By Bosun Obafemi & Gbenga Osinaike
If you want to know the secret to the exponential growth of the Redeemed Christian Church of God and the outstanding miracles experienced there, you need not look too far. Just make time to see the Coordinator of the Church’s Directorate of Prayer, Pastor Peter Olawale.
He will give you a rundown of how prayer has not only impacted the church but has also transformed several lives. Beyond that, Olawale is a living testimony of God’s miraculous hand on the RCCG.
Little wonder the church has over the last 72 years consistently been going from glory to glory.
It is also certainly no coincidence that the theme for this year’s convention is “HEAVEN” when the reality on the ground is biting global hunger.
The human mind would have thought of a more human-friendly theme that would appeal to the emotions and the present human needs. But that is not the case.
The theme is Heaven and it is an indication of a new level of sublimity that has been birthed by prayers over the years. It is only a mind that has been programmed to resonate with divine reality that can conceive such a theme.
It also shows the level of compliance with divine truth as it is being downloaded from above. Only a church that is connected to heaven can think of heaven as a theme.
It is this same energy that has been the mainstay of the church in the years gone by. Year after year, unprecedented miracles characterize each convention. Despite the tumultuous crowd at every major gathering of the church, God has demonstrated His faithfulness. There has been no major outbreak of disease and the shield of God has been on all worshipers.
As stated earlier, Pastor Olawale is fully armed with the story of how prayers have been instrumental to the growth of the church and the many miraculous happenings in the church.
His choice as head of the prayer directorate is thus a round peg in a round hole. He is a living testimony of God’s ability to save, heal and deliver. Listening to him share his testimony will keep your mouth wide open.
First, his conversion to the Christian faith was divinely orchestrated. He woke up one sultry afternoon in 1967 to see the apparition of one of his uncles and then the flash of a star. “There was no rain, people saw it and someone said the star normally goes like that when somebody has died.”
Fear gripped him after that experience. He then got a devotional published by the Anglican Church. He began reading it and started going to church. He was between the ages of 11 and 13 when this happened.
Shortly after that experience, Olawale, who was a sickle cell carrier, came to Ibadan and was taken to a crusade by one of his elder brothers. He recalled that the experience of being a carrier of the SS genotype was a nightmare for his family.
“It was the battle my family faced; it was a tough time. Nobody thought I was going to survive. That was when they got a charm, the charm was laced with cowries; in Yoruba they call it “Gbekude” which means to suspend death.”
That charm was on him when he attended the crusade. The crusade was going on and it was time to pray. The evangelist roared with a compelling voice and said, “Some of you here, you are praying and you have a charm on you and you think that God will answer your prayer.”
That message jolted him. How did the preacher know he was carrying a charm? He thought it was his brother who took him to the crusade that reported him to the evangelist.
Saved at last
But then, he responded to the altar call and joined several others to surrender his life to Jesus. That happened in 1976. Deciding to follow Jesus ushered Olawale into a new world.
He said, “After I got saved, I heard that Pastor Adeboye and Pastor Kumuyi had given their lives to Christ years earlier.”
That information made him feel he had been lost for several years. It also made him develop a perfect hatred for the things that he used to love doing.
He lost his appetite for the cinema house. “I just discovered that all of us who had been going there were going to hell fire and that was how the journey of my Christian life started.”
SS turned AA
The Lord went further to heal him of his SS status. That was a truly remarkable healing that brought a complete turnaround in his life.
“The Lord told me: “I have saved you. I have healed you. But do you know I can make you whole?” This made me know the difference between salvation and healing. That was how my SS was turned to AA; that one shook me to the marrow,” Olawale said.
He further said that his experience of Jesus is beyond what people told him. “We are not building our experience on what somebody has said; it is a personal encounter. I discovered that the sins I used to commit before, I could not do them again. The life of God became real to me. I was not forcing myself to live for God, I found it easy to live for him. Salvation is not a matter of trying to be what you are not. It is a divine impartation and enablement that makes you truly love God.”
Incredible answers to prayers
Indeed, the love Olawale had for God from the onset made him experience more of his benevolence. It seems when it comes to prayer being answered, he has some secrets not known to many. But in the real sense, it may well not be a secret. It is just that he has been blessed to see God manifest in incredible ways.
Barely a year after his conversion, he was exposed to many scriptures. One of them was Matthew 7:7-8. “That scripture talks about the reality of Jesus and prayer. The Lord Jesus Christ said, “Ask and you shall receive.”
When he heard that scripture read to him on a particular Sunday morning, he took the words literally. By 5:00 am the following day which was a Monday, he knelt and prayed to God in Yoruba which when interpreted is: “Jesus, our pastor told us yesterday that you made a promise that whatever we ask, you will give. So, I need two trousers, and two shirts. I hope you have heard (S’otigbo?).
By 3:00pm on the same day, he visited a schoolmate. They talked about Jesus and many other issues. The schoolmate saw him off to board a bus back to his house. Suddenly, the schoolmate said to him that God asked him to give him something and that he had kept the thing in a nylon bag. He went back home and handed him a bag which contained two trousers and two shirts; exactly what he had asked Jesus to do for him in the early hours of that day.
He was amused that Jesus could answer the exact request he had made. To be sure it was not a coincidence, he made another request.
Olawale recalled, “To join the choir, I needed a white long-sleeve shirt and a black trousers. Among all the clothes they gave me, there was no white shirt there. So, I told Jesus that I need a white long-sleeve shirt to join the choir.” The answer to that prayer came almost immediately. He was shocked. He did not recover from it for a long time.
God used his brother to supply the white shirt. His brother was passing through Ibadan on his way from Lagos to Ekiti. He stopped by to greet him and dropped the gift he bought for him from Lagos. It turned out to be a white long-sleeve shirt.
The spontaneous answer changed his perspective about prayers. He was so amazed that it became difficult for anybody to convince him that God does not answer prayers. It is that understanding and experience with God that he brought to bear on the prayer directorate of the church.
Prayer ministry of RCCG
Olawale traced the history of the prayer directorate to the founder of the RCCG, Pa Josiah Akindayomi, whom he described as a praying machine.
He was the one who laid the foundation to ensure that every activity in the RCCG is birthed in prayers. Olawale noted that the manifestations we see today are a consequence of a long-time tarry before God by leaders of the church.
“We didn’t know Pa Akindayomi as much as Daddy G.O. knows him. Baba Adeboye will tell you that this our leader (Pa Akindayomi) was a prayer man. Pastor Adeboye once shared how he left Pa Akindayomi praying before he went to bed only to wake up in the morning to still see him praying.”
The same grace, according to Olawale, fell on both Pastor Adeboye and his wife, Folu Adeboye. “We can say like John 1:16 said, “In His fullness, we have all received Grace”. That is all about the prayer ministry. What we do today is to build on the solid foundation that has been laid for the prayer ministry in the Redeemed Christian Church of God.”
It is that understanding that informed the newly constructed Prayer and Meditation Centre where people come to pray at no cost despite the ennobling facilities in the place.
It has state-of-the-art structures with the latest information technology facilities. There is a one-on-one counselling room, an international counselling room, an equipped studio and an audio and video control room in the facility.
The beauty of the Prayer Centre is that it has become a hub for people who are in dire need of answers to their requests. The testimonies are countless and it goes to show the amazing consequence of trusting God and making requests in the place of prayers.
“What we are experiencing at the Prayer Centre is that one person comes to pray, gets answers to his requests, then tells another to go and pray there and the answers keep coming. It is a one-tell-one for those who experience the supernatural hand of God.”
He cited the example of a nurse who happened to be the leader of a medical institution in the United States of America who had a stiff hand.
“She was unable to stretch her hands. She called her sister for help because they had done all the diagnosis and they discovered that the trace of stroke could not be found. So, it was not a matter of stroke. After much effort, they found out about the RCCG Prayers and Meditation Centre in Nigeria. They came, and within five minutes, God performed His miracle. The hand was stretched.”
He recalled also how a lecturer brought his wife to the Prayer Centre. His wife had been diagnosed with cancer. They were Muslims, and surprisingly, they received their miracle. They went back to the hospital to carry out the test and the cancer had disappeared.
Olawale noted that several testimonies have been recorded at the Centre.
“A woman staying in Mowe called her sister who is outside the country and narrated the sudden change in her husband’s attitude. She narrated how he took the children away from her. The sister who is outside the country told her, “you are closer to Redemption City where there is a Prayers and Meditation Centre; go there”. She came here to pray and a day after, her husband showed up miraculously, returning with their children.”
The impartation
Olawale traced the beginning of the miraculous in the Centre to when the place was dedicated by Pastor Adeboye. “It became the centre of signs and wonders and miracles after the dedication.”
He however noted that “the place is not being hyped because when our Master Jesus was born, there was no noise about His birth. But later, the news of His birth began to spread on its own. That is what we are experiencing with the Prayers Centre”
Olawale stated that there are at least 10 outstanding testimonies every day, if not more, from those who come to pray at the Centre.
“We have a large number of testimonies. So, people are coming because we don’t charge them for using the facility.” Olawale said.
Unanswered prayers
But then, it is not all about prayers being answered. There are also instances of people who pray and don’t get the answer they desire. Does that mean God is being partial? How did Olawale react to this?
He told our correspondents, “I think as a beneficiary of God’s favour and grace, God has also made me to pass a particular road whereby, God can prove to everyone that He is the one doing His work, He has His timing and not because of who you are.
“I was trusting God for something and instead of that thing coming to pass, the problem became unbearable. I cried out; I said, “God, what offence have I committed? Have you not called me again?” And the Lord gave me this analogy. He said, “if you are driving your car and it’s necessary to change the gear, what happens to the gear?” I didn’t understand what God was trying to say. And He said to me, “have you not taken note that the gear will pass through neutral?” He then said to me, “I have put you in neutral because I am selecting your new gear.””
Olawale reasoned that when prayers are not answered, God is selecting a new gear for the person making the request.
“From my personal experience, Lazarus is a typical example. So, my candid advice to all is that whatever you commit to God’s hands, He’s set to do it. But God has His timing, different from ours.”
Prayer, its origin
He reasoned that there is a need to understand how prayer came about in the first place before one will understand its true meaning.
He explains, “There are two kingdoms. The kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of light. Each of them is governed by either of two personalities: God or Satan. Neither Satan nor God can do anything in this world without passing through humans. That is why Jesus had to become a man in this world. It is the person we yield ourselves to that will guide our thoughts and actions.”
While noting that God had ceded the earth to man, he said, “God must pass through us before He can effect anything, be it salvation, blessing or success. Satan also must pass through us. Prayer, therefore, is to align with the kingdom you have decided to serve.”
Prayer gives permission
While underscoring the essence of prayer, Olawale noted that any time we go to pray, we are permitting God to be in charge of our circumstances and plans. “When you pray to God, you are saying, “God, be in control”. That means you have permitted Him to take over. So, prayer, means your alignment towards the kingdom you have agreed to serve.
“It is to let God know we have yielded ourselves to Him. That is why Apostle Paul said, “whoever you have surrendered yourself to is the servant of whom you belong”. When you ask God to take over, the devil will know he has lost that particular battle because prayer is permitting God to take over the circumstances of the petitioner here on earth.”
The odds
The RCCG, according to him, understands that prayer is purely spiritual. “And the spirituality of prayer therefore will require an individual to understand the battle ground. The first thing you need to discover is that it is the most hated, most neglected, most abandoned. We are talking about prayer because perhaps, it is the only institution that is directly an attack on the enemy of God.”
According to him, Pastor Adeboye is doing great because he does not joke with the secret place of prayer and he gives all the support needed to the prayer unit.
“The first thing Daddy G.O. has done is to support prayer 100%. We still remember those days, when everybody believed that you cannot move the church forward without prayer. You can have every other material thing and still won’t move the hand of God. But with the instrument of sincere heartfelt prayers, there is no limit to what God can do in our lives and indeed in the mission”.
The Directorate
He traced how his office evolved to Intercontinental Prayer Coordinator adding how the Lord used Mummy G.O. to impact the ministry. “Mummy prayed that day and the content of her prayer from the first sentence to the last word had deep meaning. So, the support of the ministry of prayer from our spiritual parents, Daddy and Mummy G.O., is what I refer to as the strength that is moving the unit forward. If that office is not there, we cannot do anything.”
The RCCG impact
The beauty of the prayer unit, however, is that it is not independent of other departments of the church. It serves all the units of the church. It is like the life-giving unit to other units.
One of the steps taken by the department is to collaborate with other departments of the church to make greater impact.
Olawale talked about a programme with the Admin and Personnel Unit. “We call it ‘Harnessing the Potency of Prayer Evangelism in Soul Winning”.
The import of that programme is to underscore the importance of using prayer to draw souls to Christ. “We believe that prayer is key to evangelism. Souls have to be won on the knees first before they are won on the field,” he noted.
He added, “It’s not a tree that can make a forest. We need to collaborate with all regions in the church to make the desired impact. That is what has been happening.
Activities
What are some of the practical steps taken by the unit to engage young people in daily prayers?
Olawale disclosed that during the last annual prayer of the RCCG, some young people were engaged in marathon prayers. “There is a programme on the Prayer Rain platform. We call it ‘Home Front’. It is every Tuesday between 1:00 pm and 3:00 pm. This ‘Home Front’ is where we call a spade a spade.
Through the Home Front programme, Olawale says those who will take over the baton are being prepared. “We are going to harness ourselves in the ministry of prayer to build up the youths because they are going to carry on this particular work tomorrow effectively, which is our hope.”
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