Happy New Year folks!
I’ve been in Nigeria for the last week and it’s been an interesting start to the year. The New Year is usually a time of optimism as people resolve to live a better life and dream bigger dreams than they had previously. It’s a time to wipe the slate clean and start afresh. A lot of that optimism and resolve was stolen from many Nigerians.
On Christmas day, a church in a Northern city of the country was bombed and entire families were wiped out. For that reason, many who would usually celebrate the beginning of the year at church were too afraid to attend services. Fear, took the place of optimism, despair, the place of hope. Within a few hours of the year starting, news of the removal of the fuel subsidy was released. Anger took over fear and people took to the streets to voice their disapproval.
Watching television accounts of the protests in Lagos, things didn’t seem so peaceful. People revolted against corruption, some peacefully, others, violently. The authorities responded in their usual violent manner and chaos was the result.
This morning, I found myself reading the 6th chapter of Genesis.
5 The LORD saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time. 6 The LORD regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. 7 So the LORD said, “I will wipe from the face of the earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them.” 8But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD. 9This is the account of Noah and his family.Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked faithfully with God. 10Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth.11 Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence. 12 God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. 13 So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. 14 So make yourself an ark of cypress[c] wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. -Genesis 6:5-14
I recognised the world described in that chapter as the world we currently live in. I shuddered to think that God almost wiped out the entire human race for the very things that are going on in our world today. I wonder how He feels looking down and watching us live violent, corrupt and hedonistic lives. He most certainly cannot be pleased.
But there was Noah.
Noah’s righteousness and blamelessness were the reasons God spared the world. He found just one man that was living right and that was all it took to spare the humanity.
Are you a Noah?
If God looks upon you, will your life cause him to have mercy on the world you live in? Will he find you righteous and blameless? If not, that’s a challenge I put to us as we kick off 2012. Let our lives speak for others, just as the life and death of Christ speaks for us. Let God look on us and for our sakes, have mercy on the people around us. Let our lives act as intercessors, petitioning God on behalf of the people around you.
In this New Year, I pray that the peace that surpasses all understanding will guard all our hearts and that the best days of our lives will be ahead of us. I pray that as Christians, we will affect our world just as we have been called to do. The truth will prevail and the light of Christ will shine into the darkness that shrouds our world.
Happy New year people!
xxx
Waila

