DIARY: Humbling evidence at RCCG Holy Ghost Congress

This year’s Holy Ghost Congress of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG) with the theme, ‘Complete Restoration,’ started last Monday on a humbling but strong note to erase doubts about the power of God.

If people have reason to doubt the existence of God, as scientists are wont to do, they would be queried by the fact that General Overseer of the Church has a PhD in mathematics.

On Monday the man who formally declared the Congress open was Professor Fola Aboaba, another scientist. At over 85 years old, he looked much stronger than his age, his voice still strong and well modulated.

Aboaba is a professor of Agricultural Engineering, Zonal Pastor Redeemed Christian Church of God, Redemption Pavilion Parish, Victoria Island, Lagos; and Pro-Chancellor and Chairman of the Governing Council, Redeemer’s University.

He met Pastor Adeboye years ago at the University of Ibadan, where he was a teacher. It was there a he witnessed a rain miracle in his house.

Miracle in Aboaba’s house

According to Pastor Adeboye, “Many years ago, when we started a Bible study meeting at the University of Ibadan (South-West Nigeria), we were only five people in number. It started in the house of one of our elders – Professor Aboaba – who was a lecturer at the university. With time, many lecturers joined and when the living room could no longer accommodate us, we moved to the back yard.

“One day, as we were taking our seats to begin the Bible study, it began to rain. The professor and others wanted to go inside the house, but I lifted my hand and said, “Rain, you cannot fall now.’’

“On that day, it rained everywhere else in the University except for Professor Aboaba’s residence.”

New study on science’s acknowledgement of God

Even beyond the lessons of scientists like Aboaba turning to God, a new scientific study has shown that religious experience has indeed a fascinating effect on the brain. Michael Ferguson, the study’s first author, said: “When our study participants were instructed to think about a savior, about being with their families for eternity, about their heavenly rewards, their brains and bodies physically responded.”

Dr Jeff Anderson, a study co-author, said: “Religious experience is perhaps the most influential part of how people make decisions that affect all of us, for good and for ill. The study was published in the journal Social Neuroscience.

Pastor Ashimolowo

Even after Professor Aboaba anybody was not sure about where he was, Pastor Ashimolowo burst with an electrifying presentation to leave no doubts. Soon after the formal opening, Pastor Ashimolowo, the Senior Pastor of Kingsway International Christian Centre (KICC) in London was introduced to a loud welcome by the congregation. Recalling his past encounters Pastor Adeboye and his Wife, he revealed how some years ago he was the proud interpreter of the RCCG General Overseer, who was a guest preacher at a Four Square church.

Ashimolowo, the son of a soldier, was raised in the barracks. On Monday, he spoke about the benefits of thanksgiving in what sounded like a poem of thanksgiving. He said it is to show appreciation to the giver of life, for His favour and mercy, and for all our achievements. The most popular line in the some sections of the congregation was, “if you want your tank to be full you have to be thankful.”     

History of the Holy Ghost Congress

The Holy Ghost Congress, noted as a programme of prayers, salvation, signs, wonders and miracles, started on December 18th, 1998 at Lekki Beach near Lagos, the only place that could take that kind of crowd at the time. It was an all night event with a miraculous turn out of millions of people, which the CNN reportedly estimated at over six million. Attendance at the Congress has since grown beyond imagination. And that was partly responsible for the initiation of the historic Arena three-kilometre-by-three-kilometre- auditorium to seat about 12 millon people.

On the Monday, when many worshippers were supposed to close late from their offices, the Congress commenced at the old auditorium at the Redemption Camp.I learnt that late and had gone to the Arena first, but it wasn’t a loss. Without its usual sea of people, I had the opportunity to appreciate the enormity of the facility. Massive! From one end, it was impossible to see the other end, which extended endlessly into the horizon. It was no use trying to walk the length and breadth of the Arena, leaving me with the only open of allowing the eyes to take in as much as possible from the distance I could walk.

With so much space for even the Friday crowd, when of Lagos literarily pours into the Camp, work was still ongoing for additional space. I counted no fewer than 6 caterpillars at work. One fact was glaring. The Arena is the work of God, birthed as a dream in a man.

Pastor Adeboye’s entry

As in all Pastor Adeboye’s programmes, the atmosphere was one of spiritual solemnity, spiced with excitement and when he came on the feeling was intense. Before then, some testifiers had given account of their miraculous experience in previous Congresses. Another humbling experience!

Speaking on the theme of the HGC, ‘Complete restoration’, and on the topic ‘In “The Beginning,’ Adeboye went back in time to the creation of man, who God himself blessed, and how all that changed into rejection and curse after the first couple disobeyed God.

But even then, God promised a restoration, which could be achieved through Jesus. He however pointed out that to have restoration; we have to deal with the issue of sin. “If you have not surrendered your life to Jesus Christ, do not expect any kind of restoration,” he said.

For people who were yet to do that to enable them benefit from the prayers and miracles of the night, Pastor Adeboye made an altar call, which generated a stream of people to the altar.

That done, he went into a session of prayers over the clearly identified manifestations of sin in man, starting with the body. If in the beginning there was the Word and the Word was Jesus, then Jesus was there before the individual was formed.

And just like the case a returning a new product a buyer finds to be faulty to the manufacturer, the obvious place for man to turn to for healing and restoration is the One who was there before the individual was formed. He was there before the mountains, the storms, the fruitlessness was formed. For each, Pastor Adeboye led the congregation in payers to fix the problem towards restoration.

Faith size and Miracles

He advised that the size of one’s miracle was a direct function of the size of one’s faith, and illustrated it with one of many testimonies he uses to illustrate sermons:

During one of the Holy Ghost Nights, God spoke through me (that is the Word of Knowledge coming through). I delivered the message to the congregation: “There is someone here who has said to God that he wishes he were taller. God said to tell you that your request has been granted. ”

I said to him, “When you wake up tomorrow and find out your trousers are two inches shorter, there is nothing wrong with the trousers, it is because you have grown taller.”

I announced this message because I knew who was speaking. The following morning this man woke up and looked at his pyjamas trousers, and called his wife, “Darling, did you notice anything?”

She said, “No.”

He told her to look down.                        

And the wife asked, “What happened to your trousers? They’re too short.”

Then he narrated his ordeal at the prayer auditorium.  “When I was sitting in the auditorium and things were happening around the altar, I tried to see what was going on but anywhere I turned, taller people were blocking my view. So I prayed to God to make me taller and he granted my request.”

Rounding up the sermon, he warned that if one returns to one’s sinful ways after restoration, one can be sure of a return of a far worse situation.

Day Two of the Congress, which exploded on Friday with the attendance of millions of people from around the world, was on healing.

TO BE CONTINUED