Enter the Cozy Road to the 21st Century, or the Road to the Past:

Fiction

The talk of the town on a Sunday night was that twenty-six year old Moyola had gone mad.

She is one of my closest friends, and we literally grew up together in the same estate. I hadn't seen her since Thursday night when we went to buy suya* from the mallam down the street. The rumor was spreading like wild fire. At the market place, where I was trying to get some tomatoes, the town women were talking and laughing about Moyola's new madness.

So I decided to walk down the road to her house, which was only a stone throw away from the market place. I hadn't walked too far when I saw her. She was sitting under a tent by the roadside, right in front of her house. I looked inside the tent, and there she was. She was wearing a loin cloth, a long strip of cloth wound around her waist and in between her legs. A loose tunic was hung over the loin cloth. It was gathered up in a bunch around her shoulders, and also tucked in at the waist with a leather belt. The rest of it flowed gracefully towards her feet. Two alabaster flasks lay at her feet; they were filled to the brim with oil.

"Moyola, what is wrong with you? What are you doing?"

"Shalom Anu. Shavua Tov."**

"What? Is this your new way of speaking to people? Have you gone mad?"

"You don't get it, do you?" she asked me with tears in her eyes. "I have chosen to live the way the women in the bible did. This is my new lifestyle. I want to feel the way they did when God spoke to them. I want to dress like them, walk like them, and talk like them. Anu, please let me be."

* * * * * * * * *

The Road to the Past:

A lot of Christians are still living in the times when the Israelites had to fight with swords and spears. The days of Abraham, Moses, Elijah, Deborah, Ruth, and Esther. What we don't understand is that even as God was with them in those days, He is with us now in the 21st century. Rather than walk the same paths that the men of old did, we need to enter the cozy road to the 21st century.

"...of the sons of Issachar who had understanding of the times, to know what Israel ought to do, their chiefs were two hundred... (1 Chronicles 12:32)

The Road to the Present:

When you read your bible, do you see Moses parting the red sea or do you interpret your own red sea as a 21st century "challenge" that you have to overcome? Do you see Esther being chosen as queen, or do you see yourself selected above your peers? The occurrences in the bible are not meant to remain in the past. There is a requirement for us to translate those experiences into our 21st century experiences. We are the "sons of Isaachar" of our own generation, and we need to have an understanding of our own current events. People think the bible is boring, but it is the most exciting thing when you're able to apply it to your life right now.

How do you interpret the bible when you read it? Do you get stuck in the past or do you relate God's Word to today's events? What are your thoughts?

*Suya = roasted skewered meat

**Shalom = peace (Hebrew)

**Shavua Tov = wishing someone a good week (Hebrew)

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