When we come to difficult passages, I must admit, we sometimes have to guess at the meaning. Some Nigerian pastors prepare their sermons by going to bed and asking the Lord to reveal in a dream or vision what they should say the next Sunday at church. True, the Holy Spirit does work in marvelous ways. But friend, our lack of written resources dooms us to haphazard preparation. As a result the Nigerian church is struggling.
Church attendance is very large, but too often the teaching is shallow.
Too many of my Nigerian brothers and sisters come to church with traditional, non-Christian ideas still controlling their subconscious minds. A myriad of cults, which stress the phenomenal and open the door to occult practice, vie for attention. In Northern Nigeria we also face considerable pressure from Islam. As a result, the devil is busy infiltrating our churches with counterfeit and confusing ideas. The gospel is often misunderstood.