GS, Emeka, calls on the Church to return to the Holy Spirit
From Geoffrey Anyanwu and Precious Ali, Enugu
All are set for the kick off of the 2023 Annual Revival Summit of the Assemblies of God (AG) Church Peniel in Enugu.
The Revival Summit which will hold from today to Friday at the Nnamdi Azikiwe Stadium Enugu, will attract members and non members of AG nationwide and beyond.
Briefing newsmen on the event, the General Superintendent (GS) of the Assemblies of God (AG) Nigeria, Rev. Prof. Paul Emeka, gave the theme of this year’s Penile as, “A return to the Holy Spirit.”
The cleric lamented that the Church has wondered away from the Holy Spirit hence the rot in the society, stressing that the choice of the theme was to return the church and society to the Holy Spirit.
Prof. Emeka emphasised the need for the church to return to the Holy Spirit whom he said has great concern for the people of the world and particularly those in Nigeria.
The GS noted that because of the many in the church lack knowledge and understanding of the person of the Holy Spirit and His works, they have been deceived by merchants in the church who present or represent the Holy Spirit wrongly.
Warning that there is great difference between Holy Spirit who is Dunamis in Greek and lunatics, he said, “The theme of this year’s programme is “A return to the Holy Spirit.” We will use that chance to preach on all needs and on all areas of Christian problems and needs but we will be emphasising on the Holy Spirit. Return to the Holy Spirit simply means that the Church has wondered away from the Holy Spirit. Many times what we talk about as the Holy Spirit is not really the manifestation of the Holy Spirit. People can create and come up with their own idea of the Holy Spirit and we always say that the Holy Spirit that talk of power in Greek is Dunamis, the power of the Holy Spirit.
“I tell people that Dunamis is not the same thing as lunatics. Many times you find us doing many things in the church, doing many things even in programmes, things that resemble what mad people do and we call it Holy Spirit. We have to come back to the Holy Spirit and allow the Holy Spirit to bless the church the way He wants. We don’t have to force the Holy Spirit and that is the purpose of this very theme. Again the purpose of the power of the Holy Spirit is evangelism, letting the world know about God and the gospel.
“The Holy Spirit is concerned about gender and movement, is concerned about the oppressed, is concerned about bad governance, is concerned about all these things that are going on in the world. And I want to let you know that in this programme these things will be emphasised. This is the overall theme but different aspect of the theme will be ex-rayed and also as it impacts the lives of the people to make it relevant and show them that God is concerned about their affairs.”
Disclosing that in the Peniel, which is a programme through which the AG relates to people outside its church, the teaching of the word of God would be emphasised, Prof Emeka adding that “the church should not be answering questions that people are not asking, that we don’t just preach the Bible for the sake of preaching it, we preach the Bible as it concerns the needs of the people, we try to answer the questions that people are asking. By this I mean, that even the current situation in the country will be brought into focus. And in line with these things happening, the Bible will be brought out to show how the Holy Spirit is concerned with the needs and for the needs of the people in Nigeria.”
Acknowledging the rot going on in the country today he said, “many things are going on because people want get rich very quickly. Among the things we emphasis is teaching the people how God can bless them, how wealth can be created in genuine way and how entrepreneurs can be promoted and made to do things in the right way so that people will not be led to the wrong ways.”