By Lanre Ogundipe
“Test all things; hold fast what is good.” — 1 Thessalonians 5:21
History often records events without immediately revealing their consequences. Many decisions that appear harmless in one generation become defining turning points in another. The Church is no exception.
More than a century ago, in 1914, Ven. Thomas Adesina Jacobson Ogunbiyi, an Anglican clergyman of remarkable reputation, established what became known as the Reformed Ogboni Fraternity.
His objective, according to available historical accounts, was to provide a platform through which educated Africans could preserve certain cultural values without abandoning their Christian faith. To many, it appeared an attempt to reconcile culture with Christianity rather than to replace one with the other.
Yet history compels us to ask a question that transcends personalities and generations:
Can the Church borrow from institutions rooted in another religious worldview without gradually altering its own?
That question has not lost its relevance. If anything, it has become even more urgent.
This essay is not an indictment of the late Ven. Ogunbiyi. Neither is it a trial of the Reformed Ogboni Fraternity. Rather, it is an invitation to examine a much broader issue that confronts the Church today—the subtle but persistent danger of syncretism, the blending of biblical Christianity with beliefs and practices that derive their authority from sources other than the Word of God.
The Nigerian Church has grown phenomenally. Cathedrals have multiplied. Congregations have expanded. Christian broadcasting has reached millions. Yet beneath these encouraging developments lies an uncomfortable question: Has numerical growth been accompanied by doctrinal purity?
Increasingly, practices once considered incompatible with biblical Christianity are finding acceptance within Christian circles. The language may be Christian, but the underlying assumptions often reflect another spiritual worldview.
Objects are invested with mystical powers. Personalities increasingly occupy the place that belongs to Christ alone. Fear has become a stronger motivation than faith. Experience is frequently elevated above Scripture, and spiritual phenomena are sometimes embraced without careful biblical examination.
These developments did not emerge overnight. Like tiny cracks in the foundation of a building, they appeared gradually—almost imperceptibly. What begins as cultural accommodation may, if left unchecked, mature into theological compromise.
The Scriptures repeatedly warn against such a progression.
Israel entered Canaan carrying the covenant of God, yet within a few generations, the nation had adopted the religious practices of the surrounding peoples. The prophets did not merely condemn idolatry; they condemned mixture. They understood that the greatest threat to God’s people was seldom outright rejection of Him, but the gradual attempt to worship Him while simultaneously accommodating competing spiritual systems.
The New Testament continues the same warning. The Apostle Paul urged believers not to be “carried about with every wind of doctrine.” He reminded the Corinthians that he feared lest their minds should be “corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.” The Apostle John gave perhaps the simplest instruction of all: “Beloved, test the spirits.”
Those admonitions are as necessary today as they were in the first century.
The issue before the Nigerian Church, therefore, is not whether African culture possesses admirable values. It certainly does. Every culture bears the imprint of God’s common grace. The real question is where cultural appreciation ends and spiritual compromise begins.
That is the crossroads at which the Church now stands.
It is to that crossroads that this series invites pastors, theologians, church leaders, and believers—not to inflame controversy, but to return together to the only final authority for faith and practice: the Word of God.
In the next section, we shall revisit the biblical meaning of syncretism and examine why God consistently rejected every attempt to mix His worship with religious systems that did not originate from Him. That journey begins not in twentieth-century Nigeria but in the pages of the Old Testament itself.
Ogundipe,itinerant Bible teacher, Public Affairs Analyst, former President Nigeria and Africa Union of Journalists writes from Abuja.