Beside still waters

I was walking leisurely to the office this morning, listening to a joel osteen podcast, and speaking in tongues, when the holy spirit whispered to me: “i am leading you beside still waters”.

that caught my attention big time. the past couple of weeks, i have been struggling with adjusting to this new life that god has given me. a life of leisurely work, where i function from a position of rest.

it is funny, because i have spent most of my prayer life asking god to bless me, and then when he blesses me, i struggle with how to receive the blessing. i feel like i need to work hard to earn what god has freely given, and i battle a feeling of irresponsibility and unworthiness. I want to work hard for the goodness of god, so hearing him speak this words to me really caught my attention.

one of the results of being led by the god is that you will come to a place of rest, where your productivity and your increase is less dependent on your efforts. it is gift of grace and favor, and all that is expected of us is to be still, and simply walk with god beside the still waters.

Walking with God

In the last few days I decided to stop cycling, and instead walk to the office. Summer is approaching and the weather is warmer and nicer to walk in.

When i cycle, it takes me about 10 mins to get to the office, while walking takes me about 30 minutes. I find that during my walk I can catch up on my podcasts and sermons, while speaking in tongues and listening for God’s voice.

One particularly new podcast I discovered was God Centered Success with Mia Rene – listening to her talk as i walk to the office has done a lot to boost my confidence and prepare me to face my new role. Even though it has been almost 3 months since I resumed work, there are still tons of new things I have to get familiar and competent with, and sometimes I struggle with Impostor Syndrome and the fear of failing. So it helps to pump faith-based strategies and reminders as I walk to the office.

I also realized that there is a reason god has positioned me in this environment. Just like he positioned Daniel in Babylon, and gave him 3 years to learn the skills of the land so that he could provide excellent and exceptional administrative governance to the king, I believe that i have also been placed in this job to  help achieve our organizational impact.

I find that walking with God every morning helps frame my mental capacity and spiritual awareness to learn new things and to improve old things.

A future and a hope

Yesterday, my wife and I went to Heathrow airport to receive a friend coming in from Nigeria.

I paused briefly after writing the sentence above. It feels surreal to imagine how far God has brought us. If anyone told us 6 months ago that we would be living in the UK, it would have made us laugh, and yet here we are.

I was walking home from work today, when I paid closer attention to a sign I always see during my walk – “Always thoughts of tomorrow in mind” – it is the tag line hanging above a company building.

As i walked past the building, this scripture lighted up in my mind: I know the plans i have for you, plans of good and not evil, to give you a future and a hope. It reminded me of where I was coming from. Between 2005 and 2010, I was so sure my life was going nowhere fast. Then God turned everything around, and the sun began to shine in my life.

Sometimes, we can only see as far as our eyes can see. But I have learned over the years to see with the eyes of faith, and to live a life of prophecy. Every year for the past 4 or 5 years, God has been speaking to me ahead of each year. In 2018, he gave me a word through the lyrics of the song by Tasha Cobbs and Nicki Minaj – I’m getting ready.

If my mobile phone could talk, it would testify of how many hours that song played on my deezer app. Day and night, I listened to that song, I spoke that song, I prayed that song, I studied scripture through that song. Looking back now, I can see how every word of that song has become a reality in my life. “I am getting ready to see something i have never seen before”. Indeed, I am now living a future i never imagined, and a dream i never even thought to hope for. Indeed, one thing is certain, when you stick to the word of God, you will come back with a testimony.

But there are moments when i fear that i will wake up to find that this is all a dream. There are moments when i am afraid that someone will discover that i do not deserve any of this. There are moments when i fear that the devil will be able to take back all that God has given. I guess this is why the holy spirit highlighted that signage to me. It spoke to me that I am fathered by a God who has has thoughts of my tomorrow in his mind. The scripture reminded me that I am living in a future and hope God prepared for me without my knowledge, which implies that there is yet another future and hope that God is still preparing for me.