THE National President of the ChristianAssociation of Nigeria, CAN, Pastor Ayo
Oritsejafor and his wife, Pastor (Mrs.) Helen
Oritsejafor had just played host to delegates
from across the globe for this year's
Daughters of Sarah International Convention
and a two-week trade fair where business
men and women and companies gather to tell
the world about their businesses. The theme
of the event was; "The God of my tomorrow"
with Jakie Talena from Abuja, Abiola
Omobode from Benin City, Ayuk R. Ayuk from
Cameroon ministering. To expatiate on the
theme, our SAM EYOBOKA managed to get
the CAN president who had just finished a
meeting with the General Overseer of the
Redeemed Christian Church of God, RCCG,
Pastor Enoch Adeboye and his wife, Pastor
(Mrs.) Folu Adeboye, to speak thus:
"Any state or nation that doesn’t plan or think of
tomorrow, does not have a right to exist because
if whatever you exist for is for now, then you
have missed everything about life because
there’s much more in the future than what you
are seeing today.
"I think the theme of this con-vention was very
apt and timely. It is coming at the right time.
And I would want to encourage Deltans and
Nigerians in general to understand that the
future is there; tomorrow is there; God has
already made it available, but as as a people, we
must prepare for it. And in preparing for it, first,
we must make contact with God because God is
the owner of the world.
"If you don’t know the God who owns tomorrow,
then how do you hope to go into tomorrow? I
was saying it inside the church at the end of the
service that tomorrow is for everybody but not
everybody will get tomorrow, because some
people are not prepared for it. So, we must first
know God who owns tomorrow.
Secondly, we must also under-stand that
tomorrow is for people who are ready for it.
When tomorrow comes, if you are not ready, it
moves to the person who is ready. If Nigeria is
not ready, other nations may be ready, so
tomorrow goes to them. That is why you will see
a nation that has existed for 200 to 300 years
with nothing to show for it, but then you see
another nation that has existed for 50 to 70
years and it has gone very far.
Why? Because they prepared themselves for the
future, for the tomorrow and when tomorrow
came, they were set for it and they were able to
go into it. Nigeria is a nation with great
potentials for tomorrow but we must tap into
those potentials by preparing ourselves. Lazy
people don’t get tomorrow. We must come out
of the fact of just depending on government
alone to do everything. We must become
creative, innovative and must be prepared to
take advantage of the opportunities that
tomorrow brings to us by preparing for it.
When is Word of Life Bible Church going to
branch out?
The moment God gives an okay, we will. I’m
willing, but I just want to get a clear word from
God
But you have teach-ing centers all over the
place, why can’t they be turned to parishes and branch-es? Because God has not said so. The moment He
says so, we will do it. We pray and talk about it.
We want it, but we must wait and listen. Because
if God does not tell you to do something, don’t
do it because when the time comes when you
need God, He will not be available. He only backs
what He instructed you to do. If you do what you
think is good, a day will come when what you
think is good will need help because we will all
need help at one time or the other, but when
you go to Him for help, He may not respond
because the question is did I tell you to do it? If
He told you to do it, when the challenges come,
He will back it and find a way out for you. But if
He never told you to do it, you are on your own.
And I will hate to be on my own. Not in this
dangerous world we live in now where brothers
are betraying brothers and people are
destroying each other. If you are on your own,
it’s a very big problem. So that’s the only thing.
What effect does the just concluded
convention have on the nation Nigeria?
First of all, tomorrow is for everybody.
Tomorrow is made available for every nation, for
every people. Like Mama preached today, among
so many things she said, I think the major one is
the issue of preparation. A nation that does not
pre-pare itself for tomorrow, when to-morrow
comes, then tomorrow will go. It will come and it
will go and you will look at the nation and you
will not be able to see the effect of tomorrow
because the nation was not ready for it when it
came.
Tomorrow is not complicated if you prepare
today. It only becom-es complicated if you have
not prepared. For me, Nigeria and Nigerians,
must begin to take the time to prepare. And we
must begin to also understand that everything
we do is preparing us either positively or
negatively for to-morrow. And I heard her say
something that is a popular saying; if you don’t
prepare, you have already prepared to fail.
Whatever attitude we have today, the way we
handle what is going on with us as a people, as a
nation, as individuals, will only manifest itself in
a certain way, either positively or negatively
when tomorrow comes. It just depends on what
we do today. Preparation itself is a very funny
thing. Sometimes it’s not as if you sit down and
say what is my plan, it may just be attitude, it
may just be mentality, it may just be relation-
ships. So all these form part of the preparation
which also lead to her third point, who you listen
to; who are your advisers; who are those that
speak into your life? Nigeria has the potentials
for a great tomorrow but the point is, what are
we doing about those potentials today, because
that is what will determine what to-morrow will
be.
As a nation, are we preparing for tomorrow?
To be honest with you, if you ask the average
Nigerian, he will say yes we are. But I don’t think
we are preparing. I don’t think we fully
comprehend the fact that tomorrow is actually
coming. That’s the way I look at Nigeria right
now. It will come whether we like it or not.
When you see our attitude to each other, the
way we treat and relate with each other, a lot of
things make everything look so negative. If
everything to the left and right and everywhere
is negative, then what do you expect tomorrow
to be? For me, I don’t think we are preparing.
So what do we do?
What we must do is what many people have said
and continue to say. First of all, we must move
closer to God because your knowledge of God
affects your mentality; it affects your
relationship with others. Some people may not
understand this but there’s a difference between
being religious and being close to God. You can
be very religious and yet you are far away from
God. Nigeria is a very religious country but are
we really close to God? So that’s a question on its
own. I think it’s a question we need to answer as
individuals, collectively as a people.
If we are not, then the foundation is not very
good. We need to be close to God. To me, that’s
the number one thing. If we are close to God,
then we have the most important ingredient that
will propel us for tomorrow. If we are close to
God then it sharpens our minds and capacity to
handle things that will come up tomorrow. I was
saying in the church, I went to Israel, and I met a
Jew. We were in a bus together. My question to
him was; God said I will take you to a land
flowing with milk and honey. So I said I’ve come
to Israel several times and I’ve found out that
this land is a desert. So where is the milk and
honey? And he said to me, it is here (pointing to
his head). He said the milk and honey that God
was talking about is not necessarily the land, He
was saying that is a location where I will want you
to settle down and I will use your mind to change
the location.
My point is what will make Nigeria manifest its
greatness is in our minds because wealth is not
money but mental capacity. God did not make
any human being without giving him the capacity
to think and create. Look at what they have done
with a desert; turned a desert to a blossoming
land. Most of the flowers that are supplied
around the world today come from Israel. A lot
of agricultural products today come from Israel.
Talk about technology, computer; if all these can
happen from a desert, imagine what will happen
from a land that is this fertile.
What we need to do is to cultiva-te what is in the
brain in the mind first and use what is cultiva-ted
in the mind to cultivate what is in the land
because if the mind is not activated and brought
to a certain level to produce, it will not be able
to handle what is in the ground. That’s why we’ve
had oil all these years and it hasn’t done much
for us because it is not the oil, it is the man that
handles the oil.
So it’s not about the land, it’s about the people.
God’s greatest invest-ment is always in people
and He has already invested in us. That’s why I
said the first thing is God. We must reconnect
properly and from there, we must begin to pray
and ask Him to help activate what is in the mind.
In Deuteronomy 8:17, thou shall say it is my
strength and the might of my hand that has
gotten me this wealth. But thou shall remember
the Lord thy God for it is He who gaveth this
power, the mental capacity, to produce what you
now call wealth---money, influence, success.
When we connect with Him, then He activates
the mind. He created every human being and
put things in every human being's mind that will
not only change his/her life but help change his
environment. So that’s why I said I don’t know if I
can confidently say we are preparing or we are
prepared. We have a long way to go as far as the
tomorrow of Nigeria is concerned. The funny
thing is that it is coming anyway whether we like
it or not. God help us.
In a few months, you will re-linquish your
post as President of CAN, what is the
preparation?
There’s nothing I have to prepare than to do my
handover notes.
You will agree with me, Sir, that if there’s one
institution in this country that has been so
un-united it’s Christendom. What is on
ground to wedge the broken walls?
You are trying to get me to talk but I will not talk
because I decided not to talk. It’s my decision.
The only thing I will say to you is by the grace of
God, in a few months time, I will have finished
my mandate from God and from man to lead the
Christians in Nigeria. By the grace of God, I want
to also believe that CAN will still be there as an
organization that has five blocks, five groups of
Christians and it will continue from there. I think
I have done my best and played my part and I’m
sure others will come and take it from there and
I pray for them that they will do better than I did
in Jesus name.
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