GHOST RUN (Part 15&16) – OPEYEMI AKINTUNDE

Part 15
GHOST RUN
Opeyemi Akintunde

Three troubling days had passed.

Nonso had shut down about four times but the timely intervention of the doctors restored him back to life. I refused leaving the hospital, I wanted to see to the end of the matter. I prayed all the prayers I knew how to pray. I didn’t mind sleeping on the bare cold floor of the hospital. I felt my presence at the hospital would not let the Adegbile sisters or Bunmi finish their evil assignment.

“ Adenike, you need to go freshen up!” My mother had said

“ I am fine” I said

“ No you are not! You are oozing…”

“ Mummy, I cannot leave here!”

“ No one is asking you to leave here, just take a 2 hours break. Go home, freshen up and return here. Your father and I have been doing that for three days, likewise Nonso’s mother and his siblings!”

“ Nonso’s mother lives just across the street!”

“ Adenike!” My mother said raising her voice and I honestly did not have the strength to argue…

“ Ok mum!”

I left Nonso with my mum. My Dad had gone to the church, while Nonso’s mother had returned home.

On getting home, I took the much needed bath and out of exhaustion, I laid on the bed. I woke up 5 hours later..

However, in the course of my much needed rest, I had a dream.

I saw a land where I was a pastoring a church. The members were quite much. Suddenly, an odd religion surfaced and a man started referring to himself as the messsiah… Some of my members started following the new religion because the man was doing strange miracles and wonders. Although the miracles were not lasting miracles, many still fell for it… Almost all the members of my church fell for the new religion and I kept asking…

“ Why is it so easy for these people to backslide? Why is it so easy for them to throw their belief in Christ away?”

I woke up from the dream! The first thing I did was to check the time. On realizing I had slept for 5 hours , I dashed out of the house without giving my dream a second thought…

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I walked to the ICU, my parents were not in sight and neither was Nonso on the bed anymore.

My eyes were turning, I began to do a 360 turn looking for Nonso. And for the split of a second, I saw Nonso standing before me saying…

“ Adenike, I am sorry! I couldn’t fight it anymore”

I tried to stretch my hands to him but my hands caught nothing…

“ Adenike!” I heard my Father’s voice like an echo…

“ Daddy, Where is Nonso?” I managed to ask but my Father’s response of silence said it all…

I screamed so loud I knew the whole hospital would have heard me. I wanted to just die….

For days, I ate nothing. I cried all day in my room. I wanted to turn back the hands of time. I wanted to reverse back to that day, I made AdeYanju and I go to Mororo… I wanted to undo everything.

On the fifth day after Nonso’s death, I was alone in my room when I had an open vision. I was seeing Mororo in plain sight…

I saw the Adegbile sisters discussing…

“ Stupid girl, in her next life, she won’t dare the witches. This is Mororo, and it is under our guidance, Mororo must continually be in darkness and no light must come in…”

I saw Seun in his Living room…

“ God, I think I will be leaving Mororo. I have wasted my years here, hoping you will prove that you are God and more powerful than Evil, but instead every one that comes here to liberate this town ends up losing their lives or the lives of their loved ones… Is there no salvation in you?”

I saw the witch girl AdeYanju and I saw the first time we got into Mororo, sitting in the forest…

“ I thought they said you are more powerful than the witches, why are the witches winning the Christians… Will Mororo ever be free?”

As I laid on my bed watching , I heard a voice loud and clear…

“ Who will go for me? Who will go liberate my people from the claws of evil?”

“ I will Lord! Please send me!” I said crying …

I laid on the floor weeping and it all dawned on me…

“ If Mororo had received genuine salvation, they would have had the power to defeat the evil ones!”

Two days later, I had packed my stuff after saying a short prayer…

“ Lord, use me for Mororo in Jesus name”.

“I am ready to die and lose any member of my family for Mororo to be free!” I had resolved.

**********
“ Adenike, Where to ?” My father asked

“ Mororo! “ I answered “ And my advice is that you avoid any form of unrighteousness so that you don’t become a prey of the enemy, because nothing is stopping me!”

“ Are you crazy?” My mother said hysterically “Are you in your right senses!” My mother had jumped up at me

“ Solanke, Let her be!” My father ordered my mum…

“ Just one question, Adenike!”

I nodded in response…

“ Do you have the Strength to conquer?”

“ I will not glory in my own Strength, God will give me the Strength I require!” I replied

“ Do you know that God enough for HIM to supply you that Spiritual Strength you need to Work for Him?”

I didn’t understand my father’s question, but then he said…

“ Adenike,but the people who know their God shall be strong, and carry out great exploits. Dan 11:32 New Kings James Version..Adenike, you can only do exploits, if you have the Spiritual Strength that only comes from Knowing God!

I was silent!

“ Adenike, I ask again, do you know God?”

Part 16
GHOST RUN
Opeyemi Akintunde

The question obviously didn’t need an answer. I obviously didn’t know God beyond what I have been taught in church. My knowledge of God was the general knowledge of Who God was; That He is the maker of Heaven & Earth and that He has a son named Jesus who died for our sins and through Him we have the access to eternal life…

That was basically the knowledge I had and I had been recycling this knowledge since childhood. No genuine quest to know God intimately…I couldn’t boast of knowing a lot of scriptures.

“ Adenike, you are not answering me!” My father said bringing me out of my world

“ I don’t know!”

“ You don’t know if you know God?” My father asked and I gave him no reply

“ Then you should know that you are not ready for this trip to Mororo!”

“ But God is sending me there, He asked who will go for Him?”

“ Adenike, I don’t deny that you are called, infact it is a good thing, but passion and zeal is not enough… Adenike!, My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge… Adenike, most of the people who have gone to Mororo were people who were passionate like you but they lacked the deep knowledge of God, hence they were destroyed!”

“ Adenike, I know I have my faults, I was carried away by the idea of having missionary churches like my other Pastor friends. You know it is always a thing of pride when we all gather at the Christian Fellowship of Nigeria and pastors boast about how many mission churches they have established. Also, having Mission churches was a way of making more money for the ministry. People donate a lot towards the mission churches, so after settling the Missionaries, the Church still has more than enough… So all of these got into me and I never bothered about the Spiritual Strength of the men I sent into the field. However, your involvement got me reevaluating myself…”

“ Father! How can I know God, other than the way you have been teaching me?”

“ Knowing God is more than going to church and listening to what others are receiving from God, You need to also receive from God. Don’t be a third party Christian!”

My father didn’t have to tell me to return my boxes to the room. I did voluntarily..

I sat on my bed for days not knowing how to start this journey of Knowing God…

My Father must have noticed how uneasy and confused I was because he came to my room one evening…

“ Adenike, do you remember your best game as a child?”

“ Hide and seek!” I replied as there was no debate about it.

“Your brothers gave you a tough time but you always had a way of outsmarting them!”

I smiled remembering my younger days with my elder brothers…

“ Whenever your brothers hide, you made sure you searched everywhere till you found them. Why don’t you play that game again?” My father said

I looked at my father very puzzled not getting his point..

“ Fortunately in this case, I will tell you where to find your subject of interest…”

“ Dad, I don’t get you, who am I playing hide and seek with?”

“ You won’t be playing Hide and Seek this time around, but Seek and Find?”

“ Daddyyyyy!” I didn’t have the patience for my father’s riddles…

“ Whoever seeks me shall find me… I believe you have been trying to know Who God is , why don’t you seek Him, search for Him and I can assure you, you will find Him?”

“ Where? Where do I find God?” I asked

Father took me by the hands and pulled me from the bed, Like a child whose father was going to show her where her brother was hiding, I followed.

My Father opened the door to a room I hardly stepped into.

My Father’s Library. It was a Large room filled with Different Translations Of Bible, Spiritual books by Spiritual Authors, Books by General Overseers, Books written by Great Men and Great Women of God, Biographies of Generals ….

“ Here you will Find Him!” Was all my father said as he left me in the room and Walked our…

How was I going to find God in over 300 books and uncountable Bibles… I kept turning round with no idea of what to do with the books.

After about 10 minutes of wondering what to do with the books… I randomly picked a book and sat on my Father’s Ancient study table…

“ God… It’s time to play Seek and Find…I am not leaving here until I find you!”