GOD’S COVENANT SNR
He was the only one that believed himself in the beginning. He didn’t seek a foreign partner; neither did he take a loan from any institution. Even if he had wanted a loan, no bank would have considered him because he was not known and the collateral that he had was his spiritual goal that nobody believed would manifest. He apparently just came from nowhere and proved everyone wrong.
Temitope Balogun Joshua, born in June of 1963, 40 long years before the day (June 12) became a volatile, controversial milestone in the political history of Africa’s most populous nation.
His birth place called Arigidi-Akoko in Ondo State, describes a “very rigid” people (Arigidi) or a stubborn/radical tribe folks (Agidi). Their praise name, Elese’Omi or Elese’Odo means (a people whose legs have affinity with the sea). The natives have a way with traditional music and dance.
The oldest dwellers in Egbe town, mostly Awori aborigines recall, with clarity, when this young man started.
“The way he started was shrouded in mystery; he was living in a swampy ground, a place thought to be dangerous because of reptiles,“ recalled Septuagenarian, Chief Taofeek Adetola Adigun.
“Also, the method of his healings was new and magical to us native people. Although my children showed me one white man (Benny Hinn) on television and another Nigerian pastor (Oyakhilome) doing similar healing on television, but his own was different because he was right in our neighborhood. We were particularly curious because he had an interpreter, one prophet Taiye who was his assistant,“ the old man said.
THE BUILD UP
He foresaw where he was going to and was not silent about it. In 1994, he talked about people of all nationals finding succor in the Synagogue. Whites and black and Asians will troop to the Synagogue for refuge, he had said.
Lagosians will also remember that the live divine healings that used to take place at what was called Synagogue Way (the roadway from the bus stop going inside the church compound) was one of its kind.
“Some of the patients were bad cases withdrawn from big hospitals, and they include the blind, the maimed, and physically challenged as well as the visually and hearing impaired,
even mentally deterred,” one of the early disciples who spike in camera recalled.
Residents of Ikotun-Egbe environment will never forget how the Synagogue phenomenon affected the neighborhood like wildfire. “It was not only that, many small businesses prospered and provided succor to many families because of the Synagogue to many families because of the Synagogue Church people. Some residents even rent out their rooms for visitors to SCOAN to make quick money”
Bus conductors renamed the bus-stop ‘Kilo bubble?’, like “what’s bubbling?’ and the road between Egbe Ile-Iwe bus stop to Ikotun Roundabout became a traffic bottleneck, especially on Sundays after service.
TEST OF TIME
Counting on his fingertips the number of churches that blossomed in uncommon ways but failed to survive the test of time, an Elder of The Apostolic Church at nearby Ikotun Area who refused his name to be in print, talked about testing ministries sand prophets, using time as a divine too, recalled:
If you run with God’s vision and all go well from its beginning to the end, that vision is not of God. And by extension, the man posing as a man of God would be exposed as an impostor,” the Elder said and recalled:
Emmanuel Odumosu, alias ‘Jesus of Oyingbo’ was both rich and powerful but his notoriety proved that he was not a man of God. Today, his estate in Maryland has been broken up and sold to individuals. He took ill and died of sickness.
Bishop Oduyemi of Bethel Ministry was another phenomenon (he started the live Friday night vigil on television). The man died in his 50s and his wife who took over also died quickly; that wonderful church at Aja became desolate and didn’t have a successor to continue it.
Lady Malaika of Mushin was a woman who said she was God who came to ‘enjoy’ life after the labor of creating the world. Her ministry was popular for ‘giving’ children to barren women- until a magazine called Prime People of those days uncovered the horrible things she was doing to bring about her fake miracles.”
SEPTEMBER 12 2014 TRAGEDY
How would the Elder explain the tragedy of the collapsed building on September 12, 2014 and subsequent persecution by the government of Lagos State?
“Those are the ‘Ways of God’ no man can understand,” the Elder began.
“If you can read between the lines, not one of the families of the martyrs of faith filed a complaint or sued the Church for damages or loss of their dear ones. Then if you look at the pattern the persecution started and the way government handled it, TBJ should prayer of Jesus when He was being crucified. “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
That would seem to exonerate Raji Fashola and Akinwunmi Ambode who rose to persecute the Church, but Prophet Alabi Joshua, of CAC, Alagbado in Alimosho Local Government Area of Lagos State, who is also a Yoruba scholar, told this writer that the action of the governors reflects the history of the Yoruba people.
“The answer to that is twofold,” he began.
“It is in the character of the Yoruba people. Our history is full of great men of valor that were hunted and hacked down by people of their own nativity.
You may remember that it took former military head of state and later civilian president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, a Yoruba man, to pull down Kalakuta Repubic belonging to the famous Fela Anikulapo-Kuti.
“No past government touched the Kutis because some of them had been loud, but not dangerous. If you will remember, their famous mother, Mrs. Funmilayo Ransom-Kuti, at her old age was thrown out through a window by soldiers sent there by Obasanjo; the woman broke her leg and ribs; she died later at the hospital.
“Then Fela’s immediate younger brother, Dr. Beko Ransom-Kuti was chased by soldiers even to the roof of the house and was thrown down also. It took a Yoruba man like Obasanjo to do that.
“On the other hand, it is also in the Character of God to put His elects to test through fiery storms and disasters.
“For example, God only needed to prove to Satan that Job was an honorable man who feared God and will not sin. It cost Job the death of all his children, the destruction of all his massive business empire and his health over long period. “Also, remember that all the Disciples of Christ the LORD were heavily persecuted; all but one of them were persecuted even on to death.
“I liked it when Scoan called victims of that building “Martyrs of Faith” because those are the Fingers of God in circumstances human beings cannot easily understand or accept.”
ORCHESTRATED PERSECUTION
It would be recalled that when the church submitted infrasonic weaponry as cause for the collapsed building, government ignored its defense. The police concluded it was an external attack; professional builders in the construction industry testified the cause came not from the foundation, the soil or the structure, but all fell on deaf ears because the hands of the judge ‘were tied’ by orders, as they say in the judiciary.
The Daily Times last year, drew attention to the threat of insurgency laying hands on such phenomenal weapons in a 4-page article. War veterans, people in the know in security and armory spoke and warned that government should look critically into the counterinsurgency strategy to abort the looming threat of advance weaponry that could overrun the nation at large and Lagos in particular, by searching diligently for proverbial black goat while it was still day.
The Lagos state government has made haste to beef up security; navy, air force and policemen as well as the vigilante groups, even native hunters “to curb the sudden invasion of militants who invaded many communities of Lagos through the creeks and waterways.
Observers say these may turn out to be child’s play building up to doomsday – if the government doesn’t heed the warning of the Church and the concerned people in the society.
An elderly resident and retired soldier in the Ikotun area last year had warned in State Government to “start looking for the proverbial black goat while it was still daylight.”
Leave a Reply