By Charles Ighele

My personal plan for my life was to marry early. And when I came across a girl during the last year of my stay in secondary school, I made up my mind to grow with her and marry her in the nearest future. The relationship was not sexual at all. The love was so much that I will begin to lose weight when I do not see her. I could hardly eat.

There was a day something happened and I thought that she was dead. I was preparing my mind to kill myself when news came that she was very much alive. The instance I mentioned above is the only time in my life that the thought of suicide ever crossed my mind. I give thanks to God that I did not kill myself because of love that was blind.

In order not to make a short story long, I wrote the West African School Certificate Examination (WASCE) and it turned out to be a fiasco. Who else did I need to comfort me than the girl I was blindly in love with? Instead, she sacked me. She sacked me!

I went back to my parent’s house. I put on Jimmy Cliff’s music titled, “That’s the way life goes.” I put on another one titled, “Not now, no baby not now.” I was almost sinking into depression until I asked myself, “what is wrong with you?” It was then I decided to pick up the broken pieces of my life. I decided to rewrite WASCE and I had one of the best results in the school. From there, I went for my Higher School Certificate (HSC) and finally, my university education.

I did not blame the girl for sacking me. We were of about the same age and I think she did not want to marry somebody who cannot pass an ordinary West African Certificate Examination. One or two of my readers out there would also not have wanted their daughter to marry somebody who cannot cross the school certificate hurdle. But I made up my mind never to fall blindly in love again.

It was much later I began to see that I, Charles, was blind and that love is not blind. When I looked back, I saw that the signals that I was making a fool of myself were all there, but I was too foolish and blind to see the signs. In Judges 16:4, it is written “and it came to pass afterwards that he (Samson) loved a woman…” In Judges 14:1-20, Samson had earlier fallen blindly in love with a girl. He kept ignoring all the signals, including attempts on his life because he was blindly in love. There is nowhere in the Bible is the adjective “Love is blind” used to define love. “God is love” and His love for you is not blind.

I pray that anytime any member of your family is blinded by love, and begins to do stupid things, God will send someone to rescue him or her so that he or she will not become permanently physically blind and harmed like Samson. Love you!

• Bishop Charles Ighele is the General Superintendent of Holy Spirit Mission, Lagos.