I didn't notice the changes at first.
Maybe because they came like the dawn — not in a blinding flash, but in slow, soft layers of light.
One morning, as I stood in the kitchen stirring a pot of porridge, Zawadi wandered in, rubbing sleep from his eyes.
"You're not working today?" he mumbled, surprised.
I smiled. "It's Sabbath, Zawadi. A day of rest."
He blinked at me, confused. "But... you always worked on Saturdays."
"I know," I said, ladling the porridge into bowls. "But not anymore."
It sounded strange even to my own ears.
Not anymore.
Because I was building a different kind of life now — one with room for stillness, for worship, for grace.
I didn't know all the doctrines yet.
I couldn't quote many verses.
But I knew this much: I was tired of running.
The first Sabbath I spent completely at home felt foreign, almost awkward.
I woke up early, out of habit, expecting to rush somewhere.
But instead, I sat by the window, Bible in my lap, listening to the gentle hum of the neighbourhood waking up without me.
I read stories of healing.
Of broken people made whole.
Of lost sheep brought home.
And for the first time, I realised — those stories weren't about them.
They were about me.
Of course, not everyone understood.
One afternoon, as I left work carrying a small grocery bag, I bumped into Esther — an old colleague from my banking days.
"Neema!" she squealed, hugging me too tightly. "Girl, where have you been hiding? We miss you at the lounge!"
I laughed awkwardly. "I've been... busy."
"Busy doing what? You work at that little NGO now, don't you?"
She said it like it was something to be ashamed of.
I forced a smile. "It's where I'm supposed to be right now."
She gave me a look — the kind reserved for people who'd clearly lost their minds.
"Well, let us know when you're ready to come back to real life," she said with a wink, walking away in her high heels and perfume cloud.
For a moment, I stood there frozen, stung by her words.
The old shame bubbled up, hot and familiar.
Real life.
Had I abandoned it?
Or had I finally found it?
I clutched my grocery bag tighter and kept walking, one small step after another.
At home, the shifts were subtle but profound.
We prayed before meals — awkward, stumbling prayers, but prayers nonetheless.
We played board games on Sabbath afternoons instead of disappearing into screens.
We sang songs on the porch when the sunsets painted the sky in bruised purples and golds.
It wasn't perfect.
The children still grumbled sometimes.
I still lost my patience more than I wanted to admit.
Money was still tight.
But under the surface, something was growing — like seeds breaking through hard ground.
Hope.
Not the cheap kind that came and went with moods or money.
The real kind.
The kind planted by faith, watered by surrender, warmed by grace.
One evening, after a particularly hard day, I sat on the edge of my bed and opened my journal.
The ink smudged where my fingers trembled, but I wrote anyway:
"I am not who I was."
"I am not yet who I will be."
"But today, I am His."
I closed the journal, pressed it to my heart, and smiled into the darkness.
This was not the life I had once chased.
This was not the freedom the world had promised me.
It was better.
It was slower.
It was sacred.
And it was only just beginning.