COMFORT: INSENSITIVITY'S EXCUSE?

Hello there!

I know, I know, I’ve done you dirty –disappearing without a word of notice. I’m so sorry, I wish I could give you a cogent reason for my disappearance besides saying that life’s been happening but the truth is that life really has been happening, I’ve never actually set out to not come here to gist oo, it just always happened that I would just find myself on Saturday night realizing that I never did gist with you guys, and I’m so sorry about that, I’ll try my best to do better from here on.

Anyway, welcome to today’s long overdue gist.

The last time we were here, we were gisting about lessons from the book of Esther and I’ll like to continue from there. 

So let’s talk about what happened after Haman got the King to assent to his evil plan to destroy the Jews. Mordecai rent his clothes and put on sackcloth and ashes on his head and wailed while walking round the city, but when he got to the gate of the king’s palace, he stopped since no one could wear sackcloth into the king’s palace. And when Esther heard that Mordecai was sitting outside the king’s gate in sackcloth, what does she do? She sent servants with new clothes for Mordecai to wear. At this point, I asked myself “for your mind now na cloth Mordecai no get wey im wear sackcloth?” When Mordecai refused the clothes she sent, she now sent someone to ask him what the problem was and why he was dressed in sackcloth and refusing to receive better clothing. Mordecai informed Esther, through the servant of course, of the plan that had been hatched by Haman for the extermination of the Jews.

Here’s what my issue was: Esther had become so comfortable in the palace and with the grandeur of being queen that she did not even realize her people’s plight. She was in the palace when the plans were put in motion to destroy her people yet she didn’t realize! As I wanted to quickly bring out my gavel and begin to judge, God asked me how many times I too, like Esther, have been so focused on other things that I failed to realize the threat of danger on the people around me, people who God has given me charge of. When I started this gist, I was talking about how the fact that life has been happening has been the reason why I’ve not been here to gist with you and the truth is that life is happening to a lot of us; unexpected knocks, crazy experiences that occur as a result of our living in this world, in short, “things dey occur.” It becomes very easy to be so focused on living and surviving that we become deaf and blind to the needs of those around us and then we wake up one day and something drastic has happened to someone and we ask ourselves “how did things get here without my noticing?"

The truth is that this lesson is not a ‘one-off’ lesson, it’s a lesson that I’ve had to keep relearning in the months since God first brought it to my notice because it really is very easy to get so caught up in things that you unwittingly become insensitive, if not indifferent, to the plight of those around you. You must be very intentional about looking out for others and making sure you do not forget, to remember that as e dey do you, e dey do other people too. The Holy Spirit is your help in this regard, when He sees your genuine desire to help and be there for others, He will nudge you into remembrance as is needed, He will show you how to be there for the people God has placed in your care and He will help you be there for them.

I’ll tell you now that sometimes, it will take serious self-sacrifice to do these things because some things that may be required of you by God will put you in uncomfortable positions and the desire to say “make everybody answer im papa name abeg” will be strong. That is why you need the Holy Spirit’s help, so that beyond good intentions, you are able to be who God will have you be to the people He would have you be that to.

May God help us to be sensitive to those around us and to be there for them like God would have us be.

TUNES AND THOUGHTS: The song that has been ringing in my heart for the past couple of weeks has been Dunsin Oyekan’s “Breathe”. The lyrics that resonate the most with me are those in the Chorus “Just breathe Your name upon me, breathe. Just breathe Your name upon me, breathe. Yahweh, Yahweh is Your name, breathe Lord. Just breathe Your name upon me, breathe.” Every time this song rises in my heart, which is pretty much all the time, I think of what it means for God to breathe upon a man; His breath is the source of life –there is nothing that the breath of God comes upon that doesn’t receive life. And for God to breathe His name! His name “YHWH” means “I Am”, so asking God to breathe His name upon you is asking Him to give His essence and pour life upon you. So, as you listen to this song, hopefully, I want you to look to those areas of your life that are dry, dead and lifeless, ask God to breathe His name upon them so that they come back to life, and I pray this song blesses you as it has blessed me.

Well, that is that as far as that is concerned, see you next week, hopefully.

Love,

Achenyo.

PS. It’s 25 days to my birthday!!!!