Let the waters flow

theolivebranchadmin — Thu, 22 Jun 2023 11:13:25 +0000

Many years ago, In a distant faraway Utopic Land, there was a baby girl given birth to in the stream of happiness, she was birthed with so much love and faith that she had no idea what the future held for her. All she knew was that it would be a life filled with joy.
She grew up with the naivety of life but the love of a family and then like all stories go, tragedy struck.

20 years later, she’s on the streets, tough and defensive but still with a little faith trying to make ends meet. She no longer remembers home, she barely remembers family. One day, she gets hit by a car and the driver takes her to the hospital. He falls in love with her and decides to marry her. They get married finally and he takes her to his hometown.
The prominent chief sees her and realizes she looks just like his wife. Eventually, they find out she’s their long lost daughter who was kidnapped many years ago. There are tears and reconciliation and everyone lives happily ever after.

Can we skip to the good part?

I can continue this story, you can too. I’m sure you knew where this was headed. You already formed the conclusion in your mind.
“Forming a conclusion” is the easy part. How you arrive to that conclusion is the tricky one.

“For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.”
Jeremiah 29:11 NLT

As a 90s child ☺️, i can say to an extent, i had a balanced childhood. I played a lot, played outside and inside. We had a lot of games that time and i also knew when it was time to read.
I didn’t know what i wanted to be in 10 years, i wanted to be a lawyer then a shop owner then a doctor, they changed because i only knew that i wanted to be something in life. I didn’t know what exactly.
So along the years, the shapes changed, the colors changed and the picture changed.
Someone once told me that if we knew what it would take to get to a destination, we wouldn’t want to go there at all.
Before i entered medical school, people told me how it wasn’t easy to become a doctor but they just told me. If i had probably experienced it in my mind, who knows if i would have gone ahead with the journey.
As i grew older, the painting started looking like something that made sense and very soon, it became a landscape painting of one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever seen.
Painting for me doesn’t come easy but i had to paint and I’m still painting.
(This is just a metaphor for saying my future is one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever seen, it’s dependent on what you see your future as).
I had a determined end for that story, the girl would find her way back home and she would live happily but there are a million ways she could have gotten home. I could have written that 100 times and it would still get to that same end.

What next? I really don’t like that question

“Many plans are in a man’s mind, But it is the Lord’s purpose for him that will stand (be carried out).”
Proverbs 19:21 AMP

I’m not going to tell you not to make your plans but make sure your plans are from God and on God. You cannot attempt to lean on your own understanding.
Imagine the way i wrote that story. The character was possibly wondering what exactly was going on with her life and she may have tried one or two ways to get out of her situation. They may or they may not have worked but i, the writer was weaving a very beautiful story that made it all worth it.
That’s how God is to us and even far greater because i can make mistakes while writing, even misspell or use the wrong words or context but God is perfect in his ways and thoughts and he knows the ultimate best for us.
The purpose of God for your life won’t change. The plans may and they will but there’s already an end, promised.

It’s not as easy as it sounds but it gets easier the higher you go. What do you think you know? How much do you think you know?
You need a map and you need clarity on next steps so what makes you think you can figure that out on your own. This isn’t an adventure movie, it isn’t Pirates of the Caribbean or Chronicles of Narnia( all beautiful movies) but God isn’t there to give you hints. He’s not a passive character or an observer. He wants to help you completely. Why don’t you let him?

Get ready to swim

The moment i typed the first word of this article, i had no idea how i was going to pass along what i wanted but i knew the message i wanted to pass across and i trusted God and the holy spirit to write this.
So, I don’t know if you’re like me, discovering purpose and figuring out the ultimate plan or maybe you’ve already discovered purpose, you know what’s next but you’re scared to take that next step.
A dear friend of mine will always tell me;
“How do you know you can walk on water if you don’t step out of the boat”.
Step out! Come out! Come out of it with the faith of a child that believes in Santa Claus or the tooth fairy.
It will be so beautiful to watch at the end, no more holding back. This is the sign that you’ve been praying for. Catch your sub eh.
Let those waters, let your waters flow and let your life move with the fluidity of an unhindered wave.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding. Seek his will in all you do, and he will show you which path to take.”
Proverbs 3:5‭-‬6 NLT

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Trusting God

theolivebranchadmin — Sat, 21 Sep 2019 18:28:16 +0000

At a point in our life we made a conscious decision to actually love God and continually fall in love with Him day after day. The funny thing is He loved us first even before we loved Him, before we decided to enter into a relationship with Him and serve Him all the days of our life, getting to know Him, growing in Him and communicating through prayers.
It’s a journey with Him and that’s everything we do on earth. We get all the blessings and privileges attached to it. It’s one large family God has called us in. A different kind of relationship compared with the ones we humans have in such that we can’t see God whom we love but we feel His presence everywhere and we have the Holy Spirit that helps us. I mean, it’s such a wonderful and unique relationship to be in.
One of the skills or things you’d have to learn which is one of the major ones is waiting on God and this is a combination of Trust, hope ,faith and patience all in one. No one can escape this and it’s bigger and wider than you think.

You ask God for something you want so badly and He promised to give you even more than that and He has said He would always answer when you call on Him. But most times He doesn’t give us on time; we get tired we don’t even talk to Him again. We start losing the vibe, the connection reduces because we are not getting what we want in the way we want it.
Even when He told us already in the love letters he wrote to us that His thoughts and ways are not ours, yet we just get weary, tired and would want to end the relationship just to go out of our way and get it ourselves using the shortest route possible, as God is too slow for us and we’ve forgotten His timing is different from ours.
Instead the best thing to do is evaluate how this process is drawing us closer to God the lover of our soul.
God knows us so well, that to stretch us He would go via a longer route just so we can learn to trust Him more. He wants us to have that big bank of trust where when bigger things come we can easily pick from that bank and use it.

That’s the point where you tell God all the good things and remember all those things He has done for you. Your testimonies are as a result of what God has done for you in your period of waiting and trusting him. That’s the bank of trust right there!!!

God loves us so much and wants us as close as He can, so He provides a waiting path to take us through and make us experience Him, resolve our trust issues so we can eventually overcome doubts, fears, hesitations and have that big bank of trust built with the faith we’ve had all round. It’s about God and it’s always about Him who’s in the center of it all.
God literally wants to embrace us then give us the best gift but most of us want to stay at the door and use long stick to collect it or we even want him to throw it at us, you know just to make it faster. He doesn’t want that, rather he wants us close to Him .
GOD LOVES YOU.

Learn to trust Him!!!

Estée ✨

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Let the waters flow

Trusting God