by His stripes

Every bible-reading Christian (and their pet) knows how that verse ends.

I for one.

https://yesterdaysprophecy.com/stripes-healed-isaiah-535/

The verse reminds me of a sad time in my life. My big aunt was sick and dying. At the time I didn't know, neither did I think much about it. She was larger-than-life person and I had never lost anyone close to me. So my mind was incapable of comprehending anything beyond a protracted illness and eventual recovery.

In the last days I spent with her, she had me read the bible to her. And one of the more common passages she enjoyed listening to was Isaiah 53 especially verse 5. She said that verse so often, I felt so sure she would recover from her illness - given how much faith she had that she would, and with it attending hope. At that time, I was also under the impression that God could not refuse a child's prayers so I joined my faith and hope with hers. Oh the innocence of childhood!

All the above isn't news! However I want to admit that I only just started comprehending why 'His stripes' are a source of healing. It'd seem that all along, I either never gave it much thought or just took it for granted while carrying about a mental image of a neatly-stripped Jesus like a stripped t-shirt on Jesus.

But there's nothing neat or pretty about His healing stripes. Still they are mighty effective. Even when they don't result in obvious answers to our prayers.


Easter fills me with surreal hope! The tomb is empty. Death has nothing on us 'cos we are children and heirs of the Intentional God, whose painful and anything-but-neat stripes are healing!

Of heart break - Reminder Series

My social media footprint isn't cute. Meaning you couldn't take it to the bank. And, I don't seem interested in making it any better. Facebook gets all the likes and few coments, whatsapp groups get all the 'silent observer' status, twitter gets visited less and less often. But, I discovered Quora and I like it there. So I'd like to share something a very wise lady shared on there about recovering from heartbreaks.

I collated them into 3 categories as separated by the photos and I learned a lot I would like to not forget. I thought you might find some deep truths there too. Enjoy!

" Here are the steps I (Dushku Zapata on Quora) follow to return to the world of the living (after a heartbreak).

I hold on. The first thing I do is remind myself that my feelings are temporary. As surely as this feels like there will never again be light, the fact is it will pass. As impossible as this seems right now, I will get better. Everything will get better.
Hold on. Just hold on.

I assure myself that some day this will matter a lot less. Every one of the thoughts that are unbearable right now will not be unbearable later. He will find someone else. He will love someone else. This will one day not matter.

I remind myself that not being loved and my self worth are not related. Someone not loving me - even someone who once loved me and who now doesn’t love me anymore - has nothing to do with me. Wonderful people are dumped every day. I myself have stopped loving really, really good guys. I am worth loving and what I am going through right now does not indicate that I am not. Associating the two is a fallacy.

Photo credit: pixabay

 I set aside all skepticism and doubt. Was what we had ever real? Did he ever love me? Was this all a lie? All these questions are useless, self destructive and torturous and I am in enough pain. This is enough pain. I don’t invite any more.

I reject anything that will keep me tied to feeling like this. The sense that he wronged me, that I hate him, that I have to get back at him so he can pay for what he’s done. I want to get better. I want to move on and all these feelings are nothing but shackles. 

I stay in the present. Right now I am here with me and I love me. In the past he broke my heart and in the future he will be with someone else and - right here. Right here with me is where it’s at. We will get better if for now we stick to right here, right now.

I throw out any negative talk. You are worthless, unlovable, this was your fault and you are terrible at relationships. Oh, yeah? I am handling as much as I can right now so all you absurd, inaccurate, depressive, negative lies can go wait outside. 

I get out of my head. Honestly, I am so very tired of me. I ask my friends to give me a rest from myself and to instead talk about them. I find someone who could use my help. I volunteer. One day I spent a whole day at an animal shelter petting and holding puppies. I forgot about me for a while. 

Photo credit: pixabay

I surround myself with love. I spend time with my family and friends and rather than fill their ears with the calamitous state of my love life I ask them to list out my qualities. Maybe list them out more than once. Remind me. Remind me why you love me.

I make a list of things I neglected to make room for my relationship. I love to read and now I have time. I love to spend the day alone and wander. I love poetry readings and swimming. I love rock climbing and learning new things.

 I make a list of things I have always wanted to do. I want to go to Savannah, Georgia. I have never been to New Zealand. I want to see the Northern Lights. I want to learn how to make macarons. Or maybe I just want to go to a macaron making class so I can meet other people interested in making macarons.

I remind myself that love is a privilege. That I want to love well. That the only way to get good at this is to practice, and get my heart broken, and recover, and try again "

Photo credit: pixabay

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HUMILITY - Reminder series

It is a great thing to know oneself to be nothing before God, because that is how things are. (Furrow, 260)

Allow me to remind you that among other evident signs of a lack of humility are:

• Thinking that what you do or say is better than what others do or say;
• Always wanting to get your own way;
• Arguing when you are not right or -- when you are -- insisting stubbornly or with bad manners;
• Giving your opinion without being asked for it, when charity does not demand you to do so;
• Despising the point of view of others;
• Not being aware that all the gifts and qualities you have are on loan;
• Not acknowledging that you are unworthy of all honour or esteem, even the ground you are treading on or the things you own;
• Mentioning yourself as an example in conversation;
• Speaking badly about yourself, so that they may form a good opinion of you, or contradict you;
• Making excuses when rebuked;
• Hiding some humiliating faults from your director, so that he may not lose the good opinion he has of you;
• Hearing praise with satisfaction, or being glad that others have spoken well of you;
• Being hurt that others are held in greater esteem than you;
• Refusing to carry out menial tasks;
• Seeking or wanting to be singled out;
• Letting drop words of self-praise in conversation, or words that might show your honesty, your wit or skill, your professional prestige ... ;
• Being ashamed of not having certain possessions 

 (Furrow, 263)

Karol Wojtyla and me - trivia

I spend far too much time online reading what people write.
That would explain why I don't have enough time to write my own stories.
And now put some TV in the mix too.

I am sure if I dig deep enough, I might find my motivation dissipating in all of this.


But you know my secret hopes and wishes about writing more often- so this time I'd spare you. Hopefully actions will speak for themselves.

I like me some Saint John Paul the II. He ticked all my buttons on 'How to be a good Pope (person)'! You know... the category of people that actually ask 'What Would Jesus Do?' I felt really special when I learned that his first visit to Nigeria was on my birthday - ok, ok! He arrived on the 12th of February and I was born on the next day so...let's say he didn't want to miss any part of it.

I always knew about his (first) visit to Nigeria and the nice coincidence with my birth.

I also knew there was an assassination attempt on his life a while back before I was born.

So imagine my aha! moment when at mass, one glorious Sunday, I learned that he was shot at on May 13. Nine months before I was born. Possibly at the moment of my conception - yeah, I might as well be downright dramatic!


The lesson in all of this for me should be FORGIVENESS. I haven't been shot at, at least not literally. And I don't think I need to be Pope to forgive those people who hurt me - that's what Jesus would do! That's what he did!


I'm Work In Progress.

Saint Pope John Paul II. Pray for me

A debt that cannot be fully paid

Romans 13: 8 - Owe no man anything but love...


There are people that are more comfortable as debtors than others. In my nuclear family (as with most families, I suspect), we have a mix of both. However the majority of us are what I like to think of as uncomfortable debtors.
Now, this is not me directly or indirectly judging anyone who is a more comfortable debtor than I am. I realize this is one of the things that define me - 'cut your coat according to cloth' that is how some of us are wired. So, the way I see it is that if I get sleepless nights because I am in debt, it would stand to reason that at the nearest opportunity I'd get myself out of debt while ensuring I don't repeat the cycle (often, if at all).


This bible passage crossed my mind recently and I couldn't help but wonder 'why love?'.
Why not money?
Or respect?
Or clothes?
Or forgiveness?
Or (fill in the blank)?

I don't have the answer to that question as yet but on thinking a little bit more on the verse, it made a lot of sense that love is the one thing that cannot be (re)paid in full. Nobody, no matter how rich (or poor) they are, can claim to have loved fully all those they ought to love in the way they wanted to be loved?
I'm reminded of the rich young man in the bible who came to Jesus asking what he needed to do to make eternal life? He had fulfilled all righteousness but he did it from a place of comfort. It didn't cost him enough - at least not by Jesus' standard. Jesus had told him to go sell ALL his riches and then come "follow me". That's expecting a lot - but not more than the Savior was willing to give. It required love for the young man to do what Jesus asked.

It requires love for us to do the same - love doesn't operate from a place of comfort, or rightness, or superiority, or pride, or unforgiveness....

That's the point, love is expensive. It is exhausting from a human point of view to love everybody (even my enemies! seriously?) and all the time too. But it is not unachievable. And by reading through verses 7 to 10 it becomes clearer what the mind of God is.

In essence, even if you are in the category of people that are uncomfortable debtors, you couldn't pay off your love debt if you tried. We could not love too much in this world! All we can do is love a little more each day.

That's my interpretation (albeit limited). I'd like to hear yours too.

why infant baptism?

Born into a Catholic home, my only proof of my baptism is in the pictures (my baptismal card too)  I was shown as a little child. The pictures were in my parents' famous wooden albums and I absolutely loved looking through them whenever the opportunity (namely an ‘August’ visitor) presented itself.

On occasion though, either by questioning or story-telling moments that were part of my childhood, the stories behind the pictures were told. That is most probably how I discovered I was the beautiful baby (touché) quietly receiving her stamp of being a Christian by baptism of water. The picture is probably cliché – my sisters all had similar ones too – of a non-pregnant looking mom holding out my head to receive the water being poured from the bowl and a fuller-haired dad smiling at the camera during the infant baptism mass celebration.

At the time, we’d have gone back home either to a mini-celebration or just receiving felicitations of friends in church after the baptism mass. It officially signaled that my mom was ‘fit’ enough to get back into church activities after birthing. My parents did this for all 5 of their children by the way.

While growing up, I realized that infant baptism was not the norm across Christendom. Maybe because I was pre-conditioned as a Catholic, I didn’t give it much thought often and when I did, I couldn’t fathom for the life of me, what was so wrong with baptizing your baby versus letting them grow up and choosing their religious path. Honestly, I disliked small talk pretty early in life and my impatience extended to all the bickering across Christendom where accusations and counter accusations were always thrown in order to justify why people decided to do things differently. I avoid Religious arguments for only one reason, I think it is personal and I am making my journey for myself. I don’t expect to discover my truth for someone else and I certainly don’t expect anyone to do me that favour – we all have to make that discovery ourselves.

But I digress. Recently, I realized that asides from being commonsensical, infant baptism is an offshoot of the wisdom of the Church. The question shouldn’t be ‘why do you baptize an infant without their consent?’ but ‘why not?’ Do you go about naming your child only after they have come of age and agreed to go by the name ‘Bob Joe’ or ‘Anne Smith?’ (probably before then you’d call them ‘baby1’)? Do you wait for their consent before you take them for the ‘mandatory’ immunizations as prescribed by your doctor especially because they cry when receiving the many injections and meds? Do you wait till they are fully grown and ask them to pick what nationality they want to identify with?– and truly the list goes on!

So when is the right time to baptize your child? To me the answer lies in this question – when is the right time to claim your child for God? What is their identity between the time they are born until they decide who they want to pledge allegiance to?

In all honesty, there are so many decisions parents have to take on behalf of their children – some have little impact and others have a lifetime effect. Most of these decisions are taken by human beings who don’t know it all but who definitely should know better than anybody else – including the child at this stage. It is a foregone conclusion that most parents have the best interest of their children at heart which include spiritual, physical, emotional, social aspects of their well being. For African Christians, we like to emphasize the spiritual even if it means garnishing it over any or all of the others mentioned earlier. So I have no doubt in my mind that baptizing an infant was anything but the best thing to do. I bet you that more often than not, the celebration of the first year birthday of the child would trump any baptism celebration and if you have attended any one of these type of celebration, you know it is less for the child who barely can stand on their feet!

Having said that, I would add it is not enough to go through the motion of infant baptism. And it does not absolve the parents from doing the needful work of ‘train(ing) a child in the way that they ought to go’, rather, it should set the foundation for the child to discover himself/herself completely as fore mostly a spiritual being – belonging to the family of the Most High God - and secondly as belonging to this earthly community of believers (and unbelievers). Exactly as explained on Sunday by Fr. Afam Ikeh – we are embodied spirits and not spiritualized bodies.

I have taken care not to quote the Catholic doctrine here as part of my reasons in the bid to have meaningful conversation with people not versed in the Catholic doctrine.

My mother, my rock

I am usually overwhelmed with emotions many times I think of my mom - like when I think seriously about her. This doesn't take any effort because a lot of things remind me of her.


I feel safe in her company. She is the one person that when I hug I feel safe. Even if she is the one that is ill. If someone ever told me my mom would poison me, my first inclination would be to agree with my mom because I think she is the one person that has my best interest at heart all the time.

Enough about me.

So I was thinking about some random stuff this early saturday morning and I remembered some of the songs my mom taught us as kids. Given that she is not pushy, we must have been more impressionable.


Wide, wide as the ocean
High as the heavens above
Deep, deep as the deepest sea
Is my saviour's love (saviour's love for me)

Why? I'm so unworthy
Still I'm a child of his care
For his love teaches me
That his love reaches me
E-very-where!

Full with demonstrations o!

What occurred to me is that my mom is one person I know that loves the Lord. If she doesn't make heaven then I am not sure I want to be there. She holds no grudge and you can't use her name and anger in the same sentence. She epitomizes long suffering and consistency. She is not judgmental and is ever the pacifist. She is the only person I have literally cried out my hurting heart to 3 of the 4 times I was in that 'condition'. She is unassuming, caring without being nosy, absolutely without drama, easily lovable, not vengeful or shrewd but the best confidante anyone could ask for, wise in a quiet way in the things that matter and a mentor/mother to so many people.

She is the only person I know that loves like a child - who wakes up every morning to speak to her Maker before she wakes all the agbayas in the house for Family devotion. She has always, always done this and it got so bad that if we don't get the 'wake-up call' then it means she is either ill or unavoidably absent.

And that, my friends is truly and unarguably the best person you want to be your mother in your next life! If you are nice enough, I'd be your big sister ...LOL.

Chukwu gozierem Nnem, ezigbo nnem!