The songwriter tells God in Psalm 63: "Your right hand holds me fast." How can he confidently say that? Indeed, how can anyone know for sure that God's right hand holds him or her fast? It is only by reflecting on the past and noticing extraordinary moments when God came through for us. By marveling at the periods in our lives when only God could have made things right, we are able to say definitively to the divine providence: "Your right hand holds me fast." I have seen such amazing moments in my own life. And in this post, I will share with you a few of them, so that you can praise God with me, for indeed God's right hand does hold me fast. And you too can, inspired by my example, investigate your own life to observe that God's right hand holds you fast as well. Let us bless the Lord, and praise him all our days.
The first miracle I recall took place when I was in elementary school. In the school I attended back then, all children in Elementary Four had to take a test. It was called Slip Test. It was very difficult. Of about 240 children that took it every year, only about 40 could pass. The pupils that passed the test would be awarded double promotion. They would go all the way from Elementary Four to Elementary Six, skipping by the fifth grade. In other words, they would "slip" by the fifth class and enter the sixth and last class of primary school. When I was in Elementary Four and the day for the slip test arrived, I was sick and at home in bed with typhus. And while I lay in bed, my classmates wrote the prestigious test. The next day, partially recovered, I returned to school to learn that the glorious test had been taken. I was very sad. You see, I was a very good student and I knew I deserved to pass the test. However, I had missed it, and I probably would not get the double promotion I knew I deserved. I cried softly to myself. After a while, our teacher called me to her desk. She said, "Onyenachi, how come you of all people missed the test?" I told her I had been sick with typhus. She said not to worry. A couple hours later, our Superintendent walked into the assembly hall to read the results. Of the 42 names called that day, one was Onyenachi Nze. I had passed. I had passed an examination I hadn't even taken! It was a miracle. I have never forgotten it, even to this day. It is the first and only time I passed an exam I never took. God came through for me.
The second miracle I recall took place when I was in high school. Every morning, we students were all expected to report early for Assembly. I was early that fateful morning, and was making my way to the field like other students, when a wicked senior student stopped me. He made me do extra work that kept me late. I knew I was in trouble. The Vice Principal came to the dorms to "catch" late students. He saw me and a few other students in the dorms. Holding out a fat and thick cane, he shouted at us to form a line in front of him. He was going to whip us thoroughly with the cane. Promptly, we lined up in front of him. My heart was beating furiously. I was very afraid. I saw him raise the cane high up in the air and bring it down with such vehemence on each of the students in front of me on the line that the sound the action produced was quite impressive: "Whack!" I shuddered each time I heard it. I prayed to God. I told the Lord of earth, sea and sky to help me. I reminded him that I would not be late, were it not for that pesky senior that delayed me. I begged God to free me, somehow, from the pain of the whipping. For I had seen the students writhe in great distress after having endured the whipping. When my turn came to receive the lash, I stretched out my hand as usual and I saw him raise the cane as usual. I closed my eyes and, in a couple of seconds or so, I heard the word, "Next." Apparently, my turn was over. Had he whipped me? I could not say for sure. I felt no pain. I did see him raise his hand, though, and I heard the word, "Next," which means he had done with me. But I felt no pain. Had God miraculously prevented me from feeling the pain of the whip? Till this day I do not know. But I know that God came through for me.
The third miracle I recall took place when I was in college. As an orphan then, I could not continue to afford my tuition. The way things were going then, I probably would have been forced to drop out of school. I prayed to God. I asked him to help me. One day, after I had prayed thus, I was walking by the Departmental Office when I saw a poster. It was an advert for a nationwide scholarship program. The best students in all of Nigeria were to enter an academic contest, and only 325 out of the tens of thousands - a million maybe? - of students would be awarded the prestigious Chevron Nigeria Scholarship. I wrote an application and sent it in - at least just to try. A few weeks later, I was walking by the newsstands and I saw some people reading newspapers. I usually didn't read the papers, but something spoke to me that day and asked me to. And so I grabbed one of the national dailies and flipped open to a page and there it was: I had been shortlisted with about a thousand other students to take the test. Of the tens or hundreds of thousands of students, only a little over one thousand had been selected to take the test, and I knew that, of the over one thousand that eventually took the test, only 325 would be awarded the scholarship. I prayed hard. And on the day of the test I went to sit with the smartest students in all the country. There were medical students, engineering students, pharmacy students, law students - smart students indeed. And I was simply studying communication. Anyway. I sat and wrote the test. There were two subjects: Quantitative Reasoning and Verbal Reasoning. In the time allotted, I could finish only the Verbal section, and I probably did only half of the Quantitative section. I turned to a student seated directly behind me. I asked him if he was able to complete the Quant section. He proudly said yes. I sighed. I thought I had failed. But God be praised, when the results did come out about three months later, I was named sixth in all of Nigeria, and the boy who said he had done pretty much all the sums, the one seated directly behind me at the exam, was named 125th. God had come through for me again. Believe me, it was that scholarship money that saw me through college.
On the day I was traveling from Owerri to Port Harcourt to take the Chevron Scholarship Test, I boarded a bus that was faulty. It kept stopping and stopping all along the way so that a journey that would ordinarily have taken six or so hours, took the entire day. We arrived late at night. I knew for sure it was the devil. The devil did not want me to take the test the following morning. You see, I had decided to go a day earlier and spend the night with an uncle and then leave from his house to the venue in the morning, because the test was scheduled for 8 a.m. I had obtained this uncle's address from a cousin, and I had taken care to write it down. However, when we reached the last bus stop in Port Harcourt, I could not find the paper on which I had written the address. It had been in my pocket, but it was not there any longer! Weird. I was lost. I began to walk all around the city, asking questions. I was describing my uncle to people: his job, his name, his physical appearance - did anyone know him! It seemed no one did. I sighed. And then I asked for the nearest church in the vicinity. Someone pointed it out to me. My plan was to go to the church and sleep on a pew there. I reasoned that I would be safe inside a church. And so, I made my way to the church building that someone had been kind enough to point out to me. But as I was going there, a voice spoke to me. It said, "Turn left and take the path to the left of the church." I stopped for a moment, and then I obeyed the voice. I turned left and began to walk along the path to the left of the church building. Soon enough I came across three old women chatting together. I greeted them and asked if they knew my uncle. They said they did not. They asked if I did not know his address. I said I did not. I said I realized it was weird to ask for directions to a place without the address of the place. I explained that I had misplaced the address. They said they were sorry they could not help me. I sighed. Then why had the voice told me to make a left turn? As I was about to retrace my steps toward the church, a little boy - he was probably seven years old - suddenly showed up from nowhere. He said, "Follow me. I know the place." I laughed. Of course he did not know the place. A little boy that had not even heard me describe my uncle. But some force made me follow the boy. And we walked and walked and walked until we came to a house. The six-or-seven-year-old boy pointed at it and said, "That is the house. Go in." I laughed. But the same force made me knock and enter the house. As soon as I did, I came face to face with my uncle. He looked at me in surprise and said, "Onyenachi!" I smiled. I had found the house I was looking for. God had come through for me again.
A fifth miracle I remember was also while I was still in college. I was riding in a taxi on my way to classes one morning when our driver began to lose control of the car. Just as this was happening, a huge fuel tanker was coming right behind us. Something told me the fuel tanker was going to hit us. I said to Jesus, "Is this it? Am I going to die today?" I was very afraid. Immediately, I began to say the rosary. "Hail Mary, full of Grace, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus." I prayed and prayed and then, I heard the sound of impact. The fuel tanker hit and threw our car with force off the main road, over the curb, and into the dust on the side of the road. But everyone in the car lived. A couple days later, I offered thanksgiving in church to commemorate the event. A sixth miracle, also concerning surviving accidents, happened to me after college: a speeding motorcycle hit me hard as I was crossing a busy street, but rather than I to fall down, the motorcycle went reeling at least six meters down the road and crashed to the ground. As if I was some sort of strong wall. A seventh miracle still concerning accidents occurred when I went biking on the mountains of Colorado in the summer of 2010. It was my first time. I and my friends drove 3500 feet up the mountains, and then hopped on our bikes and began to ride down. The brakes on my bike were faulty, or maybe I just didn't know how to use them well. And as I was descending at top speed from the peak of the mountain, without brakes, I lost control of the bike and it went speeding down all by itself, bearing me on it, until it swerved right past a stream of vehicles and over the curb to the right and crashed in the dust at the other end of a busy mountain street. I was unhurt. Immediately, paramedics and other folks rushed to me and began to fuss. "How many fingers am I holding up? What day is it? Are you hurt?" And on and on and on. And then one of them said something I will never forget. He said, "Thank your God, mister. If your bike had crashed to the left rather than to the right, you would have kept falling down and down and down 3500 feet and, not only would you have definitely died, your body would have been cut up into small pieces by the jagged trees and mountain edges. No one would have found what to bury of you." Phew! It was a miracle. A bicycle, going all by itself, had crashed me on the right side of the mountain. I was unhurt. Completely unhurt, when I could have been cut into little pieces. God had come through for me again.
An eight miracle I recall happened when I was in college. It was before I won the Chevron Scholarship. I was finding it hard to find accommodation, a suitable dorm to live in. A friend of mine offered me a dorm room for free. Just like that - which by the way was a miracle in itself, a free dorm room - but little did I know that it was a problem dorm. It was rumored that all the students that lived in that dorm were notorious. And when I did move in, I found out that the rumors were true. The inmates of that dorm were bad people: smoking, having sex, doing drugs - they engaged in every filth possible. I was terrified. And I avoided them as much as possible. I pretty much minded my own business. I went to school and church and, when I did return to the dorms, I shut my door and bolted it from within. After awhile though, the complaints about the dorm became too much for the police to stomach and so, one morning, about seven or eight policemen came to raid the dorm. Because I was a loner in the dorm, no one told me about the raid. A few of the guys knew about it and fled. Only about two, and I, were left. That morning, say about 3 a.m. or so, I heard a fist banging on my door. I woke up sleepily and opened the door. Immediately, I saw a flashlight in my face. I looked and saw two policemen. They were holding handcuffs. I saw the two other inmates already cuffed and being led away. The policemen said, "You are under arrest. Get dressed and come with us." I was very frightened. I have never had any dealings with the police ever. I began to get dressed. They said, "What is your name?" I said "Samuel Nze." By my college days I had pretty much outgrown using my Ibo name, Onyenachi, which I had used in elementary and high schools. They said, "Samuel Nze? Are you not the notorious Samuel Nze we've been looking for?" I said, "Oh no, I'm just a simple boy." The said, "Shut up!" I said, "Please, I'm another Samuel Nze, not the one you're looking for." As soon as I said that, a voice shouted from outside, "Samuel Nze? Leave Samuel Nze alone-o!" I pushed past the two police officers in front of my door and went to see who it was in the courtyard that knew me simply by hearing my name. Apparently, it was someone I had met seven years ago. Back then, we had briefly befriended each other. He had told me he wanted to train to be a police officer someday. Apparently then, in the seven years since I last saw him, he had in fact trained and become a police officer, and was in charge of the raid that morning. I slumped to the ground, overwhelmed. It was a clear miracle. The police officers said, "Should we take him?" He said, "No. He's a good boy; an orphan too - don't worry, I'll tell you his story later. Take these other two, and let us go." And so they put the two other guys in the Black Maria vehicle and drove them away. I was later told that each of them paid two hundred thousand naira each (=N=200,000) before they could be released, and it took at least three weeks for them to raise the bail money. And that period was final exams period. Each of them missed all their exams. In my case, I would have languished there, because I had no money to pay such a bail, and I would have missed all my exams and not graduate - I was in sophomore year then. God had come through for me again.
A ninth miracle I recall took place also when I was in college. I was chosen to represent my university, Imo State University, at the Third Annual African Film Festival, in Abuja, Nigeria's capital. I was to produce a documentary film to show at the event. All universities attending were to do the same, and the best university presentation would win a huge cash prize. There are many universities in Nigeria. Could we win? I selected a team of bright students from my department, Communication; as well as from Theater Arts, Sociology, and English, and we got to work. I wanted our documentary to focus on a social problem on campus, and I wanted it to be very good. We wrote a script, and filmed what I felt was a good documentary. But then, the real problem arose. How were we going to pay for about 30 students to travel from Owerri to Abuja; lodge and feed them, and bring them back after three days? I prayed. I asked God to grant me favor. A voice then spoke to me, telling me to go to one of the most popular bus companies in the country. I went to their office. Just me, a young and poor student. When I got to the bus company, I said to the receptionist: "My name is Samuel. I am the leader of Imo State University's delegation to the Third African Film Festival at Abuja. I need your company to sponsor the whole thing." I expected the receptionist would throw me out immediately. Surprisingly, she said, "Have a seat." I was pleasantly surprised. I sat. After she had made a call, she asked me to go into an office to my right. I stood up and walked into the office she pointed out. The man in that office said, "You say you're from Imo State U?" I said, "Yes, sir." He said, "And you want our company to sponsor you guys?" I hesitated and said, "If you please, sir." "Who are you, by the way?" I said I was really no one important, just an ordinary student. The man in the office looked me up and down, and then said, "Come back tomorrow." I was sad. I thought he was just stringing me along. I left the company downcast. The next day I returned and went to the man's office. He had 32 return tickets in his hand, and complete accommodation and feeding tickets at the company's guest house in Abuja, all of which would take care of our travel to and from the event, as well as our accommodation and feeding for three days. Unbelievable. The man smiled at me and handed all these tickets - lots of tickets, I tell you - to me. I held in my hand the transport, feeding and accommodation of 32 people. God had come through for me again.
A tenth miracle that happened to me was when I got my visa to come to this land. Anyone would tell you that to get a visa from Nigeria to God's own country is one of the hardest things ever. I had recently been admitted to Wichita State University and had all my documents in hand: Admission letter; I-20, and GTA letter. But there are people who have all their documents and still get denied visa. I know someone that had all his documents, but was denied visa three times before he eventually got it. In my case, this was the very first time I was applying for visa to go to anywhere. I had never left Nigeria, ever. And I was very nervous. As I drew near the Embassy counter, I saw someone denied visa. The woman directly in front of me saw it happen too. She became frightened and, even though it was her turn, she said to me, "You go." I said, "But it's your turn." She refused to go. And so, in order not to make a scene, I went for the first time in my life to ask someone to allow me to leave Nigeria for the first time ever. As soon as I approached the man at the counter, I smiled and greeted him good morning. He smiled back and returned the greeting. He asked me to tender all my documents. I did. He looked at my documents and looked at me; at the documents and at me; asked me a few questions, and then sighed. I knew he was not going to give me a visa. I too sighed. And then he gave me the visa. God had come through for me again.
An eleventh miracle I recall was the night before I was to begin my journey for God's own country from Nigeria. I had been telling all my friends that I was so lucky to have got my visa, and I would be leaving them. Perhaps it was one of such friends that sent - were they assassins? - to my apartment, which I shared with two roommates. One of the roommates had traveled. It was a two-bedroom apartment. I used to always sleep in the inner room, while my other roommate - the one that didn't travel - slept in the outer room. But earlier that night, for some reason, we had switched rooms. He went and slept in the inner room, and I slept in the outer one. And in the dead of night, they came - about four men in masks. They broke the door - literally hacked it down - and entered. When they entered the apartment, they went straight to the inner room, without even acknowledging the existence of the outer room, where I was, and began asking the roommate: "Where is the money?" I heard the poor lad ask, "Which money?" Perhaps they were asking him for the money I was to use to travel to God's own country. He told them truthfully that he had no money. They beat him on and on and on and on. And they nearly killed him. I need to say that again. They beat him till he was 90% dead. They probably thought he was dead when they left him. And they left. They barely even acknowledged my presence, although they saw me as they were leaving, because I deliberately left my door open. When they left, I rushed to my roommate. You need to see the amount of blood! Some of his teeth were scattered all about the room. Oh, my God. I shudder to recall it. But I realized that that should have been me. The person who sent the masked men probably told them I always slept in the inner room. But God had made it such that I slept that night in the outer room, even though I had not known assassins were coming. The very next morning, I packed my bags and began my journey to this land. My roommate got medical help and is still alive today. God had come through for me again.
Phew! This post is getting too long. There are still very many miracles - I think I will write a comprehensive autobiographical prose at some point in my life; say when I retire as an old man - but let me just share one more miracle. It is the miracle of how I came to live in the seminary, in my religious community. The fuller rendition is contained in the post, If You Don't Know What to Praise the Lord for, Praise the Lord for Me. You might want to read it again. A summary version goes thus: After having searched for a religious community to join, so that my deepest desire of serving God as a priest - the one thing I want most in this life - might be realized, I could find nothing. Until when all options seemed exhausted, I reconnected with a priest friend I had originally met in Nigeria. In the years between when I last saw him in Nigeria and the time I reconnected with him in 2012 in Baltimore, he had become - and currently is - the Superior of my religious community. He took me by the hand - his right hand held me fast - and brought me to the seminary. The day was August 10, 2012. It is a day I will never forget. It was the day I was given a last chance to pursue my priestly vocation, which is the biggest miracle of my life. My Superior is like God to me, and I remain ever grateful for how his right hand held me fast and brought me to the seminary. I think about this man each day, and each day I pray for him. I love him.
So there you have it: 12 miracles, out of many, many more. I just thought to spend today in gratitude, recollecting all the wonderful things God has done for me. I encourage you to do the same. Sometimes, when things get tough, remember who it is that guides, protects and provides for you. Remember all the wonderful things God has done in your life and praise him. It is well. It will always be well, because "all things work together for the good of those that love God and are called to his purpose" (Rom. 8:28). Amen.
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