In his Flipside last Monday, Eric Osagie, the MD of The Sun newspapers, narrated how a prophet came to see Gen. Samuel Ogbemudia when he was the Military Governor of the then Bendel State. ‘The man had waited for hours,’ he wrote, ‘that he had a message for him’. He could not see the prophet, because he was busy, coupled with the fact that the governor had no appointment with him. With pressure and plea from his commissioners, the man was allowed to see him. “Your Excellency, you must be careful of all these people around you. They don’t mean well for you,” the prophet warned.
With that red card, their doomsday had come. For sure, the ‘evil’ people around the military governor would be shown the exit door. That was what any other governor or person in such a high position, who received such a message, would have done, but not Gen. Samuel Ogbemudia. No, not the ‘Original Bendelite’, according to Eric. No, not Gen. Ogbemudia, the first man to appreciate the plight of students in UNN immediately after the civil war, and he bought chairs and tables for us for lectures in 1971. That gesture meant a lot to us, stopping those of us living off campus, who were carrying chairs from the town to the campus every morning.
God gave him uncommon wisdom to ignore and reject the so-called prophet and his evil message. The governor’s action was a great frustration to a man, who had wanted to win cheap popularity. That was a great disappointment to a man, who had wanted to be the governor’s confidant and be promoted to the position, where he would be seeing visions for him. It was only by the whiskers that his dream of smiling to the bank and ruling the state by proxy, did not materialize.
He left, worse than what he was before meeting the governor. Yes, he entered his office as a prophet but left as a liar. It is painful for a man to remain in poverty after standing on the threshold of wealth. That was his lot. The glee in him, when the door was opened for him to meet the governor, evaporated is spilt seconds. It is painful, very painful, if the winning formula, which has been working for other people, fails to work with someone. That was his lot. He knew it well and applied it well and yet it failed him. “The Lord said that your landlord has been using diabolical means in tapping your financial resources. Bring N50,000 for prayers and do dry fasting for seven days or bring N75,000 and I will do the fasting for you,” someone is told. For another person, it can be, “Your problem is your mum. She buried your fortune inside a black pot she buried inside the ground. This is why you labour and nothing comes out of it”. Very simple!
In Ephesians 4:11, the Bible details five spiritual offices in the church: Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors and Teachers. The reason is for equipping the saints – the body of Christ. None of the offices is greater than or inferior to the other. Human beings, unfortunately, take much delight in prying into the future and also to the unknown. Some people, who may be called genuinely into one of the offices listed above, may leave their calling and shift to the office of the Prophet. To justify their self-chosen position, they delve into false prophecy before their gullible members. This makes them the enemy of the gospel.
Someone can make himself an enemy of the gospel also by preaching or teaching what is contrary to God’s Word. It is repugnant listening to a minister of God telling his members that God does not condemn a Christian no matter what he does. He will quote John 8:11 to back it up – ‘Neither do I condemn thee’. The Bible does not say that. No matter the version, it rather says, ‘Neither do I condemn thee: go and sin no more’. The difference between the two quotations is like that between light and darkness.
In Sociology 101, an elective course for us, in 1970 in UNN, Mr. Nkpa, our lecturer, narrated how someone said that the Bible encourages stealing. Justifying his assertion, he quoted Eph. 4: 28: ‘Let him that stole, steal’. But the Bible does not say that. What it says is: ‘Let him that stole, steal no more’. Not including ‘no more’ is a deliberate mutilation of the Bible. Those who love God declare what He says. Some people do this purposely for their personal advantage. Teaching that God does not condemn a Christian in what he does, gives the proponents liberty in their sinful acts. They sell it to their members so that nobody will challenge them in whatever thing they do. To seal this false message, they teach that it is wrong to judge a servant of God. So, no one should criticize a servant of God even when he violates the scriptures or sleeps with one’s wife! May God help us.
This explains why the church is sick and the prelude of all types of practices in the church. A minister can wed two men he knows that are men as husband and wife and also two ladies as husband and wife. It is mournful that after witnessing all these abominations, the next Sunday, people still worship there. We thank God that He still has a remnant.
Another strategy of the devil is to deemphasize the existence of heaven and hell. Apostle John, who narrated the story when Jesus told the woman caught in adultery, ‘Neither do I condemn you, go and sin no more’, stressed the existence of heaven and hell in his epistles and Revelation. I was glad when a dynamic minister, one of the proponents of the prosperity message, sometime ago, was preaching against it. I gave God the glory. Some of the people, who enthroned it, are today keeping a long distance from it as if it were leprous. Some people, however, are still neck-deep in it.
The truth remains that prosperity is in the Bible, but the Bible is not in it. It is not in isolation of holiness. God cannot prosper someone through sinful means. Sometimes, half-true testimonies about prosperity are shared in the church. Bribes offered and defilement of the body before contracts are awarded, are never disclosed. There are Christians, and heaven has a record of them, who refuse to compromise their faith and yet, they are wealthy. God has enriched them. He accepts their tithes, offerings and the gifts they give. Heavy amount of offerings, gifts and tithes, made out of sin, do not glorify God and they are not acceptable to Him.
For further comment, Please contact: Osondu Anyalechi: 0802 3002-471; [email protected]