Stories From The YBC (Charles's dilemma)

During the youth Bible class one Sunday, whilst discussing the authority of the believer, the study veered towards succeeding and failing. And this raised a lot of questions in the young people’s heart.

Seated in a far corner by the left was Charles, a 21 year old university aspirant. His internal thoughts was most chaotic. The discussion at hand probably held him captivated. Certain life situations left him perplexed. He had being applying for medicine and surgery in two  of the renowned universities in the country for 5 years now and every year with no admission letter left him feeling more discouraged than the previous.

“Success is part of God’s divine nature and as a partaker of that nature by the new birth, you are programmed to succeed in all endeavours” Mrs Hills, the youth teacher went on. “And you young ones, how do you define success; by God’s standards or the world’s?”

Mrs Hills’ words permeated his thoughts leaving him in a deeper state of confusion. He found it hard to understand why he couldn’t succeed at something as basic as a university admission.

After the Bible class, some of the youths gathered round at the back of the hall and were discussing in clusters. In one of those groups was Charles with three of his good friends; Paul, Steve and Victor, and they made remarks on what Mrs Hills had said earlier.

“To first succeed in a task, one must discover its purpose”, Steve the fair slender boy of 20 said. “You can only measure your success when you fulfil that purpose. Let’s take for instance guys, if I was born to be an architect and I’ve been struggling all along to become a petrochemical engineer. If I finally end up being that… and maybe even do okay at it, from the outlook of things you would call me successful right?”

The other guys nodded in affirmation, except Charles. Steven’s words struck a chord in him. ‘Becoming a medical doctor was that what God really wanted from him? If so, then why the challenges.’

As if in answer to his internal dilemma, with a booming baritone voice and a small lilt, Paul continued “the first thing is to discover purpose and firmly hold on to it, as Steve rightly mentioned. But, a gross misconception of ours is thinking that once you’re on the right path, there won’t be obstacles. That’s not true. Success rarely comes to us on a platter of gold. Most times, we toil as hard as the miners, digging up the gold with which we coat the plate life hands us.” Being one with a respectable level of experience, the other guys listened with rapt attention. “You guys remember when I wanted to buy my car a year ago, how my dad fought my selection of Toyota over Benz. But guys, I knew what I was going for, I persisted.” “That’s a practical example of what I mean”

Victor laughed really hard as he tapped him on the back. “You had to use that example didn’t you? Trust you to treat everything with a sense of humour”, he chirped.

He reminded the boys of what troubling time it was for Paul when he decided what to do with his first substantial saved up money. His father didn’t take it too well when he battled him on that singular decision of a car choice. But according to Paul, it was his own way of showing his father that he was gradually becoming his own man. It was a rude shock for Mr. Pat, who found it hard treating his grown son as a man; he always saw him as a child.

As they mulled over Paul’s comment, Charles sunk deeper into confusion. ‘So, it was possible that being a Medical doctor was part of God’s plan for his life and he would still go through this much difficulty? Five years and still no silver lining? What was he doing wrong?’

The boys made comments on other matters as they started walking to the bigger hall used for main service. Arsenal, Victor’s fave club had lost a game to WestBrom and there was no way they were leaving without Steve rubbing it in humourously. Those boys were always up in each other’s face. They all laughed along heartily.

As they got closer to the hall, certain things were settled in Charles’s mind; He had to find out in clear terms, what God wanted of him–academic wise and keep persistent in his pursuit of it. While having his faith geared up towards God, remembering that he has received from him all that pertains to life and godliness… even the ability to be successful.