Your daily reminder...

How do you grow and nurture any relationship?
The obvious answer...spend time together, talk to one another.
What about honesty?
That's important
What about sharing?
That's also incredibly important.
what about authenticity?
Yep, that's necessary.
Intimacy...that too

Sometimes in our relationships with God, we forget that we are nuturing a living breathing friendship with the one true God.
Sometimes I feel myself waxing and wanning in my relationship with Christ.
The fear of backsliding is always gnawing at my heels. I carefully think about all the things I'm about to do and rate them against my heavenly meter.
Lord...if I watch this Pg13 movie...will I lose a little bit of my christian credibility?
More often that not I wear the badge of my Christianity as a mirror of my worth. Wait, what does that mean?
Yes, God defines my worth, but I'm not talking about God.
I'm talking about the things I do that others see and use to label me as a believer.
Things like...not cursing, not having sex outside of marriage....not getting drunk.
You know the things that make me a 'good person', a good 'christian' .

I've gotten into the terrible habit of using these actions as a determination of my level of closeness with Christ. If I am behaving like a proper christian, if I don't sin as much as the next person...I use that as a checklist for whether or not I'm doing the whole christian thing right.

Self-righteousness is a sin that so many people fail to realize they're even committing, and I believe one of the easiest to fall into as a believer. If in your faith you've gotten into the routine of performing a list of duties for God with the thought that it justifies your salvation, you my friend are committing that sin.

I'd become so focused on my outward actions as the scale on which I measured my inner salvation that I lost sight of the relationship and friendship that truly paid the price for my salvation.

We live in a meritocracy, a world where the belief is widely held that the more you work for something, the greater your reward. Christianity says no, that's not true. God's gift of eternal life is free and no man earns nor deserves it.

The word goes on further to say that because of this gift,

¹⁶ Because of all that God has done, we now have a new perspective. We used to show regard for people based on worldly standards and interests. No longer. We used to think of the Anointed the same way. No longer. ¹⁷ Therefore, if anyone is united with the Anointed One, that person is a new creation. The old life is gone—and see—a new life has begun! 2 Corinthians 5:16-17

It's actually Christ that changes our perspective and allows us to have higher standards, to aspire to a greater level of consecreation. WE do not, I repeat WE do not do these things for ourselves or on our own.
While we strive to live a holy life, let us not forget who made this holiness possible. It is only by the grace of God that we're able to understand and appreciate true righteousness. 
We do nothing to earn the love of God. 
The word only asks us to draw near to God and promises that he will draw near to us. James 4:8 It's by the cultivation of this relationship, through prayer and intimacy that we will ever become the men and women of God we so desperately desire to be.

So if you feel like you've been sucking at this christian thing lately, or have felt a lack of desire towards the things of Christ...examine yourself and your life. Are you spending time with God?
I mean truly spending time, not are you running through a 15 minute prayer with Bethel worship and journaling for 5 minutes.
I'm not talking about your daily routine.
I mean are you actually talking to God? Voicing your disappointments, frustrations, convictions?

We will never be the authentic men and women of God we aspire to be if we have an inauthentic relationship with God...no matter how hard we try.

 ⁸ God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. ⁹ Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.

Ephesians 2:8-9

Bonding with my mama, cultivating our relationship during the Christmas holidays

All my love,
Obioma

Letter to my future husband

Dear future Husband,

I would love to say that I pray for you all the time, that I cover you in the blood, and I speak nothing but life over you.

I would love to say that I war against provinces and principalities in your name and call down heavenly messengers on your behalf. 

But I don’t.

I fail fully in that area.

The truth, the honest truth and nothing but the truth is that while I think about you, I spend most of my time fantasizing about you.

Are you tall? 

Is your caramel complexion perfection? 

Is your jaw chiseled? 

What does the frame of your body do? 

Does it ripple as you work out, does the sweat glisten off you back?

How’s your smile ? Do you have a perfect row of chick-let teeth that gleam as you do a half-cocked grin?

Will our intimacy be mind-blowing or medicore….

I compare you to my past, to the men from before. I stack you up against them. I weigh your future accomplishments against their past deeds. 

I reminisce about their past romantic gestures. 

I’ve already instructed you on what you need to do based on what has been done.

And even yet, I become angry at you.

Where were you when he hurt me? 

Why couldn’t you comfort me in my loneliness? 

If you had been there when I struggled with my body and my face would you have prevented the trail of men that I left in my wake?

I get sad at you, because I ponder on the hurts you’ve experienced, from the women who weren’t me. Did they hurt you, leave scars I could see?

Did they claw at your heart, take pieces that belonged to me?

Sometimes I sigh at your childhood…the one I concocted in my head. If you’re anything like me, it was unstable…yet stable. It was imperfect, yet adequate.

Did you fight the demon’s of dysfunction, and triumph only to fail. 

Will you reveal your past pain to me through tears as we sit on the bed? 

Will I have to fix you because someone else has broken parts of you?

I pray not. 

I imagine my complexity and it makes me anxious to meet yours. 

Dear future husband,

 I’ll be honest: I don’t feel good enough for you. I worry that I won’t be what you want, deserve or need. 

Worst, 

I’m just afraid of the reality.

So I look at my list, the same one I gave to God.

And as X, Y, Z and he walk by, I mentally cross them off. I anticipate you, but dread it at the same time.

Ecclesiastes, a season for everything.

So while I wait for you, I’m finally going to work on me. 

Dear future husband, 

I pray this letter finds you well. 

I pray that you forgive my failures.

I pray that you pray for me and do as I wish, not as I do.

Because the pedestal you stand on, I will never reach.

Love,

Obioma

Doing a lot with my new hat and kimono. Secret: the hat was only $7 dollars, so was the kimono. I love deals!

To the woman who has no friends

It seems like the older you get, the less friends you have.
In elementary school, the whole point of school was to make friends and have as many friends as possible.
In high school, you're awkward, but the desire to fit in and form meaningful relationships didn't dissipate.

As you get even older, the song changes. It's no longer about having as many friends as possible, now people brag about having 'small circles' and few friendships.
The older you get the harder it seems to maintain significant relationships with people.

As a woman I feel the struggle is especially hard for us. Women are more apt to express our feelings and we often read into situations on levels men never breech. I know it's not a popular thing to say, but I feel that women get jealous easier, upset quicker and vindictive sooner.
So we struggle in our relationships with one another.

Growing up, I was an only child. Only child syndrome denotes a fierce independence coupled by a desire for significant relationships. The problem was, I could never keep friendships for long periods of time, except for one. That one being my best friend Doyin, and I would love to say our lasting friendship is due to my hard work, but she kept us alive more often times than I have.

I have no trouble making friends, but forming lasting and significant relationships often eluded me, because to have good friends, you need to be a good friend.
And for a long time, I didn't know how to be a good friend.

My problems

1. I was selfish
2. I didn't communicate
3. I lacked authenticity

I state my three flaws unapologetically, because God has truly been pruning these characteristics out of me.
I possessed a sense of entitlement about everything, and my pride accompanied it. I wanted to be center of attention in all my relationships, ignoring the fact that friendship are a two way street.
If a friend and I had a disagreement, I always looked at it only from my perspective. I couldn't understand why the other woman didn't see it my way, or why she wouldn't apologize for hurting me.

I didn't communicate. I'm not talking about texting or calling (although I'm not too good at that). I'm talking about saying what I mean and meaning what I said. I would tell friends what they wanted to hear to avoid disagreement (even if it was untrue).
And if you do this, understand it is unbiblical, we can speak boldly to our true friends because proverbs 27:5 Better is open rebuke than hidden love.

6 Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses.
Worse, I would keep my mouth shut on specific issues that affected our friendships, again, to avoid fights. AND I would never tell 'my friends' my problems. I wouldn't tell them my pains, or hurts, or issues. I would never allow input into my life and I would guard my inner pains with a ferociousness that rivaled any lion.

I would say the worst of my problems was my lack of authenticity. It seems like all my life I've been trying to figure out who is Obioma. And when you don't know who you are, it's very hard, if not impossible to be the real you around anyone. I would camouflage myself depending on who I was around. So one set of friends would get loud, funny, and impulsive Obioma. The other set of friends would receive quiet, charming and flirty Obioma. I switched it up all the time.
Can I be honest and say: It's very hard to form relationships with fake people. I was that fake person.

Being transparent on this blog is something I aim to be, because I believe transparency is the key to any ministry and any move of God.

If you struggle with friendships, being a good friend or having good friends...I challenge you to examine yourself. Take your eyes off others and truly call yourself out.
Be honest about your short comings and go to God for the solution.

I didn't overcome my problems on my own, I didn't become unselfish over night. I didn't start telling all my troubles immediately, and I definitely didn't become authentic in an instant. Getting in my Bible, learning about what it meant to be a true Christian, a true Christ follower was the first step. And as I grew closer to God, as I realized who I was in him I could walk in the image of Christ and form the lasting relationships I have now.

I think the lightbulb hit when I finally realized that through my salvation with Christ I was a friend of Christ. Now I could be a true friend to someone else.

I love how John 15:12-15 models biblical friendships.

12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.

References for John 15:12

• Cross References

• 16 15:12 - ver 17; S Jn 13:34

13 Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.

References for John 15:13

• Cross References

• 17 15:13 - Ge 44:33 ; Jn 10:11 ; Ro 5:7,8

14 You are my friends if you do what I command.

References for John 15:14

• Cross References

• 18 15:14 - Job 16:20 ; Pr 18:24 ; Lk 12:4
• 19 15:14 - Mt 12:50

15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.

My bestie Doyin (middle) and Victoria in New York

After church outings with my sissy Kesi

All my love,
Obioma

When the thirst is real

This may be a pretty scandalous post, but I feel like my blog is a place where I can be unapologetically honest and real in every aspect.
If I can talk about my past shame, thoughts of suicide, depression...I can talk about my thirst.

For the first time in a long time, I am single.
No plural, no bae, no boo...no body texting me good morning or asking how my day was or otherwise.
And...it's strange. At first it was very lonely.

Since puberty, I've always accessed my worth by the number of men I kept in rotation. I didn't necessarily know that was what I was doing, I just thought I was just finally coming into my own.
I grew up awkward and unattractive, so when boys and men started finally noticing me, it was like a switch in my brain was turned on.
Couple my low self-esteem with my mostly absent father, you had a pretty formidable match.
Even as I started forming my relationship with Christ, I could never truly overcome my need for male attention. I constantly sought the affirmation I originally desired from my father from these other male figures.

Of course the relationships were never the same.

I believe the relationship I witnessed between my mother and father definitely planted seeds of insecurity and a lack of respect for men within me. BUT, Please hear me when I say my parents are wonderful parents, mother and father...they're human though.
And the enemy will take even our tiniest flaws and magnify them to a proportion which we wouldn't think. That's why it's so important to be ever vigilant in our walk and in our defenses. (1 peter 5:8) 
Ultimately I take full responsibility for all my actions, while my environment may have planted certain seeds, I chose to water them even after hearing the word of God...over and over and over.

Through a lot of fasting and prayer, I feel like I am finally at the point where through the grace of God, I'm overcoming the bondage of men. Honestly, it hasn't been easy, but I am feeling the growth.
Nonetheless, the thirst is still real.
It's almost like the more determined I am to overcome my natural desires, the more temptation is constantly pursuing me.
I think the misconception around Christianity is that you magically lose all your hormones or earthly desires the moment you are saved. Absolute falsehood. 
I truly believe this is why it's so important to have a living relationship with Christ, because without the conviction of the Holy spirit, the flesh will always dominate.

And It's not enough for me to say that the thirst is real without providing ways to quench it.

 

Practical tips for when the thirst gets too real:

1. Ask yourself: what seeds am I planting and watering in my heart?

If you find that you only have certain things on the brain, well...what are you listening to? What are you watching? what are you reading?
Have you ever noticed how music affects the way we feel..listen to a sad song, begin to feel sad.
Listen to a happy song, begin to feel upbeat and happy...listen to raunchy music, you're going to start feeling raunchy. Don't be timid when it comes to guarding you heart, your thoughts and your mind.  

Guard your heart above all else,
    for it determines the course of your life.Proverbs 4:23

2. Make sure you make deliberate efforts to focus on the things of God.

It's not enough to exclude secular influence, but you need to fill those voids with God and the things of God. If you're constantly crushing on a relationship that won't become reality, or are tempted to return to randoms, read the word of God. You'll be surprised at how quickly those previous thoughts dissipate as your renew your mind and focus on Christ-like things. Pray if nothing else! Talk to God, not that guy.

Your word is a lamp to guide my feet
    and a light for my path. Psalms 119:105

3.Pass the test. Avoid the temptation.

If you're like me, you know what your weaknesses are..so make deliberate efforts to avoid the pitfalls that the enemy has set up. I know that if I keep certain numbers in my phone, I may succumb to my flesh text these dudes, so I delete their numbers from my contacts. I know if I keep a certain guy in my snapchat friends, I'll be tempted to post extra cute selfies to catch his eye or worst, I'll constantly lurk his stories hoping he'll hit me up.
Moral of the story is: don't give the enemy a foothold, don't walk right into the traps that he sets for you. Christ has made us more than a conquerors...that means we have every weapon to pass each and every temptation that comes our way.

Flee your youthful lusts! Timothy 2:22 and walk in the purpose that Christ has for you.

It may seem small to some, but I never want to stand before Jesus knowing that my inability to my submit my flesh to the will of God kept me from fulfilling my purpose on this earth. 

I also don't want to be so busy thirsting for some random man that I miss the wonderful man of God, that Christ has prepared just for me.

All my love,
Obioma

Fellow-shipping outside of church with my sissy in Christ Kesi, trying to avoid these thirst traps

The peace that surpasses all understanding

God is amazing.
I look at my life 8 months ago, and I look at it now...and tears well up in my eyes.
From literally cents in my bank acounts, to panicing about my future, to a desperate desire to escape reality......

Now I wake up with joy, pure unalderated joy.
And this joy is not 'happiness', this joy doesn't depend on whether or not my circumstances are favorable.

Car mirror broke...I'm still joyful and smiling
Can't find my dream apartment...I'm still thankful to even be alive
Bills piling up...I'm still grining from ear to ear

no fear, no anxiety.

I wake up with a hunger for the day and a desire to do and be all that God has for me.

It's beautiful thing when all you want to do is give glory to God.

It will always get better when christ is your focus.

I know this is not a typical blog entry, but sometimes It's necessary to reflect on all God has done and continues to do for you.
I appreciate you father God, from the big to the small.

If your struggling with depression, anxiety, fear: enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise Psalms 100:4 . petition your father in heaven for the peace that surpasses all understanding Philippians 4:7. Pray without ceasing and his unfailing love will hear you.

Being ultra silly with my friend Shola.

All my love,
Obioma

Whats been going on these last couple of months: May-July

So I haven’t been writing. I haven’t had the motivation and I’ve been in a rut for lack of a better word. I've also been throwing myself various pity parties and other one woman affairs along the way.

Between April 2015 and July 2015, my life has been an exciting whirlwind of God’s grace, mercy, love and blessings.

I’ll start from the beginning.

April

I was preparing to graduate. It was supposed to be an exciting time in my life filled with warm memories and deep connections. Not so in my case. I struggled with my feelings of insecurity about my future. I struggled with my less than stellar grades. I struggled with anxiousness about where I was going to live and what I was going to do. I prayed continuously for God to reveal my purpose to me, I asked Him endlessly where I should live and what I should do. It seemed like God remained silent longer than I would have liked. I sought God’s direction about a Job, I literally lived paycheck to paycheck. I needed to pay for a mission’s trip that I had already committed to going on. It seemed to be one thing after the other after the other.

Honestly, April was a season where fasting and prayer were essential in my daily walk, but I prayed less than I would have liked and relied too heavily on the previous day’s bread for nourishment.

Through grace, the lord blessed with all the finances to pay for my missions trips and I began to truly learn that all earthly wealth is from the Lord, and he alone is my source, no one and nothing else.

May

Official graduate of the University of Central Florida

It was important that I represented a unique aspect of me in my graduation pictures. I choose to showcase my heritage

 I graduated, I made it through April. My friends and family surrounded me and supported me. God instructed me to remain in Orlando, to stay faithful to the church he planted me in and to help their ministry grow. I continued to struggle with the HOW. 

Yes God I know I’m supposed to stay in Orlando, but HOW is this going to be possible. I had no job, I had no source of income and my parents desperately wanted me to come home and focus on medical school applications.

I even went on a mission’s trip. God moved mightily in the hearts and minds of many people. I saw the beautiful country of Haiti. I spoke out loud the testimony God had grown in my spirit over the past several months. I spoke about the abusive relationship I endured due to my disobedience to God. I spoke to complete strangers and intimate friends about the beauty of the father’s redemption and how he saved a wretch like me from sure death and destruction at the hands of my own lust and selfish ambition.

I still struggled with the lust of my flesh and the need to fill the God-shaped whole in my heart with the affections of man, especially those of men.

God blessed with a job. The way he did it was almost surreal. I didn’t even apply for the position, I received an invitation to apply, and the job was given to me. Albeit it was the job which I had resigned from, but it was a source of income.

Arriving at Haiti with my missions group

Everyone loves a good selfie, with my sisters in christ: Kesi, Janelle and Noreka

We were advised to wear conservative clothing, so I spent most of the field time wearing long dresses  My brother in Christ Eno!

This is lovely, she loved taking photos on my camera so we had a mini photoshoot

June

 I felt a desire to desire more of God, I had grown lackadaisical in quest for more of God, for his spirit and power, for relationship with him.

I attributed my lack of desire to not attending Sunday service anymore. I also complained about not being able to be as involved with church as much as I would have desired because the job I prayed for required me to work Sunday mornings.

Thus began the groaning process. Why God? Please give me a better job. Lord how can I fulfill your will for my life if I’m broke and can’t even go to church.

I’m sure I did more complaining than praising. But God continued to provide regardless of my murmuring because he is faithful even when my faith is lacking.

The prayer for this season became: LORD, help my unbelief. Help me to trust you even when I can’t see what’s ahead.  Father give me a cheerful heart in this season of my life and let me never forget your goodness.

July

The Lord began to reveal his destiny for my life. I came to the understanding that I have to be okay with how the Lord chooses to reveal his will for my future, and that may be one step at a time.

I’ve come to the understanding that there are tests that need to be passed, that there’s obedience that needs to occur before I can be given anymore responsibility.

I’ve realized, I need to kill my flesh, literally suffocate it until it dies. This process truly has to be daily, regardless of how I feel. I may never feel like waking up and spending quiet time at the feet of Jesus, but it is necessary, my life depends on this, daily.

God blessed with a Job that far exceeds anything I could have asked for, he continues to rain down his favor in the big and the small.

And when I try to slip away from the grasp of his hand , he shocks me into obedience, convicts me accordingly and I repent whole heatedly because the true desire of my heart is to spend all my days abiding in the house of the Lord, forever and ever.

This really wasn’t an encouragement blog, but it’s a true snapshot of what my life has been like for a long stretch of time. I am continuously  in awe of my heavenly father.  I am so honored to be chosen and deemed worthy of his righteous love.

If I could sum up my experiences in these previous months using one passage, it would be:

Psalms 37:23-24 The Lord directs the steps of the godly.

    He delights in every detail of their lives.

²⁴ Though they stumble, they will never fall,

    for the Lord holds them by the hand.

I’m not perfect, but I continue to serve a perfect God.

My lovely mama. That's my prayer warrior friend

As I grow older I appreciate the time I get to spend with my family. 

All my love,

obioma

Christians fail too

I made a promise to God:“I want to live right”.

Since I  renewed and revitalized my relationship with Christ, I want to act according to his will.

So I made a promise to God and said I wouldn’t do certain things anymore.

I was during really good, I whined and complained, but I was adhered to my word.

During my quiet time with God, I made the ‘mistake’ of asking him to reveal my heart to me. (I say mistake in quotation marks because, I wasn’t truly ready for what was about to happen next.)

My prayers were earnest and they mainly went: ‘Lord, what sins do I commit that displease you? Father what is the condition of my heart?’

The thing about a living God is that when you pray prayers like that, he answers happily but not necessarily in the way you would like.

Suddenly I kept getting hit with these tests. The biggest thing I promised God was that I wouldn’t entertain a relationship until I was sure that man was my husband.

Would you believe the guy I had casually been flirting with in my science class seriously started pursuing me shortly after I began my earnest prayers to God. What started as studying together evolved to texting, then snapchatting…then back to text.

I found myself making sure I looked extra cute when I went to school so he would notice and compliment me. My makeup was always done with extreme care so my aesthetics would please him. As we flirted, I knew he wasn’t the one. The things he said clued me in on that fact. The most significant thing being that he didn’t actively attend church. (We rarely talked about God, although he knows I’m a Christian). I told God prior to engaging in the relationship with this particular guy that I wanted a man who loved God with all his heart, and this included attending church faithfully.

But I was lonely, I liked the attention…I liked being pursued. It had been two months since I had gotten attention from a man that I was physically attracted to.

I lied to myself, telling myself that hanging out alone with the guy was a good idea. 

I had boundaries and I didn’t plan on crossing the line.

I would love to say I was right….but I wasn’t. We hung out alone and the lines were crossed. The things I promised God I wouldn’t do, I did.

After the initial encounter I cried. I didn’t want to pray. I felt like God hated me, like he was angry with me for being a liar. Like he was angry that I failed him yet again.

I would love to say I stopped cold turkey talking to this guy…but I didn’t. We hung out again, same thing happened…and again, the same thing continued to happen.

I beat myself up, I asked why was I doing the things my spirit hated, why was my flesh taking over?

Then I remembered my earnest prayers to God. The prayers where I asked him to reveal my heart and hidden sin.

 The problem was that even before I crossed the line with the guy…I thought about the line. I imagined kissing this guy. I dwelt on the thoughts of romance with the stranger who wasn’t my husband. I was already sinning against God in my heart and didn't realize it(by not staying focused on my promises to God), but it took a physical occurrence for me to recognize my sin. 

God allowed my failure to reveal my heart to me, to show me his correction and to cushion me in his grace.

Sometimes in our Christian walk, we act so righteously...we get cocky.

We begin to think that we’re better than our other Christian brothers and sisters because we don’t listen to certain types of music, or we don’t go to the club. We place ourselves on a pedestal we should never be on. We forget that our righteousness is only possible because of the grace of God.

It took failing for me to find comfort in my savior yet again. 

In the midst of my wallowing and disappointment in myself, God continued to pour out his blessings over me. I received unexpected finances and two friends shared that it was because of my words and actions that they were pursuing truly Christ.

I believe God did it as a reminder. Without Christ I am nothing. In my weakness and failures, his strength and majesty is fully realized. 

I’m reminded of Romans 3:23-26

²³ For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard. ²⁴ Yet God freely and graciously declares that we are righteous. He did this through Christ Jesus when he freed us from the penalty for our sins. ²⁵ For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin. People are made right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed his life, shedding his blood. This sacrifice shows that God was being fair when he held back and did not punish those who sinned in times past, ²⁶ for he was looking ahead and including them in what he would do in this present time. God did this to demonstrate his righteousness, for he himself is fair and just, and he declares sinners to be right in his sight when they believe in Jesus.

It is only through the redemptive grace of God that we are justified. When we fail, God has already figured it out and he picks us up.

In our failures, Christ's Glory is manifested 2 Corinthians 12:19

And in these failures God is our vindicator and our redeemer.

 Rejoice not over me, O my enemy; when I fall, I shall rise; when I sit in darkness, the Lord will be a light to me. I will bear the indignation of the Lord because I have sinned against him, until he pleads my cause and executes judgment for me. He will bring me out to the light; I shall look upon his vindication. Micah 7:8-9

Don’t dwell in the shame, nor in the condemnation for there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus Romans 8:1

While Christians sin, the difference is that the price for our sins have been paid and we run the race like a conditioned runner, enduring till the end with our hope planted firmly in Christ. The higher standard we are called to, is only made possible through our savior. 

Constantly returning to Christ and allowing him to replace your sinful nature with a Godly nature is how we endure.

So when you fall, or fail: know that your victory is assured, and that God has neither left you, nor forsaken you, repent and return to the righteousness of God's bosom.

All my love,

Obioma

Spending some quality time with my mom and brother. I love these moments