By Moses Oludele Idowu
It is now generally affirmed by several observers and scholars both resident and abroad that the Nigerian Church suffers from theological poverty or, better still that there is a poverty of theology in the Nigerian Church. This is mostly true and more pronounced and visible in the pentecostal- evangelical segment of the Nigerian Church.
Several reasons are responsible for this but two major reasons are easily verifiable. One, the founding fathers of this segment of the Church had little education and placed little value on education although they were fervent men, sincere and upright.
Two, most of the leading lights of Pentecostalism in Nigeria today have a basic education and qualifications in the Pure and Applied Science, not Humanities or Social Science. [ Both E.A.Adeboye and W.F. Kumuyi read Mathematics; David Oyedepo (Architecture), Daniel Olukoya (Microbiology), Isaac Omolehin ( Agriculture) Wale Oke ( Surveying). Sam Adeyemi ( Civil Engineering) ….thus they are deprived of learning in Logic that are the basic features of Humanities like Philosophy, History etc.
It is clear then that the people who shape the mind of Pentecostal Christianity in the land largely all have their training in the Science and therefore lack the necessary element of Logic and Reason which are features of Humanities especially Philosophy, History, Literature.
Have you noticed that it is always Pentecostals who make foolish statements and outlandish declarations on air that they themselves have to apologize for later? Have you ever heard a Catholic or Anglican priest or ministers make “foolish” statements on air? Because they passed through training in Theology and Logic.
You can’t be a great theologian without Logic. Reason is essential for Sound Theology.
The Lord Jesus Christ was a great theologian. Did you observe that about Him? But He was also a Master of Logic.
Observe His several discourses with the Pharisees and how He wrestled them and bamboozled them with superior logic:
“How say ye that the Messiah is David’s son for David himself calls him Lord. If David called him Lord how then is he his son?
And they could not answer Him.”
I have observed this absence of Logic in some of the “doctrines” and preachings of today’s preachers especially those of Pentecostal persuasion. Some day I will have time to revisit them one by one.
Today I want to address one idea that is trending but which is false – false in logic, content, and even to Scripture. We sometimes bring our natural ideas into the Bible and into the Holy things and in the process bring error into our discourse.
I saw a video clip this week confirming this idea, an idea that I have heard expressed several time and which I now want to address.
I have heard people say, ” We need a new anointing today, a super Anointing to meet today’s challenge. Elijah’s anointing will not be relevant today or Moses Anointing because men are more evil today….”
And so on.
You can understand the drift. They believe that even Luther’s anointing or Wesley would be useless today because they preached in the days when there was no automobile or television and people were local, unlike today that people are more sophisticated.
This week someone, a man I have known for 40 years and whom I respect also said the same thing using Babalola as example. According to the clip I watched Pastor Isaac Omolehin saying that Babalola’s Anointing was good for his own day but it is not what we need today. That we should stop singing or calling on the God of Babalola because the Anointing of Babalola won’t be enough today.
That the population of Lagos alone is 20 million and how can the anointing of a man who preached to thousands answer. I hope I am not misrepresenting him but that is basically the drift of his statements which goes along the popular line so common among Pentecostals.
Pastor Isaac Omolehin is a good man and a warrior of Righteousness who has a solid testimony for integrity. He is not the type of person I want to embarrass. He is a very good man.
However, sometimes good people disagree. Luther and Calvin disagreed and they were both Protestants and against Catholicism. Moody and Sankey disagreed. Lake and Hezmalhach got to South Africa the same day as missionaries of the same party and they disagreed and parted. Paul and Barnabas disagreed. So good people can disagree.
On this issue I disagree with Pastor Isaac Omolehin. I think he did not examine the matter too well and he allowed human rationality to overshadow real spiritual understanding.
I now want to address this issue under three headings:
- Does an anointing expire or can it expire?
- Is anointing time- bound or space – dependent
- What can we glean from Scripture on this?
- The illogic of this statement A Definition
An anointing represents that divine element of the Almighty, of His Nature, Power and Substance given to a specific man at a specific time to accomplish a specific task commissioned and approved by God and His Heavenly Council to enable him operate at supernatural levels and accomplish extraordinary things; and – in some cases – act the way God or Christ would have acted if they were physically here.
I know you have never heard the definition like this before. But that is it. I hope I am able to capture the important things in that definition. You know why Anointing is special and why truly anointed men are scarce and rare in every age and under every epoch.
Why would God call a Council in Heaven about how to cause Ahab to fall? Why did God not just take him out or destroy him?
Why was David running away from Saul rather than confront and slay him when the opportunity presented itself twice?
That is what an anointing is. Upon a stranger it must not come but once it is placed on someone that person becomes special, separated, holy, set apart.
To touch him, speak against him, curse him bring dire consequences on the person. Even when God had rejected Saul he was still the Anointed of God and David had to address him with utmost reverence and fear. That is what an Anointing is.
Even when Ahab drifted to Baal worship married to a strong and super witch he was still the anointed and must be reverenced. And even Heaven respects this rule.
The number one fact therefore to know about anointing is it does not expire. The owner of the Anointing may expire but not the Anointing. It is always valid, till death.
Two, anointing is God- ordained and divine. It is not of human or earthly materiality. It is divine. Although a man pays a price to have it or be entrusted with it, it remains his own. It is unique to that person even though it is divine. It is like my cloth or shoe, they are mine but I didn’t make them or manufacture them.
And whatever is divine is not space- dependent or time – bound because God is not time- bound. He operates in the realm of eternity, the realms of timelessness. God is not bound by your time or space, He is above them. Time and space begin and dwell in Him and will end in Him.
When you therefore say that an anointing bestowed by God on a person – an anointing on an apostle and not just an apostle but a foundational apostle like Babalola has expired it is an erroneous statement.
When you say that Babalola’s Anointing was meant for his own day and will not meet the emergency of our own time it is saying that anointing is time – dependent. That is not true. That is not Scripture as I will soon show. It is a fallacy.
A true or genuine Anointing cannot be time- dependent or space-dependent. If it works in 1930 it will work in 2030 if he were here; if it works in Ilesha and Efon- Alaaye in 1930-59 it will definitely work even much more in Abuja in 2025 if he were here.
In 1936 Babalola went to Ghana, the only time he traveled out of Nigeria. Ghana is a different space from Nigeria yet the Anointing still worked wonders there that Ghanaians marvelled and were amazed. If he had gone to America too may be the white men might not even have allowed him to return to Nigeria again.
It is therefore wrong when anyone says that an Anointing will not be relevant today. It is not true. We often say it but it is an error. If Elijah were here today in the same power and spirit crowds of hundreds of thousands will still follow him.
Let us now look at the fallacy of this reasoning that the Anointing of a man of the past cannot work today.
Anointing-wise, John the Baptist was Elijah returned. He was the Elijah and Christ told us that much because he came in the spirit and power of Elijah – that is with the mantle and Anointing of Elijah.
He roused and converted a whole nation with his preaching and baptism of repentance without performing a single miracle. That was the anointing of Elijah still working almost 800 years after the original bearer had departed. John the Baptist was wearing the mantle of Elijah and the mantle still worked. Even the Lord Jesus Christ went to him to be baptized recognizing that Mantle.
Two, years after the death of Elisha his bones still raised the dead. The story is told in the Second Book of Kings Chapter 13. Even years after his death the Anointing still works. If the Anointing of Elisha works even years after his death what makes you think that Babalola’s Anointing won’t work today – less than 70 years after his passage if he were here? If the Anointing of a prophet can still work years after he was buried and even raised the dead is it logical to assume that the Anointing of an Apostle, and a foundational apostle for that matter in a New Testament Dispensation, would not work just less than 70 years after his passage?
If an Anointing consummated under a Covenant enacted with blood of goats and bulls and ashes of heifer can invoke glory is it in accord with reason to suppose that an Anointing vouchsafed.to a man in a New Testament Dispensation cannot work because time changed?
We need to think through some of the things we say and pass to the public so that entire generations won’t be castrated. People today don’t read and they rarely think; so sometimes you need to help them by giving them well thought-out ideas and materials.
Let me now address the sheer illogic in this proposition. There are two ideas I want to address, both of them readily absurd.
One, the idea that men today are more wicked than before is not really sound and cannot beat up under empirical examination. The idea that the world today is more wicked than the world of Luther or Babalola is also unsound.
Sin has not changed. Human nature hasn’t changed and cannot change. Both God and Satan and the world do not change and can never change. What has changed is simply that men have all the means and the refinements to commit evil today than before.
Both the capacity and capabilities to do evil now are magnified and easily accessible but evil itself hasn’t changed because Man is essentially the same. Women are still the same today as they were in 1930 and will remain so in 2040.
Man still thinks basically the same way and acts basically the same way – selfish, self – centered and self-seeking. Wicked and callous and vengeful, just like before. The only difference is that today the capacity to do evil and also good has become magnified.
So if an Anointing compelled people to submit and repent in 1930 at Ilesha amd throw away their idols and evil charms I can assure you that it will do more even today. The charms of those days were more potent than those of today. Witchcraft of those days was more ruthless than those of today. Evil and darkness were more prevalent in those days. In those days spirits live with men and come to the town physically. Are you aware of this? That is not possible today.
In those days there were forbidden forests that you dare not go or you will disappear without trace. So it is not true that the world today is more wicked. No. Only that the means and refinements to do evil on a large scale is now available with technology.
People of today are not as brave and ruthless and fearless as the people of Colonial Nigeria. Men today are cowards.
I can assure you of one thing, if either of Babalola or Orekoya or Orimolade was here today your cities would be shut down if they decide to come for visit.
Think of this. More than 2 million people from West Africa subregion visited Ilesa to see the work of God in the days of Babalola for the 50 days he was there. In the day when there was no television, few radio stations and telephone. That is what Sociologists call “word- of- mouth epidemics,” people telling each other untill an idea spread everywhere and the idea becomes irresistible.
Now imagine a man whose anointing brought that crowd in the day without Social Media or television in 1930 what would happen if he were here today? He would shut down your cities and nothing will move until he finishes and leaves.
Your cities would be literally paralyzed if he decides to visit because everyone will want to see him or hear his prayer.
Babalola could be heard without microphone 2 kilometers away as farmers in Efon- Alaaye told me during my research. Now imagine a man like that being heard with microphone, on television and Social Media at the same time. Your cities and government will just shut down.
Or Daniel Orekoya who raised a 4 – day old corpse to life at Ibadan in 1930? If he were here today your cities would be shut.
Tell me anywhere people would not run to see the man who raised more than 20 people from the dead? He would even be more popular today than in 1930 and more people would follow him now than then.
Let us look at the idea from the material standpoint.
It is like saying a man like John D. Rockefeller or Andrew Carnegie or Henry Ford who were millionaires in the 1940’s won’t be rich today because the economy today is different.
That is poor logic, extremely poor. Rockefeller, Carnegie, Ford would be far stinkingly rich if they were here today because they would see the ideas long before your dumb and foolish politicians see them and they will explore them.
Ford was already working on the research of using steam for his automobile because he could foresee that oil would be too expensive in future. Think about that in 1940’s. American Government had to stop him because he was going to succeed with his technicians and researchers and if he did American economy would collapse if oil is jettisoned. What would happen to many oil companies across the world and millions of jobs. That man was ahead of his time.
So a man like that would also be ahead of the pack today if he could think like that 100 years ago.
It is like saying a man who has a million dollars in 1930 won’t be rich today. That is also false. One million dollars in 1900 is worth more than 200 million dollars today and that is a rich man by any standard.
I saw a picture few days ago. The Olympic gold medal in 1900 given to people was 100% pure gold but today it is only 1% gold. So which is better?
Again consider another example in the field of scholarship. Will it be right to say because a man had his own academic degrees in 1930 he would not be able to function in today’s scholarship. The issue is even a Bachelor’s degree from a standard university of 1940 or 50’s is worth more than a PhD today from most of our universities.
It is like saying for instance that because Luther was a university professor in the sixteenth century he won’t be qualified to be a teacher in a university today.
That is not only unsound it is also illiterate. First I have been reading Luther for some years and I don’t know anyone in your Religious Studies or Philosophy Departments of your universities who has written anything with such depth, logic and clarity and wisdom as found in the writings of Martin Luther.
Two, there are no more universities again today in the sense in which university operated in the days of Luther. Luther would in fact tell you what the idea of a university is. When you talk of real idea of university as universitas scholarium and as an autonomous institution there are no universities again in the sense in which Luther knew.
In those days universities were autonomous and even the towns respected that autonomy. That was why Pope Leo could not just order the arrest of Luther when he disagreed with the Church because as a university professor he could not be arrested unless the president of his university approved it or surrender him. That is autonomy. No university, not even Harvard enjoys that today.
The notion that something is inferior or will be inferior because it is of the past is utterly absurd. It is historically unsound.
Let us examine this statement in another setting to see the illogic of that statement that the Anointing of a man that has passed is no longer relevant.
Moses wrote most of the books of the Old Testament and some Psalms. Psalms 91 is one of the most powerful in the entire annals of Scripture that is still blessing men today 3500 years after the passage of the man who penned it. If his anointed works are blessing men today think of when he himself would be if he were here?
Solomon’s Anointing is still working with his Proverbs that has become useful guide to even business gurus more than 3000 years after the man with his numerous wives and concubines have gone.
So the notion that once a man has passed his Anointing cannot work today is erroneous, wholly deficient in logic and reason and contrary to Scripture.
I will stop here and continue the remaining discourse with my disciples and followers.
God bless the reader.
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© Moses Oludele Idowu
May 24, 2025
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