Shapes, Sizes and Surprises

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Being a stay at home mom/housewife wasn't as easy as I thought it would be. Having to cater to my daughter's needs every second, keeping the house clean, cooking, keeping up with blogging, keeping up with extended family and friends and praying/interceding for a number of hours daily was a lot. At times I felt like a shadow of myself; everyday became a long-boring-tedious routine. I missed my friends that still lived in Maryland; I missed having a social life. We only had one car so when my husband was at work, I was stuck at home. The best I could do was to take my daughter to the park since it was walking distance; me not being a fan of the heat, didn't help matters, we spent more time at home than the outdoors.

I had also gained a lot of weight; the baby weight stuck on way after the baby was delivered. I wasn't happy about it, but I found myself too exhausted to do anything about it. I was also breastfeeding, I was told that it would help with losing weight but I found myself eating more. It seemed like I was always hungry! The extra pounds made me uncomfortable; it affected the way I dressed. I remembered when I first got married; I would make efforts to look 'appealing' before my husband came home from work. However, during my housewife days I found comfort in loose fitting clothing. My husband never complained but it bothered me.

About a month into moving into our new place, our spiritual parents (pastors) came to visit us. It was so good having them around. I was glad that we had a comfortable place for them to stay when they came. We had an awesome time during their visit; it was refreshing and rewarding. One day while we were chatting with them, they asked us what things were coming to our heart about doing ministry in the U.S. We shared the impressions that we had on our hearts and they made comments; mainly agreeing with us. Then they hit us with a BOMB! They told us that they were praying and God laid it on their hearts for us to start the church ASAP.

They asked for a response and we both basically started rambling; yet we agreed. A couple of weeks after that, we had our first service in our living room. There were 8 adults and one child (our daughter) in attendance. The service was awesome; it was obvious that it was time for us to start. Even though we didn't feel like we were ready; we were still trying to settle in and determine our new rhythm. But God had other plans, and it was wisdom to go with his flow and not our feelings. It became clear that God work out the house situation for this reason also; it was all starting to make more sense.

Shortly after that, I decided to stop making excuses and start work out and eating healthier. It started off slow but I kept at it. I also stopped breastfeeding after my daughter turned one so I couldn't blame it on the baby any longer. I messed up by overeating during the holidays- thanksgiving and Christmas but I got back at it once the New Year kicked off. Making efforts to lose weight gave me something else to focus on; I was always between being bored and being overwhelmed. I felt stuck and I just wanted to more forward career wise and financially but I had to sit still and obey; that was hard, because I liked to be in the move. To me then, "no movement meant no progress"; I had to learn to be still and trust God. I had to learn to enjoy every moment because they wouldn't last. I had to learn to focus on my daughter, being able to stay with her and watch her grow was something that I'd come to appreciate later on. I had to learn that I wasn't defined by a job title but by a purpose which consisted of specific tasks/assignments per time.

On most days, I made the best of it; on other days, my feelings got the best of me.



With lots of love,



- Bunmi Adebiyi


Wait before you go:

1. If you have not received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, life won't make any sense, it will be cold and empty. You deserve more! Take a few minutes and click on the 'Come to Jesus' tab at the top of the page and be saved!

2. Please leave a comment below, I'd love to hear from you!

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Our Family: Redefined

Source; Google

Hello!

Thanks for stopping by today!

If you haven’t read my previous post, please do so HERE; so that you can follow.

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Becoming a mother, bestowed so much responsibility on me. After giving birth to my first child, it dawned on me that I was responsible for how her life turned out. I must admit that I was afraid initially; I often wondered if I had it in me to lead her aright...thank God for the Holy Spirit. I wanted to do my best so that she could be her best. After I became a Christian, I realized that most of the issues that I struggled with over time stemmed from my childhood. It is a beautiful miracle when we become born again; we become brand new, our past being inexistent. However, I had major issues that I had to deal with by God’s help; and it took time. I believe that every good parent wouldn’t want their children to go through the bad things that they did...I didn't for sure!

               So here I was in my parent’s house, hogging my child all to myself. At this point, I have set up certain boundaries for myself. I was cautious about what I watched on TV, the music that I listened to, etc. In my own home in Akure, there was an atmosphere that myself and my husband had cultivated and it worked for us. Naturally, I wanted to recreate that atmosphere for my daughter. I was mindful about the power of exposure; every show, movie, song, etc. has some sort of inspiration behind it. Even though my daughter was a new born, I knew that it was possible for her to absorb many things. However, it was a bit tough because it wasn’t my house; the best that I could do was control the bedroom that I slept in. My parents and siblings started to complain about not being able to spend time with their granddaughter/niece outside of my bedroom. And to be sincere, I needed a break from time to time. It was hard for me to explain why I was keeping her in the room; I didn’t want to sound or seem super-spiritual. I eventually allowed them to spend time with her outside the bedroom while I did other things (i.e. exercise, pray, relax, etc.).

                   I was slowly learning to make the best of the situation as I awaited my husband’s arrival. I was seriously looking forward to having him around and raising our daughter together as we’ve planned. Fast forward to three months later, my husband finally arrived in the United States! I couldn’t contain my excitement. I spent most of the day cooking and preparing for his arrival. His flight was delayed for some time but the time had finally come! He was going to meet his daughter for the first time!!! And we were going to be back together after being a part for six months! When we locked eyes at the airport, we were both all smiles. My daughter….our daughter, naturally warmed up to him; it was a beautiful sight to behold. After all the prayers, sleepless nights, tears from missing him and countdowns we were together as a family! It was freezing cold as we exited the airport because it was winter time in NY; but in my heart it felt like Spring and Summer time all at once; I was beyond happy.

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After spending all day cooking, you would think that my husband would want to eat what I cooked. Instead, he requested for a burger…he wanted an American meal. For the rest of the evening, we were playing catch up; as he and his daughter bonded, she couldn’t keep her eyes off of him. It was official! She was a Daddy’s girl! A few weeks prior to my husband’s arrival, the youth ministry of the church that I attended before returning to Nigeria invited us to come and be a part of a panel for a Valentine’s Day event that they were hosting. We gladly obliged. When I was single, I always hosted a Valentine’s Day event for the teenage church; I was a teacher and eventually became a leader. It amazed me how I was doing the same thing after marriage; it felt good to be doing it with my husband. I’ve always loved to talk about every LOVE: relationships, marriage, etc.

               Off we went a few days after his arrival, going about our father’s business with our three month old baby. Getting from NY to Maryland was not a walk in the park. We had to pack extra bags because of the baby (it was our first time traveling with a baby); it was extremely cold outside, getting from point A to B was a pain (we were obviously not prepared for the weather); we almost missed our bus, we found ourselves running with luggage and a car seat in tow…it was not fun. The bus ride was smooth over all; our baby was well behaved throughout the trip. When we arrived in Maryland, it took us a while to locate our ride, for some reason we couldn’t seem to find one another. When we eventually located our ride, we were relieved. I couldn’t wait to get into our hotel room, I was exhausted!

               We finally arrived at our hotel room and it was beautiful. We awaited my sister’s arrival as she was to bring us dinner. Dinner took longer than expected and we were hungry but we tried to focus on enjoying the moment; it felt good to be alone (just the three of us). When dinner arrived, we ate so fast! And it was good! Afterwards, we proceeded to make plans for the rest of our stay; we would only be there for the weekend. But we had so many people that we wanted to spend time with us. The next day was also Valentine’s Day! Our first as parents! My sister volunteered to watch our daughter while we went out for lunch. The weekend went so fast, we had lunch together on Valentine’s day, I went to go see a friend in the evening; the next day was church service and then we had the ministration shortly after (which went well); afterwards we were invited to dinner by one of the church members…we could barely eat as we were stuffed from eating all day. The following morning, we were on our way back to NY. And that’s how our journey of doing life and ministry together began in this part of the world. It was indeed a new experience! 

With lots of love,



- Bunmi Adebiyi


Wait before you go:

1. If you have not received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, life won't make any sense, it will be cold and empty. You deserve more! Take a few minutes and click on the 'Come to Jesus' tab at the top of the page and be saved!

2. Please leave a comment below, I'd love to hear from you!

3. You can subscribe to this blog and receive email updates once a new post is published by entering your email address in the 'Follow by email' section located on the right of this post.

4. You can share this post or previous posts by clicking on the respective social media icon on the right.

5. Follow me on twitter @BunmiAdebiyi_

6. Like my page on facebook: Bunmi Adebiyi

7. Follow me on Instagram: destinationdestinyblog

Didn't God Prepare You For This?

Source: Google

Hello everyone,

It has been a long while and I've sincerely missed this space.
So much has been happening since I lasted posted. But through it all, God has been
good to my family and I!

One of the latest blessings that God has bestowed upon us, is a beautiful baby girl. One Word that describes the process from pregnancy to delivery is GRACE! I will share her story on this blog in the near future.

So I am officially a mother of two! Whoa, it still feels like a dream at times....that is until my precious newborn wakes me up in the middle of the night for yet another feeding or cuddling session...then I know that it is absolutely not a dream but it is REAL!!! *smiles*

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In my last post I continued my testimony on my journey to marriage/ministry, I will continue in this post.

Stay tuned!

You can read precious posts by clicking the 'How I Met My Husband' label.
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Adjusting from being a church member who was still trying to learn the "ropes" to becoming a pastor in such a short amount of time was an interesting experience to say the least. I was also in the process of transitioning from fiance to wife at the same time and planning a big wedding; mind you our courtship was also short (we got married within six months of meeting each other). So there was so much going on at the same time, I was good at juggling it all on some days; however on other days, I was overwhelmed and TIRED!!! Playing so many roles and wearing so many hats at once was intense...In fact, it was beyond intense!

I remember feeling so exhausted and overwhelmed one day after traveling back to Ife from Akure. I turned to one of the young ladies that used to come along and assist us and said, "I am tired!" Her response was epic, she said "Didn't God prepare you for this?" I was rendered speechless, I just nodded and kept it moving. But those words haunted me, it arrested me. I just couldn't complain, indeed God has been preparing me for 'this' for years...I just didn't know what 'this' was going to be.

As I've stated previously on this blog, I naturally do not like the spotlight; I prefer to be behind the scenes. However becoming a pastor left me with no option. I found myself having to speak in front people, counsel people, visit people, preach to people, etc. And of course, I stuck out like a sore thumb. My accent always gave me away, add my dressing and entire 'look' to the equation...and it didn't take long for anyone to realize that I wasn't from Akure.

Here I was, having to adjust to a new environment and set of people. I thought that Ife was 'bad' however Akure was more 'rural' than Ife. I struggled with the thoughts of fitting in or being accepted, but I knew that God sent us to Akure so I sucked it up and kept on going.

I had to ignore the numerous looks... ranging from annoyance to amazement when I picked up the microphone to speak. Some people may have thought I was 'faking it' while others were excited to hear someone speak 'American English'. I never focused on anyone in particular with the fear of being tempted to analyze and determine the purpose behind their stares. I often focused on an object at the rear of the sanctuary and did what I had to do. My primary task that involved speaking in the beginning was to make announcements; I later found myself leading prayer meetings and before long, I was preaching my first message!

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One thing that I discovered early was that being a pastor coupled with being a pastor's wife could be very lonely. Prior to becoming engaged, I had a few friends and a number of associates. However those relationships began to dwindle when I found it difficult to make time to nurture them.

I was very lonely! The congregation members and our assistants looked up to us so much. I slowly saw my playful and more social side diminishing. I had to be 'prim and proper ', all eyes were on me...people were looking up to me as a spiritual role model among other things. And the pressure was intense.

It was tough, I felt like I couldn't be myself. I had fought for so long to be comfortable in my own skin. Here I was, feeling that being 'myself' wasn't acceptable for this new role. I felt like I was being scrutinized left-right-and-center...I even had to watch the way I related to my fiance. I remember one day while at church, I was seating next to him and I leaned over to clean something off of his face. He drew back at the speed of light; I was beyond embarrassed. He later explained that he did not want church members getting the wrong impression since we weren't married yet. I didn't get it but I obliged him... all 'for the sake of the ministry'.


So I had to ask myself: Was I Really Prepared For This???


To be continued...


You are blessed!


- Bunmi


Wait before you go:



1. If you have not received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, life won't make any sense, it will be cold and empty. You deserve more! Take a few minutes and click on the 'Come to Jesus' tab at the top of the page and be saved!


2. Please leave a comment below, I'd love to hear from you!


3. You can subscribe to this blog and receive email updates once a new post is published by entering your email address in the 'Follow by email' section located on the right of this post.

4. You can share this post or previous posts by clicking on the respective social media icon on the right.

5. Follow me on twitter @BunmiAdebiyi_


6. Like my page on facebook: Bunmi Adebiyi

7. Follow me on Instagram: destinationdestiny_mlmt

Blessing in Disguise

Hello Everyone! I hope you had a great week and I pray that you'll have an amazing weekend!

Thanks for stopping by the blog today! I continue my personal testimony today. Please view previous posts if you haven't done so already. Just click on the "Destiny Steps" tab.

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Enjoy!

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Even though I knew that it was time to call it quits, I took some time to draw the curtains over the relationship. I didn't want to hurt his feelings and I contemplated how to let him down gently.

While this was going on, other great things were happening. As I continued the praying and fasting, God revealed a few things to me. The first thing that he told me while I was praying one day was that he sent me to Ife for training. I wasn't exactly sure of what that meant but I assumed that it was for training for spiritual growth.

I attended God's Love Tabernacle International Church (GLT) and boy was it intense. I remember one service in particular, I thought to myself "this is how church is supposed to be". My life has been transformed by this ministry in short period of time. By attending GLT, I was inspired by people who not only "talked the talk" but they "walked the walk". There was no half stepping, these people were sold out for Christ!

During the course of the month of praying and fasting, there were daily early morning prayer meetings and other special programs. One program in particular was held on a Saturday morning, at 8 am. Initially, I had no intention of going. I had a long week and I wanted to sleep in. But for some reason, I got up that day and dragged my feet to church.

I had no idea that my life was about to change forever. As praise and worship was going on and I struggled to sing along. As I struggled to focus, a young man walked passed me and suddenly caught my attention. I didn't remember ever seeing him before. As he walked passed me, God spoke to my heart and said "That's your husband." I was stunned! Where did that come from? It made absolutely no sense to me! I shoved the thought aside and figured I was hallucinating because I was half asleep,

Another time during the service, I looked over at the pastor's wife and the Lord told me, "She's attached to your destiny, follow her." I was happy about that one! I've been praying for a mentor for so long and she seemed like a nice woman. I looked forward for the opportunity to meet her one day.

The rest of the service was long but I enjoyed it. At the end, I was glad that I came. After the service, I saw Pastor Tee and Sarah standing next to each other. I walked over to say hello. And they both started talking at the same time. Sarah said, "I had a dream about you, I have to introduce to Pastor." Pastor Tee immediately said, "I wanted to introduce her to both Pastors!" Sarah asked him, "Can I please do it?" Pastor Tee said, "No!" And before I knew it, he was taking me towards the Senior Pastor. By the time we got there, the Pastor's wife was gone. But Pastor Tee was able to introduce me to the Senior Pastor briefly. He was really nice!

Afterwards, I went home and decided to relax for the rest of the day.

A few days after, Sarah said that she told the Pastor's wife about me and wanted me to meet her. That day we both went to her office and Sarah introduced me to her. She was so pleasant. I told her why I relocated to Nigeria and answered a few questions that she had. While we spoke, she told me that the Lord just told her that he sent me to Ife to train me for ministry. I was taken aback, I didn't expect to hear that.

At one point, she stopped talking and started smiling. She asked if I was engaged and I said no. She went on to say, that she sees something but she'll allow the Holy Spirit to sort it out. For some reason, I understood what she meant. I remembered what God told me about that young man being my husband a few days ago. But I still wasn't convinced so I brushed it off. She went on to tell me to join her and her husband's mentoring programs and to work closely with Sarah on some things.

I left her office that day feeling good. There was a connection that I felt with her. I knew that I was in good hands. 

While we were walking back to church Sarah asked me, "Why did you say that you weren't engaged? I wanted you to talk to her about your relationship." I had totally forgotten! At GLT, once you're in relationship you've considered to be engaged because the relationship would lead to marriage. They didn't believe in dating. I apologized and told her that I forgot. In the back of my mind, I knew that I was done with Raymond; so I thought that maybe it wasn't a mistake after all.

The prayer and fasting came to an end after one month. And I was so refreshed and rejuvenated. I was supposed to travel back to the US during that month to get the rest of my things and to attend my friend's wedding but NYSC denied my request to travel. Many people blamed me because I refused to lie. Apparently, some of the officials don't like the truth. No one wanted to approve me going to the US for a wedding. I was highly upset after waiting for the top NYSC official in my state for about three hours to get approval. Only for him to say no and ask why I didn't bring all my stuff at once. Little didn't I know that it was a blessing in disguise. I may have lost the money I spent on the ticket but I gained much more.

To be continued...


You're blessed!


- Bunmi


Wait before you go:



1. If you have not received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, life won't make any sense, it will be cold and empty. You deserve more! Take a few minutes and click on the 'Come to Jesus' tab at the top of the page and be saved!


2. Please leave a comment below, I'd love to hear from you!


3. You can subscribe to this blog and receive email updates once a new post is published by entering your email address in the 'Follow by email' section located on the right of this post.

4. You can share this post or previous posts by clicking on the respective social media icon on the right.

5. Follow me on twitter @BunmiAdebiyi_


6. Like my page on facebook: Bunmi Adebiyi


7. Follow me on Instagram: destinationdestiny_mlmt