3 stories: Different, Devoted and Deeply Loved
Stories are magical in sermonising. But this is not a sermon as a disclaimer; it is an invitation to peek into my deep reflection on life, bridging the dots on time in just a week. Honestly, our world often seems to run at a steady speed and is woven in some sameness. If we are superficial, we miss the beauty of life found in profound lessons quietly tucked into the stories we live (where we are the main actors) and witness (where we are the cast or the audience).
My Stories today are of resilience, of faith, and of love. They are not just stories; each carries a quiet revolution within them, fighting not with fists, but with conviction.
Story One: When to Trust, and When Not to Fight
There comes a time when we must choose whether to swim with the current or stand still in our truth. It’s never easy being different. Maybe it’s how you think, dress, do things, or believe; maybe it’s the choices you make that don’t fit neatly into others’ expectations.
The tension between being accepted and being authentic can be unbearable. And still, there’s a kind of power in not conforming.
Someone once told me, “It hurts when people don’t get you.” I now know how that feels. That hurt can turn to defence, and defence to battle. But what if choosing not to fight is a form of courage, too? Not because you’ve given up, but because you’ve understood that some battles are not yours or even worth the fight.
When others want you to “go with the flow,” it’s often because your uniqueness unsettles them. Maybe, just maybe. But harmony built on erasure is a quiet tragedy.
The wisdom lies in knowing whom to trust. Trust those who see your difference and don’t shrink from it. Those who sit with you in silence, who don’t need to understand every detail to still stand beside you. Trust is not about agreement; it is about safety.
My wisdom today is knowing that sometimes, choosing peace over being right, or even understood, is how we begin to live in freedom. Yes, we fight for what truly matters and our right to exist fully without apology, but doing so subtly if that poses a threat to our existential peace.
Story Two: The Stillness that Makes Us Whole
There’s a verse in the Bible that goes, “Be still, and know that I am God.” It is found in Psalms 46:10. It’s simple, but weighty, especially when addiction to instant gratification is our greatest infighting. But wait a minute, patience is countercultural, right? Anyway, in this story, patience is the silent warrior.
I want you to imagine walking through the darkest season of your life. One marked by cravings, the need to escape, or even the ache of wanting something so badly it physically hurts. Addiction is not always to substances. It could be to habits and mannerisms that leave you questioning your being and ability to be in charge of self.
Other times it could be to validation, control, success, breaking free or in the extreme, being “enough” in someone else’s eyes. But faith asks us to do something radical: be still. What a quiet, powerful call to realisation.
Stillness is not passivity. It is a deliberate act of trust. That healing takes time. That consistency, even if slow and staggered, wins. It’s waking up and praying when nothing seems to be changing. It’s choosing water over wine, rest over numbing, silence over self-sabotage. It is in these silent moments, often when nothing seems to be happening, that we are becoming.
Sometimes, the universe waits until we are ready to receive what we deeply desire. And I have said this a million times, readiness is not about perfection. No wonder waiting to be ready is akin to waiting forever. It’s about alignment.
If you stay long enough in that posture of surrender, you’ll notice that what you craved finds you when you’ve stopped needing it to survive. That’s the paradox of faith. To keep showing up, while letting go of the timeline, trusting that God has got your back. That is why it is called faith.
Story two is a story of triumph. You know it when you have been on the battlefield and come back home, never the same again, but grateful you made it.
Story Three: The Love That Feels Like Home
Love isn’t loud. Trust me. If it’s shouting, maybe it’s time to re-evaluate. It doesn’t always announce its arrival with fireworks or chase scenes – the police sirens and escort lights. Sometimes, it’s a quiet knowing. A moment of meeting someone who doesn’t complete you, because you were never incomplete, but someone who expands you.
This is the kind of love that doesn’t demand but inspires. It doesn’t box you in but brings out the best in you. You don’t do things for them because you’re afraid to lose them. You do things because it feels like breathing; just natural, rhythmic, life-giving.
There is a sacredness in vibing with people who speak your soul’s language. Who challenges you and cherishes you in the same breath. When you find that, it becomes easier to trust the process. To believe that you are not running out of time. That when things feel right, they often are. And that effort, when married to intention, births something beautiful. Something that’s meant to last.
Love doesn’t save you. But it reminds you why you wanted to be saved in the first place. And when two people decide to grow together, well, not because they have to, but because they want to, that’s when something holy is forged. A union that doesn’t just exist but endures.
It becomes a quiet rebellion against all the hollow versions of love stories sold to us. A garden, tended not in a rush, but with daily waterings of care, laughter, grace, and truth.
You just let it be, because you trust it will be. All you do is show up, sometimes unkempt, but showing up anyway. It is sowing the seeds of companionship painlessly, and in perpetuity, one memorable moment at a time. In this story, the aim is to become the bi-lead actor.
In a Nutshell
Fighting for what matters isn’t always dramatic. Sometimes it looks like walking away from an argument that tries to shrink your truth, and other times, your philosophy. Sometimes it’s sitting in stillness when those around you want noise. And sometimes, it’s choosing love not out of need, but out of sacred recognition.
These three stories, about trust, patience, and love, reveal to us that the real victories are often internal. They’re slow, quiet, and deeply personal. But they are the ones that shape us most. And in the end, perhaps the fight isn’t about changing the world all at once. Maybe it’s about holding on to the parts of us the world tries hardest to take.
And possibly that’s the most powerful revolution of all. A revolution about our singular personal state, rather than us, as unified or pluralistic.
