The search for atonement from sin on Good Friday

easterIn churches, particularly in the Catholic ones, Jesus’ body hangs on that terrible wooden cross, nails dug straight into his feet, his hands and on his forehead. You can see the shape of his ribs. During his crucifixion, the Jews dressed Jesus with a crown of thorns, to mock him because he had repeatedly told them that He was the Son of God.EVERY year, when Good Friday comes close, I feel sinful and guilty. I see the image of Jesus on the cross and I am drawn towards His suffering. He died for my sins.

Not everyone’s sins. Mine and mine alone. There are many sins that I have committed knowingly and unknowingly. Then there are those sins that I have dreamt about, imagined or possibly fantasised about.

Without atonement from all these sins, I am bound to be sent away to the devil and burn in hell fire, muGehena, forever, after I am dead. I really do not want to spend the rest of my days when I am dead in the company of the devil. He is not a particularly pleasant character to be with. Every day, he bothers me with various temptations. Sometimes, when I am trying to move nearer to God in my spiritual journey, I hear Satan the devil whispering words to tempt me. He says, “Drink this wine. Tell this lie. Adam and Eve did not eat an apple.”

On Good Friday, I am reminded of the suffering of Christ more than any other time during the year. In churches, particularly in the Catholic ones, Jesus’ body hangs on that terrible wooden cross, nails dug straight into his feet, his hands and on his forehead. You can see the shape of his ribs. During his crucifixion, the Jews dressed Jesus with a crown of thorns, to mock him because he had repeatedly told them that He was the Son of God.  Instead of covering him up decently, they put a loin cloth around him, like the nhembe cloth that our ancestors used to wear before the missionaries came and told them to cover up. How could the Jews have done that to Jesus?

The Bible says we were all born sinners because Adam and Eve sinned in the garden of Eden. Then Jesus’ death and resurrection brought us salvation from sin. Many of us believe that. But, sometimes I go through these troubling doubting moments of disbelief and lack of faith. What if Adam and Eve had not eaten that apple?

I never used to ask all these questions or even doubt what the Bible says. But wait. I am not a heathen nor am I a non Christian. Far from it. I have a long personal history with Jesus Christ. As Easter draws closer, I am happy to share my testimony. In doing so, I hope to feel less guilty and sinful when I see images of Jesus suffering on the cross at Easter time.

I first heard about the Good News and salvation from sin, when I was still living in the village homestead. In those days, I went to St Columbus Anglican School. My name at birth was Sekesai. Sekai for short. The priest called Baba Mutemarari preached about our sins and prepared us for baptism and change of name from an African one to a Christian one. He said you cannot be a new person in Christ unless you abandon the native name and take an English Christian one. A full understanding and recitation of the Nicene Creed was mandatory before any one of us could be baptised with a new name.

For weeks, we read the Nicene Creed in preparation for baptism at Easter time. Looking after goats, herding cattle, fetching water, going to school, we memorised the Nicene Creed. Even after so many years, I can recite it in Shona: “Ndinodavira kuna Mwari Mumwe, Musiki we Denga nepasi . . .”

In English, my memory is even better: “I believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen. We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one being with the Father.

Through him all things were made. For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven: by the power of the Holy Spirit he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary, and was made man. For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate, he suffered death and was buried. On the third day he rose again in accordance with the Scriptures; he ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end . . .”

Because I passed the Nicene Creed, I got baptised with a new name called Irene. It was Greek and not English. But nobody knew that.

At the Methodist boarding school, two missionaries called Miss Hutchinson and Miss Davies were ready and waiting to receive and educate many village African girls like me. They were old, having spent years working, preaching, teaching and mentoring Africans. Because God called them to bring light into the darkness of Africa and convert African sinners, the missionaries never found the time to get married and have children.

I am forever grateful to them for teaching me English, needle work, baking cakes and gardening. They wanted me to be a good Christian wife. I would have been a good one if I had followed their teachings. But then again, what could they have known about the qualities of a good wife without ever having married anyone themselves? Sometimes you have to experience marriage in order to advise or counsel anyone about it.

I am not sure when I stopped going to church regularly like I used to do. Over the years, when I was moving around studying and working in the UK, Australia and the USA, I backslided in my faith. Unlike here, over there, I saw many empty churches. In Australia, for example, there is a beautiful church in Melbourne that has been converted into a bar. The bar is called The Church. On Good Friday, you see people drinking, dancing, smoking and having so much fun in this bar. They seem to forget that Jesus died on Good Friday. I recall joining them once or twice during my student days. Then I felt so guilty and full of sin the following day. Where did all these feelings of being less pure and guilty of sin start?

Before knowing about Christ and his suffering on the cross, I did not feel as guilty of some sins as I do now. In fact, I was not guilty at all. Seriously, growing up here in the village before the Nicene Creed and change of name, I think I was just fine. I knew what was right and wrong from the village elders. Anyone of the adults had the right to discipline me, even if he or she was not my mother, aunt or grandmother.

In those days, the elders referred to a good person as munhu, meaning he was a human being with certain behaviours and characteristics that made him a good human being. Munhu. This person was imbued with the goodness, compassion, respect, honesty and the dignity of the human being, munhu ane hunhu.

In simple English terms, hunhu meant a philosophy or belief in “being human.”  A bad person was referred to as a human being who lacked humanness, haana hunhu. He had no ethics or morals. Hunhu was the African foundation of our value systems, our intense humanness, caring, sharing, respect and compassion,  a philosophy of African life rooted in the world of  our ancestors and connected to God, Mwari Musikavanhu.

Jesus Christ and the idea of sin came when hunhu was already here.  We embraced Christianity because when you compare it to our hunhu, the Christian religion was not bringing anything totally new or alien to our belief system. Jesus’s teachings served to compliment hunhu. And they still do.

If I had stayed with just hunhu and no Jesus, I may not feel so guilty of sin especially around Easter when I see the suffering face of Jesus on the cross. If only Adam and Eve had not sinned and caused us all to fall short of the grace of God. If only they had stayed away from that apple.

What if I had never known Jesus? But I really should not ask that because I know Him now. Since I am so fortunate to have grown in a Christian country and to have known Jesus early in life and the atonement that He brings, why then, do I not simply follow Him and live a totally upright life, caring and serving the poor, forgiving those who sin against me?

I still want to believe in “hunhu” because this philosophy of life makes me feel happier with no fear of hell after I am dead. At the same time, when I look at Jesus on the cross, I feel an urgent search for atonement from sin on Good Friday.

Dr Sekai Nzenza is the CEO of RioZim Foundation. She writes in her personal capacity.

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