My life on the billboard

Have you ever pictured your life on the billboard? Imagine yourself in town and everything that you have been doing being shown to the public, for me that is the scariest thing that can ever happen in my life. It’s hard to be an example to the current generation because of the different things that people are looking up to. I love the fact that I am young. This is because I know that I have time to enjoy a lot of things here on earth. The bible tells me to enjoy my youth and make good use of it and that’s what I would like to do, but sometimes it’s just hard to do that.Sophia Loren said that the foundation of a youth is their mind, talents, creativity you bring to your life and the lives of people you love. I as a young person should then have someone to lead me each and every day of my life and be an example; a role model, someone that I desire to become. The bible present some youths that led exemplary lives that we would want to emulate.

Talk of the boy Joseph. He was not that young compared to the current generation, but those times being 30 was young taking in account that people would live up to 900years. The guy was sold in Egypt, went to prison and the rest if the story we know. But what is outstanding about the boy Joseph is his commitment to God. He fled away from Potiphar‘s wife who lusted after his looks and wanted something more other than his services as a house cleaner.

Our current generation has a problem with running way from temptations. We have become ostriches and have hid our heads in the sand, but that that doesn’t mean that the temptations will leave us. We have a problem of living in purity and not indulging in the sexual sin. Saying a NO! Which mean exactly that has become a Goliath. The book of Ephesians 5.3 urges us to live a pure life and there should not be even a hint of sexual immorality. We should keep our lives holy for he who called us is holy.

The handsome David is also a person to watch very closely. This 17 years boy faces a giant and defeats him, he learnt the secret is not in the sword but in trust. David trusted God in everything in his life. He says in psalms 9.10 that those who know your name will trust in you, for you lord has never forsaken those who seek you.

Trusting in the lord with all our hearts is the only weapon that is going to transform this generation. In life we sometimes view ourselves vulnerable when we trust in someone, but always remember that true joy and love only come with trusting. We have to stop leaning on our own understanding and turn to the giver of wisdom and knowledge. We have to present our anxiety and burdens to the lord for he cares. The most deceitful thing is the heart and thus following our hearts and depending on our own abilities is the leading path to a lost generation. The things we have been advocating for are not even close to what God would desire. Let Davids be born in this generation and let’s trust God with our mountains.

Jeremiah was around 14-19 years when God called him. He claimed to be young but God still used him. Jeremiah accepted God’s will in his life and followed his calling. God says that he has good plans for us plans to give us a hope and a future. Aligning our prayers with God’s will is the only thing that will put this generation in order. God has an order for our lives and the only way to know that is by following his will for our lives.

We have become crawling living sacrifices and have crawled out of the alter when we are supposed to give ourselves fully to him. Paul urges us not to be shaped by the patterns of this world but to be transformed by the renewal of our minds in order to understand God’s perfect will for us. We are only as young as our faith and as old as our doubt, as young as our self confidence and as old as our fears, as young as our hope and as old as our despair, as young as in God’s will and  old as leading our own ways. We have to let God lead us to our destiny because he knows what is good for all of us. Give him a chance today and he will surprise you with the much that he can do.

Finally we have Timothy. He walked so closely with Paul and became like a son to him. Paul nurtured him in the ways of faith and helped him to grow up as a responsible man. Paul tells Timothy to set an example to the other believers in speech, life, love and purity. Much education of our time is monumentally inefficient. Too often we have given the youths the cut flowers when in the first place we should teach them how to plant the flower. We have been spoon fed with everything and have always depended on others, but this is the time to rise up and shine for others to emulate you. We have to set examples to the world in the way we talk, live, love and in the walk of holiness. We must have something that the next generation would want to learn from.

It’s time that we get a Paul who will grow us up to be Timothy and at that point grow up to plant our own flowers, for people will never learn to improve unless they look to some standard of example higher and better than  themselves. Titus 2.7 tells us to set a good example by doing what is good. James on the hand reminds us to accompany our faith with our deeds. This generation needs an example; we need to set an example to the youths out there. What are you doing to change your immediate environment? This generation need role models to emulate, are you willing to be one?  Let us desire to give birth to a Joseph, David, Jeremiah and Timothy in our generation and we will see ourselves rising above unimaginable height.

Wake up let us journey on.

Old school vs. civilization

Here I am in this matatu and can’t stop wondering what has gotten into us Kenyans, don’t accuse me of always complaining but what I heard is all true.  Kenyans we need to go back to the 1^st grade and be taught about moral values of the old times. “Maina I have been dating this 21years boy for the past 6months and I just can’t stop, am 40 years, married with two beautiful daughters, 15 and 19 years but I can’t leave this boy” said the woman calling classic fm. I was shocked to hear that someone can say that in a public radio and from that point I realized how much we have abandoned our ways of living and adopted careless and selfish ways life, that’s when I thought out loud about MORALS.

 I remember when I was growing up some many years ago, where television had very nice educative programs like, dunia wiki hii, upishi bora, discovery world, cartoon network and of cause wrestling. There were no soap operas at 6pm when every kid wants to be glued on the ‘telly’, those were parents’ things and none of us were allowed to be awake at 9.30pm since that is the time when the bold and beautiful was showing. Life was straight forward and moral standard had to be followed.

Then the millennium era came with all the new patterns of life and drowned most of the old ways of doing things. It came with the new fashion of ‘showing it all’, new TV programs that reveals all the bedroom mysteries and off cause the rebellion motto for children against their parents. Where I was growing every elderly lady in my neighborhood had the right to punish me when on the wrong side and every elderly man in the area could send me anywhere and I would go since all those kind of men were a representative figure of my strict father.

The current generation is different and has violated some norms of the Kenyan society. The dating rules have been violated and respect is on its way to vanity. How can a 43 year old lady date a 21 year old kid? Does that seem right to you?  Every day we are reading in the papers of the father who raped the daughter, the brother who molested his younger sister, the son who is having an affair with the step mother!!!… And every crazy thing that is out there. Where did our morals disappear to?

Bertrand Russell once wrote that; there are two kind of morality side by side; one which we preach but do not practice, and another one which we practice but seldom to preach. The sad thing of our time is that this is all true. Parents have been teaching their children how to consume water, but they enjoy the wine.  Some of them expect their kids to learn out of the blues what is wrong and right. Parents have neglected their parental responsibility and have closed themselves in the offices and business trips.

With the technology making its way into the world, information has become easy to access. Young people have turned to the internet and it has become a toy to every child in the dot.com generation. This has bought about positive changes but it has also washed away the moral of our society. Pornography has become the cartoon network of today and listening to silly music has been the fun of the young people of these days. It’s time we start the journey to our roots and start embracing the old ways of living. Call me old school or ‘mshamba’ but this civilization if abused will lead us to the hell fire.

Let’s be the change that we want to see out there and let us be an example to the next generation. Let us live decently, dress decently, talk decently and watch decent things. Let us not corrupt our brains with rubbish in the name of civilization and fun. Let us respect our parents, impact positive thinking in the minds of the growing, act mature in daily situations and fight for a better world full of strong moral standards. Let’s fight for tomorrow’s generation.

Wake up let us journey on.