MY TESTIMONY

Hey so it has been a very long time since I posted to this blog and recently God has been reminding me of the place I came from and the place that be has brought me to today. I felt like I should share this - my testimony. The one about what God did in MY heart and how He spoke directly to ME and about how i (lowercase) responded to HIM (uppercase). My story! But really God's story. It is a short one as it is written but a long, ongoing journey as it is lived out day to day. It continues every second of every minute of every hour of my life. Sometimes it is tough and other times easy but I count every day that I am not only alive in the physical, but spiritually alive in Christ a blessing. 

I only wish that you, whoever you are who is reading this, could have known me before I knew Jesus and could know me now, a couple years after having written the piece of text quoted below. The change is immense. God has separated my sin from me as far as the east is from the west. I used to be somebody who would break people down. I would destroy people emotionally and not even realize it. I was a drinker. I was living in sexual sin. I was addicted to myself. I was prideful and arrogant. I was above everyone else. Until God humbled my heart and showed me His glorious grace - Grace which enables and grace which transcends reason. Undeserved grace - and His unending love - Love which comforts and which speaks truth and life. I was saved out of the darkness and brought into the light! I was washed clean from my sin and my old life! Made new by the blood of Jesus! 

This is my testimony - a testimony to the real, living, loving, present God and how he changes lives - You can't argue with a changed life!

God has turned me into somebody who builds people up, who encourages, who loves by action and words. He has made me pure and clean. He has humbled my heart and my head. He has shown me that others are more important than myself and taught me how to put other's interests above my own. He has made me new. The old has gone and the new has come. I have and constantly continue to put off my fleshly desires and to clothe myself in righteousness in Christ Jesus who has set me free.

So here it is-

My life

My God

My Jesus

My Testimony

I’ve been a Christian all my life. My family is not extremely religious but my mom took me to Sunday school most Sundays so I was taught basic Christian principles and bible stories from a young age. So I knew the difference between right and wrong, heaven and hell etc. but I could never really say that I knew God. When I grew too old for Sunday school and had to start going to church it became boring to and I stopped going so often.

When I went to boarding school they had a “hostel cell” group which I regularly attended and slowly grew stronger as a Christian and started to question what was “OK” in the eyes of God and where one drew the line with sin. I found that A LOT of people like to “bend the rules” to their convenience and I was one of those people. A lukewarm Christian! Someone that claims to be a Christian, but is content with minor sins. And that was where I was stuck. I knew what was right and what was expected of me in the eyes of God but I life was too good.

Last year (2011- 1^st year varsity) I moved into a flat with a good friend that is a devoted Christian. After a couple weeks he managed to get me to watch a sermon that was saved on his laptop about “being lukewarm and loving it”. It felt like it was directed right at me and talked about how God wants us to be on fire for Him and stop being content with sin. It says in Revelations 3: “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other. So because you are lukewarm I am about to spit you out of my mouth.” I knew after watching that that I had to make some changes in my life if I didn’t want God to spit me out of His mouth. Then I started to experience God more often and I thought it was coincidence. Random people that I didn’t know came up to me and told me that I am not alone in my struggle against sin and that there were other young guys and girls like me that I can talk to that were struggling with exactly the same things as me. I was mind blown. I thought “how can this guy possibly know what I’m going through?” Then one of my friends told me over lunch one day about how he got saved and how great it was to really know God and he introduced me to more people that just couldn’t stop talking about God and how awesome he is. Then I was invited to “community” (like a cell group). They were having a pancake evening upstairs from where I stay so I decided to join and I came across more people who couldn’t stop talking about God and how great his love is. It was clear that all that was happening lately was no coincidence. I knew God was calling me and it felt overwhelming. It was as if He was screaming at me telling me to sort myself out and start living for Him if I wanted to end up in heaven one day. And who doesn’t? So that’s when I decided to stop sinning and to get to know God like I should. It has been a slow process so far because I have a lot to sort out but and it feels great and I haven’t looked back since!

God's glory

God's victory

God's testimony

CHRISTIANS ARE LIKE SOCCER PLAYERS

Christianity is like a sport.

Let's say that it's like soccer.

It's a really great game but some would disagree because they've never played it. 

Some don't even know what a soccer ball looks like. 

Half the reason some people don't like it and don't play it is because the people that they have seen who do play it and who they have put their faith in to play it well have put up such a horrid display of it that it makes the game look unattractive. 

They have been let down so many times by their team that they lose the drive to get onto the pitch.
Some teams just keep losing so people begin to lose hope in the entire concept.
There becomes remnants of it in parks and back gardens but it can't be fully enjoyed because rules are changed to suit certain people and certain teams.
People begin to cheat.
The way the game was intend to be played has been forgotten. 

People have added on and taken away rules to suit themselves. 

Some have thrown the rule book away completely.

And some have even replaced the rule book all together with a different, made-up rule book.
For some the game has become about winning and becoming great as an individual, not realizing that it is a team effort and that it was invented to be enjoyed by all and that at the end of the day the focus isn't on winning but rather on the enjoyment of the game - winning is a byproduct. 

Others are part of the team but they have been out of form and become complacent and now prefer to sit on the sideline and watch the team take the victory and then expect celebrate with them afterwards.
Some are playing it with broken soccer balls or on bad quality pitches or without shin guards, thinking that they are getting all they can out of it, not knowing how much better it could be, unaware of the potential that they could unlock if they were to play on a proper field with the right equipment.
Some have taken to thinking that they can play it as an individual sport, so they stand in the corner of the field dribbling the ball about on their own trying to teach themselves. 

They might even have a rule book but without a captain to guide them it will only get them so far. 

They don't realize how much more there is to the game because they refuse to be team players, using excuses like "but the team just wants to take my money" or "I don't want to join a team because I don't like the type of game that they play", ignorant to the fact that it is only in a team that they can become better players and increase their skills. 

Sometimes you need somebody else to look at your technique to be able to pick up why you may be kicking the ball skew or missing the target.
Some are training on their own, with nobody to motivate them to do better - it is necessary to train with a partner, a "spotter" if you will - somebody to tell you where you are going wrong, congratulate you when you lift heavier weights and to encourage and motivate you to push yourself to do more and to be better.
Some teams are missing a captain, not knowing that if there is not proper leadership in place the team has no structure and will fall apart.

Christians are like soccer players.
They don't always score goals but they try, and when they do it's because they have been trained well and have persevered and because they have put their faith in a good coach, even when the coaching techniques have seemed odd. 

Their coaches name is Jesus.
They should be part of a team - a church. 

The team won't always win but with good captaincy (leadership), a rule book in hand (the Bible) and faith in the coach, they can play the game right and improve.
Just because you see a bad soccer player who disgraces the game, does not mean you should stop yourself from taking it up. 

Sometimes we even see people who dress and act like soccer players but they don't even know how to kick a soccer ball. 

In the same way some people call themselves Christians and act a bit like Christians but don't, in fact, know Christ. 

We can't let that stop us from being great players and representatives of Him.
We are not called to be hypocrites or back-garden Christians, making up our own rules. 

We are not meant to be playing on dust with flat soccer balls. 

We are meant to be playing on lush green fields with the best quality equipment that Jesus has entrusted to us through the church. 

We are called to walk in the fullness of Christ, alongside our teammates as part of the greater body of Christ. We are called to be successful players and we are called to show the world how real soccer should be played. 

We are called to be humble and to give credit to our coach because without him we would never have learnt to play the game.

As Christians we are constantly on display. We are in the world cup stadium. People are watching and waiting to see how we play the game. How we conduct ourselves. How we handle big hits and defeats. How we are humble in victory and how we play with sportsmanship. They are ready to boo us when we play badly and like some good soccer teams, we need to be prepared to be booed and cussed at even when we play well and when we are on top. The best teams in the league are loved by few and hated by many, just for being who they are and representing what they represent. We need to be ready for that. We can never become arrogant, conceited or complacent because that is when we will fall. And that is what our opposition wants.
The world needs to see us be who we say we are as Christians. 

If we are not who we say we are, then what we do and who we are loses all value.

It's time for Christians to wake up, to stop kicking the ball to ourselves and to stop playing in the back garden by our own rules, to get off the sidelines, to stop making excuses and to start being genuine. 

It's time to get serious.

Because Christianity is actually nothing like soccer.

It's a matter of life and death!

Soccer is just a game that a lot of people get far too worked up over for their own good.
If Christians really were like soccer players, or if they were even half as passionate about the church as some soccer fans are about "their" teams, then Jesus would probably have returned a long time ago to claim his bride and to take his team home.

These are just my thoughts

THE LINE BETWEEN RIGHT AND WRONG AND DEALING WITH ISSUES OF MORALITY

Decision making is tough. Differentiating between right and wrong can sometimes be tough. Making a decision based on what is right and what is wrong is very tough. It all depends on the decision to be made and the situation at hand. Who determines what is right and what is wrong? Religion? The president? The UN? The people? In my mind it is extremely dangerous to leave matters of morality up to human beings, mainly for the reason that as human beings we are flawed. By nature we are selfish, judgemental and indecisive. Our ideas of right and wrong change on a regular basis as new laws are passed and new religions are established, with a small committee of human beings deciding what is best for the other few billion human beings that exist. This is why I choose to base my ideas of morality on what God defines as being right and wrong. To make myself clear, this does not mean that I am bound by religious laws and rules, but rather that because God is the creator of the universe, he is all powerful and all knowing, he created me in his own image and died on the cross so that I may live, he therefore knows what is best for me and I think it only logical that I follow his guidelines on how to live my life. I am a Christian in the truest sense of the word. In the sense that I believe that Jesus died to atone for my sins and thus I live accordingly. But even with God's guidelines (in the form of the Bible) things can be misinterpreted and some may not clearly understand what is written. I therefore find it necessary to share how I deal with tough situations and moral decisions.

From this point onwards I am going to speak from the the perspective of a follower of Jesus and predominantly to, but not restricted to, other followers of Jesus. The main question that I would like to pose, and then answer is this:

How can you tell if something is right or wrong and when presented with a choice how do you make the right decision?

So you've been put in a position where you have to make a choice. Do you take the drink do you decline? Do you punch the guy back or resolve the issue? Do you cheat in the test or not? Now, for someone who doesn't have a biblical moral compass they are kind of making the rules as they go so it's not such a tough decision, but as a Christian, how do you handle the situation? I would propose a number of steps:

1) Your conscience:
God has been so kind as to bless us with something called a conscience. That little alarm that goes off in your head when you know you are about to do something wrong. The problem is that some people have made a habit of ignoring their conscience. This is a huge issue because if you're not a Christian then step one is as far as you go. Your flawed self is determining what is right and what is wrong and even for Christians it is easy to ignore your conscience and give in to temptation. It's not always a good idea to trust your own conscience. As we grow up we are exposed to so much wrong and evil that often our own ideas of morality become distorted and the line between right and wrong becomes blurred. So if you can't trust your own conscience then where do you turn? This brings me to step number 2.

2) Fellowship, discipleship and accountability:
A big part of being a Christian involves fellowship, discipleship and accountability. Living in fellowship means to be surrounding yourself with like minded people who you can trust and in this case who are also living for Jesus. Discipleship means opening yourself up to be teachable and positioning yourself to teach others as well as having people in your life who you are accountable to. It is important to have people in your life who you can trust more than your own conscience so that when you are presented with a difficult decision or a situation and your conscience fails you, you have somewhere to turn to. Often it is good to seek guidance from older, wiser and more mature folk that have perhaps had to deal with similar issues or had to make similar choices.

3) The Bible:
The Bible is the word of God. I believe that it is clear on all issues and situations. It is not ALL knowledge but rather SUFFICIENT knowledge for us as human beings. It's on a need-to-know basis. God is so precise and intentional that at the time he sent Jesus human civilisation was at a point in its development where languages were well established and the struggles that we have to deal with on a daily basis were not going to change much over the next few thousand years. Jesus could teach the people of the time and his words would still apply to us now. Issues such as drunkenness, lust, anger. Things that human beings succumb to and tools that Satan uses against us. If you are in a position where you can't trust your own conscience or somebody else's, the Bible is a good place to turn to to find answers. If you look hard enough and properly you will find what you are looking for.

(Also, to add onto this step, the better you know your Bible and the teachings of Jesus and later of Paul, the apostle, and the closer your relationship with God, the more your heart and God's heart will align and the more you will be able to trust your conscience, which in effect will become the voice of the Holy Spirit. But we will get to that later.)

4) WWJD
What Would Jesus Do. Yes I know. Typical right? But how often, in reality, is this notion actually put into practice? When one looks past the cheap bracelets and the recurring hypocritical statements there is an echo of truth and profoundness to this idea. As Christians we claim to be "Christ-like." His followers who strive towards his example of righteousness, compassion, kindness and love. His example of living. It is therefore only fitting to ask the question "what would Jesus do?" Perhaps, in the instance that the above concept has in some views been overly and hypocritically used and thus lost its sentimentality, I should put forward another notion. If Jesus was standing next to you, simply observing, what would you do then? What decision would you make and how would you deal with the situation that you find yourself in?

The last thing I want to mention, which does not necessarily count as a step, is personal conviction. This is when you feel convicted over something specific in your life. When the Holy Spirit brings a sin into the light. Perhaps something that you have been doing all along, thinking that there's no issue and then all of a sudden God shows you that maybe there is an issue. I've found that conviction comes at times where I have been going deeper with God and he then brings to the surface issues in my life and strongholds that are keeping me from embracing him more and engaging in the fullness of his love. Convictions are personal and need to be felt that way to be real. For this reason it is virtually impossible to get somebody else to submit to your convictions. It can be frustrating mentoring or observing a young Christian and seeing their shortcomings when they don't necessarily see them as shortcomings, but until a person fully submits to God and allows HIM to change them, they will not change, or even see why they should change. You can tell somebody of your conviction and as a result they might also feel convicted but you cannot force a conviction upon somebody.
As an example, I used to watch a lot of pirated movies and television programmes and I have a friend who refuses to watch pirated material because it is technically theft and is illegal and she felt a personal conviction over the issue whereas I wasn't bothered about it. Until the day that I realised and understood for myself that, wait a second, this is actually illegal. Just like murder is illegal. But until I felt that conviction for myself it didn't affect me.

A lot of issues are situational. They are unique and lie within a certain context. A big issue that a lot of Christians are facing is drinking (alcohol). How much can I drink? Is it OK to drink at all? Jesus drank wine didn't he? But the issue of drinking goes beyond these questions as it is a situational issue. There are background questions to be asked before the simple ones can be answered. Where are you drinking? Who are you drinking with? Why are you drinking? How will your drinking affect those around you? The Bible doesn't say that you can't drink but it does say that you shouldn't get drunk. It also says that you shouldn't cause a fellow brother or sister in Christ to stumble. If you are with a person who used to be an alcoholic then maybe it would be wise to not submit them to temptation and it would be right to not have a drink. If you are with a young believer or an unbeliever you need to think about what message you are sending by having a few drinks. There are many factors that need to be taken into consideration when faced with difficult situations or decisions. There's not always a straight out right and wrong. It's not always clean cut.

Narrow is the path to heaven and few walk it, but none can walk it without Jesus to guide them. So lean on him. Lean on him for guidance and directionality. Lean on him in prayer and he will gladly and lovingly and gracefully show you the way. Look to him for he is the definition of righteousness and through his grace you can become righteous. If you choose Jesus you no longer have to struggle with right and wrong and issues of morality. Right will come naturally and wrong with fall away.

This is what I know to be true.
These are just my thoughts. 

FOR THE WAGES OF SIN IS DEATH

Romans 6v23 (NIV):

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

This verse just came to me this morning while I was in the shower and got me thinking, specifically about first part - "for the wages of sin is death". And that's the whole thing about Christianity right? In fact, the above verse does a good job of summing up what I believe as a Christian. Allow me to explain...

Ever since the beginning of time sin has equalled death.
In the Old Testament of the Bible the Israelites (Jews), God's chosen people, made a lawful covenant with God. An agreement. Basically God gave them a bunch of commandments in order to give them an idea of the definition of sin. So, for example, God says "thou shall not murder" and by that commandment they knew that to murder was a sin against God. Now this is where the "wages of sin is death" thing comes in. If an old testament Israelite were to commit a sin he would have to make amends to God by offering a sacrifice. It had to be on an alter, had to be a pure animal (often a lamb), blood had to be shed etc. But in essence if you committed a sin the result would be death. The wager of your sin was death in the form of a sacrifice (that part is important to remember). Then God was like "well these people, as well as the rest of the people in the world, are so full of sin that they will never be able to make amends for themselves." So God took it upon himself to make up for our sin. He became a human being, lived a sinless, blameless, pure life, and was slaughtered on a big cross-shaped alter. His body was broken and his blood was shed as the ultimate sacrifice to make amends for the sin of the world. In essence, the world committed sin and the result was the death of Jesus. The wager of our sins is death in the form of a sacrifice. And God's gift to us is eternal life through the death of Jesus.

So those are the two main applications, in my knowledge, of the verse in topic.
But I started thinking about how "the wages of sin is death" applies today, aside from the fact that the death of Jesus continues to cover our sins daily by the grace of God, and I came across an interesting irony. I thought about the definition of sin and the definition of death. The sin definition is easy. In the simplest description, anything that displeases God can be said to be sin. God tells us all over the new testament what sin is. In all Paul's letters in the New Testament he warns churches as to the things they should stay away from and calls them out on things they are doing that don't please God. Things such as sexual immorality, idolatry, homosexuality, thievery, greed, drunkenness, slander are all mentioned in 1 Corinthians 6 as Paul refers to things that, as Christians we have been called away from and washed clean of. Then in Romans 6, just prior to the verse in topic, Paul says

"When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death!"

It is fair to assume that the things Paul speaks of in Romans 6 that are shameful and result in death are the things he names in 1 Corinthians 6 (to name a few). We can make this assumption, which is actually more of an observation, because after reading both passages we can make a link from "things we are ashamed of" to the things named in Corinthians (sexual immorality, drunkenness, greed, etc.) as things that we used to live in when we were slaves to sin rather than slaves to righteousness. So the sin part is pretty clear.
The death part is the more unclear bit. The bit that has, in my opinion, a few applications or meanings (not in an ambiguous or contradictory way). What I mean is that there are different meanings to the word "death", even without getting to the original Hebrew interpretation or the derivations of the word. The way the word "death" is used by Paul in Romans 6v23 is put up against eternal life, as if they are opposites:

"For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life..."

How about saying that the wages of sin is eternal death. Or to be more accurate, the wages of a life lived in unrepented sin is an eternity of death. That's probably the most obvious way to interpret what Paul is saying, mostly because of the big "but" that follows. That's also the spiritual way to look at it, which reinforces the statement that it's the most obvious because the Bible is a spiritual book.

So I've been through how the wages of sin was death with regard to the old testament Israelites, with regard to Jesus and with regard to a life lived in sin. But these are all examples that might only apply to you if you are a believing Christian. If you're not a Christian then the sacrifices of the Israelites means nothing to you, Jesus' death means nothing to you and the Christian ideas of eternal life and heaven and hell are all bogus. You might not even believe that sin is a thing. But this is where the irony comes in - in my last example of "the wages of sin is death." An example that is clear for all the world to see. 

Consider the ideas of sin that were mentioned above and in Corinthians. Things like sexual immorality (premarital sex), homosexuality and adultery. Then consider how many babies are killed each year through abortions or even by being left in trash cans to die because their unmarried mother can't afford to keep the baby or simply doesn't want to. Consider how many people die from HIV and AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. Things like dilatory. Consider how many people are killed by terrorist bombings and suicide bombings because of the idols they worship. Things like thievery. Consider how many people are killed during muggings, break-ins and armed robberies. Things like greed. Consider how many people are killed over blood diamonds, gold, money, land and material possessions. Things like drunkenness. Consider how many lives could have been spared if the driver was sober. Things like pride. Consider how many people die because countries won't back down. And that's the irony. The whole world can see the that the wages of sin is death, death and more death but they refuse to acknowledge that sin is a thing and that there is a God who can save us from it. Who already has saved us from it if we will just accept Him. As human beings we are natural born sinners. It's in our blood and has been since Adam ate the apple. We are living dead sinful lives without God. But with Him we can enter into fullness and abundance of life and we can inherit the ultimate gift - eternal life through Jesus Christ!!!

I don't believe in coincidence

These are just my thoughts