Greeting Conquerors all over the world!!!! Its been a long time and today I want to begin a 3 part series I called Other gods. In this first part, I want to look at matters of religion.
I was raised the African way and the issue of other gods is certainly no new discovery to my being. I knew at an early stage in life that I had ancestors that where interested in taking care of me and directing my paths. My livelihood was attributed to these bloodline spirits who were known as ‘vadzimu’ and guardians and protectors of our lives. Nothing could be done without informing them and going anywhere meant a prayer to them for journey mercies. They were literally at the centre of it all. However as i grew i began to detect conflict. I was being introduced to another way of worship at school and at church. The same mother who led us in the ways of the ancestors would lock doors on Sunday making sure everyone was out for church and no-one was staying behind.
Now I was beginning to know more and more about a certain Jesus who was supposed to be at the centre of it all again. This question on why- the two (Vadzimu and Jesus) was always met with what seemed like a noble and straight forward answer, “takangokura tichinzi toitazvese”… “We were taught to honour both and raised that way.” These were the words of my mother, a general in worship, a believer in both Jesus and the ancestors, a teacher of the faith, a soul winner and a servant of Christ in the Church-MHDSRIEP. When things were ok, church mattered. When the going got tough, matters where more fought on the spiritual plane on the other side of town from one seer to another. The seers where varied in their manifestations and expressions. Some were n’angas, others white garment prophets while yet others where svikiros or fortune tellers and so on. Various articles where used in initiating contact with the spirit world depending on who it was e.g cloth, sticks, water, snuff, beads, oil, candles, rice and charms made by all sorts of herbs and bloods of animals and so on. As I grew older, I was more confused and curious but things got to a melting point when I discovered that what we were simply doing for years and years was going round and round in circles.
One day I consciously made a decision not to mix Christ with vadzimu as taught by mom. I was grown up and needed to troubleshoot. Things were not working so I chose Vadzimu. Vadzimu was appealing, it was my heritage, my culture and a religion that would perfectly define me as an African person. I loved it because in it was wrapped the essence of being Shona. Afterall christianity came with the white man, the coloniser and so aroused a bit of anger in me and a valid reason to flee from it. But what did i get from all those hours of worship, at traditional functions (bira), in the forests and mountains…nothing except wasted time, wasted pain and wasted effort. All I ever got told there when things where not working out after doing all the ‘right’ things was that i needed to do one ritual or other to appeal to or appease the ancestors. Worsestill, after doing all i knew to do and things weren’t getting better-my sacrifice was not found right and acceptable in the first place. I am one person that gives my all and after going around the same mountain for too long and achieving nothing, I quit. To cut a long story short, one day a mighty man of God sold the gospel of Christ to me. I knew Christ already. But why was he so special to this well polished man? I had to find out.
I began the journey curiously and have not looked back since. I enjoyed the first few years of my journey as my dad and mentor Dr Hepie held me by the hand. I enjoyed the years of discovery as i like to call them until about the 7th year when I began to see some strange types of Christians, confusing ones. I mean when you get born again, you assume that everyone in church is holy and sold out to holiness especially those that actually play the part well. These are the Christians that profess Christ but their fruits are far from what they preach. They know how to speak the language, they can pray the heavens down and even tell you about your future. Some were pastors and some were just individuals in the church. So I came across a certain breed of Christians that specialise in perculiar gifts and manifestations of a strange ‘holy spirit’. To me this has increasingly fit the decsription of ‘Counterfeit Holy Spirit’. This one seems to specialise in ‘ministry’ and sowing discord therein using ‘spiritual gifts’ e.g dreams, prophecies and lying wonders. Ofcourse most times there are biblical references cunningly devised and unfortunately those caught up in this are not always aware of it themselves. But how did I arrive at the terms ‘strange’ and ‘counterfeit’…The fruits! Yes the fruits! I began to ask questions during times of prayer and meditation in the word. I at least deserved some answers for this madness that was going on around me in the name of worship and Holy Spirit. It began to look more and more like there were other gospels and other Jesus(s) because of the behaviours being exhibited. It has become apparent that people are doing church business for various reasons. While some are truly sold out and earnestly seeking God, some are in it for spiritual fashion-playing a fashionable front in the world where ‘christian’ sells and yet others are more on the lost side just hoping from one church to another seeking a spiritual high in miracles and signs & wonders so called- never coming to the knowledge of the God they think they serve. Yet again, there exists a rebellious breed in the church. Those secretly taking the offensive and working for the enemy to destabilise the body of Christ and hinder the efforts of unsuspecting individuals in church. In the book of Matthew, Jesus mentions something interesting. He declares that there will be man and women of God who after having preached and healed people in his name would not be allowed to enter heaven. Jesus says,
“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name drive out demons and perform many miracles? Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you workers of lawlessness!”
(Matthew 7:7-23)
It therefore remains that being Christian alone will not cut it and may not mean anything in the end as it cam just be a fake title with no substance worthy of the crown.
Thank you for reading this post, lets meet again in part 2 when we look at the existence of other gods in biblical history
Till then
One Love
riseUPconqueror
falling is not the problem, failing to riseUP is!!!
Greeting Conquerors!
Jesus the Lord said “The enemy came to kill, steal and destroy but I am come that they may have life and have it more abundantly” (John10.10). I used to hear this throughout school but had no idea how ruthless and cunning the enemy was until I almost hit the grave myself by my own knife. Yes I wished to die. I had tried everything and nothing was working. It all didn’t make sense, it was better to die and end my miseries. I am so truly thankful to my redeemer who lives. Today I am alive because of his mercies that are new every morning. He loved me when I was yet in sin, died for me on the cross and saved me from destruction. I love Jesus! Looking back, I can see clearly the enemy’s tactics and just how he had mapped his agenda to take me out and continues to do to those that will fall for it.
Attraction: The living Dead
I have always marvelled at the irony of people living from their graves and those that are supposed to be living wasting their lives as the living dead~ yes dead! I was one of them, sold out to that belief system with every bone in me so I know what I am talking about, believe me. At 22 i was already married under customary law. Just after we got married an old friend of my husband came into the picture. This was a lady friend who was well polished and a true definition of success at the time. Running a well established corporate on the entire floor of one of the city’s best buildings, 7 pool cars, a massive database of top-notch clientelle -I just thought my shoulders where rubbing with the best. I was immediately brought on board after being forced to leave my humble employment as a civil servant to join this successful business woman as an account manager. I soon learnt the sweet ropes of clicking good deals and getting big commissions. I wanted more. I wanted to learn her secret to success and of-course like everybody there is always a belief system tied to one’s prosperity. This marked phase 1 of the enemy’s tactics to take me out. I was attracted to a religion that was going to be my downfall. I had found in this woman a model and a mentor.
Deception:
This began phase 2 of the enemy’s tactics. My mentors religion was Traditional African Religion (ATR). Although i had grown up attending sunday school and church, as a Shona person, I was practically born and bred in that religion too so it was nothing new. The roots were there and the tree was about to be revived. My entire being identified with it so it did not take much to convince me to join that train. As she taught me, so I dived in with an inquiring mind, seeking to understand how it all worked. I just fell in love with ATR. In it was wrapped the essence of being black, being African and being Shona. It smelt good, like a sweet scent. Something in me just totally got connected to the teachings. Having been a History teacher and once subscribing to the doctrine of those brothers we called missionaries who took our land and conned us into believing our riches were stocked up in heaven, I soon rose up with vengeance against anything biblical! That was the enemies tool that led to colonization afterall! Soon we started attending meetings at night where one of the guys that led the team manifested ancient spirits of his ancestors and we would address him as Lord. Conquerors, this was my deception. I was deceived from this point onwards.
Every week we met, our lives were spoken into by the dead. We were promised joy and happiness but I never understood why almost every song that we sang at these gatherings was sorrowful. The songs depicted servanthood, poverty, covenants to nothingness, and praises for the dead. Everytime we were reminded of how we were called to soldier on like orphans and minister to the nation as sons of the soil. Week after week we attended these meetings as if to be fueled but infact I watched families break, miseries and discouragements creep in, husbands cheating on their wives, poverty increasing but no-one opening their eyes to these evils. Contrary to the lyrics, the music was actually very soothing, comforting, sentimental and almost everyone would manifest and get into trances at some point. Everyone was addressed with high respect, using ‘mutupo’ the totem as the language of honour and if you were power-hungry this was definitely the place to be. It was for Kings and Queens in their different tribes, regions and domains.
Consequently we lost all our weekends to special meetings that can be equated to all- night prayer meetings and retreats/workshops on the christian scene today. These were held in the forests belonging to titled spirits and/chiefs and we visited other generals in the religion from other rural areas to fellowship at their functions called Biras in Shona. These were key all-night parties characterised by traditional beer, mbira music, traditional dance and song culminating in a series of trances by delegates and manifestations of spirits with various messages to their ever so expectant followers. The manifestations were particularly comforting and consoling because this is where our lives would be spoken into and we would be encouraged and given hope. Sometimes we didn’t have to wait for weekends, we would just take off on roadtrips to mountains to pray there, worshipping those mountains and the spirits they were connected to normally family ancestral spirits. I reminisce the one time coming down a mountain in Mutoko (Zimbabwe) on a very steep gradient with a baby on my back. I had to do it on my buttocks. I was so scared, the view at the bottom made me dizzy. I could have gone to meet my maker that day had he not purposed to see me testifying of his love today.
Anyway, I unfortunately watched things crumble down for many in the group. Marriages broke, relationships soured while businesses crumbled and still people believed the gods were in charge. We continued serving these gods ever so faithfully and they continued puffing us up with nothing but titles that were only good for the ego. If you were a host of an ancestral spirit (spirit medium) you were given a respectful title and that was enough to keep you believing for a better life. After about 2 years, I was tired of going round in circles. I looked around me and I realised that the gods had failed to deliver their promises of prosperity to me. All they did was make me feel important but I had lost everything. I had gotten so irritated that I left my husband and he thought it was a joke. This is the deception of the enemy Conqueror! He will never take the blame, if anything he will point at others and you will fall for it.
Isolation:
The problem is i was so sold out to the religion that i didn’t see anything wrong with it. I blamed my husband for everything and when I had enough I just eliminated him from the picture. Slow down, I didn’t kill him, I simply quit that fruitless marriage. I decided to go back to my old profession and take care of our baby girl on my own while I left him to continue the mbira parties and the drinking with that whole bunch of brainwashed generals and followers of midzimu (the gods). Inorder to initiate the final phase of his plan and finally take me out, the enemy decided to isolate me. By leaving my husband, i literally stripped of my head. I had no covering anymore. I became a lone ranger. A very angry and bitter one for that. I could not sustain a single relationship because I was ‘too good’ for the world. Remember I had spent a few years being taught the art of pride. All that praise in ancestral worship is enough to give one the thickest coat of pride and self praise.
Well ask Old Lucifer, he knows how fast you can fall from heaven when you exalt yourself…like lightning! If the enemy gets you isolated, he has successfully cornered you and you will have to be a die-hard to survive this. I survived by grace. It was the hardest part. In isolation you can succumb to all feelings of dejection, rejection, depression, poverty and unfortunately these create the negative emotions of bitterness, unforgiveness, rebellion, pride and anger all of which are enough to shut the heavens and squeeze life out of you- literally choking you to death spiritually. If your spirit man is dead, you only need mercy from heaven to survive otherwise you die! The enemy will have accomplished his mission. The question is, if the heavens are shut, what good is life, you are as good as dead- the Living Dead!
Conquerors I encourage you to join the winning side, tried and tested. God is forever faithful. His love endures forever. If you would like to give your life to Christ, please feel free to inbox us on riseupconquerorr@gmail.com and will be sure to assist you.
Till then,
Ester H.
riseUPconqueror!!!!!!
falling is not the problem, failing to riseup is!!!!
Welcome Conquerors!
Today i want to talk about joining the army of God with a particular emphasis on the love affair. Having dealt with the mystery of Christ in the preceding post, i felt it necessary to go deeper into this mystery of love. So God the author of love put his seed in us that one day our hearts would beat with love and we would respond to that feeling on the inside with a deep hunger for him. Conquerors, this love affair is not for cheaters, players or liars. It’s for those who can stay true to the battle for love, the battle for life and the battle for the soul and spirit. Anytime you enter into battle, someone has got to win. In order to win your battles of survival, you need to be on the winning side. This is the side of God your creator, to whom you are answerable…The LoveAffair between God and mankind is no different from what we see on the natural radar. Love is making the world go round everywhere. Isn’t it amazing that every human being, those who like to call themselves believers and those who act like they don’t believe, call on God when disaster strikes! That inner heartbeat that connects them to a supernatural being, a higher power is the seed of faith that was deposited in every single one of us at creation. It connects us back to our maker. That my brothers and sisters is the signal of love at first sight. We all know the story! So first God sends his Word to ask you out and for this love story to workout, both parties have to work for it after all love just doesn’t happen.
As in the natural, this love is worked and developed through stages:
- Attraction/Fall in Love: the attraction is there already, being seeded as faith by God himself. All manner of creation knows that there is a higher power – that is God. That inner voice that makes you responsible to an invisible higher power is the initial attraction.
- Believe the Mystery of Jesus: This means to activate your belief system to accept the ‘unacceptable’ and believe the ‘unbelievable.’ If you are reading this you have probably heard about how Jesus was conceived. To accept that as truth means defying the odds of logic! To believe it is a giant step of faith! When you believe with the heart that Jesus is Lord unto righteousness and confess with the mouth that he died and rose again unto salvation you become BORN AGAIN. You become a new creature, a new life, a new mindset and you enter into eternal life. This is the entry point of spiritual warfare. Joining the Army of God means believing in Jesus – The Christ.
- Courtship/Dialogue: Now comes the part where love is nurtured, cultivated and waterd. This is going into his presence, talking to him and hearing from him. We enter his presence through his Word (Jesus), which we can find in the special book called the Bible. This is where you get to know him better, see him in action and pour out his love to you. As a bride you keep yourself clean, tell all the other gods to leave you and stop seeing them. You prepare yourself for an eternal committments by preserving yourself for this new found love.
- Taking it to the next Level/Marriage: This commitment part actually happens in two stages. First in the natural life by getting Born Again then secondly at death by Resurrection and meeting with the object of our affection – God. Unlike in the natural, this marriage signifies a union with God through Jesus. This is the only marriage that will not end because of death, infact after death it becomes perfected. As you enter into this marriage covenant, you become one, you move in with him and have your entire being in him while he takes charge over your life, protects you and provides for you. You begin to walk together, plan together and do everything together acknowledging his pre-eminence, omniscience and allmightiness in your life.
To help us, God spoke in old times through prophets and inspired prophets and apostles to write his Word. When it was assembled the Word became what we know today as the Bible. He did this to give us a manual for life. The Word of God is our reference point today of who God is, what he wants and expects from us. The Word of God is like a magnifying glass in our life and it contains anything and everything that we can ever go through on this earth, how to go through it and how to be victorious. It is the book of life that clearly outlines the way we should take. Once you begin the habit of reading the bible, very soon the Word will start becoming real, it will begin to apply to your everyday life. There is a lot to God and we can never touch everything on this platform. Even the bible could not contain everything! I encourage you to read the Holy Bible and familiarise yourself with God.
Moreover, therein are the depths of knowledge and wisdom about life yesterday, today and tomorrow. The Word is tried and tested and has been proven to be true! Personally I have had my own experiences with the Word and today I can testify without a doubt that the Lord Liveth! Believing in the mystery of Jesus will protect your mind and your entire being from deception. If the enemy can convince you to deny Jesus, then he can keep you from accessing anything of God. Of course people will argue about why there are successful sinners and unbelievers. Well God is LOVE. Remember he is the author of it. He first loved us when we were yet sinners! He operates in the highest level of love and mercy. For this cause he sent his only Son to die for ALL on the cross!
The cross signifies repentance and the forgiveness of sins, which is why we are called to come as we are no matter how bad we have been! So much love! God is also very patient and faithfully waiting and giving everyone a chance to know him, choose him and return back to him. If only we can believe, then the rest of the questions will become clearer and clearer as we walk the walk of a believer. Your walk is not going to be the same as mine so never compare yourself with the next person. You will struggle with some concepts as you go but if you take heed to Gods Word and instruction and make it the final authority and final say in your life it will all workout for your good.
Be vigilant! Some days will be harder than others. This is the good fight of faith. This is spiritual warfare, where many spiritual battles are fought and if in Christ won! Picture the battlefront in war. Fire, bullets, injuries, rescue teams, cries and victories…etc etc. That will be your life. The only difference is that whether in life or death, victory is certain. Yours will be a story of victory. You will win every battle in Gods way. Sometimes you will have to understand that your losses will be Gods victories and later you will understand that they were your victories in the first place. If you are interested in joining Gods Army today, get on the love train, start your own LoveAffair with him, sign into battle by saying this prayer:
Lord Jesus, I confess that I am a sinner, I believe that you are the Son of The Most high God, I confess that you died for me on Calvary and rose again. Come into my life and be my Lord and personal Saviour.
Friends if you have made the above confession, it means you have now been born again. You are now a member of the family of God. You are now a Christian. The Angels are rejoicing in heaven because of you. Congratulations!! I am so happy for you! If you need help on what to do next, get intouch on riseupconquerorr@gmail.com
Join me again next week as we talk about the armour of God and the weapons of our warfare, otherwise keep growing this LoveAffair to greater heights!
Till Then
One Love!
Ester H.
riseUPconqueror!!!!!
falling is not the problem, failing to riseUP is!!!!!
