A Nana-Mikey story

“Dankie vir julle familie se toewyding aan God! S.Jourdan.”

After reading the hand-written message from the author to Nana out aloud, Mikey closes the book and silently ponders on the words in his razor-sharp little mind. He picked up the book while sitting on the backseat of Nana’s car on the way home from church.

“Nana, is S.Jourdan the same as Stephen Jourdan, the name on the front page?”

“Yes my sweetheart, Stephen Jourdan authored that book and he signed it for me with a personal message.”

“Was it him who preached about heartless Jonah and the bush and the worm last year? You watched him on your bedroom TV while I played Flight Simulator on Oupa’s computer.”

“Wow Mikey, you have a superb memory! Yes, that was Stephen.”

Nana quietly nurtures a profound sense of gratitude for the welcome distraction Stephen’s book brings to her built up anticipation of her and Mikey’s conversation about the topic of today’s sermon. Truth be told, Nana feels relief and she is just about to initiate more conversation about Jonah and his self-pity, when Mikey interrupts her train of thought and redirects the course of their conversation.

“What is hoer in English? Why did oom Dirk use that word so many times? I counted 20 times, but I only started after he already said it many times. He said that Ragab, die hoer, sold her body to have sex with men she’s not married to and that sounds really bad. Here, in my Bible, her name is Rahab and it says that she was a P-R-O-S-T-I-T-U-T-E.”

Nana’s mind works at lightning strike speed and she can feel her heart skip a few beats before she gets a grip on the runaway processes.  She composes herself by means of a few deep breaths and an SOS-please-help-me-Lord prayer.  She, too, is confounded by Dirk’s choice and she also counted — Mikey missed 14 times.  Dirk insisted on using the word 34 times during his preach — three times as direct quotes from various passages in the Afrikaans 1933 Bible and 31 other times.  Did she somehow miss the notification about today’s sermon carrying an age restriction?  But there couldn’t have been any notification, because Dirk’s own young children attended the service and his daughter, Missy, is a classmate of Mikey’s.  Missy turned eight years old five months ago and Mikey is still a few months away from his eighth birthday.

“Mikey, my sweetheart, the direct translation of the Afrikaans word ‘hoer’ is ‘whore’ in English. Oom Dirk’s words about sex being a gift reserved for marriage and not a product or service for sale are absolutely correct. I think that he tried to say that, despite all the bad things we do, the Lord can still use us when we listen to Him. Prostitute, as it appears in your Bible, has the same meaning, but it is less harsh than ‘whore’. Oftentimes the Bible writers use these words to label specific women without giving any historical account of the behaviour which supposedly earned them the ghastly reputation in the first place. In contrast to this, they do tell tales of reprehensible behaviour forthcoming from specific men without assigning labels to them. To be honest with you, my sweetheart, I don’t know why oom Dirk chose to use the harshest version of the label so many times and it took me by surprise as well. Why do you think it troubled you so much?”

“You know, Nana, it still troubles me… I remember oom Tim’s message about breakfast on the beach with Jesus… (read the story here 👉🏼 https://luluvanaswegen.com/2026/06/breakfast-on-the-beach/) I still so often struggle to just be good. I don’t want to do bad things, but I end up doing them anyway. But my name doesn’t change to Misbehaving Mikey every time I do the wrong things, and when I say sorry, I can appreciate having breakfast with Jesus. I’m sure that Rahab struggled just like me and I don’t think she deserves to carry a bad label. It’s just not right that the first thing people get to know about her is that she did bad things! Everybody does bad things! You teach me that Jesus looks at our hearts. He will never call me Misbehaving Mikey and neither will He call her Rahab, the whore! I think that Jesus’ voice sounds like Stephen’s voice — it is kind and gentle — not harsh and cold like oom Dirk’s.”

“You are a wise young man, dearest Mikey, and you have a beautiful heart! Jesus will never label you, He delights in you and He loves you. Just keep following Him. Why don’t you turn to page 146 in Stephen’s book and read what he says about short earnest prayers which yield rapid answers from the Lord?”

Mikey takes the book again, and upon locating the desired page, he starts reading.  Deep inside her inner being, Nana prays a short, earnest prayer.  She needs to communicate her concern to Dirk; he was perceived as unnecessarily harsh and provocative.  Oh Lord, please help?