When Life Begins at Forty.

There are certain scriptures in the Bible that guide my everyday conduct, aspirations, and life as a whole. Deep words they are, they tell me that there is a God, there is destiny, my days are numbered, they tell me my path is cut out before me, even before I was born, even though I still have to work out my own salvation. They tell me there are books written concerning me, and every second that passes in my life is as written in those books, as long as I am willing to submit to the push of destiny and the will of the most high God.

Psalm 40:7 says “Lord I come, in the volume of the book as is written of me.”

Job 23:14 says “For he performs the thing that is appointed for me, and many such things are with him.”

Matt 26:24 says “The son of man departs as is written of him…”

I have also deciphered from the Holy Scriptures that God speaks sometimes through repeated statements or occurrences. Job 33:14 says it all “For God speaketh once, yea twice, yet man perceives it not.”

This scripture led me to begin to perceive that certain ages, for certain agents, carry heavy implications. Take the age thirty for instance. Joseph was thirty years old when he became the Prime Minister of Egypt though he had seen it in dreams as a teenager. Also David was thirty years old when he began to reign as King, though he had been anointed since the age of seventeen! The Lord Jesus also began his ministry at thirty, though he had known his mission before he was twelve years old! This seems to tell me, that for certain agents, Kings by God’s ordination, the age thirty is the age of coronation.

Over the course of my life I have become irretrievably drawn into public affairs, much like my biological father. I have come to admire the lives of certain individuals whose comments, lifestyle and mission greatly influence me. They are mostly activists, or rebels by man’s estimation, but under the teachings of the great Pastor Tunde Bakare, I have understood that these men are part of the pillars by which God establishes human kingdoms. He taught, through his message, “The leadership Style of Joseph”, that these men who I so admire are called The Order of liberators. They are born with a natural hatred for injustice and oppression. Anywhere they see these evil vices, something in them rises up to fight and speak against it, usually at the expense of their own lives. But, as Pastor Bakare taught, God raises them up whenever the original pillar of the founding fathers has been shifted from position. They are God’s judges, they speak fearlessly to power, and they fight doggedly against oppression and injustice. I grew up to admire such men, and becoming a young man, I unwittingly began to demonstrate the traits they exhibited. I need not be told, that my calling is along this path, for what moves them moves me, I hate to see oppression. I hate injustice. The Bible says oppression makes a wise man mad (very angry). And in my little way, I decry it in my writings, for that is the voice that God has given me yet especially as it has to do with the oppression of the people by the political ruling class in my nation Nigeria, and across Africa as a whole.

Some of these men include by order of preference, Thomas Sankara, the man I call God’s best gift to Africa yet, former leader of Burkina Faso. A man who fought against French domination and imperialism on the African continent in his lifetime. At the same time, he inspired his people to achieve great things in his days. Without fear, he spoke to the West and declared no African nation need pay back her debt, for we were too poor to do so. He inspired his nation to clothe herself, feed herself, and build her own railway tracks. The West was scared of this young revolutionary, they set him up against his own childhood friend and Sankara was slain.

Second is Malcolm X, one of the most misunderstood black men in history, but a hero in my estimation. I consider him a hero because of the untainted love he had for God (as he knew him). The discipline he held in high esteem which caused him to turn his back on his mentor. His willingness to change philosophies and outlooks after his visit to Mecca where his eyes were opened and he realized that he had been misled and had misled others for years. A fiery and valiant fighter for the rights of Afro Americans in the 1960s, many say he preached hate. But I never consider him as a preacher of hate, for he grew up a victim of hate. Hate slaughtered his father. Hate burnt off his house. Hate scattered his family. Hate sent his mother into the asylum for over 26 years. Hate sent him on the streets at the age of nine and forced him to steal to cater for his sisters. Hate killed his people by hanging and execution without a crime, hate raped young teenage girls of his color without getting justice, and when they protested and expressed their desire to be treated as the human beings that they were, hate sprayed them with hot water and used police dogs to bite them. The summary of his message was this, “Be gentle, be courteous, respect everyone, but if someone puts his hand on you, send him to the cemetery.” He did not know any better, for Islam was the first religion he discovered in jail. In it he found solace, from a lifetime of oppression and bitterness. While the Christians of then had manipulated the Bible to foist intense oppression on him and his ilk. He too was slain by members of his Islamic family.

Third is Martin Luther King (MLK), by far the greatest of all. A fountain of knowledge he was and a gift to the black race. He was the opposite side of Malcolm X. They fought for the same basic cause, but approached it from opposite ends. Malcolm X wanted separation, MLK preached integration. Malcolm X preached an eye for an eye; MLK preached non violent resistance, a course in which you must be willing to accept blows without retaliation. But thank God for MLK, for he became the moral conscience of the American nation. He was attacked and jailed, beaten many times but the strength of the love in his heart overcame. He conquered hate with love. And had it not been for him, there probably would have been genocide against blacks in America then if they had resorted to taking up arms to fight their course. MLK ate the bread of life, for out of his belly flowed rivers of living water. Till today, millions across the globe listen to his speeches, read his books, enjoy from his wealth of divine knowledge and take inspiration from him. He never lived for many days, but he has outlived all in his generation, for though dead, yet he speaks, every single day. At his Mausoleum in Atlanta Georgia in America, now a tourist attraction called The King Center, thousands throng from different ends of the earth to see where he lay, immortal. MLK was slain for what he believed in, an event he had predicted a few hours before it happened.

Fourth is Che Guevara. Che Guevara is not an African. But he was a revolutionary sent to awaken the consciousness of Latin America. An Argentine by birth, as a young man he rode a motor cycle across Latin America and saw firsthand the poverty being experienced by the people of his region. This poverty was right under the nose of the most powerful and prosperous nation on earth, the USA. This engendered deep anger in him as he discovered that the poverty oppressing his people was traceable to certain political and business policies of the USA and the entire western bloc. He teamed up with Fidel and Raul Castro to overthrow a Pro West government in Cuba and began a great work at rebuilding Cuba. So great was his anger that it is reported that even Fidel Castro had to contain and curtail his bitterness against imperialism. Che believed the whole world need a revolution from the grips of the West and was more than willing to fight as a mercenary anywhere in the world against western domination, directly or indirectly. He was in the Congo; to fight alongside Laurent Kabila against the West backed Mobutu in the sixties. All across Latin America he fought for his beliefs many times at great detriment to his life and health for he was asthmatic. His anger was not properly guided and managed. He died in the midst of fighting in the capture of Bolivian forces trained by the American CIA. Till today, the world follows the life and times of Che Guevara, revolutionaries can never forget him and he is an inspiration to many till this day.

As I grew up and studied the lives of these men, I noticed a sad trend in the manner they all died. But this observation never did hit me and become a truth in my heart until I visited The King Center in Atlanta Georgia, in the USA. I spent three days in that location, entering every room, reading everything, taking pictures of almost every object and listening to many of the speeches of King that are not on YouTube or other media. As I listened to one of such speeches at the King center, suddenly my observation became a truth that my spirit testified to. What was this observation that became a truth? All four of them, these revolutionaries, Thomas Sankara, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Junior, and Che Guevara all died at the age of 39! One single year before the age of 40! Sankara died at 38 though, but that could be approximated considering the other trending parameters.

That day as I drove back home. I began to wonder, why 39? My feelings had to be true. If the Scriptures were true, and every man’s life is written in God before they are lived out, much like reeling out a story board, why did he write the age 39 for most of the world’s leading revolutionaries? Around that same period, a final confirmation came to me that sealed up all my doubts! I had opened up the Sahara Reporters website to look up happenings in my nation when I stumbled upon the recent story of the murder of yet another freedom fighter in my nation. He did not have as much international clout as the four mentioned above but he was a gift to his people, the people of Abia state. As I read the story of the life and times of Chidi Nwosu and the brave steps he took in his lifetime. Sorrow overwhelmed me at the loss of such a jewel. This man had fought his state government to a standstill on many charges of corruption and many of them he won! A one man riot squad in his community! However, as is characteristic of revolutionaries like the ones that lived before him, Chidi Nwosu was murdered in the most gruesome manner right in his own home with his wife and children listening to his cries as he was tortured to death by his assailants. What was most shocking to me was his age at the time of his murder; Chidi Nwosu was 39 years old!

“For God speaketh once, yea twice, yet man perceives it not.” At this point in time, I had no more doubts in my mind that this was yet the voice of God speaking through similar events in man’s history. Men who knew their purpose early in life, and followed it with intense passion, men who fought for a better life for others, men who led people even where angels feared to tread. Many of them died just before their 40th birthday. When I remembered the significance of the 30th birthday as reflected in scriptures, I knew that there was something about the 40th birthday as well.
If I ever attend a person’s 40th birthday celebration and I had a chance to speak, this is what I would say to the person. The 40th birthday is a birthday of re-appraisal. The man who said life begins at 40 did not know all the stories I laid above, but he spoke of things greater than his knowledge at the time, for that statement is almost a hundred years old! The 40th birthday is given for anyone who has never lived a life of purpose, for any man or woman who has lived his life pursing what to eat, drink and wear alone without a sense of purpose and destiny. The 40th birthday is a gift to such a one, a special gift from God and God is saying to such a person. “Begin again! You have lived for yourself the first half of your life, now live for me and the purpose for which I have created you into the world.” That is when, life truly begins at 40. That is when deliberate living begins, when one begins to pursue his reason of existence, and not just the ephemeral enjoyments of this transient world. 40 is an age that could still be classified as youth, no wonder the Bible says “Remember the Lord in the days of thy youth, before the evil days are come and thou shall say, I have no pleasure in them.”

For any man or woman, who has known his purpose before the age of 40 and lives beyond that age, God seems to be telling such a one, “Keep on, there is yet a great assignment and great glory that awaits you. Do not relent, there are many whose deliverance are tied to your destiny, and you must find them and deliver them.”
I thank God for my life as I know exactly why I am here. I was born for the transformation of my nation and Africa at large. This transformation must be spiritual as well as in the living standards and conditions of Africans as a whole. Africans need to turn to God and eschew the evil of greed, materialism and wanton bloodshed; we must embrace God and the spirit of love. Africans must also rise and cast down all age long yokes of poverty, oppression and bad governance that currently pervade the land. I believe there is going to be a thing such as the great African renaissance and it is right now upon us. Africa will yet be better than it is now. Black people will be respected across the length and breadth of the world. Nigeria will yet rise again; we will overcome all our challenges. The blood of many revolutionaries that have been shed in times past will not be in vain, for justice shall cast away injustice in the land, light shall overcome darkness. And deliverance shall be obtained for the peoples of my continent and my nation.

If I ever live to be 40, for I know that the path of my destiny is not an easy path at all, but If I ever live to be 40, I will thank God and celebrate it in a big way. I will also speak about this message at such an occasion. But if not, then may God be glorified for long life does not necessary men the longevity of days, as far as I am concerned, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Che and Thomas Sankara even though lost their lives at 39, have outlived many of their generation who died in their 80s and 90s and are today unsung and unknown. Today, videos of their speeches are watched all over the world, books have been written about them and youths of all colors and hues take inspiration from them. For me, that is long life! Though dead, yet speaking…..