What's in a cup?

God is the true vine. If we are part of Him, we will bear fruit, the fruit of kindness, peace, love, joy. Many times I have done things that I knew did not belong to the way of Jesus Christ. I would leave the vine, so to speak, and follow my own will rather than the will of God. I lost my way because I stopped looking at the way. I stopped checking who was holding the source of the light. And that is dangerous. For there is evil and trickery in this world, and we can be deceived. God is the lamp onto my feet. But Satan masquerades as an angel of light. So we need to check our sources. We need to make sure that the truth we are receiving is indeed from our heavenly Father who loves and protects us. His truth, when it hurts, will be for our good, and it will keep us in the vine. And if we persevere, we will bear fruit.

To work is to toil. To work is to earn an honest living. To work is to live out our purpose. It is part punishment and part purpose. We spend 80% of our weekday at work, so it must mean something to us. The workplace is where I complete tasks, communicate with colleagues and service providers. It is here where people see me at my best and my worst. It is the place where I am both boss and slave. The workplace is where I experience my greatest joys and sorrows. I grow in character. Sometimes I do not like what I see. In myself and in others. What I know for sure is that God watches us. He deems it a good thing when someone is hard-working, and God says that we should work for Him. We must not work only when the boss is looking. We must work as though we are working for the Lord Himself. The author and perfecter of my faith. May you bless my enemies, as I remind myself why I am really here.

There is a deadline to life but no deadline to love. Do you rush up to it or work consistently towards it? Do you plan it out Or wing it and hope for the best? Do you play around and in the last minute score the goal by chance or do you practise until you get it right and score that goal deliberately? With a little bit of luck and a great team behind you You will be part of the winning team that have both fame and fortune but more importantly, the faith of those around you and the faith in whom you love.

Sometimes, like right now when I am in the most renown party island of the world, I realise that in spite of my wild and spontaneous streak that does not want to be buried, God has changed me. You could say that time has matured me, but maturity requires for its completion not merely a single ingredient of time but a cupful of wisdom, or else you would be simply older but potentially still emature. The desires of your heart - God knows them and is fitting the pieces of your life puzzle together. The fears, the confessions, the doubts - God sees them all. And promises us that He will make it all turn out for our good.

When will you ever be the best? Beautiful girls and gorgeous bodies, interesting conversations, loving exchanges, passionate nights and glorious mornings. I live in a competitive world, and at one point in my life, I want to feel like Usain Bolt - the best. To be the best version of yourself. What does that look like? Fix your eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of your faith. God has seen me at my worst and still He loves me. He knitted me together in my mother's womb. He can count all the hairs on my head. I am made in His image. So when I was born, He already had something in mind for me and my life, something that I could do that would glorify Him. Now I just have to figure out what that is. God has given me the uncanny ability to spell. And a need to write. A natural sense of rhythm. I can dance. I feel music in my body and express it. I take great pictures. And I love to see the world. I should be a pop star. But that would not really honour God, I think, unless I wri...

So I'm going to Ibiza, I'm gonna have a party! And then I am going to love. If I don't fall, that's okay. Then I will step into it. I was given this advice before. Someone told me not to fall but to step in love. Perhaps that is why I felt safe. Maybe that's why I had never felt more cherished and adored. I have nothing to lose. I have no one I am responsible for. There is no one I need to report back to. But I am accountable for my actions. And my Father has already shown me the way. I simply need to follow His lead. I am learning the difference between dancing for someone and dancing with someone. And I want to move away from the former and practise the latter. Grow up, mature. But still have fun and feel free. 

I am obsessed with the topic of love. I love love. I desire to love and be loved. I have been loved, and I have loved, and I continue to experience the different facets of love. I started loving boys from an early age, and then I fell in love, so that the colour of my world changed. It was wonderful and it was heart-breaking, and it made me feel upside down and inside out, and I could not make heads or tails of my life, but I loved to be in love. There was no better feeling in the world to me than falling in love. And then there was a different kind of love, one that I still don't always grasp, but one that says that God is love, and that He showed this love by dying for us. 1 Corinthians 13 is a chapter in the Bible that defines love as patient and kind, as holding no records of wrongs, of being selfless and not selfish, and it describes love as the most powerful emotion above hope and faith. But not only is love described as a feeling but rather as a characteristic of a human b...

Ich schwimme im kalten Eis, das zwischen den Tasten fällt. Ich schlafe ein auf der Tastatur, wo ich dachte mich zu erfinden. Erweck mich, so dass ich glaube an mich selbst und was ich kann. Erlöse mich von den Gedanken, die mich treiben ins Sinken. Ich analysiere und erwarte die Zukunft. Mein Los steht noch in Seiner Hand. Ich habe gewählt einen guten Beruf, aber die Geduld läuft aus wie Wasser. Das Eis schmilzt und ertrinkt die Tasten. Ich ruhe mich nicht mehr aus, sondern tippe trotz allem auf die Tasten, denn ich muss auf höherem Niveau, um nicht zu ertrinken. Nun warte ich auf Erlösung, auf die heiße Sonne, die das Wasser soll verdunsten und mir geben die Freiheit zu tippen ohne zu beängstigen das Eis, dessen Kälte kommt unter die Haut.

I love it when guys make sense, you know, like when someone is talking and you ease into yourself, you start to relax, because everything they say resonates with you. You feel like you don't have to argue or put up a fight, you don't have to try to convince them otherwise or figure out a way to get through to them, because they already get it. They already have the truth inside of them. You are already willing to listen. Perhaps it is the amount of truth we keep inside of ourselves that makes people listen to us, or ignore us. If we are in touch with truth, then people listen. They want to know more. They want to hear the truth. But if we are filled with lies, even if we are unaware of the lies we hide inside, then our audience struggles to hear. It is as though there were a veil drawn over our mouths. I know for me that there are some people that I absolutely struggle to listen to. They talk a lot, but it is not going through, because they are not making sense to me, and I...

As I look upon the walls of my life, I see cracks where once there was a smooth surface. The four corners of my room give me a home, a place of belonging, and I have often moved from east to west and from north to south but most important was always the roof over my head. As I look upon the walls of my life, I am grateful that the structure has not fallen apart. Within my space I have hung up art and made my home a place of expression, and perhaps even of impression of places I've seen and people I've met. I have learnt that having less on the outside gives you more on the inside and placing less inside creates more outside. And when moving outwards seems to fall flat because the walls are coming down on my life, I look up. I move from the inside upwards and through not a flat tented roof but a high reaching spire and I reach heavenward to enter the great escape of God's precious kingdom where I find peace and hope grace, truth and mercy, and m...

I seek to hear the beat of God's heart. Imagine lying on His chest and listening, anticipating the lubb dubb of His magnanimous heart, beating the drum and making you move, but not to compete, nor to turn someone on, but to walk in step with His rhythm. As a lover of music, and a lover of rhythm, I have found myself dancing to many a beat, but the one song I need to dance to is the one God has in His heart. I pray for His music to start in my heart. I pray for a new song, a new beat, I pray for a way forward where I move in step with my Lord.

Flight over the Alps at sunset 2018

Laid bare You punched me with your words and bruised my subtle mind. My heart filled with anger, which, when provoked, fills my eyes. I wonder what thoughts lie hidden in the tears, which, when shed,  flow with words and reveal all my secret fears, which, when. Which, when. Written on 2 February 2018

I have come to a point where the knot is so thick that I stop, and then I let it go and walk to the opposite side of the thick rope to have a look at the knot from another perspective. You see, I thought as I was growing up that life was about getting to the end of the rope. Now that I am middle-aged, I think life is about untying the knots to ensure a smooth ride. The knots are the unresolved issues. The knots need loosening first, then untying. And yes, by untying a knot, your whole path gets uprooted. Sometimes in frustration you make the knot worse. You tighten the knot. Or just move it. Or worse, add another.  So I have discovered many knots in my life. Knots in my path. Hurdles. Unresolved issues. Issues that cause me pain, issues that make me unable to move on. And until this moment, I did not know how to tackle the hurdles in my life, the thoughts and pattern that keep me stuck. So I came up with a slight of hand, a different visual, similar enough to the knotte...

In Richard Templar's book 'The Rules of Work', he shares the value statement of Walt Disney. The first value statement mentioned is "no cynicism." It got me thinking. I had to admit to myself in a moment of self-reflection that I have become cynical. I have let my cynicism get so out of hand that I even laugh after a cynical comment I make and almost with pride I say out loud, "Sorry, I'm cynical," as though this cynicism was a reflection not of my personal perception of life but a wise realization of the harsh realities of life. Having read Disney's value statement, I decided to repent. I must never lose my sense of wonder, no matter my physical age and no matter the many experiences I have had that have led me to conclusions that, had I analyzed them in a positive light, would probably have made a different point. Positive thinking has been a challenge to me. My mind leans towards the left, to the minus sign, to the problems. I can foresee pr...