Why Magufuli administration misses the point on Government splurge

Why Magufuli administration misses the point on Government splurge

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Your First Question

‘What is your first question going to be?’ I was preparing my cross-examination for one of the first criminal trials in which I was involved when I worked as a barrister. A senior and experienced lawyer was helping me prepare. He showed me the significance of a first question.
 
Psalm 2:1-12

1. The first question in the Psalms is about Jesus

It is all about Jesus. The safest place to be in life is close to Jesus.
Paul, preaching the gospel in Antioch, quotes this psalm. He says, ‘We tell you the good news: What God promised our ancestors he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second psalm: “You are my Son; today I have become your Father.”’ (Acts 13:32–33, quoting Psalm 2:7).
It is Jesus who is his ‘anointed’ (Psalm 2:2). The Hebrew word here is ‘mashiah’ (messiah). He is the Christ, the Son of God, whom we are to love: ‘Kiss his Son’ (v.12).
The psalm’s original context probably concerned a particular situation involving a human king of Israel. Yet, as we read it with a larger horizon in mind, we see that the first question asked in the Psalms points forward in anticipation to Jesus. Why do people ‘conspire’ and ‘plot’ against him (vv.1–2)?
This is exactly what we see happening in the New Testament, even in today’s passage, in relation to Jesus. Right from the start of Jesus’ life, we see rulers gathering together and conspiring and plotting in vain (Matthew 2:3–4).
Yet the psalm ends, ‘Blessed (happy, fortunate, and to be envied) are all those who seek refuge and put their trust in him!’ (Psalm 2:12b, AMP). With all the storms of life, and supremely the storm of Jesus’ coming in final judgment, the only safe place to be is ‘in him’.

Lord, thank you that as I look to the year ahead and all the potential challenges, opportunities and possibilities, the safest place to be is in you.
 
Matthew 2:1-18

2. The first question in the New Testament is about Jesus

The whole of the Old Testament is fulfilled in Jesus.
The Magi (often referred to as ‘the wise men’) sensed the significance of Jesus’ birth. They asked, ‘Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews?’ (v.2) They sought and found him. When ‘they saw the child… they bowed down and worshipped him’ (v.11). They recognised that Jesus was the fulfilment of all the hopes and dreams of the people up to his birth.
Jesus is the one who fulfils all God’s promises. Today we see three more examples:

Place of his birth
Matthew saw that even the place of Jesus’ birth was prophesied (Micah 5:2). It was out of Bethlehem that the ‘ruler’ and ‘shepherd’ would arise, ‘for this is what the prophet has written’ (Matthew 2:5–6).

Exile in Egypt
When Herod tried to kill Jesus, the family escaped to Egypt (v.13). Matthew writes, ‘So was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”’ (v.15; see also Hosea 11:1).

Slaughter of the children
When Herod ordered the murder of all boys under the age of two (Matthew 2:16), this fulfilled the prophecy of Jeremiah (31:15) (see Pippa Adds – Matthew 2:17–18).

Lord Jesus, today I want to bow down and worship you. I want to offer you everything I have – my life, my all.
 
Genesis 2:18-4:16

3. The first question in the Bible is about God’s goodness

Do you ever find yourself doubting whether God’s way really is the best? Do you find yourself wondering whether, even though God says it is wrong, something is worth trying anyway?
God gave to humankind everything they could possibly want. The whole created world was made for us to enjoy. Every possible need was catered for. The pinnacle of God’s creation was humankind. The need for community was solved by the creation of other human beings: ‘It is not good for the man to be alone’ (2:18).
It started with the beautiful gift of marriage: ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh’ (v.24). Marriage is the lifelong union of a man and a woman in which sex, another of God’s beautiful gifts, is to be enjoyed with intimacy and freedom, without guilt or ‘shame’ (v.25).
Yet despite this abundant provision of everything good, human beings looked for something more and they succumbed to the temptation to take forbidden fruit.
The temptation started with doubts about God. Here is the first question in the Bible: ‘Did God really say, “You must not eat from any tree in the garden”?’ (3:1). Behind this question is the demonic lie that God is withholding from you something that is really exciting.
Eve’s first mistake was to engage with the snake in conversation. We are created to converse with God, not the devil.
The devil, in the form of the snake, fools Eve into thinking that there will be no consequences to her sin – ‘You will not certainly die’ (v.4). He imputes bad motives to God: ‘For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil’ (v.5). It is often the case that you swallow a lie about God, before you swallow forbidden fruit.
The fruit looked ‘good’ and ‘pleasing to the eye’ and ‘desirable for gaining wisdom’ (v.6). This is often how temptation appears. Adam and Eve sinned and, as so frequently happens, cover-up followed the sin: ‘So they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves’ (v.7).

4. The first question God asks in the Bible is about you

Adam and Eve’s friendship with God was broken. When they heard God coming, they hid (v.8). But God immediately came looking for them, and we find his first question in the Bible: ‘Where are you?’ (v.9) God did not give up on them.
Whenever you fall away from him, God comes searching for you, wanting the relationship to be restored.
He says to the snake that one of Eve’s descendants ‘will crush your head, and you will strike his heel’ (v.15b). Jesus is the one who will crush the head of the snake. But there will be a cost – ‘you will strike his heel’. We see here the first hint of what it will cost to restore the relationship. On the cross Jesus crushed Satan, but it cost him his life. His blood was shed so that you and I could be forgiven and our relationship with God restored.

5. The first question human beings ask is about responsibility

‘Am I my brother’s keeper?’ (v.9b). This is the crucial question for today. Do you have responsibility for others?
The result of the fall is a broken relationship with God. Adam and Eve blamed each other (vv.11–12), and in chapter four we read that their children also fell out with each other. Arguments, quarrelling and falling out with one another began here. It has blighted the human race ever since. Try to avoid arguments. You will rarely win one and they are so destructive.
Cain was angry with his brother Abel. God’s questioning continued: ‘Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it’ (4:6–7).
You will either master sin (now through the power of the cross and resurrection and with the help of the Spirit), or else sin will master you. In Cain’s case, it did. He killed his brother (v.8). God asked him yet another question: ‘Where is your brother Abel?’ (v.9a).
In response, Cain asked the first question by a human being in the Bible: ‘Am I my brother’s keeper?’ (v.9b). Cain wanted to avoid responsibility. He was saying, ‘Do I really have responsibility for anyone other than myself?’
The biblical answer is that you do have responsibility for others. We cannot exempt ourselves from responsibility for what is happening around us – in our city, nation and the world. For example, we cannot accept that thousands of children die every day as a result of extreme poverty and simply say, ‘It’s not our responsibility.’
Not only do you have responsibility towards your fellow human beings, but it is your privilege to bring blessing and joy to your friends, family and all those around you, and to make a difference in the lives of as many people as possible.

Lord, thank you that you have created this wonderful universe for us to enjoy in relationship with you. Help me this year to fulfil the potential I have to make a difference in other people’s lives.


The devil, in the form of the snake, fools Eve into thinking that there will be no consequences to her sin – ‘You will not certainly die’ (v.4). He imputes bad motives to God: ‘For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil’ (v.5). It is often the case that you swallow a lie about God, before you swallow forbidden fruit.
The fruit looked ‘good’ and ‘pleasing to the eye’ and ‘desirable for gaining wisdom’ (v.6). This is often how temptation appears. Adam and Eve sinned and, as so frequently happens, cover-up followed the sin: ‘So they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves’ (v.7).
 
Pippa Adds

Matthew 2:16
‘When Herod realised that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi.’
I always feel traumatised when I read this passage. What a terrible thing Herod did to the vulnerable, just because he felt insecure about his own position. Are you ever in danger of putting others down to try and secure your own position?
 
There's now a growing tendency of CCM election thieves transforming themselves into messengers of righteousness but whose end shall be according to their deeds.

Whether it is pleasing or displeasing we obey God commandments but if we choose to obey God when it's convenient to us we are a bunch of hypocrites and the gospel truth not in us....

Many presidential appointees from Rombo to Arusha make sure cameras [emoji328] are rolling to record their latest exploits as crime busters encroaching on police and other agencies' orbit while urging the society to respect the rule of law hoping we had forgotten what they did last summer


Election thieves will never fight crime because they epitomise it...and their arraignment of the small time, petty and first time offenders overwhelmingly confirm our case...that, it is a personal promotion initiative to impress their appointer not to axe them while considering them for future promotions...we call it self-centredness...very selfish motivated...

We also know that publicity hungry presidential appointees are doing whatever they are doing not out of strength but out of insecurity...they want to keep their jobs or at best make a case for promotion..

But there shall be no peace for election thieves, not now ...not ever...
 
Not all Kingdoms are set by the Lord Christ Jesus [emoji120] some are set by the Kingdom of darkness and we know them because they steal elections
PSX_20210106_195747.jpg
 
New Year's Resolutions

I belong to a squash club, which is also a gym. Each year on 1 January they bring in extra gym equipment. The place is packed out. By about 7 January, they move out all the extra equipment, as most people have given up their New Year’s resolution, and the club returns to normal!

Get fit

Lose weight

Reduce drinking

Stop smoking

Get out of debt

There is nothing wrong with making these common New Year’s resolutions. Of course, all of us make resolutions that we fail to keep.
The good news is that each year is an opportunity for a fresh start. But then so is each week. Every Sunday is the first day of the week – a new beginning. Actually, every day is an opportunity for a new beginning.
The first three words in the Bible are, ‘In the beginning…’ (Genesis 1:1). Each of the passages for today tells us something about new beginnings and new opportunities, and suggests some possible New Year’s resolutions.
 
Psalm 1:1-6

‘Delight’ in the Bible

If you are beginning the challenge to read the Bible in One Year, this psalm has encouraging words for you.
The promise is that if you ‘delight’ in God’s Word and ‘meditate’ on Scripture ‘day and night’ (v.2, MSG), your life will be blessed. Happiness comes from what happens to you. Blessing is what happens to you through knowing God and meditating on his words.
God promises you fruitfulness (‘which yields its fruit in season’, v.3b), vitality (‘whose leaves do not wither’, v.3c) and prosperity ('whatever they do prospers', v.3d), though not necessarily material prosperity!
This message is backed up by a glance across at the ultimate fate of ‘the wicked’. The psalmist does not try to pretend that the wicked don’t sometimes prosper. He simply reminds us of the transitory nature of their prosperity – ‘they are like chaff that the wind blows away… [they] will perish’ (vv.4,6).
The key to lasting – and ultimately eternal – fruitfulness and vitality lies in your relationship with God. As you seek to follow ‘the way of the righteous’, you are assured that the Lord himself will watch over you (v.6).

Lord, thank you for your wonderful promises as I resolve to make a regular habit of delighting in your word and meditating on it.
 
Matthew 1:1-25

Focus on Jesus

Resolve to focus your life on Jesus. The Bible is all about Jesus. The New Testament opens with his family tree.
As we read the list of Jesus’ ancestors, it is encouraging to see that they include Tamar (the adulteress), Rahab (the prostitute), Ruth (the non-Jewish Moabite), Solomon (who was conceived after King David’s adulterous affair with Bathsheba), as well as many others. Thankfully, God uses sinful human beings and, therefore, can use us. Whatever your past, however broken your life may seem right now, God can use you to do something great with your life.
The very name ‘Jesus’ means, ‘he will save his people from their sins’ (v.21). Every time we use the name Jesus it reminds us that our greatest need is not for happiness or contentment (although these may both be by-products). Our greatest need, as with Jesus’ ancestors, is for forgiveness. Therefore, we need a Saviour.
The beginning of Matthew shows us that Jesus is the completion of all that is recorded in the Old Testament:

Jesus is the climax of history
Matthew opens his Gospel by summarising the Old Testament story in terms of Jesus’ ancestry (vv.1–17). The Old Testament tells the story that Jesus completes. Matthew sets out the history of the people of God in terms of three equal periods: fourteen generations from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the exile and fourteen from the exile to Christ (v.17).

In the genealogy, biological generations are skipped over (as was quite common in Old Testament family trees). Matthew was pointing out that Old Testament history falls into three approximately equal spans of time between crucial events. Jesus is the end of the line as far as the Old Testament story goes – the climax has been reached.

In Jesus, all the promises of God are fulfilled
Jesus is not only the completion of the Old Testament story at a historical level, he is also the fulfilment of the Old Testament prophecies and all of God’s promises.

Matthew concludes each of five scenes from the conception, birth and early childhood of Jesus by quoting the Hebrew Scriptures that have been ‘fulfilled’ by the events described (Matthew 1:22–23; 2:5–6,17,23; 4:14–16).

The first one is the fulfilment in the conception of Jesus: ‘All this took place to fulfil what the Lord had said through the prophet: “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son and they will call him Immanuel” (which means “God with us”)’ (1:22–23).

All of history, prophesy and promise, is completed in Jesus. Your whole life is completed in Jesus. Every part of your life: your work, family, relationships, friends, memories and dreams are completed in Jesus.

Lord, thank you for this promise for the new year – that, in Jesus, you are with me. Help me to focus my life on you in the year ahead.
 
Genesis 1:1-2:17

Enjoy God’s creation

You are not here by chance. This universe is God’s creation. You are made in his image.
Genesis gives an account of the beginning of the universe. It goes way beyond the scientific theories of ‘how?’ and ‘when?’ It answers the questions of ‘who’ and ‘why?’ Scientific theories do not prove or disprove this explanation. Rather, they are complementary.
Reading this passage through the lens of the New Testament we see the whole Trinity involved in creation. The Hebrew noun for God (Elohim) is a plural noun. The Holy Spirit was involved in creation (1:2). It was through Jesus that creation came into being: ‘And God said…’ (v.3a). Jesus is God’s Word and through him the universe was created (see John 1:1–3).
In the midst of this account of the creation, there is an amazing throwaway line showing the immense power of God: ‘He also made the stars’ (Genesis 1:16). We now know there are probably between 100 and 400 billion stars in our galaxy alone, and our galaxy is but one of around 100 billion galaxies. He made them all, just like that!
The pinnacle of his creation was human beings. You are made in the image of God (v.27). If we want to know what God is like, it is men and women together (‘male and female’, v.27b) who reflect his image.
Every human being is created in his image and should be treated with dignity, respect and love. Your ability to communicate with God is a reflection of the fact that you are made in his image.
God approves of all that he created. He said, ‘It is good’. Many people feel worthless, insecure and of no value. But God did not create rubbish. God created you. He loves you and approves of you. He may not approve of everything you do, but he loves you unconditionally, wholeheartedly and continually.
We see in this passage that work is a blessing: ‘The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it’ (2:15). Work is part of God’s good creation – not a result of the fall. This passage also reminds us that taking care of the environment is right at the heart of God’s plan for human beings.
Rest is not an optional extra. It is what God did (‘he rested’, v.2). These days of rest (days off, holidays) are days of special blessing: ‘God blessed the seventh day and made it holy’ (v.3). Holidays are holy days. They point to the fact that life is primarily about being rather than doing. Don’t feel guilty about taking time off. Holidays are good in themselves. They are also a time to recharge spiritually.
Don’t work too hard. God took time to rest and enjoy what he had made. You are not supposed to work constantly. You are created with a need for relaxation and rest – taking the time to enjoy your work and the fruit of your work.
In Genesis 2:16–17 we see that God gave Adam and Eve far-reaching permission (‘you are free to eat from any tree in the garden’, v.16), with one prohibition – ‘but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil’ (v.17a). He warned them of the penalty if they disobeyed (‘when you eat of it you will surely die’, v.17b). You do not need to know and experience evil. God wanted you to know only good.

Lord, thank you for this universe that you have made. Help me to keep well away from evil and to enjoy all the good things you have given us to enjoy.
 
Pippa Adds

Matthew 1:18–19
How difficult this must have been for Mary, her parents and Joseph. They must have felt embarrassed and ashamed. We see why Joseph was chosen to be Mary’s husband – he was very impressive. The girl he was about to marry was pregnant; he would have been justified in being furious. Yet, he didn’t want to humiliate her – he planned to ‘divorce her quietly’. We see how he acts after an angel appeared in a dream and told him to marry Mary (v.24). It must have taken faith to put aside what people thought and raise a child that was not his own.
 
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