Hello, Demola. Sometimes last month I was in. It was on Sunday, I think we were on our way to church when my wife told me that one of my classmates in Ife had lost his wife to childbirth. I know him, I know the wife. I was kind of sad. When we get to go to church, a woman came to give Thanksgiving. She had been barren again. I don't know what the politically correct statement is, but she's been barren for seven years. She's not had a child. Then they had twins. That Sunday was their Thanksgiving outing for the twins. And as I sat there, I was reflecting on both things like, it's the same day. I mean, my wife had. My friend had lost his wife earlier, but I heard that same day. So it's the same day. On one side, someone has lost his wife to childbirth. On another side, someone has had her prayers answered, right? And there's God in the middle. The woman that gave a testimony was like, oh, you know, we waited on God, we thank God, you know, we prayed to God and you know, God answered us. And anything God says God would do. I was reflecting on my friend's state of mind at that point. What would my friend think about God? What would my friend think about the child? How would my friend cope with the loss of his wife? So I think that's where it started from and then coalesced this morning that if I don't have a child, I pray to God I want one. And then it happens and I thank God God has answered my prayers. If I don't have a child and I pray to God and it doesn't happen, at least doesn't happen the way I want. Is it again this coming down to like God does not care or not? But are my prayers getting reaching someone? What I ask for, does it matter? Is it about my faith or the lack of it? I also remember an old, old man I used to be friends with. I played Scrabble with him way back. He was much older man, let's say 65. And I was like 25. And he was very sick at the time. So I would spend time with him. We'll play Scrabble I would go, I just started working in Lagos. When the man died, the man died. Eventually, when the man died, I was saying, ah, this man didn't have. They didn't have enough faith. They didn't pray enough. That's why the man died. And I felt very hurt because in this Scrabble time, I developed some kind of relationship with him and his wife. And I felt angry that why would this person just say this? Or why would this person assume this, that it's because of lack of faith? You get, again, all of this is coming down or centering around death or no death. But death presents a kind of finality against which most people rebel against God, in my opinion. And I think why people rebel is either that their expectations were not met or they feel their prayers were not answered. Third case in point was a girl on Twitter that came last, sometimes last month to say, you know what? I've given up on this Christian ish because I feel God has favorites. Everything I've prayed for, everything, everything I've asked for, none of it has happened yet. I see people who are praying for it or asking for it, and it's like they're getting their way. So I'm definitely not God's favorite and I don't care anymore. Another reference, I don't know that you've seen the series Lost. Lost is about, at the surface level, is about some people that crash on an island. But the underlying philosophical arguments in Lost is about faith and science. Anyway, in Lost, they're on an island and they have information that this island will sort of disappear or implode or they are all going to die if they don't put something. It looks like a. Like a message capsule. You're supposed to put that thing in a tube every hour or every 24 hours. So. So there's a countdown timer. That timer keeps counting down. And you must do that thing. The day that timer comes down to zero and you don't do that thing, the island will explode or the island, everybody will die. So one person who is a person of faith is like, yes, we have to keep doing this to keep this island alive. But one of them who is just like a hothead is like, see, what if we don't do it? What will even happen? Safe. So this guy, the one, the antagonist, then decides to get a gun. I think he found a gun somewhere in the jungle. And then holds everybody ransom, a hostage that I even want to see what will happen if we don't feed this message capsule into this tube. Nobody wants to lose their life. They begging him. Guy, we have seen what this island can do and the island is pretty mysterious. There are a lot of crazy things happening, so everybody believes this island is weird. And he holds them all to ransom. And the count clock ticks down to zero and nothing happens. And guys like it. I told you guys, nothing will happen. But again in the story we find out that something actually happened, but it wasn't what we're expecting or what we had interpreted that the island will explode to mean. Anyway, I know I'm ranting, but you get my point. That it's like we're praying blind at times, most times because we can't see God. And it's like we are hoping. There's a huge part of it that is hope. That once I first believe that God exists, then I believe that when I pray to God, God is listening. Then I believe that the good things that happen to me are because God exists and because God has listened to me. What if all of these constructs is not? Or what if even God's perception of me is very different? What if my prayers don't count? What if it's just my hope that is making me interpret either answer or non answer as what it is, whatever it is.
