The Boy from Osogun

“You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was written in your book.” — from Psalm 139

A long time ago, about the year 1807, a baby boy was born in a town called Osogun. Osogun is in the Yoruba country, in the land we now call Nigeria. His family named him Ajayi.

Osogun was a big, busy town. It had a tall wooden fence all around it, with six gates. The houses were made of mud, with tall roofs, and families lived close together around open courtyards. Ajayi’s father was a weaver and a farmer. Ajayi had a big brother and several sisters, and lots of aunts and cousins nearby.

His family remembered that he was the leader of a club of about forty boys who worked on the farms together. Years later he loved to tell his own children about it: hoeing the heaps of earth for the yams, and then sitting in the shade laughing at the boys who were slower than he was!

Ajayi had never seen the sea, or a great river, or a white man. He did not know about Jesus. His family prayed to the old Yoruba gods. He could never have guessed what his life would become.

But God knew. The Bible says that God saw each one of us before we were born, and that every day of our lives was written in his book. God saw Ajayi playing in Osogun. And God sees you, too, wherever you are.

Dear God, thank you that you knew me before I was born. Thank you that every day of my life is in your hands. Amen.