Knowing the cause of a matter speaks to the Why question, which is perhaps the most valuable question we could ever ask ourselves. We could do a thousand and one things and weary ourselves, without the right question; why are we doing what we are doing, in the first place. Every ‘why’ usually leads to many other ‘whys?’ Until we arrive at the truth; the truth that will ‘make you free’. Africa’s problems have challenged many and unfortunately caused despair in the hearts and minds, even of our ‘brightest and bravest’. These, ‘brightest and bravest’ (in the words of one of them, Philip Emeagwali), have fled for refuge to ‘greener pastures’. Yet, those pastures, we need to remind ourselves, were built by the ‘brightest and bravest’ of their kind! That includes, by the way, the many Black inventors and pioneers in different countries, all through the ages, that history has hidden from us, deliberately or by default. That our ‘brightest and bravest’ can only thrive in other systems is itself a challenge that should point us to another why? The solace is that our ability to thrive elsewhere at least means that we are not inferior, per se, to any other group but simply lack the ‘ecosystem’, the community, to support the creative instincts of our ‘brightest and bravest’. Bill Clinton said it all, rather wistfully, when he used Philip Emeagwali’s achievements as an example of what Nigerians, (we say Africans and Blacks in general), can do when given the opportunity. So we can settle the matter, for all time, that ours is not an inferior race.
What then is the problem? Why this pervasive disorder in Black communities all over the world; from the USA, the richest and greatest country on earth, to Haiti, the oldest independent Black nation, and one of the poorest in the world, to Liberia, the oldest independent Black nation in Africa, to Ethiopia, the one Black country that managed to avoid colonization? Too many of us have given in to the temptation of firefighting the symptoms only to have a relapse. Visit any Black neighborhood or country and you would see the same pattern; the forms but hardly the substance of true development. You would observe extreme opulence in the midst of abject squalor, and starvation in the midst of plenty; disorder! This is pervasive and is apparent in all spheres of Black life. We educate ours, ‘for action’ to redress our lot, only to feed them to richer and more developed ecosystems. And now, even our unskilled manpower is being depleted in the latest migration challenge; the Brawn Drain!
The answer to our dilemma is not to be found in the symptoms; the natural manifestations, no. The answer, as is the cause, lies elsewhere. Every why in life ultimately leads us to the very Why of all existence; the reason for it all. The Bible tells it clearly and plainly enough for all to understand:
“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.”
There is no answering the question of the ultimate Why of life without recourse to that very dramatic and assertive statement. In that very first statement of the Bible is a truth that unlocks all other truths. The supernatural heaven and the natural earth are both real and the supernatural precedes the natural; most importantly, God is the Source of it all. But there is so much more:
…God created man in his own image…
Let this truth sink into your heart/ human spirit by repeating it to yourself over and over again until belief or faith is birthed in your spirit; for faith comes by hearing…
You, Blackman and Blackwoman, like every human, were created in the ‘image and likeness’ of God!!.
We are beings in the very class of God!! That is not sacrilege. It is the will of God! And He wants us all, every human being, to be in dominion over all the works of His hands, here on earth.
The heaven, even the heavens, are the LORD’S: but the earth hath he given to the children of men.
God has given us precise instructions to equip us for the task. The word torah translated as law or commandments more accurately connotes instructions. One of those instructions is:
‘Be ye imitators of God as dearly beloved children’
Belief/faith, pisteuo in the original Greek, means to ‘trust in, rely on or to obey’ another. We are subject to two great mysteries of life; Godliness and wickedness. We have the power of choice, our will, but we do not make the rules; or determine the consequences of our choices! Ultimately, the battle of life is the battle of choice; between faith in God (heaven) and faith in satan/worldly circumstances (the corrupted earth). Moses made recourse to the beginning when he offered that choice to Israel:
I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose…
If you wonder what all that’s got to do with Africa and peoples of African descent, here is the answer; if we do not understand the very basis of our existence as spirit beings and choose rightly, then we shall suffer the consequences.
Life is governed by principles!
We do not like what we see, when we look in the mirror. We would rather be like the ‘others’, and live like the ‘others’… but we end up as very poor copies and not the originals God made us to be. So we deprecate self and one another and perpetuate our undesirable condition. There is a better way; God’s way.
So, how would God deal with such an undesirable situation? He would think on His desire and speak forth the desire; the things ‘…which are not, to bring to nought things that are’
Thoughts and words are powerful spiritual realities and they precede every material or natural manifestation. Think about it for one moment: every creation of man starts with a thought! The cars, houses, computers, internet…everything we now take for granted. Every creation starts ‘first within, then without’, Sam Adeyemi
Thoughts and words are actually seeds sown in the human spirit to bring forth a desire (fruit) in time. Thoughts are words, only inaudible. “She said in her heart…” is how the Bible puts one account of a healing miracle birthed by desire but expressed inaudibly.
We are spirit beings and ‘the currency of the spirit realm is WORDS’! S. J. Aganaba
Like God, we must proclaim our desire. That is a necessary first step because the human spirit, like the earth, will only bring forth, of itself, whatever is planted therein; it will not change the nature of the ‘seed’ sown. To desire a transformed Africa but continue to ‘say it as it is’, may seem sincere, even ‘knowledgeable’ but it will never yield the desired fruit. Better to keep quiet than to spew ‘perveseness’; for whatever is inconsistent with the instructions of God is just that; perverse, foolish, a lie. It will only deceive the heart/human spirit further. A corrupt seed can only produce a corrupt fruit! The Word of God, the expression of His will and intent, the Truth, is the only incorruptible seed!!
Action: Think on these things and speak forth today, and every day, every good thing you desire for Africa and Blacks in general, in accordance with the will of God. It shall be well.
Welcome to a new You, welcome to the Great Africa.
