It was the eve of her departure. She was going back home to a foreign country that had become home. I went to see her at the first break of dawn hoping to save pockets of time before her cousins whisked her away. This was the second time we were going to see in eight years. Read more
Of Butterflies, Rings and Growth
Hi guys!
I started out this year with a vision of discovery and growth. There’ve been times I pursued after growth and other times when growth pursued me and I ran away. Lol. Ironic isn’t it? Most times we want to grow and become the beautiful butterflies but the process of change can be so painful that you remain content being a caterpillar. Read more
DTM6
Dear Diary,
Today was a really good day *inserts dancing smiley*. Two good things were involved- food and shopping! 😀
Friends do make the journey on earth a lot easier. They are there when you’re rejoicing and when you’re sad. As much as I claim that I make friends easily, over the years I’ve learned to value the ones I already have. I hold onto every one of them who saw me grow from being a child to a mid-twenties adult. As long as that time period is, there’s just a handful of them.
Truth Series: Musings
I should write something. Anything. The silence is killing me. The boredom is eating me up. Isn’t this when creativity comes alive? When you’re bored? Read more
Forgive Me
Welcome to the 6th day of the A-Z blogging challenge. If you’re just joining us, feel free to play catch up on all the posts missed. 🙂
Today’s letter is F and I was so tempted to write on food but oh well, other things are more needful.
I had messed up. I knew it, God knew it. I hated myself for it. Come on! At this point how can you still be making such silly mistakes? How can you fall when you’re supposed to be grown in the faith? I posed those questions and many more at myself. I was angry with myself. I had allowed my flesh rule me- whatever happened to living by the Spirit?
After a while, I finally went to go to God in prayers. Laying aside my self-righteous acts and seeking His forgiveness. Unsure He had forgiven me, I kept repeating the prayer all through the day. Finally He answered;
I have forgiven you, forgive yourself.
That led me to a long banter about how my ‘self’ didn’t deserve my forgiveness. I mean, there are times you do wrong and feel like you deserve a punishment. Grace doesn’t feel ‘good enough’. It’s not enough to say ‘go, your sins have been forgiven’. There should be something more! Something that will make me writhe in pain. So if God won’t punish my flesh for disappointing, I’ll do it myself. I’ll hurt myself by hating it or for some others, by inflicting physical pain. I may just be the only one who thinks this way at times.
Truth is, grace is always sufficient! God loves us so much. He sent His only son to suffer some gruesome death, for what? So we keep nurturing guilt after confessing our sins? So we hide away because we feel our sins are ‘too much’ for God to handle? So we hate our bodies and everything about it that disappoints us? Hell no!
Jesus could have just been shot! -Dunno if they had guns then– but you get my drift; they could have just stabbed him with the sword to kill him at once. Why the cross? Why the crucifixion? Why the slow death? So you see the gravity of it all! Grace was birthed from bloodshed. Grace was bought by the blood Jesus shed on that hefty wooden cross. Grace is freely given but is not cheap. So please, never for once treat it as a cheap commodity! Now that’s a topic for another day.
Some of us are still in bondage because we haven’t forgiven ourselves for unpleasant situations we believe we could have averted somehow. But God doesn’t hold it against us. He forgives us when we ask for forgiveness and He expects us to do same to ourselves.
Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. -Isaiah 1:18
His desire is for us to be free indeed! Forgive yourself for the child that got wayward. Forgive yourself for the hurt you allowed. Forgive your body for the abuse it went through. Forgive yourself for the bad things you did… Let it all go! Embrace His finished work on the cross and His unending love for you.
It’s always my desire that you live victorious lives
Lots of love,
He Loves me; He Loves me not
It was a day to Valentines and I wondered what the day would bring. Appointments or disappointments, make ups or break ups. Would he send me a gift? Would he not?
My eyes trailed the lonely path to see a beautiful flower with delicate petals. I picked it up and watched as the flower felt secured in my palms. I lightly tugged at a petal and said ‘he loves me’ as the mild February breeze seized the little petal. I pulled out another and said ‘he loves me not’. As I began to pick other petals still repeating the same words, my heart shuddered at what the end of the game would yield.
I’ve always believed in love and I’ve probably watched too many Rom-coms that I can’t help but dream of the fairy-tale. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen tons of them where the girl was unsure of her man’s love and trusted the petals of a flower to tell her if he loved her or not.
Who doesn’t want to know if they are loved? Or the extents to which that love would go? That’s why there are love calculators and apps like M.A.S.H valentine or even a simple striking out game of ‘F.L.A.M.E.S’ which help you ‘know’ the extent of love or degree of compatibility.
So I lingered with the flower. Most people would say it was a lame game but it kinda meant a lot to me because I was unsure of his love for me. I never really doubted his love when I was on my best behaviour; when I was the good lover that spent hours and hours with him; who made him smile by adoring him. Yeah, he sure loved me then!
But what about the times when I was too busy for him? Times when I defiantly did the opposite of what he asked of me? What of the times I cheated on him…? My heart sank. I unconsciously squeezed the light flower in my palm and when I opened it, it looked really pale. Just like my love. 😦
‘He loves me…’
‘He loves me not.’
Three petals remained in my palm. You could already tell the result of my game. A smile that had been hiding behind the creases of my face turned up like the sun rising in the east.
I smiled at the last petal and whispered ‘he loves me.’
The thought sent electric waves down my spine. Like every lover, there were days when I was insecure about his love for me; days when I felt undeserving; days when I didn’t just feel like it- like today. But the result of the game said otherwise and I was willing to believe it.
Look! Listen! There’s my lover!
Do you see him coming?
Vaulting the mountains,
leaping the hills.
My lover is like a gazelle, graceful;
like a young stag, virile.
Look at him there, on tiptoe at the gate,
all ears, all eyes—ready!
My lover has arrived
and he’s speaking to me!
SOS 2:8-10 (MSG)
He loves me! I screamed as the realization began to give me more meaning. He loves me no matter what I do. He loves how weird I get. He loves how I smile one minute and cry the next. He loves how I get weak sometimes and reach out to him for help. He loves all of me. My beautiful imperfections are truly loved by a perfect God! Nothing could ever separate me from that love! 😀 ❤ ❤
Do you ever feel unloved or undeserving? Here is a quick note to self;
Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us and Christ’s love for us? There is no way! Not trouble, not hard times, not hatred, not hunger, not homelessness, not bullying threats, not backstabbing, not even the worst sins listed in Scripture:
They kill us in cold blood because they hate you.
We’re sitting ducks; they pick us off one by one.
None of this fazes us because Jesus loves us. I’m absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God’s love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us. -Rom 8:35-39 MSG)
***song for the day- His Kind of Love by Group 1 Crew***
©Mfon Etuk, 2016
Write a letter to someone who has hurt you recently -Day9
Write a letter to someone who has hurt you recently
Wow! This is a tough one.
Uhmmm, okay.
Let’s do this.
Here it is:
Dear,
This is to let you know you brutally hurt me; constantly stabbing my fragile heart with a sharp dagger. Yes, I gave you my heart when you clearly had no capacity to love. You didn’t hurt me alone but constantly hurt others, dragging a trail of broken hearts in your wake.
You always wanted your way even when you knew it wasn’t going to work out. You always went overboard with your imaginations and emotions, hurting me every time another one fell through. You hated me and did a poor job at disguising it. You never believed in me but constantly reminded me of my weaknesses.
I don’t blame you for hurting me. Your immaturity clearly got a strong hold of you and blinded you from the truth. You never saw me for who I was, but for some weakling with a heart made of cheese.
I forgive you because you didn’t know better. I set you up for failure by making you an invincible superhuman when you were a mere human with skin and bones.
I forgive you for letting my heart hurt, once, twice…multiple cuts. With the bleeding came the strength to allow the healing waters flow. With scars to tell the story, I’ve become the strong woman I was meant to be. Thank you for hurting me, even though you didn’t know it was to make me stronger.
I forgive me for hurting me.
Yours truly,
~Mfon
What a twist right?
It was pretty hard writing this letter. I could easily think of a number of people who had hurt me in the past and conveniently write a long essay to this effect. But deep down, I know I hurt myself by giving them the power to hurt me. Most of which (the hurt) didn’t even happen in reality as much as they did in my head-brooding over a hurt that cut so deep in my mind while it was a mere brush of the skin in reality.
Most people find it a lot easier to forgive others than themselves. They blame themselves for everything and undermine what they have going on good for them-I inclusive. So yeah, this is my letter to me. Not to some guy who broke my heart, or a parent that never truly understood, or a friend that said hurtful words-no, this is a letter to me.
Your turn…
Are you holding on to hurts that you might have caused? Or are you holding on to people who have hurt you in the past? Take some time out to think about this and forgive the people involved, including yourself. A hurting heart will always hurt others.
Day 9 done, 22 more to go!
Yes we can!
Happy Sunday guys!
Dainty M. 