Heartbreak Hotel

I once fell in love, when I was younger. I had fallen head over heels for this girl. But unlike the ‘usual falling’, God had told me she was the one CLEARLY; and that was when I began intentionally pursuing. The brother zone was my zone prior, but I strived to get out. She’d shared many secrets with me making me swear I’d not tell them to anyone. One birthday, she called me the man that colors her world as she displayed me on her WhatsApp status. Years later, she was getting married to someone else! Yes, you are allowed to laugh!

Hello reader, I am Biggie. Welcome to Heartbreak Hotel. Here’s your dinner reservation:

This is not a Netflix film — no! This is real life! Real … crappy … life!

I will run you through this quick, since it is painful at some points. And perhaps I hoped too much. Perhaps I went ahead of her, and my poor heart got stabbed and sliced without genuine notice! O well, you’ll be the judge of that.

We went to senior high school together, but I was just her classmate. She was one of those christian girls that even the boys with the worst discipline record had their eyes on. Over the years, I was even a delivery boy for those who wooed her. She was prophetic. A dreamer, who rocked her curly natural hair. I too loved and have curly hair, an aspect we both worshipped.

When God had stamped this, I asked for signs to confirm that He was in it. There were confirmations, sign after sign. We went to Javas multiple times. This one time, my rich friend gifted me a ‘dinner for two’ coupon at Serena Hotel for my birthday. I took her and we ate Italian food whose pronunciations we failed to utter. For non-Ugandans, Serena is one of the top five-star hotels in the city. It don’t come cheap!

That day I got cold feet. Later I confessed my love through a WhatsApp text. Those words came from very very far. I had never been so timid in my life! I had never typed something, revised it, edited it, prayed over it, before I pressed ‘send’ hours later.

When she saw the text, she said I was such a comedian. She thought I was joking! I told her I wasn’t. then she retorted, “I don’t even know what to say…”

Pastors used to tell me she would be snatched. That I needed to ‘secure’ her. When I confessed again, she asked me to give her some time to think about it. I wondered why it seemed complicated now … yet she had posted years ago that I colored her world! I thought we had been on the same page! Regardless, I would not ‘secure her’ against her own will. Even God requires an un-cajoled yes and yielding. Another time she said, ‘let me pray about it.’ What would I do! I sat on the bench, awaiting her feedback.

I was … hopeful. I used to go all out on her birthdays: the biggest being during the first lockdown. I broke rules for that. I over posted her on Facebook with captions from Song of Solomon. Ah, I was walking by faith. The comment sections were always on fire. Friends used to say ‘we are ironing our kanzus and gomesis.’ (Traditional wear for customary marriages here in Uganda)

Enter 2021, church was hard on the get-married-young doctrine. It came with some degree of pressure, and some cliques moved with an element of match-making. I’m big headed when it comes to such crucial matters. And no! No one could convince me to get married if God hadn’t laid down that leeway.

My biggest fear came to play. This cool and intimidating dude, blessed with satin beards and charm started escorting her whenever they left church. By the looks of things, he seemed way better off than I. I told myself, “The Lord maintaineth my lot.” Little did I know that ‘the lot’ had begun being ‘un-maintained!’

Enter March’s end, I cornered her, as the sight of them together was wrecking me. Of course it was via WhatsApp: ‘So what’s with you and that guy?’

Point blankly, she said, “Oh. Him? We are dating! … for marriage!”

I fainted!

I prayed in tongues for three hours. THREE! So that I downloaded the right state and emotions for my response. Politely, I texted back how I had been in line as well.

“But you’ve never made your intentions clear!”

AH!

“You love every girl the same!”

AHHHH!

But I didn’t take ‘every girl’ to Serena! And even if I posted some, I posted you the most. For goodness’ sake you used to see the comments. You were teased with me.

I pulled out all the receipts. Thankfully the evidence was in the past chats. I slid whatever she always told me when I confessed. That’s when her voice notes turned shaky, filled with stammers … Eventually, she apologized;

“I … I am sorry man. But it’s now too late.”

She added, “I even prayed about it, and I felt … nothing.”

But why did you then say I had never made my intentions clear! But also, that ‘praying and God saying nothing’ slapped me.

Things happened so fast from that point on. My best friend died after a brutal sickle cell episode. I used to pray with him, and he consoled me well, especially when she had said I was such a comedian;

“O Biggie, we funny guys are never taken serious. Even when we are dead serious.” He said.

I stepped down from ministry as well due to some misunderstandings and misrepresentations of me. At 2021’s end, her engagement befell and later, her kukyala pictures went viral in the church groups. My inbox was so full of questions. (Kukyala is a formal visit by the bachelor to the spinster’s home).

We shared a small inner circle group from high school, and there she invited all of us for her introduction ceremony very early. I asked God what to do. He suggested I attend, because if I didn’t, and came up with an excuse, I’d be labelled. Most mutual friends just pretended like there hadn’t been a history. Her family just went mute.

I attended the intro and the wedding, boxing up soooooooo many malevolent emotions and thoughts. Please read that again. Soooooooo many emotions and thoughts. The devil was having a number on me. I never knew I would get that vile, that vicious, that wicked.

So this was what heartbreak felt like? I see how victims end up killing their supposed partners. That shame!  

I was led on. I wish I’d been told I’d never amount to a boyfriend, as opposed to being given hope. Only for it to shatter. Now I hated the greatest three! I hated faith. I hated hope. I … I hated love.

I hated every wedding I attended in that period. I was still bleeding! With every tuxedo, gown and entourage I saw, I was seeing something I could have had. It felt like having a miscarriage and being invited to a baby shower shortly afterward. It felt like getting divorced in the morning, and attending a wedding jubilee in the afternoon. It would be giving BIAS left right and center. I was way beyond prejudice.

I contemplated celibacy. Because what the flip!

Why am I overreacting? I’m not the first to go through this, right? O but … that ingredient of ‘the Lord told me.’ I WAS MAD! PSYCHO! HOW COULD HIS WORD HAVE FAILED ME! I had considered all men liars, and Him only true! How about ‘my word will not return void until it accomplishes what I please (or what I sent it to do)’?

I wished something dramatic would happen as the vows were being exchanged. I imagined the church roof collapsing in! I don’t think that was my thought. But then again, I embraced it. The church which was once my hill of happiness, had become the valley of my sorrows. A factory of tears! I was depressed. They laughed at me. All of them that told me that she would be snatched: fellow brethren!

Snatched!? — But she was never mine! She never said yes to anything. She is innocent. Was I bipolar now? I had several opinions and voices and moods and swings in my head.

I kept showing up at church, smiling: plastic smiling! You see, when you are such a good actor, they just can’t ever know. They whispered in the halls, ‘But Biggie is the happy kind. He’ll get over it. He’ll be ok.’

The wedding went well. No drama befell! That was when all hell broke loose.

‘See … your God lies.’ The devil said, and from that point on, I blocked God out. Whenever He said something, I’d say, ‘But you lied last time. And now I am ashamed. I am a joke to the hall of faith.’

You see we christians claim so much of ourselves until the hard circumstances or incongruencies befall. What happened to ‘love your neighbor as you love yourself?’ God would ask. Even when I was mad at Him, His word would challenge my thinking. ‘You see I love those two as equally as I do you. So you can’t expect me to ‘bring down the church’ over your childishness. If it comes down, she’d also not make it, you as well. A loss for all!’

ARGH!

I wanted my anger justified. But as Bill Johnson says, we all must face the aspect of God’s Lordship. He’s a father yes. But He’s a master too. A commander of some sort. He said that if we love Him, then we have to obey His commands. Will you obey His commands even when you were thrown under the bus?

My biggest breaking in this whole phase was not that I had lost. It was believing scripture like ‘all things work together for the —’

‘SHUT UP! What good can come out of this?’

I was breaking glasses and plates in my head. I deleted our pictures together. I was those people in heartbreak songs, who either burn memories ingrained in photos, or cut in half every one that reminds them of smitteness or the Eiffel Tower feels.

Because you lost, in that ONE event doesn’t mean the integrity of God’s word should be doubted or questioned. Job teaches us so. He abides faithful, and He has exalted His word above His very name. God’d only take a lap, and return to me in gentleness.

What made me angrier were the church people who came like Satan through Peter saying, “Are you sure God spoke? Are you sure it wasn’t a familiar spirit?” When I prophesied nice things, the same said I heard God superbly. Now that things were controversial it was a familiar spirit???

If I had a gun with me, I’d have shot them! I’d have punched them! O the fury that I had to contain. It is those questions that made me push God away farther. Trying to defend Him was hard. No wonder some leave Him. Some have left church! Others have gone back to drinking and smoking!

My trust of Him was shaken mightily; but He said to me ‘Do not be moved.’ And even when I made my bed in hell, there He was. To make me feel better, during one of those days, He told me, ‘You have to forgive people for not choosing you. You’ve also broken someone else’s heart, or refused to choose someone. But I chose you anyway.’

In the days before the storm ever thought to stir, I remember God asking me, after a mockery flew in the air by a pastor; ‘What if what he says passes? What if the girl is taken? Would you still trust me? Would you believe that I spoke?’

That question passed over my head, because no threat had surfaced. Now it returned, and He sought for the answer I handed Him back then: That I would trust with all my heart. And that I would not lean on my own understanding. Oops! Easier said than done.

***

My story isn’t different from what you have read before. ‘Why did you tell the world about something you were not sure of?’ you’d ask. I believe Abraham and Sarah were in my position. Firstly, keeping quiet about God promising you descendants through angels is something hard to do. As you tell of the angels, the listeners would ask, ‘Did they just come to show face?’ … and if you said ‘no’, they’d ask for the exact reason as to why they came. Noah was building something no one had ever seen. When he was asked the reason, he said it would rain. It had never ‘rained’ from the sky. The ground was always watered by some underground deeps. That rain took 120 years to come. Noah told people who saw up to their great grandchildren, and still no rain had fallen. He was a joke to many generations … And so to answer the question; faith can make you tell the world.

If someone promises you a cheque of a million dollars within a week, however timid you are, you can’t keep such news to yourself especially if the person who promised keeps their word. Even if you keep quiet, questions will arise. Noah couldn’t hide the fact that he was building a huge titanic. That is something that is going to be seen by everyone.

Same goes with faith. It would be hard to keep it to myself. Of course I learnt not to tell those that don’t matter. But even one person told, could whisper to the birds, or to the walls that have ears. Or maybe, I’ll keep it off social media next time.

Others argued that God had to tell the girl too. But did God tell Sarah to go sacrifice Isaac. How about Mary? Did Gabriel appear to both her and Joseph simultaneously? No. Even when the twins wrestled in the womb, Rebekah was told: the younger would be served by the older. Isaac didn’t receive this intel at all I believe. Otherwise he would have called Jacob to bless instead of him applying witticisms of his mother, to pretend to be Esau. I know it might appear that I am defending myself, but I am simply letting you know the lessons I learnt so that we avoid stereotypes in regards to situationships. Perhaps to the unvisited party, peace could be their sign from God.

I didn’t tell her ‘God said…’ because she had told me many people had come saying the same. I asked God to instead confirm His word so that I don’t go by the cliché card, and I believe He had, through the favor I received in the sight of her family members.

The hardest pill I had to swallow was that of will. God partners with humans to bring to pass sometimes. If the widow who owed much didn’t borrow many jars as Elisha instructed, her sons would have been taken as slaves. If Ruth didn’t obey Naomi, she would have remained a widow. If Esther didn’t inquire of Hegai, she would have missed the X factor the king was looking for. For Hegai served the king for years, and so, he knew what tipped the king off, and what turned him on.

In the same way, a friend told me God usually offers. If a person rejects it, He might offer another chance or eventually move on when the grace runs out. I used to say God has power over any man’s will as He forced Jonah to go to Nineveh. But let’s also remember that Jonah had chosen not to initially. Some cases are just different.

My conclusion of the whole matter, is to watch out for the creeping of the seed of darkness which turns us against God’s word in whatever trial. Friends told me to leave church. But had God told me to? No. Christian friends justified my bitterness, while God echoed Mathew 6:15 at the back of my mind: If you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. When I hated weddings, He reminded me of Romans 12:15: Rejoice with those that are rejoicing. So, I had to throw out my selfishness. For love is not selfish.

Do not also think marriage is a horrible institution just because you think you lost.

This whole thing was never about losing. It was never about what was seen, but the unseen. It was a test to see if I’d obey still … if I’d trust still … If like Job I would say ‘though He slay me, yet will I TRUST Him’ … If I’d lower God’s word, to a level of inferiority: the thing that would not pass away even after Heaven and earth did. How foolish would it be, if I chose a relationship that was earth bound over it.

You could have been hurt, but if your LORD commands you to love your enemies, then you should. The other thing I learnt was to separate God’s other children, from the word ‘enemy.’ 2 Thessalonians 3:15 advises. They are your siblings in essence. The true enemy is the devil, so don’t let him divide your side of the kingdom, for you shall not stand. Many of us are out here fighting one another within the body, having been distracted from the actual great commission. Of course not everyone in the church is ‘perfect’, but play your part as a disciple of Jesus.

When my eyes were opened to the actual battle, my shame departed. But the test continued. I bumped into the couple individually at church occasionally. But I didn’t have the maleficent thoughts as years before. It’d be uncomfy, and forgiveness may not be as easily executed as easily spoken about, but staring any of them in the eyes, very up-close, was some sort of progress.

That is when you realize, that you have transfigured, into a Jesus of some sort. The whole event killed a part of me, and revealed God’s nature in me. Did He not forgive those who crucified Him even before they did! This happening in you feels like ‘letting His kingdom come’, and ‘His will being done on earth as it is in Heaven.’ Because, if you are going to see those who hurt you in eternity, forever … what’s the point of holding onto grudges?

Pastor Jerry Flowers said, “If you are not ready to commit, be okay when someone else is.” I also feel maybe the girl would have desired marriage quicker, which I wasn’t up for. That institution requires lots of preparation in my view; stable income and all, which I hadn’t attained. Plus, I’d reasoned with God what age to get married at, and it was still ahead.

We should as well move on, if someone has entered a covenant with another person. It is dangerous, for the ‘God-told-me’ person to continue holding onto the past. He is a God of contingent plans. If Abel is massacred, He’ll bring Seth. When Ruth lost Mahlon, He prepared Boaz.

But then, all the while, if you know a friend who has gone through this, be slow to speak, lest you trigger some emotions. Be sensitive and empathetic and gracious. Also, if you are new friends, maybe letting your friend know about such is important, otherwise they’d not know what could spark you off. Healing takes long for every individual. If you are a victim of this, please, return to the master’s feet. Camp under your first love’s pinions. Even fellow christians are capable of the worst advice you’d ever receive, just like Job’s wife. But while at Jesus’ feet, if He doesn’t tell you to pursue anyone … don’t! If He stays silent, suffer your feet from any motion as well. You mustn’t go if not commanded. Remember He is your LORD. Your captain. Hearts are such fragile things to keep healing and shattering again. The next time you glue it back, one shard could be missing, leaving a hole in your heart.  

The insesitivity I received was when some people who knew my story, got themselves smoothly married and then started teasing me with that whole bawdy humour and grotesque texts like ‘Marriage is so good. What are you still single for?’,’Getting married is the best thing that could happen to you.’

ARGH!

I shook it off however. I have as well faced insecurity. As the healing continued to happen, and God remained quiet, other close girl-friends would talk to me about their stalkers or people interested in them. I suddenly felt like all of them would be taken leaving me without potential suitors. So the temptation to manipulate them came. Who knows, mayhaps one of them could be my wife! But then again, my Lord hadn’t said anything in that regard. I had to rebuke myself before he would and let go of any lasso I had bound round them.

Finally, victims, please tread carefully! Wait on Him, and continue to trust, trust, and trust. May He help you not only heal, but to walk His talk: to live the forgiveness He requires of you. May His power aid, resuscitate you, and dry your tears, surely even if slowly. Receive your quickened healing from the balm in Gilead who has nothing He can’t heal or fix or restore. May your next partnership be divinely steered having no man to owe but God’s Spirit (Eliezer) Himself.

I pray for your partner (even you who has a clean slate), that when they manifest, that there will be clear closure, that your relationship will be covered, graced and evolve into a beautiful and pure marriage, that will weather all storms and never smell the odour of divorce. And may He make whichever thing has happened to you, to work together for your good. May He weave every strand of torn piece into a new colorful coat of many colors, called Beauty for Ashes, In Jesus’ name.

Thank you for visiting; and I do hope you did enjoy this five or six or seven-course meal.

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1 Thessalonians 5:15-18, 23 See that no one renders evil for evil to anyone, but always pursue what is good both for yourselves and for all. Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. ‬‬

Abstain from all appearance of evil.