Godly teens

Hey you! I've been watching you for a while now and I know you're not fine. You smile and laugh and talk a lot on our group chats. But when the lights are out and when nobody is around, I know you feel this big vacuum inside you. I know how much time you try to drown yourself with work, friends and social media so that you won't have to deal with the emptiness that's screaming inside you. It doesn't matter what other people think about you, you know that something is missing. I know you're struggling.  With sin.  It's like quick sand. The more you try to get out, the more you're sucked in. You've tried and failed thousands of times and you've settled with the lie that you can't ever be free. See, I see the sadness in your smiles and the tears in your laughter. I hear the hollowness of your words and I can feel the gaping emptiness inside you. I see the heavy chains wrapped around you, holding you back in darkness. You crave happiness, fulfil...

As they settled down in Michael's sitting room that night, Michael looked around the room at his friends and heard the words they were not saying aloud. "If only they had more time to reach out to more people. If only night didn't come so early....This was what they would do till their last drop of Strength: sharing the salvation message, preaching to the lost, restoring the broken, the backslidden... "At least we exhausted all the gifts we went with and everyday is another opportunity," Grace subtly whispered into his ears as she passed plates of food around.  He smiled at her but a lump formed in his throat that wiped his smile away. His pocket suddenly felt heavy. There was something he needed to do tonight that would be some sort of icing to his cake. He asked God for the umpteenth time that day for boldness to propose to the beautiful lady serving food around whose passion for God was always a big motivation to him.  Minutes later, Grace and Shade were relax...

Now on the open streets, their Christmas evangelism had begun in earnest. They dispersed themselves in the locality. Michael went to the police station, Emmanuel headed to an area where many young people usually hung out due to clubs and pubs in the area; Shade went to the general hospital to her left and Grace decided to stick to the open streets where she already sighted a beggar by the road side. His clothes were haggard, torn and dirty and he looked like he hadn't had a bath in days. His lips were chapped and he shivered in the harmattan cold. Grace wondered if he was mentally stable to approach and tell about Jesus, the man who died for him so he didn't have to be this way, didn't have to spend Christmas alone, tired and hopeless. She approached him anyway and sat beside him. He kept looking straight ahead of him as if oblivious to what was going on around him, too captured in his thoughts. "Good afternoon," she greeted and his eyes shifted to her, but the fa...

Episode 2 "Tracts." "Oh!" Emmanuel replied, shaking his head. "How could we have forgotten that?" Michael smiled and nodded at Grace. "Thank you for reminding us Grace. We'll get going." When the guys had gone, and they had the food cooking steadily in the kitchen, Shade and Grace relaxed in the sitting room  "So you and Michael..." Shade started, with a mischievous grin on her face. Grace grinned. "What happened to me and Michael?" "Do you think he knows yet?" "Knows what?" "That you know he's the one?" "Shade!" Grace exclaimed, wide eyed. She put a finger to her lips. "Shhhh. You don't know if he has a recording machine somewhere around." Shade hissed. "Really? Who puts a recording machine in their own home?" "I don't know if he knows actually. But I'm in no rush. I'm just going to hold on to what God has told me. Whenever he's ready...

Michael had just finished praying when he heard the door bell ring. "Perfect timing." He whispered excitedly to himself He was more than ready for today. He pulled on a blue and red colored T-shirt and went to answer the door A chorus of "Merry Christmas!" greeted him as he threw the door open. There, standing on his front porch were the people that mattered most to him in the whole world. Emmanuel, his best friend since campus days; Grace, his very good friend who he was planning to propose to very soon, and her best friend Shade who had somehow managed to become very close to the group "Welcome guys," Michael replied, mirroring their radiant smiles and shaking their hands. "Come on in. They all had their nose masks on and he could see they were particular about keeping Covid-19 rules. They caught up on what had been happening in each other's lives. Michael told them of his recent job as an auditor in a big accounting firm in Lekki. Emmanuel shar...

We lived in the part of the country where religious hostility was at it's hottest and most dangerous. The streets were usually pitch black and quiet in the night, except for the occasional chirping of crickets. Mary's house was located far away from the others and stood in isolation on top of a hill. It was not that she did not have enough money to own a house in the city. But we were outcasts. Everyone knew that we were staunch followers of Jesus Christ and they hated us for it. Some Islamic terrorists hunted us down day and night, to throw us into prisons or kill us off for praying to Jesus. We were the Church in the North. On this fateful day, we were gathered in the middle of the room. Our hearts were heavy and sorrow hung heavily in the air. Just last month, the terrorists caught one of our beloved and prominent teacher, because he went out on the streets telling people about Jesus. They threw him into prison and killed him off after some time. Now, to convince us that the...

  Once upon a time, you would have thought she was a great nation, She was pregnant with inexhaustible gems and resources, the envy of all other nations. Her various cultures were the beautiful jewels that adorned her. Her skin shone brightly and none could ignore the beauty and wealth she weilded as a weapon. She had earned her place on the map and she was called the Giant of Africa. The western countries saw it and they came scrambling for a piece of her.  They set their greedy fingers on her and deceived her with things she had never seen, but things that could never have been compared to what she carried.  One after the other, they came to reap where they had not sown.  They latched unto her like eels and milked her year after year, refusing to let her go until they had had their fill... Until her children decided they had been cheated enough and fought for their mother's freedom. Independence! Or was it?  She never recovered from that exploitative experienc...