The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina, has stated how he stopped attending a church in Abuja in 2018 when the pastor ceaselessly attacked President Muhammadu Buhari as though he was committed to bringing the government down.
Adesina made the revelation in an article titled “This Kumuyi is simply different” in his weekly column, From the Inside …Fridays with Femi Adesina.
His piece is devoted to the non-partisan position of the General Superintendent of the Deeper Christian Life Ministry, Pastor William Kumuyi, who he said “gave some home truths on what the attitude of a true Christian should be to secular government, particularly of his own country.”
He quoted Kumuyi as saying: “If you genuinely believe in Christ, you wouldn’t hate your neighbor. Nor would you disdain those in power because they appear not to be delivering on electoral pledges such that you would go on the rampage, destroying government property…”
Kumuyi’s position, the president’s spokesman said, was opposed to those of many clerics who used the church platform to condemn government and even instigate the populace to the point of causing violence.
Buttressing the activities of such pastors, Adesina narrated his experience in a church in Abuja and how he had to leave as the pastor was persistently attacking the president.
Said Adesina: “Profound, again I say, profound. But this is not what we hear from most preachers today. What we rather see is the pulpit being turned to a soapbox, where hatred is preached, where fake news is spread week after week, and where congregants are instigated against the leadership of the country
“And I know what I am saying. I used to attend a church in Abuja from 2015 to 2018, till the pastor began to see himself as someone who must bring the Buhari government down. Sunday after Sunday, it was all sorts of criticism from the pulpit. But I endured, since it was branch of a church I had attended for over 30 years. Till one day, he overdid it. The Dapchi girls were abducted, and there was no name the pastor did not call President Buhari that Sunday. It was horrendous that such things could come from the pulpit. But I suffered long, and sat through the sermon, or rather, what was supposed to be a sermon. I then went home, wondering what the church of God was turning to.
“If you recall, the Dapchi girls were recovered within a week, except for Leah Sharibu, and a few others. Awful, quite sad, but still there was cause for one to be thankful to God. So, the following Sunday, I went to that church, waiting to hear what the pastor would say, having excoriated and flagellated the government so badly the week before. I was dazed, nay, stunned. Throughout the sermon, not a word, not even a whisper about the recovered Dapchi girls. Bad faith. “If you are a genuine believer in Christ, you wouldn’t hate your neighbor. Nor would you disdain those in power…””
Adesina described the perspective of Kumuyi as a balanced one.
“That is the balanced perspective, the approach of a true man of God. That is the ancient landmark, which we must not shift or remove. We must “earnestly contend for the faith, which was once delivered unto the saints” (Jude, verse 3). But some would say Kumuyi is of the old school. And I say yes, the old school is the real school, and remains ever faithful, ever sure,” he added.
