EVERY NEW DAY COULD BE THE LAST DAY -Part 1! During some funeral service a boy on the same bench with me whispered to his friend who sat on the front bench: “If Jesus wants to get some people in this village, let him come on a day like today, during the funeral.” I pretended not to be listening and the boy continued, “Everybody is really praying!” His friend smiled, signaled to him to keep that till later and closed his eyes in the ongoing prayer mood. I couldn’t help pondering over that statement. Even people who are normally rare in church usually appear at burial prayers. For some it may be their only prayer attendance in a year besides Christmas day and probably some wedding ceremony, or during Bishop’s visit! Anyway when it came to the prayer known as “the Our Father who art in heaven,” everybody prayed in unison, gently and most sincerely. It sounded more like Our Father “who art in this tent” than “who art in heaven!” When I turned round I saw more or less the same “repentant mood” in the other tents as well. There are more prayer experts at the funeral than are present at Sunday services! Even when the catechist prayed some longer prayers, you could feel the silence, except for some little movement from the makeshift kitchen area under the mango tree across the compound and also from some shifting of chairs in the VIP tent where some late arrivals “from other similar functions” kept arriving. Whenever the catechist said “We make this our prayer through Jesus Christ our Lord” you had to be there to hear the most sincere “Amens” not heard on normal Sundays! It was “Amen” from the heart! Some man on our bench would even raise his eyes skywards, briefly but solemnly with slightly raised open arms, as he would say his Aaamen. I’m sorry to have observed him when I was also on my part supposed to be deep in prayer, but it was inevitable; you just had to notice him! The other mourners in our tent also noted him, also because he never usually appeared in church on Sundays. Good day. (Tomorrow we hope to continue this post). ERIC E E OKIROR.
Posted on: Mon, 01 Jul 2013 14:13:09 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015