Why do we have so much grievances and hatred in our families? Africa is known for communal living and sharing. But now we pretend to be at peace and live a communal life when it is obvious there are unresolved grievances among us.
As usual, some ladies are going to crucify me for saying this truth, but the truth must be told. Women contribute a lot to hatred and quarrels we have in our families. Some of these grievances and disputes started ages before our grand-parents were born. We try to make things up and live like nothing is happening while they exist.
As children, we were made to believe that every adult must be involved in the proper raising of children. We see adults who are in no way related with a child take up the responsibility of discipline whenever the child misbehaves even in the absence of the parents. What we see these days are adults who sit and watch a goat die the wrong way.
I want us to look at those destroyers of family relationships. These things are the reason we have two brothers fight while their wives make their negative contributions from behind. My reason for talking about this today is for us to make amends before things get out of hand.
Don’t forget, the family is the smallest unit of the society. If things are wrong in our families, the society will be in chaos. If there is peace among brothers and sisters, there will be peace among villages, states, and the nation at large.
THE HEART: I always tell people to learn to pray against the wishes of their hearts just the way they pray against their enemies. Our greatest deceiver is our hearts. It is your heart that feeds you with negative information about things that don’t exist. Your heart tells you someone is looking at you and does not like the sight of you simply because you saw her looking in your direction.
If you don’t deal with your heart, it will destroy you. I want you to understand today that the heart of every man is naturally wicked and deceitful and is capable of destroying you. As a woman, your heart will tell you things against your spouse and your in-laws.
When your man leaves the house, your heart takes over with the music of infidelity even when the man is faithful. I know a good number of men are unfaithful and with the kind of stories I hear these days, the devil has taken over the hearts of many.
A man you trust, believing he doesn’t step out of the house is right there in your house committing all sorts of atrocities just like the story I heard last week-a man sleeping with his seven and thirteen year old daughter, leading to the death of the seven-year old. This is a typical example of what we call “household enemies”.
In the midst of all these, there are still some decent men with high moral values. I pity these ones when I see the kind of women most of them are married to-Jezebels. If you are in control of your heart, you will not be tormenting the man once he leaves the house. If your heart is in a very healthy state, you will not spend time trailing a man who is busy with his business meetings. An idle mind, they say, is the devil’s workshop; get busy.
Some women go the extent of sending spies after their men. I heard about a girl who asked her friend to watch her man while she travelled abroad. On getting back; the lady took over as the new girlfriend. Another asked her sister to move to her place while she travelled on holiday with her kids. On getting back to Nigeria after summer, the sister was pregnant for the man.Today; she is out of her home with her children while the sister lives in her house.
The earlier you learn to trust your man the better for you and your relationship. Stop pestering him for no good reasons. Stop suspecting every move your in-laws make in your house. Stop monitoring them whenever they step into the kitchen. They are not trying to kill you. Your friends told you before you got married, not to allow your mother-in-law into your house. I hear girls shamelessly say they don’t want to get married to a man whose mother is still alive. My constant reply to this madness is: your own mother will also die because another girl somewhere will be praying for her death.
SELFISHNESS: A friend recently said something that I totally agree with. Most men we see as selfish and stingy are not. The fact is that they get influenced by their wives. I heard people now pray for female children simply because they need someone to take care of them at old age. A good number of men forget their parents the moment they get married. I know it is not their wish to do so, but the selfish women they get involved with won’t let them be.
Selfishness has destroyed love and joy in so many homes. I see some women cry about the uncaring nature of their husbands towards their people. In most cases, it is what you give in that the man gives out. How do you expect a man to love your own family when you don’t always want his own people around?
You keep moving from one prayer house to the other in search of prayers against your mother-in-law. Your sister-in-law is on her own side praying against your own mother who happens to be her mother-in-law. As this continues, you find out that everybody is virtually praying for somebody to die.
It is selfishness that will makes you to buy a N5,000 lace for your mother-in-law while you get the one of N30,000 for your own mother. Selfishness will make you not to be happy the moment your husband’s relations come visiting. In fact, some women go to the extent of plotting evil against their in-laws. You stole your man’s money, but there you are laughing because your brother-in-law is being thrown out of the house for an offence he did not commit.
Woman, it is selfishness that makes you bring a little girl from a poor home and leave her to be trekking to a public school in Lagos while your own kids who are older are being chauffeur-driven to the best private school in town. What will it cost you enrolling that girl in a cheap private school? I don’t care how good a Christian or Muslim you are, if you are guilty of this, your religion is in vain.
JEALOUSY: A lot of families have been destroyed due to jealousy. I have seen homes where the men are happy with each other, but their wives are not in talking terms with each other. This is wrong.
Jealousy will make you go round the town trying to paint someone else black while you remain the saint. Jealousy, if not properly addressed, can lead you into many other sins. Jealosuy is a thing of the mind and when it starts from the mind, it leads to hatred and hatred leads to so many other sins against humanity.
How do you feel when you see that other woman in your family show up in that event well dressed? How do you feel when your sister-in-law moves into a house that is better than yours? What goes on in your mind when you have the children of your own sister do better than your own children?
I have seen people do certain things against their own blood sisters. What pushes you into going about town spreading rumours against your relation? When that woman next door joyfully comes into your house with the news of her daughter’s marriage, how do you feel? Are you one of those who will go behind to say things against the poor girl just to stop her marriage? This is why I tell people to find things out themselves and go ahead when they feel they love a girl because even her sister could be jealous of her and then destroy the relationship with lies against her (household enemies).
African Culture-Wrong Orientation
Our cultural system hasn’t helped issues in some ways. We are raised to believe there are people we shouldn’t relate with. I am not talking about the Osu of a thing in my culture because I see that as complete madness. Children are there paying for something they know nothing about.
I want to look at this from the angle of generational hatred and bickering in families. Some people grew up to avoid certain people in their families and towns because their great grand parents had issues with them. Shouldnt you be ashamed of yourself for making yourself a part of something you know nothing about? I don’t care how anyone feels, but people who know me well know I can never get myself involved in all those rubbish.
This demonic practice has even moved from families to villages and towns. There are people, young men and women, who have walked out of wonderful relationships simply because the parents said they don’t marry people from a particular area.
Some people grew up with the mentality that someone is after them. They were made to believe the old woman next door is a witch because all her children died and she is still living even when she is above 100 years old.
Why did our fathers do this to our African society? We were taught not to eat in people’s houses to avoid being poisoned. And we are gradually passing the same mentality to our children. I was telling a friend sometime last week the reason for my refusing to buy cake for someone marking his birthday. I avoid doing that because of the negative mentality of Africans. If you give him the cake and suddenly there is stomach pain, you are the cause.
We see people from other cultures share things in common during festive seasons. They eat freely wherever they find themselves. But here we are living in bondage and avoiding everyone because our family says so.
Prayer Contractors
The prayer contractors we have in Africa are not helping us. This is why I don’t go to people to pray and see visions for me. God is also my father and in one way or the other, He will speak to me.
I see people who patronise these ones get confused with time. These evil perpetrators have ignited the fire of hatred; bitterness and malice in families. You don’t expect anything different from them when you patronise them because all they specialise in is destruction of peace in our families.
Haven’t you seen men avoid their wives and even send them packing because one liar in the form of a man of God said so? I have seen even children run away from their parents because one evil man was able to penetrate into their home.
Ladies, we are the mothers of the nation. If we decide to bring peace into our families and the nation, there shall be peace. But the problem is that we are the ones igniting those fires of hatred, jealousy, wickedness, and selfishness.
Let us have a change of heart and train our children with the right mentality and attitude towards one another. If we can strive to raise godly seeds who will be filled with so much love in their hearts that they have no place for bitterness, the world would be a better place to stay.
