Believe Right!

There's a popular proverb in my mother tongue (Yoruba) that roughly translates into "A white chicken does not realise its own age." Of course most Yoruba people know that this isn't at all about a literal mature white chicken acting like a chick. We know that this Yoruba proverb is a cue for its recipient to " Respect yourself." This hidden meaning in words reflects the style of the entire Book of Proverbs. In fact, Proverbs 1 tells us the purpose of the Book: "These kingdom revelations will break open your understanding to unveil the deeper meaning of parables, poetic riddles, and epigrams, and to unravel the words and enigmas of the wise." Proverbs 1:6 (TPT). Christ our Wisdom from God is "the Wise." The Proverbs break open our understanding of His words. Little wonder there are 31 in all- one for each day of the month and we do as He says aka "pay attention to my words, incline your ear to my saying" by His Grace alone, so as...

Beloved, of God, Romans 15:14 tells us:   “ For whatsoever things were written in times past, were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope.” The Scriptures/Old Testament were written to comfort us and to give us hope. In the Christian sense, hope is not just a “maybe.” Bible “hope" is a “ joyful and confident expectation of eternal salvation."  Summarizing the Gospel of Christ and our salvation in Him to mean striving for godliness/perfection by human strength or trying to not have one's hand in the cookie jar upon Christ's return for His saints does not give any comfort, make us joyful or bring a confident expectation of eternal salvation. If anything, that false summary puts one under the pressure of trying to be good/perfect (be like God) and makes us all pretty hopeless because always, we are imperfect of ourselves. Even right now. " There is none good but God"  says Christ. Christ Himself was the ...

So many things to learn about God's love for the sinner in this parable, even in the life of the older brother who was angry that his dad never gave him even a young goat to celebrate with his friends despite all of his hard work, notwithstanding the fact that he also got his own share of the Father's estate at the same time as did his younger brother. Hear this from Christ Himself in Luke 15:12– “ 11 And He said, “A man had two sons. 12 The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of the estate that falls to me.’ So he divided his wealth between them.” Remember what the Father said upon the return of the son who had squandered all of his inheritance, all after embracing and kissing the returnee:  22 “But the father said to his slaves, ‘Quickly bring out the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet; 23 and bring the fattened calf, kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; 24 for this son of mine was dead and has come to ...

Why do bad things happen to good people?  Christ answered this question for us in Luke 13 when some people came to Him with news that Pilate had killed some Galileans as they were offering sacrifices at the Temple -- observant Jews cut down by their oppressors in the middle of doing something lawful. See this and Christ's response in Luke 13-- " About this time Jesus was informed that Pilate had murdered some people from Galilee as they were offering sacrifices at the Temple. 2 “Do you think those Galileans were worse sinners than all the other people from Galilee?” Jesus asked. “Is that why they suffered? 3 Not at all! And you will perish, too, unless you repent of your sins and turn to God. 4 And what about the eighteen people who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them? Were they the worst sinners in Jerusalem? 5 No, and I tell you again that unless you repent, you will perish, too.” Beloved, understand that repentance is not that beating of one's breast in regret fo...