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viltglance007
Guest
Samuel.Akeju - Nigeria.Africa
I was born into a family with a high moral standard. My brothers, sisters and I were introduced to the church and Sunday school. We were also introduced to the worship of idols. My parents believed that the "God" of the Christian has no power to deliver us from cults and occult; therefore, we must seek protection from the gods. These gods must be appeased with peace offering and some rituals to ward off evil spirits. The missionaries who brought the gospel to my people did not present the full gospel since they did not experience powerful encounters like Africans. Growing up in this environment, I grew up with the belief that nobody dies naturally no matter how old the person might live. But God was gracious to my family in that we did not experience death compared to our neighbors. This made it hard for me to trust anybody. I was in the grip of the fear of death. Fear is one of the strongholds of Satan.
In December 1976, one of my brothers who had accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior came home for his wedding ceremony. Because of his involvement in his local church and Interdenominational Fellowship in Kaduna, many Christians came with him to the village, Ogori. That was the first time I was exposed to evangelical Christians. Even though many of these Christians were coming to the village for the first time, they were free with everbody. They ate food items presented to them without fear of being killed. In the night they slept without the fear of darkness.
As a sequel to this experience, I met with pastor Amos Nwonkena (a Christian Religious teacher in my secondary school) to ask why the Christians were not afraid of death. He showed me in the Bible the power of death and what the Lord Jesus Christ did to death on the cross. Since I was very religious and morally upright he did not suspect that I was not a Christian. After the explanation, I went home and personally prayed to receive the Lord Jesus Christ into my life. When I prayed that prayer, nothing spectacular seemed to happen. I had no strange feelings. But within the next three weeks, I realized that something was indeed different. My fear of death no longer had a grip on me. The charms given to me for protection were destroyed. Before this experience, I was specifically told not to eat some food items for "safety" purposes. I went ahead and started eating them; nothing happened to me. God also gave me extra boldness to speak to relatives and friends who were having the same problems I had. God opened the spiritual eyes of my parents after three years of my conversion and they prayed to receive the Lord Jesus Christ into their lives. As I began to read my Bible, I discovered the sovereignty of God.
I was born into a family with a high moral standard. My brothers, sisters and I were introduced to the church and Sunday school. We were also introduced to the worship of idols. My parents believed that the "God" of the Christian has no power to deliver us from cults and occult; therefore, we must seek protection from the gods. These gods must be appeased with peace offering and some rituals to ward off evil spirits. The missionaries who brought the gospel to my people did not present the full gospel since they did not experience powerful encounters like Africans. Growing up in this environment, I grew up with the belief that nobody dies naturally no matter how old the person might live. But God was gracious to my family in that we did not experience death compared to our neighbors. This made it hard for me to trust anybody. I was in the grip of the fear of death. Fear is one of the strongholds of Satan.
In December 1976, one of my brothers who had accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior came home for his wedding ceremony. Because of his involvement in his local church and Interdenominational Fellowship in Kaduna, many Christians came with him to the village, Ogori. That was the first time I was exposed to evangelical Christians. Even though many of these Christians were coming to the village for the first time, they were free with everbody. They ate food items presented to them without fear of being killed. In the night they slept without the fear of darkness.
As a sequel to this experience, I met with pastor Amos Nwonkena (a Christian Religious teacher in my secondary school) to ask why the Christians were not afraid of death. He showed me in the Bible the power of death and what the Lord Jesus Christ did to death on the cross. Since I was very religious and morally upright he did not suspect that I was not a Christian. After the explanation, I went home and personally prayed to receive the Lord Jesus Christ into my life. When I prayed that prayer, nothing spectacular seemed to happen. I had no strange feelings. But within the next three weeks, I realized that something was indeed different. My fear of death no longer had a grip on me. The charms given to me for protection were destroyed. Before this experience, I was specifically told not to eat some food items for "safety" purposes. I went ahead and started eating them; nothing happened to me. God also gave me extra boldness to speak to relatives and friends who were having the same problems I had. God opened the spiritual eyes of my parents after three years of my conversion and they prayed to receive the Lord Jesus Christ into their lives. As I began to read my Bible, I discovered the sovereignty of God.
