Two months ago, we were at the worship service for the dedication of my first daughter’s babies. It looked too true to be true. Three years ago, we were at the same church for the same purpose for the first set of their twins. Babies? Yes, babies galore! And that was a lady, four years ago a relation of mine mocked for not having children, seven years after wedding. The ridicule was not in secret. My wife and I heard the woman. And so did my daughter, her husband, two of my other children and other family members.
That ridicule was even uncalled for as we were not quarrelling. Our discussion, as family members, was why she did not allow her daughter to pay the Power Holding Company’s bill we told her to pay. Though she was enjoying the light, we had never demanded any contribution from her. We did not respond to her ridicule, being God’s children. We rather changed our prayer pattern. Our prayer was not and will never be that the enemy should die. The enemy should rather live to see how God will turn any ugly situation confronting us to our blessing. We were still on our warfare prayers, when the news came that our daughter was pregnant. It was followed on the heels that it was a set of twins, a boy and a girl. At the fullness of time, the babies were born. Two years later, another set of twins, two boys, arrived. What a mighty God we serve, the God of the miraculous!
God has taught me a lesson on Roman 8:28 – ‘All things work together for good to them that love God’. It was difficult for me to accept it during my first apparent ‘disappointment’ as a child of God. After my promotion to management position in my company in those days, I was told to move into a duplex building. I told God that I would like to live in a place I would be able to tie wrapper and visit Elder Austin and Dr. Bode Ogunleye, my Christian brothers. Not long after, we found a duplex, newly built, almost opposite their houses. The agents agreed to rent it to me. In front of the building was written, ‘Only God’. I claimed the house and applied to my company for the rent.
I informed my parents-in-law at Enugu that we would soon pack-in to a new house. My mother-in-law was sent by daddy to help us in packing to the house. For no reason, our MD delayed in approving my application for the house rent. When he did, I raced to the agents, only to be told that it had been rented out. My dreams crashed. My joy was swallowed up. I came back home sorrowful and to comfort me, my mother-in-law quoted Romans 8:28 – ‘All things work for good for them that love God’. It made me angry. Which house would suit me more than that one? Any other house would, for sure, keep me far away from Elder Austin and Dr. Ogunleye. During the weekend, my wife suggested that we looked around for another house. We went to a nearby close and found a well-built house, of four bedroom flat on each of the two floors, owned by a former Vice Chancellor, University of Lagos. It had servants’ quarter of three rooms. I paid for it. It turned out to be the place our church was nurtured.
My company had a policy in which, staff members were given a lump of money to buy any property they fancied. One day, I saw a three-bedroom-terraced flat in FESTAC Town. I was so excited that I saw my family living there. My company, ‘unfortunately’, turned down my application. That was sad news for the family and me. A few years later, someone directed me to a duplex of two wings, which a Christian family wanted to sell. The amount was within the range of my entitlement. We appreciated the Lord for it. ‘All things, worketh out for good for those, who love God’. And so did it work for us, who love Him.
I was dismissed from the primary school for possessing a talisman catalogue. Igwe, my friend and classmate, was a fellow victim. As young as we were, we planned suicide. We were to jump on the railway line, when a train was passing. In the bush where we were crying, the sound of a passing train was literarily lifting up the earth and it forced us to rescind our evil decision and then settled with our fate. We only knew the Church but had no personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Today, both of us are born-again. At the hindsight, I see my dismissal from school as a great blessing. That seeming misfortune, was really a blessing in disguise. My academic life would have ended in primary school if I did not pass through that experience. How could that misfortune be a blessing, when I did not know God? This is why God is God.
It is true that God will visit His children at the end of the day, no matter the pains. The challenge is what we do or do not do before the divine visitation. Do we behave like unbelievers because of the hurt? Do we make wrong confessions like them? Do we say like Uncle Job, ‘I know my Redeemer liveth’? The Bible tells us that the people, who know their God, shall be strong [even in the face of uncertainty] and that we shall do exploits. Let us settle at this. This is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith.
Some people believe God’s Word after manifestation. Nobody, including unbelievers, doubts what he or she has seen. Faith is believing it before it comes to pass. This explains why no situation perturbs such people. A child of God, therefore, does not give up, even at the face of hopeless situations. Aunty Mary had bought a costly ointment to anoint the corpse of the Lord Jesus, the third day of His burial. It was a great disappointment, when she arrived at the tomb and found it empty. She did not quit. She went ahead to alert her brethren, Uncles Peter and John. The story changed that morning. She met the Living Lord. Imagine what would have been her satisfaction had she seen the corpse of the Lord and anointed it! Imagine her disappointment when she found an empty tomb, without seeing the dead body! All things work out for good to them that love the Lord!
God does not support evil from us, His children, yet, if we are involved in sin and repent from it, He still turns everything around to our own good. He punished David for committing adultery and for the murder of Uriah, whose wife, he also inherited. His Son, the Lord Jesus, came out from that womb! Rahab was a prostitute, yet, she was the grandparent of Jesus. A Christian should not be involved in sin with the hope that his evil deed will turn to his good.
For further comment, Please contact: Osondu Anyalechi:0802 3002-471;[email protected]