IN PURSUIT OF LOVE

My life has been lost seeking for humanly approval and fleshy desires; I’ve been wound up in a whirlwind of trying hard to satisfy man to the extent of even worshiping them like a demigod here on earth in the name of love.   

I lost my spiritual life with this deep desire to satisfy a man here on earth, I could skip my worship practice and fellowships with other Christians in the University, skipping bible study sessions and also skipping the church services constantly losing touch with my Christian life by giving all my time to this relationship that was slowly killing me and giving me anger towards the people who would have given me guidance and also a place of solace and openness.

So, this is where I lost touch, I got into a relationship with handsome and charming man in the university, who promised everything he could not deliver. I bet he could have been so cunning that all he said seemed to resonate with my thinking then and he ticked all the boxes that made sense to me then. Soon I discovered that all that was like bright light flashed to while in darkness blinding my sight but giving me hope of better things. He led me away from the Lord and took part in the destruction of my Christian foundations. I had anger towards my housemate and I disconnected from everyone else. My life was intertwined between my boyfriend and I. He wasn’t a leader, he led a careless life and so did he lead me there too, I know that a man should take lead in a relationship and also help me to lead a life in purity but all this was disregarded and hence we I was down the destruction path.

When we went home for the holidays, I regained track and wrote down what God teaches us in matters purity, I had a conviction that I needed to make things right with God. During this time I discovered for us to do anything worthwhile and beneficial to us and pleasing to God, we needed to meet up with a third party every time we went out together, have joint bible studies and also prayer together, he needed to be a leader and a protector in a sense that he should have protected me from himself: to me, this were the foundations of any Christian relationship. When we got back to session and I shared this with him, and he was so displeased and pissed off that he called the relationship to quit, this is the worst I had expected and it broke my heart. In my naivety and vulnerability, I again gave in to his manipulations and the status quo remained for quit some time. I needed love and then I felt this was where I could find it.

When I was back home during the break, I was so ashamed, angry and in condemnation, I couldn’t harness any courage to tell my go dad “Spiritual dad” neither couldn’t I tell my friends because I was afraid of being judged, I had already judged myself harshly and I expected the worst  from any other person. 

God still had my back and he sent someone else to my rescue, my spiritual mum reached out to me and sought to find out if I was doing fine and okay, I had an urge of telling her that I was not okay and confessing to her my detrimental state but I was still undenied and I couldn’t do that, so I went offline.  She, however, followed me up with a text message, she told me something rare that was the beginning of me changing my life and my lifestyle, she told me that God was telling am not okay and was instructing her to pray for me. Knowing her relationship with God and her walk in faith I couldn’t second guess, I believed. We arranged for a meeting on Sunday and after the service.

Coincidentally, that very Sunday we had a sermon on repenting and reconciling our lives with God. Hebrews 4:12 for the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.  And indeed it just did that to me. My thoughts were to reconcile myself with God by confessing my sins to my spiritual mum and for her to pray for me. Now immediately after the church we met with mum and we talked quite a lot. I just remember telling her that I don’t love God while crying because by then I knew how the state of my heart had been. She advised me and the first scripture that God gave her was Job 22:21-30. You can find time and read it. I’ve been praying and studying it and some of the things that I came to realize from this was that God wants me to submit to Him, Accept His message and store it in my heart, return to Him and I’ll be restored, make Him my treasure and when I do this things then He promises in His word that ill surely find delight in Him and He will lift up my face to God, I’ll pray and He will hear me and I will fulfill my vows.

Then HE continues to say that what I decide on will be done, and light will shine on my ways. When men are brought low and I say lift them up then He will save the downcast. He will deliver even one who is not innocent, who will be delivered through the cleanness of my hands. And so after we prayed I felt at peace and purposed to love God with all of my heart, mind, strength and soul and also I forgot to mention that I wasn’t in good terms with my housemate. I even couldn’t talk to her because I was so full of anger, bitterness and anything she did that pissed me off even offended me a lot. I just switched off everyone and it was really tough for me. For my housemate God talked to me about the unity of believers in Ephesians 4:1-6 and what I learnt was that I should be humbled, be patient, gentle, bearing with one another in love and making every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.

This happened at the beginning of this semester during our first service here at our university. Now am know that truly in all this circumstances that God still loved me and He made a way for me to just confess my sins, provided His guidance through His word to pursue Him and not other people and again I got back to serve Him. Indeed knowing that His love, never fails, never gives up or runs out on me just gave me an assurance that indeed His love for us is pure. You can listen to one thing remains and He loves us by Anthony Evan and I belong to you the one of William McDowell it has been constantly ministering to me throughout this period until now. It is my prayer that we will get that satisfaction in Christ and even experience the joy of waiting upon Him and again learning on paying hid to the corrections He gives us. For he alone, is satisfying and not anyone or anything in this world that we are in. I love His corrections/rebukes, His guidance, His grace and Mercies, His faithfulness and the list goes on and on. He can never heartbreak you because He promises us never to live nor forsake us and so just choose to trust Him and wait upon Him. Through my own experience I know that God indeed loved me. He forgave me and granted me a chance to live for Him and I just don’t want to find myself being led by the evil desires that burn within me but to always be under the leading of the Holy Spirit and also to grow in loving Him with all my heart, mind, soul and strength and to love my neighbor as I love myself.

Through this experience my eyes got opened and I now know that God’s love is greater than any other love anyone living can offer. His love is unconditional and pure and is the only one that we can find solace in. We should forever pursue it and pursue his love and just as Mary in the bible he will love us and give us the desires of our hearts as they may be best for us.

God IS LOVE, how I may explain I cannot but just by how He has been to us then we will certainly acknowledge that indeed HE loves us so much. First, HE so LOVED the world that He GAVE His ONLY begotten SON that whomever BELIEVES in HIM should not PERISH but have EVERLASTING LIFE. Find this in john 3:16. He loves us by granting us the gift of life and even the air that we breathe. He loves us even through the punishment that we receive if we stray away from His word, when we are away from His presence. Hebrews 12:6 because the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son.” He loves us by providing for us His word to be a guideline to a Godly living that honor and glorifies Him both in word and in deed. He loves us by being merciful and gracious to as when we fall into sin or rather when we stray away from His presence.