Author: Vanessa Moonkie

”I LOOKED WITHIN AND I SAW NOTHING.”

Hey family. Please pardon me for posting late especially this week. I am trying to do all l can to be more efficient however from next week l should’ve locked into a good routine becauseeeeeee I’m bringing Christian novels for you!!! Anyhooo let’s do some reflection. I have something to share with you that may help you now or in the future.

I grew up a flexible child. By flexible I mean, I was quite good at school, good at singing, good at writing and story telling, good at acting and just getting things done – leaning more to the creative side. I had lots of setbacks with my education. I did many things past the time I was supposed to. I was delayed in getting employment. I had to take a lot of part time jobs that paid close to nothing. My many talents were hidden and no matter how much l dug , l couldn’t find the treasure within. Boy I worked hard in music, l gave it my all. I did beauty. I did medical stuff. I was a Jack of all trades just seeking for a door to open for me “please!”. At some point I had throat infection for not giving my voice rest and still .. there l was .. no proof of “life” nothing to show that truly I was not a dumb lazy girl, nothing to show that I had talents and was working hard .. and family doesn’t make it easy for those people.

I would look within and find nothingness. I found emptiness. I know your story may be more intense but it’s not a competition of whose is worse, it’s in the courage to even tell the story. I didn’t see a butterfly in me (my name means butterfly by the way) I just saw a worm. I functioned like a worm because as a man thinks so is he. With everything God put in me – l felt like I was nothing. That’s how it is yes? When you’re not serving your generation with a product, a solution or a skill, you feel like you’re a dead person walking. Casper the ghost?! I’m sharing all this with you to pull you out from that room of darkness. The room is dark because you switched off the lights. The light within you.

I tried to escape. I started applying for visas and guess what? That failed too. I prayed. I fasted. I served. I loved my God. I gave it my all. Double Guess ? Everyone who applied after me got their visas and left. There I was .. with a brain I knew was not dull. With energy for dayyyyys! With capacity. With a plan but with no way forward. I would look at myself in the mirror and hate myself. I hated myself for not being like others. I hated my parents for not giving me a silver spoon. I hated rooms full of curious people. I hated the questions , “Where are you in life? What are you doing? When are you getting married? Did you end up graduating? Everyone has gone overseas why’re you still here?”

I hated questions that threatened the peace I fought so hard to keep. My mind was a battlefield. Trusting God seemed like trusting a boyfriend that just cheated 5 times in a month. I will be real with you. While serving on the pulpit sometimes I’d cry not because I was overwhelmed by worship but I was saying within myself , “l am pouring my empty self to happy people and I’m here not even sure what I will eat.” So I’m not the child that nags her mom. Nah. I don’t nag anyone except my brother lol. To me, my mom had done enough already, I needed to find my ground and not keep pulling her purse for what’s left.. I was “worming” through life. Full of skill. Full of talents. Full but empty. A treasure that caught so much dust it now looked like an old piece of metal, rusty and invaluable.

I don’t even know I’m led to share this today. I’m not big on “share your story”. Don’t get me wrong I love to testify but l am not an open book lol yeah I’m a mystery. Solve math not me 🤣. Anyhoo, long story short , God gave me a gift that I myself don’t understand. I promise you , I don’t understand how!! When l get a keypad or a pen and paper, I no longer see Vanessa the worm, l see Vanessa the butterfly. I find treasure within me!!! I find purpose. The mirror gets cleaner and clearer. It took time and SELF REFLECTION. Yes. That’s where this is going. It took digging a little more. Oh I’m lying not a little more, dig , dig, keep digging wells like Isaac! Then l realised; within us shoooo! Within us are treasures God Himself put knowing full well that when we discover them we will smile.

I’m saying to you, you may be looking for treasure in the wrong places. You’re the house of treasures. You! You sit. You pray in the spirit! “Lord I keep seeing a worm but l know there’s more to my life than a couple of rejected cvs. I know there’s a blueprint of greatness. Lord my eyes keep seeing Vanessa the nobody, the one who can’t attend family gatherings because we go with joy and leave with depression , Lord l keep seeing an empty vessel, rusty and good for nothing, show me what you put in the inside of me!!!”

I close by saying, I am proud of myself. This is the first time since l was born that I say this about myself 😭🥹😮‍💨. Vanessa I am proud of you. (Yeah l made it bold) You are a butterfly and more! This is not pride. This is a break out of low self esteem. This is confidence. This is healthy. When you reflect , you’ll find many things to be proud of. Today l present to you, my pride. Click on the link below and see the things God put in me that l never knew of. There’s more in us. There’s so much more. You could be depressed because of your background but eiii when you discover the giant within , David, Goliath will be the boy and you’ll be the giant because there’s only room for one giant and that’s YOU! Stop worrying. Don’t live like I did, anxious, trying to prove a point to people, pressures from social media, no my love. It’s on you! I pray that as you reflect , you find the goodies and gold within YOU. I love you.

Dear brethren, think about these things.

Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!

How are you doing??? How’s your heart? I hope you’ve had a good week so far. To conclude our topic this week I have linked a video that you may want to watch. I believe there was more that we needed do discuss on this topic that a couple paragraphs couldn’t cover..

Special announcement to parents , aunts, uncles , infact the whole Yielded Family. We are introducing fun , engaging, educational Bible stories for your little ones. This is one of the perfect ways to introduce children to the Word of God. We live in a world that is targeting children for the enemies agenda. It is more than just promotion of a channel, it is a platform for Christians to have holy entertainment while being groomed in their faith.

I was so shocked to find out that cartoons right now have so much of the devil’s agenda to sow the seed of sin while the kids are still on milk. It is very dangerous for parents to choose content for themselves and their kids based on the number “views” or the “hype”. We don’t want to miss out on certain shows because everyone at work tunes in. You guys know the programmes I’m talking about. I don’t really know the stand of the owners of this website otherwise I was gonna name them but they may take down my posts. The shows that irritate the soul (if you’re nolonger getting irritated please check your fire, you may be left with ashes).

The reason why we have chilled Thursdays is not to sound canal or just to fill a blog gap in the week. It is to encourage the believer to watch and listen to godly content. One of the agendas behind The Yielded Center is to have different activities suitable to groom the believer in-order for us to infiltrate our generation with sound Word. The main goal is evangelism. I encourage you to tune in to the Yielded TV programs as well as commit to read our Blogs.

Today we are uploading our first bible story cartoon and narration for the little ones. We are trying our best to put together a series for the matured believer, it is not easy. When I got the unction to start all this l had no idea how far I’d have to go to create , to put together, to master the art. It is one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do but because I enjoy creating and writing, I find myself back there. At some point I gave up but my mind was screaming for attention to create. Anyhoo, by Gods grace we will have more shows this very year. While we wait for the mature believers content, I will start posting Christian novels here , so we will have our blogs in the morning (l will try to commit to this) and then we will have two chapters of a novel every week, those will be posted in the evenings.

Thank you so much for your love and support. If you’d like to share your gift with the Yielded Team (voice overs – kids and adults) please don’t hesitate to reach out. If you want to donate costumes for our upcoming tv shows , you’re welcome to. If you would like to offer your services on the camera , make up or tailoring etcetera , we need you! Monetary support is welcome. Partnering with us to share the links and posts will also be much appreciated! As the Holy Spirit leads us. Follow us on Instagram and Subscribe to our YouTube channel.

Here’s the link to our video for today on how to address the Wounds of the Heart.

Watch Now

I thank God for you my yielded family. God has been faithful. It can only be God who gives us a word daily. It is not by might not by power , the things of God are bigger than skill. How many people are highly skilled, more talented, more able who are still going in circles? The most talented there is, not backed by any spirit, will still be a failure. All great people you know are backed by a spirit, either Holy Spirit or demonic spirits, even atheists. No one makes it in this life without the support of the realm of the spirit. The making happens in the spirit and the manifestation is physical. So I really praise God for Yielded Center. We are in our 7th month and we cannot say it is my ability to write or use words, this is by God, through God, for God!!!

It’s Worship Wednesday AND I am so excited. I’m excited about the last half of the year. I perceive by faith that people are about to dance like David! As a matter of fact – start NOW! I believe God is opening great and effectual doors. This is why l always encourage us to play our part in positioning ourselves for these things. If Mary was living carelessly she would’ve missed her visitation. Our positions in waiting are different. Hannah should be on the altar like Zechariah. Ruth must be in the field. Esther must be part of the virgins getting beauty treatments. Moses should be by the bushes shepherding. Zacchaeus climb up the tree and be in position! Blind Bartimaeus be sure to shout out – therein lies your miracle. Woe unto intercessors who will not be found in position. Watchmen who aren’t watching. Bridesmaid who are out looking for oil at the wrong time! Everyone should be at their post waiting for the manifestation of prophecy!

Be positioned in worship. Not to be seen by anyone but GOD! Be positioned with your alabaster box. Oh yes be ready with your offerings or seeds. Prepare the jars for oil – borrow now if you can! Fill the jars with water! Get the certificate. Get the sermons! Pray! Eat of the bread of life! Whatever it takes to stay ready, do it. The doors are unlocked! They’re about to open – be positive, positioned and prepared!

“Beloved friends, what should be our proper response to God’s marvelous mercies? To surrender yourselves to God to be his sacred, living sacrifices. And live in holiness, experiencing all that delights his heart. For this becomes your genuine expression of worship.”
‭‭Romans‬ ‭12‬:‭1‬ ‭TPT‬‬

As we position ourselves in worship today , let us remember, He has required of us! Of our entire beings. He says come and offer your genuine expression of worship which is more than words ; which is your very own body , soul and mind.

Hey guys! I’m amazed at the feedback from this particular topic. I got messages from people on social media talking about how God is helping them through this topic and I’m so glad!! I’m so glad that we want to become healthy people, healthy Christians , that way we can impact our world more effectively. Please pardon me for posting late today.

How are you? How’s your heart? I travelled to the Eastern Cape a couple of weeks ago. So we had a stop over by a garage and I was talking to the cashier, I asked her ,”Are you happy? How are you? How’s your heart?” she almost started crying. Her eyes were teary and she said ,”I have never heard that kind of question. Nobody has ever asked me that. I don’t know if I’m happy but thank you for asking.” Eh I wanted to give her a big hug. How many people does she have in her life and do they know this? That she feels that way? As I was walking away I thought of how many people in the world, in my circle, in my family , who are just looking to have a conversation about it. By “it” I mean, people dying to talk about their pain or experiences and they have no one to talk to. How many people want to be checked up on because they’re having a hard time?

I’m just not an open person. I am quite sociable but for me to actually speak and say “I’m having a hard time!” Is so hard for me. I think many of us have not been able to address the wound because we don’t speak? We shut it in. We thug it out. We have become emotional Batistas. We shut people out and we don’t understand that we need them; that the people we are pushing away will oneday go away. I am learning to speak, to learn to give my friends a chance to be there for me when they can, to tear down the walls l built because I was protecting myself from being wounded.

One of the reasons why we seem to be stuck in pain is we don’t believe we can truly be healed. We have had it for so long we can’t relate to life without pain. When people say they’re joyful we don’t even know what it means and so we entertain the thought of pain as “home” ; as “default mode” ; as “normal”. You meet someone who has been raped more than twice and they can say stuff life “life happens” or “these things happen” , you then realise ah, because of the length of the time it took to heal and the many times they were wounded, they have automatically locked into the box that tags , “Accept it. Pain is part of life. Just keep going”. It’s hard for a limping man to keep going. He surely wants to sit and rest for a while yes?

I have a question for you. Do you really want to be healed? Or do you like your life as it is? Posting about pain? Is it okay if you were to live like this till you die? If it’s okay then you even need more help for not realising a need for change.

“When Jesus saw him lying there, he knew that the man had been crippled for a long time. Jesus said to him, “Do you truly long to be well?””
‭‭John‬ ‭5‬:‭6‬ ‭TPT‬‬

When Jesus saw a man who needed healing , He asked the man a question. He didn’t assume the man wanted it. He didn’t just heal him. He asked him “Do you truly long to be well?” Someone can say, “But Jesus , he is by the pool obviously he’s there for healing.” Just like many people flood counselling rooms and we assume they’re looking for healing but they just like to talk about it. Many people were by the pool! A group of friends with the same story! Others got healed but he remained there 38 years! He lost time because he was not healed. You lose more than the man, you lose time. He could’ve made so many memories, did so many things, but year after year he sat on a mat, the legs remained crippled. My darling you must desire it! You must long for it, truly! How long has it been sitting by the pool while others finally find joy? How long has it been?

Why is Jesus asking someone he found in a hospital if he wants to be well? I really picture that place as a hospital because the bible says many ailing people were found there. So why ask if you can see the need? Because unless the “needy” sees the “need” there’s no need to help them. Unless we realise that we need help, we won’t get the help. Unless we understand that we cannot go on like this, we will keep going on like that. It’s a conscious decision to come to .. Am l bleeding? Do l truly long to be made whole? I can tell you right now, many many many people, depressed, hurt, angry, don’t want to be made whole…. They are okay with the attention that comes from people .. they are fine as long as they have a mat and a cup to beg at Bethesda. No family, It is time to go forward.

“Since my people are crushed, I am crushed; I mourn, and horror grips me. Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then is there no healing for the wound of my people?”
‭‭Jeremiah‬ ‭8‬:‭21‬-‭22‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Why then is there no healing for the wound? Is there no God in heaven? Can’t He help us? He can family but here’s the missing piece… Do you truly want to be healed?

I greet you with a hug in the Name of Jesus. I trust that you are well and had a good weekend. This week l want us to wrap up this topic so we can look at an interesting topic that I’ve been studying. If you didn’t read the last two posts on this topic I encourage you to, as it will give you insight and understanding. If you did read, we don’t read to cram or to just get excited. We must be transformed by the renewal of the mind. The Word should fall on fertile ground otherwise we are just running with chained feet.

What happened to you?

You guys already know l write from pictures. If I come across a picture it inspires me to write. I found this on Pinterest and l just grabbed it for today’s blog. What happened to you? For many people the picture is a visual representation of the state of our hearts. Many wounds. Many bandages. We just patch where there’s bleeding and move onto our next fresh cut. The previous wound hasn’t healed but you’re now dealing with a fresh cut. The cycle continues and people die – broken people. People even die from this, I hope you know. People have died because the heart couldn’t take it anymore. How far do you think your heart can go with all those cuts and bandages suffocating it day and night?

The truth is this may sound harsh but it’s not of God for us as believers to have a wound that doesn’t heal. If that were true , why did Jesus heal everyone He came across? Why not leave them to suffer ? It means that some wounds don’t heal because we don’t want them to. We enjoy the attention we get from friends and the many people that come for our pity party. We sit by the pool 38 years. We have not purposed in our hearts like the woman with the issue of blood to get the healing we need. We have tied ourselves to the identity of “she’s so broken” or “life has been so hard for him” so much that we feel we cannot relate with any other identity. Is it Gods will for us to cry over one boyfriend for 10 years? No. Why is Israel still crying about Pharoah?

“Then the Lord said to Moses, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on.”
‭‭Exodus‬ ‭14‬:‭15‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Why did they cry? Is it because they remembered the trauma of Egypt? Between a rock and a hard place we say? Have we ever thought about what those people actually went through in Egypt? How painful and hard their lives were. Let’s not forget that it’s in Egypt that people lost their sons , isn’t that how Moses was found in the river by Pharaoh’s daughter? It’s a place where the Hebrews cried and no neighbour had the strength to come over and comfort because they too were in mourning. What do we say about the Labour? This one that we work 9-5 and want to quit? No one is beating you o . The Israelites were working HARD! Toiling! And still got beaten. Isn’t that traumatic? Do you now understand why they cried? Wounds. Between death (drowning in the sea) and going back to the tyrannical government, both sound like death to me. Yet God hears them cry and He says , MOVE ON. Yho!

Wouldn’t you have cried too? We still cry about what someone said 5 years ago. We are still bleeding from the first relationship and we are 6 relationships in and the stench of blood is still on us – the heart is bleeding. Yes, brokenness is like joy, you can smell it off a person. Think of it, why haven’t we healed? Because some of us are lying to ourselves. We think we are healed yet when the triggers come the bandage falls off. On the previous posts I mentioned that people with scars don’t bleed, they testify in joy. Wounded people bleed and their testimony sounds like anger. I’m addressing two things today , What happened and When will you be ready to finally move on? I am sorry to say that whether you choose to heal or not, you are between Egypt and the Red Sea, cross the sea or become a slave forever. Freedom or comfort?

I went for counselling at church one day and Pastor KG said to me, “Part of deliverance is walking out of the situation.” I had never heard that before. I have only heard about the process, the gradual transition, just you know, the “kinder” way of dealing with things. God saying to Israel, “ My poor children, that’s so sad. Don’t worry , l will kill the Egyptians okay? Cry it out, breathe in and out. Did you eat? Awww. Let me see what l can do. Should l part the Red Sea? Aww I will. Shhhhh . Shhh my baby.” That’s it right? But sometimes that’s the mistake our friends make. Sometimes it’s the uncomfortable that drives us to move on! God in His perfectly loving self said to them “You better stop crying and move on!”. Ah! If I said that to anyone wouldn’t they hate me? We call the people who tell us the truth that we need “insensitive” but what if we needed to hear that to finally break out! I know many people who left me because I told the truth. They wanted people who validate their commitment to particular things. God says , move on!

Question is, did God know that Israel had never walked between the Sea before? Yes, He did. Does He know you have never known joy before? Yes He does. Is He aware that all you’ve known is Pharoah’s abuse and now that you see him coming you’re terrified, hurt, afraid, angry, feel defeated, because you’ve been there before and it took every ounce of your strength? He knows. Does He know you were raped? You were a child. You couldn’t fight. Does He know that you lost a child or a parent like the Israelites and yet others still have theirs like Moses’ mother? He knows. Is He aware that you gave your all to that man, that woman, you genuinely loved them but they took you for a spin in a car with no doors and you had no seat belt so you got bruised so much you can’t trust anyone anymore? He knows. Read what Ps KG said to me again!

”No that’s just what your pastor thinks!” Okay let’s read God’s response.

“As Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians, marching after them. They were terrified and cried out to the Lord.”
‭‭Exodus‬ ‭14‬:‭10‬ ‭NIV‬‬

“And the LORD said unto Moses, Wherefore criest thou unto me? speak unto the children of Israel, that they go forward:”
‭‭Exodus‬ ‭14‬:‭15‬ ‭KJV‬‬

I have come to tell you. One of the ways you actually address the wound is by moving on. Walk now. He is with you. I know it is a hard thing to do. To step out of this cycle of pain that you may have known all your life but my darling, it’s time now. Remove the bandages. Arise and shake yourself from depression. He says to tell you, “It is time to go forward!”

I love you. ❤️