I woke up thinking about the Kianjokoma brothers. Do you remember them, the two university brothers that were brutally murdered by the police?
Let me refresh your memory just a bit. Emmanuel Ndwiga and Benson Ndwiga, aged 19 and 22, were arrested by the police and clobbered to death. The police tried to cover it, and it caused great uproars in the entire nation. Everyone wanted the six police that were responsible for being taken to books.
I thought about the mother…
How is she right now?
How is she coping?
I thought about how life happens sometimes, and you feel helpless at the events that happen to you.
Life is a gift, not a right
The other Sunday, there was a ghastly accident at the Eastern Bypass. The accident claimed the life of eight people. Two of these people were a mother and her son.
The accident involved a Prado, Matatu, and a Tuktuk. The Prado guy was drunk and overspeeding. He missed his lane and hit the parked tuk-tuk, and the tuk-tuk hit the matatu. Only one person, the daughter of the mother that died with her son, lived. She is currently in the hospital and requires multiple surgeries.
I do not know how the daughter is right now. I am unsure if she can attend her family’s funeral. I do not know how she will be afterward, like generally.
The trio was attending church—the fellowship at Jesus Winners’ Ministries. Due to the large masses that attend the church, they usually go to church at around six o’clock to save a seat for themselves.
The young boy that passed was eleven years. On Wednesday, he had borrowed their neighbor a frying pan as their CBC curriculum dictated that they be taught how to cook chapatis. The teacher had postponed that activity to Monday, and the boy did not live to see Monday.
On that particular Sunday, my mom had purposed to attend church early, maybe by 30 minutes or so. She adjusted her alarm properly. She woke up earlier than usual but was thirty minutes late despite the effort.
She could not forgive herself for the lateness. She wished she could have just woken up as usual other than waking up earlier and end being even later. My mother missed that accident by ten minutes, she would have been in that particular tuk-tuk.
The Prado driver was unscathed. He staggered out of the wrecks of his car without even a scar. I am not sure if he will ever remember the accident in detail.
I know he will always carry it in his heart that he caused the death of eight people and the incapacitation of one very promising young woman.
I don’t know if he will ever forgive himself. I don’t know what he is thinking.
I wish I knew what the people around him were telling him. Does he think he is still worthy of life?
I don’t know. I wish I knew.
Then comes the doctor’s report
My friend shared with me about her friend. The doctors told her that she had a cyst in her uterine walls and they needed to perform surgery on her. The surgery means that her womb will be affected; the doctors must take it all out.
The advice that the doctors gave her was that she needed to get a baby ASAP.
I know what you are saying. Based on the initial stories’ severity, you think this is a non-issue; and it can be. But it is not.
The lady is born again. She serves in church, and she subscribes to chastity 100%
In addition, the lady does not even have a boyfriend. She has a choice to make. And time is of the essence.
I was thinking of this last story.
We fail at life’s tests at times
In as much as in a Christian debate, I would say that I won’t compromise, I am not sure I wouldn’t compromise when it comes to it.
I am not so sure that I won’t dupe someone’s son. Sorry to say; I have a plan in my head, and it does not include not having a baby. You might call me an immature Christian or someone in the faith for convenience; I would not argue with you about that.
In my defense, we do not mature in a day; it is a process. I get to understand that Abraham had some decades of learning these things. He delayed obeying God. Sometimes he even outrightly disobeyed Him.
I hear that the duration between God telling him about making him a father of many nations and him accepting his wife’s offer of sleeping with Haggar was, at most, ten minutes. I don’t know about that am just saying what I hear.
Let’s go back to the last lady again. My heart goes out to her. I imagine her explaining to her spiritual leader that she needed to be pregnant because if she did not, she would miss her opportunity to have a baby.
If you are not in Africa, you might think of the option of adapting; but adoption has not been highly adopted in these parts of the world. Africans pride themselves on bearing their children. Most people are not open to that idea yet.
To be precise, I am also thinking of the church, her local church. Will they take her in after this?
If she is a leader, I know they will rip it off of her immediately.
But will they understand her?
Does she have to move to another church to save face?
Will she forgive herself even, if she goes with the option of getting a child?
Life takes a detour occasionally.
I read a book that said, “Live like today was your last day, but only on Sundays, then get back to reality and put your life together.”
I laughed at this statement because it made sense. YOLO is a scam; you cannot live like there is no tomorrow because tomorrow is there; if you live to see it. You have to plan your life even if, most times, life comes and gives you a detour of some sort.
Think of Job, just chilling and minding his business and God decides to flaunt him to the devil:
“Have you considered Job, My servant?”
…
The devil is granted the authority to “consider him.”
God outrightly parades Job to the devil.
What of Naomi?
The woman loses her husband and two sons in a foreign land.
Hosea is told to marry a harlot. Cross that. Prophet Hosea is told to marry a harlot; an oxymoron
He is not only told to marry that harlot but to take her back when she returns to her business during the ‘high season’. You would think that this is the climax of this story. It is not; he is told to pay her dowry.
What am I saying in all this?
That life can be chaos at times; it can be a beautiful mess
I am saying that life is happening to all of us differently at different paces.
If you are not fighting some battle of some sort as we speak, chances are you are from winning one or losing. We cannot ignore that it happens too.
If you are not in depression, you must know someone who is fighting it daily. If you are not sick, you know someone. If you’re not mourning a loss, you most definitely know someone.
I do not know what my friend’s friend will decide moving forward. I don’t know what you would choose if you found yourself in such a situation. I know I would support her choice and commend her strength because every choice requires it.
God Acquainted you for life
I am listening to a recording of a song I wrote. The title of the song is “Zaburi 144.”
It is an inspiration from Psalms 144, my favorite psalm:
“Blessed be the Lord, my rock
Who trains my hands for war,
And my fingers for battle_.”
I am a believer in the fact that God equips us for things that come at us or to us. I am a firm believer that he tests us according to our capacity. He does not test you to embarrass you.
If we were to choose the tests that come at us, I know that no one would choose to lose her two sons in the hands of police or die because of a drunk driver’s recklessness. No one would choose to be tested between her faith and her biological clock. But it happens anyway.
No child wants to come out of the womb. They are pushed out and cry out immediately they are out.
No one wants to be fired at the height of their career.
One thing I know is this; when we look back after some time, it makes sense, maybe even in parts sometimes.
It makes sense in its way, and sometimes we cannot even explain how it finally makes sense to other people, but it does.
Where do we go from here ?
Now that we are in the detour. Now that you have a dismissal letter, have just had a miscarriage, or have a missing mark, that will make you not graduate this year.
Now that your heart is broken and you do not know whether you will ever love again or even allow yourself to get in so deep. What do we do now?
Eat first. I know this looks like I am joking, but I mean it; please eat. Try because tomorrow is coming and you need that body to function.
Remind yourself that this, too, will pass. Your loss will pass, the pain in your heart will pass, and you will get another job or start a business. You actually will graduate, maybe just not this year. But just as there is day and night, this too will pass.
Journal. I know it might not make sense; why would someone want to write their bad days? Journaling brings clarity.
Allow yourself to feel. Do not invalidate what you are feeling. Cry, scream, take some time out.
Live one day at a time. If you feel that the more you think about the future, the more unbearable it becomes, stop. Live one day at a time until you can see the end without pain.
“Why do bad things happen to good people?” someone asked Pastor John Carson.
“The question should be, Why do good things happen to any of us?” he responded
This pastor’s statement might look arrogant onset, until you hear his own life’s detours_ he lost his wife and daughter at different seasons but in the same spot. The wife left him with an infant.
In the song I am writing, the bridge goes like this.
“Moto Hunichomi (Fire, you won’t consume me)
Giza huniwezi (Darkness, you won’t engulf me)
Kifo umeshindwa (Death, you are defeated)
Nimefunzwa vita (I have been taught how to fight)
You have been taught how to fight. You are not a victim. You have been taught how to fight. Grief won’t consume you, and neither will bitterness. You will forgive those that need to be forgiven, even if it’s not now.
But this story ends with you winning because the One that flaunted you to the tester is banking on that.
Heaven is backing you.
God is counting on you to win.
So win.
With Love,
Cheers.
Nice work sifaa