So that first day, I enjoyed the message. I sat at the back and when it was time to go, Pastor Adeboye said, we want all God’s children to wait behind. I told my fiance, now my wife, that we should go and that he was talking to members of the church and that this was how all these Pentecostals talk. My wife asked if I wasn’t a child of God and I said I am. And she said that they said children of God and not members. So I stayed back. I was at the back of the hall again. Then Pastor Adeboye opened the meeting and said the church wanted professionals in the church. They had just started getting bits and pieces of their camp ground. They wanted engineers, builders, electricians and others who could deliver their services. I said I wasn’t any of those. I was ready to go and as I was trying to get up, he said: “And you!” I asked, Who? He said: “That brother wearing blue, white, blue. I was wearing a short-sleeve shirt with the colours he mentioned. He asked what my profession was and I told him I’m a lawyer; then he said I should see him after the service. He told me the church had some legal issues and asked if I could help. And that was how the relationship started. I was baptised and in 1988, I pioneered what is now called Modern Parish of the Redeemed Christian Church of God at 1 Oluwole. On 1 October, the Lord spoke to me that my days were numbered in that place. He spoke to me about the Latter Rain Assembly. And I ran to tell him (Adeboye) about it. He didn’t want me to go, but I had made up my mind. I left and the Latter Rain Assembly was started in April 1989. The rest, as they say, is history.

You don’t use mantle, anointing oil and others for deliverance services like other churches do. Why is it so?

I will judge that question controversial and allow lying dogs to sleep and sleeping dogs to lie. There was a battle I fought at all levels in my life and most people who are involved in that…If your parents had been Aladura, and if they had used water to pray for you, oil to anoint you, it is just a carry-over. There are those who have argued that those things are in the Bible, asking why should anyone talk about it. But I can tell you where to find it. In Mark chapter 6, when Jesus was sending his disciples to the jews, He said: “I am sending you to the lost sheep of Israel. Go bring them back. As you go, anoint the sick with oil.” And they came back and reported back to him that they got result.

•Pst Tunde Bakare

The second place you find it is James chapter 5. It says: Is any among you afflicted? Let him pray. Is any merry? Let him sing Psalms. Is any sick among you? Let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. The prayer of faith will save the sick and if he has committed any sin, it would be forgiven. Confess your faults one to another so that you may be healed…” So if they bring the sick to you, and an elder is there to anoint the sick with oil, then it’s fine, no problem. But what we do now is to say the whole church is sick and anoint everybody. And they start holding anointing series. And pastors are making more money from even oil because they know that the people have become solely dependent on oil.

Do I believe in oil? Not at all. Oil cannot do anything. No! But the Jewish people, it was part of their culture. When Jacob left home for example, he had a bottle of oil in his pocket. They would rub their bodies against tsetse fly and other insects and it became part of their culture. And it is medicinal. For example, virgin olive oil in vegetable salad is a fantastic meal. Sometimes, when they ask me what I would like, I tell them virgin olive oil. It is good for me. But don’t fool me that there is power in oil to heal anybody. If the oil is the Holy Spirit, then Jesus is a lamb walking on four legs because John called him the lamb of God which carries away the sins of the whole world. This things are symbols of the Holy Spirit – oil, water, fire, wind. All those four show you can’t hold Him down, you can’t control Him, because He manifests His gifts as He wills. The last symbol of the Holy Spirit given to us in the Bible is the dove. Some people think the dove is the Holy Spirit, but no, the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus like a dove. As a dove would descend so that nobody is rolling on the floor and shouting power!

All these extra-scriptural devices may just excite people. They fall down and they get up, I wonder what they get up with. And as for mantle, the places Paul could not go, he had people who went for him and he gave them mantle he prayed upon so they could place them on the sick until they themselves would have faith to do it…

I remember a woman here who was a seamstress and very godly woman. Her husband, we were told, was sick and lost his mind and was insane. She ran to my office and I told her, ‘I can’t follow you to Bayelsa,’ where they were from, ‘But bring me a handkerchief’ and I prayed. I told her: “When you get there, lay this upon your husband and trust God for the healing.” She came back and her husband was healed. I didn’t distribute mantle everywhere. What is wrong with the hands of the saints themselves when He said: “These signs shall follow them that believe, they shall lay their hands on the sick and they shall recover.”

Why should the pastors become stars or celebrities in the church? Our job is to keep the saints so that they can do the work of the ministry. But we do not judge any man who wants to sell oil; by the time the oil begins to fail and fail, every man would know for himself. That’s why I said it is very controversial. So let’s leave it at that. I don’t sell oil. They are made from Japan. Even Japanese use it for their own food and other things.

The name of Jesus towers above all things and the word of God towers above all those things. Jesus didn’t use any of them for example, or who did He anoint with oil or send mantle to? “In my name, you shall cast out devils.” Let’s stand on the word of God and die to all these pre-conversion dispositions we are used to in our Aladura churches, where many of these people came from.

How would you react to what is happening in the churches now, including how pastors now buy private jets?

It is not wrong to buy private jet, but that is if you can afford it and it is not at the expense of the work. I like to be upfront and don’t sweep anything under the carpet. In 1993, for example, this ministry and some other partners in this church, two captains in this church – Captain Sambo and Captain Benson – brought a proposal to me and they wanted me to invest. I brought Chief Oluwole Adeosun (of blessed memory) of First Bank and we bought a Boeing 707. You could see the logo of the Latter Rain Assembly on the Boeing 707 and it was christened the Latter Rain. But it was for cargo business. I entered that plane only once in my life with my wife to take photograph and they were carrying cargo to Saudi Arabia, up and down, to East and to West. And when they banned Boeing 707, we stopped the business.