I’m a daughter of a Pentecostal pastor. Let me tell you a little of what that means. You wake up at dawn with a worship song blasting from Daddy’s speakers. You look at the time and it’s 4:30 a.m. No one tells you what that time means. You saunter through the darkness of your room, looking for slippers. You turn on the light, look in the mirror to see if you’re well dressed to fellowship with God. You open your door, walk slowly into the living room and join other family members in prayers and exhortation. When you’re two minutes late, you’ll hear a knock on your door and a voice that seeks to cast the evil of lateness out of you.

We were three sisters. I’m the youngest. We were brought up the same way, to marry the doctrines of the church and give birth to the holy spirit manifestations in our lives. My senior sister, Georgette, never had a boyfriend until she completed university. Because you can’t have a boyfriend when Jesus is in your heart. He’s a jealous God and doesn’t want to compete for affection.

Georgette found a man in the church and their relationship was keenly monitored by my mom and dad until the day they had a wedding and left home to live their own lives—life they were admonished to allow Christ to be at the centre.

All through those periods, I was tasked to look at the lives of my sisters and emulate same. So apart from the teachings from the Bible, I also had to allow the lives of my sisters to teach me. Whenever they did something that pleased God, as my father used to say, my mom would call me and tell me about it and say, “This is what God wants from his daughters.”

I didn’t have a boyfriend until I completed university. I had crushes. There were beautiful men I saw that held my heart bound but I saw it as the sin of the flesh so I prayed those crushes out of my life. Jonathan came close. He touched me and I melted under the care of his soft touch. All day I was thinking about him; “He touched me. Jo touched me. Does that mean he loves me the way I love him? Is that his way of proposing to me? Then yes, Jo. It’s a yes for me. Be my boyfriend.”

In the night when I was alone with my thoughts, I broke down and cried. I’d given the Christ in me a competition and I found it sinful. The lives of my sisters came to the forefront of my thoughts so I asked, “Would Georgette do this? Did Jessica fall for a man’s touch when she was like me?” The answer was no. So that night, I prayed the crush away and asked God to take Jonathan away from me as if he was the cup Jesus prayed against the night before his death; “God, take this cup away from me…”

I was one of the lucky few who had a job immediately after service. My job was out of town so one day, I packed my things and left home to begin my life of work.

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Before leaving, Dad admonished me to look for a church that teaches the true gospel of Christ and join as soon as I got to town. Mom, the most worried parent at the time told me, “When you finally find a church, allow us to talk to the pastor. We’d like to hand you over to him so he can continue with what we started in you.

The first month in my new town, I attended four different churches before settling on one. I settled on this church because it had a vibrant youth system that had been tasked with the leadership of the church. I wanted to be part of that system so I stayed.

On my second day at the church, a gentleman wearing a black suit and looking like a curated groom walked up to me. His name was Elvis. He said, “You’re new but haven’t introduced yourself to the church—no need to hide. We are a family here. We like to know our new members so we can take care of them. What’s your name? Let me take you to meet our pastor.”

He became a friend, Elvis. And because he was the youth president, he invited me to every program the youth organized. He made me a Sunday school teacher to ensure that I was in church every Sunday.

One day I found myself in his house. We talked about our love for God and things of the church. I found myself cooking for him, sleeping on his couch and later sleeping in his bed. He hadn’t proposed to me yet but he made it obvious that he liked me.

One evening I was in his place watching a movie with him when the light went off. We both screamed, “Oh!” But we sat still, hoping the light would come soon. Minutes later, the light was still off. I felt his hand on my lap, searching for my hand. I put my hand in his and leaned on his shoulder. He kissed my forehead and said he loved me. I didn’t say a word. I was only screaming in my head, “Can you do that again? The kiss on the forehead.”

Before him, it was only my dad who had kissed me on the forehead. The feeling was different yet the same. I felt protected, loved, owned. I said yes to him and that night, the light came back on to find us naked in his bed.

I quickly rushed for the sleeping cloth to cover my skin while he turned away from me, looking for a hiding place for his own skin. We were like Adam and Eve, the night they tasted the forbidden fruit. We didn’t hear the voice of God screaming from the ceiling asking us what we’d done. We got pregnant a month later.

I was so disappointed I wish I could disappear. I thought of my mom and how disappointed she would be. I thought of my dad and how he’d deny me as his daughter. I thought about my sisters, Georgette and Jessica. I thought about the church and what they would say. I thought about God and his intentions about the pregnancy. I felt ashamed, the black sheep of my family.

Elvis had the shame of his own when I told him. He had his own thinking to do but one thing we didn’t think about was what happens to the pregnancy. We didn’t think about it because there was nothing to think about except to have the child.

The first person we confided in was our pastor. He was young and a friend so we thought he would understand us. He said, “You’ve brought shame to the church. The elders will meet and decide your fate.”

I called home to inform my parents. As expected, they were very hard on me. My dad called me a disgrace and my mom asked me not to come home again until the right thing was done. I asked, “What’s the right thing?” She answered, “The man has to come home as soon as possible to marry you before the pregnancy begins to show.”

I loved Elvis but I didn’t think of marriage when I thought of him and I didn’t believe we should marry because of the pregnancy. While fighting the shame on the left, Elvis was fighting it on the right.

The church elders met and decided our fate. We were called in front of the leadership and that day, Elvis lost his position and I lost my Sunday school teaching job that I did for Christ. They told us we’d been excommunicated until further notice.

Like Adam and Eve, we also came at the junction of our fate where we faced our own version of ejection from the Garden of Eden. But we still loved God so we didn’t travel far from his presence. We decided not to attend the church again but rather look for another church that would see our sins and still welcome us into the fold because God is the father of the righteous and a caregiver of the sinner.

Instead of going home to see my parents, they came to visit me, met Elvis and questioned his standing in the faith. My dad asked him to marry me. He said he would but would not do it in a rush. Dad asked when he intends to and he told him after the baby was born.

My sisters called lambasting me for my decision to shame my dad and the church. If they could, they would have denied me a place in the sisterhood. We were pressured but we remained calm in the spirit, knowing problems pass, stormy waves get calm, life goes on.

Elvis’ family was very receptive of me. They are elders of the church but they didn’t throw us away like everyone did. They shared the Bible with us. On Sundays, we went home and they shared what they heard in church with us.

I was seven months pregnant when I went to visit Elvis. We were watching a movie when he got up and went outside. A few seconds later the light went off. I looked around and realized the neighbouring houses had light. When Elvis came back I told him his prepaid was finished. He sat next to me in the dark, placed his palm on mine and I froze.

The night we got pregnant started flashing through my mind. I asked, “What?” He said, “It’s been a roller-coaster for some time now. Thank you for not giving up and thank you for carrying our baby safely. But let me ask you, “Will you marry me?”

He knelt on one knee and held in his hand something that looked like a ring. I wasn’t seeing well. I asked, “Are you giving me a ring?” He answered, “Yes, if only you’ll marry me.” I didn’t say yes. I didn’t say no. I stretched my finger and he put the ring on it. The baby kicked very hard so I sat down. He sat next to me and I held his hand and brought it to my tummy. I said, “Be still. You’ll feel him kicking.”

He stiffened up like a statue for several seconds. The baby didn’t kick. We laughed. He got up and went outside again. The light came back on. He intentionally turned the main switch off so he could do it in the dark.

Our child was two years old when we had a wedding in our new church. Everyone spoke against a white wedding because we had a child. But we wanted to come out of the darkness and show our marriage to God in the light. What better way to do it than a wedding?

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My dad was there. He preached that day. My mom was there. My sisters too. We had a beautiful small wedding to bring to light what we created in the dark.

We did life and marriage in a different way. The usual thing is to step from the bottom to the top. We started from the top to down. We are not proud of it but we are proud that regardless of it all, we still remain the children of God.

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—Abigail

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