AFTER 21 YEARS OF WAITING, JOURNALIST GETS REWARDED WITH BUNDLE OF JOY

What would you do if, after two decades of marriage, you were still waiting on God to provide you with a fruit of the womb? Keep on hoping and believing in God? Or 'try it out' with a fresh partner and see if you were actually productive?

For Chuks Onuoha, Chief Correspondent of The Sun newspapers in Umuahia, Abia State, and his wife, Udodirim, the latter was not an option. They kept their faith in God, believing that their joy was certainly on the way. And it paid off. Today, Chuks and Udodirim are proud parents.

On November 8, this year, 51 days before the couple's 21st wedding anniversary, Mrs. Onuoha gave birth to a bouncing baby girl. And the tears of 21 years instantly metamorphosed into instant joy.

Since God had shown his immense faithfulness in their lives, the baby's names are quite predictable. Her English name is Faithfulness of God. And the other? Nwachineke, which in Igbo translates God's Child.

Yet in his early years, it had always remained a recurring decimal in Chuks' mind to bear children early. This desire wasn't without reason. His mother actually gave birth to 10 kids, but eight of the children died, leaving only a little boy and his kid sister. For this reason, the only surviving boy wanted to marry early and bear many children so that the family name, which is always held in high esteem in Igboland, would not go extinct.

There was also immense pressure from his mum who wanted the only son to get married early to enable her carry her grandchildren.

But the young man, who had wanted to become a father in his early 20s could not, because of financial constraints.

At 30, he got married to Udodirim, a pretty damsel that was the desire of every young man in the community. But still haunted by men's most common foe, lack, the newly weds who got married on December 29, 1989, decided not to have children immediately until their 'economy' improved. Yet when, after about one year, they now desired kids, trouble started rearing its head.

The wife actually became pregnant in late 1990, but three months into the pregnancy, Mrs. Onuoha suffered a miscarriage. 'It was when the pregnancy came down,' the journalist recounted, 'that our problem started. She would take in and after some time, it would come down.'

Naturally, after some time, many people, including relations, in-laws and friends, started writing off the couple in terms of producing babies. But Chuks was not despaired. He had absolute faith in God that the Almighty would look towards his direction some day.

'It was 21 years of hope and faith in God that He would do it. My full name is Chukwunyeremuaka, which, when translated, is a plea to 'God to help me.' It was when my mother's other children started dying, and when she had me, that she made a plea to God to help her so that I would not die like others. And God answered her prayer and I lived. I have seen God solve more serious problems in the lives of people. And I have seen God give children to a woman whose womb was removed due to some medical problems and the family members thought she was not going to have a child again. But God visited her and gave her children. All these experiences helped to build my hope in God, not minding pressure from family members,' the journalist narrated.

More pressure came from the husband's family members, including his mother, half brothers, in-laws and others. They wanted him to marry another woman or adopt children. But he held on to his faith, believing that God would give them their own children.

'At a point, my mother started having problems with my wife over the same problem, but I had to settle the rift. One day, my elder half-brother told me to go and adopt a child since it was like my wife was no longer going to bear a child for me. But I told him that I was sure that God would give me children through my wife. I said if the God whom I serve failed to do it, so be it.'

One night, buffeted by pressure from all sides, Onuoha's wife begged her husband to get another wife.

He recalled: 'One night in February this year, she woke me up and asked me to go and marry another woman who would bear me children. She was weeping as she was telling me that.  You can imagine what must have been going through the mind of a woman who loves and cherishes her husband so much before she could come out to tell him to go and marry another wife. I did not take offence, but rather started comforting her, asking her to have faith in God that one day, he would give us children. But while this was going on, we never knew she was pregnant.'

Onuoha had his reasons for not yielding to pressure. He came from a polygamous family and wouldn't want the unpleasant experience he had replicated in his own family. His father married three wives and his mother was the last.

'Besides, I and my wife love ourselves so much that even if I had wanted to marry another woman, I wouldn't know if I could have seen the replica of her anywhere in the world,' he said.

But before Onuoha came to know God, he had taken his wife to so many places in search of a child and spent a fortune in the process. They became customers to a particular herbalist in Lagos and made sacrifices to the river goddess, but all to no avail. The couple also went to hospitals where tests were carried out and they were given a clean bill of health. He later realized that perhaps their problem could be spiritual, which only faith in God through prayers could solve. They changed the direction of their search and focused on God. This has now paid off.'

Was he surprised when the baby came? Onuoha said what would have shocked him was if God did not answer his prayers 'because I know that God never fails those who believe in Him.

'At a point, I had to ask God to give me his own child to father so that I would feel the joy of fatherhood, that I wanted to be some sort of caretaker to the child. Her names are in fulfillment of that vow. I feel great. I feel fulfilled. It feels great getting used to being a father. The baby belongs to God. I am just a caretaker.'

The new dad has a word for couples going through the same problem: they should exercise patience and have hope in God.

'You can never be sure what God intends to achieve through that condition,' he counselled. 'One thing I have always been sure about is that God never disappoints those who look unto him. If there appears to be any, that person should review his or her life to be sure that he is not the one at fault. He is righteous and faithful to fulfill his promise to his own.

'It is not because of my faith that this child has come: it is a proof of his own faithfulness to his children. For removing this reproach from our family, we owe him service for the rest of our lives. There is nothing we did not hear because of this condition.  But the joy in our hearts has wiped off all those things, so we don't owe it against anybody. We have forgiven all who offended us and we are using this medium to plead with anyone we have offended to also forgive us, because the type of joy we are feeling is not the type that can be mixed with malice or anger against a fellow human being.'

For the wife, Udodirim, it is still like a dream. It's even difficult to believe she is now a mother. 'God is the one that has all the glory,' she said. 'After God, it is my husband. I am short of words,' she said.

Since the incident, the Umuhu Ohuhu residence of the Onuohas has virtually become a tourist site, as people from far and near troop there to behold the manifestation of God's miracle.

'For the rest of my life, I will serve the one who has removed my reproach of 21 years,' Onuoha said. 'His faithfulness cannot be quantified in cash and gift. I can only give him my life and my family.'