Dear Anurika,
I really don’t expect you to bring an end to this my dilemma, but do please allow your numerous readers to comment and tell people like me out there, what to do.
In Africa and even in the world, Nigeria and Nigerians are rated among the most religious. In Nigeria, we have a lot of pastors, Imams, Alfas, clergies or men of God, depending on what you wish to call them.
I was once a staunch member of the Deeper Life Bible Church, but after my one year National Youth Service Corps scheme, I noticed a marked change in my elder sister, Patience Olaniyan.
She had embraced God. She was attending The Redeemed Christian Church of God. I joined her in attending RCCG.
As a Christian, and someone hoping to be a better Christian and make heaven, I have battled many beliefs and questions. I have battled many situations and came out stronger, with my faith in God growing. True, all my questions, which border on religions and Christianity had not been answered and I doubt if all would ever been answered.
Every time I think I had gotten things into perspective, another religious issue will rears its head.
Today, I was in church when the Sunday school lesson veered to marriage and divorce.
Apparently, all divorcees had somehow, whether witting or unwittingly, flouted the divine injunction of God, that they should not divorce the spouse they had married, no matter how bad the marriage is.
“Marriage is for better or worse, no matter what your wife or husband is doing to you,” the Sunday school teacher lectured. “This is why you must take your time and study the person before you marry him/her. If there’s anything the person is doing you don’t like, don’t say you’ll manage the person. Don’t say the person will change after marriage.”
If you must study the person, how do you study the person? Does this not contravene the teaching of dating before marriage? Many churches are yet to agree on ‘dating before marriage or waiting for the will of God,’ which mostly comes through dreams, trance, revelation and messages from divine men of God.
How do you study your spouse without dating him or her?
There is more: if you marry a divorced man or woman, you’ve committed a grievous sin and there’s apparently no room in heaven for you or the likes of you, no matter how born again you had become.
Bible does not recognise divorce and sees and adjudges it as sin. Once you’re married to a man or woman, as long as the person still lives, that person is the only person recognised by God as your legal wife or husband. Any other wife or husband is a ‘concubine.’
To hell with whatever you’re going through or had been going through in your marriage. If you’re a single woman and decide to marry a divorced guy, just get ready for the lake of fire.
If you are a single guy and decide to marry a woman who had married before, whose first husband is still living somewhere, perhaps with a new wife, you’re doomed to the eternal fire that doesn’t ever quench.
Thus, if you’re a woman who ended up marrying a husband who had turned you into a punching bag, stay put in that marriage. It’s your cross.
If you happen to marry a woman, who gives you grief every day, nags you every day, fights you every day, allows your friends to sample her holy of holies, stay put. It’s your cross.
If your husband beats you to death, or starves you and your kids to death, who knows, maybe you would finally make heaven after you shut your eyes in death and obvious relief.
If your wife finally gets tired and decides to poison you, when you wouldn’t let her go, even after she had done everything to make you realize she wanted to leave, and you die from the poison, maybe you would finally make heaven.
I’m not a divorcee. I’m a single lady who got married to a divorcee with three kids. Now, we have two kids together.
I go to church, not to please anybody, but to satisfy my soul. As we age, we tend to think of God, life and death. But I also know that some people (pastors) are supposed to guide us to understand God better and know what he truly wants from us.
Every day, I feel my heart growing warmer towards God and the things that are of God. I try as much as possible to partake in church activities and contributions, no matter how difficult my job makes it.
I had on several occasions fasted on my own, without discussing with anybody because I strongly believe that’s the only way I can commune privately with God about my troubles. Has God been faithful to me? Yes! I have faced death twice and God had dragged me back to the land of the living.
Yet today, I left the church premises depressed. Like a dog that had iced-water poured on it…With my tail between my legs.
It seemed that no matter how much I serve and worship God, I’m not going to make heaven because I married a divorcee. So why do I bother serving God, when I’m still going to be thrown into the lake of fire?
My fate and destiny had apparently been settled. Is there any need for me to continue to strive to be a better person? Is there any need for me to continue to pursue the holy life, when a place had already been carved out for me in hell?
I just don’t get it!
I mean a lot of women and men are clearly going to end up in hell like me.
Why? It’s because there are too many divorced and separated couples in the world. And yes, no matter how close they are to God, no matter how they love God, they are bound for hell fire.
The fact that you divorced your spouse is a sin. The fact that you left and married someone else, while your first wife/husband is alive is double sin for you.
And if your born-again wife/husband refuses to give you divorce and you walk out, to take up with another person, you’ve sin.
My dear, there’s no way out and no short cut.
So, tell me people…do I still need to attend church, worship and serve God, when my fate had already been sealed? Is there any need to continue to bother myself with God?
Chinyere
ebere20@gmail.com. SMS only: 08038465069.
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