We are not ashamed to be called the church of the rich - Bishop David Oyedepo

Founder and President, Living Faith Church aka Winners’ Chapel, Bishop David Oyedepo, in this interview talks about the church, corruption and wealth, university proprietorship, expensive tuition fees, boko haram and sundry issues

YOU PREACH AS IF YOU HAVE COMMITTED THE ENTIRE BIBLE TO YOUR MEMORY. HOW MANY TIMES HAVE YOU READ THE BIBLE?

The Bible is an unfinishable book, you keep reading. A student once met me after a meeting and said that I quoted 68 scriptures verbatim. He asked if I memorised the scriptures, I said no, I eat them. No matter how unintelligent you are, you can’t forget the food you ate last night, except you are mentally derailed. If you are given three seconds, you could tell what you ate about five days ago, if you truly ate it. So, the Bible is just not for reading, it’s actually for eating. I’m not among the people that have read the Bible three or five times, I don’t know how many times I have read the Bible and I’m not planning to know how many times. I just know it’s my delight to feed on it daily, and I can’t claim to have finished reading it.

THE LIVING FAITH CHURCH IS 33 YEARS OLD, HOW HAS IT BEEN, PASTORING THIS ONE CHURCH FOR THE PAST YEARS?

The ministry is 35 years, the church is now in its 31st year. It started as an itinerant ministry before we were called into the church ministry. It has always been interesting. These things work when you have the right perspective on them. Every pastor is ordained to serve the congregation, not to be served by the congregation. When that understanding dawns on any pastor, and he embraces it, then, pastoring (pasturing) becomes a sweet adventure. I’ve never looked towards what I can get from any member since inception. But I’ve always longed for what I can give to the people. I must say I’m jealous over them, I don’t want anyone to take advantage of them or play games on them. I want them to just be the children of God that they are, serving God without duress or pressure.

IS IT TRUE THAT CHURCH MEMBERS HERE PRAY FOR THE DEAD AND THEY WAKE UP, EVEN IN THE MORTUARY, HOW DO THEY DO IT?

(Cuts in..) By tapping them and saying wake up (laughs). We must know the source of everything that we experienced or observed. No man has the power to raise the dead. Jesus is the only one that has the keys of resurrection and death in his hands. So, we rely on him to do those things and he quickens whosoever he wills; he determines who to bring back and who not to. We only believe in God to bring back whosoever he wishes, if we have the key, we would be delighted to bring back everybody, and even open a clinic for bringing back the dead.

WHY ARE THERE SO MANY RICH PEOPLE IN WINNERS’ CHAPEL?

Because they know better than their contemporaries. If you don’t know what you have, you won’t know if you are deprived of it. The Bible is an open chequebook, it is by revelation we access what belongs to us; by faith we take delivery of it. Someone had access to our empowerment programme and she is a pepper seller, while others sell one basket a day, she sells six, seven. I learnt she had become the envy of all the pepper sellers in her area. Such person has an understanding that whatever she does, she prospers and she knows that when she pays her tithe, she experiences open heavens. But in case people don’t know, they perish for lack of knowledge, and in case they think when you are rich you miss heaven, then they perish for lack of knowledge.

SO , IT’S RIGHT WHEN PEOPLE CLAIM THAT THIS CHURCH IS ONLY FOR THE RICH?

It’s for all the people who believe that Jesus already paid for them to be rich. And those who don’t believe, when they come they start believing when they see it happen in a lot of people’s lives. And we are not ashamed to be called the church of the rich. If they call your family poor, will you be excited? Nobody would be excited. Even when a family is poor, they hate to be called poor. No man in his right mind enjoys being called poor, and nobody truly wants to be poor, people may pretend. Which is more honourable between being a giver and a beggar? Most of us came in very poor, but the light of God’s word came on us and we walked out of poverty in grand style into wealth and riches.

HOW COME THERE IS SUCH WEALTH IN THE CHURCH DESPITE THE POVERTY IN THE NATION?

The kingdom of God is funded by God’s resources. We are not funded by the economy of the world, but by the economy of the kingdom, which has a budget for all of its agenda on earth. We’ve been here (Canaanland) since 1999 and we have never had power outage or water shortage. The main players are Nigerians, the builders are Nigerians. There is no building here that any foreign expert took part in. There is no foreign company’s presence here, including the (Faith) tabernacle. Some of the revered foreign companies here in Nigeria are technicians in Germany, and they are all political contractors, not that they have something special to offer.

IS THERE ANY WAY WE CAN TRANSLATE THIS INTO THE NIGERIAN SYSTEM?

It is possible by believing in the capability and capacity of Nigerians to do whatever they need to do. This is the largest church auditorium in the world. It’s 104m free span wide. Even one of the reputed foreign construction companies (Julius Berger) came here to take pictures. Nigerians have unusual capacity to match any expertise in the world in any field they are involved in. Most of us go to school in foreign lands and we beat them, is it that when they get here, they become smarter? It’s just for the authorities at the various levels to believe that we cannot develop ourselves seeking foreign aides for everything. We must take advantage of the opportunities around us to develop the capacity of our men and women. This office (Church Headquarters) was built in 2001 and it’s neat and there is no crack on the wall, so, what is the problem? But if we want to do anything, we must give it to people from foreign countries so that those who award the contract can have a deal and share the money and at the end of the day, they are still poorer than poverty because any money stolen never enhances a man’s value.

WE LEARNT YOUR CHURCH MEMBERS ONCE DONATED ABOUT 700 CARS AS SEED AND THAT THE CARS WERE GIVEN TO THE PASTORS?

It’s important to mention that there was no time that I know in the history of this church where there were 700 cars. There is no such story. People can make anything out of anything. There was a time they said we had six planes, and I said they didn’t count them well, they should be up to 30 so that we use one each day of the month. Those are things that make news in the social media even when they are lies. People give here because they are taught to give, because we understand from the scriptures that it is the only way to increase. Every normal Winner takes good care of his parents. We also give to the poor. My family has sponsored close to 150?? people out of university and others at Landmark University are on scholarship on our own ticket because of our commitment to agriculture. It is a lifestyle; it didn’t start yesterday or two days ago. Since 1992, I have been consciously sponsoring students in various universities in Nigeria. The church is blessed because the church is a giving church. Just today (before you came), I signed millions for people who have health needs from the welfare account. And that continues. For instance, the church gives scholarships annually, not N100m or N150m. And it’s not in the news. And that we have been doing for years.

HOW DO YOU FEEL WHEN PEOPLE ACCUSE YOU OF FLYING IN JETS AND SPENDING CHURCH MONEY TO MAINTAIN THE JETS?

I feel very good. It’s an opinion. Let me tell you what my understanding of persecution is; it’s simply an opinion harshly expressed. And everybody has a right to his opinion. People who are walking in the truth are hardly bothered when things are said negatively about them because they have nothing to hide. The truth is I have never felt it, some say it’s not human, but I have not. I can’t be wasting my time trying to reply lies because I have too many things to do. They are doing their work, let me be doing my work too and before they wake up in the morning, I’ve done the next one, so, it doesn’t matter. My idea of it is that, in a football match, you have only 22 people playing with thousands of spectators. And that is the way it is in the journey of life. In every field, you find just few players and many spectators, multitudes. If we don’t know where to place opinions, they will displace us. When we started Covenant University, so many people said it would not work, now, we hosted two Nobel Laureates this week, whereas no Nigerian university has ever hosted one in the history of university education in Nigeria. Now, it is the most pronounced and preferred private university in Nigeria. In fact, they say this is the university of the future; that is what they say in the university community. Those who said it could not work now have their children here because they have changed their mind. Some people say how can you tell children how to dress? We have to do that so they won’t behave like mad people on the street. They say how can you tell them they can’t use phone? We tell them so they would be disconnected from cultism. Ask me anything, I can tell you why we did it. Where are you going to find the President of a nation with a woven hair? I can tell you that in the next 100 years, you won’t find a male president using earring because they would count you as irresponsible, even in the secular world, they won’t see anything in you. As free as America is, have you ever seen any minister there with earrings? The person may be qualified, but he will be termed irresponsible. But if you train these children how to carry themselves, it will open up their future. Everywhere you get to in this world, people are looking for responsible people, who don’t only say so, but prove so. So, all the opinions on Covenant University have died now because we didn’t stop pursuing what we believe was right and now it has become a standard.