With Faith, Hope And Love As We Remember Leah Sharibu
The Oasis Reporters
January 2, 2019
Reflections: With faith, hope and love…
__We remember Leah Sharibu, and all people still held in captivity across the world.
The year 2018 was filled with both great successes and sadness for many around the world, with some tragic things happening nearly everywhere: violent attacks, diseases, floods and fires, war, famine, bus smashes, joblessness, and other calamities too many to mention. With all going on around us, both good and bad, let’s still stop a moment today to reflect on our many blessings. And in this season that brings so many families together, let’s pause once again to remember Leah Sharibu and all innocent captives across Africa and the world, held as hostages, prisoners, or slaves, far from their loved ones during this special time of year.
Several months ago, Dr. Strive Masiyiwa, founder of Econet Wireless wrote about Leah Sharibu, the 15-year old Nigerian school girl, who has now been held hostage by Boko Haram militants for 10 months after being kidnapped, along with more than 100 teenage girls who attended a science and technology girls boarding high school in Dapchi, Yobe State in northeastern Nigeria. (“Boko Haram” roughly means “Western education is forbidden.”)
Leah was the only schoolgirl not released in March, because she refused to renounce her Christian faith.
“Every day I pray for her safe return, and salute her amazing faith and courage”, wrote Dr. Masiyiwa.
He went on to mention that when he wrote earlier 2018, “Leah is not the only hostage still held in Nigeria today. In 2014, about 226 schoolgirls were abducted from Chibok high school (about four hours from Dapchi). Some escaped and most were released following negotiations, but I understand that up to 100 are still thought to remain in captivity? UNICEF aid worker Alice Ngaddah is still in captivity as well.
These violent kidnappings are happening globally, not just in Africa. Reports are that people are being taken hostage (both women and men, of all ages) and held across the world, for different reasons by different groups, including human trafficking purely for profit… It’s a tragic state of affairs!
“What then shall we do?” asked the crowds (Luke 3:10).
The first thing everyone amongst you can do, regardless of your faith tradition, is to show love… To Leah, her parents Rebecca and Nathan Sharibu, and the rest of her family, as well as to Alice Ngaddah’s family and any other captives anywhere around the world you may want to share messages with. There are so many, yet so few names that we know. Let us not forget anyone in our thoughts and prayers.
You can also send messages through us which shall be compiled and published. Make them strictly non political” .
The great African icon and entrepreneur, founder of Econet Wireless, Dr. Strive Masiyiwa shared his own message:
“Dear Leah: As if you were our own family and our own child — we continue to remember you, love you, and salute your courage. We continue to pray for your family, and for your safe return. Always remember:
“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”
(1 Corinthians 13:13)
Merry CHRISTmas.”
Dr. Strive Masiyiwa also said, your words matter…
“The extremists were, and they are, afraid of books and pens. The power of education frightens them. They are afraid of women…” said 16-year old Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Malala Yousafzai, only nine months after being shot in the head by the Taliban for her activism as a child speaking out for the education of girls…
“Let us pick up our books and pens. They are our most powerful weapons,” Malala told the United Nations that day.
One of last year 2018 Nobel Peace Prize laureates is 25-year old Nadia Murad, a survivor of sex slavery by ISIS in Syria and Iraq. Nadia said earlier in the month of December in her Nobel acceptance speech that hundreds of women and girls from the Yazidi religious and ethnic group are still being held captive and sold into sexual slavery by ISIS militants and others.
Dr Denis Mukwege, who worked more than 20 years treating sexual injuries against women in eastern DRC, also received the Nobel Peace Prize 2018, for his courageous work for justice and healing.
Let us keep them both also in our prayers for all they do on behalf of women, helping them to be released from captivity, to heal and to be heard.
“The terrorists thought that they would change our aims and stop our ambitions, but nothing changed in my life except this: weakness, fear and hopelessness died. Strength, power and courage were born,” said Malala Yousafzai, the youngest person to win the Nobel Peace Prize at only 17 years old.
We keep Malala also in our prayers for her brave work on behalf of the education for girls, and other important causes to uplift the poor.
The recorded message in August released by Leah’s captors said this: “I am calling on the government and people of goodwill to intervene to get me out of my current situation. I am begging you to treat me with compassion. I am calling on the government, particularly the President, to pity me and get me out of this serious situation. Thank you.”
Let us continue to deeply pray for all those working for Leah’s safe release to her family…
Written originally by the African legend of entrepreneurship in mobile technology, Dr. Strive Masiyiwa.
The Oasis Reporters merely adapted very little portions of it to suit the time and publication here.
Credits: Dr. Strive Masiyiwa
