Lagos Swears-in Female SSG

Lagos State  Governor, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu has sworn-in Mrs Folashade Jaji as the 18th Secretary to the State Government, SSG.

The Governor also sworn-in Mr Tayo Ayinde as his Chief of Staff, Mr Gboyega Soyonwo as the Deputy Chief of Staff and six new Permanent Secretaries.

In his remarks during the ceremonies at the Lagos House Alausa, Ikeja, Mr. Sanwo-Olu urged the appointees to hit the ground running in tandem with his administration's agenda.

Reminding them that they have been called to served, Governor Sanwo-Olu advised the appointees to be innovative and receptive to new ideas that would continue to make Lagos a centre of excellence.

Responding on behalf of the appointees, the SSG, Mrs Folashade Jaji  who thanked the Governor for giving them the privilege to serve promised that they would justify the confidence reposed in them.


Cue in

Correspondent Omolara Omosanya reports that the new Perm Secs are: Dr Ademuyiwa Eniayewun, Mr Olumide Erinle, Mrs Oludara Okelola,  Mr Wasiu Akewusola, Mr Yewande Falugba and Mr Abiodun Osiefa.


COV/Omos

Lagos Assembly holds valedictory session

The Lagos State Assembly is about now holding its valedictory session at the Assembly complex in Alausa,  Ikeja.
The session marks the end of the eighth assembly which began in June 2015.
The valedictory session also presents the Assembly with an opportunity to bid farewell to lawmakers who were not re-elected or have taken up other political positions.
It is also an avenue for the House to present its scorecard for the past four years to the public and for lawmakers to reflect on the legislative business thus far.
Spouses of lawmakers are attending the valedictory session.
The ninth assembly will be inaugurated tomorrow with a proclamation by the governor.


By Barnabas Hunjo

World Environment Day reinforces commitment towards cleaner Lagos--LAWMA

The Lagos Waste Management Authority,LAWMA says it used the the occasion of yesterday's World Environment Day to reinforce commitment towards establishing a cleaner and healthier Lagos.

LAWMA had on the eve of the world Environment Day celebration, flagged off operation "Lagos at 4AM", an intervention to quickly sanitize  Lagos Metropolis , through maximum deployment of trucks from 4 am daily for prompt evacuation of gathered wastes.

In a publication on its official Social Media Page, LAWMA implored all Lagosians to be part of the noble cause by making sure they do not pollute the environment via improper waste disposal.

" As we mark this year's #WorldEnvironmentDay, we want to reiterate our commitment to establishing a cleaner and healthier Lagos. 

"Be a part of this noble cause by making sure you don't pollute the environment via improper waste disposal".

In a related development, Lagos State Governor Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu has said working with LAWMA , the PSP and other relevant Stakeholders, the right attention was being paid to waste management value chain.

Governor Sanwo-Olu dropped the hint shortly after visiting the Olusosun landfill at Ojota.

He observed that the landfill was over-utilized , receiving about Ten Thousand tons of wastes daily.

By Innocent Onoh

HOW TO LOCATE YOUR FUTURE PARTNER IN DREAM

HOW TO LOCATE YOUR FUTURE PARTNER IN DREAM

 

As a youth, I had at least a fair image of the type of lady I would like to spend the rest of my life with, and I committed that fervently in prayers. I desired and prayed for a wife that is young, intelligent, humble, above average height, pretty and daughter of young parents. I didn’t really know why I had to make that one of my prayer points at such very tender again, when ordinarily I could say that I had a relative self control in issues of sex, compared with most youths of my age then.

After few years had passed, I began to dream constantly of visiting a rural and remote settlement, which in real life happens to be the place I was born when my parents sojourned there for business. For over 15 years I dreamt of going to that community. At a point, especially around 2007 upwards, the dreams were coming very frequent. The irony of the whole thing was that, I used to be very obsessed about visiting villages in dream because some people made me to believe that such was a sign of demotion or spiritual attack by forces from the village. So, I would quickly counter each of the dreams when I woke up. It didn’t end there. I would visit the Blessed Sacrament at Saint Mathew’s Catholic Church, Amukoko Lagos, my parish then, during which I would also pray through the 14 stations of the Stations of the Cross, begging God to liberate me from the impending doom.

However instead of the dreams to stop, they became even more frequent and specific.

In one of the dreams, I saw a large crowd of people leading a bride to meet her husband. All, but one of the people in the crowd leading the bride were unfamiliar faces. The only person I recognized came to meet me with smiling face, and said to me, “I told you that you would return to our community; now it has happened”. She commended me again and again, and went to join the others.

The familiar person is named Monica. She was my close friend when my family was still living in their village. As close friends, we used to discuss a lot of things. I remembered, I once told her that no matter how rich I become, I would still be practicing agriculture, but I never told her I would marry from her place, and for me taking a wife from her town was the last on my mind. So, I never suspected the dreams were revealing the place of my better half. I kept praying to God to save me and give me better dreams.

The dream that revealed it all

In the dream, my mum, who I regard to be an angel on earth due to her strong religious standing, had invited me to come home from Lagos. While in my room in the village, mum brought me a young lady and said, “This is your wife. Everyone has adjudged her to be a nice girl and suited for you; let me see why you won’t accept her as your wife”. I was working with my laptop, and the lady sat on the bed close to me, looking happy. Mum left. Soon, mum returned and said, “See, she is not from our village. She is a stranger. So take her around our village to introduce her to our kits and kin, including your step brother, Raphael”. Mum left to stay in our sitting room.

I quickly left the laptop. The lady and I stepped out. We visited the houses of all my relations, both from paternal and maternal sides. When we came back to the house, the girl suggested that we go and fetch water. I agreed and we went. On reaching the Amankpu stream, (Amankpu used to serve as the only source of drinking water for my people before boreholes started springing up), we saw that the water was full of tadpoles as it used to be sometimes in real life. We didn’t fetch immediately. We sat on the walls built around the stream, discussing based on the request of the girl that we should chat a little before going home. Before, I could turn; I saw that she had fetched very clean water, which baffled me. I asked, “How were you able to fetch such clean water from this tadpole infested pool of water?” She simply smiled saying, “don’t mind what you find in the stream. Water from it is very good and is even medicinal, curing a lot of diseases”.

Then she carried the bucket of water and headed home. While we walked home, we saw ongoing massive work for different projects including pipe borne water. She told me we would execute our own projects with huge supports from the World Bank. I was so excited that she was too friendly to be with and seemed to know so much about my place and where to source for fund. We walked past the construction site and soon we approached my house. I told her why I built that house and the other things I intended to do there. She showed approval for all that I said, and she laughed aloud. I turned to look at her and saw it was this, my wife. Surprised, I asked, “Chidimma so it’s you that I have been with? She smile and I woke.

How to achieve yours:

For born dreamers like us, it could be much easier to have great dream revelations that make it possible for you not to drift from your God given destiny, including meeting the wife and husband and of your dream.

But for the majority who do not dream that much or whose dreams fall short of the relevant revelations, I think it may demand a little more efforts that include remaining focused on what you actually want in life , God’s favour upon you and being close to God through prayers and obedience to his commandments.

In Genesis….its says, my people shall dream dreams. That continues even up till now, in Mathew…….i am the same today, tomorrow and yesterday.

However, based on my experience and those of many others including those who are happily married, born again Christians, counselors and dreamers like me, the following observances will help you to locate your true husband/wife, thus ending your endless search for your God ordained future partner. They include, being in great communion with God, Pruning yourself of human beings who do not add value to your life and being flexible in your attitude to life. For an in-depth knowledge about how to dream well, read this book “ACHIEVING GREATNESS THROUGH DREAM REVELATIONS”.

Going forward, these activities will help you to minimize mistakes in your quest to achieve that great revelation that unearths your life partner from the Almighty God.

Start early to pray: One of the greatest mistakes that bachelors and spinsters make in their search for life partners is that of waiting till the dying minute, when they feel they are due for marriage or when people pressure them to marry, before they start praying for future husbands/wives. This is both disastrous and unproductive.

At this time you are matured ‘age wise’ and pressures are mounting on you from different quarters to settle down immediately or within the next couple of years. You realize that the time to actually do real prayer is not there.

At this point, both males and females are in confused state. While it is believed that this time, the clock is ticking very fast for ladies making them less competitive in the marriage industry, the men who may have gathered enough financial muscle and lifetime experience are the toast of many women who flaunt around them, thus confusing them the more.

Realizing that you need some time to pray and possibly another to wait on God to answer you, it makes meaning to start praying right form secondary school and tertiary institutions.

Mind who you meet for prayers: If you are planning to go into marriage as you should if you decide not to be a celibate, one of your major preparations should be to come closer to God in prayers and supplication. Therefore, I recommend that you pray your way out and only consult your spiritual directors probably for guidance and support.

Regrettably, many especially among our separated brethren have turned their pastors and prayer warriors into demy gods, who must give approval whether or not the two of them are perfect match. This is risky, because most of the so call men and women of God may not be as powerful as we believe them to be. As a matter of fact, many are fakes.

Perhaps, many people do not understand how activities take place in the spiritual world. As a result, they expect their pastors to not only be a preacher, but also a prayer warrior, healer, prophesier and visioner. No one has that capability, except perhaps in very rare cases. In my experience as a dreamer, I don’t just dream everything, I dream about things that affect me, my relatives, people around me and events in the environment. For outsiders who had asked me to pray along with them, I first of all, make them part of my life, to start seeing things about them. That’s how it works. So don’t be surprised when your pastors give the wrong prophesies. Trust me; with thousand and one of their followers and outsiders coming with the pictures of the ones that have asked for their hands in marriage or that they intend to marry, the pastors under normal circumstance can’t give you the right answer, especially given the short time that the confirmations are needed. But out of ego, some of the pastors give you what they think and not actually what the holy spirit says. That have left so many devastated after their pastors failed to approve the real persons that God actually meant for them.

Why not do it yourself? Commit yourself to God and he will bring him/her to you, in dream or other ways he chooses.

Pray based on your qualities: I have heard a lot of people advising others to just pray to God for the wives/husbands that suits him. This to me is no prayer and would not yield the best result. God is not selfish, so he didn’t create us as robots. Although he has the power to remote us as robots, our God is kind enough to give us free will to make choices, a tradition that he established from the beginning when he created first parents, Adam and Eve, and kept them in the beautiful garden that he made.

When you pray for your future partner, tell God the qualities that you want in that great person that he would give you. As I pointed out earlier, when I was praying, I had on my palms the kind of wife I needed and I prayed in that line. When my wife finally came after about 15 years, I saw that in all the qualities that I prayed for, none was lacking. In fact, God added other outstanding qualities that I never remembered to pray about, thus confirming that he wants and gives nothing but the best to his children.

Don’t reject him/her because of temporary physical qualities: At times, we may not find exactly all the qualities that we ask for in our future wives/husbands, but as long as you are convinced that he/her is the right person, please go ahead with the marriage. Some characters, especially the physical ones, begin to manifest later in life.

 When my wife was revealed to me, I had issue with her complexion and weight, even though she had a pretty face and stood tall above the ground. I felt she was thin and very dark, just like me. I needed light skinned lady who is also plump, believing that the combination would help me to have children with better physical appearance. Even when someone told me that she would eventually become fleshy when we start living together, I wasn’t convinced and wanted to chicken out.

Then, she was making guy, proving hard-to-get, unknown to her that I didn’t even consider her good enough. However, because of the conviction that I had in my dream which assured me that she was my wife, I had to remain. Interestingly, just within two months that we were together, my wife transformed exactly into that my dream wife, with chocolate skin colour, and fleshy body, as well as radiating great beauty.

Change location and attend functions: After residing continuously in a particular street and yard for up to three years or thereabout without any man noticing you to be good enough for marriage, one thing that should come to your mind is that you probably may have faded in the eyes of people there. Another is that, may be your husband is not in that vicinity or that it is not time for him to locate you.

You should then try relocating to another place where you will appear fresh, and no one knows your history that may work against you. Regrettably, many ladies would remain in a particular place even in the midst of past boy and men friends, until their fruitful years are over.

For many years of dreaming about the place of my wife, I never met her, until after I traveled from Lagos to Abia State where she was then based.

Apart from changing locations, attending functions such as weddings, good parties and get together, offer great opportunities to meet new people, thereby bringing you closer to your God ordained life partners. Try also to be flexible in adopting modern things to still look trendy, while making effort to dress fashionably.

You must not find him/her yourself: It is common to hear young ones these days say that they neither believe in match making nor betrothing. For those with this mentality, my advice is for them to quickly wake up from their slumber. Marriage by introduction otherwise called match making as well as that by betrothing , are still very potent and fruitful as they were in the times of our ancestors. Have you not observed that the rate of divorce appears to be even higher now that young people mostly select their spouses by themselves? It is believed that because the ladies or men being introduced to you may have lived long enough with the people that brought them to you; meaning they have fair knowledge about their behaviours. So, if there is sincerity, they there is no way they would introduce to you someone whose character is questionable.

Besides, the person may actually be the one that God preserved for you, that you have not been able to locate. So, instead of rejecting out-rightly, you will be on safe side by taking time to pray over it, and if you have been praying, it would be clearer.

I wish here to notify you that I was able to get the clear image of my wife in the dream after she was introduced to me. That year, I traveled home and just as I alighted from the vehicle, I saw a lady that I met last during primary school period. As she came to help carry my loads inside my father’s house in the village, she told me of one girl that she loved so much, and had wanted her to marry a good man like me. I smiled mockingly, when she introduced me as a good man. I could remember that when she said it, I wasn’t interested because I had another girl that I made up my mind to marry after many years of waiting. However, since God had a better plan for me, I didn’t even knew how I accepted all that she said, and with an address she gave me, I went to locate the girl in her school. Today, we are exceptionally happy husband and wife.

Wait for the Lord’s time: God is God, he is not man. He does his thing at his appointed time. A great deal of patience is required to avoid falling into the wrong hands in marriage. Unfortunately, the word patience is lacking in many people. They feel they are running out of time, so they just jump into whatever that is available, instead of praying a little harder and longer for the right person.

I was among those that were not patient to the end. When my wife told me to give her more time to think when I approached for the first time, I felt insulted granted that there were many women that were dying for me at that time. I simply forgot about her and deleted her phone number. When she eventually old me of her parent’s decision that she mustn’t marry outside her community, it made no meaning to me as I wasn’t interested any longer.

But, despite the fact that I wasn’t willing to marry her and even hated her, she continued to be my favourite in dream. Perhaps, because I had the grace of God over me, God used different means to separate me from unhealthy marital commitments that could have ruined my life. Friends, since, you might not be as fortunate as me, extra care is needed to be safe. So, wait for the lord. It is better to wait longer to find your real bone than rush and make the worst mistake of your life. Remember mistake in marriage, is easy ticket to hell fire.

Avoid the Deadly Mistakes

Pregnancy can’t to tie down a man: When a man is not interested in marrying you, nothing will change that, even if you give him a set of twin. So trying to catch him by having him impregnate you, will amount to a waste of time and the disgrace of your person. Sometimes, even if the guy wants to bring you home because of your condition, the pressure from relatives won’t allow him. Also, when God does not approve it, nothing both of you does can succeed. I know of a guy who at first never wanted a lady. With time, he was forced to change his mind out of pity for the girl who was developing hatred for him for not granting her request. A very tough decision for the guy indeed, he persuaded the lady to conceive as a ploy to force his family members to acceptance, and also be sure that the girl in her late 30s could still conceive.

They both agreed and soon had a son. However instead of the marriage to hold as planned, it was one issue to another. The guy has heard dirty secrets about the lady and was afraid that he was bringing fire upon himself. To confirm that his fears were right, the lady in question started seriously exhibiting some difficult traits. First, she refused the man access to any document pertaining to the baby. She not only seized the child’s baptismal card and his birth certificate, but ensured that he never even set his eyes on the documents, however hard he pleaded. That was as all expenses on the child were made by him.

In the process, the guy began to suffer severe financial losses whenever he made up his mind to visit the lady’s people for the marriage things.

It got a level that he became so afraid, and worried that he was making the greatest mistake of his life. That was when he realized that there was need to seek the face of God to confirm if the lady was actually the right person for him. Since they already had a child, his motive wasn’t to abandon her if the prayer turned out otherwise, but to ask God for mercy, if he finally settled with the wrong person. In the process of the prayer, he had countless opposing dreams, during which another lady was constantly brought to him as his real wife. The more he prayed for God to unite the two of them, the more he dreamt about another woman that he had not seen yet.

All the people that he shared the dreams with warned him not to continue with the marriage, concluding that a child should not be the reason for marriage. While he was bent on fulfilling his promise to marry, he was greatly concerned about the future consequences of putting up with the wrong wife, granted that the lady was already exhibiting traits he considered to portend danger.

He needed the lady to give him assurance that she won’t turn into a bad wife and make life a hell for him. So one evening after a long silence, he told her, “I don’t know how you will take this, but the fact is that I am terribly afraid about the kind of wife that you will turn out to become. Give me your word that you will not make life a hell for me, at least I will remind you with that whenever you start dealing with me?” But she bluntly refused to make any commitment and only said, “It is your behavior that will determine my actions. All I can say is that I am a woman of peace”.

He was not satisfied with her shabby reply and he concluded that he was actually in a journey of no return. He then decided to go ahead and marry her just to fulfill all righteousness, but to divorce her immediately. The next step he took was to meet his parish pastor for confession. On hearing his story, the pastor was easily convinced that the two would be a threat to themselves should they go ahead to wed, describing them as victims of circumstance. The man of God told him, “ I could see no love existing between the two of you based on the tune of your voice. For now, forget about the marriage. Confess your sins and ask God for forgiveness, and never go back to your sins. The thought of God is different from that of men. He has forgiven you”.

That was how the risky marriage ended.

Looking at the scenario, I feel they were just ignorant and above all the will of God prevailed. If they had prayed, kept themselves holy according to the commandments of God, and avoided unhealthy commitments, they would not have brought such shame upon themselves and their families.

Don’t allow him shoulder all your financial problems: We inherited a culture whereby man and woman relationship is like trade by barter with the woman expecting the man to shoulder all her financial problems while in returns she offer him sex. This is very unhealthy and wicked. As a woman, you little yourself by mortgaging so cheaply, yours sexuality which is your greatest asset , for the mundane reasons of wearing the trending fashion materials and accessories , expensive mobile phones, paying your rents , etc. Take it all leave, woman who demand so much from men are seen as being after material things as well as worthless. So, sometimes, even if your proposed guy has seen enough spiritual signs suggesting that you are the right woman for him, he may still dump you if a  more responsible lady shows up at that critical point when he must present  the would be wife to his family.

Don’t’ be quick to ask or collect his gifts and you will see how he would so value and respect you, so much as that he would have to think twice before opening his mouth to invite you over for sexual intercourse.

The point here is that, as a lady, you should know that being financially reliant is important so that you do not unnecessarily embarrass yourself by depending on a man to pay your bills.

When I say ladies being financially reliant, it includes even offering to pay for their meals when they visit the restaurant with males for a launch. In the office, they was a Muslim lady that was known for this. She would go to the office canteen for launch, and would pay for the two plates behind the guy’s back. Every one fell in love with her unlike other women that were pestering on different men to take them for launch. As a matter fact, the lady became the toast of many eligible bachelors. So, at a time when ladies were crying over scarcity of men to marry them, she actually had so many good men to choose from.

Sometimes gift is a sign that he is a husband material: Whereas as a lady, you are advised not to show to expect the man to shoulder all your financial responsibilities, the willingness or interest of the boy in seeing to your welfare, to a large extent sends signal of how good or bad the man would care for you when both of you finally live together as husband and wife. A man should not be told to act when his woman is parading unkempt hair, wearing worn out dresses and looking beggarly. If he doesn’t bother about how you are and just happy to flaunt you in that horrible way you look and passionate about sexing you, then it is hard for him to be a responsible man in terms of caring for you.

If you meet that kind of man, gently begin to withdraw from that relationship, unless you love him so much, and you are convinced he has many other great qualities to make up for his deficiency. In this case, you should find a way to draw his attention to those areas he needs change.

This also applies to men, if your would-be wife, earns enough or about the same as you, yet she is depending on you, watch that parasitic lady; she is likely to make a bad wife to you. I once handled a case as this. The boy and girl after agreeing to marry, went ahead to have a child out of wedlock. Throughout the period the lady was pregnant and some months after, they lived together as husband and wife. One of the reasons the guy gave for not going to visit her parents to begin the marriage rites was that “she was very stingy”. It happened that the lady lost her job even before they agreed to marry, but she had about Five hundred thousand naira in fixed deposit account and over fifty thousand naira in her savings account. Unfortunately the man has virtually no savings, because she was the one paying the bills for the period they were together and his salary wasn’t big enough. It happened that no matter how hard that the man complained, she would not take anything out of her bank accounts, claiming that she was not working.

One day, the man traveled to the east from Lagos dropping only the money for feeding. Just as he landed, the lady called that she forgot to inform him that baby was to be taken for a checkup in hospital and she needed about One thousand five hundred naira to foot the bills. It happened that where the man traveled to, there were no banks and for him to find any, he would have to pay about two thousand naira in transportation. That to him was like a waste of scarce resource. So he called her on phone, pleading that she deducted exactly that amount required from her savings account, which he would refund as soon as he was back. She didn’t buy the idea, claiming that her ATM card had expired, and that she could not queue to withdraw at the counter. That means, no matter how much he would spend or how far he would travel to send the One thousand five hundred naira, she should do it. The guy apparently trying to give her a cheap test, refused to pay in that money. He returned to Lagos and saw that the lady didn’t take the child to the hospital. Instead, she went to her diary and boldly documented, “baby was to be taken to the hospital but did not because husband to be refused to send money”. The sight of that negative inscription completely destabilized him and he wondered how a lady that was begging for marriage could be that heartless. “If she can behave like this now that she is on the begging side, how much more when she becomes the woman of the house?”, she asked himself.  He could answer that question all alone as he consulted some elders in the marriage industry. More than ten people that he asked said, the lady was nothing but a “bad market”. I too concur. That was how the man gave her the last red card. So, many women are like that; very stingy and stupidly cunny. You can’t behave that way and expect a man.

Keep your virginity; that is your pride as a woman: Keep your virginity; that is your pride as a woman: That a man agrees to pay such large sum of money in bride price and other marriage requirements, when you have lost your virginity, which is your pride as a woman, doesn’t mean you have completely won. It only signified how loose and careless you were as a youth that culminated in wasting what could be your biggest asset as God made it. Bear in mind that if your spouse had an alternative, he would probably dump you for her, and if you still had your pride intact, he would definitely love and appreciate you better.

On many occasions, I have men coming back to appreciate their parents’ in-law after they discovered that their daughters who they married were still virgins. What a great honour! Wouldn’t you be happy to be so recognized and honoured?

Ironically, most women, in defending their sexual escapades, shamelessly say that there are no virgins. Who told you that? Know that there are many decent girls out there making effort to preserve themselves for their husbands and be respected. Apart from respect, keeping your virginity would save you the head ache of contacting diseases, prevent abortion that could either lead to your death or damage of your reproductive organs and disgrace you with teenage pregnancy  that not only cost you your education but also cut short your ambition to attain great height.

Now the question is, are you still complete as a woman? Have you eaten that forbidden fruit that has taken away your crown?

If you have fallen victim of this, your first step of recovery is accepting your fault, next ask God for forgives and promise sincerely never to go back to that sinful act which not only greatly offends God bust also is a sin against your own body.

Again moving forward, don’t hit yourself so hard thinking over your virginity. It has gone and will never come back. But with abstinence, your tightness may return to some extent.

The best you will do now is to resolve to protect your daughters when they start coming. Train them well to realize the importance of being decent and the dignity and honour that await them if they succeed in keeping their virginity.

Don’t date him for so long: Although it is encouraging that intending couples should date themselves as long as they keep their closeness clean, prolonging the duration of the date is often times counterproductive.

I have lived to see relationships which started beautifully with glamour, taste and reference point crashing suddenly like a pack of cards. In most of the failed relationships, I discovered that outside interferences played a great role. For instance, people known or unknown who do not like your progress may start rooting for your downfall including sowing the see of hatred in your relationships. They may start from murdering your image to your intending spouse, his or her family members and even friends, neighbours and acquaintances.

Also, within the period of long dating or courtship many have nicknamed it, your spouse who may actually not be firm in his decision among other inadequacies and external pressures, may start seeing other people who could take over your place. In addition, after dating for so long, especially in the case of open relationship, members of the public who see you both together already formed opinion in their minds that you both are couples. So that alone dims your chance of finding favour in the sights of other eligible bachelors and spinsters, as the case may be. As a matter of fact, where I come from, once a particular is seen constantly with a particular man for over a year, other men run away, and if she is seen with over two different men especially from the same locality, she is considered a prostitute.

All these points itemized, are some of the reasons long dating is often frowned at.

He mustn’t be rich in the beginning: So many ladies these days find pleasure in running after already-made men for husbands. They want men with good and trending cars, mighty houses and fat bank accounts. This mentality is wrong. It robs one the opportunity of marrying his or her God ordained spouse. The implication of this type of parasitic love affair can be grave, aside just marrying the wrong person. Think of it, most of the ladies that are in love with money end up marrying elderly men, some old enough to be their fathers. What this means is that , the excitement, team play, tender love affair that is expected from new couples are obviously lacking because the huge gap in age creates hiatus in relationship. First, the men are almost not trendy again for a young lady, his sexual performance drastically reduced and even thinking out of fashion for young ladies. I have met so many ladies who ended up with older rich men complaining with much bitterness how they were not enjoying their marriage. Most of them regret that their men treat them with no respect, not giving them opportunity to make inputs to family decisions, because they see them as immature both in age and thought. Although some may actually be destined to end up with older men, but don’t allow yourself to make that decision; let the approval come from the holy spirit through revelations including in dreams.

Now this advice is not only for females, but also males, as many men these days go after women that are comfortable. It is become a common thing that men should marry working class women whether office workers, or self-employed through business or handwork. In making that decision, you should know well that for a lady to have attained some measure of financial freedom, age may not be on her side again. And when a lady is advanced in age, she is prone to myriads of maternal challenges including greater risks of caesarean section during delivery, ectopic pregnancies and cessation of menstruation. Above all, it is natural that when women are made breadwinners in the family, their wealth gets into the heads of most of them and they become bossy even to their husbands.

Nonetheless, these negative attributes are not found in all older women, as I have seen very many of them, having smooth pregnancies and deliveries even when they are above fifty. As a matter of fact, many wealthy women have demonstrated that their humility to their husbands as God ordained it is not negotiable.

In all of these, my take is, follow the natural processes and in doing that let God be in the center of it all. With God, you will surely avoid that avoidable deadly mistake in marriage.

ACHIEVING GREATNESS THROUGH DREAM REVELATIONS

THE TURNING POINT 

Although I have dreamt all my life, it was not until September 2016 that I resolved to give better attention to my dreams and use the lessons of every one of them to guide any step I take, including planning and execution. That is what I consider, “the greatest turning point in my life”.

That was perhaps the worse period of my life. I lost my son during labour on the 14^th of that Month. It was the worst experience in my life. I cried and wailed openly, thinking my world was over. That child meant the whole world to me. He was conceived on our wedding night which was also the major encounter I would have with my wife. We had planned to celebrate big and to have him (Akachukwu was the name I gave him while in the womb) as reference to the age of our marriage. As a mark of honour for my “Isaac” I took two Months off work to nurse him to delivery and even canceled my oversea trip (I won a fellowship as the only from West Africa to travel to Hawaii, Honolulu, in the US) because it fell on the period of his birth. All that sacrifice and honour for a son abruptly came to a naught, when baby Akachi came out in state of comma, unable to open his eyes to see his parents and dozens of relatives who keenly awaited his arrival as the triumphant entry of a great king. Sad enough, the doctor and all other medical officers on duty claimed it was a strange situation, as there was no tangible reason they could lay their hands as potent enough to snap life out of the baby.

My son was such a “handsome creature” to behold-hefty of about 5kg weight, stout, ebony hairy skin and well-built face with a pointed nose. I couldn’t imagine losing such a precious gift, and I asked God, why. I cried like never before and the ceaseless thinking diminished my skinny flesh, reducing me to a “walking-skeleton”.

However, after some days and weeks have passed, I tried to draw strength from floods of advice from sympathizers, to pick the pieces of my bones together and move on. The summary of all the consolations from people was that, “baby Akachi had paid the noble price with his life to save his siblings coming after him”. I held that so tightly and assured myself “never again”. But it turned out that I was day dreaming as the greater plague was waiting for me and my innocent wife. That was revealed in what I call, “the turning point revelation dream”.

 THE TURNING POINT REVELATION DREAM

In that dream, I found myself in what appeared like an ancient village. Located in the middle of a forest, the village had very few obsolete mud houses with thatch roofs. The houses were separated by grasses. At the centre of the village, was a very tall palm tree and a mighty snake twisted itself around the plant but stretching its head to look over the village. Suddenly few villagers surrounded the palm tree in worship to the snake. I stood nearby crying profusely. Then a man who appears to the spokesperson of the deity came to me and telling me, “Have you not cried so much? See, since the child died, you have not stopped crying. There is no need for you to cry because it is based on agreement which your wife is aware of. The agreement is that, in alternating manner, your children would be sacrificed to god. For instance, while the first child belongs to you, the second comes to the deity, the third yours, fourth to the deity, and so forth. You see you are crying in vain”.

Those things he said made me uneasy. So I turned to my wife to know if what the man said was true. My wife nodded that the man was right. The man then left me. I cried even louder, asking my wife why she failed to reveal any of those things to me even before our marriage. I was still crying, and then I woke.

Panicking and panting like one pursued by a lion, I also woke my wife to tell her the latest dream. She was too so terrified. Then I told her, “no! Never again would I bury my child. We are going to devout all to worship God since we can’t be going to native doctors”. That same day in the evening, we went to Saint Mathew’s Catholic Parish, Amukoko to attend programme by the Catholic Charismatic Renewable group in the parish. We planned to at least meet a brother or sister to tell our problems. We were however disappointed when they told us we had to wait till Saturday during their programme known as “Faith Clinic” in the morning.

But on the D-day, before 7 am, we were already at the program venue. It was a power packed programme for mostly people in trouble. It was a day to remember. The preacher brother Linus spoke with so great a power and I told my wife, “Here lays our solution”. After the programme, my wife and I accosted the man of God to share our worries and for his counsel. When I had narrated our plight and the dreams to him, he was marveled and said, “This is more than ordinary dream. It’s a revelation that God gave you because he loves you and want to save your family from the attacks of enemies and ancestral curse”.

The brother paused to meditate and after which told us that he needed to pray over it because he was seeing a strong negative powers attacking us. I looked at my wife. Her face looked much depressed. But to me, it was a good day. At least the journey for my total freedom had begun. We left the church, while expecting a call from bro Linus and the next step for us.

Within the next week, he eventually called me. He said, “I am directing you to another brother called Cajetan in Saint Kizito Catholic Parish, Alaba. He is strong man in the Lord and can handle a case as big as yours”. We agreed to go to the parish with my wife on Thursday when the Charismatic group there usually holds its version of “faith clinic”.

On Thursday, we went as agreed and it was a superlative experience. Brother Cajetan that day preached the gospel as I have never heard. He preached as if in a trance, telling the story of my life as if I have held a press conference with him to inform him all about me. “Some parents are very careless. …………

Hearing all those words, I began the weeping again. I realized I had been spiritually careless not to have taken the right actions to save my son and marriage. For instance, i recalled that as soon as my wife took in, I dreamt where a crowd of people from a certain community (not mentioned for a reason) came to my community, saying the ball they were playing with went into my house and they had come to collect it. I had also dreamt of seeing my son in the middle of an expressway with fast moving cars. He was crying on top of his voice and shouting daddy! Again, I dreamt making fruitless efforts to rescue my son from a pit he was thrown into. On the other side of the pit where my son was, I saw people who were long dead. A few weeks to his death, I saw men in my village digging grave near my house. They started with a standard grave and latter resized it for a new baby and there I saw the man I had planned to name the baby after crying bitterly.  So say the least, God in dreams gave me countless revelations about attacks on my marriage and child, which I dismissed with some shallow prayers. After all people usually say, “once you wake from a terrible dream, pray to cancel it”. I did exactly those cancelling after every dream. But i was so disconnected from the realm of the spirit that I didn’t know that some cases require serious prayers and spiritual warfare that are better handled by people with greater grace in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Those costly mistakes, brother Cajetan underlined in his sermon which touched me to the bone marrow. In all of that, I was grateful to God that I was able to recognize the great spiritual gift that the Almighty God has given me to guide my steps and help me in planning as I sojourn in this wicked world.

Since that encounter, I have closely monitored my dreams to great advantage. There is nothing that happens in my life that I do not know about, because I would have received the revelation in dream. All the traveling including those outside the country, failed contracts, opportunities and events I have embarked upon in recent times were foretold and I prepared for accordingly based on dream revelation.

 You too can discover your dream gift, but to do that, you certainly must do a lot of things differently.

*Continues