love for others doesn’t mean the suppression of free expression of our faith

I wish I knew what it was that keeps pulling me back to my old way of life.

I cant blame chicks for posting pretty pictures of themselves cos I’m the one who chooses to look at them.

I have a sister so I have no excuse not to relate to members of the opposite sex.

but of course you relate to the woman you choose to marry differently than how you should ideally in a godly setting of the world to the fellow sharer of your mothers womb who knows all your business inside out and is always the first to call you on it when you mess up or display signs of spiritual or physical weakness.

they should also be one of the first ports of call when you need a shoulder to lean on or somebody to rely on when you are going through trouble in your life.

if your brother or sister or mother or father or aunty or uncle or some kind of relative cant bail you out of jail when you get on the wrong side of the law then its a poor show indeed.

still sometimes we get more love from those who are supposed to be our enemies than those who we would consider to be our fondest friends fighting on the same team as us.

its hard to figure out where people are coming from sometimes.

ive had a daughter of a witch and Buddhist having a crush on me who thought that people were still Christians if they swear.

I know some Christians who think that obviously they have never heard that scripture that goes whatever things are pure whatever things are lovely whatever things are of good report if there is anything excellent or praiseworthy meditate upon these things

philippians 4:8

she wanted me to lick the cream off her fingers.

I didn’t obviously not just because i’d probably be fired for doing something that would be considered publically unacceptable and inappropriate behaviour towards a workmate yet alone a young teenage girl who should have been old enough to know better but wasn’t but also because my Christian beliefs wouldn’t allow me to subject her to such demeaning of her personhood.

it’s funny how some girls can see it as a credit to you that you behave nicely and by the same token others can see you as boring for the same reasons.

still those who we may consider boring may still have something exciting to offer.

do we find safety and stability and dependability exciting.

if not then we should.

these are highly prized assets in a society that devalues relationships and gives up on people too easily.

some people cant see beyond their own skin cos they never traverse beyond their own immediate surroundings.

\we are becoming far more insular and decentralized destabilizing earth inhabitants.

of course if we are Christians we are ultimately citizens of heaven whose loyalty extends beyond geographic and artificially created boundaries.

does anybody who likes drinking or gambling ever listen to the warnings that they do so responsibly

maybe Kenny rogers knew when to walk away from the poker table but id haphazard a guess that most hardcore slot jockeys wouldn’t know restraint if it painted a black spot on their noses.

just because somebody has an original thought doesn’t mean you should celebrate it or emulate it.

not every idea is worth repeating.

not every thought benefits the world from being spoken out loud.

I just want everybody in the world to love each other and embrace their identity in Christ.

this is my dad’s heart also.

both my dads

earthly and heavenly

some of my homies spend all their romantic time together watching movies

then when theyre married or hooked up with babies all the memories they have together are based on somebody elses regurgitated celluloid experiences of real life which doesn’t always reflect real life cos it proposes a skewed view where almost anything that’s morally right is relegated to the sidelines of society and mocked into suppression or virtual non existence.

why is it that Hollywood had an age of moral purity then it just seemed to retreat into the shadows again and never come back to what it once was.

they talk about the golden age of Hollywood but it was never golden to me at that point in time.

that was the height of moral depravity and decay in celluloid.

the only thing that has changed is the amount of skin being shown and the excess of profanity has increased with the passage of time.

while there still remains girls in chobok forced into marriage to muslim terrorists I wont waste your time complaining about my pet peeve of people mispronouncing the year as twenty seventeen instead of two thousand and seventeen like a person who has completed their 12th grade education instead of short changing their future for flipping fries in a burger barn.

we also see the dumbing down of days being shortened to thirty one instead of thirty first. et all…

I guess my problem and conversely my greatest asset because of Gods presence in my life exclusively is the fact I don’t know where to quit.

I wish I had a girlfriend.

getting a relationship off the ground is the biggest problem for me.

the second biggest is maintaining it once we have taken off from the dizzy heights of initial honeymoon periods misty eyed surprise where everything is fresh and new and everything the other person says is exciting and wonderful and full of hope and promise and it seems like rosebuds hang on their every utterance and every syllable they utter is magical and miraculous and full of prophetic tingling and happy energy and the expectation of future snuggling as the sun collapses into the gaping mouth of the horizon.

I don’t know how I’m gonna handle having babies with my wifely woman but I’m sure God will help me step up to the plate and adopt the necessary maturity and responsibility when the time is right.

of course that time may never arrive if I never have a steady job and rely on words alone to make my pay all my days.

I don’t even know if my art has the potential to appeal to anyone who would actually consider the possibility of paying money for it.

they wouldn’t do so when I wasn’t making a red cent from it and it was intended to advance the causes of my local church.

maybe they would if my churches had bothered to promote it.

I’m hesitant to go back to a church that doesn’t believe in the wrath of God but only His loving merciful side.

if you only love half of Gods nature you don’t really love any part of Him cos its on the cross where justice and mercy kiss.

God is always just and always merciful.

you cant separate one part of HIm from the other and only love the parts of HIm that don’t make you feel responsible for your actions and guilty and willing to make a change in your life and do what pleases HIm instead of pleasing your own sad sorry self.

may God have mercy on our souls

may all of us whatever we believe reach out to Him wherever we are at in life

and know He is watching over us, caring for us, providing for us

even if He never slides into our notifications

take notice

He is always and ever will be with us ❤ 🙂

hobnobbing with eaglehawks

why do so many television programs, movies and music albums and videos and people’s mouths and ears have filthy words in them.

why do we make excuses for evil behaviour.

does restricting the overseas travel of registered peadophiles have any bearing on the reduction of kids being sold into sex slavery or young women being exploited by the pornographic and modelling industry, the former being so interlinked with the later they become almost interchangeable and indistinguishable.

it’s possible that it does but it might be better simply to track their movements as it doesn’t take into account compassionate leave cases such as when a sex offender needs to visit their dying or already departed relative or perhaps redeem their lives by using them for humanitarian purposes.

nobody is beyond Gods redemptive power even if society writes them off.

to completely eliminate sex slavery western governments must be more vigilant in imposing trade restrictions as punishment for exploitation of women and children .

one major evil that currently exists in the world is the public slaughter of known criminals by beheading in Saudi arabia.

is it any wonder jihadists imitate this kind of behaviour when it is a common place form of punishment in the Arabic speaking world.

to a certain extent we all must rely on help from government but ultimately all of us are dependent on Jesus for our breath and everything else.

if anyone can confirm whether as planned the holy bible was removed from American public libraries en masse please let me know so I can pray and believe with you for the reversal of that notorious decision.

if I had listened to my girlfriend when she said to just kiss her on the cheek and nowhere else and not to touch any part of her body that wasn’t covered up with wool or cotton thread we might still be in a relationship and I wouldn’t have wasted money on a ring for a fiancé that no longer exists in the form of my heart’s better half although compared to me she is still better by half. 🙂

I know there are far more deserving cases and faces worthy of attention than mine who don’t get the recognition they deserve for all the hard work they do on a daily basis diligently plugging away at their keyboards trying to blog on something that will stir the soul into activity, acting as a positive Christian alternative or more wholesome direction for our minds and eyes to turn as opposed to the nonsense that passes for entertainment with endless rehashing of clichés and in depth analysis of the inside of people’s eyelids.

sometimes when we speak people hear us wrong then we resent them for it and get angry bitter and twisted about it like a jagged metal krusty o cutting the insides of our stomach as it turns with every churn of our brewing belly of vomit.

the correct response of course is obviously to try better next time to make our voices clearly heard and understood and if even the mice in mexico( when youre all the way tucked up in Alaska) can hear you then you know the problem is them and not you.

some people are just jerks.

that’s all there is to it.

of course that’s not all there is to it cos like Gregory boyd says inside every child is a monster and inside every monster is a child.

when the receptionist gives you a hard time of it she has probably been at the receiving end of grouchy kids who don’t want to go to school or who are grumpy cos they didn’t get an extra fifty spoonfulls of sugar in their cereal bowl which was already more shiny from frosting than a small snow capped dwarf rival of the Himalayan mountain ranges.

is it stereotyping or just effective marketing to label all females who have kids and blog as mommy bloggers?

its like soccer moms.

they aren’t always ultra conservatives.

some of them actually have tattoos and bright pink hair and piercings everywhere.

yes I mean everywhere.

visible to the naked eye, the general exhibition  rated eye and otherwise

of course some of those people are conservatives too

if anybody thinks that patriot is synonymous with racism they obviously don’t know what it means to be a true embracer of the concept of nationhood with its necessary recognition of a multiethnic society which is practically anywheresville.

we have got to find a way to combine the compassionate nature of Christ’s heart which takes in the widow and the orphan and shows kindness to the stranger with the obvious strain on society by adding extra burdens of welfare payments with every illegal mouth that needs feeding which isn’t attached to a body that’s prepared to work for a living.

perhaps they could subcontract the jobs usually filled by hardened criminals in chain gangs to illegal immigrants.

often overseas contractors get major project jobs for infrastructure and transportation module systems and main roads anyway so you are just fast tracking the process.

I also think permission to build mosques and temples and houses of worship should be reserved for those whose own home countries permit Christian churches to build recognisable houses of worship and gather together in the name of Jesus to worship Him in spirit and truth.

also I don’t believe madrassas should be legal anywhere.

if muslims want to teach their kids about their religion they can do it at home like Christians are forced to do in their countries.

when they allow open evangelism on their streets then they should be afforded the same kindness but while a contradictory law exists in india and some parts of the middle east which allow for conversion by ex pats or prosletyzing to natives but not changing of religion such an outbreak of Holy Spirit transformation of people’s hearts and minds is being hampered by the selfish motives of people who would prefer others minds go blind into the grave rather than being permitted to be challenged by an alternative way of looking at the world.

I don’t believe homosexual education has any place in any school in any country under Gods sun.

not just in those countries that have openly declared allegiance to Gods son some of which seem ironically to be backsliding as fast as humanly possible away from the influence of His rays.

let them try His reach extends beyond the galaxies and is able to destroy any obstacle in the path of His truth’s progress if He so desires.

but He refuses to destroy us completely despite our occasional hearts of disobedience.

He has promised to always preserve a remnant of His people til He returns to take us home.

speedy come the day of your return sweet Jesus.

let us be ready for the moment of your revival to transform our world and perspective of ourselves forevermore

let heaven collide with earth as all our expectations for the future become superseded by the present reality of your presence infiltrating the atmosphere and clearing the path for your triumphant return as lumberjacks do the forest floor with a chainsaw’s grinding yell.

 

A few rapworld mysteries

On his remix to fanatic lecrae name checks Spurgeon in a positive or neutral sense. Later on church clap without explanation he switches loyalties by mentioning Spurgeon amongst practitioners of incorrect doctrine. I personally have no issues with Spurgeon. I haven’t studied him in depth but he has some useful bible verse commentary on biblehub.com . I wonder if tasha cobbs is inviting a curse upon herself by getting nicki minaj to bless her wedding. It makes me laugh as well as cry to think that nicki prefers to listen to gospel music and advocates that little girls avoid her music like the plague yet she continues to cultivate an image that’s a mixture of cutesy pie quirky kiddy bait mixed with her more raunchy risqué sexually provocative side. She can actually make a good Christian rap. So can lil kim n d.m.x . Yet though they see the need to cry out to God they see no wrong in simultaneously being purveyors of sonic n visual filth.

 

In more positive news t i and charlie Wilson have a song about how God provides for our everyday needs and blesses us.

I feel conflicted when I see Christian music videos featuring folks using alcohol and drugs.

I am especially shocked that any Christian artist in name or practice particularly a seminary educated one would use a rude word for poop in their raps or refer to females as dogs.

Worst of all possibly is a Christian rapper who wears an occultic symbol of an upside-down cross in his video.

Here’s hoping he’s either identifying strongly with peters fabled choice to be crucified upside-down rather than die exactly the same way as Christ or merely acting out of plum ignorance.

I am also on the fence about lecraes involvement in the soundtrack of a blasphemous movie called the shack as it contadicts his faith and the lyrics of his own song heaven and hell from his first album real talk.

He has previously discussed being pressurized by the Christian rap culture into writing in a certain mould.

I can relate to that dilemma.

There can be freedom n joy found within the confines of restrictions and boundaries.

For example we hear the old story of the young lady who wanted her momma to prevent her going to the party with kids boozing, shooting up or sniffing substances harmful for insertion in any veins or orifices cos she didn’t have the gumption to stand up to her homies and tell them she wasn’t interested in opening doorways in the spirit realm for demonic possession, getting strung out with stinking clothes and addled brain cells or waking up with a hangover or facedown in vomit gulch.

There’s a widely propagated misconception by attempted social reconstructionists to falsely impose their own values on millenials and deny the obviously widespread influence of conservative ideologies primarily rooted in Christian values.

As much as mainstream hiphop flirts with satanism or sexually exploits women and treats them as commodities rather than valuing their character, personalities or focusing on the positive contributions they can make towards creating a more compassionate and Christ focused society there still remains a vast majority of rappers who subscribe to the promotion of Christian iconography, attend church services either regularly or sporadically and frequently thank God for their success although this practice appears to be fading in popularity outside the dove awards and other gospel music award ceremonies.

One Christian rapper was known to joke if you gave that album as a sacrifice to God He’d probably dog you out like cain and toss it back again. 😂

ce ce winans quite rightly said an album by a genuine bloodwashed Christian instead of self confessed by lifestyle and lyrical evidence hypocrites like kanye n yonce should win album of the year.

After all most Americans of all religious persuasions 9r the complete lack of them has some kind of gospel related artist in their personal music collection.

The previously mentioned artist who let’s say accidentally flirted with satanic imagery has an album cover where he’s sitting on a desert island with what appears to be women he is both in a relationship cuddling up close to him.

Again evil is implied not overtly displayed.

As christians we are called to be above reproach in what we promote as much as in what we do behind the scenes in our own personal lives where only God’s eyes can reach us.

It boosts my spirit to see chance the rapper talking about how Jesus has changed his life.

I kind of think modern Christian hiphop needs more artists like cross movement.

The uks best equivalents are probably Dwayne tryumf or green jade.

In oz we truly have no match.

One guy purified is probably the best we have to offer even though he’s got a dirty mouth on him when he gets riled up in rap battles but hey everybody makes mistakes and probably 99% of the time he’s chilled with it.

We all gotta watch our gobs don’t become volcanoes of the non dormant kind though cause we’re surrounded by a great cloud and crowd of witnessing observing how we select to live out our faith everywhere we go.

Has a Christian rapper ever won scribble jam.?

An ozzie once did but he wasn’t a believer in Jesus

I think the Christian rap scene has more support in atearoa.

This is due to strong support and cross pollination from the dance and club culture.

The fast and the furious is probably the last major movie to give any love to Christian rap back when hitting curves was hyped in stadiums and grits were still tight with the mackalicious toby.

Christian female rappers domes are getting more shots at the big time from the Christian rap industry but it’s still a slow steady climb from the bottom of the valley to the peak of equal promo mountain.

Spoken word has probably been kinder in hyping the poetic musings of Christian females but most radio stations areyet to catch onto the commercially exploitative potential of even the most mediocre inoffensive poetry yet alone souled out life challengers that advocate daily crucifixion of selfishness, exposure of evils like slavemade clothing and child prostitutes globally or being willing to lay down your life for the sake of the gospels furtherance.

the case for Christ by lee strobel movie review

a man and his pregnant wife are at a café their daughter chokes on a gumball and almost dies but for the intervention of a nurse. the nurse says that she was directed to that café and not to another one by the Lord. this makes a huge impact in the wife who had a Christian upbringing but was turned off god by her atheist husband. the husband struggles with understanding his wife especially after she becomes a Christian following a further intervention of gods answer to prayer with saving the life of their baby boy. the husband becomes determined to prove Christianity and the message of the bible is untrue by exposing what he calls the myth of the death and resurrection of our lord jesus  Christ. his journey takes him to several experts who confound him with the truth with which he struggles. finally he has to admit that the gospel message is true and he believes receives and accepts Christ as his saviour. it was based on a true story of a person who later wrote many Christian books about his journey to faith and he became a pastor and a teacher at a theological college. he is part of willow creek community church pastored by rick warren the author of the purpose driven life. at first his wife responds to the incident in the café by saying she was lucky that she met a Christian nurse. she soon changes her tune to one that acknowledges the influence of Christ in her life. she was the same nurse who helped to deliver both their children. she went to a local church. the nurse influenced her to go to church. the husband lee attacks the nurse  verbally and tells her not to come near his family. he was working for the Chicago tribune newspaper. his Christian co-worker challenged him to go for the jugular and examine the truth behind the resurrection. he didn’t feel threatened by the potential that lee might be able to discredit his faith as a result. lee went to a medical doctor, a psychologist, pastors ( including a former archaeologist) as well as his atheist co-worker to obtain source material for his research. his travels took him to California. he found himself becoming increasingly enstranged from his wife as he found himself unable to reconcile himself with her newfound belief in something as opposed to nothing. she was angry at him when their daughter alley or Allison asks who is Jesus because the nurse at the café mentions the name of Jesus influencing her decision to choose the restaurant where alley was choking on her gumball. lee says that Jesus is a fairytale and doesn’t elaborate on who He is. He just says that they are a family of atheists and they don’t believe in God. his wife gets mad because she had previously decided with her husband to let their daughter decide for herself whether or not she believed in God. lee felt like his wife was cheating on him with Jesus. he was hurt when she said that meeting Jesus was the most significant event that had taken place in her life. he felt like he was playing second fiddle to Jesus. this is something we all must do. Jesus said anyone who doesn’t love me more than family and friends isn’t fit for the kingdom of heaven. we must be willing to leave everything else behind in order to follow HIm and remove from our lies everything that doesnt honour HIm . his wife had previously told him I will love you and only you. his boss wouldn’t let him publish a story on his journey from atheism to Christianity  cos he said he would be made a laughingstock. his wife prayed successfully that his heart would be turned from a heart of stone into a heart of flesh. his atheist co-worker has a bad relationship with his daughter because he is an atheist and she is a believer. Bertrand russel is quoted in the film. he was known to have had a bad relationship with his father. this is a common thread amongst famous atheistic authors. they often have father wounds. it is often said that the way we think or feel about our father determines the way we think or feel about God. this is evidenced in the movie by lees decision not to call his dad when he gives birth to a son. instead he forces him to read the announcement in the newspaper like everybody else. it wasn’t until he died that he discovered that his dad kept a folder of all his stories and kept the announcement of his joining the Chicago tribune as reporter in his wallet. he never knew that his father was secretly proud of him. from this we can learn the lesson that we always must express our pride in the achievements of those we love as well as our love for them in case we never get the opportunity to tell them. when the pastor presents evidence to lee he shows him a copy of homer’s odyssey as well as fragments of an ancient Egyptian copy of the bible. he says there is more evidence for the historical reliability of the death and resurrection of Jesus than there is for any other historical figure including Julius ceasar and Socrates. we learn from this movie that historical reliability is not discounted but confirmed by contradictions in accounts of the events that occurred cos this dissimilarity would make it less likely for two people to compare notes and fake an account. the closeness in time between Jesus’ resurrection and the first written accounts from unbiased sources is further proof of the accuracy of this event. the American medical association has published proof in their journal that Jesus’ death can be proven by medical evidence cos there is no way that He would have survived being pierced with a spear and blood and water flowing out of HIm which was a result of asphyxiation or losing His breath in His struggle to take one without pain on the cross. He was scourged with bits of bone and glass. He was whipped almost to the point of death which is why it was too much of a burden for HIm to carry the cross all by His lonesome.

one proof we get from the movie of Jesus’ death and resurrection being real is the fact that in a male dominated society the four authors of the gospels of matthew mark luke and john saw fit to mention that Jesus’ resurrected glorified body was first seen by women who went to prepare sweet smelling fragrances for His corpse.

yet further proof is found in the fact that no roman soldier worth his salt would allow a body he was guarding the tomb of to be snuck away on his watch or else his own head would be on the chopping block as a result.

the Islamic faith falsely claims that Jesus’ body was replaced by someone else on the  cross or that He was merely sleeping and later resuscitated in secret by the disciples.

there was once somebody who attempted to crucify himself for world peace.

he did not manage to endure the suffering involved.

Jesus did.

there was over 500 impartial witnesses to His resurrection including Pharisees who had a vested interest in seeing Him remain dead and yet were unable to deny the proof of His resurrected body walking among them.

also in the movie we see a man wrongfully convicted of injuring a cop.

in truth it was the cop that shot him first so the man sent to jail was set up .

he had shot his gun earlier in another incident that had nothing to do with the cop on that same night.

 

he was a member of the gangster disciples.

he felt like he was left with no choice but to plead guilty cos the evidence was pointed against him.

lees newspaper had to retract the story of his guilt in injuring a cop.

lee was so sidetracked by trying to prove his wife’s faith wrong that he completely missed the concealed weapon being carried by the cop in the form of an ordinary pen.

the guy he got wrongfully convicted told him that he missed the evidence cos he only saw what he wanted to see.

this is true of the way we all approach God.

at the end of the day it comes down to a personal  choice of whether we want to be convicted by the overwhelming evidence for God’s existence all around us.

lees Christian mate told him to put up or shut up in his search for whether Jesus was really who His followers claimed He was cos he had abandoned his search before he reached a conclusion that satisfied his previous delusions about the existence of God.

lee went from a guy who was full of his own ego trying to offload copies of his first published book on everyone in the office to being a humbled guy who approached life from a perspective of seeking to do what is pleasing to do in God’s sight before he satisfied his own personal needs.

in truth we all need to do what is pleasing in Gods sight we just don’t know we do until we want to do it. 🙂

it challenges some people’s perceptions of what exactly constitutes church when lee gives his heart to the Lord in front of his wife not using any fancy words but just pouring out his heart at the feet of Jesus and completely surrendering his life to His will.

we learn from the movie that lees daughter later became a Christian author and his son went to bible college.

lee went from storming out the house on his wife and sleeping on the couch to openly communicating with her about their shared faith and mutual goals to raise their kids in the ways of Jesus.

we get a mild chuckle over the fact that lee’s wife was joking about him doing his research on the bottom of a can of beer 🙂

one of the authors lee spoke to turned to Christ as a result of a personal crisis brought on by the death of his wife.

lee started out being able to talk to his wife about anything under the sun but it wasn’t until he decided to surrender his life to God that they were able to restore a free flow of communication with each other.

it was lee’s daughter who woke him up to his conscience by saying daddy stop being mean to mummy.

too many daddies are mean to their mummies

they may make the excuse that they don’t mean to be

they may even pathetically and in a cowardly manner attempt to pin the blame for their anger onto their spouse when they themselves are responsible for its source.

the reverse is also true in regards to how wives treat their husbands.

we do not see the movie openly explore the fact that the wounded look on the face of lees boss as a result of his story getting an innocent man wrongfully convicted may be influenced by the fact they share the same skin color as well as the personal burden placed upon the reputation of his newspaper as a result of this error in judgement.

his boss hates it when people swing the door shut on him.

only one time in the movie do we see lee respectfully closing the door in deference to his bosses’ personal preference of peace and quiet when he’s in the process of editing his thriving periodical.

it must have taken the African American nurse that helped lees wife all of her self  control and good graces not to burst out in anger but simply respond with a smile on her face when lee came flying at her spitting chips about the fact that she was influencing his wife to believe in God.

we can all learn a lot from that woman.

just because we have the democratic right to lash out and fight back with our mouths when someone attacks us doesn’t mean we should.

she achieved more by her silence and smiling response than she ever could by shaming him over his pathetic and hateful reaction to his wifes decision to  choose to make Jesus Lord of her life which didn’t affect his ability to breathe and live his life according to his wishes one iota.

he tried to forbid his wife from believing in Jesus to no avail.

she ended up persuading him to go himself even though he was motivated by a desire to do an expose on pastors getting involved in sex scandals.

God can even use people’s twisted motivations to bring them to the cross and redeem their souls.

in the movie lee referred to a john as a toilet or the client of a prostitute mocking the fact that his dad wanted him to name his son john after his middle name which had been a strobel tradition for generations but he refused.

his reasons are not mentioned but it is possible that lee was motivated by a reaction to his religious upbringing.

his wife is disgusted that he would use such colourful language to refer to a whore in front of his daughter.

he was not there for his wife to take part in her delivery of their second baby when he should have been because he was too busy gallivanting across the country in his attempts to refute the truth .

his wife’s nurse friend manages to console her and convince her to keep on fighting for what she believes in and to keep standing firm in her faith.

it is funny to see the paradox of lee and his wife both exploring faith simultaneously one with a mind to discover more about the truth and the other with the determination to eliminate its relevance to our daily lives.

praise God that lee’s marriage wasn’t destroyed by faith as he feared but enhanced and strengthened by it.

no matter what your religious belief or lack thereof you will find the same will be true for you in your relationships if you choose both Christianity and making Jesus Lord and master of your life, allowing HIm to guide your thoughts and decisions and to always consider what pleases Him as more valuable than what merely gratifies the desires of our flesh.

I was partially helped in my writing of this post by my dad’s ability to recollect the nitty gritty details of the movie and expand upon its themes.

it is sad to see that lee’s boss did not have enough value in their friendship to grant his wishes to pursue a story that would have actually brought more attention to his newspaper than he had ever deemed possible and potentially jettisoned it into the most widely circulated newspaper on the planet.

but of course we will never know what might have been only what has been and what is and with the help of the Holy Spirit’s prophetic knowledge through the bible and the spoken word of God what is to come 🙂

I would personally be interested in knowing as follow up if any of lees fellow reporters became a Christian as a result of his research knowing that lee was a man of facts and he would not stake losing his reputation and a well paying job on perpetuating a lie if he did not in fact know beyond a shadow of a doubt that he was reporting the truth.

though some these days do not believe in journalistic integrity lee was from the old school where you investigate all the relevant facts before you publish a story and get references from as many sources as possible.

the only thing that disappointed me with this movie was that hell and sin weren’t ever mentioned nor repentance in the process of lee turning his life over to Jesus.

that doesn’t mean he didn’t say that.

it just means it wasn’t included in the movie.

lee was producer so he had some degree of control over the result of what was produced.

of course he would of had to negotiate with studio heads and publicity departments as to what was publically acceptable and what would be funded and green lighted by the movie company.

I am glad he was still able to exercise a degree of creative control over the story of his life.

his wife said that when she fell in love with Jesus her love for her husband only increased.

this is evidence of the transforming work that takes place in our lives when we decide to follow Jesus .

what He requires of us is more than a casual acquaintance but 100 % commitment to serve HIm in every area of our lives and worship HIm with each aspect of it.

it was amusing to see lee watching from between two trees as his wife became baptised.

it is important to mention that she was baptised in the name of the father the son and the Holy Spirit and fully immersed in lake water as this is the biblical methodology and precedent and not every church or believer in Christ believes in doing it that way although it is the only way that is best and right.

although we do not see lee getting baptized we can hopefully assume that he later did in fact make that step of commitment to Christ.

we do know he took a bold step by witnessing to his boss and proving that the boss of his soul was more important than any human who handed over his pay cheque regardless if he ended up in the gutter or a mansion as a result . 🙂

I pray that many will decide to make a commitment to Jesus after drawing their own conclusions about this movie and the validity of its claims.

it is a wordy movie so don’t watch it if you are the kind of person that prefers action packed block busters full of blood and guts , gore and explosive fireworks.

but watch it if you want a heart warming drama that will make you question the possibility of whether God exists and potentially decide to consider HIm for yourself if you do not already claim to be one of His followers and love HIm enough to lay down your own life for the furtherance of the gospel and deliverance of all mankind.

happy viewing 🙂

may God bless your journeys in life wherever you’re at in your walk with Him

 

Michigan girls inspired this post

what is it about this world that makes it so impossible to figure out?

why do we delude ourselves that we are able to have a relationship that lasts for the entirety of our lives without running into any sign of trouble?

isn’t it that very trouble that helps mould and shape us?

if we didn’t have any challenges to overcome how can we truly claim to be in love?

if neither partner is ever required to compromise to keep what they have alive then we are basically just sharing the same roof we may as well be in a business meeting unless we make it our business to merge our lives together with theirs.

I don’t know what it is that convinces us we can carry on living our pre couple lives when we are in a relationship with somebody.

do we need to consult with them about everywhere we go and everything we say and do?

as far as i’m concerned that job belongs to Jesus before my spouse but obviously I wouldn’t make any decisions that affect them personally without consultation.

it’s not good enough to just crack an Abraham and say all right wife let’s get going to the promised land.

she might have a few things to say to him first.

we are not all of us  called to a moving tent ministry thank God.

I can barely handle life on the road for a month or 7 yet alone a year or more.

try 40 years wandering around the wilderness cos of your disobedience.

now that’s a tough concrete apple to swallow worse than the bitter waters of marah made polluted by the people’s complaining , a consequence of not checking their attitude at the door when they come into the presence of the Lord.

we need to have that attitude of gratitude for God giving us life everywhere He happens to find us on this planet.

just like the tree purifying the waters of marah once tossed in by moses  in exodus 15:24 God can make our lives sweet tasting and pleasant to His sight as well as appealing to others who may be potential converts for His kingdom.

God can uproot the bitterness of our hearts and transform our minds so we are no longer looking back with longing for the past like lot’s wife or with contempt upon those who have wronged us but are able to perceive them with the redeeming eyes of Jesus who always views us as capable of changing until we have no breath left in our lungs.

right now i”m listening to ce ce winans beautiful life transforming song about letting the world fall in love with Jesus.

that is my prayer for all of you if you are not head over heels infatuated with Him already.

whatever my foibles as a writer that is insignificant compared to the glory of God which He is able to bring out of all our lives.

let us not waste a single second of our time complaining but let us switch our focus tracks immediately as soon as complaint comes by nipping it in the bud and quickly counting our blessings even if we have to dig around for a while inside ourselves to find something worth rejoicing about.

we will always find something even if it’s only that thank God I woke up this morning

even if we wish we didn’t- God had a reason for allowing us to breathe another day

and even if all you ever did to interact with the world was smile at the postman and wave to your neighbour walking the dog past your house God can use those tiny interactions for His glory.

so don’t complain about God not rewarding you with a major ministry cos He only gives us what we are capable of handling and He makes everything beautiful in His time.

I used to complain about not having babies or a wife until I figured out just how much hard work was required to maintain both.

now I just wait on the Lord to bring that perfect partner across my path and like adara butler says actively seek while remaining in His will .

❤

we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us- philippians 4:13

Jesus said who of us by worrying can add a second to their life

in fact our complaints have the opposite effect on our ability to sustain life.

they draw us closer to death by the minute.

all of us want to have a long and happy life but we don’t all want to do what is required to bring us to that place of lasting joy that can only be found in the loving arms of Jesus.

hidden within you is the potential and power to change the world if your will is aligned with the maker of the universe ❤

 

Bakersfield blues?

I wonder what it is that convinces us that the ones we love are going to leave us or even that they love us in the first place.

some of us think better when we have nobody around to distract us but I am not one of those people.

when I am all by myself I find myself struggling to figure out how to find the words to say what I need to say because I am not fighting to hear the voice I want to hear inside my head.

instead I am being intimidated by this unearthly quiet.

though the birds will give me stiff competition for the claim that I am indeed all alone by myself with no one to keep me company and nothing to listen to and potentially take umbrage that their sweet song isn’t being included in my chronicles of my listening experience.

I wonder what it is that attracts some people to certain types of people.

sometimes they are buying the lie that only one person in the universe can possibly sustain their romantic interests.

other times they have bought into the lie about their sexual identity and think there is no way else for them to be other than the opposite of how God intended them to act think and behave because the tragedy they have experienced has convinced them that their choice was removed before their birth when actually it has always existed just waiting in the wings of their imagination to spring forth and declare itself openly for all the world to see.

🙂 selah

I felt like God was convincing and convicting me to turn off the notifications of specific people who were causing me to stumble spiritually.

I am no longer the kind of person to block someone straight off the bat unless I feel that our interactions will not be conducive to the betterment of my spiritual journey with Jesus.

it is too easy to add someone and then block them straight away and add them straight back again on social media.

this makes me look less like a moral purist and more like a schizophrenic love handler. 🙂

it’s true what james says that the tongue can be used to build people up or tear them down.

it is potentially set on fire by hell.

it is the hardest beast in the universe to tame and the trickiest instrument to tune to Gods intentions.

out of the same mouth proceed both blessings and  cursings.

with it we build up our neighbour and simultaneously tear him or her down sometimes almost within the same breath.

we are nice to people’s faces and curse them in our thoughts.

when they have a relationship with someone we wish we had a relationship with we have been known to wish they were dead so we could stick our feet in their shoes or slip our bones beneath their skin yet would their partner choose us if we had our current personality instead of the one they fell in love with which may or may not be the person they married?

exes are like the dregs in the coffee cup .

they’re not worth going back for.

you don’t need closure.

you wont find anything good there so you may as well do yourself a favour and not stick around.

you don’t need closure you need the peace of mind that only Jesus can bring your heart.

I know I sure do 🙂

live in peace or relapse into perdition

assume a position of neutrality unless you want a constant state of war within yourself to remain a reality.

we should go to war with any being that lurks around this earth except God.

if we fight against God we are always guaranteed to lose.

we should only ever fight people with words spoken from a heart of love unless He advises us otherwise.

the world and all its whirling pool of peep holes

I was convicted yesterday by the demonic nature of my own curiosity.

I found myself being drawn to investigate the sex scandals of pastors who I didn’t even know existed until yesterday.

it saddens my heart when a Christian rapper and well known gospel artist is caught cheating on their wives.

I can barely hold a relationship down for a year yet alone get married so I’m not gonna qualify myself in a position to judge others and their own private lives but I do think that people shouldn’t get into a relationship especially with all the pizazz of marriage unless theyre prepared to stick around for the long haul.

they shouldn’t expect it to always be a peachy beach or a bed of roses.

I may not be married but I learn from the example of what to do and what not to do in a covenant marriage relationship that’s right in Gods sight by observing the lives of my friends who are.

I don’t know why I keep getting drawn into long distance relationships.

I guess you could say its a lack of self control on my part or perhaps its the allure of excitement that compels me to seek the adventure of romance overseas instead of interstate or locally.

I was successfully enough with a dating/ friendship website to get a girl to vaguely commit to marrying me at some future date  but gained a firmer commitment from my former love who I dashed the hopes of just cos I expected something magical to happen with a lovely African American woman who though she may have been the perfect woman for somebody definitely wasn’t the one for me or maybe she was and I just stuffed it up by pestering her too much with questions and  commenting on everything she did or every picture she took of herself on social media.

big mistake.

have I learned my lesson.

do I know post with permission instead of without it.

not so much.

but I try to refrain from posting on every single thing they post just in case I get another furious response of blockage due to my ‘despicable’ ‘deplorable’ ‘laudable’ behaviour.

at least she was better than the chick who tried to say that I needed to have her permission before making romantic advances towards her.

I don’t think so.

she didn’t apply that rule to her own love life or pursuit of men so I don’t think its fair that she applied the do not pursue rule to me alone.

plus I didn’t even get to the fact that in her book she focussed more on how the abortion counsellor made her feel like a piece of poop when trying to convince her not to have an abortion which was illegal for her age in the state of new York more than she did the act of murder she committed at the hands of her offspring although she did call it wrong.

it’s easy to disconnect ourselves from our sins.

it’s easier for us to focus on the sins of others than our own sins.

we go away from the mirror and immediately forget what we look like.

we think our poop smells like roses when really it just smells like poop.

we should look at the giant tree branch poking out of our own eye before we focus on the tiny speck of dust in another’s eye as much as that needs to be extricated  so they don’t cause harm to themselves by its presence.

if we are living holy lives we will be in a better position to point out the sin in others or to bring them to a place of conviction through the Christ loving example of our lives that never says die and never gives up on their friendship no matter how much pain they cause us or themselves, no matter how far they stray from God’s covering of blessings, regardless of how much they criticize or condemn us, despite the fact they may not appreciate or value us anywhere near as much as we think they should.

the question we should be asking ourselves is are we being the kind of friend to others we want others to be to us?

t.b.c