Entering through closed doors
Calamity had just befallen the disciples of Jesus, the master had been taken from them in such a shocking, embarrassing and the most cruel of ways. More so, rumor had it that the people who hanged their master, didn’t mind to have their heads also. They were wanted people, who every other person feared to associate with. So they stayed in hiding in that upper room, behind locked doors like frightened rabbits; while they nursed dashed hopes, frayed hearts, disillusionment and disorientation, imprisoned not just by their fears but at their own failing attempts at security. And then unexpected and un-ushered … behold! Jesus was in their midst.
My mind flashes on the gory episodes that have been witnessed in and around Jos, where the embers of the turmoils of a barbaric war have barely gone out. It’s been only a couple of days since, in Zot and Dogo-Nahawa, villages in the Berom community, every person or thing associated with Christianity was a target, including children, women and the aged. They were hacked to death wherever they were caught or burnt alive. A mother still hears the echoes of the last scream of her baby. A girl still remembers her father’s dying shout of agony. The sights of piles of lifeless bodies and the stench of death, the debris and the ashes still linger not only in their senses but perhaps literarily in the air. So that everybody still double checks on the locks all day and have their eyes behind them as much as they have it in front.
I think the fearful experience of those who survived these Jos raids may be similar to that of the disciples after Jesus was killed. I see Jesus coming again through their closed doors and frayed nerves to heal their hearts and bring them hope again. I see him coming to them with those words: “Be not afraid! I am the Resurrection and the Life, He who believes in me, though he were dead, he would live again.”
Let our country never neglect to continue to pray for Plateau State and the bereaved people of Jos, especially the Christians. That the blessing, hope and confidence, that the resurrection affords be multiplied to them as they recover from this trials.
The city of Jos would be restored;
Our justice, charity and our community;
Our spirit, our hospitality and prosperity;
Beauty for gun smoke and ashes;
peace and strength for war cries and despair.Our children will once again play on the streets
without fear, without guns in sight.
Our patrons will remember our famed hospitality and return,
we will regain our place as a national scenic attraction
Cool, green, lush, rich tin city of Jos.The city of Jos would be restored
We will not pass on a heritage of malice
Or handover missions of revenge against our neighbours
But a legacy of justice and equity swallowing up
A history of hatred, murder and greed.Our age old portrait of community life
Weaved by numerous ethnic threads and binded
by a rare spirit of tolerance and hospitality
once again will be recaptured;
saved, reborn and revitalised city of Jos.
