Motivational speaker and evangelist, Pastor Femi Emmanuel, is the senior pastor of Livingspring Chapel International. Emmanuel, who is also a former deputy speaker of the Oyo State House of Assembly, in this interview with SEGUN OLATUNJI, speaks on his experience, the role of the church in the society, the anti-corruption war and other issues of national importance. Excerpts:
Could you briefly tell us about yourself?
My name is Femi Emmanuel. I’m the senior pastor of Livingspring Chapel International in Ibadan, Lagos and all over the country and even outside the country. I was the deputy speaker of Oyo State House of Assembly, 1992 to 1993.
I read engineering and I was in business but I have a strong pull towards the ministry. I had always known that God would use me in the ministry at a point, but I didn’t know when. So, at the appointed time, December 18, 1993, Livingspring Chapel International started. I was still the deputy speaker then but I knew my political voyage was over because you can’t wear two caps on the same head and I considered the pulpit a bigger calling than what I was doing then.
Since then, what has been your experience?
It’s been very challenging and very rewarding. Pastoring is like parenting and I didn’t come into pastoring as a novice. As I told you, I was in business, succeeding in my business. I went into politics and succeeded and I was under a pastor in a church, learnt the ropes. I never thought I would be a pastor.
So, coming with an avalanche of experience, I’m finding it very interesting because pastoring is ministering to people. It’s being a role model. It’s about teaching people; reconstructing life. When you see those lives that were beaten and shattered now put together by the word of God, by practical counseling and you see them turn around, it gives you joy. That’s the joy I’m having; it’s been very rewarding but also very challenging.
Outside politics and ministering to people, what else would you have loved to do?
I love business. In fact, I grew up wanting to make money because I came from a very humble background. I just wrote a book, “Up from the Valley: The story of my Life.” I came from a very humble background. What I met when I was growing up was poverty. So, I wanted to make a difference.
Can I deliver my family from this?
So, my whole heart was make money, go into production. So, I would have been into business if I was not into church work. I love politics. When I was in politics I enjoyed it, seriously. I still love it till now but this is a higher calling. Now, I’m more into mentoring and being a father to politicians.
Since you started the ministry, any regrets?
I have no regrets; I have challenges like any people have. The greatest challenge I have is people. In ministry as well as in politics or business or career, even in your industry, the greatest assets are people and the greatest challenge you also have is people. I came into the ministry with a vision of raising people, raising children, sons in the ministry and I did raise them. I provided platform, by the grace of God, to raise young men who have a calling for ministry. But you know, many of them got up, got a name, got a face and of course, would rebel, will break away and even talk ill of you. Those are the challenges but then the beautiful part of it is that some will remain loyal and committed and you’ll keep going on.
I believe that without challenges, life would not be interesting because these challenges, betrayal, rebellion, opposition, are what gives you fuel, power, make you wake, get some other things, retouch, reprogramme and fire on. So, I say to people, without problems, life would be dull. So, let’s thank God for problems because they make us wake up and they make us fire on.
Do we really have too much churches around the country?
No! Churches are not too many. We should even thank God for churches. That is not to deny the fact that there are some who are charlatans, who are there for what they can get and it has always been there even from the days of Jesus Christ. Time will sort them out.
So, I don’t deny the fact that there are so many people going in and unfortunately, for the church world, there is little or no regulation. Anybody can just come up and say God has called him. But you see, as I said, time will tell.
Thank God for churches; thank God for prayers over this country. Without prayers, we would have been worse than Somalia and Burundi. You see what is happening in other parts of the world. Tough, stressful, challenging as Nigeria’s situation is now, we should still thank God and I think it’s the power of prayers.
What difference has the church in general made concerning the lives of ordinary Nigerians?
Many, serious. The only thing why it’s not as obvious as we would have loved it to be is that by the nature of the church, we don’t blow our trumpet. The church doesn’t go out to say we did this and that.
You need to know the huge number of people the church caters for orphans, widows, poor people. An average wellconstituted church has a strong welfare department, gives scholarship to people, and does empowerment. Look at the Army of youths the church takes out of the streets. It would have been a well compounded situation. With this, we’ll see more peace.
These days the church is involved in corporate social responsibility. Where we are based in Ibadan at the Dominion City, we sank bore- holes for the community, we constructed roads, we got security outfit for the community. We don’t sing about these things. We are not politicians, we are not looking for votes. We are looking for God’s endorsement and people’s blessings.
So, the church is doing a lot and that’s why I said it is wrong and it would always be wrong for those who clamour that churches should be paying tax, because they don’t understand. In other climes, the United Kingdom or America, for instance, for every one pound that a member pays in the church, the government will support with 28 per cent because the governments in these countries see the churches as partners in progress. The government alone cannot solve the problems.
Nigerians are somehow have lost hope in this government due to the harsh economic situation. How will you advise Nigerians in this trying period?
Nigerians should be hopeful; they should not lose hope. When people lose hope, they get frustrated and a frustrated man is a dangerous man. He can do anything. So, we must keep hope alive because Nigeria will change.
We are blessed with everything you can think of – material resources, human resources, mental sagacity but we lack leadership. We have selfish leaders, we have thieves as leaders, mindless thieves who will rob the nation dry as we have seen before this government came in and this government itself is not getting it as right as it should.
So, we keep praying for them because I believe prayer changes things. To the ordinary Nigerian, I say don’t lose hope. As bad as our economy is, Nigeria is still one of the most conducive atmosphere to generate resources. There are many things crying for attention. I have the belief that this recession, if prayerfully and well-handled, will even lead to waking up both the government and the citizens.
This will wake up the productive power, the creative grace in us. An average Nigerian is so resourceful. Certificate should not be a meal ticket. You go to the university and polytechnic to discover yourself, to build on your potentials. You now come up and say what do I want to do in life? You don’t necessarily need to work with your certificate. So, you discover yourself, discover your potential, develop it, get a mentor, start something. I believe that given a peaceful atmosphere, in the next 10 to 15 years, our story would be different.
What’s your take on the government’s anti-corruption crusade?
I wish and pray that God would raise a leader for us who has the incorruptibility of President Buhari and the courage, boldness, fearlessness of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo in one person.
I campaigned vigorously for President Buhari and up till now, we have not pinned any corruption on him. But that a man is not corrupt is not enough to rule a country. You need more than that. You need sagacity. Nigeria is a very difficult country to lead. You need to be proactive, you need to be wild, you need to be able to gather a formidable team on different aspects of the life of the nation. That we have not seen.
So, corruption, yes. But corruption is not just fighting a person, like you find a lot of people alleging it’s selective. A system that must be built to fight corruption, to disallow corruption. How many thieves can you catch, when almost everybody is a thief? How much can you take from them when the laws of the land cannot catch a big thief. Nigerian laws, as they are now, can only catch somebody who has stolen a goat. But when you see big time thief, all he needs to do is to hire a senior advocate of Nigeria and he starts arguing technicalities until four years are over.
One of the first major things that Buhari should have put in place is a bill to change many of these terrible laws that cannot take us anywhere. As it is now, the government has not got the platform to fight corruption. It is a system that must be put in place to discourage corruption, to expose corruption, to disallow corruption. But running after somebody who stole N2.3billion? He would just hire a SAN, give him part of the money and he keeps getting adjournment. And it’s also because the judiciary itself is corrupt, the bar is corrupt, everybody is corrupt. So, Buhari would do a good thing if can initiate this system.
