TT 171

in Authority and

CONTENTS

My Pulpit message notes: | Go in Authority and Power | 3-4

My Education: What does it take to deliver quality early learning that nurtures children’s full potential? | 6

Give e more of God: Why Spiritual Intimacy Can Feel Elusive | 7

My Inspiration: Your daily routine and eternity | 8

My Entrepreneur: There’s no such thing as work-life balance| 9

My Health: Passion, exercise, and meaningful relationships are a boon to brain health | 10-11

My Kitchen: Dodo (Fried Plantains) |12

My Sports: World Championships: Adhiambo and Nekesa happy with their show at global event |13

My Pulpit Message Notes

Go in Authority and Power

Mark’s Background

Simon Peter is behind the writing of Mark. Peter ranks as one of the most in fluential personalities not just in Biblical history, but also in human history as a whole. He was a non educated fisherman, passionate man with many rough edges. He came from Bethsaida in Galilee and nobody from nowhere.

But once he met Jesus, he allowed Jesus to begin to recreate and redefine him. He became the main source of the gospel of Mark.

Mark is important in New Testament scholarship, because it is the foundation to the other two synoptic gospels. Mark was the first one to be written in the mid-late fifties and it is widely agreed, that it is a foundational gospel. Over ninety per cent of Mark verses is contained in the gospel of Matthew and fifty percent in the book of Luke. That’s how significant Mark and Simon Peter are.

Go in Authority and Power

In our series the rest of this month we are being commanded and encouraged to go in authority and power, to make Jesus known.

We need to go to the tail end of the fourth chapter to know what is begin ning in chapter five.

feature in the story, is testimony that we are now in Gentile territory. According to the Levitical law, pigs were unclean and forbidden and this is where Jesus is taking His disciples.

I have a feeling He is beginning to prepare Peter for him to understand that at the end of the day ministry is universal. Christian ministry is for all. A couple of years down the road, there will be a faithful centurion praying called Cor nelius who will be led to a man who has also been moved to pray, called Peter. Before Cornelius arrives, a sheet will come down with animals, reptiles and birds of prey and Peter will complain to God, ‘I have never eaten anything that is common, or unclean”, and God will tell him, “What God had made clean, do not call common.”, As Peter meets the crowd later on he will tell them in Acts, “You are well aware that it is against our law for a Jew to associated with a Gen tile, or to visit him.

Jesus is beginning to prepare Peter for what is to come and to prepare all of us, the ministry out there is for all. Whatever their community, political affiliation, it is for all and that is the command of our Lord and that is what Peter is begin ning to learn.

Faith is important. It is the gateway to God. What becomes clear as you read the gospels, our Lord has problems with fear and doubt. It is okay up to a point. Beyond a certain point it becomes rejection of the offer of faith. So Jesus/ God honours faith...”

At the end of chapter four, Jesus is at the Sea of Galilee and He tells His disciples, let us cross over to the other side. It is evening and soon enough there’s a howling windstorm. The Sea is in turmoil, it is rain and the boat is filling up with water. Those steering the boat are experi enced fishermen and sailors who knew the sea well. But the Sea of Galilee was notorious for its unpredictability. It had a temper, you might say.

A storm and calm could succeed each other with no notice. Air rushes from surrounding hails. Mount Hamon, Tabor, the Galilean hills, could churn up the water without warning and that seems to be what happened this evening.

As the Sea is in turmoil, our Lord is asleep, on a cushion, in the stern, in the boat. The disciples wake Him up, complaining, agitated, “So you slumber away’, they seem to be saying, ‘unconcerned. Do you really care?’

Our Lord wakes up, rebukes both wind and sea, commanding them to be still and they obey instantly and theres is calm. In what is more of a rebuke than a question, He asks them, “Why are you so afraid? What do I need to do and for how long do I need to do it for you to trust Me? For you to get it? For the penny to drop?” Why are you afraid? Where is your faith?

“You call yourselves practicing Jews because many of these Jews were. Have you forgotten the crossing of the Read Sea in years gone by? I Am God. Sovereign Lord of nature and history. I Am God who acts and intervenes by the power of My word. I have the power and authority to rearrange the forces of nature and to bring to complete and total submission.”

Jesus frees ‘the violent man of the tombs’

So they cross the Sea and end up on the other side. They come to the country of Gerasenes, also known as the Decapolis. This was a league of ten cities that answer directly to the Roman governor in Syria. The presence of pigs, soon to

So Jesus steps out of the boat and He meets a man who is introduced to him as the violent man of the tombs. The tombs were the dwelling place of the wretched of the earth. The scam of society. This man is fettered in chains. Lacerates himself with sharp stones, emitting wild cries, he is an ear sore, an eye sore, an untenable monster, reject, annoyance and a burden to society.

This man is the way he is because he is controlled and possessed by demons. The sole function of demonic occupation is not only to control, but also to destroy the victim. The confrontation with the Saviour is therefore inevitable.

Our Lord wants this man free of demonic control and this man also wants to be free. So Jesus asks him, “What is your name?” He says, “We are legion for we are many.” And the demons can tell what is coming, because in the cosmic spiritual world, the network is clear. They know who they are and the demons know who Jesus is and they know where He is and what He is about. So they beg Him to send them out of the country.

“Please”, they say, “Send us to the pigs.” So Jesus agrees, and all two thousand pigs become the new hosts of these legion. They rush down the hillside and they drown in the Sea. This becomes breaking news in the area. People rush to confirm what the herdsmen have told them. They said what they had witnessed, what had happened to the violent man of the tombs. And as they come, the man is seated there, clothed and in his right mind and the pigs have drowned and gone.

The man in cured. And now there is a slightly different problem. The owners of the pigs look at the situation and Mark tells us, they were afraid and begged Jesus to depart from their region. The pig owners could live with the fact of demons in the man. They had gotten used to that. It was a simple fact and real ity and as they say, ‘It is what it is.’ What they could not countenance and were unwilling to accept was the idea of demons in their pigs and the consequential loss of revenue.

My Pulpit Message Notes are extracted from the sermon preached at the Nairobi Baptist Church (NBC) Ngong Road on Sunday 2nd October 2022. Preacher: Rev. Mutava Musyimi. Scripture: Mark 5:1-43. Topic: Go in Authority and Power

My Pulpit Message Notes

The man looks at the situation and pleads with Jesus, “Can I come with you?” The man knows Who has healed him. He wants the warmth and the security that Jesus offers and of course the healing. Jesus says, “No. Go home to your friends and tell them how much the Lord has done for you and how He has had mercy on you.”

I find it interesting that Jesus says, “Go home to you friends and family” because they will not say, Look at the one who used to be crazy. Because in family and friends you know there is warmth, latitude that you don’t often find elsewhere. The man is somewhat lonely and a bit lost. It is not unusual. Many who have walked long with the Lord know that an extraordinary experience with God, when God discloses Himself for who He is, when you know His presence. That doesn’t happen often, it can be freeing and overwhelming, but it can only be a bit lonely.

Remember the story of Peter at the Lord’s transfiguration, when the glory of the royal presence, the, divinity and majesty of our Lord was for a moment revealed, Peter gets a bit lost. He wants three tents, one for Moses, one for Elijah and one for Christ. The Scriptures tell us, he did not know what to say. He was terrified.

Jesus heals the woman that haemorrhaged for many years and resurrects Jairus’ daughter

In the second half of chapter five we have two events that overlap. There’s a woman that has haemorrhaged for many years and the resurrection of a young twelve year old girl. So Jairus , the father of the girl, comes to Jesus and as he be gins to join him to go to his house, the crowd is jostling. In the midst of all that confusion, this poor lady who had spent her fortune on physicians to no effect.

As a matter of fact we are told, she got worse and not better. Her state of ritual uncleanliness not withstanding, she reaches out to Jesus in despair and faith, and with all the pain and shame, much of it privately borne, she decides that even touching His garment will be sufficient to dispense the healing that she needs and she is healed instantly.

Jesus feels power transfer. Remember, not every person who contacts Jesus ex periences transmission of power, but in this case there is power transfer. To the extent that our Lord feels it and asks, “Who touched Me?” And before He can even begin asking that question, a woman is before Him, prostrating herself, full of fear, trembling and bearing her sob. Our Lord looks at her and says, “Your faith has made you well. Go in peace and be healed of your disease. Be whole.” And the healing takes place and it is permanent.

This is not healing by osmosis. Our Lord is actively participating in this heal ing because of the lady’s faith. That is the connection. Faith is important. It is the gateway to God. What becomes clear as you read the gospels, our Lord has problems with fear and doubt. It is okay up to a point. Beyond a certain point it becomes rejection of the offer of faith. So Jesus/God honours faith and that is what we see here.

So powerful is this story that about twenty years later, Paul is in Ephesus in his third missionary journey. We are told God was doing extra-ordinary miracles by the hands of Paul so that even handkerchiefs and aprons that had touched his skin were carried away to the sick and their diseases left them, and the evil spirits came out. That is the power of faith.

The story of Jairus’ daughter.

The healing of this woman had caused delay with tragic consequences on Jairus’ daughter. She died. And as Jesus is preparing to go the onlookers believe that His going there is an exercise in futility. Jesus overhears their conversation, ignores it and says, “Do not fear. Only believe. Let us go.” When they get to the house it is chaos, there’s weeping and wailing. Jesus immediately goes where she was with Peter, James and John, Jairus and his wife, “Little girl,” He says, “I say to

you, rise.” She gets up and walks. “Give her something to eat,” our Lord says. The practical thoughtfulness of Jesus.

This is the third time in the gospel, that the Lord has put Peter, James and John on the from row of history. The other times are the transfiguration and the Gar den of Gethsemane.

Prof. Edmund Clowney, of Theology in Westminster Seminary in Philadelphia says about this events we are talking about, “Peter had seen Jesus and loved Him. Peter well knows that it is not his physical association with Jesus that joins him to the Saviour. It is not necessary for us to have been in Galilee with Jesus. Through the witness of Peter and other apostles we learn about what Jesus said and did. They bear witness through the Holy Spirit. By the witness of the Holy Spirit we are brought to know and love the living God.”

We do not have to have been at Galilee two thousand years ago to trust this Jesus.

Peter wrote two letters; the first letter he wrote to churches in times of enormous persecutions during the reign of Emperor Nero. The second he was dealing with heresy, gnosticism. In the second letter he says, “We did not follow cleverly de vised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. But we were eyewitnesses of His majesty. For when He received honour and glory from God, the Father, and the voice was borne to Him by the majestic glory, “This is My beloved Son with Whom I am well pleased”, we ourselves heard this voice borne from heaven, for we were with Him on the holy mountain.

Who is an apostle?

Sometimes the name ‘apostles’ gets rather misused. The apostles are the ones who were witnesses who sat on the front row and saw what Jesus did and were witnesses of his resurrection. And so they could go out and bear witness and keep a record that has impacted the church for the last two thousand years.

Remember after Judas committed suicide, the qualification for the man who would replace him was somebody who had witnessed the resurrection of our Lord. That was the only qualification. Of course he needed to be a believer and that is how Matthias replaced Judas.

Jesus’ resurrection different from all others

Going back to the resurrection of Jairus’ daughter, this is one of four resurrec tions that are recorded in the N.T. The others are; the most famous, Lazarus of Bethany, Son of the widow from Nain and the resurrection of our Lord Himself.

The resurrection of Jesus Christ was very different from all the other three, be cause all the other three died again. C.S. Lewis humorous statement when he re fers to Lazarus’s death, “Poor Lazarus, he will have to do his dying all over again.”

In the case of our Lord, His resurrection was final. Amazingly, even as we are witnessing the resurrection of Lazarus, the son of the widow from Nain and Jairus’ daughter, when you come to the resurrection of Jesus, It’s a very different ballgame. It is witnessed only by angels. In the four gospels and even in Mark, when he talks of a young man who was in robes, we have to conclude even that was an angel. There isn’t a lot said, but I think his literary understatement on the person seated on the grave, because when you go to the other gospels the witnesses are angels.

They are the only link between the actual event of the resurrection of Jesus and us. They were the first witnesses and then they told women. Only angels are the constant witnesses of our Lord’s resurrection. They said, Christ is risen! Which human being would have described this most indescribable event? God is inde scribable!

And so to Him who is blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, Who alone has immortality, Who dwells inapproachable light, Whom no one has ever seen or can see, to Him be honour and eternal dominion forever. Amen.

My Life

How to get saved and spend eternity with God

His Love

“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish, but have eternal life.

John 3:16 (NASB)

My response

that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.

Romans 10:9-10 (NASB)

My prayer

Lord God Almighty, thank You for Your love for me. Thank You that You sent Your Son Jesus Christ to die for my sins. Please forgive me for all the sins I have committed against You. I believe that Jesus Christ is Lord and that He died on the cross and You raised Him from the dead on the third day. Please write my name in the Lamb’s book of life. Help me to live a life that is holy and pleasing unto You. In Jesus’ Name I pray and believe. Amen

My Education

What does it take to deliver quality early learning that nurtures children’s full potential?

DINGMELISSA KELLY|

Quality early childhood education (ECE) is one of the most important invest ments societies can make to help children build strong foundations that will support a lifetime of learning. This summer, we launched the World Bank’s new volume Quality Early Learning: Nurturing Children’s Potential, which makes the case for more and better investments in quality ECE to make the most of its enormous potential. The volume distills the evidence on the best ways to support a child’s early learning, bringing together insights from renown researchers and implementation experts across multiple disciplines—including neuroscience, psychology, education, and economics—on what it takes to deliver the critical elements of quality ECE at scale in low- and middle-income countries.

Why focus on quality in ECE?

Access to ECE has increased dramatically in the past decade. Today, 62 percent of children are enrolled in ECE worldwide up from 33 percent in 2000. But this expansion in access has not been consistently accompanied by investments to ensure sufficient quality of that service provision. And as the deep learning crisis that many low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) face today has taught us, access to school without adequate quality does not lead to learning. Today, an estimated 70 percent of 10-year-old children in LMICs are living in “learning poverty,” unable to read and understand a short text.

This learning poverty often starts early in children’s lives, with approximately 43 percent of the world’s under-five population at risk of not reaching their devel opmental potential, due to the debilitating effects of poverty and malnutrition. The COVID-19 pandemic has only added to the challenge, hitting the youngest children particularly hard, limiting access to learning opportunities and exacer bating deprivations that affect their development, including increased poverty rates and food insecurity, reduced access to basic health care, and increased lev els of stress and violence.

Quality ECE has the potential to address developmental gaps and set children on strong learning and developmental trajectories. Young children have enor mous capacity to learn during their early years, a fact that should be nurtured and harnessed through investments to ensure children’s early years are filled with high-quality, joyful learning experiences. Getting this right early—both in the early years of children’s lives and in the early years of setting up an ECE sys tem—is much easier than fixing problems later.

What policy implications can we take from the new volume?

The latest QEL volume highlights four central policy implications. First, five key ingredients derived from the science of how young children learn underpin impactful ECE programs: 1) effective curriculum and pedagogy; 2) high-quality training opportunities to upskill the ECE workforce, including teachers and ECE leaders; 3) pedagogically intended learning environments; 4) effective monitoring and quality assurance systems; and 5) systems to scale up services that deliver quality early learning.

Second, in the short-run, countries should act fast to prioritize investments that boost child learning. This prioritization depends on countries’ starting points in terms of coverage and quality, but typically includes improving the capacity of the existing ECE workforce, adopting age-appropriate pedagogy, and ensuring safe and stimulating learning spaces. These investments do not need to be very expensive or complex to improve quality in the classroom. Many countries have a unique window of opportunity now to establish quality ECE while access is still relatively low, as well as to build systems that can ensure quality as ECE access grows.

Third, quality ECE at scale is built progressively, and it requires planning, mul tiple investments, and numerous adjustments through iteration and adaptation. Expanding ECE with quality entails a continuous cycle of assessment, design, implementation, evaluation, and adjustment. Through this iterative approach, countries can learn about what works in the local context and adapt accordingly, guiding the growth and consolidation of the ECE system towards quality early learning at scale. Monitoring and quality assurance systems are essential to sus tain this learning feedback loop.

Finally, investments to improve quality ECE should be accompanied by policies and programs across sectors that boost and support early learning in home and community environments. The home environment plays an instrumental role in shaping children’s developmental trajectories and child learning. To help realize children’s potential, quality ECE programs should be accompanied by invest ments to boost parental engagement and the availability of learning resources in the home. Public learning spaces and resources in the wider community that supplement the school and home learning environments should also be pro moted and supported to increase learning resources and opportunities to all children.

We hope that this volume helps inform investments in ECE to promote more early learning and higher developmental trajectories for children around the world.

By Jon Bloom | www.desiringGod.org

Give Me More of God

Why Spiritual Intimacy Can Feel Elusive

Deep in the heart of every true disciple of Jesus is a deep longing for more of God. But what is this more we desire? We might each de scribe our want somewhat differently, depending on how this long ing refracts through our biology, history, and theological influences. To some degree, none of us has words for it. But at the core, what we desire is to really know God — to know him in the intimate ways that only love knows.

And we have this desire because, by God’s unfathomable grace to ward us in Christ (Ephesians 2:8–9), he first has known and loved us (1 Corinthians 8:3; 1 John 4:19). It is his great desire, one he ex presses in the promise of Jeremiah’s great prophecy (quoted in full in Hebrews 8):

This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, “Know the Lord,” for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more. (Jere miah 31:33–34)

At the heart of the new covenant is God’s great desire that we “shall all know” him.

Known by Love

You don’t need to know Hebrew (or Greek) to discern the knowing God desires. It is the knowing of relational intimacy, of deep friend ship — the kind of knowing that only love knows. For to truly know God is to love God.

“To truly know God is to love God.”

The role of love in intimately knowing someone is profound. On one hand, we cannot intimately love someone we do not know. So, knowledge must precede love. But on the other hand, the deep love of intimate friendship is the door to even deeper knowledge of the beloved, because intimate friends entrust themselves and so disclose more of themselves to each other. So, there is an intimate knowledge accessible only through the deep love that results from and produces even more profound trust.

We see one illustration of this dynamic in play at the end of John 6, when, as a result of hearing Jesus say offensive-sounding things, “many of his [wider group of] disciples turned back and no longer

walked with him” (John 6:66). But the twelve didn’t leave him. Why? Because, to use Peter’s words, that they had “come to know” that he was “the Holy One of God” (John 6:69).

For eleven of them, this knowledge wasn’t merely intellectual; they had come to love him and trust him, even when he confused them. And because they trusted him, Jesus disclosed to them “secrets of the kingdom” he didn’t disclose to others (Luke 8:10). To really know Jesus was to really love Jesus, which was the door to knowing Jesus more. This is what Jesus is getting at when he later says to them,

Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him. (John 14:21)

The Way Is Simple

Notice the simplicity in those words: Jesus will manifest himself to whoever loves him. And two sentences later, he says, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him” (John 14:23). If we love Jesus, both the Father and the Son will manifest themselves to us through the “Spirit of truth” who “dwell[s] in” us (John 14:17).

These are precious and very great promises (2 Peter 1:4). The way to know the triune God intimately, to experience the relational com munion promised in the new covenant, is not complex. Jesus calls us to keep his commandments, or keep his word, which is essentially what he means when he says, “Believe in God; believe also in me” (John 14:1). Jesus doesn’t give us a list of rituals, ascetic rigors, de tailed prayer requirements, long pilgrimages, meditative practices, or instructions for creating special aesthetic environments to expe rience communion with him and the Father through the Spirit. The way is simple: “Believe in me.”

The Way Is Hard

The way may be simple to understand, but, as Jesus says elsewhere, “The way is hard that leads to life” (Matthew 7:14). The complexity and difficulty for us come not from the way itself, but from the evil we face: the internal evil of our unbelief or “little faith” (Matthew 17:20), combined with the effects of remaining sin dwelling in our members (Romans 7:21–23), and the external evil existing in a world that “lies in the power of the evil one” (1 John 5:19). Learning to overcome the obstacles presented to us by our sin-infected flesh and the devil-filled world (1 John 2:16) is very hard indeed.

But the way to more deeply knowing, loving, and trusting God is by faithfully persevering through the great difficulties, and through re ceiving God’s grace of forgiveness when we fail (1 John 1:9). For God uses these difficulties as opportunities to manifest more dimensions of himself to us. Through tribulations, we experience that Jesus has overcome the world (John 16:33), that his grace is sufficient in our weakness (2 Corinthians 12:9), and that he “is able to make all grace abound to [us], so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, [we] may abound in every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8). We come to know more of him.

Through this hard way that leads to life, we also repeatedly encoun ter the reality that God is true to his “living and active” word (He brews 4:12). And we discover that the reality we’re encountering is not merely a set of propositions, but a Person: Jesus, who is the liv ing Word (John 1:1). We discover, in fact, that Jesus is the way that leads to him, the life (John 14:6). And when it comes to our practical pursuit of God, we discover that the Lord most often and most pro foundly reveals himself to us “by the word of the Lord” (1 Samuel 3:21).

For Those Who Want More

It’s possible that this may strike you as disappointing, as if the secret to intimacy with God is “read your Bible more.” Because what you long for is something more. You want to be near God and to encoun ter him more personally than you seem to experience when you read your Bible or hear God’s word preached and taught and discussed. If so, your disappointment could be resulting from one or all of the following possibilities.

First, it’s possible that your exposure to God’s word has outpaced your obedience to it. A familiar and accurate grasp of God’s word is only as good as your behavior-determining belief in it. Jesus said this to some of the most frequent Bible readers of his day: “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life” (John 5:39–40). Jesus discloses himself intimately only to those who keep his word. It’s worth prayerful examination.

“Jesus discloses himself intimately only to those who keep his word.” Second, it’s possible you have a misconception of what intimacy with God should feel like, which has given rise to expectations based on a kind of fantasy, not unlike the unreal expectations we can bring to romantic love or deep human friendships. Remember, our most inti mate marriages and closest friendships usually result from a few in tense experiences that punctuate many ordinary times that all build

trust and deepen love.

Third, it’s possible we might think that the word of the Lord is a poor substitute for the Lord’s manifest personal presence. And in a sense, of course, that’s true. But think of what makes your most intimate, manifestly present friends so meaningful. Ultimately, the words through which you disclose yourselves to each other in mutual trust, along with the promises you faithfully keep, create the intimacy you enjoy. So it is with God.

Now We Know in Part

But it’s also possible that your longing for more is your inconsol able longing to be with your Beloved, the longing all true disciples of Jesus experience. You have come to know Jesus and love him and trust him, but you are keenly and sometimes painfully aware that the wonderful disclosures God has made to you are like a splash of the ocean of joy you someday will swim in (Psalm 16:11). You’re aware that now you only “see in a mirror dimly” what he’s revealed to you, that now you know only in part, but later you will know fully, “even as [you] have been fully known” (1 Corinthians 13:12). There’s part of you that’s weary of the betrothal phase of your relationship with Jesus, and you long for the wedding, when the full marriage will at last be consummated.

For most of us, our discontent with our current level of intimacy with God comes from a mixture of the above: slowness to obey, mis conceptions of what leads to our desired intimacy, and a longing that will be realized only when we finally see our Beloved face-to-face. But all these causes are reasons for great hope because they all point to the fact that there truly is more. There is more of God to know, more of God to love, and more ways we can deepen our trust and intimacy with him through faithfully keeping his word.

Whatever the cause of our longing, the Spirit is stirring in us a desire that comes from God. Because it’s his great desire, the very heart of the new covenant, that we all really know him. And someday, per haps sooner than we think, God will bring to pass his precious and very great promise:

No longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, “Know the Lord,” for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. (Jeremiah 31:34)

In the meantime, “Let us know; let us press on to know the Lord” (Hosea 6:3).

Jon Bloom (@Bloom_Jon) serves as teacher and cofounder of Desir ing God. He is author of three books, Not by Sight, Things Not Seen, and Don’t Follow Your Heart. He and his wife have five children and make their home in the Twin Cities.

My Inspiration

Your daily routine and eternity

By William King | Email: kingwilliam189@gmail.com | image courtesy: prezi.com

Did you ever think that as you go through your daily routine, doing what can often feel like the same old, same old, that your actions and words may be hav ing an effect that reaches further than you ever imagined, even for eternity? For you, it might mean going to work every day.

What we often fail to see is that while we’re faithfully doing our daily routine, we are doing the will of God for our lives. Too often we think that doing God’s will means some big assignment. The apostle Paul says, “For we are God’s handi work, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do” (Ephesians 2:10).

That tells me that God has already prepared a way for us to walk in His will. How do we walk in it? By our good works. Paul is saying that when you gave your heart to Jesus, you receive the spiritual DNA of Almighty God and become His new creation. That means you are predisposed or newly created in Jesus.

God is drawing you to the good works He has already prepared for you to dothat is His will. Think about the simple things that you will do today and consid er the possible effects. When you overlook an offense, do you realize the effects it may have? What happens when you extend forgiveness to a loved one rather than hold a grudge?

When you go to work with a good attitude even though your work place is a difficult one, do you know the difference it will make in your children’s lives, co workers’ or in your own life today? Might it have an extended effect for a week, year or perhaps even a lifetime?

The enemy doesn’t want you to see your good works as fulfilling the will of God. He doesn’t want you to see every good work as also working in you, changing you and leading you to fulfill your destiny. We need to see these “good works” not just as our duties but see them for what they are - pleasing in God’s sight.

Entrepreneur

There is no such thing as work-life balance

| By Catherine Gates | image credit: istock

There is no such thing as work-life balance.

There, I said it. Work-life balance is a social construct that points us in the wrong direction, pitting work against life. The phrase “work-life” suggests that work is not part of life but something you struggle through so you can get to live your life.

No wonder people dread Mondays and trudge through the weekdays with their sights set on the weekend … then complain that the weekend is too short while they start the vicious cycle all over again. What a shame to wish 50 percent of your life away!

The fact is, work is very much a part of life and is meant to make our lives more meaningful, fulfilling and challenging in all the best ways.

Work was the very first assignment God gave mankind as a blessing so we could partner with God in the work He is doing (Genesis 2:15).

What if we could see our work—all work—not only as a blessing, but also an integral part of living a joyful and meaningful life? We would need to reframe the goal to be less about seeking balance and more about aiming toward living a truly integrated life; one in which we steward all elements of life well based on God’s guidance and each season of life (Ecclesiastes 3:1).

From my experience, the first step to living a fulfilling and joyful integrated life is to make sure your top priority is your relationship with God(Matthew 6:33). Putting your relationship with your Heavenly Father first and taking intentional steps to make sure you invite Him into every part of your life is the key to en suring the other parts of life are working, that you are taking the best next steps with your relationships, your work and everything else.

From there, take account of your priorities at this season in your life. I like to look at life somewhat like an equalizer. Relationships, health, work, children, ed ucation, community, church, and so on will require different levels of investment at different seasons of your life.

There are going to be seasons when you need to invest more in your work, others where children or elderly parents take more of a priority. You may be in a time in which your health needs more of your time and attention. And there will be seasons when things like education or other interests need to be factored in.

In 2016, I decided to go back to school to get my bachelor’s degree. I’ve been pac ing myself, taking two classes a semester, one class at a time. While I’m in class, I cut down on volunteering, socializing, and other activities (housework) so I can focus on my work. When I have a break, I jump right back into volunteering for Ladies of Grace, spending time with friends (and cleaning!) My mindset is that I can do all of it, just not all at the same time.

Just like an equalizer needs to be adjusted for different musical pieces, the levels of time and energy you give to different things in your life will need to be adjust ed up or down. What we want to avoid is allowing work to dominate our lives so there is scarcely time for God, self-care, or your most important relationships.

Colossians 3:23-24 tells us that whatever we do, we are to do it with all of our hearts as working for the Lord. All the work we do is a means of partnering with God and giving Him glory.

By focusing on living an integrated life, you can reclaim the energy spent com partmentalizing and enjoy all aspects of your life more fully.

Catherine Gates is a speaker, author and writer. She is Executive Director for Women in the Marketplace, a national non-profit that equips working women to confidently pursue their faith and career for the glory of God. She is the author of The Confidence Cornerstone: A Woman’s Guide to Fearless Leadership. Catherine has contributed to several workplace Bible studies and written over a dozen You Version reading plans. She is on the board of Ladies of Grace, a women’s prison ministry. Her passion is to help women reach their full God-given potential.

My Health

Passion, exercise, and meaningful relationships are a boon to brain health

In a recent paper, researchers reviewed studies linking exercise, relationships, and passion to brain health.

They found reasonable evidence that all three factors offer protection against cognitive decline.

Their review noted that randomized controlled trials are needed to confirm their findings.

Changes to cognitive function during the aging process are relatedTrusted Source to the brain’s white and gray matter volume.

Gray matter consists of biological structures, including neuronal cell bodies, synapses, and capillaries, whereas white matter consists of myelinated axons, through which signals are carried between neurons.

Gray matter volume steadily declinesTrusted Source at around 10 years of age. Research suggests that medically and cognitively healthier individuals experi ence less brain atrophy than less healthy individuals.

Studies also show that regular exerciseTrusted Source, strong relationships, and passion are key to maintaining a healthy brain during the aging process.

In a recent paper, researchers performed a thorough review of the extensive body of literature available on the link between brain physiology development, and physical activity, social relationships, and passion. Based on the evidence, they report that increased passion for an area or skill leads to more physical ac tivity, more social relationships, and better well-being.

“[From our research], we have found that passion- or strong interest- may be a [key motivational factor for achievement and well-being] as it sets the direction

of the arrow,“ Hermundur Sigmundsson, Ph.D., professor of psychology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, the lead author, told Medical News Today.

“Therefore, we say: Find your passion and develop it! Grit, or perseverance, is the size and strength of the arrow. Find your interest area and focus on the process. [Be ready to] take challenges! Challenges are key for development!” he added.

The paper was recently published in a special issue of Brain Sciences.

Physical activity

Observational studies indicate that an active lifestyle is helpful for maintaining cognitive and neurological health across age groups — especially in higher or der processes such as switching between tasks, working memory, and cognitive inhibition.

The researchers noted in their paper that intervention studies had confirmed these findings.

For example, older adults who underwent 1 hour of aerobic training 3 times per week for 6 months had increased gray and white matter volume compared to controls.

Other research shows that physical activity increases functionality in brain ar eas linked to attention and attention control, daily life activities, and cognitive reserve, a reserve of thinking abilities that acts as a buffer against age-related cognitive decline.

www. medicalnewstoday.com | By Annie Lennon on September 28, 2022 — Fact checked by Jessica Beake, Ph.D.

My Health

Relationships

The new paper points to studies that suggest that maintaining social ties en hances cognitive reserve through cognitive strategies, greater neural growth, and synaptic density, which protect against pathological processes.

Imaging studies have demonstrated that larger social networks are linked to a larger orbitofrontal cortex — involved in decision-making — and amygdala vol ume.

These studies also demonstrate that less socially active people have a greater number of white matter lesions.

In addition, randomized control trials have shown that social relations may en hance cognitive reserve, and interventions have shown that increased social in teraction in communities is linked to better cognitive function and larger brain volume.

Other studies, however, indicate no link between social relations and cognitive function later in life. The researchers thus suggest that more robust evidence from randomized controlled trials is needed to demonstrate causality.

Passion

In their paper, the researchers defined passion as “a strong feeling toward a per sonally important value/preference that motivates intentions and behaviors to express that value/preference.”

Other research has found that passion is related to more deliberate practice among football players and better well-being and performance among workers.

The researchers also noted that passion might thus be important for maintain ing neural plasticity. They wrote: “…hence repetition, use it or lose it, use it and improve it and intensity.”

An example of this is someone who is passionate about learning new languages. The researchers wrote that passion could motivate an individual to practice the second language more and thus strengthen their gray matter, neural cells, and connections.

They also noted that psychological traits such as grit and a growth mindset have also been linkedTrusted Source to the development of gray matter in different parts of the brain.

The researchers further cited a number of articles that suggest impaired motor function, antisocial behavior, depression, and anhedonia (the inability to feel pleasure) are common in neurodegenerative and psychiatric disorders and in the natural aging process.

They thus suggested that a “vicious cycle” may be at play: less physical activity may promote less social engagement and lower well-being.

“Passion gives direction to the area of interest, which could be related to the do pamine system, which is central in attention, learning, goal-directed behaviors, and rewards. Passion may be providing the focus essential for long-term goal achievement,” wrote the researchers.

Underlying mechanisms

When asked how physical activity, socializing, and passion improve brain health, Art Kramer, Ph.D., professor emeritus in the department of psychology at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, not involved in the research, told MNT:

“We know more about the mechanisms that underlie physical activity than so cial interactions or learning novel skills since there is a multi-decade literature on physical activity effects on brain health and learning and memory because there are excellent animal models for physical activity (often wheel running with rodents).”

“The animal literature suggests a number of brain changes associated with phys ical activity, including new neurons in brain regions that support memory, more connections among neurons (called synapses), and increases in vascular struc ture. Increases in neurotransmitters and nerve growth factors (among other changes) have also been associated with increases in physical activity in animal models.”

– Art Kramer, Ph.D., professor emeritus at the University of Illinois Urba na-Champaign

The researchers concluded that physical exercise, social interactions, and pas sion are key to maintaining brain health.

When asked about the paper’s limitations, Dr. Sigmundsson noted that their article is just a review and that intervention studies focusing on increasing pas sion, physical activity, and social engagement need to be carried out to confirm their hypotheses.

Dr. Kramer added: “There are a number of limitations, including how best to personalize these factors to enhance cognitive and brain function in individ uals as well as how best to combine intellectual engagement, physical activity and social interactions to maximize their benefits across the lifespan and with non-patients and patients alike.”

My Kitchen

Dodo (Fried Plantains)

By Yewande Komolafe | https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/

Ingredients

Yield: 4 to 6 servings

4 medium ripe, deep-yellow plantains (about 2 pounds)

1 small red onion, peeled and halved Canola or other neutral oil, for frying (about 3 cups)

1 lime, zest removed in strips and julienned, plus 1 tablespoon juice

1 teaspoon red-pepper flakes

Kosher salt

Preparation

Step 1

Cut off the tips of each plantain. Use a sharp knife to create a slit in the skin along the length of each plantain, carefully making sure not to cut into the flesh. Re move and discard the skin by peeling it apart. Slice each plantain in half length wise, then cut into 1-inch pieces.

Step 2

Thinly slice one onion half, then transfer the slices to a medium bowl. Quarter the remaining onion half lengthwise, and pull the layers apart.

Step 3

In a large, deep skillet or sauté pan, pour ½ inch oil and heat over medium. When hot, add the larger onion pieces and fry, stirring occasionally, until golden brown, about 6 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, remove and discard the cooked onion.

Step 4

Working in batches to avoid crowding, fry the plantains, stirring halfway through, until browned and caramelized at the edges, 10 to 12 minutes per batch. Using a slotted spoon, transfer to a paper towel-lined baking sheet.

Step 5

While the plantains are frying, toss the sliced onion with the lime juice, red-pep per flakes and a pinch of salt in a large bowl. Let marinate, at least 10 minutes.

Step 6

Toss the fried plantains in the bowl with the pickled onion mixture while still warm. Add the lime zest and season to taste with salt. Serve immediately.

My Sports

World Championships: Adhiambo and Nekesa

happy with their show at global event

By Ernest Ndunda | https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/sports/

Malkia Strikers debutants Veronica Adhiambo and Emmaculate Nekesa said the inclusion of five new players in the team for the world women volleyball championships in Netherlands enabled them to dis play their athleticism, talent and grit.

“Determination and hardwork was the secret behind the success of the young players who made their de but at the global showpiece,” Adhiambo said.

“It takes a lot of discipline, focus, self-sacrifice, hard work and determination to realise your dream. My patience finally paid off with inclusion in the nation al team,” the Kenya Pipeline player said.

Adhiambo who was one of the leading lights for Malkia Strikers at the World Championships said she has improved a lot on her attacks, services and blocks.

“We met different coaches while in Brazil and Ser

bia where we mingled and learned a lot from at the training camp. I feel more energised than before and am looking forward to even do better,” said the for mer Directorate Criminal Investigation (DCI) vol leyball player.

She hinted that several clubs outside the country have shown keen interest in her services.

“My message to the upcoming women volleyball generation is that they should work hard and remain focused. Nothing comes easy,” added the outside hit ter.

Another debutant setter Emmaculate Nekesa who is believed to have stepped in well to fill the gap left by long serving setter Jane Wacu said she was excited to be part of the team.

“I gained a lot of experience. I feel I am on top of the game and full of confidence. My accuracy coupled

with excellent service and blocks have improved tre mendously for the months we have been in camp and at the competition,” Nekesa said.

“Great things in life take a lot of hardwork, dedica tion, and a little time. You don’t just wake up being a holder of a Diploma, Degree, Masters’, or PhD. I have been patient and working hard to play for the national team,” said the 19-year-old player.

Coach Paul Bitok said the duo together with other new call-ups demonstrated they deserved to be in the national team.

Malkia Strikers outside hitter Veronica Adhiambo celebrates a point against Cameroon at the 2022 World Championships in Netherlands on September 27. [Courtesy]