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The
first time I gave my life to Christ was when I was seven, at our local church,
because our Parish Pastor had held a combined service and told us about the
miracle of accepting Jesus. Of course, pious Christianity would mean that I had
done it countless times before then, without my own proper understanding even.
But perhaps this instance is most peculiar because it was only when I understood the essence and vowed to make a decision.
Our
Pastor said that one day he had decided to accept Jesus and his life turned
around forever; that one day he made this great choice and sin became a thing
of the past.
He said, “God’s grace will lead us away from sin” and that once we
prayed that prayer, sin would stop being attractive. He said it would be like a
movie one had seen repeatedly and lost interest in.
And so, I gave my life, I
gave my life to Jesus. I said I would never sin again.
Read: Is Jesus Really God ?
Read: Is Jesus Really God ?
However,
the next day at school, I sinned. I called my classmate an “Idiot” for a reason
I do not exactly remember and I said also that “He was a fool”.
I hated myself. I imagined God to have folded his arms, pouted his lips, and looked at me
disappointed. I imagined Jesus to have been saying “So soon, Caleb, was it not
just yesterday you gave your life?”
Several
years down and the cycle remained the same. It was the “I run away from Jesus
when I sin” cycle, the “I run to more sin when I sin” cycle, it was duplicity, a
deceit of the devil and frankly shams are shams because you do not know
initially.
However,
initially is long gone and this is what I know.
I
know of Grace, it is the hand that lifts me when I fall, the pillow that drowns
my snuffles of inadequacy; it is tender and affectionate, kind hearted and
warm. It is “It is well with my soul” and Nathaniel Bassey on repeat, it is
finding oneself in the lyrics of Jesus Culture and catching yourself smiling
because you cannot explain this love
I
know that because of this Grace, you do not sit and count with your fingers
every little sin, that you are very concerned about my wellbeing, I know you
are concerned about what perfume I wear every morning and what shirt looks good
on me. Because of Grace, you are my best friend, my favourite person.
I
know of your love, it is singing stridently in my bedroom and feeling it in my
bones
Jesus is all the world to me
My life, my joy, my all
In him, I find the strength to live
Without him I would fall
I
know that life will get in the way sometimes, it would snuff out evidences of
this love, sneer at me and say “It cannot be real, how can someone love you
like this, common you? You know what you have done”.
I
will forget sometimes, Dear Lord that I am nothing without you, my thoughts
would be brusque, not curt like those kings college children in stainless white
on white, but offensive. My thoughts will belittle what you have done for me,
tell me that I could have done it on my own.
Sometimes,
it would be career getting in the way, this enthusiasm to write would become
prerequisites that I would believe too that I could do it without you.
But
forgive me lord, I do not mean it, I do not mean any of it.
I
know of love that hung on a tree, abnormally so. Because the world finds love
in red, roses sitting curtly beside each
other on glass tables, and pink cards that read –I love you. The world finds
love in trivialities, but Lord, I am glad to have found it in you.
Your
love is infinite and inexhaustible, like my favourite Adichie Novel, I see
newer dimensions every time I read you. It is vast and rich, healthy, like the
faces of smiling children in peak milk commercials; your love is never ending.
Forgive
me for my gloomy days, for my ungrateful days, for the days when I do not tell
a soul of how amazing you are, forgive me. I am the unappreciative child who
after receiving a matchless gift from his Father still refuses to run errands,
I am unthankful.
And
I am not only unthankful, I am faults and wrongdoings, failure and flaws.
But,
Dear Lord, this is what I know, I know that you love me wholeheartedly, and
that frankly is all I need to know.
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Caleb Somtochukwu Okereke is a writer and literary blogger. His works have appeared in Sun and Vanguard Newspapers, Kalahari Review, New Black Magazine, Hamilton Stone review. He is a weekly contributor for Ynaija whose first Novel, is set to be published by Bahati Books UK in 2016.
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