My Testimony By Pastor Wale Adeduro
“Behold, God is my helper; the Lord is the sustainer of my soul. (Hinnch Elohim orzer; Adonia b-som’keh naph’shi)” Psalm 54:4
The word “sustain” basically means to keep someone alive without providing vital supports for the person. The man who is being sustained on life-support devices in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of hospital needs more than the machines. Vital care such as hygiene, visitation by family members and prayers must be provided for the unconscious patient.
To be sustained requires giving physical and emotional support to guarantee that the beneficiary thrives. I am forever indebted to my parents for sustaining my siblings and I with warm unconditional love characterized by unimaginable sacrifices. The love of my parents has not only ensured that my siblings and I live, but also made the five of us to flourish as God’s children in our different spheres of influence despite being raised in the low-class environment of Obalende in Lagos Island of Nigeria.
The sustaining love of my parents was emotionally, physically and spiritually adequate to move all their children towards fulfilling their God-ordained destiny.
The hand that cuddles a child from cradle till the child grows into a responsible and God-fearing adult is a sustaining hand. That sustaining hand is nothing but the hand of Yahweh (pronounced YHWH in Hebrew language).
“And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” Matthew 28:20
“Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you; Before you were born, I sanctified you; I ordained you a prophet to the nations.” Jeremiah 1:5
I have no shred of doubt in my mind that YHWH has been my Jehovah El-Sustainer from the day I was conceived in my mother’s womb. Till this moment, I am still somehow claustrophobic. So, if God had not been with me, I couldn’t have survived in the windowless womb of my mother for nine months. I shudder to think how instead of suffocating to death inside the otherwise hot womb, I was nurtured by the unseen hands of God.
In the real world, I have come to know that ordinarily being smeared with blood, not to talk about being in a pool of blood, portends danger. Life could be lost any moment from that point if a drastic medical intervention does not occur.
The reverse was my case while I crouched helplessly in my mother’s womb. Right inside the womb, where there was neither light nor sun, I was practically rolled in the blood of my mother but the Presence of the Lord, according to Isaiah 9:5, did not allow me to come to any harm. “For every battle of the warrior is with confused noise, and garments rolled in blood, but this shall with burning and fuel of fire.”
Despite being in the midst of a million spermatozoa in what can best be described as a dying field in my mother’s womb, the Lord sustained me to be the only one who crossed the finishing line to see the light in the world beyond my mother’s womb. By God’s sustaining power, the dungeon of fatal deaths and annihilation became my foxhole of safety.
“By you I have been sustained (nis’mak’ti) from my birth; you are He who took me from my mother’s womb; my praise is continually of you. I have become a marvel to many, for you are my strong refuge.” Psalm 71:6-7
Over the years, I have experienced the marvellous help and sustaining grace of God. Indeed, I am not favoured by God to write this piece as an account of God’s love towards me, I am a living testimony.
Rescued from death on my third birthday
I have been saved several times by the blood of Jesus. The angel of death visited me on the day of my third birthday on earth. His ice-cold hands were stretched at my family. Death did not come for me alone. It came after my carer, my baby brother and I in one fell swoop.
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