Every year on July 8, Canada-based gospel artiste Jennifer Mugisha celebrates her birthday thanking God for blessing her with a new year.
The 30-year-old singer was born in Kigali and currently lives in Montreal, Canada where she is a worship leader at Impact Centre Chretien.
In 2003, Mugisha moved to Tanzania where she did her high school studies and later moved to Ottawa in 2008 to pursue her College studies at Algonquin College from where she got a Diploma in Business administration – Human resources and Bachelor of Commerce.
As she celebrates reaching her 30s, Mugisha released a new video song titled, “Birthday Purpose.”
In an interview with the Gospel Time Rwanda, the artiste explained the story behind the song.
It was during a prayer time last year when Mugisha picked up her guitar and started playing some chords and the lyrics started flowing. Later, she arranged a verse, chorus and recorded a mini-video which she posted on her social media platforms.
“At the beginning of this year 2021 as I was praying to God for the next steps, “Birthday Purpose” came back to my memory. The Holy Spirit reminded me that I was turning 30 this year which is a new decade. Therefore, it would be a good way to set the pace for the coming year,” Mugisha revealed.
“The “Birthday Purpose” means the reason why God formed me and placed me here on the Earth,” the artiste explained, adding:
“I believe God has a good plan for me (Jeremiah 29:11) which includes doing good works that He created me to accomplish as I walk with Him. (Ephesians 2:10).”
For Mugisha, birthday celebration is an opportunity to celebrate thanking God for a new year, celebrating life, looking forward to seeing what else God has in store for her to fulfill. However, she believes that for others, it can unfortunately be a depressive time because they are not where they have expected to be in life.
“We live in a society where at my age, every person wishes to have attained a particular status. But, what place do we give that status, and knowing that we are still in God’s perfect plan if that status is not up to par,” she wonders.
Mugisha meant that what matters most is not about what we possess or achieved. We should be happy with our development but also examine if we are where God wants us to be.
She added that in today’s societies there is pressure based on the world standards that at a certain age, one should have a car, house, a family of his/her own, finish school, a good job among others.
“Some people end up committing suicide because they fail to meet the worldly standards. These standards also push some people to measure their success by comparing themselves to others. This is wrong because God has a plan for each of us (Jeremiah 1:5) that we can walk into once we receive Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior,” Mugisha pointed out.
She reminded believers that though they are in the world, they are not of the world,
“God gave us dominion over the earth and wants to bless us, but if we do not have certain things this does not mean that we failed in life.”
“We, believers, should remember that success to God means doing His Will by seeking first his kingdom and the rest will be added unto us as recorded in (Matthew 6:33).”
According to Mugisha, every birthday should be a celebration time, but also a time to reflect on why we were born, discover the call from God, and where He wants us to spend our time on Earth.
