important things in any relationship is the foundation. Food for thought: Ps. 11:3.

• They lacked counselling. Proverbs is one of my favourite books in the bible and three times(that I know of), it mentions the importance of counsel: Prov. 11:14, 15:22, 24:6. Now you may say Mel got counsel from her sisters but I’ll say to you, never take decisions based on counsel from someone who hasn’t heard from the two people involved and put in the effort to bring you both into one place to discuss whatever the issue is (I’m guilty of this mistake). No matter who they are to you. Family member, best friend, youth pastor, whoever. 

• Offences were never discussed in-depth or attempts made to work at forgiving and forgetting. One constant theme, you’d hear while watching the movie are all the things she did for him and all the ways he hurt her. As human beings, it is very easy for us to get offended and to be honest, there’s nothing wrong in getting offended but what is wrong and dangerous, is to allow that offence take root in your heart, germinate and begin to bear fruits. Before long, those tiny offences build big fences around your heart and close out the person you love. The scary part? The person may not even know until the fences have been built solid and you take the decision to close them out. Study Eph. 4:26-27 and listen to the link I’ll share below. Practice forgiveness every moment of every day. 

• Wisdom and understanding was not consistently applied. The movie is littered with too many situations in which this was the case. Wisdom is the principal thing, then understanding (Prov. 4:7). Study: Prov. 3 :19, 24 :3.

Before you proceed to break a relationship or marriage for that matter, sit down and think. Is it the person or is it the situation? More often than not, it’s the situations and if you can get your partner to sit down in one place, have a heart to heart frequently and also have regular prayer sessions together, strictly for your relationship.
The devil will always fight relationships. It’s never about our differences but about what we choose to focus on and the moment we choose to focus on the negatives or the offences, the devil begins his victory dance. Your focus determines your perspective.

The charge for the week
The charge as we go into the week is to examine our relationships/marriage and try to apply the four steps above among others.

Sage

P.S. Please listen to what’s hurting your relationship by Steven Furtick:
https://youtu.be/q5vffxSQibk

Also listen to this podcast titled Stay Focused:

https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/elevation-with-steven-furtick/id216015753?mt=2&i=1000415081048 

P.P.S. One of my mainest guys got married over the weekend. I wish you a happy married life bro. 

Photo credit: Acrimony Movie twitter handle @AcrimonyMovie

Common Sense vs Uncommon Sense?

Hello Readers & Followers,

It's another week! Do you feel ready for this new week? Or would you like a longer weekend? If I could choose, I'd want every single day to be a weekend; if only we can get our wishes come through. This week's post is about our thought processes and some common sense saying that we say or think. Are they really common sense? or uncommon sense? What does God think of our common sense?

Common Sense 🆚 God's Word

• Common sense questions: why are some world leaders so horrible?
• God says: Trust me, I haven't lost control, I can turn the leader's heart in any direction I choose (Proverbs 21:1).

• Common sense says: I need to work this much so that I can live very comfortable.
• God says: Do not wear yourself out to get rich; be smart enough to stop making yourself uncomfortable, depend on God for wealth that you can enjoy and be comfortable with (Proverbs 23:4, Ecclesiastes 5:19 & 1 Timothy 6:17).

• Common sense says: My own money is not enough, so why should I give to people that are poor?

• God says: Whoever gives to the poor will not be in need, but he who ignores the poor receives many curses (Proverbs 28:27).

• Common sense says: When I am angry, I let it out as it is difficult to hold it in.

• God says: A fool vents all his feelings, but a wise person controls what he or she says (Proverbs 29:11).

• Common sense says: It's best to visit my neighbour/friend every time.
• God says: Do not visit your neighbour's house too often otherwise, your neighbour or friend may see too much of you and hate you (Proverbs 25:17).


• Common sense says: It's not easy to rely on anyone's word as people are not reliable.
• God says: Come to me, rely on me, I am reliable, my word is always true and it has proven to be true (Proverbs 30:5)


• Common sense says: No one knows what I have done wrong and nobody needs to know.
• God says: You need to tell me everything that you have done wrong and you need to abandon those things ( Proverbs 28:13).


• Common sense says: It's okay to get away with things that God says are wrong as God is very old school.

• God says: Consequences are certain for doing things that are against my Word (Romans 6:23).


• Common sense says: The more you accumulate money, the more you get richer.
• God says: Give freely and become more wealthy; be stingy and lose everything (Proverbs 11:24).

Final Words

The charge for this week is for you to know that common sense is not God's sense. In other words, you can't always follow common sense in fulfilling God's purpose.

Have a lovely week. See you next week Monday for another post.

- Mysses Lafunky