AFRICAN PLUME

By Akin Ojumu Slowly, but surely, the realization is starting to dawn on me that I could never again live in Nigeria. You may not realize how chilling, bitter, and hard it is for me to admit that. Throughout the nearly 25 years I have been a FORPART – a term me and my High School friends coined to disparage and denigrate all diasporan Nigerians – I had always thought my sojourn as a stranger in a foreign land was a temporary thing. Certainly, the time I have spent away from home has in no small measure diluted my Nigerianism. There are several societal nuances that I’m no longer familiar with. I have certainly gotten less and less tolerant of the typical Naija mindset. And the way our people like to do their own thing – the fatalistic, it shall be well, laissez faire approach to life – now rubs me the wrong way. I guess, living almost half of your life in America would do that to anyone. Despite all of that, I still considered Nigeria my home and had always felt a thrill run up and dow

“Blessed are the Persecuted, Reviled, and Insulted” By Akin Ojumu In a phenomenal way, the heavens indeed proclaim the glory of the LORD, and the firmament puts on a display of His master craftsmanship. Beyond the heavens and the firmament, though, the supreme majesty of the Almighty God is also fully evident in His written Word. A pulsating harmony courses through the pages of the Holy Book, and a sonorous symphony reverberates across the 66 books of the Bible. The chapters and the verses all beat together to produce a rhythmic melody so powerful that it can transform the life of anyone who allows the sound of life to penetrate deep into their soul. The writer of the Book of Hebrews said it the best: “For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”  (Hebrews 4:12). It becomes quickly obvious, going throu

“Create in Me a Pure Heart, O God!” By Akin Ojumu To the people gathered around the Palestine hillside that fateful day, Jesus’ words hit them like a ton of bricks. The Beatitude sermon was like nothing they’ve heard before. The spiritual leaders – the “men of God” – of Israel had conditioned the people to believe that righteousness was attained only by sheer grit and human effort. The people saw themselves as godly by virtue of their performance of religious rites and sacraments. They believed they were a tiny oasis of godly people in a desert of heathen gentiles. Then they heard the Sermon on the Mount, and their spiritual pride took a dagger to the heart. Contrary to what they knew, the kingdom of God belonged to the spiritual destitute, God’s comfort was for those who mourn their spiritual poverty, the earth would be inherited by meek and humble, the spiritually satisfied were those who hungered and thirst after righteousness, mercy was for the merciful, those who’d see God were th

“The Door to God’s Kingdom is Low, Those Who Enter Crawl” By Akin Ojumu In the last commentary of this series on "Blessedness", we used Newton's First Law of Motion to illustrate the fact that Jesus was the external compelling force that broke the inertia of the Jewish people. He demolished their religiosity and punctured a hole in their pompous piety. In the Sermon on the Mount, the Lord established new standards for becoming a citizen of God’s kingdom. And these standards are far higher than the “righteousness of the Pharisees. Sitting on the hillside that day, the Lord presented a set of sacred paradoxes. In the Sermon on the Mount, He established a standard of living that is antithetic to everything the world knows and in direct opposite to what the world practices. It’s a way of life that results in blessedness, i.e., makarios. This makarios is a deep inner happiness, a deep and genuine sense of blessedness, a bliss that the world cannot offer. It is a happiness that

“Marriage is a Blessing and not a Life Sentence in a Maximum-Security Prison” By Akin Ojumu In Matthew 19:1-12, our Lord Jesus reiterated God’ s original intent for marriage. In broad strokes, He painted a picture of the type of marriage that is pleasing in God’s eyes. It was an overarching framework for marriage in an ideal situation. Luckily for us, God did not leave the question of marriage and divorce hanging on just what we have in Matthew 19:1-12. Because this is a subject near and dear to God’s heart, He inspired men like Paul to take the picture Jesus painted, expound on it, and apply it to the not-so-ideal marital situations that existed in our sinful world. In his letters to the churches, it was obvious that Paul preferred celibacy. He’ d rather that people remained unattached like himself, and thus free to serve God without the encumbrances of marriage and the responsibilities of family. Yet, he never forced his preference on anyone. Paul was mindful that not everyone had th

“When a Man Takes a Wife and He Finds Some Indecency in Her” By Akin Ojumu Just as it is with the doctrine that equates celibacy to godliness, so it is with the “Any Cause” Divorce. They both derive nourishment from the poisonous stream of erroneous interpretation of Scripture. Distortion of the Word of God is the common thread that runs through all false religions. Misinterpretation of Scripture is the cornerstone of all erroneous religious practices. Last time, we established the fact that the Hillelite Pharisees invented the “Any Cause” Divorce. It was an instrument of divorce they created to accommodate and legitimize the decadent behavior of sinful men. This divorce decree made it easy for a Jewish man to dump his wife for another woman under any pretext. Under the Law of Moses, there was only one ground for divorce, and it was on the ground of sexual immorality. But because the Law was incapable of banishing sin from the human heart, the Jews always looked for loopholes in the La

“The Any Cause Divorce was an Invention of Reprobate Minds” By Akin Ojumu For me, nothing is more exhilarating than discovering the truth of God’s Word. Whenever the Holy Spirit turns on the light bulb in my mind and reveals a hidden truth in a passage that I’ve read ad infinitum and ad nauseam, it sort of gets my juice flowing like a fast-moving flood. It’s like ripping off the veil of ignorance and tearing to pieces the scale that has blinded the eyes of my understanding up till that moment in time. The exhilaration of the revealed truth in God’s Word turns into a wholesome liberation when the revealed truth is adopted, and it becomes a way of life and a manual for living. The chain of ignorance is broken, and I mount up with wings like eagles soaring to a higher level of walk with God. The truth heals, the truth sets free, and the truth builds us up. Our Lord and Savior attested to this very fact in John 8:31-32: “If you abide in my word, then you are truly disciples of mine; and yo

“An Abusive Spouse Is an Unbelieving Spouse, Let Them Go ” By Akin Ojumu There are many Christians in marital-discordant relationships today who either don’t know it or are in denial. These are folks who either believe, or choose to believe, they are married to God-fearing believers like themselves. Yet, there’s nothing in the lives of the spouses that suggest they know Christ or have any relationship with Him. Yes, these faux-Christian spouses have all the appearances of religiosity. They are fluent in Christianese, sing in the choir, fast every day, pray like hell, their tithes and offerings break the offering basket, and some are even big men of God. Yet, these are nothing but ravenous wolves in sheep’s clothings; they are Christians in Church attendance only. No true Christian will turn his home into a toxic atmosphere devoid of peace and absent of harmony. You can’t call yourself a Christian and subject your wife to domestic abuse and make her a victim of torture. The Holy Spirit

“If You Think Your Abusive Spouse is a Believer, Think Again” By Akin Ojumu Apostle Paul used his numerous epistles to the various Churches to teach sound doctrine and impart spiritual knowledge. 1 Corinthians 7 was Paul’s teaching on marriage and divorce, two subjects of which the Corinthian Christians had loads of real-life questions in need of practical applications to the messed-up relationships that existed among the congregation. We’ve already examined Paul’s instructions that the unmarried, the widows, as well as the virgins could marry if they couldn’t exercise self-control. Additionally, we discussed his command to the married not to divorce their spouses, but that if they did divorce, they were to stay unmarried or reconcile. The next question Paul fielded was that of the marital-discordant couples. i.e., those in marriages in which one of partner is a believer and the other is not. We read his answer in 1 Corinthians 7:12-16: “But to the rest I say, not the Lord, that if any

“To the Married Believer I Command, Do Not Divorce Your Spouse” By Akin Ojumu Context is key when it comes to interpreting Scripture. An accurate understanding of the Bible is anchored on a contextual, linguistic, and historical exegesis. The reason the Church is filled with erroneous doctrines is because people carelessly handle the Word of God. Failing to interpret Scripture from the foundation of the context, they end up with faulty doctrines which produce corrupted faith, perverted beliefs, and unsteady believers. This shaky grasp of Scripture is the reason some may read 1 Corinthians 7 and not understand that the “unmarried” Paul was talking about in this chapter was someone who had been divorced from their spouses. If these folks actually study the Bible carefully and not simply regurgitate what their daddies in the Lord told them, they’d have known that the word translated “unmarried” in this chapter is the Greek word “agamos,” which literally means to be “loosed from marriage.

“Are You Divorced? You’ve not Sinned if You Remarry” By Akin Ojumu Now, on the question of whether the unmarried Christian – i.e., a divorced Christian – should be allowed to remarry, Paul replied: “But I say to the unmarried and to the widows, that as a practical matter, it is good if they remain single and entirely devoted to the Lord as I am. But if they do not have sufficient self-control, they should marry; for it is better to marry than to burn with passion.” 1 Corinthians 7:8-9). Here, in these 2 verses, Paul made it explicitly clear that a Christian woman who is unmarried by virtue of having had a divorce before they came to Christ can remarry if such a person cannot exercise self-control.  Paul’s instructions to the unmarried men on the same issue were consistent with his counsel to the unmarried women. “Art thou loosed from a wife? seek not a wife. But and if thou marry, thou hast not sinned.” (1 Corinthians 7: 27b-28a). This instruction applies strictly to individuals who d

By Akin Ojumu Reno Omokri is a lawyer, son of a lawyer, and the grandson of a lawyer. The man is also a businessman, human rights activist, and bestselling author. He’s the star of a travel documentary series, Reno Around the World, broadcast in the UK and Nigeria.  During the administration of Goodluck Jonathan, Omokri served as a Special Assistant to the President. Currently, Reno Omokri is a Vice President of Joe Trippi and Associates, a U.S political consulting firm. Yet, with this type of extensive career, international exposure, professional accomplishments, and numerous accolades, in Reno Omokri's insular view of the world, a law firm is not a business because it employs only legal professionals. If, as Reno Omokri suggests, a law firm is not a business, a logical extension of such a silly notion is that a medical practice, accounting firm, and other professional establishments are not businesses either because they all employ individuals in the respective professional field

By Akin Ojumu After decades of leading his flock astray by teaching them that tithing is a divine ordinance that all Christians must abide by otherwise their lives will be tight and the devourer will invade their finances, Pastor Creflo Dollar has now repented of being one of the chief promoters of the compulsory tithing doctrine for New Testament believers. The prosperity preacher who became inordinately wealthy by teaching tithing now says he was wrong all along, and that tithing was never, and has never been, a requirement for Christians who live under grace. To which I say, “Welcome Bro Creflo to the camp of the renegades.” Although, over the years, you have deceived and misled many people around the world by your insistence on tithing, and have fleeced your congregation out of their meagre resources by your strident teachings on tithing, those of us who have been called rebels because of our stance on tithing have no choice but to rejoice that you have finally seen the light and h

“To the Divorced Person, Better to Marry Than to Burn with Lust” By Akin Ojumu Fundamental to the role of the Pastor is the obligation to teach the truth of the Word of God. In fact, there is no greater responsibility the shepherd of God’s flock has than to feed God’s sheep with God’s Word. It's in the diligent fulfillment of this important task that the people of God are brought to maturity in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ.  The primary objective of the Pastor is to bring people to a point in their conscious mind where they are submissive to the Word of God, where they believe that the Bible is the infallible, authoritative, inerrant, holy Word of God. If I as a pastor can just get people to make a general commitment to the authority of the Word of God, then you can introduce any principle out of the Word of God, and they are bound by their heart's commitment to abide by it (John MacArthur). This mindset is exemplified by Apostle Paul in al