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Daughters, dances, divinity and devotion.

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  My teenage daughter loves to dance. Ever since a very young age, she has watched videos of different kinds of dancers and then tried to imitate their steps. She was teaching herself and doing a very good job of it. Seeing her passion for dance, we enrolled her in dance classes. Enrolling her in these classes didn’t just mean she learned to dance; it also meant we were invited to watch her perform at shows that the dance school organises. Recently, we went to their Christmas performance. As I expected, it had lights, smoke machines, and a good sound system. The performances themselves were many in number. Some were tap dances, some ballet; some were street style, and others were jazz. Some were performed by children as young as seven or eight years old, while others featured older, grey-haired (I am being kind here) adults dancing as well. It was a loud, smoky, and artistic evening, divided into two sections with a 15-minute interval. My daughter’s dances were in the second half o...
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Questions In A Season Of Pain

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There are certain things we all go through. If you are reading this, then we share the common experience of being born and being alive. Our lives after that might look very different from each other. But there are still some common experiences we share. Pain is one of them. The degrees might vary as well as the details and circumstances. But we all experience pain in some form or the other. It does not matter if you are someone who is obediently walking with God or if you are someone who has decided this whole “God thing” is not really a thing. Pain comes at us anyway. In those seasons of pain, our hearts and minds begin to ask questions. This is a human and natural reaction and there is nothing wrong with it. The Bible encourages us to come to God with our questions and be real before Him.  What I would like us to think about is the kind of questions we ask, and how helpful they are. This is not a write up pretending to be a recipe of how to ask questions and make your pain easier...
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A Gamer’s Guide to Spiritual Warfare (Even If You’re Not a Gamer)

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  Disclaimer: Please bear with the opening two paragraphs of this blog. You can judge me for it if you like. But I will get to the point and I hope you will be blessed and encouraged.   I am not much of a gamer. I would occasionally go through a season of playing football or basketball on the PS. But I would not really call myself a gamer. I prefer board games. But, about two years ago my son introduced me to a game he was playing that he thought I would like. I thought I would give it a go as a means to maybe spend more time with him and enter a part of his world. To my surprise, he was right! I really enjoyed the game. For those who might care, its an open world survival game on the computer. What that basically means is that you have a character, and you explore an open world. You fight off wild animals and enemies that are out to kill you. You forage for food and you collect materials to build a base and armour and weapons with. As you progress through the levels of t...
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I thought I knew

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Something I wrote a few days after my mother passed away on the 24th of December.   I thought I knew pain Until I got a call that day; That call to give me news That my mum was now far away. That I would no longer hear Her laughter and her voice, Would no longer be able to hug her Or see those twinkling eyes. My world crashed in around me, And nothing felt the same; There was anger, guilt, remorse, And waves and waves of pain. My head felt dizzy and light My heart couldn’t stop racing; As I let the news sink in, Of the reality I was now facing. “There’s no pulse” is all I could hear Those words kept ringing in my head; I felt all my strength vanish I had just enough to crawl to bed. I cried till there were no more tears, And then I cried some more; Why didn’t God keep her alive? I would have been there day after tomorrow. I would have seen her one more time And been able to see her smile; Able to see her laugh and cry Been able to say goodbye. The questions seemed unending The...
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The crowd and the bride.

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It’s 2017 and as I look back on 22 years of walking in faith and 38 years of being alive, one of the many blessings that God has allowed in my life is the blessing of community. I am an extrovert and so I naturally love meeting people and therefore am very comfortable in community. The Christian community around me has been incredibly influential in my development as a person and has been instrumental in my faith journey as well. I see this community as vital to God’s plan in my life. And this is fitting because when I study the Bible, I see that God places a high value on community. In the bible narratives, He is the one who builds communities and is Himself the one upon whom eternal communities are built on.   When we come to the life of Christ we don’t find a loner. We find community, we find many people around him. It is wonderful to see that Jesus had no restrictions for those who sat in audience as he taught or as he performed various miracles. He did not stop to identify...
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The story of Yahir

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   (A fictional story based on real life events.) Hello. My name is Yahir. My name means “God will enlighten”. My life story, however, is sadly a stark contrast to my name. I won’t bore you with a long backstory of my childhood and all the various struggles we had to go through. But all of these and the company I kept lead me to a not so savoury lifestyle. As I grew up, I found that my calling in life was to voluntarily ease people of some their excess (in my eyes) belongings even if they didn’t appreciate it. Yes, that is a fancy way of saying I was thief. I was a very good one too. Until I got caught that is. I won’t forget that day. I was so sure I would get away. Being so good at my profession had given me an air of over confidence. It was this over confidence that lead me to be a bit tardy that day and a couple of missteps gave me away.   I am sure by now you are judging me for these life choices. And you are probably right for not liking what I chose to do with ...
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Covid, Christ, and a cancelled Scottish holiday.

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  As a teenager I watched the movie Braveheart (yes I know it is not historically accurate) and have ever since been enthralled by the idea of visiting Scotland sometime. Since then I have visited the UK a few times but have never really mad it up to Scotland. This year we finally made concrete plans. Besides just visiting Scotland we would be visiting friends who we have been waiting to meet for some time now. You can only imagine the excitement that had been built up to the day. Then the day came! We were all packed and ready to go, when we got told that a friend my daughter had met a few days earlier had tested positive for Covid. Twenty four hours later we got the test results that my daughter had tested positive for Covid as well. It was much more than just inconvenient news. It was annoying and very disheartening. But here’s the thing – we did not have any major discussions or any back and forth debates. As soon as the message said “Covid positive” the decision to cancel wa...
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