Who Are You?

I had barely walked into the Interactive Media department of the company I work with than a colleague asked: “What do you call that plastic thing at the ends of a shoe lace?” For a moment it seemed I was sitting on the hot seat of Kafui Dey’s ‘Who Wants To Be Rich?’ programme waiting to attempt an answer to the penultimate question where one wins GHS 25,000.00. I shrugged and carried out the motive which took me there in the first place, but not after a bout of laughter from them.

It wasn’t after a couple of hours had passed when a colleague from the IT department walked into my office than I remembered the question. This bizarre reminder and quest for knowledge drove me straight to ‘google’ it on my phone. An aglet, it is called. I relayed the answer to him and was given a thumps up. Later in the evening, I again accessed the internet on my phone, and realized I hadn’t closed the tab on which I found the answer to the brain teaser. I proceeded to scroll down to satisfy my curiosity. The webpage had this for a definition:   

I Have A Dream......

As a student of history, I find it almost unpardonable that I hitherto, hadn’t found it necessary to listen to the complete speech made by the doyen of the struggle for freedom in American politics for the Afro-American, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr in 1963. I had heard snippets of it whiles growing up, and seen it referenced in many articles but hadn’t really saddled myself with that kind of research. However, I woke up one morning, and “I have a dream” emerged victorious in the quest for attention in my mind after saying my prayer. Where did it come from? I have no idea. Nonetheless, I also have dreams. I will share one I have on politics.

If this was the picture Kwame Nkrumah and his men had seen when they fought for our liberation, they would not have lost sleep, gone to prison and endured all manner of abuse. I don’t believe the Ghana I have seen for twenty-something years is the same Ghana they handed over to our generation. Successive governments have fought so hard to plunge us into a state of anarchy. Our leaders have happily carried the cross of corruption since independence, and seem to be in the contest of who will outdo the other. They have always said on campaign platforms that they intend to strengthen one institution or another to tackle corruption. Ruling parties have been voted against in elections because they failed miserably to face corruption head on, inter alia, only to find that the next government is actually worse off. They tend to rather build systems that make the menace thrive. They create, loot and share! The mere mention of ‘politician’ in certain quarters will be met with derision because the breed we have in Ghana and Africa are liars. This has led to the game being rechristened ‘politricks’, because that’s what they do essentially – trick us the populace into voting them into office.          

In Ghana,We Celebrate Mediocrity.....

I haven’t yet reached the 100^th page of Lee Kuan Yew’s 729-paged memoir: From Third World To First, but I’m already fascinated by how Singapore broke free from the shackles of poverty and journeyed itself into greatness. With a team of enterprising men and women led by the writer, the natural resource-less country was transformed by the power of human capital and a sheer passion for excellence, and catapulted from a third world country to a first.

My beloved Ghana is undoubtedly a land endowed with milk and honey, but her citizenry is ludicrously fed with manna. We have been served this staple since independence and thus have become accustomed with accepting and celebrating anything that appears a little better than our ‘delicacy’.  

For a twenty-something year old, I carry too much pain in my heart. Pains I think are enough for the faint-hearted to just fall to the ground clutching the left section of their chest and be called to eternal glory. I have witnessed the ordinary being celebrated as achievements worthy of reward in recent past, and I’ll endeavour to catalogue a few of them here [feel free to add yours in the comment box below].

The humiliation from some foreign media calling Ghana a ‘circus’ following the incidents that led to our exit from the world cup still hurts, so I will start my musings from there. Prior to the tournament, the GFA set a clear target for our ‘super coach’ James Kwesi Appiah. His was a semi-final berth for the Black Stars since anything short of that would draw criticism from the many football aficionados in the country. Whether that ambition in itself was realistic is another topic worth debating.

Pay Them No Mind….."Mentiee Obiaa"!!!

I am slim. Well, some people think I am thin, but I vehemently disagree. Despite my disagreement, I have made it a point to jog for about 30 minutes at least 3 days of a week. I decided to do this because I developed a habit of eating very late in the night. As result of that poor eating habit, I think I saw a little bulge develop below my chest and above my abdomen. Others thought otherwise but I wasn’t ready to be that slim guy with a pot belly. Imagine how awkward and awful I’d look. In this era of the packs; 2, 4, 6 or 8, and with all my faculties working effectively, why would I want one big pack preceding my every movement?

My alarm clock woke me at 5:00 am today for me to hit the road and burn those accumulated calories. After snoozing for 20 more minutes, I rose from my bed, changed into my jogging kit, and stepped out for the jog. Something didn’t seem right today. It was the weather. I looked up and saw the clouds had gathered and was showing off the pale orange colour it usually does when God decides to bless us with early morning rain.

Growing Up......

I received the terse message informing me of my dad’s ailment on Thursday evening whiles at choir rehearsals. I ‘whatsapped’ my sister back and asked what the problem was. “Fever”, she said. I quickly brushed that aside without even replying the message. My sister and cousin accompanied him to the hospital on Friday, as I was told when I called to check up on him in the morning. Let me hasten to add that I did try severally to reach him on Thursday evening when I closed from rehearsals, but was unsuccessful, before I’m labeled an ‘uncaring brute’ by those who don’t know the kind of relationship I have with my dad.

There’s this young lady where I work who has developed a penchant for taking offence at my every tease. Those who really know me will tell you that I like to do that a lot – tease others, albeit not the harmful kind, and also enjoy being teased. The situation is so bad that she would not respond to any of my pleasantries when I try to offer it anytime I go to her office to transact any business with any of her colleagues. As a result of that I also developed a habit of not paying her any mind when we met in the hallway, staircase or anywhere.    

Say No — to Say Yes to What Matters

Today I want to share a very simple, yet very critical time-management skill that usually is underestimated.
But not having this skill can seriously sabotage your best efforts to get things done and to move towards your goals in life.
The skill I’m talking about is to say no — primarily in your mind — to everything that is not what you really want.
Sure there are a gazillion opportunities out there waiting for you to jump on them. There is so much information and advice waiting to devour your attention. And of course, there are dozens of things on your to-do list waiting to get checked off.
But what is the one thing that is all about you?
What one thing is expressing your core dream?

KEEP WALKING......

It was one of those days I had to arrive at work just about when the sun was rising in order to meet a very tight deadline I thought was ‘impossible’ to meet, but I did anyway.  And after trying my best to complete a portion of the report, I was somewhat tired by brunch time, so I needed to, as it were, ‘stretch my muscles’ outside the four walls of my shared office. 

I had just walked in and resumed my seat next to the Sony radio/cd player when Nat Brew’s ‘history-telling’ tune – ‘W) gb3 j3k3’ was just about ending on Adom FM’s multilingual presenter, Ohemaa’s show. I liked that tune so much that I had to access Google’s popular music video portal, YouTube to listen to it again…and again… and again….throughout the rest of the day and week actually. I had heard this tune since I was initiated into puberty, but it didn’t really make sense to me like it’s been doing over the last couple of days.

LET'S GET READY TO RUMBLE!!!!!

A certain ring announcer made this his trademark catchphrase whenever he was about to introduce a bout, in which two physically endowed men punched each other with all the strength they could garner, without mercy and in certain instances, one party literally beaten to pulp. He’s made over $ 400m from patenting these few words. Michael Buffer made this catchphrase gain currency in our boxing parlance. It’s almost like it’s impliedly supposed to be screamed at every boxing bout the world over.

It usually goes like this: Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls…LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLET’S GET READY TO RUMBBBBBLLLLLLLEEEEEEE!!! [Yeah! The tongue is kept rolled in the mouth in order to stretch the ‘L’ in “let’s”!] I usually wouldn’t ‘enjoy’ a boxing bout whenever I missed that phrase, even if it was the infamous bout in which the church usher Evander Holyfield got his ear bitten by a certain bald-headed heavyweight Iron Mike Tyson whose punch weighed more than a bag of Ghacem cement, or the latter’s famous tumultuous defeat by the dreadlocked Brit Lennox Lewis. It was that serious, really!

THOSE THREE BOYS........

Bible scholars actually engaged in a really painstaking mental ‘torture’ to calculate that it was about 600 years before our Lord and Master was born that King Nebuchadnezzar besieged Jerusalem and took captive many of Israel’s finest citizens and ‘carted’ them to Babylonia. Among these were three young men from the tribe of Judah [four actually, but this article zeroes in on the three].

It is instructive to know that it was God who actually gave Nebuchadnezzar victory over Judah as a result of their outright rejection of His tenets, leading ungodly lives by majority of them etc… God actually permitted him to take some of the sacred items from His temple. Interestingly, Nebuchadnezzar, haven been permitted by the Supreme God to take these priceless items belonging to Him, he in turn placed it in the ‘treasure house’ of his ‘god’.

WHO DO YOU SAY HE IS????

Once upon a time in the Bible, Jesus sought to know what the people he taught thought of Him. He proceeded to enquire from His disciples. Some equated Him to John the Baptist, some said Elijah, and others also mentioned Jeremiah.

John’s bluntness, I believe was the reason for his mention, Elijah because of the ‘humongous’ miracles and the Jeremiah because of his ‘compassion’ [he was nicknamed the ‘Weeping Prophet’].

When Jesus now asked them what they (disciples) personally thought, Simon Peter downloaded ‘divine intelligence’ from above and declared, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God”! (Matt. 16:16)

Although this knowledge was handed down to Peter, I believe it was made possible because of his personal encounter Jesus. When Jesus asked posed the question to them, each began to reminisce what He had done for them throughout their relationship. Peter recalled how Jesus met him crestfallen after toiling all night on the high sea without any catch to show for it. He remembered how in his lethargy and frustration, but at His word, he let down his net and hurray!, what seemed to have been a moody night turned out to be the beginning of his surreal association with Jesus.

It was while thinking about this and a thousand-and-one other wonderful things that God ‘connected the dots’ in his mind, and dropped what will eventually be the ‘Rock on which Jesus built His Church’ into his mind.

Brethren, I honestly believe each and every one of us must have a personal encounter or relationship with Jesus in order to answer this question. Let me pose this rhetorical question and try to answer it..ironical, isn't it? But I will venture nonetheless; How will you be able to tell someone about me when we haven’t acquainted? Is it possible to say something noteworthy about me? Admittedly, it is, except that your declaration will be based on another’s opinion which may [or may not] be true. 

Lots of people thronged the family house of Komla Dumor, Joy FM and the Accra Press Centre to sign the books of condolence which had been opened at these locations when the senior BBC journalist died of a cardiac arrest in his London home. I heard the morning [and mid-morning] show host[ess] of Joy FM read the tributes of his ‘loved ones’ who had come to the radio station to sign the book of condolence opened there, and I could only wonder how many of these people actually ‘knew’ him for who he really was apart from what Joy FM and subsequently BBC had made him to be. In his funeral brochure, a few of these tributes were captured there, and anyone who cared to read them could easily separate the proverbial ‘wheat from the chaff’. Wheat here represents those who really knew him, and chaff…well…..

The former gave detailed description of their association with him, whiles the ‘not so brown’ gave one, or two-liners as ‘tributes’.

 

My point is simply this; you need to ‘know’ someone for who he/she really is and not just on a ‘face-value’ level in order to tell others when called upon to do so.

Many of us know Jesus for what He has done for us; that well-paying job He gave us, that lucrative deal He helped us close, that malignant tumor He removed from the thyroid and many other wonderfully humongous things He does for us each day. These are fantastic! But hear this: He is more than that! The Good Book calls Him the Bread of Life, the Good Shepherd, the Comforter, the Saviour, ‘the-One-that-takest-away-the-sins-of-the-world’, Emmanuel etc…but above all, the ‘Son of The Living God’! Know Him for you!

Who do you say He is?

HOW FAR ARE YOU WILLING TO GO???

How far are you willing to go? – In your career? In your relationship with that ‘special’ someone you call ‘honey’? But most importantly, I ask this question in relation to your walk with God! When one wants a promotion or a pay rise from his/her employer, that fellow would go all lengths to ‘please’ the supervising officers. This includes, but not limited to working longer hours, offering to get the coffee etc… Similarly, when a 30+ year - old lady wants her boyfriend to consider her as a ‘marriage material’, I’d bet she’d go the extent of tidying the house of her ‘prospective’ in-laws, and perhaps wash for them, pretentiously oblivious of the presence of a house help in the house! Shouldn’t that be the case in our walk with God?

I ask this because most of us Christians seek a ‘reward’ [for lack of a better word] from God for virtually ‘no work’ done – And I literally mean this!Let me digress a little and take us through how Elijah met Elisha, albeit briefly. It was simply divine, in my humble opinion. He didn’t find the latter praying, nor evangelizing, but rather going about his everyday work – ploughing! He then threw his cloak over Elisha’s shoulder and walked away (1 Kings 19:19-21).

Now let me tackle the ‘meat’ of this note. Fast forwarding to 2 Kings 2 when Elijah was taken up to Heaven, it is strikingly evident that he, on three occasions had this to say to Elisha:“Stay here, Elisha; the Lord has sent me to….Bethel, Jericho and Jordan”! And at the utter of each ‘order’, his protégé had this to say: “As surely as the Lord lives and as you live, I will not leave you.” Dare I suggest that if Elisha had been a child, a scolding of sorts wouldn’t have been out of place? But the man stood his grounds and followed his master throughout his journey. Call that positive defiance!

Elisha knew that his mentor was going to be taking up to heaven. At least, his responses to the questions from the school of prophets suggest so. I want to believe that his request from Elijah seemed to have been well-thought through and hatched from the onset. This certainly doesn’t seem to me as an ‘impromptu’ desire. He’d desired it from the commencement of their relationship! So when the time came for Elijah to be lifted up into the skies above, he effortlessly, almost without thinking of the gravity of his desire, muttered: “Let me inherit a double portion of your spirit,”! Even after Elijah had explained the magnitude of the request and the conditions under which it would be granted, Elisha relented not. He followed until he’d met the conditions set and his request granted! Amazing!

I challenge you, albeit humbly in the Name of Jesus: Never give up in your walk with God! The tribulations will certainly come; the persecutions will come but don’t give up, my friend! PERSEVERE till the crown of life has been given to you as your reward!!!

And so I ask again, how far are you willing to go?