During the meeting, which attracted Bishops of the UGCAN fold, the group’s President, Bishop Dr. Joseph Ighalo Edoro, presented a paper titled, ‘Regeneration, Revival of Christianity In Africa’.
Bishop Edoro, who is the Presiding Bishop of ‘A Touch From Heaven International Ministries’ and the President of ‘A Touch of Love Humanitarian Foundation’, maintained that Africa is in dire need of the gospel and desperately wants more of it.
He, however, stated that the gospel Africa wants is not one spiced with indoctrination of foreign cultures. He asked: “How do we divorce the influences of the varied cultures of the bringers of Christianity being so inundated in the present scheme of practical Christianity of contemporary day?”
Bishop Edoro stressed that to regenerate is to either bring back to life or spice up an ailing situation or agencies, ideas, policies and more, adding that revival in this context, can be used interchangeably with regeneration.
According to him, “This means there is an acceptance that there is a huge visible lacuna militating against the spread of the gospel in Africa. That being said, it also implies that we will need a deliberate, planned and sustained effort to revamp and regenerate the ailing conditions of the spread of the gospel of Christ in Africa, which includes Nigeria.”
The cleric maintained that the hijacking of the gospel through the infusion of the cultures of the varied bringers has become the bane of contemporary Africa spread.
He added: “The conflicts of today’s realities and dynamism have exposed the sharp variance and contrast with the modus operandi of the past. That cultural infusion of the bringers is a ghost, hunting today’s spread.
“Why we are grateful to the bringers, we cannot also negate the truth that human and cultural influences doctored the early spread.”
Edoro, a Charismatic Bishop, stated that Africa is central to the gospel from origin, stressingthat in the history of the etiology of the gospel, the role of Africa in its early spread cannot be kissed lightly or denied courtship.
He stressed: “The Libya and Egypt connection to the gospel is a known fact expressed in the Bible. The negatives to the spread and Regeneration and Revival of a weakened African spread rests on the plank of our inability to come to terms with analysing our culturally defined methods and practice as well as understanding the evolution of our spirituality among other factors.
“Our fusion must take cognisance of our aspects, our architecture, music, family et al. We must fuse our African culture in the dynamics of worship, which includes music genre, dancing, clapping and more.
“Christianity must be apt in the spread of the gospel of Christ. Going about healing the sick and all who are oppressed by the devil, raising the dead should be our core value and must not be adulterated. Yet, it should not be seen in the mirror of the cultures of early harbingers of our Christianity.”
He maintained that the reality of Christianity is to bring succour to the depraved, the sick, the hungry, the ostracised and the ones seeking justice. This, according to him, must be through the unadulterated word of God.
Edoro stated that in contemporary day Africa, one cannot again divorce the economy from the spread and Regeneration of the Gospel in Africa.
He stated: “In a battered and shattered economy, a land mass of the brightest homo sapiens created by God, in a land devastated by wars and destructions orchestrated by the west, the gosperal spread (permit me to coin it so semantically maybe), has been hampered. Modestly, we can extrapolate that Africa has over 250 million Christians with evangelicals at about 45 percent.
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“In regenerating Christianity in Africa, we must continually invade our African culture to spread of the gospel. We must as a matter of urgency elicit new, admiring and attractive cultural ways acceptable though, to be infused within our African culture towards the regeneration of the gospel of Christ in Africa.”
This, he maintained, will douse the probing questions on the fact that the Christianity believers cherish is a product of the west.
“Yes, indeed, it is a product from the west by the spread. Yet, its content is sublime and distinct. Like I said, today’s fast paced society and world have exposed the hollowness in our doctrine, dogma, and modus operandi of Christian practice.”
Edoro, therefore, maintained that for renewed acceptability, there is an urgency to interface Africa’s cultural values.
According to him, there is a great avalanche of mental advancement coming and “we will need to project our content in a sustainable manner through the genuine obedience to the Holy Spirit in genuine obedience to His dictates of how it should be devoid of our flesh.
“Then, the invasion of our collective cultural patterns by technology and Artificial Intelligence (AI) behoves of new adaptations consequent on its attending negatives.
“The entrance of Social Media and AI into the global space is the bringer of a paradox. There will be evangelical advancements while also there will be negative consequences.
“The nature of the African and its attending culture, his exclusive trust in the sublime and his creator encourages him to service.”
Edoro stressed that another militating factor to Africa regeneration is the realisation of the African peoples of the presence of materialism and inordinate ambitions of the holders of pastoral offices.
He said: “The narratives have been damning and colossal to the sustainability of the gains of Christianity. Men have lost their faith in men of God who have overtime veered from the truth of Samaritarianism of the Gospel to the one wrapped in capitalist tendencies and lifestyle fraught with fraud and deceit and occultism and deception.
“Now that the lid is lifted off Pandora’s box by societal mental speed, there is dissatisfaction among the people. The deceit by the pastoral holders has been enormous. This obvious greed evidenced in affluence and power and money and jets and mansions has damaged and hampered the regeneration of the Gospel.”
He said that the quest for the juice in the Gospel has generated quacks of all sorts so visible in their trademark of voodoo and fraud. These, he insisted, are rife today and the gullible fall, even as he lamented that unfortunately, secularisationseems to grant such practitioners immunity.
Ashe concluded, Edoro stressed: “The compositions sequel to secularity have not helped matters. Serving God is a fundamental right. This, in some climes, has been taken for granted.
“The lack of cohesion and monitoring has endangered the system. We must safeguard the hearts of lovers of God from these deceitful men holding pastoral offices, whether Pastors or Bishops or Prophets or Cardinals, etc.
“Now is the time for renewed vigour and movere. Africa still yearns for the Gospel. There is no time. The days coming are evil and black. There will be no more published Bibles. None will be on the shelves. Prepare!
“The ones online will be removed. Government will unite against Christianity. The atheist will rain terror. Our holders of pastoral offices will sell out.
“The United Nations will be used to hand down laws against Christianity. Prepare! Eschew bitterness and be formidable
