Tinu Agbabiaka, a certified relationship expert who started Practical Christian Living Initiative, a relationship NGO, eight years ago, spoke with Women’s Editor, TEMITOPE OJO, on the NGO and others issues.
What is Practical Christian Initiative (PCLI) all about?
Practical Christian Initiative (PCLI) is an NGO focused on relationships. Before a couple gets married, they started out as singles and then they went into a relationship. It is how you have been nurtured in your family that plays out when you have your own home. For instance, the values that a girl or boy grows up with is what he/she will eventually play out when they get married. If a girl grows up with a mother who constantly tells her that men are not to be trusted, when she gets married, she will never trust any man. We’ve discovered that a lot of times, people are fixated on doing things a certain way, even when it is not the proper way. But that is the way they’ve always known to do things. So, at PCLI, we educate, teach and assist to change people’s perception about issues when it comes to relationships.
And because these days, there are so many doctrines, there is a lot of hurt in the home. Look around, you must know someone who is either going through a bad relationship, has gone through a bad relationship or will go through a bad relationship.
So, what we do is to balance things. In our ministry, we do not just assume it is the man or the woman that is the problem. If a woman got married to a bad man, that means she has a problem of connecting with the wrong people. If you do background check on that woman, you find out that such a woman probably had a childhood where the father was not present as such or the father was a bad man. There is always a reason.
So far, how would you describe your experience?
What we do is hard, because by the time someone who is into a bad relationship cries out, it has really gone deep because it is perceived a private affair. So the first instinct is to try and shield it and manage it yourself. And then when he or he/she decides to speak, it may be to people who would rather condemn him/her, or some would even tell them what they are going through is nothing compared to what another person is or has gone through. And when you hear all the bad stories only, you’d almost believe that there is no good story anywhere.
So, we are trying to manage our own relationships in such a way that it is inspiring. Not that we haven’t had our challenges. I try to live what I preach.
How old is PCLI?
It is eight this year.
What have you achieved so far?
When PCLI was five, I clocked 40. So it was an opportunity to launch my book as well as get people together and take testimonies, knowing well that with relationships, people don’t want to admit openly that they had issues. It is different from being healed from a swollen leg when the Word was spoken, and now he/she can jump. Relationship involves people and emotions and it is a very delicate ministry.
But when PCLI was five, we had a couple who attended to give their own testimony.
They were on the verge of divorce when they attended one of our programmes before then. In fact, it was the husband’s friend who paid for them to attend the event. And when they eventually came, they didn’t come together. But, to the glory of God, they left together at the end of that programme. They danced, participated in fun games and other activities.
Three years after, I was at a burial ceremony when a man walked up to me and said ‘thank you’. I was shocked because I didn’t know him. I later got to know it was this same man. The husband said when it was time to dance and he held his wife, he had tears in his eyes. According to him, staying out together was a start in resolving the issues they had.
Another one was a colleague at work. By the time I met him, he told me that his marriage was over. Then, we got talking at every opportunity. On my birthday, he was there with his wife to testify.
So, little things like that give me joy and fulfilment that we are on the right part.
What are the major challenges you encounter?
Part of the problem is the foundation. The Bible says: If the foundation be destroyed, what can the righteous do? It would be nicer if things were done properly from the home. In other words, as a mother, you must teach your child the right values. And you can’t teach what you don’t have. You must teach a lady what to look for in a man. Don’t marry for money; money can’t buy love or happiness. The funny thing was that I was looking for a man like my father who is a wonderful man. And I found one.
My brother is a wonderful husband because he was raised by a wonderful father. So his wife is enjoying her husband. What I’m saying is, it is a cycle. If you don’t train someone well, the person will end up not training another person properly.
Another challenge is that people are getting married for various funny reasons, and this goes back to haunt them later. If someone gets married because “all her friends are getting married”, and they are not compatible, when issues start to come up, then they start to run helter skelter. But my take also is that if you have chosen that person as the one you want to stay with, then, make the most of it.
I recently counselled a lady who got married as a virgin and her husband gave her syphilis. He decided to treat her by himself, though he is not a doctor. At some point, the husband was having a relationship with his own sister which she got to know about. I told her it was not time to get pregnant for such a man, that the man needed a lot of work to be done on him through prayers and counselling. But she wouldn’t listen. After a while, I decided not to pick her calls again. Eventually she got pregnant. I later learnt that the man tried to kill the child, so she had to run. Recently she called me and said people were advising her to go back and have another child with that same man, so that she does not have children from different men. Now, that kind of counseling, I don’t get it, because what eventually becomes of those children she would have for a man with that kind of mindset?
And that is why this nation is like this. I keep saying that as long as we keep ignoring the family, this nation will not be made whole.
Another challenge is funding our programmes. We want to do more, but for funds. People sometimes think men would not respond when you invite them to programmes such as this; but I would rather say women are more cynical. There have been times men sneaked notes to me at our events, asking that I speak to their wives to dress better. If you have decided that that is the man or woman you want to marry, then, you have make that home habitable.
What led to the establishment of this unique NGO?
What happened was, I was away for six months to have my son. After I returned, there was this urge to do something more, but I didn’t know what it was. I am a worship leader in church, but I don’t write songs. Then someone came to me and said God said, that thing that He said I should do, I should do it. I still didn’t know what it was. I had so many responsibilities at work, my six-month old baby and the older ones were there to care for. So, I wasn’t interested in whatever the person was talking about. Then, another person came to me and said “those songs God wants you to write, write them”. You know that is how people deliver God’s message with ‘self’ because she felt because I was in the music ministry, it most certainly must be songs that God wants me to write. The first person then came back and said “God said you haven’t done it and that He is a jealous God”. That statement frightened me. I was frightened into this ministry. Because I discovered that the reason I was saying I didn’t want to do what God wanted was because of my husband, children and all other things.
So, I started writing. I would write and give to people to read. There was a testimony of one, when I wrote about how to endear yourself to your mother-in-law. I tried to analyse whom you are getting married to as a first step. It is not just about both of you alone. If you are marrying a first son, a favourite son or the last son or the richest son, then you should be prepared because those roles come with a lot of responsibilities, and if you don’t watch it, you’d be seen as an enemy. And you know when people join forces against you, even your husband would align with them because you’d be seen as complaining too much.
A woman then told me that reading the piece made her bond with her mother-in-law and she was glad she did because the woman died later.
It is very important that when you want to get married, you must understand the background of the person you are marrying or who raised the person, because there is no way the person will not manifest things from the one who raised him or her.
Earlier, you said a wise woman builds her home. Don’t you think too much emphasis is being placed on the girl-child than on her male counterpart in building a home?
The man was the first to be created, but when the woman was made, she was made differently and she came with extra gifts. She can reproduce, multiply and so on. We are gifted. On the other hand, there is a limitation to what the woman can do and that is why when you find a man who is in the claw of a woman, no matter how high, mighty, wealthy or popular that man is, he will still come to do the will of that woman.
Yes, there is a lot of role for the woman or the girl-child, but it is a two-way thing, which is why we are coming up with a programme targeted at young male adults. The purpose is to raise godly husbands because there are not many out there right now. And the problem is that you can’t give what you don’t have. Who is teaching them? Who is their role model? There are so many bad examples that even the good ones are almost embarrassed to rise up to say the right things out. You find a man who helps his wife iron her clothes every day because he sees it as a duty; but how many persons can he tell that to without the people looking at him as a ‘woman-wrapper’? And a lot of times, you find out that most of the programmes out there focus on financial strength. Financial strength does not make a home; otherwise all rich people will have happy homes. We have to teach our men how to be proper husbands and treat a woman well. You find parents telling their girl-child to keep their virginity, but the boy is allowed to roam with his ‘weapon of mass destruction’. They simply tell him to use a condom. Psychologically, you have told him that women are not to be valued or you can just exchange them anyhow. This is wrong.
Tell us more about your upcoming programme
The one happening in the morning is tagged ‘A man worthy of respect’. The man craves respect from a woman and the woman wants love. You need to be worthy of that respect. Research has shown that a woman has no problem submitting to man who does the proper things. Love a woman, treat her well… I tell people, the greatest gift a man can give to his children is to love their mother and show it. You can’t keep talking down on your wife, abusing her and expect the woman to be submissive. This act has far-reaching consequences and, like I always say, nobody changes after wedding; you just see clearer. Someone who is going to be a wife-beater must have given you or someone you know a dirty slap and you chose to ignore it, except you didn’t court at all. He would have reacted in a rage that you just couldn’t comprehend. The signs are there.
The programme for the young male adults (single or married) is for Saturday, June 27, at Oriental Hotel by 10am. There is no age restriction, as long as they are willing to learn and improve themselves to be a good husband and a father.
The second event, which holds same day at the same venue, is for couples, and we are talking about money. Next to sex, money is the divisive issue in the home. It comes in different dimensions. You find men who are jobless these days and the woman has to become the bread-winner. What does the man do? Another scenario could be that they are both working and the woman is rising faster than the man. How do they handle it? A man earns N100,000 and the woman earns N400,000. The man can only afford a face-me-I-face-you house in Mushin and the woman, with her status, can afford a better environment. So, where do they meet? These are the practical issues we want to address that day.