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T H I S D AY, T H E S U N D AY N E W S PA P E R Ëž RCH 12, 2017
PERSPECTIVE
Adeboye at 75: Silent Celebration of a Loud Day Bisi Daniels
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t was Pastor E.A. Adeboye’s birthday and the 31st anniversary of the monthly Holy Ghost Service of the Redeemed Christian Church of God on March 2. The service is always heavily attended, a part reason for a 3-kilometre-by-3-kilometre auditorium called The Arena. But people who had thought that a 75-hour non-stop praise of the Lord at the Redemption Camp was a build up to fanfare and cake-cutting arrived the Arena on that day to the usual service, the birthday having been celebrated privately. Pastor Adeboye is not known to put himself in God’s way or share in God’s glory or time. In fact, as big as the day was to millions of people around the world, preachers at the service, with the theme “Come and Drink,� on March 2 were youths from four zones of the church. On the second day, when Pastor Adeboye ministered, the only direct reference to a birthday celebration was a message from the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria, delivered by Bishop Wale Oke, who had known him from the first day the celebrant taught him mathematics at the University of Lagos, some 40 years ago. The message said it all! The third day was an anointing service, but the day after there was a thanksgiving service – no wild celebration - at the end of which Pastor Adeboye gave thanks. According to a new book, Stories of Pastor E. A. Adeboye by Bisi Daniels, Bishop Oke, it was who on December 24, 1979, around 2p.m. at Abusi Edumare Grammar School, Ijebu Igbo, Ogun State prophesied Pastor Adeboye’s great future. “God spoke to Bishop Wale Oke and gave him a word of prophecy for me. He wrote it down as God told him and he brought it to me,� said Pastor Adeboye. “That was in 1979, so you can imagine how young he must have been then – in his 20s. As soon as I got it and read through it, I knew it was from God. So, I sat down and broke it down into pieces. I noticed 28 promises of God for my future.�
That fateful Sunday in 1942 About 75 years ago on Ayesanmi Street in the sleepy town of Ifewara when the little Enoch, Elisha, Sunday, Adejare, Adetona, Olagundoye, Adeboye was born, the Heavens rejoiced over the birth of a great man. But no mortal could have predicted that even from the strange occurrence of heavy rain in sunshine that fateful Sunday in 1942. Babies born in such moments are nicknamed the Tiger, but that gave no hint of a man God would love and use so mightily across the world. Not even the wise old men in Ifewara who called the slatecarrying, and chalk-white faced little primary school boy “Senior Academician,� and “Baba Eko� in those day saw a Daddy GO. Not when he was born and raised in abject poverty. Perhaps only Mama Esther Adeboye of blessed memory got close to knowing who he was destined to be in her frequent prayer that, Enoch would someday call a person and twenty persons would answer. Today, decades later, he calls a person, and hundreds answer: not only Nigerians, but people in over 196 countries, including those from far-flung Samoa, Fiji, and Papua New Guinea. God Almighty, who knew him before he was formed some 12 months before a delayed birth, had seen the great Daddy
Pastor Adeboye and wife, Folu, at the thanksgiving service GO and protected him. Even when he stopped going to church, God told the founder of RCCG, Rev Josiah Olufemi Akindayomi to look out for him to lead the church he had earlier ridiculed as “Big Name Kill Small God.� A man, who rather than being the lion he was predicted to be in 1942, is so great, yet so humble, and lives in complete holiness and in total obedience to God. Daddy GO is noted for signs, wonders and miracles of the dimensions of the Biblical days. Miracles that, as they were some 2,000 years ago when Jesus Christ lived physically among us on earth, have saved lives of millions of people, and attracted many more to the Lord to receive salvation for eternal life and therefore be saved from condemnation to hell fire.
renew your youth and take you from glory to glory. I have been a son to Daddy GO for 40 years since the year I had the fortune and blessing of being taught mathematics by him at the University of Lagos. During the first lecture he took us, I sat at the back of the class listening to him and I knew within me that “this is a man of God.� I knew it. I was the leader of the University of Lagos Christian Union and immediately after the lecture, I went to him to introduce myself to him and he said, “Follow me.� I did. I followed him to his office and since then I have been following him. Daddy, many, many happy returns! By the mercy of God you will finish strong, you will finish well.
Bishop Wale Oke’s message
And Pastor Adeboye gives thanks
This is a joyful occasion. Tonight, I am wearing two caps. First I am here to represent the National President of the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria, Rev Felix Omobude, who is out of the country. He sent me and the General Secretary, Apostle Nuhu Kure to felicitate with my Father-in-the-Lord, his immediate family, leaders, pastorate and members of The Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG) Worldwide, on occasion of Daddy GO’s 75th birthday on earth. The whole of Christendom of Nigeria and the world is celebrating a true icon that God has raised to bless the generation. Actually, people like Daddy GO come raised by God one in a generation and we are so glad in our generation, he was packaged in Heaven, born in Nigeria and anointed to be GO of RCCG. But he is also the captain of God’s end-time army all over the world. Daddy, many happy returns! The Lord will continue to
I want to thank God once again for the salvation of my soul. If He had not saved my soul we wouldn’t be here today. I thank Him for bringing me into the world and I thank him for bringing me into contact with you all. I thank God for you. God will bless you mightily. I thank you for your love, for your prayers and your gifts. Anytime the work of the ministry becomes a bit burdensome; anytime we think of some people God has used us in one way or another to bless, but who turn out to be enemies and we want to feel discouraged, we remember the tens of thousands of all of you who appreciate the grace of God upon our life, then we march on. Thank God for you, thank God for your encouragement. There are moments when we feel tired of praying, but we remember the thousands of people who are praying for you. Thank you for your prayers. Thank you for your gifts.Thank you very much!
The Need to Compensate Victims of Boko Haram Nnennaya Ijeoma Nwachukwu
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e live in a world today that is increasingly threatened by human excesses riding on the back of religious terrorism. The worst of human depravity is constantly exhibited by those who believe that their mode of religion is a better model that the rest of the society must be forced to follow. The failure of the sane majority to toe the line of religious fanaticism then drives the misguided bigots to resort to unleashing relentless deadly attacks and bloodletting on us in the name of fighting for their religion. Such is the modern-day damning reality of our extremismchoked world where heartless, barbaric and blood-thirsty religious insurgent groups like ISIS, Al Qaeda, Al Shabaab and Boko Haram have become potent terror to humanity. It is rather a sad irony that the practice of religion which should normally help breed better human beings imbued with virtues of love, compassion, tolerance, kindness and everything good, has been turned upside down to destroy mankind. It is even a sadder paradox that some people in the society who should join hands with the rest of us to fight religious terrorism are aiding and abetting the same evil cause. Such is the case with Boko Haram in Nigeria today. There are still some misguided minds in the North who are sympathetic to the twisted ideology of Boko Haram. And this aberration of support for Boko Haram due to faith affinity is softly killing Nigeria and frustrating efforts to halt the madness that has lingered for so long. It is little wonder then that right-thinking patriots like Profes-
sor Wole Soyinka recently said that if we don’t tame religion, religion will kill us. Perhaps we should say it in another way: if we don’t all join minds and hands to stop Boko Haram now, this evil sect will kill us. God forbid. As an active participant in the collective fight against the scourge of Boko Haram, a leader of the Christian Women Against Boko Haram and a concerned Nigerian, I have long come to agree with the truism that evil will proliferate in a society where good men and women stand by with folded arms, doing nothing. The major reason for the evil of Boko Haram still waxing stronger in Nigeria is that we did not promptly nip this seed of terrorism in the bud early when it was germinating. Now, the barbaric insurgents have grown in strength, wasting lives, razing whole villages and communities, and kidnapping for the past 8 years. The case of the abducted Chibok school girls is still fresh in memory. Today, some of us helping in our own little civil ways to fight Boko Haram are being threatened by the sect’s sympathizers in town. We in Christian Women Against Boko Haram are constantly under threats to back off the struggle. But we would not be intimidated or deterred until Nigeria takes back her sanity and stability from the destroyers called Boko Haram and their sponsors. Really, our concern at Christian Women Against Boko Haram even goes beyond our personal safety. As women, we are also deeply bothered that the government is not doing enough to compensate all victims of the Boko Haram insurgency over the years. Eight years of the insurgency have caused widespread untold suffering across gender, religious and ethnic lines. There are estimated 1.8 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the North East. And widespread killing of civilians,
the destruction of towns and villages by Boko Haram, loss of livelihoods and lack of food in an increasingly recessed economy have worsened the humanitarian crisis. But while the government, international aid agencies and concerned stakeholders in our society try to cater to the needs of IDPs in designated refugee camps across North East, there are other displaced Nigerians of different ethnic stock who have been left out in socio-economic desolation due to no compensation for their loss of livelihoods and businesses in Boko Haram ravaged areas. We hope the government can give urgent consideration of compensation to such displaced people who are not in refugee camps but are Boko Haram-affected Nigerian victims struggling to survive with their families while still stranded in the North or are relocated to their villages and home towns in South East, South South and South West. In all, we really hope the government of the day can muster the political will to tackle the Boko Haram conundrum from all angles, especially dealing with the sabotaging enemies within. Aside catering to the rehabilitation of the IDPs and other victims of the insurgency, and increasing military operations against the stubborn Boko Haram militants, there is the critical need to address the problem of some elements within the Nigerian military who allegedly provide covert support to Boko Haram. If Nigeria would achieve real victory over Boko Haram and recover to experience lasting national stability necessary for socio-economic development, the alleged subversive antics of some pro-Boko Haram officers within the Nigerian military must be checked and dealt with without fear or favour. ––Nwachukwu is national leader of Christian Women Against Boko Haram, Lagos.