The Volcano

His journey into Christianity was quite a drama
He was in the village at the time
He was 16 years old
He had a very strange dream
He told his Father the dream after having 
it for the third time
He had to tell, the dream was taking a 
the very toll on his health
He had noticed that since he started having 
the dream he grew weaker and weaker
and sicker and sicker
He would have a sudden bout of headache today
Another bout of migraine tomorrow
From being a robust, healthy child
He became a sickly thing that brought his mother 
great pain and agony every day
Wherever they took him to
He would start recovering for a while
It would seem to everybody that he was out of the woods
And then the cycle would start all over
He would have the dream and fall sick again
The dream was a strange one
They were a family of hunters
His grandfather was the chief hunter of their community
His Father, though a teacher, was also a very good hunter
As a result of their profession
They had a shrine  dedicated to the god of hunters
During the hunting season, all the hunters would
gather around the shrine, sing and offer a sacrifice
Usually, a dog to the god of the hunters before they
head out into the forest to hunt game
In the dream, he saw himself destroying the shrine
He saw himself take out all the charming hunting
gears, guns, bow and arrow, charms, shoes,
everything!
He took them all to the shrine and set the 
shrine on fire!
Then a voice said "Do it! Do it! Or 
I will raise another"
He didn't know the voice
He wasn't sure who it was but a dread fell on him
as soon as he heard the voice
The dread gave him the creeps and goose pimples all over
And as soon as he wakes up, fear would grip his heart!
The fear was for many reasons
Nobody  in his right mind would desecrate a shrine
People have died doing much less
He had seen the power of the god of the hunters on display
so many times
He had seen unfaithful hunters die after swearing falsely
before it
He had seen the god strike a thief down in broad daylight
How could he do what the voice was saying and survive?
It was like being placed between a rock and
a hard place!
His Father listened carefully to his story
The next morning, his Father woke him up by 5 AM
They took the first bus out of the village
His Father handed him over to his uncle in the city
His Father told him the devil wanted to tempt him
into error and incurring divine wrath
"If you are far away from the shrine, you are safe"
He improved remarkably in the city
His uncle was married with three children
He was the same age as his uncle's first child
He was enrolled in school  and settled down quite well
At seventeen he gained admission into the University
to study veterinary medicine
It was a federal University quite close to his village
The school was about fifteen minutes walk from
his family compound
He did his registration and lived on campus
On the day he resumed class
A young lady came to meet him
The young lady talked to him about Jesus
He was not a stranger to Jesus
They had a Catholic and an Anglican Church in their village
The Reverent Father of the Catholic church wears white
The Reverend of the Anglican church wears black
He used to wonder why Jesus wouldn't settle for
one uniform and make fun of Christianity!
He had never seen the Christian god catch a thief,
strike anybody with thunder, or display any power
He told the lady as much!
The lady laughed and said "The Jesus I am talking about
is different! He told me he had been talking to you
since you were 16 years old! He sent me to you to
tell you he will empower you to do what he told you
to do if you will accept him as your Lord and saviour!
He was stunned!
Apart from his Father, he didn't tell any other person
about the strange voice in his head
The voice never left!
He had only managed to ignore it
He was captivated by the Jesus she preached
The Jesus who told her his secret
He accepted Jesus as his Lord and saviour  
One week later, the Lady gained admission to another 
University to study medicine!
She handed him over to other believers for his discipleship
studies and left
The day the lady left, he felt very bad
He had developed some emotional attachment for her
He was even daydreaming that they might be a couple one day
When he got back to his room that evening
He read Psalm 23 and Psalm 121 out loud
Then he slept!
He saw himself, eyes closed and on his knees
He saw oil pouring on his head from above
He heard the voice say "You are ready now"
When he woke up, he was speaking in tongues!
Everything felt weird
It felt as if the scene he saw took place in his room
The whole room was clouded by a strange atmosphere
He couldn't sleep again
He prayed from 11 PM till 4 AM
When it was 7 AM he woke up from sleep, dressed up and went 
to his village
His parents had gone for a wedding in a neighbouring village
He packed his father's charms, hunting clothes, everything
He threw them on the shrine and ran into the house to get
some kerosene or petrol
He couldn't get any!
He was pressed for time because he wanted to do whatever
he came to do and run back to school before his
parents and other neighbours who went to the wedding
returned home!
He said "If it is the will of God for these things
to be burnt, let them burn now in Jesus name"
Then he remembered where his mother usually kept
the local palm kernel flint
He ran into her kitchen to get it
By the time he got it, everything was on fire
He ran!
He knew the consequence of what he had done
He didn't return to his hostel
He went to the house of Christian brothers on campus
He told them what happened and they all prayed
One week later, the Holy Spirit said "go to your 
Father's house"
He felt it was the worst instruction ever
But he had learnt to obey the voice
When he got to his Father's house
He saw a crowd!
All the hunters and their family members
His Father and two brothers were laid in front of the compound
They were dead!
They had gone hunting the previous night using hunting lights
and all three of them had been shot!
The hunters claimed the "god" of the hunters struck the three
of them dead as a result of his desecration of the idol's shrine
When he got there, there was a sudden silence
They wanted him to see with his eyes the consequence
of the evil he did by burning down the shrine
His mother was cursing him from afar
people restrained her from attacking him physically
He could hear her but her words were a muffled noise
everything was in a blur
He started praying in tongues, his whole body was shaking
He said "The god of the hunters didn't do this,
this was done by wicked men to prove a point
and discipline my family!
But that you may know that there is only one
God and all power in heaven and on earth belongs to Him
In the name of Jesus, I command the living to rise up now!
He didn't touch them, he just stood there
A gentle breeze went from him to the bodies on the floor
The crowd gasped, as his Father sat up, then his brothers
The bullets "gone" and bullet wounds healed
The power of the Holy Spirit rode on the wonder
It was like the eruption of a volcano
The crowd started shivering and shaking
Some started crying while others stood there, dazed!
The high chief of the village and some chiefs
arrived in a bid to see the corpse
They walked right into the atmosphere of power
The high chief fell on his knees in awe
The chiefs with him were knocked down by the power
of the Holy Spirit
He told the people about Jesus
The Jesus whose voice he heard when he was 16
The Jesus who sent a lady to him only for the lady
to move to another school right after he accepted Christ
The Jesus who raised the dead right in their presence
The villagers accepted this Jesus as Lord and saviour

PS: They built a church right on the shrine
he burnt down
The first Pentecostal church in the village
He went on to become a revivalist and evangelist
His ministry was backed by great demonstrations of
power and deliverance of the Holy Spirit
By the power of the Holy Spirit he destroyed
demonic idol shrines and brought the light to
those in darkness
He was blessed with one wife and five children

There are some of us you have heard the voice
or seen the heavenly vision but refused to walk in
line with it and we wonder why our lives are
upside down!
Apostle Paul said "I was not disobedient to
that heavenly vision"
If you have been disobedient to the heavenly
vision, please repent now!
Swimming against the tide will always yield a 
life of struggle and toil!
The wise will always surf in the direction the
waves are headed!
Don't be like Jonah! 
Be Wise!