Last Saturday was indeed memorable. Like it has to go into the annals that on the valentine’s weekend Christian students in Kenya rallied to propagate for chastity. Then probably in the days to come we’ll have the old generation telling the young generation, “The other events of the details of the Chastity campaign, how it began and how it progressed, are they not written in the annals…” You know like how the Bible puts it in 2 Chronicles 13:22!

So we marched on the streets. We had charts and banners. Messages of sexual purity had been written on them. When young people decide to do a thing, clearly they are unstoppable. I could stop to read some messages on the charts and I just marvelled at the convictions people have. We wore white tshirts. There was no way the people in town would just ignore us. Some of us passed through the corridors instead of the main road and went chanting those sexual purity slogans. The message had to be driven home!

Some people were happy that a generation of young had gathered for such an initiative. Others looked at us as if to say, “seriously! Get a life!” Others were abusive. Others couldn’t stand the message and so they even grabbed the charts out of our hands. I tried thinking what was going through their minds. May be they were shocked that a bunch of intellectuals from the institutions of higher learning had come up with such a ‘primitive’ idea. Or they were amazed by the guts we had. Or still they were happy that there existed some people who would march to the streets not to sing the infamous ‘haki yetu’ song, but to proclaim some sane message.

At a personal level, I felt accomplished. But then the reality of what we had just done begun to sink. The act of going to the streets to proclaim what we believed in had only made things worse for us. Worse in a good way, may be. We were to be held more accountable. Somehow, going to the streets was like acknowledging that we were ready to be custodians of the message of purity. That’s a scary thing to imagine!

So here we were. We marched and it was great. But will the part where we are required to walk the talk be as easy as marching on the streets?  Will we stand the test of time, after all is said and done? With the world becoming increasingly immoral, will our convictions still hold five years from now? When temptations come our way, will we give in? When we’ll be in an office where everyone speaks vulgar language, will we still do what we did on the streets? Proclaim a different kind of message? Ladies, when your boss makes advances and you know so well no one will know when you give in, will you still say no, even if it costs your job? And what if you fall and no one gets to know? What if you commit sexual sin but never get pregnant/impregnate a girl? Will your accountability partners know? What if an opportunity presents itself? Will you still say no to sin?

I assure us that it’s not going to be easy, even if we said purity is cool and everything… One Johnie Gathuku once told us that you’ll probably be tested most on the things that you stand for. In this case it’s sexual purity. When I think about this, am filled with ‘holy fear’. The kind of fear that makes me want to be more careful and walk closer with God. For we are not ignorant of the schemes of the enemy!

The whole thing about Chastity Campaign was not a one day initiative. It was not something that FOCUS Kenya was just using for popularity. It wasn’t to showcase our holiness and make everyone get impressed by our purity standards. First, it had everything to do with God. It was to honour His name and to make Him known and honoured. So forget about these notions we have on purity. Ati we are staying pure for our future spouses… No! It’s primarily to honour God. The Chastity message loses meaning if the centre is not Jesus!

I hope that Chastity Campaign will not be an event. It would make more sense if we made it a lifestyle. We don’t have to wait for a campaign for us to tell our friends that it’s possible to be pure. No. We should live it and proclaim it every day of our lives. Perhaps we should have the messages we wrote on charts during the campaign hang on the walls of our room. May be that way every time we wake up we shall be reminded of the things we believe in, and everyone who walks into our rooms shall not resist seeing these truths.

After all is said and done, when we shall gather at the feet of our master, I pray that he’ll pat our backs and say, “Well done, good and faithful servants… Enter into the joy of your Lord.” May we be found faithful!