GUN VIOLENCE IN AMERICA: FOR WHO THE BELL TOLLS NEXT.

Just five people shy of Sandy Hook elementary school mass shooting incident that claimed 26 lives, the Uvalde Texas Robb elementary school mass shooting at 21 victims, now ranks among the highest grossing gun carnage in America. It is sad that such frequent blood spilling has tragically become part of our culture as a society. May the souls of the killed now rest.

25th AMENDMENT: ITS NOW ALL CRICKET.

Madam Speaker Nancy Pelosi once questioned former President Donald John Trump's fitness to remain in office due to what she claimed was his declining mental capacity. Does anyone know what Madam Speaker presently thinks about the incontrovertible case which America is now saddled with? Just curious!

WHO WILL REBUILD UKRAINE?

The West should convert frozen Russian assets, both state's and oligarchs' owned, into a full seizure and set them aside for the future rebuilding of Ukraine. Like the Marshal Plan, call it the Putin Plan.

A HERO IS BORN.

I am staying put. I will not run away and abandon my people. The fight is here in Ukraine. What I need are weapons and ammunitions, not a ride out of town like former Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani - President Volodymyr Zelensky.

IT IS WHAT IT IS.

"There is too much hate in America because there is too much anger in America." - Trevor Noah.

WORD!

A life without challenges is not a life lived at all. A life lived is a life that has problems, confronts problems, solves problems and then learns from problems. - Tunde Fashola.

NOW, YOU KNOW.

When fishing for love, bait with your heart and not your brain, because you cannot rationalize love. - Mark Twain.

JUST THE FACT.

In our country, you can shoot and kill a nigger, but you better not hurt a gay person’s feelings - Dave Chappelle

DO YOU?.

“What you believe in can only be defined by what you’re willing to risk for it." - Stuart Scheller.

HEDGE YOUR CRISIS.

Never get in bed with a woman whose problems are worse than yours. - Chicago PD.

PROBLEM SOLVED.

'The best way to keep peace is to be ready to destroy evil. If you Pearl Harbor me, I Nagasaki you.' - Ted Nugent.

OUR SHARED HUMANITY.

Empathy is at the heart of who we are as human beings. - Cardinal Matthew Kukah.

WORDS ON MARBLE.

"Birth is agony. Life is hard. Death is cruel." - Japanese pithy.

REPENT OR PERISH - POPE.

Homosexuality is a sin. It is not ordained by God, therefore same sex marriage cannot be blessed by the church - Pope Francis.

CANCEL CULTURE IS CORROSIVE.


FOR SAKE OF COUNTRY.


MAGA LIVES ON: NO RETREAT, NO SURRENDER!

TWITTER IS BORING WITHOUT HIS TWEETS. #RestorePresidentTrump'sTwitterHandle.


WORD.

"If you cannot speak the truth when it matters, then nothing else you says matters.” - Tucker Carlson.

#MeToo MOVEMENT: A BAD NEWS GONE CRAZY.

"To all the women who testified, we may have different truth, but I have a great remorse for all of you. I have great remorse for all of the men and women going through this crisis right now in our country. You know, the movement started basically with me, and I think what happened, you know, I was the first example, and now there are thousands of men who are being accused and a regeneration of things that I think none of us understood. I’m not going to say these aren’t great people. I had wonderful times with these people. I’m just genuinely confused. Men are confused about this issue. We are going through this #MeToo movement crisis right now in this country." - Harvey Weinstein.


RON DELLUMS: UNAPOLOGETICALLY RADICAL.

"If it’s radical to oppose the insanity and cruelty of the Vietnam War, if it’s radical to oppose racism and sexism and all other forms of oppression, if it’s radical to want to alleviate poverty, hunger, disease, homelessness, and other forms of human misery, then I’m proud to be called a radical.” - Ron Vernie Dellums.


WHAT REALLY MATTERS IN LIFE - STEVE JOBS

“I reached the pinnacle of success in the business world. In others’ eyes, my life is an epitome of success. However, aside from work, I have little joy. Non-stop pursuing of wealth will only turn a person into a twisted being, just like me. God gave us the senses to let us feel the love in everyone’s heart, not the illusions brought about by wealth. Memories precipitated by love is the only true riches which will follow you, accompany you, giving you strength and light to go on. The most expensive bed in the world is the sick bed. You can employ someone to drive the car for you, make money for you but you cannot have someone to bear sickness for you. Material things lost can be found. But there is one thing that can never be found when it is lost – Life. Treasure Love for your family, love for your spouse, love for your friends. Treat yourself well. Cherish others.” - SJ

EVIL CANNOT BE TRULY DESTROYED.

"The threat of evil is ever present. We can contain it as long as we stay vigilant, but it can never truly be destroyed. - Lorraine Warren (Annabelle, the movie)


ONLY THE POOR WISH THEY HAD STUFF?

“I’m not that interested in material things. As long as I find a good bed that I can sleep in, that’s enough.” - Nicolas Berggruem, the homeless billionaire.

Sunday, September 28, 2014

FLEECING NIGERIANS IN THE NAME OF GOD - GABRIEL OMOH

tourism

When the white man came to Africa to preach and spread the gospel, he was altruistic, truthful and selfless. He rendered selfless service to humanity. He left the comfort of Europe and risked his life in a land seen then as a dark continent full of evil spirits and peopled by beings that were living on top of trees.
He came into a land that was infested with mosquitoes that was a death sentence to the white race as at the time. Yet, in the name and love of Christ, they came.
These missionaries were taken to what many saw as evil forest to settle, with the hope that they will die on their own.
Yet again, in the name of Jesus Christ, they conquered every challenge thrown their way. They taught us the truth, showed us the light and the way. In the process of time, they set up schools which many attended without paying anything or just a token.
So we became educated, learnt the art of preaching and teaching the word of life like them. In the process of time, many left the early believers behind as old school, those born before. They got born again, the fire of revival spread through the continent and Nigeria.
Many pastors were raised. General overseers were in their numbers. The church saw prosperity, the born again knew the way to wealth. The message changed from salvation to prosperity.
The name of the Lord soon became the key and access to wealth. Many became attracted to the church.
Many who believed as well as those who did not but wanted a piece of the pie that was in the church, trooped into the church. In their quest for material possession, splitter groups began to emerge as a result of disagreement on managing the tithes and offerings coming into the church.
The slogan became how much you can make by being a man of God. Instead of using the money realised from offerings to serve God and charitable cause, men of God started buying expensive cars, houses in highbrow areas and now jet planes.
Nigerians will remember that in the 1960s, 70s and early part of 80s, magicians were in every major street in Lagos, Benin, Aba, Enugu, Kaduna etc.
These magicians who were performing magical acts in these cities got inspired by the fact that there was money to be made in the name of the Lord. So they abandoned their magical acts and went into church-planting. Since the Nigerian state is lax in its laws governing charity organisations, it was easy for these men to creep into the house of the Lord.
In some of these mushroom houses called churches, as soon as you enter, the so-called man of God starts prophesying to you; your mother or sibling is the one behind your travails.
The gullible accept this; the next thing you hear is that the Lord wants you to sow a seed. Sometimes in thousands of naira. These fake men of God have forgotten that the Bible say, freely have you received and freely shall you give.
These men in Nigerian churches are crucifying the Lord Jesus the second time. In every ministry today, it is all about money.
What car am I driving as a pastor? What kind of house am I living in? What part of the city is the man of God living in? Many pastors today if transferred from the city to a rural area, will quit that ministry.
It is no longer service to the Lord, but self service. In-fact, the poor, the needy that the church is supposed to cater for are neglected. Men of God in search of wealth and fame dine and wine with politicians. They, as their political associates have become corrupt.
They bear arms for these politicians, run errands for them and some to the point of money laundering. They cannot serve as the conscience of the society anymore.
They cannot look at these evil politicians, like Elisha did to King Ahab and said: ‘You and your father’s house are the problem of Israel.’ Nigerian gospel ministers have lost it.
They have shut God Almighty out of the Church, locked Him outside, and are now worshipping money. If today you enter into any Nigerian church with serious money, no one will ask you what work you are doing to make money. No, it is the Lord that has blessed us.
How can a true man of God openly endorse divorce? How can a true man of God use the church’s money to build an empire for himself and his family at the expense of his poor congregation? How can a true man of God establish schools that his members’ children may never be able to attend?
How can a true man of God be competing in worldly possession with his members? How can a true man of God rape teenage girl in his church? How can a true man of God commit adultery with his members’ wives?
These acts instead of drawing men to Christ in actual fact bring shame to the gospel. It makes unbelievers unwilling to accept the true gospel. Instead of many of Nigeria’s pastors being the light of the world, they show darkness, cover the true light in preference for money.
No responsible man of God will disobey the laws of the land, but what do you have, Nigerian pastors openly disregard the law and even threaten citizens who point out their wrong doing.
No responsible believer in Jesus Christ is happy about the presence of such social evils as racial hatred, a spiraling crime rate, the liquor and drug traffic, slums and violence. He realises that such conditions as these have the potential to destroy his society and therefore ought to be checked. If the Nigerian church had shown enough love, perhaps some of the problems facing the nation today would not have occurred.
If the Nigerian church leaders were not working hands in glove with the political class, if they had consistently denounced corruption and punished members found to be involved in stealing, the moral decadence in the society today may have been checked.
Where is the power of the Spirit-inspired testimony in the Nigerian Pentecostal/charismatic and even evangelical churches? It is only the effectual working of God’s power in a human heart that will allow a man to go outside of himself to share the gospel boldly and testify of Jesus.
A man with social and political stigma cannot boldly share the gospel. When a man of God is spiritually healthy and vibrant, it brings light into the local church and city. Precious are those who are on fire for Jesus especially in times of gross darkness and moral decline as we are in now.
In a time of spiritual declension in Great Britain in the 1800s, Catherine Booth, wife of Salvation Army founder, William Booth, went about the churches “looking for burning words.”  She recognised that doctrine alone is not enough. Logically sounding phrases and great swelling words are not enough. Oratory skills are not enough.
We must have the Word on fire and the power and move of the Holy Spirit.
Nigerian churches need to get out of the twilight zone of cessation theology and post-modernism and craze for wealth and learn what it means to be filled with the mighty Holy Spirit and press on into all the fullness of God.

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