Gbile Akanni: Question God asked me that changed my ministry

Founder of Peace House, Bro Gbile Akanni has said God asked him an immortal question in the early years of his ministry that brought him to a place of great understanding of God’s purpose for his life and changed his perspective of ministry.

 Akanni shed light on the question during a recent Zoom meeting with some ministers of the gospel.

 At the meeting which was monitored online by Church Times, the Bible teacher also took time to answer questions from participants. The event turned out to be a time of Bible exposition.

The big question God asked

 He said in his early years of ministry he was desirous of impacting people with life-changing messages. His words, “When I was starting out in ministry, I was always praying and asking God to use me. The Lord then asked me a question. That question has remained with me all these years. He said, do you want me to give you a sermon or do you want me to make you a message? I prayed and asked what does that mean?

 “It became clear to me that you can preach a sermon and always prepare and produce a sermon anytime. But for God to make you his message then you need to be at his feet for years. I heard God say to me,  he would want to make me an aroma.

 “But the aroma of a soup is never produced except the food is being cooked on fire. I realise that I needed to face the fire in a private place. And God said what I want people to touch is the aroma of what comes out of you after you might have been roasted. And if you are focused on your life in the secret place with God you don’t need anything else. Even if you are in a hole, people will look for your there.”

 He counseled the ministers to focus on the altar where God is roasting their lives adding that they should abhor any form of self-advertisement. “Go back to the secret place. Let God put fire in your life. As he is roasting you, it is the fire of it that will break forth. As God is breaking you and molding you men will be blessed by your ministry.”

 He explained further that ministry is an outflow of a person’s life.“A minister of God is one whose life is a blessing to people. It is one’s life that affects life. And there is only one thing that is needful. Jesus said to Martha, you are distracted by much serving, but one thing is needful and Mary has chosen that portion. Every minister either young or old must first learn to build his life. Paul told Timothy to take heed to himself and the doctrine.

 “Your ministry cannot be greater than your secret life. The power of an effective ministry is in the secret life of the man of God. If anyone wants to have a ministry that affects men, they should focus on their walk before the Lord. They should focus on becoming God’s friend, then he will release them to bless men. Don’t first look for publicity, look for God.”

The ancient landmark

 Earlier in the conversation, Akanni did some exegesis on the Ancient Landmark.

 He said for us to work in the ancient landmark the believer has to ask for it and inquire how fathers in faith walked in enduring anointing.

 Making reference to several scriptures in both the Old and New Testaments, he said ancient landmarks are marks that define the boundaries of our faith.

 He said a Christian has been called out of the world and out of darkness into God’s kingdom adding that, “the implication is that there is a boundary when you are called to faith. There is a clear distinction between darkness and light. Right from the Book of Genesis, God distinguished between darkness and light. You can’t put one leg in light and another in darkness and claim to be a child of God.”

 Giving an analogy of the physical landmark, he said, God, himself set a mark between light and darkness, between righteousness and unrighteousness.

Jesus is the landmark

 Akanni said also that “Ancient landmark means our faith is not a recent faith. It does not change from one generation to another. It is ageless.

 “Any generation that comes and goes must go in that faith. Even the death of those who set it does not affect the landmark. The landmark they set remains. The faith that was once and for all delivered to the saints outlived the people that practiced the faith. Our fathers were subject to that faith. If believers want to share the same heaven with fathers of faith, then they have to ask for the old path and walk in it.” Akanni said.

 He noted that there is a need for believers to go back to the ancient landmark that has been laid adding however that the ancient landmark is in the person of Jesus.

 “It has to be focused on who Jesus is, what he practiced, how he lived, what he taught. Jesus is God’s landmark for correct theology and biblical ministry. We must look at his methodology. Everything about Jesus is God’s landmark for us. Any man that wants to live well must look to Jesus. Any man that wants to be focused must focus on Jesus. As long as your eyes are on him, you will succeed.”

Between Moses and Jesus

Making reference to Jesus repudiation of Moses’ teaching, he said, “Jesus once said, you have heard that it was said of old that Moses gave you permission to give a letter of divorce but he said, in the beginning, it was not so. What that means is that even if it is a person like Moses that shifts the ancient landmark, when he who set the mark comes you will still be in trouble. Jesus was greater than Moses, When he has spoken every other prophet has to bow, no matter their opinion.

 Akanni said whatever teaching contradicts what Jesus taught must be jettisoned. “If I want to walk in the ancient landmark I don’t need to look everywhere. I only need to look at Jesus. The faith in Jesus cannot be edited. You can’t add to it. God has a standard. He has a landmark. And he did not want to bother us to go to the southeast or south. He has put all the landmarks in one person.

 “And that person is Jesus. All I have to do is to study Jesus who God said, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased, hear him. I have found Christ as God’s landmark. Thank God the Bible calls it ancient not out-model, it means it has endured generations and it has remained solid. You can’t bring a human idea and say you discovered something new”