“Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love.”
‭‭Ephesians‬ ‭4:2‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Most of the time we take for granted how patient and merciful God is with us each time we sin and fall short of his glory. God is always gentle, humble and patient with us despite our many flaws because of his love for us. As a result he expects us to do the same and cut others some slack just like he does for us so that they may also experience the love of God.



Prayer and reflection:

Dear Lord, in this week help me to be humble, gentle and bear with others in love just as you do for me. Give me opportunities where I will be required to be completely humble in order to be patient With others and when these opportunities come, remind me of this scripture and give me the strength to be able to put it into practice for your Glory. Amen!

Worship is essentially one of the basic foundations in the life of every christian. At some points in our lives, we've all worshiped in one form or another. But one may ask, what is worship? Most of us were raised to believe that worship is just a style of music. And our understanding of worship was simply what we do after praises before the preaching.. Our perception of the difference between praises and worship is merely just the pace of the music with worship being considerably less chaotic and more intimate than praises.

Until we realise that worship is way more than music, we will not be able to worship God in the way he wants us to. Everything we do at church is worship-preaching, bible reading, offering etc are all different forms of worship because they bring pleasure to God if they are done in truth and in spirit.

This brings us back to the question... What is worship that is true in the eyes of God?

In James 4:23-24 the Bible mentions that "Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”
This tells us that worship is far beyond music and just exalting God with our words. In Matthew 15:8 Jesus said "These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me." Therefore, from here we can learn that worship predates music, preaching, offering or even church going. Worship is a lifestyle, and beyond the singing and dancing and our conventional understanding of what worship is. Worship is love, forgiveness,gratitude, how you treat people, being quick to listen and slow to anger, being generous,being humble etc. Worship is doing things as if you were doing it for Jesus, Worship is loving like Jesus.

Worship is any act that is done wholeheartedly which brings glory to God as in doing this, we let our "light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven".  Essentially worship isn't just a part of your life, worship is your life.
Worship is a lifestyle 

“Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.” Psalm‬ ‭37:4‬ ‭NIV‬‬

To delight in the Lord means to take pleasure in Him and find fulfillment in Him. This also means  loving Him with all your heart,  doing what pleases Him and living according to His will. David said “the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want”. David compared to Saul was a man after God’s own heart because He took delight in God and he was rewarded for it. 

When we delight in the Lord, His desires and the things He takes pleasure in becomes Ours. As a result we begin to walk in His perfect will thereby having a sense of an unexplainable joy, peace, happiness and fulfillment deep within us. Life becomes more about God and less about us.

Prayer and Reflection:

Dear Lord, from today onwards help me to take pleasure in and to only desire the things that pleases you. So that all the desires of my heart will be fulfilled and I will be fully satisfied in you.
This I pray in Jesus name Amen! 🙏🏽

“In their hearts humans plan their course, but the Lord establishes their steps.”‭‭Proverbs‬ ‭16:9‬ ‭NIV‬‬

One thing I've realised is that things don't usually go according to how I plan for them to turn out. Sometimes I make plans in my mind, pray and ponder over them before I set off to carry them out only for things to turn out unexpectedly, sometimes with outcomes which I didn’t even think were an option. It doesn't necessarily mean they turned out bad, it just means God had greater plans.

Prayer and reflection:

This week, as you set out to do your day to day activities each day, ask God to help you to remember that although you make your own plans in your heart and mind, it is Him who orders your steps. I pray that the Holy Spirit will continually remind you of this so that you will not be discouraged and will not lose faith when things, especially ones which you've vigorously prayed about in hope of how you wanted them to turn out doesn’t go as planned.

So as you go through your week, don't forget to seek the Lord first in everything that you do and always remember that “when my plans fail, God has greater ones for me".

Amen

In hospital pharmacy, we have something called medicine reconciliation. It is done by the ward pharmacist for every patient that is admitted to the hospital. It essentially involves taking an accurate list of the medication history of each patient before they were admitted to the hospital and comparing it to the medications they have been prescribed for by the doctor at the hospital. This is done because unintentional changes to medication regimens can lead to adverse drug effects which will harm the patient. The pharmacist needs to ensure that each medicine the patient brought from home matches the ones that has been prescribed and that the dose, frequency and route of administration have not been changed without a clinically valid reason thus ensuring continuity of care and avoidance of medication errors.

In the book of 2 John, the bible teaches us about living in love, truth and being mindful of people who aim to deceive us. In John 14:6, Jesus says “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me”. So, in this scripture we learn that Jesus is the truth and therefore we can cannot claim to live in truth if we don’t have Jesus in us. But also in John chapter 1 we learn that In the beginning was the word, the word was with God and the word was God. Further down in verse 14 we also learn that the word manifested into flesh, which was Jesus Christ. So how can we claim we live in truth and have Jesus if we don’t have the word? Therefore, from these scriptures we learn that the word is the truth and if we don’t know the word, we can’t claim to live in Christ. 

This is why we must set a time out every day (aside of our morning devotion) to read and meditate on the word of God for ourselves and develop our personal relationship with God. Because if God wants to speak to us it will be most likely through his word therefore, if we don’t spend time with God we’ll never know God and if we don't know God we will not be able to recognise his voice or hear him when he speaks to us. John 10:27-28 "My sheep listen to my voice; I know them and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one can snatch them away from me."

The Bible also warns us to "beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep and but are really vicious wolves (Matthew 7:15)" and False messiahs and prophets who will rise up and perform great signs and wonders so as to deceive, if possible, even God's chosen ones (Matthew 24:24). However, if we know the word of God and develop a relationship with God by constantly reading His word and seeking out revelations for ourselves, we can easily discern between sermons that are not based on the word of God and ones that preach the truth as well as sign and wonders that are of God. Just as Jesus said that His sheep know His voice and follow him, we will be able to discern which prophets and sermons are of God based on what they preach about. Matthew 7:20 "Thus, by their fruit you will recognise them”. 
This is what I call scripture reconciliation, when we have an accurate list of the promises God has for us in the Bible, the commandments that has been set for us and an understanding and knowledge of the ways and works of God, we cannot be deceived by false prophets and their teachings. Because we can check the bible, read it and understand it for ourselves and in doing this; hear from God ourselves rather than relying on hearing from God through others (pastors and prophets). Therefore, we should be vigilant, hold on to our faith and his word.  By doing this, we ensure that no one can snatch us away from his presence.

The main difference between people isn’t the problems we face but it is how we interpret and respond to our problems.

“The temptations in your life are no different from what others experience. And God is faithful. He will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand. When you are tempted, he will show you a way out so that you can endure.”
‭‭1 Corinthians‬ ‭10:13‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Here’s an example:

A shoemaker wanted to open a shoe shop in a particular town. In order to find out if the people in the town would be interested in buying his shoes, he sent out 2 people to the town to find out.When they both went to the town, they realised that not a single person in that town wore shoes. They then returned and both reported back to the shoemaker.

The first persons's report was that it would impossible to sell shoes in that town due 
to the fact that not a single person there wore shoes which means that no one would be interested in buying his shoes. Therefore, it wouldn’t be beneficial to him to open a store in that town.

The second person who was sent to the same town came back so excited to give the shoemaker the good news. His report was that he needs to open a shoe shop in the town as soon as possible and having a shop in that town would be a huge advantage because the people in that town are in need of shoes as not a single person was seen wearing shoes.

From this story we can tell that they both saw the same thing which was the fact that the people in the town wore no shoes. However, the only difference was the interpretation that was given to the situation which was whether the fact that the people wore no shoes was a problem or a possibility.

My question to you is that as you face up to life do you see problems or possibilities?

Most of the time when we face problems, we become overwhelmed and let them completely take over our mind. In doing so, we make the problem seem bigger than the God we serve and we forget that we serve a God who can do the impossible (in other words we lose faith in God). However the Bible has made it clear that it is our faith that moves God to take control and in Matthew 17:20 we are told that “if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Be moved’ and it will be moved. Nothing will be impossible for you.” Mountains signifies problems, obstacles and anything in our lives which are out of our control. Therefore 
by having even the slightest faith, we should be able to command the problems to move out of our lives and truly and indeed they shall be moved. Also,we are told by God In John 16:33 that “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” If we take hold of this word no matter what problem we face , we will not be overwhelmed by it and as a result; we’ll be able to see past the problem and rather see the possibilities.

Being a born again doesn’t mean we won’t face problems but it means that God will help us and be with us every step of the way. Being a born again also means that we need to change the the interpretation we give to things and we can start by starting to see problems as possibilities because problems can only have an impact on our lives if we let it. Therefore when we face problems, although it may be hard and easier said than done, we should try and look at the possibilities in the problems by putting our complete faith in God knowing that “Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but the Lord delivereth him out of them all (Psalms 34:19 KJV)” and also that “all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose Romans 8:28 KJV”. 

So when we face problems, to make it easier to see the possibilities and to get through the problems rather having sleepless nights and thinking about the problems all the time; we should turn it all over to Our creator knowing that He will come to our rescue. In order to do this we need to continually read the word of God to build and stair up our faith. By doing this, each time we face problems we'll remember case studies or situations that people such as Job, Joseph, David and many others faced and how God turned their problems into possibilities. The Holy Spirit uses the word of God to comfort us and to lift up a standard against our problems or anything that comes up against us. 

Life brings problems HOWEVER in those same problems lies possibilities. We can either choose to focus on the problem or the possibilities but our choices are determined by the level of faith we have in God.Every impossibility is an opportunity for God to demonstrate His glory and power, therefore let go and let God.