Easy money

We live at a  time when almost everyone is after easy money. Young people almost do anything to earn money. They simply call it 'business' or ' shikella.' Wherever is the easy money, wherever is the shortcut to richness, there, you can find the youth. I often see people turn down job opportunities they are passionate about because it doesn't pay good; and I often, see young people engaged in activities just for the money; no interest, no passion attached to it. Growing in a certain career seems not that important these days.

So what triggered me to this idea? 

I was just reading the story of David on 1 Samuel 24 David was hiding from Saul in a cave, when Saul went to the cave to relieve himself (most probably for number two). This seems like a good, even a God designed opportunity for David to kill Saul and be enthroned. David could have just said, 'the Lord has given me my enemy in my own hands...' That is what his friends actually advised him, "This is the day the Lord spoke of when he said to you, 'I will give your enemy into your hands for you to deal with as you wish." v.4 Imagine David at the corner of the cave hiding, while his enemy who was actually out to find and kill him is before him relieving himself. 

David had time to think, a moment to make a decision that can take his life from cave to palace, from living as a fugitive to a luxury of a royal life, from sleeping on a stone to a kings bed, from eating hunted food to the feast of the palace, from life of loneliness to the life he can marry and be friends with whoever he desires, from tiresome waiting to what God has promised to him, to taking by force and owning what God has promised. David could have just stabbed Saul at the back and become king of Israel. But David didn't kill Saul by the sword in his hands. David decided to wait on God instead of taking things in his own hands. 

David's integrity was tested, he was tempted to take the shortcut to success, he was tempted to take the easy way out, however he didn't fall for the temptation. David remembered Saul was appointed by God and it is against the law to kill the king. And that was a defining moment in his life and a lesson to us to this day.

It is funny, though David restrained from killing Saul, he made a bizarre decision in sneaking up to cut off Saul's robe. Ha, something to show off of his integrity, something to show to his friends later, and when the time comes to Saul himself.  It could be something to show off when he said, 'I could have killed Saul, look how close I was, but I have integrity.' 

In our words it could be... 'I didn't take a short cut, I didn't take a bribe at my work, I didn't do what those people do to earn easy money, look everyone I have integrity.' Often times we cancel out our integrity with pride. Integrity and pride can never go hand in hand. 

The very thing I always love about David is that he recognized his mistakes and took responsibility. David was conscious stricken for having cut off a corner of Saul's robe. He said to his men, "The Lord forbid that I should do such a thing to my master, the Lord's anointed or lift my hand against him for he is the anointed of the Lord. With this words David rebuked his men and did not allow them to attack Saul." v.5 

"Wealth gained hastily will dwindle, but whoever gathers little by little will increase it." Proverbs 13:11

May God help us to keep our integrity like David; to not take the shortcut to God's long term plan for our life and to have a heart of repentance like David... Amen! 

In the morning...

Genaye Photography

When the sun shines through your window in the morning

When you don't want to wake up but sleep your life out

When you desire, for your mattress to be your coffin once and for all;

Remember Jesus is still standing by your bed side

to lift you up and walk with you

so hold his hand, let him help you up;

you see the sun rise again

only because God is not done with you yet

for his mercy is new every morning

for his love endures forever

So...

'Stand!!! and do everything to keep standing!!

Predators & Prey

One morning I got up with a taught about predators and prey;

The bible tells us to run from sexual sin. In order to run from something there has to be a chaser. The Bible also tells us, to “Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. “1 pet 5:8

Imagine a lion …

Lions in general have two main hunting methods. The first is that the lion stalks from bushes it hides from, with a final burst of speed at the end. The second method is to find a bush close to something its prey NEEDS - usually water. It climbs in and waits where its prey HANGS OUT.

Once a lioness is close to a herd, they usually target the CLOSEST PREY. They don't abruptly run to every prey they see but stalk their chosen prey. The lioness sneaks up to its victim until they reach a distance of proximity. There are two things that are said to help the lion considerably; they’re incredibly good at hiding and phenomenally patient.The attack is SHORT & POWERFUL. The lioness often catches its victim in a fast run and one big leap. 

If you are a fan of national geographic like me, you might  have noticed how the lioness targets its prey and runs specifically after just that one prey it put its eye on though there are many other zebras running away from it. You might have also noticed this prey is often not alert for an attack.

A lioness takes advantage of factors that reduce visibility; many kills take place near some form of cover or at NIGHT. However, they will hunt whenever the chance arises and that could be in the middle of the hottest day.

When the lion runs and leaps on its prey, the prey might still try to keep running. But that won’t be easy thing to do since the lion has it by its neck. The only remedy the bible gives us, is to run from sexual temptations. “Run from sexual sin! No other sin clearly affects the body as this one does. For sexual immorality is a sin against your own body.” 1 Cor 6:18 Like a prey in a herd; we have to be alert and ready to run whenever temptations arise. There might be rare circumstances a prey can fight with its predator and win. I have seen various YouTube videos where a lion or hyena is killed by a zebra or buffalo, it tries to kill. However, the best option is to always run from the predator. Once the predator is on your neck, it requires so much prayer and struggle to pull that sin off before it kills you.

Nevertheless we should always remember the predator is already a defeated enemy. Let me bring one more scenario from the wild life. Often hunters use a poisonous arrow in hunting. Though the animal is hit by the arrow, it keeps living its life till that poison spreads in its body and kills it.The devil is like this animal attacked by the arrow, and it is doing everything in his power to take us with him.

Let’s keep alert!

Let’s run away from any temptations!

And if we have already been attacked, let’s be those exceptional preys that wrestle the enemy off their neck and be the victor instead of the victim.

What if you go crazy?

Have you ever imagined what kind of person you will turn out to be if you go crazy?

I talked on this with friends and it turns out to be one of the funniest things to talk about. So I am sharing this to give you something to experiment with friends, and I hope you will also have something to laugh about!

Here is how my friends and I thought would turn out to be if we go crazy.

So here is the list of what we thought our characters would be;

Meti

Under normal circumstances has the eye for errors. She sees spelling errors, grammar errors, and accent error...any error out of anything. FYI she is the editor of my blog and almost everything else I write, she is goooood.

So if ever Meti goes nuts...

She will be walking around the city with a ladder and a paint and brush, to correct all the spelling errors on banners and billboards in Addis. She would go to restaurants during lunch and dinner time, but spend all her time editing their menu....

Me:

First I will never be friend with Meti because she will be walking around with ladder, and I am terrified of ladder. And I would walk around the city talking about all the story that is always in the process of being made up in my mind, or I will do the opposite and stop talking, mine is kind of typical crazy:)

Kidi

Kidi is under normal circumstances a woman of love. She loves loving people and she actually loves and Sympathizes with almost anyone.

So if Kidi goes nuts, she will be walking around the streets of Addis, hugging everyone, smiling for everyone and telling them she is sharing the love of Christ :)
And she would definitely be dancing outside of music shops of Addis,  she always envies drunk men dancing under the tune of music opened at music shops.

Aye 

Aye under normal circumstances loves numbers (he works in finance) and he loves jocks. So if he went nuts he would be walking around the streets with a calculator, and laughing loud! 

Well these are few of my friends I had this ‘what if we go crazy’ conversation with. Go ahead and think of what kind of person you or your friends will turn out to be and have some fun!!!!

Rapture happens in a blink of an eye!

Can you imagine walking on street with a friend, and in a blink of an eye, your friend is not there? 

You reach home, some members of your family are not there,....

People you see on the street,

 one by one disappear...

I bet, when this happens you don't want to be left behind; 

I bet when this happens you don't want to leave your friends and family behind.

Cartoon by: Genaye Eshetu

" For with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and the trumpet of God, the Lord himself will descend from heaven, and those who died in Christ will rise first. Afterward we the living who remain, will be caught up along with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we shall ever be with the Lord" (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17)

Right to life- for the unborn

I went to Hawassa recently to direct a documentary video production. Part of the shooting involved abortion clients in a hospital. We found a volunteer who was willing to be video-taped while she was having a counseling session with the nurse. The girl, who is in her early twenties, came to the hospital for an abortion accompanied by her mother. They both look nervous and at the same time there is so much strength about them. The girl tells the nurse that she is a university student who currently got raped in the university compound by two guys & she thinks she is pregnant. The nurse asked the girl when she last had her period, when she last had HIV test, what kind of contraceptives she used and so on. It is obvious why the girl visited the hospital, and specifically why she visited this nurse, it is to have abortion. 

In my personal definition abortion is the killing of babies, nothing more nothing less! So it was painful for me to hear the conversation between the girl and the nurse. At some point all I wanted was to reach out to the girl and hug her  that would be weird though. At the same time my heart was groaning for the baby inside her.

When I was in high school I remember a group who came to our school and taught about sexuality. Most of all I remember the video they showed us about abortion which has always stuck in my mind. The video shows the various ways of abortion. One of the things that always stuck in my mind is a garbage can in hospital with little hands, legs, heads of babies aborted. That set up my views about abortion once and for all. 

As I was standing and listening to the conversation between the girl and the nurse, my eyes fells on  this piece of paper on the wall which has a text from the constitution of Ethiopia on abortion; 

1.When the pregnancy results from rape or incest; 

2. When continuance of the pregnancy endangers the health or life of the woman 

or the fetus; 

3. In cases of fetal abnormalities; 

4. Women with physical or mental disabilities; 

5. For minors who are physically or psychologically unprepared to raise a child; 

6. In the case of grave and imminent danger that can be averted only through 

immediate pregnancy termination

Till recently this is Ethiopia's law on abortion. Any girl can have an abortion if she got pregnant due to the six reasons above. No proof is required beyond the woman’s statement that it has occurred. This means the girl I mentioned earlier might not even be rapped. I believe, this is the kind of law that doesn't forbid the thing but makes it seem as though it is forbidden, because Ethiopia is a religious and culturally strict country with people who will not accept legalization of things like abortion.

I remember the controversy, the various appeals made by different organizations some years back when the constitution legalized abortion, if for the aforementioned six reasons.

Later I talk to the nurse; there is no way she believes this girl is raped. She even made jocks that she has the physical strength to rape others let alone be raped. She then told me there are a minimum of 30 clients who come to her every month for abortions. Most of the clients are high school and university students. This is like one abortion, by one nurse every single day and just in one hospital in Hawassa. Imagine how many abortions are done daily throughout Ethiopian hospitals, and there are so much more abortions done by traditional midwives every day, that puts even the mother’s life at risk. 

After drafting this, I was talking with a friend and she told me the constitution of Ethiopia now totally legalized abortion, that they just keep it quite because of how people and certain organizations would react. I know one in seven women die from pregnancy-related causes in Ethiopia, and unsafe abortion causes more than half of the 20,000 maternal deaths that occur annually. I only wish we worked more on contraceptives to avoid unwanted pregnancies, and on physiological and financial support on mothers who got pregnant due to rape, incest, also in cases of women with physical and mental disabilities, for minors who are physically or physiologically unprepared to raise a child.... after all it is a baby that is inside these mothers, a precious life, a great potential, not just a fetus!!

http://www.lwym.org/pure/2012/10/24/what-really-happens-
to-the-baby-during-an-abortion-this-will-shock-you/

"Words are things; and a small drop of ink,

Falling like dew upon a thought, produces

That which makes thousands, perhaps millions think."

- Lord Byron (1788-1824), from "Don Juan"

"Lord Byron never finished his masterpiece, the epic poem "Don Juan," but he might never have begun it had he been conceived today. For Byron was born with a slight deformity - a clubfoot - that nonetheless left intact ...." (Read more on Famous people who would have been aborted http://facta-non-verba.blogspot.com/search/label/beethoven)

Let me just leave you with few list of famous people who would have been aborted but survived and greatly contributed in changing the world.

Could you please do me a favor, whether you agree on what I am saying or not in this article, if you recognize any of the following names, please copy and paste their name under Comments, you can also do this on the shared link on facebook or twitter. Thanks!

Andy Berlin 

Anthony Williams 

Aristotle 

Art Linkletter 

Beethoven

Bo Diddley 

Buffy Sainte-Marie 

Carl-Theodor Dreyer 

Charlotte Anne Lopez 

Christina Crawford 

Clarissa Pinkola Estes 

Crazy Horse 

Dan O'Brien 

Daunte Culpepper 

Dave Thomas 

Da Vinci

Debbie Harry 

D.M.C. 

Edgar Allan Poe 

Edward Albee 

Eleanor Roosevelt 

Eric Dickerson 

Faith Daniels 

Faith Hill 

Freddie Bartholomew  

George Washington Carver 

Greg Louganis 

James MacArthur 

James Michener 

Jean Jacques Rousseau 

Jesse Jackson 

Jett Williams 

Jim Palmer 

John J. Audubon 

John Hancock 

John Lennon 

Langston Hughes 

Larry Ellison 

Lee Majors 

Leo Tolstoy 

Les Brown 

Lynnette Cole 

Malcolm X 

Mark Acre 

Matthew Laborteaux 

Melissa Gilbert 

Michael Reagan 

Moses 

Nancy Reagan 

Nat King Cole 

Nelson Mandela 

Patrick Labyorteaux 

Peter and Kitty Carruthers 

President Gerald Ford 

President William Clinton 

Priscilla Presley 

Ray Liotta 

Reno 

Sarah McLachlan 

Scott Hamilton 

Sen. Paull H. Shin 

Sen. Robert Byrd 

Steve Jobs 

Surya Bonaly 

Tim Green 

Tim McGraw 

Tom Monaghan 

Tommy Davidson 

Victoria Rowell 

Wilson Riles

Recommended reading:

http://www.lwym.org/pure/2012/10/24/what-really-happens-to-the-baby-during-an-abortion-this-will-shock-you/

http://www.catholic-convert.com/wp-content/uploads/Documents/AbortionDecide.pdf

http://www.bible.ca/s-Abortion.htm#hands

http://www.bible.ca/s-Abortion.htm

This is why I write :)