A case of mistaken Identity

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For the umpteenth time I have been mistaken for a supermarket attendant manning an isle. It's no longer even funny. It's a disturbing trend that should stop. In my attempts to look dapper, but not too dapper lest I appear on Fashion Watch because I don't desire too much attention, my ensemble has mistakenly being viewed as 'supermarket uniform'. Why people see me in a sweater, shirt and tie, looking at a row of items and conclude that I work there is beyond me? Maybe I should drop the whole tie, shirt and sweater thing, and carry a trolley for good measure.

Away from my supermarket chronicles, with even more regularity, the Christian faith has been mistaken for something it's not, a religion, when it is in fact, a relationship with Christ. Christianity, not a religion you say? I know, I know....it sounds preposterous, but let me try my best to explain.

You see, like so many, I had that view of the Christian faith, as a religion. I didn't outright label it as a religion but it was evident in my outlook and my behavior. When I gave my life to Jesus as a teenager, my main reason for doing so was for fear of spending my eternity in hell.

I watched the play, "Heaven's gates, hell's flames, and I just didn't like the thought of spending eternity in an inferno with the Devil, so I got 'saved'. I honestly couldn't grasp the gravity of my decision at the time. I just feared hell, so I chose the better option( not Safaricom, but life with Jesus).

Before I reached a point of discovering Christianity as a relationship with Christ, I made the honest mistake of viewing it as a religion. I was a young believer. A kid. I thought that Christianity was about keeping a balanced score-card with God, so for every lie I told, I needed to drop a coin in a beggar's bowl, I needed to pray,  I needed to read the bible, I needed to faithfully give offering. My righteous acts were my security or down payment to God, in exchange for consolidating my place in Heaven.

Moreover, I viewed my righteous acts as the basis for feeling entitled to God's blessings of success, prosperity, finances, good health, a girl-friend. When I didn't get them, I whined and complained that God was unfair. When I did get them, I felt God owed me more.  My Christian faith was purely about going to church, seeing what right I could do to earn God's favor.

Then, gradually, as I grew in the faith, it all unraveled, rather dramatically I may add. When God purposes to make you his, he makes you his, but he does it in his way that just leaves you awestruck at the change he can produce in an individual, even yourself.

That's God's love. He loves us too much to leave us just as we are so as I continued to follow him, he continued to change me; my altitude, my thoughts, my mentality, my heart. I guess the first part was realizing how much he loved me.

It began with the sermons on love, that slowly become embedded in my mind. Thereafter was the visual illustration of that love, cue in, Passion of the Christ and the John 3:16/Train video which you can check out through this link click here

However God wasn't finished there. Then came the big one. The experience. While I was in campus, I got insanely attracted to a lady, let me clarify what insanely attracted to a lady..is. By insanely attracted, I mean when I saw her time seemed to stand still for a fraction of a second, when she smiled at me and said hi, right there and then, just that one moment made the whole day perfect.

For the longest time I struggled to understand why her? Sure she was pretty, light and voluptuous at that, smart, witty....but there were other ladies like her, so why her? Why did my heart go gaga for her? When recently I stumbled upon the story of Samson and his first wife in Judges 14, in particular verse 4, it hit me, perhaps God was scripting this love story with a greater purpose in mind and as you will see from this subsequent explanation, it's easy to see why.

I tried a poem, I tried chocolates, I tried surprising her with a bouquet of flowers on Valentines Day. I tried compliments,  showing her I care through texts, whether it was her birthday, or she was due to defend her project but to no avail. My attempts hit a brick wall, or as we would say when I was bush, ' Niligonga Ukuta!!'

Worse, that she would never call or text. It was frustrating. Being consigned to that zone, the friendz...., it hurts just writing about that forsaken place. I took solace in some Rock/Pop songs like Franz Ferdinand's- No You girls. Katy Perry's-Wide Awake, Bruno Mars and Cee lo Greene's-The Other side and the feeling's- love it when you call, which, dominated my playlist. With it, they gave me untold bitterness and resentment towards the lady in question.

All the while, God was still working behind the scenes. A convicting Sunday Sermon about getting rid of all malice and bitterness(Ephesians 4:31) had me deleting the above songs from my playlist. Perhaps this was to marinade my heart in preparation of the barbecue of God's scorching love which would follow soon after.

True to form, soon after,  I watched the movie, Fireproof and In main character Caleb, found someone I could relate to. Like him, I was trying to show my affection for a lady and like him my attempt to show my affection hit a brick wall. Like him, the lady in the question just so happens to also be called Catherine, coincidence? I think not!

One day, upon having my Quiet Time in the morning, I realized what Caleb went through in the scene as he talks to his father was the story of my life, click here to view the Fireproof scene.

I realized that God relentlessly pursued me in love in spite of me rejecting him, ignoring him and taking him for granted. Like Caleb, that realization brought my knees, because it became crystal clear that God loves me a lot and I could only respond in tears, saying 'Thank you' amidst the sobs.

From that point on, My faith became a response to that love. Jesus gave his life for me, I give mine back to him in return. Sharing Notes on Facebook about God was my thanks to him. Giving that tithe, whether it was 10 from 100, 20 from 200, 350 from sh 3500 was out of love just showing my appreciation for all he had done for me. What does a God loving a man and a man doing things to love in him return spell? R-E-L-A-T-I-O-N-S-H-I-P, that's what.

A mother does not wake up at 2 am in the morning, to tend to her baby because it is stipulated. " that when baby cries, thou must cease all things sleep and take care of baby." Neither is it stipulated in the book of matrimony, "thou husband will make breakfast and serve breakfast to bae when she is in bed." Both instances aren't obligations, both mother and husband do such loving acts because they are in a relationship and wouldn't have it any other way.

The mistaken belief is that  the Christian faith is just about religiously sticking to a list of do's and dont's lest your place in heaven goes to the dogs. Sometimes Christians themselves can ascribe to this belief, and their life with Christ is just one of going through the motions, just serving God in the choir, or as an usher, because it's what church expects them to do. Sometimes attending church is just an obligation for some, it resembles more of an appointment with the Dentist, act all nice and promise to follow his advice to keep off sweets, then upon leaving his clinic, sugar rush pap. The Christian goes to Church on Sunday, sings the songs to appear religious, promises to repent then scurries off after the service to do the exact opposite of repent till the next Sunday appointment.

The Christian faith is not about what doing what the Church says, nor doing what the Pastor says,nor is it about doing things so that other people see that you're spiritual;  it's about responding in love to a loving God dying on the cross as an atonement for your sin to reconcile you to God.

People do all manner of things in the name of love, or being in a relationship. The Christian faith isn't any different. As relationships are based largely on honor and  trust, so is a Christian's relationship with Christ, which will reflect how he/she responds to God's love.

Fat pay-check, fame, success, yet he leaves it all behind because he feels called to help the less fortunate in Africa and be a living vessel reflecting God's love for the downtrodden, who honors God by caring for the plight of the less fortunate. That's a Christian responding to God's love not the church.

Or perhaps take a Christian, who decides not to bet, because his relationship with Christ, based on trust, has him trusting that God will provide money for him in other ways than gambling.

Maybe, it's a Christian who chose not to sleep with every Tom, Dick and Harry, striving to honor God with her body  as her way of saying thank you  to Christ dying for her. She trusts him to wait and while feeling the need to work on herself in preparation for when God gives her a man, because the relationship she has with Christ has proven time over that God is faithful.

I can list a host of responses in love, like me typing this long blog-post because I just want Jesus to be known. No need for that though, because ultimately , the bottom line will be that, for the christian's faith and subsequent behaviour , a relationship with Christ is the motivating factor. The focus is a love relationship between God and the Christian.

 As I said earlier, people do all manner of things in the name of love, or being in a relationship, Christians are no exception and that is Christianity for you, not religion, but men and women who realize God loves them and respond to that love as a result of their relationship with God.

I Love You too

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"I love YouTube." Quite frankly, It's hard to find anyone who doesn't but many people wouldn't mind uttering these words for entirely different reasons. Were one to say, "I love YouTube", really fast, it would sound as if he/she said, " I love you too." I can't say I have flirted with the idea of using that line, but the YouTube reply would be convenient for somebody not too keen on commitment and comfortable being in the relationship just for the benefits.

I wouldn't be crazy enough to pull this stunt on a lady but on introspection,  I did something far worse..... I pulled this stunt on God and not even the thought of being just one of many to do it, offers scant consolation.

God said, "I love you" to us, when he gave his one and only son, Jesus.

The first man, Adam, sinned, leaving a trail of sin, brokenness and fallibility in his wake. It has been a trail we have inevitably followed for years. Judges, Kings, Prophets, Priests could only do so much before eventually man wandered away from God's commands. Man gravitated to sin, the very thing that was displeasing to God.

Despite casting Adam away from the Garden, God still longed to relate with man. He always has. God still pursued man even when man was pursuing what God detested. Sin had created a gap between man and God. It is said that love makes a way, indifference an excuse. Rather, than giving up on us, and citing our sin and our total disregard for him and his holiness, which would have been a valid excuse; God out of love, made a way to bridge that gap.


Enter Jesus Christ, the living atoning sacrifice for the world,(1 John 2:2) who gave himself as a ransom for all men, mediating between God and men to this very day. (1 Timothy 2:5-6) What we lacked in holiness, Jesus compensated for in grace. He died the death that we were to die, so that we may live the life that was always beyond us because of our sin. His sacrifice paid the full penalty of our sins so we owed God nothing.

He was insulted, rejected, battered beyond recognition, nailed to a cross so that in dying on that cross and resurrecting from the dead, we would be reconciled to God, so long as we believed and accepted that we couldn't save ourselves but that only Jesus could. He didn't need to go through all that hardship but he chose to, and in going through it, declared to us unequivocally, "I love you!!!"

That was a massive statement of love, that demands a massive, "I love you too God." Love is one of the hardest things to define, let alone illustrate, more so to God. Thankfully scripture spares us the headache of figuring it all out by ourselves in John 14:21 by saying, "Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father and I too will love him and show myself to him."

Thus, to  love God is to obey God, it sound's simple enough but it isn't. Well, humans,have never been  big on obedience, as Adam and Eve so wonderfully demonstrated . It's made the more difficult when the picture you have of obedience is that of God as a tyrant like Loki in Avengers, perched on his throne,wielding a large scepter, demanding that we kneel or fall prostrate before him in complete reverence. We think he delights in nothing more than taking away our freedom, consigning us to a life of  utter boredom and slavery. We think of obedience as merely following a litany of do's and dont's, but it really isn't.

Loving God is more than that and it isn't always the same for everybody. God speaks to us not just as a  body of believers but individuals as well, giving us commands for the whole body to follow, but also giving commands to be carried out by a specific individual.

To the body of Christ, he commands us to do many things. Psalms is littered with the command to praise him and worship him in song, therefore we love him by singing to him and declaring our love and adoration for him in song. However, worship is more than just a song, it is a lifestyle of showing reverence to God, and this can be achieved in many ways.

We love him, by  learning to do right, by seeking justice,by encouraging the oppressed, defending the cause of the fatherless and pleading the case of the widow. (Isaiah 1:17)

We love him by acting justly, loving mercy and walking humbly with God. (Micah 6:8) We love him by seeking him while he may be found, calling on him when he is near.(Isaiah 55:6)  We love him by not only reading but meditating on his word, day and night(Joshua 1:7-8) and also praying(Philippians 4:6-7), and by committing not to give up meeting each other in fellowship but to encourage one another, spurring one another on towards love and good deeds(Hebrews 10:24-25)

We love him by giving him honor, honoring him with our money, by spending it not only on ourselves but the less fortunate as well, by cheerfully giving our tithe not robbing him. (Malachi 3:8, 2 Corinthians 9:7-12). By not loving money and viewing the acquisition of it as an end, instead viewing it as a means with which to serve God(Matthew 6:24)


We love him by honoring him with our body, by being mindful of how we dress and dance, by not giving in to bodily urges of sex or sexual perversions like lust, masturbation, bondage domination masochism as a result of remembering that our bodies are not our own, that we can do anything we want with them, they are temples for Christ(1 Corinthians 6:12-20)

We love him, by trusting him with all our heart, not leaning on our own understanding and acknowledging him in all our ways and he will make our paths straight (Proverbs 3:5-6). Trusting him even when the situation looks bleak and opting not to take the easy way out of compromising on our integrity by bribing, cheating, gambling, canvassing, having sex for a good grade or promotion, a kickback for a service but by trusting God to make a way even where there seems to be none. We love him by seeking first his kingdom and righteousness, and trusting God will provide for our needs instead of worrying about tomorrow, when each day has enough trouble on its own.(Matthew 6:33-34)


We love him by choosing not to be friends of this world (James 4;4), by not conforming to it and its ways of doing things but being transformed by the renewal of our minds(Romans 12:1-2). We love him by not being of the world and yet not isolating ourselves from it but being in it to influence it for Christ(John 17:14-15)

We love him by not being drunk on wine,(Ephesians 5:18) and being intentional about not causing our brother/sister to stumble by drinking, eating or anything that might encourage them to sin but opting to do that which leads to mutual edification (Romans 14:1-21, 1 Corinthians 8:9-12)

We love him by using the talents, abilities, spiritual gifts he gave us not primarily for our glory but for his glory by serving others in church, by seeking to be used by him  whether he calls us to the corporate world, entrepreneurship or  the mission field.(Matthew 25:14-30, 1 Corinthians 12:7, 1 Corinthians 14:12)

We love him, by loving other members of the body of Christ, loving them just the way he loved us,(John 13:34) bearing with one another in love and forgiving the grievances we may have against one another, as Christ forgave us (Colossians 3:13-16) and thus fulfilling his very important prayer request that we may be one.(John 17;20-23)

Most important, we love him by accepting his free gift of salvation and then considering everything as of little importance than knowing God and becoming like him,(Philippians 3:7-11) which makes us tell others about him, his love for us, and striving to help people become like him, following his commands and thus make disciples for it's what he commanded us to do.(Matthew 28:18-20)

Arms outstretched on a cross, giving his life for us,Jesus was essentially telling us, "I love you this much that I will die for you." The very least we can do is love him back through obedience, both general and individual. Love him with all your heart, your mind and your unique being as only you can. Ditch, the I love YouTube in favor of, "I love you too."

The struggle is real

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Pogback. Utd have finally landed their man, or re-landed as some would rightly argue, given the French midfielder is returning to the very same club that sold him in the first place. His transfer fee is off course, ridiculously high, an indication that the beautiful game has become ugly when it comes to money; not that United will care one bit.

A few weeks prior to his signature, United made it plainly evident why they needed to make his signing priority numero uno. For all the talk of Mourinho, coming with new signings, tactics, what have you; it was old problems that resurfaced against Borussia Dortmund in pre-season. United were run rugged by a sharper, quicker Dortmund side that laid bare their shortcomings in the middle of the park,  and were deservingly handed a 4-1 pasting. It was a chastening experience for Mourinho's charges, which served to highlight that they were far from the finished article, in spite of Jose's arrival.

Far from the finished article, is a term a lot of sons and daughters of God can relate with. They are a work in progress whom Jesus will complete as per his timing. He doesn't complete it in an instant. Upon receiving Jesus Christ as savior, one's struggles with sin do not automatically do a disappearing act.

Indeed God gives us a new heart (Ezekiel 36:26), with a desire not to sin but to walk in God's ways. He also gives us a helper, the Holy Spirit, who also emboldens us not to sin(John 15:26). However, sin's presence still hovers around us, stalking us, crouching at our door like the way it did Cain, waiting for the  slightest drop of our guard, to devour us at the opportune moment and boy oh boy, do we drop our guard.

We often fall short of his glory or holiness. Too many times to even count.This means that, as much as our noble goal, is to become like Christ, we still have our flaws that our loving savior has to chip away till he crafts the final masterpiece of his image. That we are still flawed or struggling with certain sins does not make Jesus a quack of a doctor neither does it make our salvation a sham. Rather, it just serves to illustrate the gradual process that is salvation, as opposed to the one-off event many see it as.

Our healing, molding into God's character from our diseased sinful self requires time, patience and effort it isn't a one-time thing that happens overnight.

Therefore, the struggle against sin is real. One that will be your faithful bae till death. The cast may change in that your struggles will be vary over the years but it will be the same script of struggling to overcome sin till the grave. Therefore, keeping it under wraps for fear of being labelled a back-sliding Christian is in my view, out of place. It only eats you up inside and stifles you from experiencing the true freedom that God has given you with Christ.  God's grace and mercy was not just to forgive us and to reconcile us with God. God's grace was for those moments, and they will be many of them; when we slip back to sinful habits and need his grace to remind us and reaffirm us of our identity in him in spite of the slip. Our identity is that we are sons and daughters of God, co-heirs with Christ, sin doesn't change that one-bit.

Someone who has believed and accepted that Jesus died for his/her sin and has saved him from eternal death is a child of God. He is a son/daughter even if he struggles with substance abuse be it alcohol, cocaine, weed. He is a son even if he struggles with porn, sex addiction, masturbation, same-sex sins. She is a daughter even if she struggles with leaving the club life. She is a daughter even if she is struggling to let go of her sponsor.

Sin's constant influence or our sinful tendencies mean as children we are susceptible to get sick, that's why we need constant grace not  the 'one-time, we got this' grace. As has been said, the Church, the body of Christ(not the building) is not a club for saints, it is a HOSPITAL for SINNERS and guess what, everyone is sick.

 It is a hospital, because we are sick, and if we claim that we are not, that we are without sin, then we are lying and living in denial. (1 John 1:8) Church is a hospital, where we acknowledge we are sick and seek God to heal us through his word, through fellowship with other believers who encourage or rebuke us when they have to and  through prayer by candidly telling him about our iniquities.

There is no shame in going to hospital because you are sick, that's what sick people do. Duh!!! "I'm sick, I can't let them see, what will they think of me?!!." Seriously. Seriously.That's as counter-productive as it gets. Hiding your infirmities won't make them go away only seeking treatment will. You're sick, go to the hospital to get well and the first starting point is to admit you are sick.

 It maybe customary to hide one's struggles but it shouldn't be. Confess it. Confess your struggle or sin to an accountability partner, someone whom you trust. Confess it to an accountability group or a small group or a bible study. Will it make you any less of a child of God? No it wont. I'll tell you what it will do, it will make the guilt, the burden, the shame  go away. It will clear your conscience, give you peace of mind. enable you to experience closer fellowship with God and give you the confidence to approach his throne of grace. The heavy load on your shoulders will be no more and with that give you the chance to start over again rather than live your life of faith with a perennial noose hanging over your neck.

Life with Christ is confessing and repenting, not struggling and hiding.  Confess and Repent, is the broken record whose cover you can do even Jimmy Gait, because of your sinful inclinations that will get the better of you once in a while.

Sin is a part of who you are but  isn't it refreshing that God still loves you and me at our worst. That iniquity/struggle we have is not news to him, Our sin doesn't cause him to reel from his lofty throne and fall backwards in total shock over our shortcomings . Our loving father is well aware of our shortcomings and longs to help us overcome them if we let him, if we confess them to him in prayer and confess them in private to a fellow christian or even confess them in public.

I know it's human nature to resist disclosing one's flaws because we want to present the best/ most beautiful picture of ourselves. Ladies go all out on foundation, concealer to hide those flaws to feel beautiful. Funny how God makes us beautiful not by hiding but by revealing our flaws. Zacchaeus knew it, the Samaritan lady and Paul knew it, When we show our flaws we reveal our broken human nature but in doing so allow God to reveal his abundant grace which embellishes us by showing the world that we are not defined by our flaws but defined by our relationship with him.

Our identity in Christ plus those flaws shows the full extent of God's grace to a world who struggle to understand this divine grace of God. They get it, when they see the imperfect in us and God still loving us and are emboldened to pursue Christ, because believe it or not, who wouldn't want to be loved and accepted and affirmed in spite of the skeletons in their closet.

Therefore, child of God don't living in silent suffering, speak it out, lay it bare. God knows your struggle, It was not for the well, he came for, but the sick, there is no shame in confessing you are, neither is it sinful to struggle. The struggle is very real, and Jesus, his spirit, will in no way distance himself from you because of revealing it but will stand by your side, till that day of glorification when the struggle will be no more.

It's not as hopeless as it looks

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Unless you've been living under a rock, it is inconceivable that sporting events in Brazil have passed you by unnoticed. Whether it's Bolt bolting to victory in the 100m, Phelps adding to his record medal tally, Rudisha proving that he is King David in the 800m and Jemima Sumgong finally claiming a a medal for Kenya in the Ladies marathon, Rio has been at the center of it all.

The Olympics or sports as we know it, in my view, give us a well-needed break from the circus of the political scene, harrowing tales of domestic violence, school fires left, right and center and the endless drama that grips our country. As a people, we have naturally and assiduously grown cynical, resigning ourselves to the conclusion, that ours is a corruption-rampant country whose leaders will never do anything to break us free from the cycle of theft ; if anything, they will only propagate it further.

The Olympics paints a rather different picture from the one we have been accustomed to as Kenyans. This global showpiece of sports reminds us how life ought to be. It brings into sharp focus merit-based achievement, exemplifying that hard work in the gym or on the field training, actually translates to success not the buy/cheat your way to success model that has been accepted as the norm today. It also showcases the aspect of chance, as time and time again, athletes who aren't even given a prayer in the heats end up amongst those on the podium receiving a medal.

King Solomon, makes a very wise observation in Ecclesiastes 9:11 when he says, " I have seen something else under the sun. The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all."

Solomon's observation is not the preserve of the Olympics, it is of life. A thought that often escapes me when I read this verse; time and chance happen alright but I forget that there is one who is master over time and chance, that is God.

Jesus is often referred to as LORD of LORDS, not just a title that you use in prayer to sound religious but because he actually is the LORD of LORDS.  Colossians 1, speaks in detail of his sovereignty, verses 15 to 19 read," He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created; things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church, he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him."

John's description of Jesus in Revelations 1, only serves to illustrate the supremacy of Jesus even more. A similarity in Revelations and Colossians is that Jesus is the beginning, the first or the firstborn. In John 1, this is again highlighted, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Notice that in the beginning, God was already there!!! Jesus was there, before time even began, so how then can he be limited by time when he is the creator of time? I believe time and chance is subject to him.

That gives me the world of encouragement as a child of God. I have experienced God to be gracious and he has given me way more than I deserve. In Economics, ceteris paribus is a term denoting all factors remaining constant, isn't it stupefying that all things are never constant, and that we are loved by the very one who can either ensure all factors are constant, or at the very least, one or two factors change.

It's quite common seeing people doing life with a sense of non-entitlement, with a perennial frustration that it's all hopeless. You can assume a defeatist mentality; ruling yourself out before the competition even begins, an inclination to shrug your shoulders with indifference, wave the white flag and capitulate without as much as an effort.

The gracious LORD Jesus, who is LORD over time and chance, time and time again, tilted the scales and altered chance for his will to be done. Were it not so, David , the last born shepherd would not have become king. Moses, the kid who was placed in the river would not have been 'found' by Pharaoh's daughter. The Moabite lady, Ruth, would not have found Boaz, single and searching and would instead, be just one of the many thinking, "All the good ones are taken."

The Ninevites would not have been forgiven and saved, nor Rahab the prostitute, nor Zachaeus the reviled tax collector. The LORD of time and chance just happens to be the LORD of grace, the LORD of love, who forgives and gives us a hatful of second chances we scarcely deserve so long as it falls in line with his plan to reflect his glory.

No chance of nailing that job, no chance of moving out, no chance of hooking up to that guy or lady you dream of daily, the LORD of time and chance may have something different to say about that.

The Olympic games has shown that things don't always go to script, so has God. The script was that sin had condemned us to death but Jesus changed that script. He died in our place as an atonement for our sins, then resurrected  so as to reconcile us to God and save us from eternal damnation, to take away our shame and our guilt. Before that and thereafter, the LORD of time and chance has been changing the script at will, for his will to those keen on doing his will.  Therefore, run the race, knowing you don't always have to be swift to win it or have all the aces in your pack to win, time and chance can happen to you because you serve Jesus, who is LORD over time and chance, able to tilt the odds in your favor if he means to.

Why I will not be imitating Ronaldo anytime soon

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When most people hear the name Ronaldo, they think CR7, Portuguese goal machine, the main man at Real Madrid. Before Ronaldo, there was another Ronaldo, the original Ronaldo. The Brazilian no 9, scourge of defenses, before injuries and weight gain robbed him of his blistering pace.

Apart from his ridiculous haircut at the 2002, the other thing that was synonymous with Ronaldo was his trademark finger-wagging celebration. It was a gesture fans were fond of, if you weren't in the opposition-that is.

Ronaldo frequently used this gesture, given his goal scoring prowess, but he isn't the only one to use it. The finger-wagging gesture is more commonly used when you are passing judgement on somebody, warning them, expressing your criticism of their behavior. More often than not, people shy from doing it openly to avoid being deemed hypercritical.Instead, they wag their fingers inwardly or criticize others via words.

People do this a lot, Christians even, to damaging effect. As much as sometimes people pass judgement with good intentions of correcting somebody else, sometimes it's taken a little bit too far. It has taken me some time to learn that discipleship is not about fixing people. It's not about constantly scrutinizing their sin and carrying out jicho-pevu like investigations to see what offense they've committed this time. As much as we have a right to point out somebody's mistakes, it shouldn't be our focus 24/7.

Sometimes mistakes/shortcomings are 'identified' before they even happen just based on the fact that someone did something wrong in the past and all the signs are leading to him/her doing it again. Judgement is passed swiftly without one knowing all the facts and swiftly concluding that he/she/them is in the red because of how things appear to look on the surface.

The log in my eye and the spec in somebody else's, quite a contrast Jesus made between the two. Romans 2:1 reads, "You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgement on someone else for at whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgement do the same things."

Just because I sin differently to somebody else shouldn't give me the right to obsess and whine about their iniquites, I may have far more greater than sins than I would care to think or talk about. It was then that I was conveniently reminded, that if God could remove the log from my eye, which he has done severally, why should it be hard for him to remove a spec from another's eye without my involvement? Is he too limited to do that? Not at all!!!

As I have grown in my walk with Christ, overcoming temptations, iniquities and growing in my knowledge of Christ, pride has sadly never been to far from my life. Pride has a habit of attributing victories that were God's to myself. Pride has seen me mistakenly think that the child of God I am today was primarily my doing or that the reason I don't struggle with sins that someone else does is because of my will. Big, big mistake. Fortunately for me, God's word rebukes and I stumbled upon Romans 3:10-11 which states that there is no-one righteous, not even one; there is no-one who understands, no- one who seeks God.

Instead, Philippians 2:13 insists that it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose. Picture that. God working in you to worship himself, to be righteous, because by yourself, as Romans 3:10-11 implies, you would never seek him. I cringe at the very thought. It humbles me, nullifying any reason I have to wag the finger at someone else.

Ephesians 2:8-9 is yet another timely reminder. "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God, not by works so that no-one can boast. Salvation isn't a one-time thing, it's a process of 3 tenses, justification, sanctification and glorification.

You are first saved or justified when you admit you are unable to save yourself from the consequences of sin and you believe that only Jesus Christ can do that, because of the perfect self-sacrifice he made to God on the cross so that we may have eternal life. On believing he did so and accept his gift of salvation, we are forgiven, made right with God and justified as if we had never sinned.

It doesn't end there. Being forgiven doesn't mean one is free from sin's influence/temptation. One can still sin even if they have accepted God's gift of salvation. The underlying fact is that they are no-longer slaves to sin, they are saved through sanctification, sanctification being the process by which God delivers us from sin's power over us. It is where God makes us holy by giving us the strength to resist sin's influence and overcome it from time to time rather than meekly submit to it because we are human and it is our nature.

I believe this is very critical to the finger-wagger like me, because the third tense which is glorification, salvation through deliverance from sin's presence is only attained when we die. No-one alive is glorified yet, only being sanctified. Sin is still with us and we need God to deliver us from it's influence, we can't do it by ourselves.

I am holy not because I chose to be, but God compels in me a desire to be holy. I seek God through quiet time, through small group fellowships, through witnessing, not because of my own will but because of the Holy Spirit within me who strengthens me and convicts me of righteousness.

I'm not saying, leave it all to God, I'm saying any victory you have over sin, any righteousness you have acquired is by faith, God doing it. I can't laud it over others and sneer at them for struggling because God is ultimately the one responsible for my growth; not me. Therefore, I have no right to wag my finger at another.

Christ urged us to make disciples and by all means, we should do what our loving saviour commanded us to do. Make others follow him, make others thirst after him, follow Christ, follow his teachings, more so by modelling him yourself. Christ came to save the world and not condemn it, the only sinless man had the right to have finger wagging as his trademark but didn't so who am I , with my numerous sins to wag my finger at others.

He corrected them gently, allowing for restoration and I pray that I may learn to do it as much and leave the finger-wagging and the fixing him to him alone because he has proven in my life to be the ultimate fixer, a gentler one at that, may I just be the one to facilitate it with his wisdom and guidance.

Child-like faith vs Adult-like reason

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18th Birthday- Wooh!!!

20th Birthday- Awesome!!!

21st Birthday- Yeah!!

25th Birthday- Okay

26th Birthday- Seriously?!!

27th Birthday- Please, make it STOP!!!

Birthdays are days of the year we look forward to. Especially, as children. When Adulthood checks in, a massive paradigm shift occurs. Instead of anticipating them with eagerness and glee, we sometimes meet them with dread. You would think one more year of living life would be cause for celebration, instead, panic sets in at the realization that one's life is trundling towards the finish line,.

I know this for a fact because I've experienced it. I'm 27 now!!! I'm still very much in denial that I'm growing old. However, were I to consider the alternative, of dying early, then I appreciate that God has blessed me with another year.

As we advance in years, a part of us still wants to hold on to memories and experiences of our youth. A part of us still wants to be 'forever young'. A part of us still wants to live in the past of childhood and never grow old like Peter Pan.

For the child of God, this conflict of interests is a potential landmine. The battle that rages within, between the child-like self, that implicitly trusts, hopes for the best; and the adult self, that tends to rationalize things, leaning towards cynicism; can be subject to manipulation, the devil's manipulation and that of our sinful nature.

It is not without good reason that Jesus teaches us to model a child-like faith. For starters, God is trustworthy. He is love, He loved us so much that he sent his only son, Jesus, to show us how is like and then die for us to atone for our sin and reconcile us to God(John 3:16, I John 5:11-12, Galatians 2:20). God being the loving father he is, gives us good gifts,(Matthew 7:11) and if he could not spare his own son for us but gave him up for all, how will he not give us anything if he knows we need it(Romans 8:32)

Like any loving father who knows the significance of being present and the comfort children derive from knowing Daddy is there; God promises never to leave us( Hebrews 13:5). As kids, more so being sinful in nature, we can be prone to mess up but God forgives us, not just for our sake but his as well(Isaiah 43:25) and even when we don't think we deserve forgiveness or even when someone else doesn't think we merit forgiveness, he still forgives us.(Luke 15:11-32, Jonah 3-4)

Yet in spite of this, and more, our faith in God isn't as small as a mustard seed, worse, it's even smaller! Frequently, we lapse into moments of distrust and doubt in his good plan for us. In those moments, the Devil, uses an ingenious tactic, just like he did millennia ago with Eve, reason

He sidestepped God's command for Eve to trust God through obedience by leading her to reason and question if God was holding out on her; that the fruit was good for her. She fell and so did Adam, and he continues to use that as his trump card every now so often.

Reason is intrinsic to us, it's what make us human, it's what forms the basis for understanding and discernment, but on the negative, it is susceptible to Satan's manipulation when the foundation for our faith is substituted with manipulated reason. Reason is what he uses to lead us astray. It's usually packaged so well, with solid arguments and premises ,making it hard to dismiss. It may sound something a bit like this......

"This corrupt government steals my taxes, why don't I just understate my income. People get away with refusing to pay tax, at least I paid some of it."

" I am going to fail this exam, I am not going to graduate if I do, why don't I just cheat, I've worked so hard to come this far and it's only just to get a satisfactory grade, it's not like I want to be in the Dean's list or something."

"Let me just settle with this guy, I'm not sure I really love him but he loves me and he provides financial stability, good men are so hard to find any way."

" I have a loan to pay, along with rent, my kid needs to go to the hospital, this side-deal more than covers for those, I need the money, God knows I do. Who cares about policies and standard operating procedures?"

And the list goes on. Think of being rudely awaken by the alarm and hitting the snooze button because of thousands of excuses that run in your head telling you it's the right decision, that's the same way the devil operates alongside your sinful nature, feeding on the opportunity to sin if you let your guard down by rationalizing the act with every possible reason to make it seem valid. Most of the time, this flawed reason substitutes child-like faith to damaging effect.

When Abraham lied about Sarah, he reasoned he would be killed if he didn't so he lied. (Genesis 12,20)When David took a census, he reasoned that he could count his fighting men and by doing so, attribute his military success to numbers rather than God who granted him victory. (1 Chronicles 21)When Saul made a sacrifice, he reasoned that sacrifice was better than obedience (1 Samuel 15)

Reason ends up taking us places we later on regret after acting from reasoning it out. Child-like faith, on the surface looks crazy but it's the surest way to avoid the pitfalls of sin.

Child-like faith is comfortable not knowing the motives behind the commandments, it is okay not knowing the answers, it trusts, it believes and it obeys regardless of the command. Child-like faith is when Abraham was ready to sacrifice his son, knowing without Isaac, it was crazy to foresee having numerous descendants like the stars. Child like faith is when Joshua  agreed to walk in circles even when the command made no military sense and was just borderline crazy. Child-like faith is when Naaman agrees to wash himself in the Jordan to get healed of an incurable disease

There is reward in the crazy. You may look stupid for pursuing integrity even when people are making money from unjust ways. You may look crazy pursuing sexual purity when sex is all around. You may look crazy when the world is shifting its convictions to allow for relativism while you stick to the bible. 

God is made manifest in such faith. God delights in responding to that crazy faith, not always immediately, not always as we expect him to or the way we want him to, but he responds to it all the same. Abraham's son was spared and the he had descendants as numerous as promised. After walking in circles the wall of Jericho came down. Naaman was healed after washing himself seven times.

Make no mistake, child like faith isn't easy for an adult, we want to know, we want to be certain, we want to logically and rationally work out things, but we must remember we are just children to a God, who is our father, who knows everything, who is in control of everything. He can work against the natural order of things like he did when he split the Red sea for the Israelites. He can move people's hearts to be favorably disposed towards you or your situation without you having to do anything to earn it like he did to King Cyrus towards the Israelites (Ezra 1). Even when other officials tried to foil those plans later on, another King is reminded of the favorable disposition and does the same(Ezra 5-6)

He can thwart the plans of those seeking to harm you like he did when Balaam tried to curse Israel.(Numbers 22-23). He is limitless in how we works unlike our limited ways with our reason. Not to mention, he loves us dearly as his children . Thus, we can respond to him in child-like faith and trust him to come through for us even if doing so appears crazy.  Whether it means waiting on him, whether it means taking a step of faith, whether it means refusing to compromise; child-like faith in our father, God, is the real deal.

Thank you Daddy

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One day my father, he told me,

“Son, don’t let it slip away”

He took me in his arms, I heard him say,

“When you get older,

Your wild heart will live for younger days

Think of me if ever you’re afraid”

He said, “One day you’ll leave this world behind

So live a life you will remember

My father told me when I was just a child

These are the nights that never die

My father told me.

Avicii struck a cord with many when he penned those lines and belted them out in his hit, ‘the nights'. Many can relate with the EDM's star, given how our fathers have offered us sound pieces of advice from time to time.

Fatherhood is the true litmus test for manhood if you ask me. A responsibility, a privilege, all  rolled up in one, that goes beyond spawning a child but nurturing one.

Tomorrow people will wax lyrical about their fathers, and why shouldn’t they? Those dads have earned it. From that poignant moment when they first held us in their arms, as we cried a river as any normal baby would do, they had our back.

They have had to sacrifice sleep in a bid to make us catch ours. They have had to put in the extra shift at work to put the food on the table, clothes on our bodies and a roof over our heads. He went the exta mile to ensure we had a good education and that we were able to visit the doctor when we felt unwell.

Fathers have had to cut out on time with the boys, or miss out on the top-of-the table EPl game just to be at their son’s game or daughter’s concert. Sacrifice is in their blood, ‘them above me, my desires’  is the mantra.

These men have had to know how life works more than Google and Wikipedia. The phrase, “I don’t know” is akin to hurling expletives, they just have to know.

You can count on dad to protect you from a broad array of villains, name them, the boogeyman, the neighbourhood bully, the mbwa kali, the teenage boy wanting to make out with his daughter et al. Dad just had this presence about him that gave us peace and comfort even when danger lurked nearby.

For some of you though, Avicii’s lyrics and my words are hollow. Perhaps death snatched your father away from you before he could leave his mark on your life. Perhaps you have a father who doesn’t tick the above boxes. Maybe it was a dad who turned physical and beat you and mum silly with his fists of rage as a result of his close relationship with the beer bottle. Maybe he jumped ship and left you and mum to fend for yourselves. Maybe be violated you as his daughter and raped you.

I won’t lie and say, I feel your pain. Neither will I pretend to know what you’re going through. What I will say is that all is not lost. Your need to be identified as a child, to be affirmed and to be loved will not go unfulfilled with the father I have come to know largely by reading what is said of him in the bible.

He is a father who heals the brokenhearted and binds their wounds(Psalms 147:3). He is a father who gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak(Isaiah 40:29). He is a father who does not revel in singing, “fimbo, chapa!” He does not take pleasure in the death of the wicked but is pleased when they turn from their ways and live (Ezekiel 18:23)

He lives in a high and holy place but also with him who is contrite and lowly in spirit to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite.(Isaiah 57:15)

Like most of our dads, he gives good gifts to those who ask him (Matthew 7:11) and knowing how we are comforted and find peace in his presence, he promises never to leave us or forsake us(Hebrews 13:5)

Despite all this, you and me decided to run away from him. We thought to ourselves, “We got this”. We thought that we knew what was best for us. We thought that he was too old school but we were wrong. 

Only that we didn’t got this, we knew nothing and we ended up making mistakes, plenty of them, our desire for independence only made us realize of a gnawing need to be dependent on him.

In our stubbornness, we ended up sinning, going against what he said in his word, being involved in drunkenness, being sexually impure, deceiving others and we paid a heavy price for it. Fortunately, of all the qualities God has as a father, the one that stands out is that he is love(1 John 4:8).

God loved the world too much to leave as we are so he sent his son Jesus, to be a ransom for all men(1 Timothy 2:6) to buy us back from the slavery that our sins had plunged us into. He saved us when we could not save ourselves, and it cost him more than an arm and leg, it cost him his son who had to die for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous to bring us close to God.(1 Peter 3:18)

What a loving father he is, words fail me to describe his everlasting goodness, mercy, grace and love to me. That’s my father. That’s our father. One day a year to recognize fathers is good, thus I will say happy father's day to the many dads out there. They deserve it. To God, my father, one day just doesn’t cut it, quite frankly I don’t know what can, in thankfulness I just give him my life and say thank you daddy.