Five days ago, President Goodluck Jonathan changed two of his top security management team.
That move indicates quite clearly that like many Nigerians, Jonathan believes that the solution to the many complex and multifaceted problems besetting our country right now lies in human efforts. To some of us, that thinking by Jonathan and some of our compatriots is not correct. For me and those who belong to my school of thought which believes that the spiritual controls the physical, it is our humble view that while there is nothing wrong with taking human steps, what we need most in our present circumstances is to go spiritual first before human efforts can have the desired results.
Nigerians must seek God’s intervention now if we want peace, progress and prosperity to reign in our land. And our thinking is anchored on one fact: the challenges facing our nation are not ordinary; they have their roots in the spiritual. We have a case to answer with God and unless and until we settle our case with God, we will continue to live in fear and confusion.
Other Nigerians have the liberty to laugh to their hearts’ content at our contention but we will like to maintain the courage of our conviction by pushing the viewpoint that we Nigerians have sinned greatly against God and he has turned his back against us and our nation which is why we are contending with seemingly intractable problems, foremost of which for now is the Boko Haram insurgency.
Our contention is that the agenda of God for Nigeria is for her to be a nation of priests who will lead the charge in re-evangelising the world. For Nigeria to be able to play that role and become a light for Africa and the world, her people must live a pure and decent life with the fear of God as the basic and guiding attitude of everyone. But this has not been the case. Millions of our countrymen and women are thoroughly dishonest, corrupt, wicked, unpatriotic and greedy. A good number of our people are great wasters of the bounties which the good and generous God has bestowed on our nation. We take God’s grace for granted and engage in acts of vanity that are detestable to our God.
What is more, life is extremely very cheap in Nigeria. People are slaughtered on daily basis through accidents and for rituals. One of the most offensive of our entire wicked attitude is the daily ritual murder of God’s children for satanic power.
Even this minute and second that we are ‘talking’ here, someone is being killed somewhere in one corner of Nigeria for ritual purposes. Those entrusted with leadership are fully aware of this great evil and many of them are, unfortunately, active participants in it. God is greatly displeased with us Nigerians. We have completely lost many cherished values and behave as we are exempted by God himself from being responsible and accountable to God or to secular authority. In my weekly lamentation, I have always stated that we Nigerians tend to act as if we live in a county where there is no Sherriff to keep the law. Every one acts as he or she sees fit. No respect for laws. No respect for constituted authorities. No respect for parents and no respect for neighbours and fellow citizens. And, above all, no respect for God Almighty. Only one thing seems to matter to our people and that one thing is money. The only god many Nigerians are ready to worship fervently is the god called mammon.
In Nigeria, everything begins and ends with money. Money is the common denominator factor in everything we think, plan and do. The love of money is the one reason why a wife can betray her husband at the drop of a hat; why a child will not bat an eyelid to sell away his parents; why friends do not hesitate to part ways and forsake several years of cultivated companionship. Our situation is bad. We have become the laughing stock of the sane world yet the iron cast which the devil has used to close our eyes will not allow us to see that we are living a life that is most displeasing to God and one which is leading to our daily hurt.
We are today grovelling like men and women who are blind and have no foggy conception about the way out. Here is a nation more blessed than America yet is the greatest poor rich nation on earth today. We do all these and many more not mentioned here yet expect to live in peace, harmony and prosperity. We think we are the elect of God, the apple of his eyes; the children of his old age who have a license to play pranks and be sparred of our unbridled indulgence. God has said no. He has indulged us long enough. The time has come for us to pay for our many sins. And the currency with which God has decreed payment for sins is repentance and forsaking of our evil and unprofitable ways..
When you have depended on your wisdom; on your own devices and that has failed you, is it not time to cry unto God for help? To what extent will we fall before we realise that we need help from above? As far as I can see, this is the time for every man in Nigeria to call upon the God or god he worships to come to our help because our own efforts can no longer avail us.
Whether we profess to be Christians, Muslims or idol worshippers, are we the over 160 million souls who inhabit this land called Nigeria so blind of mind that we do not yet see that our problems are not ordinary? Are we so insensitive that we do not yet realise that the many calamities and tragedies that have been befalling us are signs from a higher being beckoning us to retrace our steps because we have erred in many ways and that we need to repent? When will the political elite reach out to the religious elite so that a three-day national mourning can be organised so that everyone can cry out to his God to send us a helper or helpers? Do we want to wait for everything to collapse before we seek God’s help?
I regard Boko Haram not as a movement to fight for social justice and a just and equitable society. I see it as pestilence allowed by God to torment us to wake up to the reality that there are many things we are doing wrongly in Nigeria. As we have seen in the Bible, when God allows a pestilence to torment his people so that they can repent of a particular sin or sins, the answer is a spiritual action: repentance, acceptable sacrifice, atonement for the sins committed and a crying out to God for help. Pestilences have no human solution.
This viewpoint of mine will be tested and either proven or disproved in the next few days. If the changes Jonathan has made will lead to a severe curtailment or dramatic elimination of the Boko Haram insurgency, it will mean that what we need is reasonable human effort. If it does not, it will be proof that we need to go to God with bended knees and foreheads to the ground because the challenge confronting us has a deeper root. Sooner or later we will see whether I am speaking the will of God or I am imagining vain things from my imagination.
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