HUMANITY BEFORE PROFESSIONALISM

Push! Push!! 

Try harder! Try harder!! 

Work! Work!! 

It’s an appraisal issue 

Your promotion is tied to it 

You can’t afford a slip up 

Put in everything you’ve got 

Don’t relent…push harder!

The benefit is worthwhile 

But at the end of the day… 

I realized many have been hurt 

My quest to get higher 

My drive for the next level 

All hurts my relationship badly 

Those who should be close are enstranged

My inner core is lost!

Give more! Give more!!

The center no longer holds 

Everything is falling apart 

At what expense? 

My  family  

My relationships 

My health 

My mental well-being!

Pain! Pain!! 

Would I pretend not to care? 

Success is not about money or power 

It is wellness - mental, physical and spiritual 

I need to be free again! 

To love those who need it most 

To be there when needed most 

Please, help!!! 

©Esther Emmanuel-Obu

November 6, 2021

IN THE CLOSET

Feeling overwhelmed, I fought back the tears. My emotions running wild...I really don't know how I will get out of this rut. Except God helps me, I really don't know how I am going to survive yet another season.

“I feel bad,” I said to God.

“Do You think I have no faith because I can’t stop crying when I’m praying? I have done all I knew to do.”

I wondered if God understand how pressured and pained I am. The rollercoaster of events in the last couple of years have been extremely demanding, and my heart is bleeding and in pain. When exactly will this rat race end? Didn't His word say that "the path of the just is as a shinning light, that shines brighter each day..."?

“I don’t really know what You think, o God. This pain is unbearable! How long more do You think I can go?” I said, the pain of the pressure reeling in my body. I could feel it like it were a physical pain.

“Can You really handle this emotion of mine? Time is running out, o Father!"

I continued, "It’s not like I really do not know that You know how I feel, but it seems like I have been abandoned. I feel You are giving the unbelievers a reason to mock my faith in You.”

I prayed and shed tears in my Prayer Room as I pleaded with God to step in and calm the storm raging within. If there is a time I needed Him to rise up, now is the time. It has to be urgent, permanent and desperately so.

Scripture contains many examples of people wrestling with God while struggling. The writer of Psalm 42 expresses a deep longing to experience the peace of God’s constant and powerful presence. He acknowledges his tears and his depression over the grief he’s endured. His inner turmoil ebbs and flows with confident praises, as he reminds himself of God’s faithfulness. Encouraging his “soul,” the psalmist writes, “Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Saviour and my God” (v. 11). He’s tugged back and forth between what he knows to be true about God and the undeniable reality of his overwhelming emotions.

God designed us in His image and with emotions. Our tears for others (and even for ourselves) reveal deep love and compassion, not necessarily a lack of faith. We can approach God with raw wounds or old scars because He knows how we feel. Nothing wrong about being absolutely vulnerable before Him. Each prayer, whether silent, sobbed, or shouted with confidence, demonstrates our trust in His promise to hear and care for us.

In His ever-reaching love He called out to us, in the darkness and solitariness of our soul He is saying, “it is well with you my child, I love you and I understand how you feel.”

 

“Happy is he who has the God of Jacob for his help, Whose hope is in the LORD  his God.”_(Ps.146:5)

OUTSIDE THE CAMP

Years back, the relatively long ride from Lagos to my school was usually filled with its thrills, frills, adventure and mixed feelings. For me, and depending on which direction the journey faced, it was usually of excitement or low energy. I had to master my routes with a game I made up for myself - “What’s The Next Landmark?” - and it was my own way of occupying myself throughout the journey. 

We usually came to a boundary town between Ondo State and Edo State where there was a colony of people with Hansen’s disease (leprosy). That particular location had two impressions on me, every single time. The first was that it told me how close or far I was to my destination. If I was going, then it showed I was close to school; but if I was coming home, it told me I still had a long way to go. 

But another strong(er) and unforgettable impression it made on me is the state of those people who pitched makeshift tents along the road begging for hand downs. Society has ostracized them for fear of infecting others like in the Bible days. They have been left ‘out of the camp’ to fend for themselves and live on the crumbs that people throw at them. They are encumbered with shame and sought survival whichever way possible. Their medical condition is irreversible and they will have to live with that condition for the rest of their lives. (Thankfully though, with multi drug therapy today, leprosy is curable!).

The book of Hebrews 13, verse 13 tells us something worth pondering, it says, "Let us go forth therefore unto him without the camp, bearing his reproach.” Does that tell you something? We are admonished to go meet Jesus, our Saviour, without the camp, bearing His reproach (or shame). In other words, the real encounters of our faith are without the camp where we would find all manner of people - the rejected, poor, forsaken, lonely, suicidal, depressed, sick, tired, rebellious, abandoned, shamed, hungry, frustrated and ostracized. It’s time we left our comfort zones and went without the camp to salvage those that situations and circumstances of life have ebbed into seeming oblivion. Let’s go and minister the love of Christ to them and help bring them home. Let’s remind them that their case is not forlorn and God has not forgotten them. Let’s bring them home.

Outside of the camp - that’s where we can find the real Jesus!

© Obu Nwani Emanuel

September 15, 2021

FAITH OR FEAR

"And who is he that will harm you, if ye be zealous of that which is good?” (1 Peter‬ ‭3:13‬, ASV)

I really have this to say about the fear-mongering that is all around us today, in the name of COVID-19. Truth is that fear and faith can never operate together and at the same time. It is either we are living in fear or we are living by faith. To fear is to lack faith; and to have faith is to be fearless. Scripture says that "the righteous is as bold as a lion”.

When I see Christians live and exhibit fear in the face of this noisome pestilence, what I see is a people who undermine the promise of God about their protection and safety. EVERY BELIEVER IS ASSURED AND GUARANTEED OF SAFETY IN THE SECRET PLACE OF THE LORD.

It is absolutely counter-faith to believe in God’s ability in keeping us, yet we continue to live in the fear that we may contract the virus and die. We are absolutely not under the element and the bondage of this life (Gal.4:3). We are superior beings and no disease or sickness can thrive in our bodies. We have to believe the word of God for what it says about our wellbeing. If we’ve been commanded to heal the sick, does it make sense that we now become the object seeking healing ourselves?

Don’t get me wrong; I am not advocating reckless faith and will never be one to. I do believe in maintaining good safety protocols. My concern is just to draw the line between being too careful and living in fear or utter disbelief in the ability of God to take care of us. It is funny how many will avoid going to church for the fear of contracting the virus, despite the safety protocols observed in the church. It is funny that the same people will go to the office and even interact with strangers, and won’t be afraid of contracting the virus. Some even go to the market where safety protocols are blatantly disregarded. They even allow their children go to school to interact with children who may have been to places God-knows-where. Yet when it comes to going under the cover of God, they have all the excuses laid out. They prefer to run under a so-called 'safe haven’ that they have created for themselves that is truly not protecting anything. IF THEY CAN CONTRACT THE VIRUS IN CHURCH, THEY CAN AS WELL IN ALL THESE PLACES THEY GO TO. SAFETY IS OF THE LORD.

It is very obvious that many economies can't survive another lockdown. Many economies are capitulating under the weight of this orchestrated noise. Can I also shock you my people? This virus will be here a while. I believe a third wave is around the corner soon, and probably a fourth or fifth. For as long as we are in the last days, there won’t be an end to pestilences and diseases of this nature. HIV-AIDS, lassa fever, tuberculosis and other infectious diseases are still very much around us today! We may just have to learn to live with this virus and continue to live by faith in the face of all of these uncertain times. THIS IS WHAT DRAWS THE LINE BETWEEN THOSE WHO BELIEVE AND THOSE WHO DO NOT. You have to believe in the covering made possible by the shed blood of Christ, for you and your entire household.

While this last let us continue to maintain good hygiene of regularly washing of hands, wearing of face masks and maintaining physical distance all the time; and most importantly to live by faith daily. Let us continue to do the right thing and also stop running away from where true protection can be found. Unless God watches over a city, the watchmen are observing worthless vigils. 

Shalom!!!

"For the Lord God is the sun and shield...” (Psalm 84:11).