Echoes of Eternal Exaltation: A Timeless Yoruba Hymn Awakens Childhood Memories in the Heart of Lagos
– Kayode Ajulo
In the resplendent glow of Lagos’s bustling heart, where the azure waters of the lagoon whisper secrets to the shores of Marina, I found myself enveloped in the warm embrace of celebration. It was a dinner party of singular distinction, marking the golden jubilee of the Body of Senior Advocates of Nigeria—a venerable institution of which I am a proud member. Beside me, my beloved wife, Lady Kofoworola, lent her grace to the evening, as we toasted to the enduring pillars of justice and erudition that have shaped our nation’s legal firmament.
Yet, as the night yielded to the promise of dawn, our sojourn in this island metropolis extended into the sacred realm, for Sunday beckoned us to the hallowed portals of Christ Church Cathedral before our flight bore us back to Abuja.
Ah, Christ Church Cathedral! This grand edifice, rising like a sentinel of faith amid the colonial echoes of Marina, stands as the oldest Anglican cathedral in the Church of Nigeria, its foundation stone laid with solemn ceremony on the 29th of March, 1867, and its establishment consecrated in 1869.
Rebuilt in the neo-Gothic splendor of pointed arches and soaring spires, its cornerstone was graced by the hand of the Prince of Wales—later King Edward VIII—in 1925, and completed in 1946, it embodies the intertwined threads of Nigerian Christian heritage and colonial legacy. More than mere stone and mortar, it has served as the episcopal seat for archbishops of West Africa, All Nigeria, and the Ecclesiastical Province of Lagos, a beacon of spiritual authority where history’s tempests have bowed before the eternal light of devotion.
As we entered its venerable nave, the air thrummed with the timeless cadence of worship. Hymns flowed like a mighty river, their melodies weaving through the vaulted ceilings—ancient anthems of praise, drawn from the wellsprings of Anglican tradition, resounding with the organ’s majestic roar and the congregation’s fervent voices.
Yet it was during the thanksgiving, that sacred interlude of gratitude, when the strains of a cherished Yoruba song ascended, that the veil between past and present dissolved. “A gbe O ga o, Oba,” the choir intoned, “Eniti o fi fẹ sewa si aye, Ko si ohun to le ya mi ya, Jesu Oba igbala.” Oh, exalted King, Thou who in boundless love descended to dwell among us, no force under heaven can sever me from Thee, Jesus, Sovereign of salvation!
In that moment, the song became a portal to yesteryears, evoking the tender vignettes of my childhood. It summoned the memory of my late father, that steadfast patriarch, whose piety illuminated the pews of St. James Cathedral in Oke-Bola, Ibadan, where the echoes of similar praises once cradled my youthful soul.
Thence to St. John Cathedral in Iloro, Ilesa, and myriad other sanctuaries, where the same melody had danced upon the lips of the faithful, binding generations in an unbroken chain of adoration. How it stirred the depths of my being, this hymn of unyielding love and divine inseparability, rooted in the scriptural assurance that neither height nor depth, nor any created thing, shall part us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.
Thus do I celebrate thee, O timeless ode! In thy verses, thou art more than melody; thou art the soul’s anthem, a classical paean to the Incarnate Word who, in selfless affection, bridged the chasm between heaven and earth.
Thou recallest the pilgrim’s journey through life’s cathedrals—be they of stone or memory—where faith endures as the eternal judge, outlasting emperors and empires. May thy strains ever lift us high, O King of Glory, in the grand symphony of redemption, where no shadow can dim the light of salvation.
