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Showing posts from June, 2020

Thanksgiving Chronicles 7: Planted and Surrounded

May the LORD repay you for what you have done. May you be richly rewarded by the LORD, Ruth 2:12   Credit:Uncle Debo Adeleke  Today as I mark the start of another year, the focus of my thanksgiving is on the family God planted me in and all those wonderful and amazing people that God has surrounded me with from the cradle up until now. Without God we are nothing and without the right people, life can become a lonely, desert island. I have so many things to be grateful to God for and could keep writing for days unending because God has never stopped doing me good. He daily loads me with benefits and marks my journey with his grace. Thank you Lord for my parents, parents who took their responsibility seriously and set our feet on the path of righteousness. Parent who prayed for us and thought us to pray and depend on God. My parents can pray!!! Ahh!!. The long list of people we pray for daily in morning devotion. If you are in a hurry to get somewhere, please

Thanksgiving Chronicles Day 6: Crushed but not broken

The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit. Ps 34:18 These photos taken in Accra, Ghana in July 2006 not only reminds me of dashed hopes but how God has come through for me in my darkest and weakest moments. It was 3 months after our wedding and I had just had a miscarriage. Nobody wants a miscarriage but if it’s going to happen let it be private. Mine started at work and while my husband was out of town. I will forever be grateful to our staff nurse at work who pulled all her connections to get me checked up at LASUTH that afternoon and my senior colleague who drove me home in his car. The situation got worse while he was driving me home and I has bled all over the back of his car. When I felt I needed to push, he’d stop the car and let me and would not let my mum clean the car for him when he dropped me off at home that night. Thankfully and coincidentally my parents were in Lagos that evening. We had suffered another family bereavement

Thanksgiving Chronicles Day 5: He Made a Way

The LORD directs the steps of the godly. He delights in every detail of their lives. Ps 37:23 Only God can turn random and aimless wanderings to a journey into fulfilment. For someone like me who likes to be planned to the minute details, God has hijacked my plans severally and turned my random wanderings into things bigger than I could comprehend. One of my biggest worries as an undergraduate was how I would get a good job after school when we did not have connections in high places. I remember a childhood friend-Seyi Oni visiting and we were having this same conversation. Mum overheard an interrupted our chat. She said, you guys don’t have to worry about anything. We have prayed for you. In your generation, it won’t be about who you know but what you know. Just keep working hard and standing out. You will all be ok. Thanks you Ma, we said looking at each other. I honestly didn’t see much sense in it at the time. During our service year, one of my friends stopped at

Thanksgiving Chronicles Day 4: He Meets My Needs

Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.  Are you not of more value than they? (Matt 6:26) I love birds and have found it difficult to delete photos of these two. I won't put myself down as a bird watcher. Far from it. I no get time! (As we'd say in Pidgin English). Birds just remind me of Matt 6:25-34, one of my favourite passages of scriptures growing up. That ’s not to say I had no worry. In fact quite the opposite. I was a worrier and at a point had to print these passage and place by my wall. I photographed one of those birds in Clacton-on-Sea, UK and the other in Tel Aviv, Israel. Why do you need to know where? Because that reminds me that God’s provision is not a factor of geographical location. If he looks after birds all over the world, he’d look after me wherever I find myself. I didn’t grow up with surplus but our parents worked hard and our needs were met as much as they could. I

Thanksgiving Chronicles Day 3: He Crowns my effort

Put God first, and he will direct you and crown your efforts with success Prov 3:6 When God gives you the 'expo' who is the lecturer that can fail you? I was very academically bright as a child. We really didn't have a choice. Our parents put us in the best schools, were hands on when it came to their involvement in our education. Daddy was the Current affairs, Chemistry and Biology tutor and Mum was the Maths tutor. That is not to mention extra lessons out of school and during holidays. We had every book on the school's list of books and either Mum or Dad will travel from Akure to Ibadan during the long vacation to shop our textbooks at Odusote Bookshop. We all skipped at least 1 primary school class to get into secondary school. I and my brother went to secondary school from Primary 5 and my sister crushed Federal government exams and left for Secondary school from Primary 3. You could say we were the highly 'alakowe' (literate) family but I'd

Thanksgiving Chronicles Day 2: He Watches Me

The  Lord  watches over  you; the  Lord  is your shade at your right hand Ps. 121:5 What can beat God's divine intervention in the face of situations where we know it only takes one silly move, bad decision or mistake and life could be gone within the twinkle of an eye. When we decided to relocate from Nigeria, I had a lot of concerned relatives ask why I would leave the security of a good job to face the unknown in a country that was at the time going through an economic recession. One of my responses was, I just wanted to go somewhere I could sleep through the night without a scare. I had faced too many security near misses and I didn't know how many more I could afford to face. Around Sept/Oct 1995 somewhere between end of SS2 to start of SS3, while school was on mid-term break, a few of us that were writing GCE stayed back in school as we had papers that weekend. Very deep into the fateful Friday night, we heard some movement on the door of our room and befo