In times like these, the just shall live by faith – Ojo

Archbishop Ojo of Calvary Kingdom Church (CKC), Lagos, in this interview with SEYI JOHN SALAU spoke about the role of the Church in larger society; the need for those who have been endowed by God to endow others; God’s ability to meet the need of His people even in difficult times and the necessity of thanksgiving to God in the midst of challenges. Excerpts:

The scripture talks about the church standing out, what clarification do you have on this?
The word of God says we are a royal priesthood, peculiar people, chosen to show forth the praise and glory of God. So, I think the understanding of the persons concerned is very important in this area, it depends on somebody’s definition of peculiarity. I have not seen the church fall short of being peculiar; if God’s word says we are royal priesthood, peculiar people, I believe that’s what the church stands for, but these days with different doctrinal backgrounds from different churches, some people interpret to be peculiar to mean to dress very differently; you are not of the world, you are in the world and things like that. The understanding of being peculiar is very important, but I believe that the church remains what God says the church is. We are a royal priesthood, peculiar people, so special because the church is a called out body, we are called out of the world, called out of slavery like Egypt held Israel, and Israel was called out of Egypt, so Christians are called out, we are living for Christ, we are living like Christ and that is a peculiar people. Also, another thing that makes the church peculiar is that Christ is in us, Christ is in the believer, that’s something special – the unbelievers can’t understand it; you are looking at me, you are seeing my physical body but the real me, Christ is inside of me that’s what makes us peculiar.

In Ephesians 5:27, the bible also made mention of presenting a glorious church: what is a glorious church?
I believe a glorious church is a church of His vision, I mean the church of Jesus vision, the church He anticipated, the church He desired, and the church that recognises that Christ is the head of the church. He said I will build my church and the gate of hell cannot prevail against it. Again, this also depends on the peoples’ understanding of what glorious church is, some will think a glorious church is a church where everything is pure, everything is clean, everything is perfect, and everything is done according to old time religion. I was preaching in Abuja recently – it was a Holy Communion service, I said in that church and I believe every word of it, I said the bible calls this feast Communion; Paul said in Corinthians – the cup of blessing whose we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Jesus Christ; the bread we break, is it not the body communion of the body of Jesus Christ? There is nowhere in the bible that it is called the Holy Communion, it’s we that have added that toga to it to frighten people, to make sure some people see themselves as unholy and not qualified to take it, and the people who say things like that are just hypocrites. They say this Holy Communion now, except you search your heart – except, except, and people will be withdrawing, when you give to some people, they say no ‘I am not qualified’; they are condemning people. I said, listen the night Jesus instituted the Holy Communion, that same night Judas betrayed him, that same night Peter denied him, but He gave them, they ate. A week after, Thomas doubted him, he said no, no, no, I don’t believe until I see it – but He gave them and they all ate; if it were for perfection to take the Holy Communion, the disciples were not qualified because the day it was instituted they failed: so, it is the doctrine that preachers have brought out to make others feel inferior where they are, so I believe a glorious church is a church bought, washed by the blood of Jesus Christ, it is the blood of Jesus Christ that makes us glorious; it’s not the way and manner we dress, we speak, no.
At a time like this when recession is biting hard, hardship everywhere, is the church doing enough in comforting one another?
If you do not understand it, you will find yourself in self-pity, criticising and condemning others; but your understanding of what the bible says about it is very important, in II Corinthians 1: 3-4, it said ‘Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; who comforted us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God’, somebody who is not comforted cannot give out what he does not have. The situation in the country is biting everybody; my counsel is those who have received comfort from God and from other people should reciprocate, what you get you give, those who say they are not able to comfort other people, maybe they have not been able to receive comfort, but if God has used somebody to comfort you, you should be a source of comfort to other people – that’s what the bible says. If you have received comfort you should be able to be humane enough to give comfort to those in need of comfort.
While some are talking of recession, you are celebrating ‘Thanksgiving of Abundance’; how would you explain that?
This year we celebrated God’s promise of abundance of peace, abundance of supply because in recession God promise to meet our needs even in times of recession like the times we are in now. If you are believing and trusting God for something you will begin to understand that God doesn’t fail; there have been times in the bible when things were tough, that’s when God shows up, so we believe we are not just celebrating abundance of life, we are celebrating God’s faithfulness; God has been faithful and God will remain faithful. In a recession, you will smile when others are crying, and I believe it as a Pastor and I believe God will bring it to pass. In Job 5: 22, it says ‘at destruction and famine thou shalt laugh: neither shalt thou be afraid of the beasts of the earth”. What is ravaging Nigeria today is famine, and God’s word is saying at destruction and famine you will laugh, it only takes someone with faith to believe this is God’s word; we believe in it and want to key into it. Is not that we are buying from another market but that we believe that God can bring His word to come to pass. We believe this our thanksgiving is a double thanksgiving because I have my own thanksgiving in our corporate thanksgiving; Sunday marks our 41 years of marriage, it’s worth thanking God for – 41 years of being a father; I am a grand-father, God has so much helped us, we need to appreciate and give God all the praise, so I believe that at times like this people need to have faith in God because the just shall live by faith.
As we count down to end of this year, how will you review the year 2016?
I will say 2016 has been an outstanding year in many ramifications; nobody thought that Nigeria will cross 2015, God’s faithfulness saw us through, the way God took absolute control for Jonathan to concede; if he had said no: Babaginda did it before he would have been able to do it and said I am not accepting, I am not sure we would have been where we are now, what we are crying over now is recession, hardship, but the war would have been worse than this but, God who took us to cross 2015 to 2016, is still going to take us into 2017. First and foremost, 2016 has been a very outstanding year, the year after the expectation and prediction of people who had thought that Nigeria was finished by 2015, at least we have lived another year and Nigeria is still standing; so to me it’s an outstanding year, it was the beginning of the beginning and the Lord who has done this I am sure is leading us into 2017; that is going to be somehow shaky at the beginning but will stabilise at the end; I am very sure of that.

 

SEYI JOHN SALAU