Exodus 90/Day 10: I updated my bio…
And in doing so, thinking of what I would really like to be remembered for.
Four years ago I traveled to Nigeria to see firsthand the country my parents came from. I joined the paramilitary forces and lived in Nigeria for one whole year. I went there thinking I was going to gain such unusual experiences and turn them into a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. I still might. Four years later I am yet to complete that novel not for lack of material but for lack of vision.
“Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he.” — Proverbs 29:18
I still don’t know what the experience of being in Nigeria meant to me other than it brought me closer to God. In Nigeria, I was told and saw with my own eyes, a man has few options, either he chases money or he chases God. While there, the boys that chased money were only interested in me because I was a foreigner and an American. But there was one man, who everyone called “Man of God,” that took a liking to me and sat me down to read the Bible. He was, I believe, some kind of prophet. He was wise beyond his years. And he is quite literally the only person I remember vividly of my time in Nigeria.
Man of God. It was a nickname. It rolled nicely off the tongue. And when you said it you said it with oomph, like, “Man of GAWD.” Like all nicknames, they eventually embody the subject they are attached to. This friend of mine became truly the first example in my life of a man that lived his life according to God. That is both his name and what I know him to be. And that is such a lovely thing to be. A man of God.
I wrote my bio today. It was blank before. I didn't know what to put because what I want to be known as seems so far away. I would like to be known as a man of God. For that to be written on my epitaph.
Amen †
