My morning was a routine of prayer and purpose. I was on the clock in Minneapolis, connecting neighbors to essential phone services. I had just run into a childhood friend—a bond stretching back to our first birthday in Lagos, Nigeria. As I moved toward a new group to offer my help, the air shattered.
Bang. Bang. Bang. I was shot twice in the back. Collapsed on the curb, I recorded what I feared was my final message. Yet, the physical wounds were the quickest part; the real war was the mental aftermath. I felt a suffocating shame. Having survived a previous shooting years ago, I felt cursed, wondering why this kept finding me.
But God’s timing is absolute. Two days prior, I watched my mother get baptized. In the back of the EMT, surrounded by the screams of other victims, my perspective shifted from victim to vessel. I realized I was covered, not cursed. In that ambulance, I found myself mentoring the others, telling them we would make it. I was put here to be a guiding light in the darkness, proving that even when we are broken, we are commissioned for a higher calling.