₦airaland Forum

AntiChristian:
This is three much!

Yeah

Timi Adigun: When “Sorry” is not Enough

(This article was written almost two years ago when Timilehin Adigun was first accused of indiscretion in ministry. Today, Juliana Olayode, Toyo, is again accusing this guy of sexually abusing her younger sister. I had said if he is not removed from ministry, he will do it again. Like a prophet, my words have come to pass)

I only learnt of whom Timi Adigun is when the scandal around him broke into open. A few days ago, social media began to buzz with the story of a Lagos Pastor who had gotten into another sex scandal and is at this time under discipline. Timi Adigun’s case is a little different because his ministry centers on the matter of sexual purity among teens. Pentecostal churches have this thing for “specialties”: so you have this minister who has the “anointing” for marriage, another for prosperity, another for praying for barren women to get pregnant; then you have those who have the knack for motivational speaking; there is one whose prophecies focus at bringing about a better Nigeria, and so on. Timi Adigun, on his part, teaches young people sexual purity. Unfortunately he failed in carrying out his own counsel and fell. He has published an apology note to the public where he wrote:

“I want to say I AM DEEPLY SORRY to everyone my actions and inactions have hurt at this time. The truth is, I was involved in inappropriate behavior with females over a couple of years. I went against the sexual purity message I preach and I believe in and I AM SO SO SORRY. I failed those of you who look up to me. Please find a place in your hearts to forgive me…”


Timi Adigun did not shed light on the nature of the “inappropriate behavior” he had with the young females over a number of years but he was quick to state in a latter part of the letter that “there was no sexual intercourse with any…” And for this reason, Timi believes that he has not sinned enough and is still at the point where he can still return to ministry and continue to preach. Dear Brother Timi Adigun, accept this as my counsel to you: you are forgiven but you will need to see a truth in scripture about sexual sin so that you might appreciate the depth to which you have fallen. Jesus Christ said: “But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28).

At what point does “lustful intent” translate to sin? Let us read James: “But each person is tempted when he is lured away and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death” (James 1:14-15). Let us talk man to man here: it is not every look or desire that exhumes from a man towards a woman that is sin. But there is a point where mere looks or even desire become sinful lust; it is at that point where one’s temptation becomes enticement and eventually sin. Notice that in our Lord’s admonition to us, sexual intercourse does not need to happen before sexual sin is conceived. My dear sir I wish to state to you that what you did with those girls is as sinful as committing sexual intercourse with them; the caveat “… there was no sexual intercourse with any…” which you put in your letter was not necessary. There indeed was sexual intercourse, albeit it was in the heart and it is just as sinful as the very act.

The implication of Mr. Timi Adigun’s actions is simply this: he betrayed the trust given to him by a cross section of his congregation; he abused his authority as a spiritual leader; he broke his marriage vows with his wife; and at the moment Mr. Adigun stands disqualified from ministry. He would do well to step down from the pulpit, join the congregation in the pew and never to return to the sacred duties of ministering the word of God to people again. Timi Adigun’s letter of “sorry” is not enough; he would need to leave ministry completely and find something else to do in life. This is the only way one can say that Timi has genuinely repented of his sin and the only way he would never be in a position to abuse the trust put on him as a spiritual leader.


Some months ago, I wrote an essay along this same line of ministers being disqualified from ministry when they fall into sin. A lady reached me privately and went on about how it was practically impossible for men, including pastors, to be chaste in our time. She explained that sin was everywhere and everyone would have fallen at one point or the other. If we were to go by my standard, she argued, no one will be in ministry. I responded that perhaps no one should be in ministry then. But the truth is that there are still a few who are still chaste and this is the more reason why not too many should be found in Christian ministry. Pastor John MacArthur says that a minister is a “one woman’s man”.

What that means that a minister of God is permitted to know only one woman sexually in his lifetime (as long as his mate is alive). When Paul gave the list of qualifications for a minister he said that such a man must be above reproach and that he must be well thought of by outsiders, so that he may not fall into disgrace, into a snare of the devil. Sexual sin, the type that Adigun got himself entangled with, is reproachful and it would forever dent his name and image in the public. He would forever be known as the man who sexually abused young ladies in his ministry. For this reason he is disqualified from the pastorate and should not be in ministry. Those who forgive him to the extent of returning him back to preaching are the ones lowering the high standard of Christian ministry and thus making the pastorate a common thing. In an environment like this, you can only await the next “fall” from grace with a lot of certainty.

Another reason why Timi might regard his “sorry” letter sufficient to restore him back to the pulpit is because of the nature of the gospel he preaches. Timi preaches sexual purity; a message that exhumes from the Pentecostal/Charismatic movement that has a tendency to produce all kind of ministry specialties. Where men specialize in everything but true righteousness and holiness. Those who read my essay know how much I bemoan the gospel of Prosperity that has taken over the heart of gospel preaching in our country, Nigeria.

The result is that there is great emphasis on wealth and little emphasis on holiness and righteousness. It is a gospel that exhumes from the Word of Faith message where Christ’s death is seen as a means to resolve men’s troubles on this earth; while they ignore the more salient part of Christ saving men from their sin and leading them on the path of holiness. The result is usually that unconverted men take the reins of ministry and then preach messages that sooth the consciences of other unconverted persons.

The other implication is that once in a while the true nature of these wolves shows forth in scandals like the one that Timi Adigun has fallen into. If Timi will hear the voice of the Holy Spirit, he would need to leave the ministry completely and embark on a journey of soul searching to find the gospel and the Christ that died and rose to save sinners. It is only in this manner he would truly find forgiveness with God and then show forth fruits in keeping with genuine repentance. Until then, all these “sorrys” is a waste of both his time and ours.


On a final note, those of us in ministry must take heed to ourselves. I recommend this book: God’s Rules for Holiness by Peter Masters to every person who is serious about keeping the laws of God. The author does an exposition of the Ten Commandments in each chapter. At the point of “thou shall not commit adultery”, the author states some formulas for which all men (and women) can abide at to keep themselves above board when it comes to sexual immorality.

We are all bombarded with darts of temptation everyday but the Christian man is that man that knows how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honor (1 Thessalonians 4:4). It is even doubly so for the man who is called to minister the gospel of Christ. As I write this piece, I am receiving information of some of our brothers who espouse reformed theology but who are throwing their consecration to the wind. In the name of Christian liberty they are doing things they ought not to do.

I remind them of the high standard of both God’s word and the reformed tradition: if you are found wanting, you will lose your position and never return to ministry again. The Pentecostal/Charismatics may “forgive” their own in whichever way they wish; we do not have such traditions in our movement. Most men have a slim chance to serve Jesus in ministry; if they allow themselves to crash on the laps of Delilah, they will never recover from it.

Those of you who accept Timi Adigun’s “sorry” and return him to ministry, I feel sorry for you. You do not know the high standard that Christian ministry demands and it is for folks like you that ministry has largely gone to the dogs in our time and remains largely ineffective among the heathens.

© Deji Yesufu

Source: https://textandpublishing.com/timi-adigun-when-sorry-is-not-enough/

Tired 2022

You are in a very bad situation and if you do not handle it well, you will soon kill yourself. Either you die of some disease or you take your own life out of depression. I'll make my suggestion thus:

Understand that sex is a mind thing and what takes hold of your mind, takes of you. Somebody once suggested to me that the same effort you put in creativity is the same you put into sex. Many years ago when my wife deprived me of sex, I channeled the energy into writing a book. I'm still earning money from that publication till date.

So, engage your mind. Learn a new sport. Learn a trade. Do something with your mind that will interest you. This far is the physical level.

Let me introduce you to the spiritual. I am a Pastor with a Christian denomination called Reformed Baptist. In this denomination, we engage people's minds. We help you to comprehend the Bible. We give you hundreds of books to read.

At the end, your mind is renewed and you will be delivered of your addiction.

Your predicament is serious and it will take years to be rid of it. The first step however is to start.

Reach me on newdejix@gmail.com for more counsel.

All the best

tesseract:
Crap...

babasolution:
This is apt.This is the pure truth.A great article with tremendous insight

Why You Should Remain in Nigeria

Let me begin this article by accepting the reality that some people are destined to leave Nigeria. The truth is that some professionals will thrive better outside this country and they will add more to society while they are overseas and probably help support the Nigerian economy with whatever monies they send back into the system. This is a fact. In spite of this reality, I am convinced that the majority of those leaving the shores of this country are never meant to go. Such individuals may travel out of the country, make a lot of money and probably reach their zenith in life. But such people will still come to their grave without a sense of having accomplished what they were sent into this world to do. This is simply because they left the nation of their birth and moved away from it.

A lawyer shared a question on social media recently. He asked his readers what they will counsel him to do: many people think that he will thrive better overseas. They feel that he can make better use of his gifts outside Nigeria and that he is likely to earn more from legal practice overseas than in Nigeria. I was very glad to see many people come to that thread and advise him against leaving the country. He later posted that he had decided to stay and slug it out in Lagos.

In a related manner, a medical practitioner was lamenting why none of his students were even considering remaining in Nigeria to work. Every single one of these young doctors have already planned how they will begin studying for foreign exams and the moment they pass; it is bye-bye to Nigeria. The most alarming part was that when he asked a class of prospective young doctors if anyone among them was even considering living and practicing in Nigeria, no one supported the idea. In fact, they regarded it as a taboo or a curse. In this essay I want to enumerate a few reasons why you should remain in Nigeria – work and live here.

Many Nigerians, regardless of religious views, do not have a healthy grasp of their end – I mean the subject of death. In foreign lands, this same place many of young people are fleeing to, people have witnessed generation after generations come and go. There are properly documented accounts of the lives of people’s parents, grandparents and forefathers. In short, white people know that a day will come when all that is going to be told about you is not how much money you possessed; or how many cars you drove; or how many houses you built. They understand something called legacy and the fact that a person’s name can be traced to something virtuous. Because of this, oyinbo people think fundamentally about humanity. They look at leaving their world better than they met it. It is thinking like these that makes a man spend all his life in a laboratory looking for a solution to a certain life problem and having found it, he documents it in a book and pass on his knowledge to his students. White people end their lives with a sense of fulfilment of having added to humanity.

Now, because many of us have grown up either in abject poverty or have lived our lives with poverty either staring at us daily or threatening us, survival is the motivating factor in our worldview. The average Nigerian is hoping to secure food in his home first. After that he hopes to build a house, buy a good car, and maybe get his children through school and make them independent. This survival mentality has made us to see life from a very narrow perspective of self. Many Nigerians do not think of others. Most of all we think about is ourselves, our children and then our wives (in that order). No one is concerned with what happens to our unborn children. The other day I was lamenting the felling of trees in South-west Nigeria. Trees are being used up in our forests for building houses and no one is planting new trees to take the place of the felled ones. We build houses and everyone use up the space in their compounds. There are hardly any grasses planted; the whole place is cemented; and there are no trees around. We uproot the trees to build our houses. Yet we complain about erosion and the adverse effect of the wind when it rains. This survival mentality is what is pushing our young people abroad. If they realize that life is more about giving back and leaving a legacy, perhaps they will stay.

The life of Christian missionaries that helped to bring education to Nigeria is worth studying. Two of them are worth mentioning here. They are Mary Slessor and S. G. Elton. Slessor worked in Nigeria from the late nineteen century until the 1915. Her missions were mostly in the Calabar area of today Cross River State. Sidney Elton worked in South-west Nigeria from 1937 until 1987 when he died. Slessor is known for her social reforms in Calabar, particularly ending the killing of twins. What is little known about her was how she came to the decision of remaining and dying in Nigeria. Like many white missionaries of those days, after serving on the mission field for a while, they return to their country for a holiday. They use the period to catch up on family matters, check up on their health, rest, raise money for missions and return to the mission field after a while. One day, while working in her mission field in Calabar, Slessor received news that her mother and her sister had passed away. She told those who cared to hear that there was nothing to return to the UK for anymore. She continued to work in Nigeria until her health succumbed to the incessant malaria attacks that killed many missionaries of her day.

Elton, on the other hand, had served in Ilesha for quite a while. Besides helping to establish Pentecostal missions around the country, he also helped the fledgling Western government of Awolowo to develop curriculums to train teachers for schools in South-west Nigeria. One day, he got wind of an information: some mischievous element in the Nigerian government had promised to ensure that the next time Elton travelled out of Nigeria to visit home, he would not be allowed entry back into the country. Because of this S. G. Elton put an end to visiting his home country and made Nigeria his home. He never travelled out of Nigeria from the early 1970s until his death in 1987. His daughter is still working at her father’s mission house in Ilesha till this day.

When you look at stories like these, you begin to ask: when white people are making Nigeria their home so that they can help impact humanity, what exactly are Nigerians going outside the country to do? Someone will say they are going to make the almighty dollar. I will ask at what expense? The answer: at the expense of family life. Someone told me that he was convinced that many Nigerian couples will still be together if they had only remained in Nigeria. They travel abroad and little domestic problems that will quite easily be solved in Nigeria, are blown out of proportion by foreign authorities who have no idea what genuine family life is all about. Besides that, how many Nigerian couples are mourning over what has become of their children. They send children abroad to school and the children return home with some education and a lot of godlessness. The other day it was Doyin Okupe’s son that had become gay. The list is endless. If such people had remained in Nigeria, many of the things happening to them will not be happening.

Finally, and I think most importantly, still in keeping with the sense of adding to society and humanity, our young people need to realize that we are the ones that will fix this country and not anyone else. Except we want white people to return to colonize us again, we had better get to work. Some colleagues in my office went to India to train. They said one of the things they noticed about that country was that it was not popular for Indians to leave their country and go to another country to live. They said that many Indians are well trained and many of them have certification in various fields that could help get them mouthwatering jobs abroad, but there is an unspoken sense of nationalism that tells them to remain in their country. They earn a lot less in the process, but help to build their country as a result.

The whole concept of a developing country is not meant to be derogatory. It is simply a verdict on where we are in our national life. “Developing” is a pointer to the fact that something has a lot of room for improvement. In fact, the countries that call themselves developed are the ones that should be most pitied because there is little or nothing to add to them – everything about them is formed. A developing country like Nigeria offers up many opportunities that developed countries do not have. There are a lot of things that can be done in our national space. Perhaps one of the greatest blessings that could come the way of our young graduating people today is that there are simply no white-collar jobs for them. Universities are now being forced to in-cooperate entrepreneurial skills into whatever course of learning our students are embarking on. In the process, our young people are branching out into all kinds of fields and they are excelling in them. This is how this country will be saved: our young people will simply dig into themselves and out of sheer survival bring out workable formulas for national development. And this country will be saved at the end.

Again, not everyone is meant to live within the national space he was born in. A few people will find themselves outside the shores of their motherland and some might even make such places their home. But there is clearly something very wrong with this mass exodus of young people from our country. There is something inherently wrong with every young nurse nursing the ambition of going to the US or UK to work. There is something incongruent with common sense when every young graduating doctor is planning to write PLAB or one of such foreign exams for doctors. It does not matter what they may be earning over there, most of these people are not meant to be outside this country. They may succeed at surviving for now but a day will come when they will realize, as in the words of Jesus Christ, man shall not live by bread alone. Life is a lot more than food and drink.

So, my dear young person, remain in Nigeria.

https://textandpublishing.com/why-you-should-remain-in-nigeria/

© Deji Yesufu

oldienavie:
So I am 36 years and looking to settle down.
I have a lady friend who I have know for a while and is a really decent lady.
She is the type of person I would like to marry (I like conservative ladies and she is the conservative type no makeup which is what I want).
She is 32 years old.

A part of me feels it is better to wait for a while and try and get a younger "god fearing" lady.

To the men, what would you advise ?

I am kinda traditional and feel like a man should avoid marrying a lady in her 30s and also have a gap of atleast 7 years with the wife but I think I love her, I have been thinking about her lately.

Edited: A lot of people asking why I am not married at 36 years old, I was studying abroad, I just got back to naija to try and marry.

Marry her.

The grass is always greener at the other side.

Ammishaddai:
Nice

Why Does God Allow Suffering?

There is this man who lost his faith in God as he beheld his youngest daughter undergo numerous surgeries to correct a birth deformity. He asked the question: why does God allow the innocent to suffer? No one could offer answers to his questions and ultimately he became agnostic. There is also the famous story of how Steve Jobs, founder of Apple, became an atheist. He had visited his pastor in the late 1960s and saw pictures of Biafran children with protruded bellies – suffering from malnutrition and in some cases dying of starvation. Jobs asked the same question and when he could not find answers, he ceased to believe in God.

To be sincere, there are no easy answers to the question of suffering and humanity. I personally believe that to understand, in entirety, why God permits suffering is to ourselves become like God. So because we are not God, we must be content with some feeble attempts at answering this grave question.

Do We Deserve Any Better?

When we ask the question “Why Does God Allow Suffering”, we totally underestimate the goodness of God, the evil in man and their natural consequences. The question is a good question because it presupposes, atleast, the existence of God. This is a good place to start because it will compel us to look at God’s own account of the origin of evil and suffering as recorded in the Bible.
The book of Genesis tells us that God made a good world. In Genesis 3, we see man disobey God in the garden of Eden and we see humanity fall into sin. As this happens, God told our first parent the consequences of their sin: suffering. But this very chapter records another account that is often overlooked. After man fell, God took the initiative of killing an animal and clothing fallen humanity. This chapter records for us a simple fact of our existence on earth: there is sin in all humanity; we suffer the consequences of this sin but in the midst of it all, God still manifest his gracious goodness to us.

So when suffering comes, we should remember that we as humans are fallen and will suffer the consequences for our sins. We actually deserve worse in relation to our sins. But even in the midst of such deep suffering, we must never forget that God has also been very gracious to us. Those who suffer the pain of bereavement should remember the goodness of God that gave them the gift of a child, a spouse or a parent. There are million other people on earth who don’t have children, spouses or who never grew up under the warmth of a parent. That God very graciously gave you and I a few years to enjoy these mercies, is every reason to be thankful. In other words, our questions and anguish are mollified when we consider the goodness and mercies of God even within our suffering.

The Suffering God

There is the story that is told of an incident that occurred during the Rwandan Genocide of 1994. The murderous Hutu ethnic group invaded a Catholic missions but because the UN soldiers had come to evacuate the foreigners in that mission field, they waited outside – patiently. One of the parishioners approached the white Rev. father and asked “father, where is God in all these?” The man of God said he didn’t know. A few hours later, the UN soldiers left with the foreigners. The Rev. Father refused to go with them. When the locals asked why he remained, he said he finally understood where God was in all the violence: God was with the suffering people of Rwanda and that he had chosen to remain where God was. The Hutu militias came into the missions and hacked them all to death.

Hebrew 4:15 says we serve a God who knows our infirmities; he feels our pain because he is with us in our pain. Suffering causes humanity to consider, with God, the most important things of life. The most pitiable people on earth are people who have everything going for them and have no care in the world. Suffering makes us seek a higher power; suffering causes men to seek God. It is the reason the Bible says God has made the poor to be rich in faith. The one who suffers, learns to trust God. In the process his faith is built up in God.

Have we considered why Jesus was born to a peasant family and not in a palace? Do we understand why Christ said he had nowhere to lay his head? Do we realize that if women were Jesus ministry financiers, then he must have been earning very little in ministry? And, most importantly, why did Jesus have to undergo excruciating suffering when he died? Answers to these questions and most importantly to the last question, will draw us nearer to understanding why God allows suffering in our world.

So I began to attempt to answer this question of suffering by positing the story of the beginning. In Genesis 3, God said that the Seed of the Woman, Jesus, will crush the head of the serpent. But the serpent will bruise his heel. God was giving us a picture of what will happen in the story of Christ bringing redemption to the earth. In one hand, sin, death and suffering came to humanity through the first Adam. By necessity, redemption was to come through the second Adam, Christ. And the means of redeeming man from sin was Christ identifying with men in their humanity – he took on flesh. Then he identified with us in our sin – the sins of whole world was put on him. Then he died a most ignoble, shameful and painful death. Jesus’ death in bringing redemption to humanity was also God identifying with humanity in her falleness and suffering. In other words: the biggest Sufferer is not man but God.

Conclusion

When men suffer, the question of God, sin and redemption comes before our eyes. The sun that hardens clay is the same that brings growth and vitality to plant. Our sufferings may leave us hardened or better persons. Our sufferings may make us lovers or haters of God. The options are left to us to choose.

As we consider our options, however, permit me to reiterate the major points in my essay. Sin is the root of all suffering. Jesus Christ came into the world to redeem you and I from our sins. In the process of doing this, the God-man underwent great suffering – such suffering that no man has ever and will ever endure. With Christ’s suffering also came redemption. When our sufferings are seen in the light of Christ’s work, they take up new meaning. They bring us to a new perspective of God. We realize that we are sinners, deserving nothing but having received much – we are thankful.

Then when our sufferings come, whichever way God permits them, we do not necessarily ask why God allows suffering; rather, we worship God who knows all things. As we do this, our suffering brings redemption to the world all around us and it makes us better people. We will be never know in entirety why God permits suffering. We can however worship God in faith, knowing that the day we see him face to face, we will find more than enough answers to our questions. Whatever those answers will be, I’m certain, will reflect the nature of God – the goodness of God. Because God is good and all knowing, then permits suffering, we are certain that our suffering has a positive end. And such end that will warrant the saints to worship God right now – whether or not they know why God allows suffering in their lives.

Source: https://textandpublishing.com/why-does-god-allow-suffering/

© Deji Yesufu

What God Has Done: Birthing A Reformed Church in Ibadan

On the 10th of October, 2021, a group of us, who have been meeting monthly on Saturdays, decided to commence a Lord’s Day service in the city of Ibadan. This meeting will be a culmination of an eight year effort to plant a reformed assembly in this city. In 2019, a number of us started to meet every Saturday to study the book of Ephesians. It is this same group that trasnformed to the Sunday morning gathering that we now have. Yesterday was our tenth meeting together and I felt that it was time to talk about what we are doing on my blog.

The Coronavirus pandemic truncated the 2019 meetings, so that throughout 2020 we did not meet at all (on Saturdays) but the group persisted because we understood the pertinent need for a gospel church in a city like this. Rather than continue with where we stopped in our study of Ephesians, I redirected the church to Paul’s missions to the city of Ephesus as they are recorded in Acts 18 to 20. In our study of these texts so far, we have seen the apologetics drive in Paul’s missions (Acts 18); we saw the true place of “speaking in tongues” in a Christian gathering (Acts 19:1-7); We saw how God uses miracles as signs for a community (Acts 19:8-20; 20:1-12) we understood why a church should be confessional (Acts 19:21-41); and we saw three vital items in a Christian gathering: the men in the Church, the methods employed in a Church, and the message of the Church (Acts 20:13-24). When Paul said to the Ephesian elders: “…to testify to the gospel of the grace of God…” (Acts 20:24b), we understood this as the overarching message that a church should believe and proclaim. After the teaching yesterday, I came to the conclusion that every Monday I will publish a blog on the sermon I preached the previous Sunday. I trust God that you will be blessed as you read this.

In Acts 13, we see the commencement of the missionary efforts of Paul the apostle. In the same chapter, Luke (the writer of Acts) records almost verbatim one of the messages that Paul preached. In that message I figured that we would be able to have a gleams into what Paul meant as “the gospel of the grace of God”. From verse 13 to 39, Paul begins to address the people of Antioch of Pisidia in a Synagogue. In that address, Paul lays certain emphasis and I would simply surmarise them thus:

verse 17: God chose the fathers and made Isreal great.
verse 18: God bore with the sins of Israel.
verse 19: God destroyed seven nations and gave Israel an inheritance.
verse 20 -22: God gave Israel leaders, including David.
verses 23: God gave Israel a Savior.
verse 26: God sent a message of salvation.
verse 30: God raised Christ from the dead.

In the strength of all that God has done above, “therefore”, forgiveness of sin is proclaimed to sinners and justification from all things is given to the believer (verse 38-39). In other words, the gospel of the grace of God is a message of God showing mercy to sinners in the light of what he, the Lord, has done. The Christian overarching message is about God and his works. Humanity is only a beneficiary of these and this is shown by God showing sinners mercy and bringing justification to them.

This message is important in the light of a man-centered Christianity that we find in our world today. Messages in churches center on what man must do to be right with God. We are told how to “give your life to Christ”; we are taught how to live holy; we are given a list of commandments to meet; we are told that morality is all that matters; and in some cases, we are pressed down with the need to make heaven. Fortunately, all of these items were missing in Paul’s proclamation of the gospel of grace. When Paul will bring a people to understand the gospel, he centered his message essentially on what God has done and not what man should do.

It is also interesting to note that the very first point of his message was the doctrine of election. Paul reminded his listeners that when God was to bring redemption to Israel, the first thing he did was that he chose the fathers. The same point is reiterated concerning the Church in Ephesians 1:4, where Paul writes: “…even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the earth…” Unfortunately when the doctrine of election is taught in churches today, it is disputed and called a doctrine of demons. Others who may agree to it, will say that it is a difficult doctrine and should be left for matured believers. But Paul does not agree; Paul will rather make the doctrine of election the beginning point of his evangelism. It was the starting point of his debate with the Jews. The reason is because there is no other doctrine that tells us of what God has done, with no contribution from any man, than the doctrine of election. Election tells us that God’s dealings with sinners in a redemptive manner is an act of his grace; it is what he has chosen to do and the actions and inactions of men could not in any way influence it. And because reformed theology espouses the doctrine of election, reformed theology joins Paul in proclaiming the gospel of the grace of God. It is called “grace” because it is a gift of God to an underserving humanity who could never work to earn God’s approbation.

So after ten Sundays, we encounter this mighty doctrine of the gospel of the grace of God and we see its application also: the fact that through it God offer forgiveness of sin to a sinful humanity and through it we find justification before God; something we could never earn either by our religious efforts or by keeping all the laws of Moses. Grace is indeed beautiful and this is God’s good news to counter the bad news of sure damnation that our sins bring. For sinners, all you need to do is believe this message; for believers, all you should be doing is worship and celebrating the name of Christ. Amen.

Next Sunday we would continue to observe other themes in Paul’s admonition to the Ephesian elders as it is recorded in Acts 20. Soon we would conclude that chapter and begin to examine Paul’s epistle to the Ephesians. This epistle of Paul is regarded as one of the most rounded texts that the apostle wrote and it is a text that is relevant for the church; especially a beginning church like ours.

If you are out there and you are not committed to a Christian assembly in the city of Ibadan, we will like to invite you to be part of our church plant. We are in the process of building a work that will glorify God on earth. We are trusting God to plant a Christian church that makes the Bible central and that is faithful to the historic Christian faith – as had been believed by Christians from the first century. You may reach me on newdejix@gmail.com for directions to where we meet. May God’s grace, mercy and peace be extended to you and yours as you make the decision to be part of this gathering.

The gospel of the grace of God is the good news of what God has done for undeserving sinners. We are also blessed to have God, through many providential means, birth a reformed gathering of Christians in Ibadan. It is the doing of the Lord and it is marvelous in our sight.

© Deji Yesufu

Source: https://textandpublishing.com/what-god-has-done-birthing-a-reformed-church-in-ibadan/

helinues:
Toh

Word

“Unknown Soldier – na ‘im do am”

by: Deji Yesufu

Three individuals were the primary planners of the Janaury 15th, 1966 coup. They were Kaduna Nzeogwu, Ifeanyi Ifeajuna and Adewale Ademoyega. Of these three only one survived the upheaveals that the military coup plunged Nigeria into and that person was Ademoyega. Besides a lot of conjectures, no one could tell what were the driving forces in the minds of these young men that led them to do what they did in those days but since Ademoyega survived, he documented his thoughts in his provocative book “Why We Struck” – published in 1981. According to Ademoyega, a lot of things triggered the 1966 coup but the final straw that broke the carmel’s back were the incidence around the Tiv riots of 1964.

After the British left Nigeria, crisis broke out in Tiv land when the natives refused the political dominance of the ruling National People’s Congress (NPC). The Tiv people sought separation from the overbearing political presence of the Sardauna of Sokoto, Ahmadu Bello, on them. They will eventually get their freedom with the creation of the Plateau-Benue axis in 1976. But initially, the Tiv resented the Sarduana because Tiv land was never conquered by the Fulani and now they saw themselves under the dominance of the North in the abscence of the British. With time riots broke out all over Tiv land. The police were unable to curb the violence and so the military was employed. Adewale Ademoyega was one of the officers sent to Tiv land to help restore sanity. While under the orders of his masters the government, he also understood the argument of the Tiv people – who were seeking independence from the North. At the same time Ademoyega was never comfortable with the extreme force that was employed to squash the riots. For Ademoyega, it was this singular event that convinced him that the rule of the NPC should be ended. Ademoyega, in 1964, was an unknown soldier whose actions in latter years will soon become well known all around the world.

It is no longer news that the report of a panel set up by the Lagos State government to investigate the shooting of young Nigerians on October, 20, 2020, has now been made public. I understand that the report was leaked to the public the very day a copy was handed over to the Lagos State government. We are being told that reports like that should never have made it to the public. What should have happened was that Lagos State should have considered the findings of this report and then they will issue a “white paper”, which will be the official government position on the matter. Unfortunately, the report is in the open and a government white paper is almost unnecessary now because the matter is already in the court of public opinion. Whoever leaked that report must have suspected that, like many other governmental reviews of issues in our national life, government has a way of making nonsense of reports by committees and panels they themselves constitute. Most recommendations made by such committees are pushed under the cabinet and filed away forever. These people must have reasoned that if the report is in the public, government will have no other choice than to take seriously the matter of implementing the recommendations made by the panel.

Government has every reason to be concerned about the report on the killings at Lekki Toll Gate last year because the report gave some damning verdicts on the government, the police and the army. The report states in part: “…at the Lekki Toll Gate, officers of the Nigerian Army shot, injured and killed unarmed helpless and defenseless protesters, without provocation or justification, while they were waving the Nigerian flag and singing the National Anthem and the manner of assault and killing could, in context, be described as a massacre…” The report went on to say that at least 11 persons were killed, 37 persons sustained varying degrees of injury; while another 96 dead bodies were found all around mortuaries in Lagos State with considerable numbers of these bodies coming from the incident at the Lekki Toll Gate.

Since the unofficial publishing of this report, government at both state and federal levels have remained mute. It is clear to everyone that a case of injustice has occurred in the country’s national life and where justice is not seen to be clearly carried out in a body polity, you leave the people with the possibility of taking the laws into their hands. A country’s democracy itself is put in jeopardy when a people are continually denied justice. They reach a point when they take matters into their hands and those who are most prone to do this are young military officers who are armed with weopon and who realize that if they are lucky enough, they can steal into government, kill those who are in power and take over power. This is what has leads to coups in African countries – the most recent being the forceful take over of power in Sudan. The soldier who was relatively unknown, comes to political prominence via the barrel of the gun because those who were entrusted with political power used it in an irresponsible manner.

Nothing short of justice will pacify the cries all around the country over the killing of those young Nigerians in Lekki, Lagos. The panel has recommended the dismissal of Maj. Gen. Godwin Umelo and Lt. Col. S. O. Bello, who refused to honor the invitation of the panel, and whose names where mentioned numerously as being the officers in charge of the soldiers that shot at the protesters. All officers and soldiers involved in the Lekki incident have also been recommended for dismissal.

Maj. Gen. Omata was said to be excluded from these officers because although he was on ground that night, he it was that ensured that many more protesters were not killed. The moment he got wind of the information that soldiers were shooting at protesters, he drove to the Toll Gate and ordered those men to stop the shooting. It was after the soldiers had gone, that policemen from the Maroko Police station came and began another round of shooting. The panel recommended the dismissal of these policemen also. It should however be noted here that while the report recommended the prosecution of the police officers, they said nothing about prosecuting the soldiers. I would add that if justice will be seen to be done, all the soldiers involved should also be prosecuted for these dastard acts.

In 1977 Nigeria hosted the Festival of Black Arts and Culture (FESTAC). A number of people criticized the Nigerian government for wasting public funds on it. One other critic, Fela Anikulapo-kuti, was a little more virulent than others. In reaction to this, soldiers were deployed to the Kalakuta Republic home of the late Afrobeat crooner. He and members of his family were brutalized and subsequently arrested and detained. Fela’s mother, Funmilayo Ransome-kuti, a major influence in Nigeria obtaining her independence from the British, was beaten and thrown out of the window of a high rising house in Fela’s compound. She was hospitalized but subsequently died from the injuries she sustained in that fall. Mrs. Ransome-kuti was effectively killed by faceless soldiers in the Nigerian army. In response, Fela waxed his immmortal “Unknown Soldier” track to shed light on the injustice that was meted on his family: “Uknown soldier… na ‘im do am…” he sang.

One will never know when the Nigerian government will realize that might is not right in the civilized world. Not everything must be crushed by the force of arms. The very situation that we have today, with the bludgeoning terrorist activities of Boko Haram, was exacerbated by the extra-judicial killing of Mohammed Yusuf, the founder of the sect. It is very possible that if Yusuf was brought to justice through the law, his followers will not have needed to take up arms against the state. Similarly, the very situation the country is witnessing in South-East Nigeria has reached this point because government continues to use force to quell the demands of members of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB). Now these guys have taken up arms against government and plunging another region of the country into violence.

My argument in this essay is simply this: the unknown soldier in the Nigerian polity is an individual with a mind and with emotions. When they are used by the state to crush both lawful and unlawful dissent in society, the Nigerian state is further equipping them for a similar situation when these soldiers could take up arms against the government itself. The solution is for government to realize that force should never be the first response to dissent in society; rather, it should be the last. And if government will pursue viable options at curbing dissent in society, we might never ever need to employ force – talk less of having a detachment of armed faceless soldiers opening fire on defenseless citizens of the country.

The unknown soldiers who killed countless number of youths at the Lekki Toll Gate last year must be found out and punished this time around. The ball is in the court of the Nigerian government right now.

Source: https://textandpublishing.com/unknown-soldier-na-im-do-am/

abdelrahman:
Shuke!

The Daniel Kolenda Ibadan Crusade

by: Deji Yesufu

This morning I prayed for Daniel Kolenda. I asked that God will bless the efforts of this man and his team as they reach the city of Ibadan with the gospel of Jesus Christ. I prayed that as the gospel is preached, the Holy Spirit will take the preached word and cause for conversion to take place in the heart of sinners. The Bible says “…faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God…” This means that saving faith, the faith that converts a sinner, can only come as sinners hear the gospel preached and Christ takes the preached word and causes for regeneration to take place in the heart of the listener.

The only way anyone will be converted is when they hear the gospel preached, they understand that Christ died for them and they are brought to a place of repentance and faith. This is what I hope the Daniel Kolenda crusade will do to the people of Ibadan as they go to hear him preach. Unfortunately this is about all the hope I have in this crusade that is billed to begin tomorrow and conclude on Sunday. In this essay, I want to share a few reservations I have about a crusade like this and I will also be explaining why, although I wish the best for this mission, I will not be joining in the crusade efforts; nor will I be visiting the crusade ground.

Who is Daniel Kolenda? The Christ for All Nations website (cfan.org) describes Kolenda as an evangelist, a pastor, author and teacher. He is said to have led 22 million people to Jesus Christ. He is the successor of the late but very famous evangelist, Reinhard Bonnke. Kolenda lives in Orlando, Florida, where he pastors a church called Nations Church. Kolenda is married to one wife, Rebekah, and they are blessed with five children.

From this very short biography of Kolenda one can already spot a fundamental problem with crusade-like evangelism. This problem is the ability of evangelists and their organization to tell, with almost rock solid certainty, the number of people that have been converted as a result of their mission works. They are able to do this because crusades like these require people who have heard the word preached to them and who desire to be converted to “come forward”. In the process, they are led in a “sinners’ prayer” and they are declared converted. What follows is that some individual then writes down the names of these “converted” persons and they are listed. At the end of the crusade, the number of persons converted are counted and we have the millions on the list. The problem with this method of conversion is this: while the evangelist and his people rejoice over the numbers saved, heaven might not be rejoicing with them.

In my estimation, nineteen out of twenty people who go forward in a crusade, to receive Christ have not been converted at all (even this number is a very generous estimation). The reason is because Christian conversion is not as easy as it is suggested by many evangelists. The most difficult part of conversion is simply this: it is God that saves sinners – not the evangelist. The word that is preached on the crusade ground is only a means to an end. The real conversion happens when the Holy Spirit takes the preached word and uses it to birth understanding in the mind of the hearer. No one can tell when genuine conversion occurs; the only thing we see is that the converted person will have remorse for sin.

They will often find themselves seeking God in prayer and in his word, and someday such an individual will come to a settled conviction of their being forgiven. I am stating that genuine conversion is a process that often takes days, weeks, months and sometimes years. Finally, the person can say with confidence that he knows his sins has been forgiven and he is now a child of God. The problem with crusades like these is that they often do not give allowance for these long process of God working on the heart of the sinner. So that they will soon declare converted one who has not even understood the Christian gospel and they will confer a false sense of conversion on such an individual. This is one reason many so called converts to Christianity lack genuine fruits of conversion.

Incidentally, historically crusade-like missions started with the ministry of a man called George Whitefield. Whitefield was a Calvinist who lived in the 18th century. He was an ordained Anglican Priest but because of his unique preaching ability, he enjoined invitations to many churches in England and the new colonies of the United States of America. Soon, and out of sheer jealousy and misunderstanding of his doctrines, many churches closed their doors to Mr. Whitefield. In holy vengeance, Whitefield declared that if the organized churches will not invite him to preach, he will preach to people in the open fields.

Whitefield did as he threatened and soon the open fields of London were filled with the locals, many of them farmers and miners, as they heard Mr. Whitefield preach. Unlike the evangelists of today, Whitefield did not give an altar call but it is on record that thousands testified to having been converted as they listened to Whitefield preach. George Whitefield soon co-opted his friend, John Wesley, into this style of preaching and because Wesley lived much longer than Whitefield, Wesley instituted this style of preaching into his burgeoning Methodist movement.

In the 19th century, a man called Charles Finney took crusade like preaching to the point that we have it today. Finney invented the altar call and often invited his listeners to the altar to seek God for conversion. Finney popularized modern crusades and it was further entrenched in Christian circles by the ministry of Billy Graham. When Graham went to London in the early 1960s to preach, Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, the minister at the Westminster Chapel, told him that he will not be working with him at those missions. Besides Graham’s aberrant ecumenism, he had also taken the practice of altar calls to a height that even Finney would have been ashamed of.

There is no doubt that some people were converted at Graham’s preaching, the trouble was that many more possessed a false sense of their conversion there. Lloyd-Jones’ argument was that the Holy Spirit did not need an individual to “come forward” before he converts them. He rightly pointed out that faithful preaching of the word, repentance and faith will do the magic. Lloyed-Jones, like many Christians before him, advocated pastoral evangelism. A system of outreach to the unconverted that required painstaking and long term preaching to the sinner, either through the ministry of the church or through personal interaction. The easy believism that crusade-like evangelism births in many has done more harm to the Christian witness than good.

There is a lot I could say about the problems with the Daniel Kolenda crusade but for the sake of brevity, I will just mention one more. There is also the challenge of insecurity in our land. Since the advent of the Boko Haram in Nigeria in 2009 and its many variants in the name of Fulani Herdsmen and Bandits, life has not been the same for Nigerians any more. In my recollection, this might the first major crusade in any city in Nigeria since the advent of Boko Haram. With the media flooded with news of the coming Kolenda, I envision that a mass gathering of Christians will be an easy target for terrorists. While we should never curtail the preaching of the word because of dangers to our lives, we also want to be security conscious.

Let me end on a positive note: Paul in Philippians chapter 1 told the story of how different individuals were preaching the word of God with different motives. The apostle of Christ said that he rejoiced over the fact that the gospel was preached – regardless of the motive with which it is preached. This is another reason why I prayed for Daniel Kolenda this morning. I do not know the motive that propels Kolenda and his team to Ibadan. It is possible that many of the reservations, regarding outreach styles that I have listed above have been reformed by them; etc. Whatever the case is, I rejoice that the name of Christ will be preached in this gathering and I am hopeful that at least one person will be brought to genuine conversion in all of these. If this happens, all the monies and effort put into making the crusade possible would have been worth the while after all.

Source: https://textandpublishing.com/the-daniel-kolenda-ibadan-crusade/

Perfectman91:
What about high radiation phones like techno & infinix (just like someone said above) do they cause cancer?

Radiation from phones are equally non ionizing.

There are no confirmed reports from any sound educational institution that radiation from phones or mast can cause cancer. Much of what we hear are just hear-say.

Nonetheless, we have a duty to use our phones responsibly.

Fahdiga:
We aren't suprised. Buhari's infamous decree 4 is being used on Nigerians despite the claim that we are in a democracy

Military men have no boundaries �

Beware of Government Overreach

I saw an article online a few days ago where a man was lamenting the dressing of a young woman on the street of Lagos. This person then suggested that the government of Lagos State steps into the matter and proffer dress codes to people. He was of the opinion that just as government regulates a number of things in society, government should also legislate on how people dress.

I am not sure I have ever been more aghast as to what I read online. The internet throws up a lot of rubbish but nothing ranks in plain foolishness as to a grown, educated man suggesting government regulations on dressing. But one should no longer be surprised at people thinking like this: it is the outcome of a society that has wholly become dependent on government. In this article, I want to warn against the dangers of government overreach and I want to suggest to my readers the true place of government in a society and how citizens can develop a sense of responsibility at building up a society without becoming overly dependent on government.

It is interesting to note that the concept of a democratic government is a very recent development in human experience. Prior to democracy becoming the much accepted governmental norm, most societies have been run on a monarchical system. A monarchy is the government of one person – or a family – over the rest of society. The concept is derived from an antediluvian worldview that some human beings are born better than others. So in a given society, Family A may be regarded as one that is so highly exalted and they are regarded as being born with royal blood. In fact in the days of yore, an ordinary peasant could not marry into royalty because their blood will be seen as mixing with royal blood and thus perverting it. This is why royalty mostly married royalty in those days.

It was the Christian worldview, that teaches that every man is equal in the sight of God because every man is created in the image of God, that began to eat at the root of fascist worldview. The American founding fathers built upon this Christian worldview and added to their system of government the Greek concept of democracy. The Greeks invented democracy and they use to allow ordinary people to elect men into their government in a people’s senate. The men in the senate then went on to elect a supreme leader – sometimes called the Caesar.

After the American revolution of the 18th century, the founding fathers of that great country renounced the concept of the governing of a people by only one family – the English crown. Rather they adopted democratic principles and began to elect leaders over themselves. Europe, a little afterwards, particularly following the French revolution, will soon renounce most of its monarchical systems and adopt democratic principles as their system of government. In places, like England, where the monarchy still existed, it was very much a ceremonial title and not a government that possessed unending powers.

The number one reason why the Americans removed themselves from the monarchical system of government under the rule of England, was because the government of one person leads ultimately to autocracy. In the same vein, the government of one group of persons will lead to autocracy too. So, while the Americans brought democracy into modern times, they also retained certain principles in their constitution that will discourage the tendency of government to become tyrannical.

In the sense that they gave powers to government, but they also gave some powers to the people – especially powers that guaranteed personal liberties. Certain structures were put in place to guard against autocratic tendencies in government. So that in America today, there is freedom to practice one’s religion. Government cannot legislate against the faith that anyone practices. The good thing about this is that people have freedom to practice their religion; the downside is that America has more cults in its society than any other country in the world. But I digress.

While the United States was ensuring democratic ethos in its system of government, most of Europe was falling to the rising socialist mentality of the 19th century. With the rise of the doctrines that Karl Max taught, Europe began to buy into the idea that society must be ruled by, yes, elected officials. But because Marx doctrines were anti-Christian at heart, they did not include in their governmental principles the idea of the liberty of conscience or the necessary freedom that every man must have – while at the same time having a government over them.

So that Marx’ socialism taught that society should be governed by elected men but it denied the people freedom under this type of government. The number one reason why the American founding fathers gave freedom to her people within their constitution was because they realized that there was no such thing as a human being without flaws. They understood that the underlying principles of men’s heart is a certain depravity, which if left unchecked can produce the worst of wickedness. So, society, while governed by elected men, should also give freedom to people to speak. In the days when the American constitution was made, a certain doctrine pervaded the American society. It was the Christian worldview.

Most of the people who fought in the American revolution and help birth their new society, free from British imperial rule, were Christians. In fact, some of them were ministers in churches. So that while the American people had an elected number of persons to lead society, and they had their constitution, they also had a Christian minister teaching the people the way of godliness each Sunday. At the same time paying attention to how the nation is being governed by their elected officials. So that speaking truth to power was a common thing and the people often followed their godly pastors in choosing persons to elected offices. Gradually, however, things began to change.

The first spanner that was thrown into the wheel of the system of government was the coming of socialism. While socialism also advocated the running of government by elected persons, it did not have the Christian worldview of freedom and thus it tended to instill all powers (not some powers) in government. Socialism held the view that the moment a people elect a number of person into government, these persons can inaugurate any policy. And socialism came in the garb of welfarism. It was the idea that government will oversee the production processes of society and equitably distribute the profit from these proceeds.

This is where the whole idea of government providing for the poor in society comes into play – and which allows for many people to be lazy, because all they need to do is to sit at home; obey government and earn a stipend to wade through life. This is however against the more capitalist foundation of the American society that was founded on the Christian principle that “the man that does not work, should not eat”. The Calvinist-Puritan work ethics of the American founding fathers propelled them to work and to earn a lot, with which the great American society, that is much envied by most of the world, was birth.

Many people have warned against the rising challenge of government overreach in Western nations but it has all gotten to head with the coming of the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic has revealed not just the challenge of the frailty of men’s lives but also the extent to which people will relinquish all powers to government without restraint. At the moment, in many Western countries, government has made it mandatory for people to take the Coronavirus vaccines. Those who have refused to take it are being restricted in society and a lot of them are loosing their jobs and unable to provide for their families.

The “anti-vaccs” as they have been labelled, are arguing that there are many scientific findings that are reveal the dangers of taking the Coronavirus vaccines. This is the first time in the history of the development of vaccines that vaccines have been plunged into world market without the necessary time testing that will reveal whether or not the vaccines carry long term side effects. Many countries are reporting deaths as a result of people taking some kinds of vaccines and many of these vaccines are being withdrawn from circulation in those countries. This is besides the proven fact that the greatest vaccination that anyone can have is the naturally generated anti-body that comes with recovering from the Coronavirus disease itself.

The reality is that our world has come face to face with another wave of respiratory illness and the same way we beat the last ones – with antibodies – is the only way we will beat this one. But government tyrannical hold on people has made it practically impossible for the debate to be had in public. This is one example of giving unlimited powers to government. The people in government are not divine; they don’t know all things and, yes, they can be very wrong on issues. When public debate is restricted to views that support only what government approves, we are moving into a realm of life that will not augur well for us and our children in future.

If Western nations do not know what tyranny looks like, those of us who grew up with military governments know very well what it looks like. A group of men, whom society have entrusted with weapons to protect them, suddenly cease power from those who were elected into public office with these same weapons, and then begin to issues decrees on how society should be run. Even though Nigeria has returned to civil rule since 1999, we are yet to be delivered from these military rule mentality. Most of our leaders are either former military men themselves or government is still run in this country with the same repressive autocratic mentality that the military people have. When force becomes right in society, those who can build society through intellectual discuss are denied the opportunity to do so and society can only witness degeneration from then on.

I am saying essentially that there are dangers with giving government all powers in society. Government consist of ordinary men and women. These people are human beings with flaws and these flaws can be manifested in various forms if they are left unchecked. The best way to lead society is, while allowing for elected leaders, you also empower citizens with rights and freedom.

Of course this freedom cannot include a freedom to impugn on the rights of another person. But it certainly should have nothing to do with the personal right that one has, like those of what one should wear, eat or people one chooses to associate with. When government begins to legislate how we must live, move and have our being, government is taking the place of God and that is not only morally wrong but it also has the tendency for bringing an autocratic fellow into government – who may choose, one day, to change all the laws of society to fit his own perverted mindset. Case in point: the Kim dynasty of North Korea.

Friends, I beseech thee, beware of government overreach.

© Deji Yesufu

Source: https://textandpublishing.com/beware-of-government-overreach/

Nelidee:
I saw a former neighbor who packed few months ago. He said the main reason why he packed is because of a newly built network mast close to our building. He said living close to a network mast can give you cancer.
Is this true?

No.

Radiation from telecommunication masts are NON IONIZING.

It radiation from radioactive materials, like Radium, Cobalt 60, etc, that are ionizing.

This information is coming from someone with a Masters Degree in Radiation Protection and Physics.

JustNumb:
And what church would that be?

I stay in Lagos.

Please say it publicly

First Church:
Sovereign Grace Bible Church,
Plot 451a Oluwadamilola Fasade St, Omole Phase 1 101233, Ojodu Berger
Map of sovereign grace bible church ojodu berger


Second Church:
Crown Reformed Assembly,
23 Acme Rd, Ogba 101233, Ikeja


I requested we chat privately as I could give you private numbers of fellows you can call there. You can Google the names though and find the church telephone numbers there.

All the best man. This is a husband's worst nightmare.

Two things I'll advise:

1. Tell her family. Obviously she fears her mother knowing and that's why she told you not to tell her.

2. Find a Christian assembly and get your family involved there. That means you yourself will have to know Christ yourself and lead your family in the way of the Lord. As the Christian message reaches her heart, her sinful emotional attachment to that man will end.

A genuine Christian deliverance is what your wife needs.

By the way, that Pastor is a hireling and beware of churches like that.

If you will reach me privately, I can recommend a good church for you in the city where you reside.

All the best.

Bodydiialect57:
Fading away like the stars of the morning,
Losing their lives in the glorious sun......
May the Lord teach us to number our days so that wisdom we can apply to our hearts.

Amen

cardoso514:
Are the parent called Michael Angulu?

Very probable.

The writer says he knew the father was a Prof in ABU. They lived in the staff quarters called Area A then.

But the writers doesn't know the first name of the father. But Michael is very probable.

The Tragic Death of John Angulu

by: Deji Yesufu

The year was 1994. Life had showed up some sunny side for me. I was seventeen years old and I had already gained admission to read Electrical Engineering at the Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria. A couple of my mates at the University’s Secondary school, the “Demonstration” School, also enjoyed this great privilege which Providence had bestowed upon us. It was a privilege that we were extremely proud of and we used to strut around the university then with our heads high. It was not until the end of our first year, when a lot of us were given some very humbling carry-overs did we realize that university education was serious business.

I did practically all my schooling on campus because my father worked with the university – primary, secondary and university education. I however joined the University Staff School (the primary section) in primary five. It was in primary five, in 1986, that I first met John Angulu. John, like many of us, was the son of a university don. I believe his father was already a Professor at that time. He was also a privileged child like many of us but he added to his privilege – brilliance. Having transferred from another school to the new school, I never got my bearings regarding school work until my common entrance exams. I would however marvel at how folks like John, and another classmate of mine, Opeyemi (after whom I named my son), did exceedingly well in class. What I appreciated about John the most was that he never allowed the fact of his intelligence or being the child of a professor get into his head. I often had to approach him to help me with sums and he gladly did. But the place where John let off all his guard was at the playground. John will play football and the whole field will shake.

John Angulu did not follow us into primary six. He wrote the entrance examinations into the Nigerian Military School (NMS) Zaria in primary five and was taken. This was how John went on to become a year our senior in school. I hardly saw John again, except at few occasions when we met at the ABU basket ball court. I should mention that John was also a pretty good basketballer. He was not particularly tall but he dunked the ball effortlessly. John completed his secondary school with the Nigerian military and returned to ABU to read Chemical Engineering. So in 1994 when my other mates and I were entering 100 level, John was already our senior – he was in 200 level Chemical Engineering. This was the year tragedy struck.

John Angulu had a younger brother called Andy. I understand that Andy was in a boarding school, somewhere in Niger State. One faithful day, at the completion of the school term, John Angulu and the family driver went to Andy’s school to bring him back home for the holidays. Till today no one is sure of what exactly happened but I was told that John and the driver had reached the school, picked up Andy and they were already on their way home. It was getting dark and I think they may have been instructed to pass the night somewhere along the way and continue the journey home in the morning. Niger State to Zaria will take no less than five hours – despite the fact that the two places are situated in Northern Nigeria. I think the young boys and the driver simply braved the situation and decided to take the risk of returning home that night.

In those days, there were no mobile phones and it was practically impossible to monitor a travelling relative on a GSM line. About midnight when it became apparent to the Angulus that the boys ought to have returned but they had not, their father took another vehicle and headed out to find his children. I believe he had driven a little past Kaduna when he saw an automobile accident. On close observation, he realized that it was the family 504 Peugeot vehicle that had rammed into a truck. The story has it that it was Prof. Angulu himself that pulled his two boys out of the accident scene and brought the three bodies home. John and the driver had died almost immediately after impact because they were seated in front. Andy died of obvious suffocation from the fumes emerging from the wreckage.

Those deaths threw the whole university family in mourning. I did not know the Angulus well but I understand that the boys were the two youngest sons of the Angulus, besides their two older sisters. I made it to the wake-keep at their home and was also at the burial service that held at the Chapel of Redemption, the university chapel of ABU. Whatever height some of us might have been exalted to because we were now university students – we were momentarily humbled and we saw before our eyes the brevity of life and how easily men can perish on this side of heaven.

I do not know what might have become of the Angulus. As much as I could, because I was not so much of a person of religion then, I prayed for them. I remember returning to the department after the burial and meeting with one of my teachers then – Mr. Bamgbelu (now late too). He asked me: “where are you coming from?” I told him that I had just attended the burial service of my friend John Angulu. I would never forget what he said to me that day. He said: “… what a tragic situation”. Bamgbelu himself had also been a recipient of such a harsh providence. His only son, that his white wife had for him, had plunged to his death while sitting at the window seal of his four storey hostel at the then University of Ife. Bamgbelu understood very well what the Angulus might have been going through.

I write this essay in honor of the memory of my friend John Angulu. He died when he was just 18 years old and with his death went such a promising young man. I also write this essay with the hope that members of his family who may see it, might realize that despite John dying some 27 years ago – he still remains in the heart of some people who were his friends. I sincerely pray that God continues to give them the fortitude to bear the loss of those young boys.

Finally, I write this essay to remind all of us of the brevity of life. No holy book has promised anyone an endless life on this side of heaven. Death is about the only sure thing that this life has to offer and no one knows when it will be their turn. Children die at infancy; people die in their teenage years; and others die after a life fully spent. It is not how holy we are that determines how long we will live. The greatest human beings die in their twenties – like David Bernard who died at 29. The worst of infidels die sometimes in their 80s. What is most important in this life is that one is sure of where one is going in the after life.

I am a Christian man and I rejoice in the fact that even if I were to die today, I will open my eyes to see Jesus Christ – my Lord and my Savior – in heaven. The reason is because Christ died and rose again, in the process he paid the penalty for my sins – which should have earned me the wrath of God in an eternal hell. If you are reading this essay and you do not have a certainty of a hope for eternal life, after death, I appeal to you to repent of your sins, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.

Thank you for reading .

Source: https://textandpublishing.com/the-tragic-death-of-john-angulu/

Eviana:
That is a beautiful story.

Thank you

Mrs. Keku’s Son (A True Story)

by: Deji Yesufu

The year 2004 remains a year I will not forget very quickly in my life. It was the year I had surgery; the year I returned from my botched venture to Lagos in search for a job; it was also the year I learnt to wait on God and trust him absolutely. In 2003, after my National Youth Service Corp (NYSC) program, I had gone to Lagos to look for a job. We were told that Lagos was the city with all the lucrative jobs in Nigeria. I returned to my parent’s house in Zaria, Kaduna State, in October 2004, without a job. I still remain thankful to God that anywhere I find myself in the world, I try to locate a church to fellowship in. All of my breakthroughs in life, as far as jobs are concerned, came while I was in church. I digress.

So I joined this little church in Zaria then. I had separated from the church I attended while I was a student because of the encroachment of the Prosperity Gospel on them. I had written to the leadership of that church about it but they did not even call me for a discussion (what does a lousy student know). In this little church, the prosperity gospel influence was there too but because they were just starting off, it was not that pronounced. It was in this church that I met Mrs. Keku and her son. At the conclusion of this essay, I will explain why I chose to tell this story now.

Mrs. Keku, as of that time, had just returned from England. She had worked there for many years but decided to return home and live with her husband and children. She was very likely in her mid forties then. The boy, whom I choose to call her son in this essay, was a little over a year old. The young boy was actually not Mrs. Keku’s son. She had adopted him and I will later learn of the circumstances around the adoption of that child.

Once upon a time, a rather influential family in the city of Zaria, Kaduna State, had a thirtheen year daughter. I have chosen not to reveal the name of the family because of legal reasons. This girl “fell pregnant” at this very young age and the person who impregnated her happened to be another young boy of about her age. She eventually had the child at fortheen. The mother of the pregnant girl was Mrs. Keku’s friend – they hail from the same town in the middle belt of Nigeria. Abortion was not an option because the family found out about the pregnancy very late. Mrs. Keku learnt of this pregnancy and proposed to the family that she will be willing to accept the child when he is born. The arrangement was that the girl will give birth to the child, Keku will take the child and the young woman will return to school as if nothing happened. Done deal.

I understand that on the day of delivery, the young woman was agile enough to have the child naturally (without caesarean section). Mrs. Keku told me this herself: she said that when that child was born, she practically took the child off the delivery table and carried him off to wash – along with the nurses. The family of the girl were so traumatized by the whole situation that they did not even look back. Girl and mother of the girl were just weeping and thanking God that they had been saved from the ignominy of the whole situation. Keku took that child from the hospital and began to nurse him.

By the time I arrived Zaria and joined this church, the boy was all grown up. To be sincere, I do not know whether I have seen a more handsome child in all my life. He was dark, chubby and he was the joy of the church gathering. We all called him Mrs. Keku’s son and we loved him very much. When I eventually learnt of the condition of his birth, I came to appreciate the boy more.

I left Zaria in 2005 and have not seen Mrs. Keku since then. I understand that the family of the girl that gave birth to that boy eventually returned and asked for the child back, and with a broken heart Mrs. Keku had to return the child. There were no legal terms attached to the adoption and Mrs. Keku did not insist on holding to the child. Even while I was with the church, she always expressed the satisfaction that she had that God used her to save that child’s life. I understand that the father of that child is the son of a traditional ruler in a prominent town in the middle belt of Nigeria.

I have not mentioned names for legal reasons but I give all these descriptions so that those who know this story can confirm its veracity and probably correct any misnformation. I learnt that Mrs. Keku moved to Abeokuta years later. All these happened 17 years ago. Mrs. Keku will be in her early sixties now. The boy will be a teenager and his mother in her early 30s. That, friend, is life. But this is why I tell this story.

First, in recent time, I have been suggesting adoption as a solution to a number of problems. I have suggested that couples without children should adopt a child; I have also stated that young unmarried ladies, who may feel they are getting on in age, should adopt children. Well, I hope this story motivates people like these to view adoption as a positive thing. Children are not just a blessing from God, they are also his dear creation. No one invests in these ones and runs at a loss. The reason why people seek to have their own children is because there is a blessing in seeing the fruit of your body come to maturity and be a productive human being. The truth that many deny is that that child does not have to be a fruit of your own body. That child is a creation of God and if you will view it in that manner, you will care for any child in particular and God will bless you in return.

Another reason I tell this story is to warn against the sheer evil of abortion. I hope we all know that Christiano Ronaldo’s mother actually considered abortion when she learnt she was pregnant with him. They were so poor and caring for another child looked like an uphill task. She changed her mind and today we have a phenomenon in our hands. That young man wil become the greatest footballer ever in the world and it is all because someone chose not to abort him. Besides the fact that abortion is murder, it is also a means of short-changing our world of great talents.

Lastly, I tell this story because Mrs. Keku keeps coming to my mind. I do not know where she is and I sincerely desire to reconnect with her. I hope that this story will reach her and we can see again. She is certainly not the first person in our world to do such a great act but what she did was phenomenal. I did not mention that she did all these while suffering deep lack because she was going through some challenges at that time, and was barely able to care for her own needs. But she took up taking care of that child and saved his life. The unfortunate thing about Nigeria is that because no one keeps records and there are no legal terms around issues, the story of the birth of that child may now have been retold and the very person at the center of preserving that child’s life totally disregarded.

I pray that my story, which has not been influenced by anyone at all, will come forth and help straighten the records. The family of that boy and the girl ought to give Mrs. Keku the honor which she deserves. Of course if they do not, her reward is with God in heaven.

That is the story of Mrs. Keku. Go and do likewise.

Source: https://textandpublishing.com/mrs-kekus-son-a-true-story/

Kobojunkie:
You have your answer as far as the reason and source of his his doctrine, why wait for judgement day to reveal the truth right before you?

Today is indeed the day of salvation

excellence44:
Just one scripture| trump this your lengthy write up.

Quote the verse please

Why I Do Not Mourn the Death of Paul Yonggi Cho

The death of popular South Korean Pastor, Paul Yonggi Cho, was announced yesterday, Tuesday, 14th September, 2021. Cho was 85 years old and had been pastor of Yoido Full Gospel Church in Seoul, South Korea. This church is regarded as the assembly with the largest congregation in the world. While Nigeria churches may boast of the largest church auditoriums in the world, the church that has the largest number of members is the one that Cho led. Cho was a Pentecostal pastor who preached a full blown prosperity gospel and was one of those who popularized the brand in Asia and even went on to have long lasting influence on Christians here in Africa and Nigeria in particular.

It is because of the gospel that Cho preached that I refrain this day from mourning his death. I do not celebrate his death either and I would rather use the occasion of his passing to remind those who believe the gospel Cho preached that they do not believe the Christian message and if they were to pass from earth to eternity, the message they have laid their soul on as anchor might not be able to save them from the wrath of God coming on men’s unbelief.

Death is a leveler and Solomon reminded us of the benefit of death when he said that it is better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting (Ecclesiastes7:2). He said that when people have occasion to mourn, it tends to make their minds dwell on healthy matters – especially things that concern the eternal state of their souls. It will compel those who are not Christians to have another opportunity to find peace with God.

On the other hand, the house of feasting is a place where the pleasures of the flesh are pandered to and the ease that come with such an environment will usually not make people think uprightly. Yet it is appointed unto every man to die and those who are wise will weigh carefully their relationship with God while they still have breath. This is the reason why as a blogger I will continue to use the occasion of the death of popular persons, who pushed certain ideologies, good or bad, to remind all of us of the eternal consequences of those ideas. And, certainly, when I die I am sure somebody out there will examine my beliefs and consider, according to scripture and the life I lived, whether I would be spending eternity with Christ or with the devil and his demons.

When I became a Christian in 1998, I developed a deep hunger for Christian literatures. I read everything I could lay my hands on that espoused the name Christianity. I am thankful to God that the Lord carefully directed some helpful materials my way in those days. Unfortunately there were others that were not too helpful – in fact downright cultic. One of them was Paul Yonggi Cho’s book called the “The Fourth Dimension”. In this book, the South Korean man wrote about how Christianity came to their country through the efforts of Western missionaries. He talked about how he survived an illness and then how he eventually built the church that is today regarded as the church with the largest congregation.

In this book, Cho taught a doctrine that said essentially that a person can get whatever he wants if he would only learn the art of visualization. He explained how this technique of visualization can be combined with the Christian practice of prayer, along with positive confessions, to receive whatever you wanted in life. The book was replete with his own personal stories and those of other people who use these technique to receive health and wealth into their lives.

It was not until some years after that I discovered that the doctrine that Cho was teaching was an arm of the heretical Word of Faith (WoF) message. Cho will however take an aspect of the WoF, positive confession, and extend it into the visualization technique that he taught in his book. This doctrine is actually an arm of the very cultic teaching called the New Thought that was developed in the 19th century by men like Phinehas Quimby but was Christianized by E. W. Kenyon in the early 20th century. It is a technique that is taught in many New Age books and if they are utilized properly, do actually bring adherents a lot of wealth – and health too. What Cho and others do not tell their adherents is that these doctrines are not taught in the Bible and the mere fact that they produce result is not enough for anyone to regard them as Christian.

Christian doctrines exhume essentially from the pages of the Bible. If a doctrine is being espoused and cannot be defended by the truth of the Word of God, that doctrine, regardless of what result it brings, is not of God. Also, if a doctrine is being taught by any so called minister and cannot be traced to what believers taught in the past, that doctrine is essentially a doctrine of demons. There is nothing new in the Christian faith; after two thousand years of its existence, there are no new arguments or doctrines in the body of Christ. When New Thoughts emerged in the 19th century, Christians had every reason to be wary of it. When it transformed to Word of Faith in the 20th century, there was a lot more reason to beware of this message.

A final test of whether a doctrine is sound or not is if it narrows down to the message of salvation for sinners and if it leads those who believe it to take the matter of godliness or personal sanctification very seriously. The doctrines of Christ leads hearers to develop a sense of awe for God, which leads those who are rebelling against him to repent of their sins and lay faith on his Holy Son, Jesus Christ.

The doctrines of Christ will lead men always to a healthy comprehension of the matter of salvation. It will help believers to worship God for the faith they have received in Christ and compel them to live holy. The doctrines that Cho espoused leads adherents to look as God as a genie: an idol that gives them all their heart desires. It is almost never about salvation. These doctrines also lead adherents to living lives that dishonor God with the avalanche of scandals that follow them.

Cho himself only recently escaped conviction by a court of law in South Korea, having been involved in a business deal which his son led and which led to the defrauding of innocent people of their hard earned resources. Cho’s son was convicted and sentenced to jail; while the father, though convicted, was pardoned by the judge because of his long term contribution to social matters in the society through his ministry and church.

Cho has concluded his life and ministry and is at the moment before the judgment seat of Christ receiving his reward, good or bad, for what he has believed and taught in the nations when he was alive. Cho wrote a lot of other books but it is his “Fourth Dimension” that is most known among Christians and the false doctrines espoused on those pages are still being propagated in churches around the world today. This is the reason I do not mourn his passing. Instead I bemoan the thousands of souls that are continually deceived by the message in his books and I pray that many of such persons can get to the point in their understanding of God of renouncing their beliefs in the doctrines that Paul Yonggi Cho and others like him preach.

© Deji Yesufu

Source: https://textandpublishing.com/why-i-do-not-mourn-the-death-of-paul-yonggi-cho/

BassReeves:
Two names settles the matter.
Emmanuel and Yahshua
- Yahweh is with us and Yahweh Saves

True

PeaceJoyLove:
You need to read more so you learn before opening your mouth like an ignorant adult making comments about Nigeria.

This comment is unwarranted