CHURCH OF THE WALKING ZOMBIES

By Akin Ojumu

The Walking Dead is a post-apocalyptic horror drama television series where zombies, aka walkers, attracted to noise and scent of living humans, crawl all over the streets shuffling along seeking the next human to devour. Any unfortunate human bitten or scratched by the zombies dies and becomes a walking dead themself.

Nah! Nah! Let’s back up a lil’ bit. It’s important I make a disclaimer before proceeding any further. 

Horror movies are not my thing. Personally, I detest and I rarely watch them. So, whatever I’m going to say about The Walking Dead in this commentary, chalk it up to secondhand information gleaned from online sources. 

Now that I’ve admitted my cluelessness with respect to The Walking Dead series, don’t make any fuss about any mistake I make in retelling events in the show. What’s more important, and what you should focus on, is the analogy I’m trying to draw out of it.

The series is about a group of survivors navigating a zombie apocalypse trying to stay alive under near-constant threat of attacks from zombies known as “walkers”. With the collapse of modern civilization, these survivors must confront other human survivors who have formed groups and communities with their own sets of laws and morals, sometimes leading to open conflict between them (Source: Wikipedia).

St. Sarah’s Church is a key location in The Walking Dead and Father Gabriel Stokes was the pastor. It was to St. Sarah that Father Gabriel Stokes ran to seek refuge away from the hungry zombies seeking to feast on his flesh and suck life out of him. Not too long after barricading himself inside the Church, Father Stokes’ parishioners also came seeking shelter from the marauding zombies. Being pursued by the prowling undead, they naturally assumed their Church and their priest would be where to go when danger lurks.

Well, they were sorely disappointed. Afraid for his own life, and intent on preserving his own skin, Father Gabriel Stokes refused to open the door for his own church members. Not even the terrified screams of his flock who were being mauled down one by one by the undead would move the supposed shepherd. At that particular moment in time, the man cared more about saving his own life than rescuing the people placed under his care.

The vast majority of Christian establishments you find today are exactly like St. Sarah’s Church. They are full of spiritual zombies and pastored by the Father Gabriel Stokes of this world. These congregations are made up of unchurched and untaught pseudo-Christians who go about with their theological and doctrinal empty heads swollen up with false sense of eternal security. In their minds, they believe they are saved and on the way to Heaven. What they fail to realize is that they are on a jolly well ride on the broad road that leads to destruction.

On a daily basis, hundreds of thousands of these “walkers” throng to the various houses of horror to be fed with the same man-centered, seeker-sensitive, people-pleasing, ear-scratching, ponderous platitudes dressed up in Christian slogans. The hollowness of this sort of wishy-washy adulterated gospel is manifested in the namby-pamby Christianity that pervades the contemporary Church landscape.

Inebriated with the toxic brew of lies, conjectures, and grandiose delusions, the Church confuses its steep relapse with a spiritual renaissance. They invented false standards to measure their own success. Massive shining church buildings, palatial parsonages situated on acres of land, a garage full of luxury cars that the pastor owns and the long wingspan of his private jet, Sunday services packed to the brim with easily excitable crowd, and tithe and offering baskets that are full to the brim, have all come to be regarded as indicators of a growing church.

The true measure of a Christian ministry is not more people coming through the doors and filling up the pews. A true indicator of an impactful Christian assembly is being a different people. It is when, upon hearing the Gospel message, those who come are convicted of their sin and are broken by their lawlessness that you know that a Church is alive and well.

2 Corinthians 5:17

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”

It isn’t the size of the congregation that makes a ministry great, rather it is the life the congregation lives. A Christian assembly is awake, alive, and breathing not when it is made up of members who merely conform to whatever it is the pastor says but of believers who are genuinely transformed by what the Word of God commands.

Revelations 3:1-3

“And to the angel of the church in Sardis write: ‘The words of him who has the seven spirits of God and the seven stars. “‘I know your works. You have the reputation of being alive, but you are dead. Wake up, and strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have not found your works complete in the sight of my God. Remember, then, what you received and heard. Keep it, and repent. If you will not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come against you.” 

Revelations 3:15-18

“And to the angel of the church in Laodicea write: ‘The words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of God’s creation…For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, so that you may be rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself and the shame of your nakedness may not be seen, and salve to anoint your eyes, so that you may see.” 

A successful Christian denomination is a place where people come covered in wretchedness but leave robed in God’s righteousness having been washed by the washing of the Word. It is a place that places high premium on preaching God’s Word, New Age mysticism or human ideas and opinions. The priority of such a Church is the exegetical teaching of Scriptures one verse at a time and not the telling of cock and bull stories at every opportune time.

Jeremiah 15:16

“When I discovered your words, I devoured them. They are my joy and my heart’s delight, for I bear your name, O LORD God of Heaven’s Armies.”

Such a ministry that priorities the teaching of the Word of God is not given to gimmicks, tricks, schemes or stunts. It’s not a place where the pastor panders to the fleshly desires of the members. They are not interested in perpetually inflaming the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh and the pride of life of the parishioners with false promises of immeasurable wealth and spurious assurances of divine health. There’s no time for playing cool or acting hip in a Church consumed with rightly handling the Word of Truth.

When a Church preoccupies itself with feeding the people with accurate, precise, unadulterated and undiluted Word of God, the congregation thrives and comes alive. As they are soaked in the Word, the Spirit of God commences on His sanctifying work in the lives of the people. Reoriented by the renewing and regenerating Word, the desires of the people begin to change and their affection for God and the things of God goes deeper and deeper every day.

2 Corinthians 3:18

“And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.”

Through repeated reiteration, the hearers of the Word become doers of the Word. Gradually, they start to exemplify the message they hear through godly living. In due course, fruit in keeping with repentance begins to manifest in their lives. As time goes on, the immature becomes mature having been transformed by the Word of God.

Many of you reading this commentary belong in a St. Sarah’s Church of the walking dead and Father Gabriel Stokes is your daddy in the Lord. The reason I know this is because your fruit serves as a silent witness of who you are, whose you are, and where you are heading.

Now, the fact that you are even reading this at all is an act of providence. This is God calling you to run for your dear life and find someplace else. Take no part in the worthless deeds of evil and darkness.

2 Corinthians 6:17

“Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you.”

Again, don’t say you weren’t warned.