'Felicia had sold her soul to rebellion', that was my conclusion.
I couldn't comprehend why a deacon's daughter would chose to defy all church authority and disgrace her father so much.
Deacon Okafor must have become too tired to be frustrated by it anymore.
'Why are you like this?' I summoned up courage to ask Felicia after service that day.
The whole time, I was distracted by her attitude. Today she not only came late as usual and occupied her regular spot, I mean the last seat at the last row, she as well dressed to seduce. It definitely was to seduce. I noticed the ushers trying to make her leave but seeing her sit comfortably at her normal spot was enough evidence to tell the outcome of their efforts.
She did well to eye me from up to down, hiss and walk past like I was a light poll obstructing her way.
'Who was to blame?' I thought within myself.
For as long as I have been in the church- 'Our Father's tabernacle', I've come to know her father as a Deacon and her mother as the women leader. They were very active in the church. It was even the duty of her father to make sure the church was open by 7am for the one hour prayers before sunday service began. I would watch him drive alone and leave his family to come on their own. His wife came when prayer was over while his children trooped in much later. Felicia's case was the worst but the rest of them didn't come early either.
'Was it a crime for him to come with his entire family at once?
What was going on in the home?' these and many more troubling questions settled on my mind whenever my thought strayed to the Deacon and his entire family. How tragic!
And yet this is happening everywhere.
I remember just two days ago when Ken my neighbour got back from drama rehearsals in his church with a gloomy face. He was looking so bad that I couldn't let him walk out of my sight even after he had tried to convince me that he was fine.
On seeing I wasn't bulging to his plea to be alone, he spilled out. Behold a similar issue, only in another location.
The daughter of his sunday school teacher, a member of the drama group, walked into their meeting as it was about ending, knowing fully well she had been given a role that she would take the next day been sunday. She didn't even feel any remorse, rather she told them she wasn't interested and was only there so they could tell her father she came. How pathetic!
I was so pissed!
'Why did they give her a role in the first place?' I asked Ken immediately.
He said their pastor had pleaded with the group to try and include her in it, hoping she would change.
'Really? how would that work?' I probed further but he didn't know what to say.
His own reason for been sad was because the drama was automatically cancelled.
Sarah their only female and consistent member was not around either.
'Its God's work', He'll have His way. That was all I could say. But my pain still remained.
These men, these women. Parents they are, leaders as well but not in their homes.
Somehow I'll say they have failed. Even if it doesn't entirely lie on them, they had a role to play. I try not to judge, believe me it has not been easy.
But my Father's words I must obey-'Judge not, lest you be judged'.
I must say this however that
'Whoever you are, be it first in your home. Set the example, create the standard, implement the rules. If they should ignore it, then you are guiltless, but if you never did anything and they turn sour and eventually bitter, believe me God would hold you responsible.
Sent from my BlackBerry wireless device from MTN
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