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JESUS' LETTER TO THE NIGERIAN CHURCH

I woke up thinking about it ‘If Jesus were to write a letter to the church in Nigeria what would he say?’ So here goes the letter;

                                                                                                      Christ’s kingdom way,

                                                                                                                    Heaven.

Dear Church,

  My spirit cries with what I see. I came to magnify the old laws and change some. I am a Jew. I see a religion formed in my name but it doesn’t keep my ways. Why are you divided, there are so many denominations? I see you using the memoirs of my time on earth for your personal gain. You distort them. My words are being used to lie and deceive.

   Why do some churches say only their members will see my kingdom? Why do you ask your members to marry only each other? Why is there discrimination amongst you, your Christian brothers and other religions? Every man was made in my image. In my time, I ate with and welcomed foreigners, gentiles, Samaritans though I was a Jew.

Why is there murder amongst you? You do not keep the old commandments by my father or the new.

WAS HE RIGHT?

   I saw this in a group I belong to. It was said that American Comedian George Carlin was the author but i just had to Google it to know if it was a book so I could buy and read. I found out that yes it was from a book but it was written by  a pastor, Dr Bob Moorehead, former in his book Words Aptly Spoken, published in 1995. This essay is titled ‘ The Paradox of our Age”. Irrespective of the scandal that followed him later, well that's none of my business. Please read his words below and see if he was right or wrong.

"We have taller buildings but shorter tempers; wider freeways but narrower viewpoints; we spend more but have less; we buy more but enjoy it less; we have bigger houses and smaller families; more conveniences, yet less time; we have more degrees but less sense; more knowledge but less judgment; more experts, yet more problems; we have more gadgets but less satisfaction; more medicine, yet less wellness; we take more vitamins but see fewer results. We drink too much; smoke too much; spend too recklessly; laugh too little; drive too fast; get too angry quickly; stay up too late; get up too tired; read too seldom; watch TV too much and

THE NEED TO BELONG

  Have you ever wondered why you need friends? Why you keep trying to make people like you? Why you keep searching for love even after your heart has been smashed into pieces? Have you asked yourself why you hang on to that friendship even when it’s detrimental to your health? Why you worry about the clothes you wear, the way you speak, the amount of money you have, the cars you ride, the places you go to, the job you do? Have you sat down and wondered why you care so much about what your friends, co-workers and even mere strangers say and think about you? Have you wondered why you deemed it fitting to belong to a religious inclination and go as far as to join a society in your religious group? Do you ever remember wondering how to make friends and make people like you when you were a kid or a teenager? Do you remember, taking that stick of cigarette and holding it to your lips and dragging in as your mates looked at you? Do you remember sneaking out at night to attend that party that everyone was talking about? Do you remember wearing your uniform in a certain way like

YOU ARE NOT WORTH IT

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    I was with a friend who uttered the words ‘Frances, nobody is worth it.’ I looked at this my friend that I had tried to show ‘you are loved and worth it ‘on various occasions as the flawed being that I was and my spirit was silent. What I really heard from those words was ‘Frances, I am not worth it.’

    If you think no one is worth it then you’re indirectly trying to say that you don’t think you are worth it. I felt sadness and pity for my friend. That’s a dangerous way to live. My friend like many other people right from childhood had been unlucky with love and guys. Yes, we all fail at one thing or the other over and over but it’s how you let it handle you that matters. How could my friend let the devil win? Was all I could think.  You’ve been battered and bruised; your heart stomped on over and over so that makes you

IN WHOM DO YOU TRUST?

Trust is a very important word to all humans.  According to my Britannica, TRUST is;

1 a: assured reliance on the character, ability, strength, or truth of someone or something b: one in which confidence is placed.

  Most humans spend their whole lives searching for someone they can trust be it a life partner, business partner, friends etc. We all look for someone we can be ourselves with, share our dirtiest secrets and all and know that it’s safe with them and that they’d still want us after knowing our deepest secrets.

  Asides keeping secrets,

FEAR OF THE UNKNOWN

           We all go through this stage at one time or the other in life. It is that gnawing sensation at the pit of your belly ,that fast heartbeat brought about by uncertainty, that sweaty palm when you ponder your future, that terrible headache that won’t let you go when you have a life changing decision to make. We all react in different ways to it.

  You cannot say you have never gone through it. Remember that first day at school? Mum said go on and you looked back and realised she was leaving you; you were so scared you started crying because of the fear of the unknown. It was a new environment for you, you did not know anybody and you asked yourself questions; will my teachers like me? Will I make good grades? Will my classmates like me? Will I have friends? How do I settle in?
  You have a great job but you do not like it, it is not your dream job, you decide to give it up to follow your heart.

TRUTHS AND LIES

  Truths and lies, two siblings that follow each other around. There is a very thin line between them. You can easily move from the truth corner into the lie zone.

  We tell lies for different reason, to gain recognition, respect, feel important, and hide secrets, selfishness.

  So, what situation calls for the truth and what calls for the lie?

  Funmi and Peter had been going out for a year, things were going smoothly, and they had a little quarrel and broke up. Funmi knew something he didn’t and she was debating between telling him the truth or telling him the lie, so she told him the truth and he broke up with her.  A year before Funmi met him; she had followed a friend to her church. A prophet in that church had told her she was going to meet her husband very soon and gave her things to identify him with. Alas, it turned out to be Peter, exactly as he was described.

CHOICES

 “Choice” I don’t know why I picked that word today, maybe cause I overheard someone say yesterday, ‘I didn’t have a choice.’ I hear that a lot, that’s the easiest excuse we give ourselves but there is always a choice. In every situation there is always a choice not just one but two or more. We take the easy one and say, I didn’t have a choice. Ok, let me give a little example or rather many.
  Ebele had a boyfriend, Reggie. They were engaged and set to marry in a week. She had gone to his place and his phone rang repeatedly while he was in the shower, she felt it was urgent; she picked the call and told the caller he was in the shower. Few minutes later, he got out, found out she touched his phone and gave her the beating of her life. Long story short, they got married as arranged. Now a married woman, bearing the ‘MRS’, Ebele always has marks and bruises plus dark eyeshades are now her best friends.  When asked why she married him, she said she didn’t have a choice. Ok, what about now? She still doesn’t have a choice and that he loves her very much that’s why.
  They both had choices. Ebele had two choices;

THE LOVE CALCULATOR

   Relationships are sometimes pretty hard between two people. There will always be disagreements and misunderstandings but one thing about all that is, it can break or make the relationship. You either break up or you make up and are stronger from it. Yes, most times we battle the fear of the unknown that comes with being in a relationship, the uncertainty especially because of past experiences and things heard or seen from the environment. Not knowing where a relationship is headed can be nerve wracking. No one wants their time and emotions to be wasted. No one wants to be taken advantage of. Sometimes cause of it people tend not to give their all or they just clam up with the notion that if anything happens then they won’t feel utterly terrible.

   Once in a while we expect our relationships to turn out the way the movies, magazines, novels say they should. We expect it to follow a certain pattern and also expect our partners to do what everyone else would do. E.g. ‘it’s Valentine’s Day so you should get me a gift, take me out to a candle lit dinner and spend time with me no matter what.’ If it doesn’t go that way, does it mean your partner doesn’t love you or care about you? Well, men are from mars and women are from Venus. Men tend not to reason that way or see anything special about it but the media has made it that way and most wanting to keep the Lady happy, do what is expected for that day. What then happens to the certain few that do not conform to this? Simple, the ladies keep parting ways with them. 
   Which brings me to a point,’compromise and sacrifice’. Sometimes, they are necessary in a relationship. It is a very important tool. You know your spouse likes the whole Valentine razzmatazz but you personally don’t care about it but you still go out of your way and make that extra effort to keep them happy.  Vice versa, you know your hubby sees Valentine as nothing, he may even forget it. In the end he does as expected but you, Valentine lover as you are try to understand and reason as per his character and you don’t break up. You reason it doesn’t mean he has no love for you, he shows it on every other day. You try not to expect your relationship to be like another that her hubby bought her an Aston Martin for Valentine. You see there is compromise and sacrifice on both ends if they decide to. It’s a hard thing to do but it keeps things going.

   Let’s look at it his way, Valentine’s Day wasn’t originally made for lovers but the media and corporate bodies have built a multibillion dollar network on it. They have made huge sums from painting an image of love that has to do with gifts. If you don’t buy gifts for your partner then you don’t love them. Valentine’s Day is a day to measure the love your partner has for you depending on what kind of gift they buy for you. If they love you they’d do so and so. It’s become commercialized but hey what lady doesn’t like romance and gifts? Even, the toughest lady wants it, to feel that craze that Valentine’s Day has to offer.  We have been trained right from the days of reading ‘Mills and Boons’ that romance is to be expected. This is what it should be, so we buy the Valentine Day story, so if you want to keep and make us happy, go out of your way to do it. Romance has been defined in various forms by the media; A box of chocolates, Flowers especially red roses, a candle lit dinner and not just any dinner, expensive gifts, then a night of lovemaking but don’t forget to spread rose petals on the bed and light up scented candles. Is that now the definition of love? If you don’t get the above on that day then your spouse doesn’t love you. Most men now push all that down to just Valentine’s Day. Shouldn’t it be everyday or when you feel like? Should your gift giving be now restricted to only Valentine’s Day, Christmas and birthdays?

   This takes me briefly to another thought, ‘comparison’. We begin to compare our relationships to that of others. Well, not just to theirs but to what is expected.
’ If he doesn’t do it like Femi did for Titi then it means he doesn’t love me’.
 ‘If he did he would go out of his way to make the day special for me.’ 
‘Valentine’s day, he is meant to take me out and spend time with me, get me a gift.’ 
Guys should take note here, in most cases this leads to a break up, don’t forget about sacrifices. Women love romance. Ok, I have another thought. ‘that Femi did all that for Titi does it mean he really loves and cares about her and doesn’t have a lady elsewhere or that they will stay together forever?’ No it doesn’t! It’s been proven that most women get fooled on Valentine’s Day. Smart guys use the whole romance razzmatazz to create a notion of true love. If he wants to get her, Valentine’s Day is perfect; all he has to do is put on a little show. I’m not a love cynic but it’s the truth. It’s just done because it is what is expected or people expect something. Thanks to the false interpretation of love on Valentine’s Day the case of young unmarried teenage pregnancies goes up after this period. It’s said that women go by what they hear but on this day, actions have to speak louder than words so buckle up. Failure to do this,

   Brings in the third parties, friends who help in defining what you just did or didn’t do. Believe me a break up is eminent because if you did nothing or little  then you don’t love her, don’t care about her, take her for granted, she means little to you and God forgive you if you are not in town even if it’s for a genuine reason, she is the side ho. You travelled to be with the number one. Well, instead of talking to friends about it, why not just tell the dude what Valentine’s Day means to you, even the dumbest guy or one who doesn’t give a hoot about the day would go out of his way to make it up to youI don't mean nag about it or complain and sing it all day. Drop hints or say it out straight once. They’d know how you feel about it but hey, what do i know? Yes, people are meant to know like duh, it’s THE DAY, the news about it is everywhere, and sadly some people need to be told. Yes, I said the impossible, actually saying how you feel about it to your partner but that’s communication or isn’t it.

   Finally, your friends aren’t in the relationship with you. Don’t let one day be the judge of your love for each other. I am not asking you to make excuses or make yourself unhappy. You should sit down and check not the things that your partner has said to you and how they said it but their actions. Actions show love. Their actions excluding that day they didn’t live up to and what it shows you. What’s important is how they make you feel by the way they treat you. Besides, you should know your partner better so ask yourself what he/she is really like. How does he/she treat you? And then if you know what they like, going out of your way to do it, would make your partner appreciate you more. If they have a tendency to forget, find out if you can deal with the tendency or not or if forgetting that day ruins every good deed done. Say how you feel. Yes, it does hurt. We all are scared of being too understanding and being fooled and taken for a ride. Everyone shares that fear both, men and women alike.  But, hey, everything is a risk or better put an experiment and no one prays for either to fail, so, Que sera sera. It can go any way so if it’s on the end it side, let it be the right reason, should Valentine’s Day be your love calculator?
  Yeah Valentine's day is next Saturday but seeing this old article you're reading got me thinking again. Don't wait till Valentine's day to show someone you love them. Life is a gift that can be taken away in any moment. Live it. 
  Cheers! Love yourself first and every other thing shall be added unto you. *wink* .
Love, Frances. 

P.S: These are my thoughts on it not a rule You mustn't agree. I don't know it all.

Happy St Valentine's day in advance!

 http://youtu.be/GCHxMX9WaNc

                                                            

VIRGINS OR NON-VIRGINS ,WHO'LL MAKE HEAVEN?

  Before I commence let me state that for the purposes of this article a Virgin is not just a girl as many have dashed the importance or duty of being a virgin to the female human. A virgin is a boy or a girl. Both males and females came into this world as virgins. Well, if you’re in the group that doesn’t understand how a male can be a virgin let me clarify a bit more.

   A virgin means you’ve had no carnal knowledge or pleasure i.e. you’ve never had sex in any of its forms most especially penetrative sex. You will agree that a boy comes into this world pure as does a girl.

  
   Religion and culture for centuries has made it a thing of pride and necessity that purity or abstinence from sex be adhered to. Sadly, it’s been left to the females because their bodies have a proof in the hymen to show that they’re virgins. It’s put pressure on females over the years. The males get away with it because there’s nothing to show it in their bodies. I’m guessing this is one of the things that led to the one sided notion that only females are virgins and should be virgins. I’m speaking from the cultural perspective now. Being a virgin has been considered a thing of pride for generations by females. You even hear them say ‘Every man wants a virgin’. The voice in my head is crying ‘Why shouldn’t females demand the same from the males?’ (Every woman should want a virgin and hold the men to the same expectation they’ve been given.)

    You see the males popping cherries, having sex and sowing their wild oats before they finally decide to settle down with a female in marriage, sad to note that this marriage takes place in a religious setting i.e. the two dominant religions; Christianity and Islam.

  Let it be noted that these two religions preach purity. I’ll stress more on the Christian religion that I’m conversant with. It’s stated clearly in the Bible which is the word of God Yes, Fornication is listed as one of the don’ts. Paul the Apostle also said fornication is a sin against the body and CHristians should run from fornication as it is a sin against self and God. Fornication is sex between unmarried persons, two people not married to each other, even self pleasing i.e. masturbation is fornication. It takes two to tango; boy and girl. It never said an unmarried girl shall not fornicate. So, what’s up with the double standards everywhere? Even religious heads in some churches forget to remind their congregation that being a virgin and not fornicating was meant for both sexes. A school of thought will argue that the term ‘fornication’ does not mean sex before marriage, true. Ok, Sex was made by God for married couples, two become one is for married people. Married people married to each other o and not adulterers. Here, I’m talking about unmarried people having sex and not the various branches of fornication.

   Sadly, the choice of not staying a virgin was taken away from most boys (Topic for another day) when they were children without their consent by female teachers, aunts, maids through acts of rape and molestation though they never admit it was rape. Some ladies as we all know and admit lost theirs by rape. For the purpose of this article I’m addressing sex as penetrative sex alone. (Well, to me the sixth commandment covers all offences against the virtue of chastity. )

There’s been a silent and sometimes verbal feud between virgins and non-virgins.

   Most virgins carry on like they’re the holiest of beings. They act like they should be revered and worshipped because they’re virgins. The simple fact of them being a virgin automatically makes them special and a good person. They judge others that aren’t. They think God will keep a place in heaven for them because they are.

    
   Most non-virgins avoid virgins like the plague. They rub it in the virgins’ faces that they’re weirdos and nerds that never had the opportunity to lose it. They also tell them that no one deemed them worthy enough to touch them sexually. They’ve even gone on to call virgins relics of a lost age, accusing them of following a tradition that enslaves and belittles women. They sing that what a man can do, a woman can do better and should enjoy it too. Deep down some are envious that they’re not.

  Most forget that yeah, it was taken from you or you’ve had sex, you can pray to God, ask forgiveness and decide to abstain from fornication and become chaste.

  
   There’s something virgins and non-virgins have in common. They say they love God or Allah and their religions mean the world to them. They show it by belonging in various units in their churches and mosques. They attend services in Church and Mosque religiously. That’s all good and great. If you love God, why don’t you show you love him in the real sense of the word by keeping his laws and making him happy? Is it an eye service love you present to people who’re watching?

   
   If you’re not a virgin and you claim you love God but the night or the morning before service be you a boy or a girl, you bang the brains out of your partner or you masturbate and show that dildo and that new lubricant what you’re made of alone in your room. You show all your bedmatics styles to another human and sing in pleasure and still have the guts and feel alright to walk into God’s place of worship and sit down. You even go ahead to sit down beside said partner in God’s house. You ask for forgiveness and that same day after service you bang your partner’s brain out or run the dildo battery down or jerk off as you watch porno and you’re ok with it and still claim you love God and go about singing you love God, it’s your prerogative really. Jisike! It’s between you and He that see all.

   You’re a virgin, be you boy or girl and you also claim you love God. You say you’re keeping your virginity till you get married because you want to keep God’s word, that’s great. You’re a virgin yet, you tell lies more than a merchant. You are the gossip mistress in your unit and enjoy peddling rumours about other people. You covet and eye and envy your friend’s good fortune, you even go as far as bearing false witness against another. You even stole your room mate or friends piece of clothing and wore it to church. You look at another who’s not a virgin and judge; it’s also your prerogative. Your tribalism is high and you dislike others from a different church and religion. You do this and liver gree you enter church, it’s between you and God.

   You love God and want to enter heaven yet you say you’re a man so you need to have sex whilst not married. You say sex is great and you keep having it whilst not married. You know what you’re doing is wrong; you just tell yourself ‘God will forgive me.’ You ask for forgiveness and go right back to it. You even console yourself with the excuse that you belong to a unit in church and are working for God in God’s house. You truly love God. Methinks God would appreciate you love him in all entirety, in the real sense of it.

  It gets me thinking that if we claim we love God and still hurt him, how then can we love a human being truly? That the world has changed ,does it mean God and his laws clearly stated in the bible have?

   In the end, he without sin should really cast the first stone. Yes, even in that statement there’s a disparity, you don’t know what you’re doing is a sin or you know it is a sin but keep doing it. To be sincere what person above the age twelve doesn’t know left from right, right from wrong? Well, Everything’s between us and our maker as we stay cognizant of the truth that death can come at any time when we least expect it.

Who do you think will make heaven between the two?

 P.S: As all articles on this blog are, these are my thoughts and observations on the matter.