Christianity has a problem and the problem with Christianity is that Christians are not Christians. A lot of us call ourselves Christians and even declare such on official documents – passports, ID Cards etc. but the problem with Christianity is that we profess Christianity with our mouths but we are not Christians in our actions.
Nowadays, when you see a gathering of people that say they are Christians, you are not sure of what to expect. They break the law, break traffic rules, don’t have respect for one another, don’t fear God, and behave anyhow.
Most Christians are not ready to be true Christians. Why? Firstly, they don’t understand what it is to be a Christian. Most of us who call ourselves Christians don’t understand what it is to be a Christian. We are too lazy to learn, we are too lazy to study, and we are too lazy to apply ourselves to the Word of God. A lot of people coming to church do so for physical well-being, financial and personal improvement, breakthroughs and transformation of our lives rather than being like Christ. The word Christian means ‘to be Christ-like’.
Christians are not ready to study the Bible and are not ready for the self-discipline that Christianity requires. And once they are not benefiting from their church, they become angry. Christians have become Pastor-dependent instead of God-dependent. If you ask them why they are doing something, they say: ‘my pastor said’, ask them ‘why are you doing that?’ They say ‘my pastor said’. What happened to what God said?
Secondly, most Christians are not ready to obey the rules of engagement of Christianity otherwise known as HOLINESS. Most Christians are Sunday Sunday Christians, who are not ready to read, not ready to fast, and to ready to pray – too racy, too undisciplined, and too desirous of enjoyment, too busy to come to church and actively engage God. The fact that God is slow to judgment does not mean that judgment is not coming. If you are still having boy/girlfriends, still having pre and extramarital affairs, still looking at women, and shadowing them up and down with urge in your body, you are a ‘wishy washy’ Christian. A lot of us think we can get away with it, that God understands that we are lonely, and that we need comfort and all that.
If you can discover your purpose in life, you will never be lonely and when you discover purpose and you are working according to God’s purpose, God will supply your needs. But because it is easier to have five minutes of sex, you compromise your eternity and your health and you don’t know that you are making life much more difficult for yourself. The rules of Christianity are for your benefits and not the benefit of God.
A friend of mine was recently in Abuja for work and he came back screaming that, the place is a cesspool of corruption. He said that the problem of the people is that their conscience has been seared, they have no more conscience. I asked him what has seared their conscience. He said alcohol and sex. So they no longer have a conscience. They don’t care, they just do anything they like. They take money anyhow they like and they don’t do anything useful with that money. There is no reason why Nigeria needs to be poor. There is no reason why there should be poverty in the land if only those who have access to our resources know what to do with such resources.
We have to pray that God will give us the right leadership in Nigeria; that God will give us the right people and God will change the face of leadership in this country so that Christians can really be Christians. We have to beseech God that real Christians will get into positions of power and authority where we can do the right thing. We must begin to hold our government accountable – that is the work of the Christian.
We must get rid of Christians engaging in wickedness, thoughtlessness, compromise, plotting and planning to destroy others, bribery and corruption. If you are going to be a Christian, be a Christian. Stop pretending. We don’t want anymore of Christians who steal and cheat, even from God, stealing from church, stealing from offerings. You have people doing all sorts of contracts with church, doing business with church and exaggerating their invoices, sending invoices in twice, being paid twice for the same job! They are not afraid of God, stealing God’s money and God’s work. They do it in many churches all over the place. They fight themselves in the process saying: “Chop your own and go and let me chop my own.” They even use ‘juju’ on themselves. What kind of ‘chopping’ mentality do we have in Nigeria?
Most Christians and Christians in leadership are too insular, too narrow minded, too self protecting, not ready to leave their comfort zone and pay the price of leadership and change. That is why the Church is where it is and that is why Nigeria is where it is. They call themselves conformist, non-controversial non-confronting. The Bible says pray for constituted authority, pray for your leaders for them to rule us well. Don’t tolerate their corruption and bad behaviour. When you go through the Bible, you find that the hand of the prophet is always on top. It was Nathan, the prophet that told David: “You messed up and God will deal with you”. It was Elijah that told Ahab that: You and your father’s house are troubling Israel”. It was Elisha that told the king “if you send any rubbish people to me, they will be roasted” and one hundred and fifty people were roasted. Today our leaders are not afraid of our prophets because the prophets are not ready to take the responsibility of leadership.
We must go back to the old path. We must go back to the fundamental things of Christianity. We must go back to faithfulness, truth, righteousness and understanding. In your homes, there must be peace. Stop fighting one another all over the place. Stop being selfish, be humble. In your place of work they must know you are a serious Christian, they must not bring any nonsense in front of you. As you move around, it is not the number of posters on your car that tells if you are a Christian or not, it is the way you give consideration to the other road users. We must set good examples as Christians.
