O Death, where the hell is your sting??
June 10, 2007
ESKOR MFON AND IFY IRUKWU: A TRIBUTE
And so they died.
They both did – Pastor Eskor Mfon passed away on the 30th of April 2007 after a prolonged illness, and Pastor Ify Irukwu breathed her last on the 4th of June, having battled the scourge of cancer for over a year.
I’ll be honest, I do still find the concept of death difficult and don’t handle it as well as I probably should. Perhaps it’s down to the fact that I don’t have a complete revelation of it which I should as a Christian. But it hurts like hell to lose a loved one, and that’s what these two were to me.
It’s particularly hard when they leave us too young and too soon. Pastor Eskor had just turned fifty-four, and Pastor Ify was eleven days shy of her forty-first birthday.
I’ll speak for myself; I’ve experienced a range of emotions. The shock numbs me, then, for a few moments, I almost succeed in convincing myself that the whole episode exists only in my imagination. Then I remember a conversation, a joke shared, a smile, a hug, and the memories that flood back to me tug at my heart and threaten to bring yet another tear to my eye.
They meant different things to me. I met Eskor back in 1995 during my first year at university. I had just become a Christian, and he was the assistant pastor at the church I’d started going to.
My first impression? He seemed stern and taciturn, and had a reputation for being brutally frank. I must confess, I didn’t immediately warm to him and was content for it to remain that way, even though our paths crossed often as a result of the level of my involvement in church.
We didn’t actually become friends until four years later, when I’d graduated and ironically, decided to move to London. The distance seemed to make both our hearts grow fonder, and the relationship was built gradually. It was in simple ways: I’ve lost count of the hours we’d spend plodding around Oxford Street, scouring the shops for specific gifts he just had to get his wife and daughter, computer games for his sons, and lots of little presents for countless people he knew and worked with. Coupled with that, whenever he and his wife were in town on holiday or en route to the States where their children are studying, we would meet, spend time together, catch up.
I must say that he was there for me. Beneath the surface was a caring and generous man who gave selflessly to his family, friends and ministry. He had an unshakeable faith in God, and worked tirelessly to show Him in the lives of those he pastored at the City of David parish, through his job and responsibilities in the Redeemed Christian Church of God, and in his own personal life.
From programs to feed the hungry and reach out to the disadvantaged on the streets of Lagos, to the ’seeds’ of his time and money which he ’sowed’ into the lives of countless people in his church and beyond: to say that he was generous does not begin to describe the largesse he demonstrated during his life.
I’ll never forget the last voicemail message he left me before he took ill; he was passing through London on his way to the States. He wasn’t actually coming into town; just killing a few hours at the airport while waiting to catch his connecting flight. I was in meetings at work and so missed his call. He said he was just passing through and wanted to say ‘Hello’, check how I was doing. He said he loved me and would see me soon.
Being a sucker for declarations of love, I played that message twice before deleting it, smiling sheepishly to myself. Little did I know it would be the last time I would hear his voice while he was in perfect health.
He fell ill early last year and was hospitalised for several months in London. He was discharged just before Christmas after being bedridden for months and was making a good recovery…
…until I got the call informing me that he’d taken a turn for the worse, suddenly, and had given up the ghost. Eskor is survived by his wife Bimpe, daughter and two sons.
I met Ify when I moved to London eight years ago. She was the wife of Pastor Agu Irukwu, who pastors Jesus House, the church which became my spiritual home. You only need to meet Agu to know she was the love of his life, his confidant and best friend: her name is always on the tip of his tongue, and you can’t possibly talk to him for five minutes without him referring to her in some way! They easily had one of the best marriage relationships I’ve seen…by a mile.
I wasn’t as close to her as I was to Eskor, but she touched me regardless: I never failed to be amazed by how giving she was, and how she didn’t mind having her home almost always filled with people!
A trained pharmacist, she left the profession after several years to study and practise Christian counselling. Not that she particularly needed the training anyway: her calm and patient demeanour meant she was naturally disposed to offering a listening ear and succour to many in their times of trouble.
I remember us chatting once about my deep-seated fear of commitment and marriage, driven mainly by the scars of my parents’ – ooh, shall we say – ‘eventful’ union, and also partly by the number of pathetic excuses for marriage I have had the misfortune of being privy to.
She gently berated me for being so pessimistic, pointing out that my fear was irrational and had no grounding in reality. She pointed out that, even if all I had ever known was the bad side of marriage, it was ridiculous to assume that these scenarios represented the rule rather than exceptions, which is what they were.
It sounds silly, but that simple analysis helped give me the perspective I needed to begin the hard process of learning to drop my defences and allow myself to be vulnerable…and I’d like to think I have started to do so.
She was diagnosed with breast cancer about sixteen months ago, and passed away last week after several months of treatment. She is survived by her husband Agu, son and daughter.
I know I’ve left it too late to tell you both, but I love you!
Ify, if there was anyone I wanted to be like, it was you. You embodied everything I aspire to – you were graceful, charming, patient, modest, kind and clever, yet so unbelievably down-to-earth. You had a God-given wisdom that belied your years, and you certainly didn’t hesitate to put it to good use! From running the women’s group to marriage counselling, the seminars and talks you gave to the love and encouragement you gave one-on-one, you touched so many more lives than you can possibly know.
You’ve both gone now. We know you’re in a better place, resting with your Father in heaven. But we already miss you like crazy, and the pain is almost unbearable.
We promise to look after your families for you. Of course, not that that can make up for you not being here – we will do our best, but nothing can replace you. We celebrate the lives you’ve led and the legacies you’ve left behind.
You must both be looking down from heaven and wondering what all the fuss is about! We mourn because we will miss you, but we do so in the joy and knowledge that you rest in the bosom of our LORD. We know you are not ‘dead’, with the awful finality which that word threatens to convey; you have merely passed to a realm beyond our reach and understanding.
Someday we’ll all be together, and maybe then we’ll look back and try to remember why we cried so hard, shed so many tears? Maybe then we’ll be able to put into words why it hurt so badly…
…but until then, rest in perfect peace.
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