CWRC Anthology

HATED WITH SO MUCH LOVE

©2023 by Christine Chinyere. C. EzealaChristine

The school bell rang signaling the end of school for the day. Students immediately started moving their desks and packing their things, giving little to no regard to the teacher still trying to get them to listen to his last point.

It wasn't that long, all he had to do was explain the last point on the board, but these students were really a handful.

Mutinta felt a tap on her shoulder and instantly sat up. She had fallen asleep again and that too during a biology class.

She sighed and looked at her friend, Sally, who woke her up. "Tinta, what's going on, why are you always falling asleep these days?" She asked, standing up and throwing her bag over her shoulder.

Mutinta did the same and rubbed her eyes, "I can't help it, I barely have the time to sleep these days. I just have a lot going on."

"But you should try to get some rest, plus, what is it that you do once you get home? I know you do a lot but you should at least be able to get a few hours sleep."

She adjusted her bag as they started walking home, "Can I tell you something, Sally? It's no longer about the hours of sleep I get. I have to wake up as early as four to clean the house and when it's around five thirty, I start to cook school food. When that's taken care of, I have to deal with bathing and getting Chansa and Mumbi ready for school. I come to school, learn and go for tutorials up to eighteen thirty, then once I get home I have to start making dinner. I try my best to study and finish my work, but by the time I finish, I don't even get enough time to sleep."

Sally looked at her sympathetically, Mutinta was truly going through a lot with the situation at home. 

She remembered how Mutinta used to be active and smile each and every day, but the smile gradually became an unreadable expression when her parents decided to separate.

She and her two going on three year old younger siblings had not seen their mother in months. "Tinta, what about your dad? Why doesn't he hire someone to help with those things?"

Mutinta kept quiet and Sally knew something wasn't right, "Tinta, answer me," she asked again expectantly. Mutinta looked up to prevent her tears from falling. "I haven't seen him in two weeks." 

Sally gaped at her in shock, she knew Mutinta's father had countless issues that were the main reason her mother and him separated, but to leave his children was something else.

"Why didn't you tell anyone? He could be missing, you might find out he's been kidnapped or something."

"He isn't, he left a note on the table last time I saw him telling me he would be back soon." She looked at Sally and the tears strolled down her face. "Why is my life like this?"

Sally hugged her, feeling tears spring in her own eyes. "Don't cry, it's okay, it's going to be okay, God is in control."

"How can you be so sure? It feels like God's abandoned me. I feel like all my prayers have just sunk and fallen."

"Mutinta, God hears, just keep praying, he's after all the God who makes a way." Sally said, pulling away and leading them to the side walk.

"Sally, you know what I did and how I disobeyed God." She said furiously, wiping at the tears. "How can He forgive me after what I did?"

Sally sighed remembering what her friend did some months earlier. 

It was after the separation between her parents and she was totally shocked.

And it's at such points in life that the devil takes the biggest advantage of us and creeps in unawares.

It was at this time that he decided to bring confusion into Mutinta's life.

She became silent in class and wouldn't even talk to Sally. 

One Friday, she was about to leave school when Daniel, a boy categorized as one of the cool kids, walked up to her.

She was confused and surprised that he even came to talk to her when he didn't even bother to greet her in the mornings.

He smiled at her, a smile that seemed genuine to her. Or so she thought. "Hi, Mutinta, how are you?" He asked and she smiled replying that she was okay.

"Um, I've been noticing that you have become very quiet and I know it's not my place to ask what you are going through, but I'd like to be a friend during this time, if you want?" 

She looked at him skeptical about the change of heart but smiled nonetheless, "um, sure, that would be nice." His reaction was an even brighter smile and she couldn't stop herself from smiling as well.

They became friends on that day and he would talk to her each day afterwards and within a few days, they became close friends.

This closeness led to her being introduced to another group of people but little did she know, she was getting into something entirely wrong.

A day came when the entire group of friends decided to skip school and go out. That was where she got introduced to substances she wasn't supposed to be introduced to.

She began to take them excessively and skip school more often. This began to worry Sally, her teachers and her father. 

It got to the extreme when she came home drunk in the middle of the night and her father had been looking for her since morning.

When she got back he was waiting up for her, eyes tired and bloodshot.

He was furious and when he asked where she'd been, she ignored him and began to stagger towards her room.

He roared with anger and furiously pulled her back which led to an argument.

During the course of the argument, she grabbed a glass cup and threw it at him. He dodged it but it hit someone else. It hit her two year old brother who woke up due to all the shouting.

That was what it took to bring Mutinta back to her senses, she begged her father for forgiveness, begged her little brother who was admitted to the hospital for forgiveness and begged God, who she had forsaken for forgiveness. But the pain of her actions stuck with her.

Mutinta began to cry harder, "Sally, God hates me, He hates me and that's why I am going through all this, He hates me and that's why He won't answer my prayers, He can't answer the prayers of a sinner like me."

Sally looked at her for a while, mentally asking God to give her the right words. "Mutinta, how can you say that? You act like you don't know that God loves everyone, He loves me, you and everyone and that's why He gave us His son as a sacrificial lamb. Our past in sin doesn't matter, it's our present in Him that matters. He loved you when you were lost, that's why He created a way that you may come back to Him. He loves you now as well." 

"But if He does, why am I going through these problems?" Mutinta looked up at the sky. "Do you know that being in Christ does not mean we'll have a happy life? No, rather we have persecution and problems but it's the way we go through the situation and handle it that shows where we stand in God."

"Mutinta, rather than looking at the problems, try looking at the blessings. That you still have food to eat and clothes to wear, that God still provides and keeps you safe in your dad's absence. As a Christian, situations may say God hates you and has abandoned you, but that is when you smile through the storm and look at the little things, no matter how small it may seem that God does and say to your situation, "if God hates me, never have I been hated with so much love."

When Mutinta got home that day, she took time to examine her life and thanked God for His loving kindness upon her. She thanked Him for the little things and prayed for His strength to withstand the troubles.

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