Every Human Being wants
a better living. If human
beings were to see God face
to face, they would have
poured their hearts to Him who
designs their destiny. There is no
need of dabbling into horoscope to
know our destiny. Once you are born
your destiny is grounded in God.
There is no guessing work, no going
to fortune tellers or “Babalawo”
to know your destiny. With years
passing away, our life rolls away
and every year is full of Struggles,
our ups and downs in life, and no
one likes to remain the same. Man
needs a change after scrutinizing
his life in the year that is ending.
Man’s hope is in the God of tangi-
bility, the God that deals with his
problems here and now. Not God
of “ex- machina” but he is a God of
patience and a God of concern in
spite of our atrocities. He is a God
that does not deal with us as we are
and does not judge us according to
what we do, otherwise nobody can
escape his judgement. The creatures
of God operate a New Year ritual
where they re-affirm their loyalty to
God. Every person expects God to
come into his life situation and bring
newness of life to him and prosperi-
ty. Nobody likes to experience again
what had happened in the past,
especially bitter experiences, just like
the Israelites that say “we cannot go
back to Egypt again”. So the ritual of
the New Year is very spiritual and
existential and it involves humility
before God to forget our rotten past
and contradictions of life. It is a time
for sober spiritual reflection and
sincerity of heart, to God of mercy
to help us resolve the contradiction
of our lives. In his “Sitz in leben”
(life situation), he says good bye to
the past and welcomes a life rooted
in justice and peace. He promises to
avoid divide in the community of
God and dehumanization of individ-
uals created by the God whom he is
supposed to serve. There are many
miserable people today in the world;
it is not God that put them in that
situation. There are many people
who cannot eat a three square meal
today, there are many people who
lost their shops and means of liveli-
hood, and it is not God that caused
that situation. There are many people
whose rights are trampled upon
by oppressive regime. There are
many people who lost the election
because of election mal- practices.
There are many people who assume
the position of authority through
wrong means and fabrication of lies.
All these people are expecting God
to allow them enter the New Year
and live. The rich would beg God
to allow them enter the New Year
and continue to live their lives. But
continues a life of intimidation of the
poor and continue amassing wealth
at the expense of the poor? If man
reflects honestly, and sees the new
year as a crossing over to new life,
new way of thinking, acting and new
ways of seeing each other globally,
“life go better.” Man promises to
change and in a twinkle of an eye, he
goes back to his former way of life
because he is not sincere, or because
he didn’t make proper New Year
resolution. If man, makes a honest
new year resolution there would be
less conflict, less xenophobia, less
racism, less killing of others and less
political bickering. If our politicians
make real New Year resolution, they
would show concern for the average
man. And if the Christian politician
goes to new year mass and hears the
priest preaching about the qualifica-
tion of entering into a new year, he
can come out to be a good politician
who understands that being in pow-
er is to empower people to be who
they are and not intimidate them
by their wealth and power. In the
senate, the Christian politician does
not gang up with those who have no
respect for human rights and their
fellow citizens wallowing in poverty
and misery. The Christian politician
is in politics to help his constituency
to strive for a better life. His own
conflict of interest should not jeop-
ardize the life of his people. If he is
voted when he was in PDP he should
not change party as he changes his
dazzling cars for social respectability.
It is not enough during this Christ-
mas time to give his people Rice
that is a scares commodity which
they cannot buy because of boarder
closure. Bad politicians package well
when there is economic depression
and when they feed the poor, they
tend to have power over them. The
government of today should not
put our lives in jeopardy through
political rhetoric and imperfect
interpretation of when the economy
would boom. Heavy amount has
been approved for the renovation
of National Assembly complex
while the educational sector is un-
der-funded. Boarder has been shut
against economic goods and trade
with plans to open it for the influx of
people of likely questionable char-
acters. Our country would change
for better if our politicians have true
change of heart and embrace morality
and good conscience. This New Year
is a year where we can cooperate
with God and make Nigeria a better
country, where our country men
will feel happy and when Nigeria’s
National Anthem is sang anywhere,
they stand firm singing the national
anthem without mimicking it. This
year would be a year when all of us
would make positive resolution that
would lead to a change of hearts both
individual and the government.