•To Hold Reception On Sat, 25th May, 2019
•What He Told City People About His Life
A few months back, Pastor Femi Faseru, the National Superintendent of KICC Nigeria, visited City People Magazine Corporate Headquarters at Gbagada in Lagos to pray for staff members and the company, as they began a new year.
That was not his 1st time. Annually, he is a regular visitor to City People Magazine.
Faseru, who was formerly an IT Consultant in big corporations like Glaxowellcome, Bank of Boston, Mediasurface and GlaxoSmithKline, is also the Resident Pastor of Kingsway International Christian Centre (KICC) Maryland, Lagos.
A powerful and dynamic teacher of the word, he sits under the spiritual tutelage of his spiritual father, the President/Senior Pastor of KICC, Pastor Matthew Ashimolowo, who has mentored him closely over the years and is a significant part of his inspiration as a teacher of the gospel.
His ministry is known in Nigeria via Television broadcasts and internationally via conferences. His opinion on pressing issues is regularly sought by various Nigerian Print Media, Television and Radio channels.
Reverend Faseru is happily married to Sade and they are blessed with 3 beautiful children.
Pastor Femi Feseru not only pastors the KICC church at Maryland, Lagos (under the overall leadership of Snr. Pastor Mathew Asimolowo, who operates from London), he has been saddled with the onerous responsibility of overseeing KICC church growth across Nigeria. And he has done a brilliant job of that. He will be turning 50 next month. On Saturday, 25th May 2019 at the KICC prayer Dome at 13 Oki Lare, Mende, Maryland, Lagos, there will be a big celebration in his honour. spoke about his life.
How did your journey into the ministry start?
I was in the UK. I lived in the UK in 1994. I gave my life to Christ just before I went abroad, in Christ Embassy in 1993. I was more or less a young convert when I went to England, and fortunately enough for me, I came across KICC in 1995. So, I started to attend the church, and I was doing my business. I wasn’t involved in church work until 1999 when the Lord said I should not just be a bench warmer in a church.
So, I came to attend a Steward interview and I was just serving and somewhere along the line I got a letter from the church, I didn’t even know anybody knew me in the church; I was, by the way, an IT person. I worked for organisations such as Bank of Boston; a US Investment Bank that has its base in the UK. I worked there as an IT Consultant. After leaving the Bank of Boston, I worked with Glaxowellcome. Glaxowellcome, which later merged with Beecham SmithKline and I worked there as a Consultant as well. So, it was when I was working for Glaxowellcome that the Lord ministered to my spirit that I should not just be a bench warmer. So, I signed up to serve in the Lord. Shortly after that, because where I was working was too far from the church. I prayed, I told God I wanted to choose my career. God heard my prayer, He gave me a better job at London’s bridge with media surface that was just so close; about 20 minutes drive to the church. So, I was able to attend the service with better pay.
So shortly after, I got an email to head the IT department in the church. So, that was what I was doing. I got trained. I became a Deacon shortly after, but in 2002, I began to wait upon the Lord like the church will do in the month of June, 30 days. That was when I heard in my spirit that I should leave the United Kingdom. It was clear where I would be. Companies in the United States had an interest in me, wanting me to come over, to come and work in the state of California and they were giving me HIB Visa. At the last minutes, I decided not to leave the UK. So when that came to my spirit, I thought the Lord was asking me to go to the US. I prayed some more and it was obvious it wasn’t the US.
Unpleasantly enough, it was going to be in Nigeria. I said unpleasantly because as at that time, I had houses in the US, which I had fully paid upon, so it would have been a smooth transition from the UK because I have houses in the UK that I had paid on. Coming to Nigeria where I didn’t have a plot of land; I didn’t have anything. So it was unpleasant, but I heard God. So, October of that year, we had a programme at the stadium with Winning Ways Africa. So, I came with the team, but that was an opportunity for me to go and look for a place to rent and what I would do. I thought I was coming to Nigeria to come and do IT. IT was very backward at that time (2002). So, I came in October, rented a place to move my family in. It didn’t look juicy for me, but I knew I had to take a drastic step. What people would normally do is to come first and later bring the family, but I have seen a lot of people come, hoping to bring their families later and later they went back and they never came back. I didn’t want to make that mistake because I heard God. So I prepared my family on the 1st of January 2003 and we were on the plane. My whole family. My daughter was a year old at that time, my son was 4 years old. So, it was a very young family. So, we flew on that 1st of January to Nigeria. And March I started an IT firm.
December that year, my Pastor came to town and I was seeing him off at the airport and it was at the airport that he told me that I should Pastor KICC in Lagos.
So, a lot of Pastors will tell you they saw God, or they saw Jesus in their dreams who told them to go and Pastor. I will be really, really honest, I didn’t see Jesus in my dream, telling me to go and Pastor. I didn’t hear God tell me to go and Pastor. It was my Pastor, who told me to go and Pastor KICC in Lagos.
The demand of the ministry was so much that I didn’t have time for my personal business. After 2-and-half years, I had to make a choice: it was either I ran my business or I went into the ministry full time, and then I prayed. Then, I couldn’t see myself leaving God’s work for my own work. So, I chose to go full time into the ministry.
I had to have a conversation with my Pastor when he came to town. I went to see him and I said to him that I would like to go into full-time ministry. That was around May 2007. So, I sat in his living room and I said to him I would like to go into full-time ministry. Basically, in the past 2-and-half years I have been doing all of that, I was not earning anything from the church; it was just sacrificial, but that couldn’t continue if I wasn’t going to be running my business. So, I had to have a conversation with my Pastor, and he (my Pastor) said to me that from that first day, I set my eyes on you, I realised you had a calling of God upon your life for ministry and I also knew you didn’t realise that. If I had called you directly into the ministry you probably would have run away. So, I was waiting for you to realise that you have a calling in the ministry. Now, that you have realised that, the vision is not just for you to Pastor KICC in Lagos, the vision is actually for you to set up KICC all over Nigeria. So we thank God today. From that one branch, we have about 22 branches in Nigeria right now.
We have churches in Abuja, we have churches in Port Harcourt, we have in Aba, we have in Warri, and we have in Lekki, FESTAC, Idimu and Ikorodu. We have KICC in Akure, Ibadan, Abeokuta. God has been good to us in all those years. It is about 15 years now that the journey started and all I can say is all glory be to our God.
What were your parents’ reaction when you were going into the ministry?
My mum was so happy because she is always involved in church activities. She was a Diocesan Lay reader with the Anglican Communion, which was the highest height any women could attain in terms of clergy function in the Anglican Communion. She was excited and she must have been surprised because I did not look like the one who would be a Pastor, while I was growing up. I had a mind of my own. I want to do things my way. So, they have a tough time raising me. I remember our Vicar in our Anglican Church back then, Arch Bishop Ademowo, he just retired. He was our Vicar then. So, he knew me as a little boy and, of course, as a Pastor of my parent, they would have gone to him many times about me. So, we were flying from the UK and I saw him at the Heathrow airport, so when we got on board I went to his seat to say hello to him. So, he said good to see you Femi. I heard that you are now a Pastor with KICC. How God works in a mysterious way. So, that statement was much coded, even the Archbishop must have been surprised. My mother was very excited and she prayed for me that I will succeed in it.
I grew up in Ibadan and when my father went on to set up a Peugeot Company in Ilesa, the family moved to Ilesa in the early 80s. I went to Alaafia Institute, that is where I did my Nursery School and went to ICC Ibadan, City Council in Mokola. From there, my secondary was in Ijebu-Ijesa, from there to the University of Ife. I studied Botany as my first degree, but my father felt that wasn’t enough for me.
The idea then was I should go and do Botany, so that I will be well equipped to do Pharmacy, but by the time I finished Botany, I was tired of University education, I didn’t want to go back. As I said, I was difficult for them to raise, but together with a retired Anglican Communion, Arch Bishop Akinde. Arch Bishop Akinde was the HOD of Computer Science in Ife at that time, so my parents spoke with Prof. Akinde. Prof. Akinde spoke to me that I have to come and do a post-graduate diploma in his department. He was the one who paid for the form so that I won’t say no. And since he wasn’t my parents I couldn’t say no.
So I went, I had my postgraduate diploma in Computer Science and that was what I built on in the United Kingdom to be able to be an IT Consultant.
My father was the only and the major dealer of Peugeot. It was a lucrative business for him at that time.
