Now finally back home, I start with Pastor Oyakhilome, who was firing on all cylinders while the WAC was at its hottest and whose disciples created records across the globe for defying Coro protocols – and paying for that.
Actually, if there was an Anti-Coro Challenge, he would have easily won the gold cup unchallenged in Nigeria and be a good contender across the world.
As early as May 2020, he countermoted his colleagues who supported the closure of churches, accusing them of being settled by the government and querying there pastoral genuineness and concluding that they were not prayerful originally and that ’Christ has never truly being their lord.’
Three months later, August 2020, he described the Covid test as one of the greatest frauds of all times querying the authenticity of the kits as well as what they were testing.
He also described social distancing as ridiculous. That same August, he faced the Federal Government, challenging its audacity to limit the duration of church services, hollering How dare you? He even decreed that the number of hours you allow the church is the number of hours you have left.”
In March 2021, he attacked pastors who supported vaccination, querying their faith and wondering, ‘How can you become a minister of vaccines? What happened to you?
Where is the word of God in your mouth’? He told them that if they believed in Christ and the Word as much as they believed in the vaccines, they would do signs and wonders. He spoke with such anger that if they had been near enough during those sermons, he would have Biancaad them!
He now upped the conspiracy theory by proclaiming that the lockdown was a ploy to install the 5G, which was a part of the new world order and the schemes of the anti-Christ.
He actually claimed that what was killing people was Not Coro but the 5G technology and that the Federal Government had to shut down Abuja and Lagos so that the 5G could be installed.
What Pastor Chris did (anti-Coro and antivaxx) was also done by other pastors across the globe. He was different in that he was firing at his colleagues. The way he spoke, it appeared that God had made him a SA on the spiritual-integrity of other pastors and how to whip them into line. And they all let him be.
However, on the 5G matter, Pastor Matthew Ashimolowo decided to hit back, expressing disappointment at purveyors of foolish conspiracy theories, avowing that it is fake news to associate 5G with Coro, wondering why Coro is in his village that does not have 5G! Pastor Sam Adeyemi of Daystar Christian also disagreed with the proposition that churches were closed to install 5G, reminding us that during the 1918 influenza churches, mosques, schools and markets were also shut and that nobody blamed the anti-Christ then.
Adewale Giwa, the senior pastor of Awaiting The Second Coming Of Christ Ministry, appeared to agree with Oykhilome. He vehemently rejected the vaccine, saying he would be killed before he would take it and that it was not for his church, family and friends.
He differentiated between religious and spiritual leaders (like him for sure) who are equipped with vision, hope and faith, and authoritatively declared that ‘those asking their members to take Covid-19 vaccines are short-sighted religious leaders who are not led by the Holy Spirit.’
He concluded that Nigeria needed Jesus Christ, not a vaccine. Prophet Joshua Iginla of the Champions Royal Assembly, came on board, openly took the vaccine and declared that ‘most of the negative things said about the Covid-19 vaccine are totally erroneous and false,’ advised people not to die recklessly and telling his flock and the general public not be deceived and misled; some of the people advising you against the Covid-19 vaccine have secretly taken it.
Bishop David Oyedepo, the Winner-man who does not know the number of jets he has, was also active in the WAC. About three months after the onslaught of Coro in Nigeria, he boldly declared that 114 coronised people were healed in his church and lamented that markets, where everyone is running over each other every day of the week, were opened while churches were closed, saying that nobody can silent the church, where real, tangible healings took place.
He declared that he smelt a rat and that Lagos and Ogun states were afflicted anti-church virus. And that he smelt a rat that “There is something wrong. For people to be allowed to be in the markets. He wondered why hospitals, where people died everyday were open while churches, where people were healed, were closed, reminding the authorities that the oppression of the devil has no medical cure.”
At some other time, he declared that Coro was the beginning of woes heralding the coming of the Lord, but assured his followers that everyone in the army of the Lord would manifest greatness in thick darkness; that being in covenant places a seed of exemption from the woes of the world.
He also warned that when they stopped giving, they would start going down, admonishing them to make giving a lifestyle. That might be why he introduced tithe account numbers for his congregants, despite Coro and the consequential triple locks: lock up, lock-down and lock-in. On this, he was in league with Kenneth Copeland.
Later, he declared that Coro was a mere propaganda, noise from hell, an ordinary fever and a plot by the forces of darkness to distract the children of God; that Covid-19 is what the church can easily cure just by the laying of hands. “Can you imagine anyone bringing coronavirus patient to me and I won’t lay hands on him?
Will I wear gloves to lay hands on them? I will lay hands on them; breathe into them; embrace them and nothing will happen because he is carrying eternal life. He mocked those who have never been in a theatre before but will ‘now wear everything like a doctor; moving like somebody is under some attack… they will (soon) know that they have been grossly deceived.
He had earlier prophesied that Coro would end ‘soon.’ When vaccines were introduced, he warned his members against taking the untested ‘deadly thing’ and rather recommended a shot of anointing oil (customised ones for sure) to cure the virus.
He claimed that his views about the vaccines was affirmed by a church elder working at WHO, who thanked him for speaking the truth about the authenticity of the vaccine, saying it was a way of killing Africans after their prediction that corpses would scatter all over the street did not work.
He spoke fiercely against compulsory vaccination or termination of appointment of the unvaccinated, which he saw as an insult and assault. He declared that his church ground was a Covid-free zone, where people cannot catch Coro, and that it was why some people were upset.
When he spoke on Commanding the Supernatural 2 at a midweek Communion Service in April 2022, he reiterated that Coro was just a noise of the devil, a money-making scheme and stated that nobody could convince him that it was not targeted at the church, which was growing stronger and expanding unusually and that even if one billion viruses invaded the earth, the church would not be touched.
He reminded his listeners that before each plague, God exempted the Israelites and as such, they should have an exemption mentality. This was after the Covid rules had been relaxed worldwide.
Pastor Poju Oyemade of The Covenant Nation, as if in response to pastors Chris and Oyedepo, disagreed with the strident criticisms against the closure of churches, arguing that “the sick healed in the book of Acts were healed on the streets, in people’s homes, in public places and not within the four walls of a church.”
He also avowed that “Closing the doors of a physical building does not in any way mean the closure of the anointing of the Spirit from working. It does not stop the rivers of living water from flowing. He was also against the criticism of other pastors, which does not evidence the critic’s strength.
Pastor Tunde Bakare of Citadel Global Community Church, was not among those lampooning the government for lockdown on houses of warship. As if in response to Oyakhilome and the Winner-man, he recommended that church halls be made available to government as ‘Isolation Centres’ while pastors should support the government.
Read also: War Against Coro (WAC): The unforgettable utterances and theatricals of our pastors
Even when the churches were allowed to open, he was not in a hurry to reopen, reminding us that Noah was on lockdown for 150 days. He also declared that the church is not about tithe and offerings but also about edifying the people and fixing the challenges of the world.
He then advised his congregants to obey all the necessary rules and to ‘please keep safe and do your best to stay alive. Do not let anyone, to drive you like a sheep to the slaughter.’
I did not want to discuss Chris Okotie of Household of God immediately after his namesake, because I wanted to avoid Chrises (Chris+Chris=Chrises).
He disagreed with the guidelines released by CAN and declared in his usual bombastic grammar that ‘To allow the idol of coronavirus to determine the scope of congregational worship is an abomination of gargantuan proportions, that social distancing in the church is tantamount to blasphemous infidelity and an impeachment of the integrity of the word of God,” and that “No true minister of the gospel will succumb to such travesty of the faith.
He was against facemasks because it is a denial of the finished work of Christ on the cross and that Christians should only follow Biblical protocols. He said online churching was unscriptural and reiterated that Coro was satanic conspiracy against the church and that Bill Gates was a leader of that conspiracy.
When churches were allowed to open physically, he threw in another grammatical bomb, that his church would not open ‘until these profanation and secularisation have been pulverised by the Emperor of heaven.’
