Nigerian pastor he opened up about his habit from his youth as a Christian, admitting that what he once considered a spiritual obligation ended up upsetting the people around him.
Sharing his experience on Facebook, he reflected on how his zeal and lack of understanding made him believe he was being persecuted whenever others complained about his loud early morning prayers.
“I thought I was being persecuted”
According to him, he often woke up early to pray out loud and considered it part of a meaningful quiet time with God.
However, he later realized that his prayer sessions became disruptive to the people living around him.
The mother complained of harassment
Recalling an experience at home, the pastor said his late mother repeatedly complained that his early morning prayers were affecting other people’s sleep.
However, his father usually defended him, insisting that he should be allowed to worship in the way he understood at the time.
In his words: “In our youth, as Christians, out of zeal and ignorance, we tortured people, and when they reacted, we thought we were being persecuted.”
‘I could wake up early in the morning and supposedly have a rich quiet time, but I turned the supposed quiet time into a boring noisy time.
‘Times became so noisy and boring that everyone in the compound except those who sleep so deeply were disturbed.
‘We lived with our relatives at the time, but their silence may have contributed to their love for me and probably to their fear of hearing me babble in unknown languages.
‘But my late mother was not the type to be silenced like that. So she complained and talked about how I disturbed people’s sleep early in the morning.
‘Merciful God, knowing that childishness is my problem, allowed my late father to defend me.
‘The late dad told the late mum to leave the boy alone.
‘He told her that if the way a boy can pray to get an answer from God is to put his head on the ground and raise his two feet, then so be it.
‘Once in my fourth or final year on campus, I got up early in the morning and went to the laundry room of our hostel to pray.
‘That supposedly quiet time unknowingly became quite loud and my hostel was then Eni Njoku among Franco’s hostels in UNN, which was dominated by engineering students, one or a few students couldn’t stand the annoying noise that early morning.
‘Therefore, without coming to meet me, they started throwing stones in that direction from a distance.
‘Fortunately, the place was somehow sheltered, so the stones couldn’t reach me easily, but the sounds of the stones let me know that the quiet time had turned into an annoying noisy time.
‘If any stones fell on me and hurt me, it could be considered persecution, when in reality I was the one who was ‘bothering’ them, and they decided to bother the troublemaker as well.
‘Now I can no longer bother Her Majesty while I am in the same room, because my Quiet Time, there is no time for noise and boredom.’
Look below;
