The Missed Messiahs (Part 2)

Mismanaged and missed messiahs

Messiahs are celebrated usually after they have been killed by those they strove to save. Today, Nigeria greatly misses Archbishop Benson Idahosa. If it were possible to drag him back from the grave to speak again for the Church, many hands would gladly join in the project despite ‘denominational’ differences, but the Church did not so value him while it had him. His greatest critics were us.

Had we been kinder, God might have preserved him for us, for this day. Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor was the very vocal President of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) a dispensation ago. He lived through his tenure in tears, deeply wounded many times by the very Church he risked his life to save.

On the pages of newspapers, in the back corridors of corrupted politicians, ‘church members’ joined the enemy to plot restlessly for his overthrow. Today they join his true mourners.

President Olusegun Obasanjo might not have been everybody’s definition of the best Christian, but he listened genuinely to pastors, and sadly saw through the ‘filthy lucre’ of many, until he was forced once to blurt out, “CAN my foot!”

After helping to drive off Dr Goodluck Jonathan from office, Nigerian Christians now mourn their Bad-luck, wishing they had another chance. In 2015, God sent the Nigeria Church a clear warning about the antichrist government that was coming.

We fought that messenger vehemently, called him very unkind names. Some were ready to fight, manipulated by sorcery that they would not admit. Today, everyone regrets that we had cast our votes for Barabbas over the Messiah when we had the open choice.

Martin Luther is revered today in Germany for shaping German culture, politics, language and religion, yet his age called him a rebel and sought many ways to kill him. In England, John Wycliffe stands in the hall of fame for his enormous contributions to English language and literature in his translation of the Holy Bible.

That man was burnt alive by the fathers of those who celebrate him today. They called him heretic for what the children now call innovation and linguistic nationalism.

Saviours don’t always come clothed in purple robes riding through the clouds in chariots of fire. Sometimes, even educated scribes and Pharisees miss them for their humble outlook, for their birthplace in a manger among mean sheep.

Alas, the many messiahs missed only after they were killed – by those who miss them now, who saw no messiah in them while they walked among them. Of Jesus it was lamented, “He came unto his own, and his own received him not” (John 1:11).

When Saul was anointed first king of Israel, some blind citizens described as “children of Belial” queried, “How shall this man save us?” so they despised him. But, like most messiahs, Saul “held his peace” (1 Samuel 10:27).

The tragedy of missed and killed messiahs is not a story of today. Sadly, no matter how ‘democratically’ done, a people who kill their saviours merely prolong their slavery, until Mercy should find another messiah to send, who also would be willing to go.

Unfortunately, prophets are also mortals, who sometimes refuse where God sends them, and He forces none, Almighty though He is. When messiahs delay or abscond, like Jonah, the land is forced to wait another dispensation, while it endures its present judgments.

Why are messiahs often the victims of those they are destined to save? Why does a wife so mercilessly attack the man that God had raised as her cover, only to blame her widowhood on some distant ‘witches’ after she had helped to hasten his demise?

Why was some pastor so blinded to the divine helper in his wife that he ran off with a glittering Jezebel, only now in his tribulations to wish that he had another chance?

“Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city.” (Matthew 23:34)

Watchers who equate divine disapproval with the mob persecution of the sent one will miss their messengers. Also, messiahs who mind the press will miss their place in destiny and in the lasting halls of fame that are often built after they are gone. Only a few messiahs hear any Hosannas while they live.

The majority never do, and never will. Saviours therefore who must measure their divine mandate by mundane approval might never get there. Messiahs who rate their place in God by the ovations in the popular press would miss their way.

Often (but not always), the attraction of instant praise, according to Jesus, is the hallmark not of success but of false prophets. “Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets” (Luke 6:26).

Messiah? You might never even know that you are, until destiny begins to force you upon paths unplanned, with little victories undreamed. Don’t give up. If you should mind the people so much as to turn back now, it would be you, not they, who will answer to the all-knowing God who gave YOU the mandate despite ‘them.’

It is often the lot of messiahs that their own people seldom trust them, and sometimes even conspire with the enemy to kill them for a pittance – a present private temporary gain so shamefully insignificant in comparison to the future common good. Ask Judas where he invested his thirty pieces of shiny silver coins.

Are you being stoned by those you are called to save? Most stubbornly opposed by those to whom the voice of God “expressly” sent you? Welcome to The Club of Ezekiel.

Prayer for Another Chance

“O God of mercy, hear us today. As a nation, as a people, as corporate organisations, as churches and individuals, woe is upon us today because we killed our own prophets and persecuted others for their unflattering message (1 Thessalonians 2:15; Romans 11:3; Luke 11:47). As wives, husbands, brothers, sisters, parents, children, chief shepherds, we have stoned our saviours, maimed our messiahs, crucified our christs. Today we labour under those who should since have been serving us. Forgive us, O Lord, and for the sake of the elect, please, shorten the days of our tribulation and send us again another saviour, and help us also this time to manage better what we get, in Jesus name.” Amen.

Source: The Preacher’s diary