•LAGOS Prophet, ISREAL OLADELE OGUNDIPE
Have you met the Genesis Prophet, Isreal Oladele Ogundipe, the founder of Genesis Church, in Lagos? Did you attend any of his Church Services in Alakuko, Lagos, where the headquarters of the church is situated? If no, you must have missed a lot lately! Prophet Oladele, popularly known and called Genesis Prophet, is arguably one of the brightest of his generation. He is a man, who is loved by both the young and adults; his messages are inspiring and he is spiritually sound.
Two weeks back in Lagos, at his church auditorium, City People’s Senior Reporter, ISAAC ABIMBADE, visited him, where he was asked a few questions about some trending issues. He was asked what he feels about tithe and churches being taxed by government’ and other related issues. Excerpts.
Tell us what you feel about tithe?
For me, tithe is not meant to be eaten by Pastors. The Bible says bring all tithes to my house, so that there will be food and meat in my house. That means, there are so many problems to be solved in the church with money. Like the way we do it here; the church knows I have never been part of church tithe. I don’t touch it.
What we do is, out of the tithe, we have some old women who are on salary and the least amount they receive is N40,000 per person . In a month, we pay over 1 million as salaries; that’s how they collect the salary for the rest of their lives. I have 11 children whom I have adopted and I am paying their school fees and the church is paying. I have just adopted 2 again. There is one small artiste that I have just adopted, he is a singer, but he hasn’t gone to school, but very soon you will hear about it. God said I should pick him from there to go back to school.
That’s what we do with church tithes. That’s why, He said bring all tithes to my house so that there will be meat in my house. So, insisting on the issue of tithe is Biblical, but it is not by force, it is by choice. If you pay it, if you see that you are going to have result through it, fine! But no Pastor should really dwell and stress on it, that if you don’t pay it you will die, fail or you would not be successful, but it’s Biblical.
The argument of a majority is that many things were taken away from the Old Testament when Jesus Christ came. Why is tithe not part of the things that were abolished?
Yeah. I wouldn’t know (laughs), but you know Christianity has a foundation and when we talk about foundation it has got to do with the secret of the building, the pillars have got to do with the strength of a building where the roof is the beauty of the building. My father taught me when I was growing up to be a tither if you want to be successful and I met it in my father. Right now, I am a dangerous tither. I pay my tithe. I pay the church tithe. I pay tithe out of tithes. I have spiritual fathers whom I pay to and it is really working for me. It is your choice, if it is not working for you, but it is working for me the way I handle it. I am not forcing them.
I have only just told them the principles about being successful. Some people are not going to church and they are successful, some people are not paying tithe and they are successful. It has got to do with your belief system. You know your relationship with your God. Let us be real, let us stop pretending. There are some truths you are hiding that the generation coming would know better than what you have told them.
That is what I am saying, some people do not go to church and they are successful. You are not God to judge them and you are not the secretary to Almighty God. You don’t even know who will get to heaven or who will not get to heaven and tithe does not even connote who will go to heaven. Tithe has got to do with earthly results. So, if you pay it fine! Mine is just to teach you what we have in the Bible and it is your choice to follow. Not even everybody Jesus preached to believed Jesus. Those who will believe will believe, those who will follow it will follow it, but it is not a do-or-die affair. It is not by force, it is by choice.
What is your position on some Pastors having many private jets, while most of their members are struggling to eat 3 meals a day?
Yeah, it is a choice. It is their choice. I am not going to say because they use private jets and begin to nail them. It depends on their thoughts and priorities. Even if I should have a private jet, I am going to use it as a means of transportation for the church; where we are going to employ people to work with the aircraft and every time I want to travel, everybody will go and we will travel together. I am not blaming them. It depends on what they believe and how they have been able to set their priorities right. Probably, it was a gift given to some of them. It is never a crime, but whatever we do, we should remember there is heaven.
We should remember that we would be remembered for two things: the problems we are able to solve and the problems we are able to create. My own perception about such is if I have such money, I want to use it to affect my generation. I want to use it to help people. So it is my choice, not their own choice.
Sir, when you drive around Lagos roads, you see churches have replaced industries. What is happening?
This is how the era of error is fading away and the correctors of errors are coming up. We are in the era of handing over and taking over. Some people are handing over and some people are taking over. Where we are going to teach people about entrepreneurship that is the training we are doing there. Those are our Pastors, we are teaching them how to think outside the box spiritually; how to create businesses.
Some of the courses we have there are delegation strategy, entrepreneurship and so many things like that. Churches are still going to be more in number than they are now, but people will choose the church that they attend according to the result they are able to produce. It is not for me to judge, it is your choice to go to church. If they establish the church and if you don’t want to go, it is your choice. If you want to be at home, be at home, but there is still going to be more churches.
But is this the way forward?
It is not the way forward. If you want to start a church today, nobody is going to question you, but if some measures are being established, there are some criteria some people need to follow to become a Pastor if all those ones come up, which I know will still come up later. Some challenges will have to lead to solutions in life. I know it is not the way forward, but there is no way we want to talk about churches, the herdsmen, the Muslims that we wouldn’t comment on the leaders. Everything starts and falls on leadership. It is in their power to direct the religious part and business part of the world and other things, but I know more churches will still come up. I just don’t want to be judgmental, I believe God is at work and up to something in Nigeria.
Recently, the government proposed taxing churches. Is it proper?
They are just trying to create problems where there are no problems. Taxing churches is probably happening in other countries. If they are taxing churches and Mosques like that I think it is worth it. Government has the right to do it if they want to do it. I am not going to force them. Even the Bible says we should honour them because they are there and they are our leaders. It is not my business to say they shouldn’t do it.
What are they using the tax for? The tax is to develop the country. If truly a church is a church, you shouldn’t be against that, as long as you know that they would use the money to develop the country. Okay, what is now the situation where churches and mosques are paying tax and the church is not developing. People will react.
Look at the Bible when one of Jesus disciples asked, is it good for us to be paying tax? And Jesus was so dynamic in answering that question. He said, show me the money and what picture are you seeing? He said the picture of Caesar. So, he said give what belongs to Caesar to Caesar. That means, give what belong to the government to the government. If the churches begin to rebel against the government, then what are we really teaching. If we are so criminally minded that we are so stubborn to teach our members or tell our members, ‘if they kill you, kill them’.
We can use love to overcome our enemies. There are so many churches with billions of dollars, billions of naira, billions of pounds in their accounts. If they should remove 10 percent of what they have, they would positively affect the lives of the masses, the devil will be silenced. Let’s say this church drops one billion, another church drops one billion to support a state. Even some Muslims who are against them would re-think.
Any church that is able to positively affect the government is a church building people because the church has not got to do with Christians alone. There are many churches where we have many Muslims and pagans. What are you teaching, what are you leading them with. Nobody is entitled to dip his hand into church’s money if we want to talk about spiritual transparency. If God wants to bless you, He will bless you. The house I got, somebody built it for me. If someone should buy me another house, I am not the one, who told the person to buy me the house, but it is not right for me to dip my hand into church’s money to buy my house.
That is why we have two account sections in our church. The first account section, the elders are the ones doing the auditing, the second one is controlled by the youth and the church, so that we will balance the account and they have assurance about the future of the ministry. In the areas of money and leadership, there should be transparency, so that those who are coming behind would not have a mindset that would connect them to spiritual robbery thinking of accumulating wealth, buying many things that are so expensive, mightier than what the members will use, but trust me, I am not being judgmental. I am just me and the way I want to live my life is different from everybody’s.
