How The Church Creates Economic Recession

HOW THE CHURCH CREATES ECONOMIC RECESSION

SUNDAY ADELAJA

Sunday Adelaja

How the Church Creates Economic Recession

©2018 Sunday Adelaja

ISBN 978-1726321631

Copyright © Golden Truth Publishing

Kiev, Ukraine. All rights reserved

www.goldentruth.pro

This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means — electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise — without prior written permission of the author.

Cover design by Alexander Bondaruk

Interior design by Olena Kotelnykova

© Sunday Adelaja, 2018,

How the Church Creates Economic Recession

- Kiev, Ukraine:

Golden Truth Publishing, 2018

All rights reserved.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction 7

Chapter 1: The Get it Now Mentality 9

What is Instant gratification? 11

How the Church Encourages Instant

Gratification 11

Why Churches Must Preach Hard Work Instead

of Miracles and Breakthroughs 16

Chapter 2: How the Church Creates Economic

Recession 25

Creating Greater Miracles via Personal

Responsibility 25

Why Won’t We Have Economic Recession! 33

How to Build Strong People 38

Chapter 3: Disadvantages of the Miracle-Centred

Messages 47

Expecting Effect without Cause 47

A paralyzed Mindset 53

The Harm and Evil Done to Our Societies by the

Message of Miracles and Breakthroughs 55

Bribery and Corruption: Results of Instant

Gratification 59

Insecurity and Scams: Fruits of Instant

Gratification 61

Chapter 4: How to Transform a Nation through

the Message of Delayed Gratification 69

What is Delayed Gratification? 70

Faith in the Laws of Nature and Absolutism

of the Truth 71

How Delayed Gratification Influences a Nation’s

Growth 77

The Dignity of Labour 80

Chapter 5: If We Fix Our Churches, We Fix Our

Nation 87

A Broken Value System, a Broken Nation 87

Let’s Fix Our Churches 90

Develop Your Character and Virtues 98

Patience and Perseverance 99

Two Philosophical World-views 101

Chapter 6: Medical and Scientific Breakthroughs

Vs. Selfish Breakthroughs 109

The Breakthrough That Benefits Nations 109

Why We Are Void of Inventions 112

It is better to Research than Seek Miracles 115

It is better to build 118

Chapter 7: We Must Raise a Campaign against

Such Messages 125

Church and the Economy of Nigeria 125

Boast Not About Miracles 129

Who Really Benefits From The Miracle-Centred

Gospel? 133

Stop Following After Miracles 136

How Jesus Did Miracles 140

Chapter 8: The Gospel of Miracles Causes Doom 147

The Result of Feasting In the Morning 147

The Cross before the Glory 155

Despise the Shame 157

Choose the Pain First 161

Chapter 9: No Manna This Time! Go Cultivate

Your Ground! 169

The Manna Will Stop Some Day 169

Prime the Pump First 173

The Illusion of Fate 176

Rich Pastors, Poor Masses 177

Chapter 10: It’s Time to Fix Our Problems 185

Miracle Security: How Effective? 185

Will You Buy An Apple Fruit or Plant A Seed? 191

Don’t Abandon the Use of Your Brain 194

Conclusion 199

Introduction

Nigeria is facing economic recession, political instability, and security challenges. Poverty, a failing educational sector, and a failing health sector stare us in the face every day. The majority of the Nigerian Christians think that the only way out of our problems is via a miracle. They think that we only need a miracle from God to transform our nation and the lives of the citizens. This dependence on miracles has been for so many years, and yet the nation has not experienced any miraculous transformation. Our pastors and Bishops are parading miracle and breakthrough as though they are the criteria for nation-building and development. They are telling their congregants to expect miracles today and miracles tomorrow. By so doing, our citizens are taught only about miracles and breakthrough and not about diligence, perseverance, and nation-building.

It is for this reason that I have written this book; to teach the Nigerian populace that miracles do not develop nations. I write to bring to the consciousness of every Nigerian that if we must build our nation, we must shift our focus from the message of miracles that seek to instantly gratify our desires and begin to focus on building the virtues of delayed gratification, diligence, and personal responsibility. This book is a call to all Nigerians to take responsibility for their lives and that of their nation via hard work, instead of calling on God for miracles all the time.

The United States was not built by miracles. Singapore was not developed by miracles. Neither did China, Japan, USA, and Germany, build the largest economies in the world by miracles. It took years of delayed gratification, hard work and education to build these nations. Miracles and instant gratification do not build nations; they destroy them. That is the case with Nigeria today. I have written here how overemphasizing miracles and instant gratification has destroyed our economy, corrupted our political systems and hampered the security of lives and properties. I have stated in this book with evidence, how the miracle-centered gospel impoverishes our nation.

Within the pages of this book are the answers to our current national and individual problems. They have nothing to do with miracles, but everything to do with hard work, principles, value-systems and personal responsibility. Read through this book and discover the solutions for yourself.

I believe that if we adhere to the solutions proffered in each chapter of this book, we will all stop chasing after miracles and start building the nation of our dream by ourselves.

For The Love of God, Church and Nation.

Sunday Adelaja

Chapter 1

The Get it Now

Mentality

I think my generation is obsessed with instant gratification. We want everything now, now, now.

Dakota Fanning

In the 1960s, a Stanford professor named Walter Mischel began conducting a series of important psychological studies. During his experiments, Mischel and his team tested hundreds of children - most of them around the ages of 4 and 5 years old - and revealed what is now believed to be one of the most important characteristics for success in health, work, and life.

The experiment began by bringing each child into a private room, sitting them down in a chair, and placing a marshmallow on the table in front of them. At this point, the researcher offered a deal to the child. The researcher told the child that he was going to leave the room and that if the child did not eat the marshmallow while he was away, then they would be rewarded with a second marshmallow. However, if the child decided to eat the first one before the researcher came back, then they would not get a second marshmallow.

So the choice was simple: one treat right now or two treats later. The researcher left the room for 15 minutes.

As you can imagine, the footage of the children waiting alone in the room was rather entertaining. Some kids jumped up and ate the first marshmallow as soon as the researcher closed the door. Others wiggled and bounced and scooted in their chairs as they tried to restrain themselves, but eventually gave in to temptation a few minutes later. And finally, a few of the children did manage to wait the entire time. This popular study was published in 1972 and became known as The Marshmallow Experiment.¹

Dear friends, looking at the story above, we see two different groups of children. The first group are those children who couldn’t wait to get the second marshmallow and by so doing went ahead to satisfy their immediate desire and the need to get what they wanted instantly.

The second group of children are those who were able to delay their need for satisfaction and hence waited patiently to get a second marshmallow.

These two groups of children represent how people all over the world respond to desires and the need for satisfaction. Majority of the people in our world today are constantly in a hurry to gratify their desires and to instantly grab whatever they long for. Only very few people can actually wait long enough and patiently for what they desire.

In this book, I am going to discuss these two groups of people under the themes instant gratification and delayed gratification.

What is Instant gratification?

Instant gratification is the tendency to satisfy our desires and wants quickly. It is the inability to defer our satisfaction till later. Instant gratification is the desire to get it now. We live in a world today where everybody wants to get it now, and nobody wants to hold on a little longer to get it later. That is why Rachael Taylor once said:

We live in a world of instant gratification, the world of the quick fix.

Looking at the word quick fix, you would realize that it is synonymous with fast and easy. It brings to mind a quick and lazy way out of a problem. From the above definitions, we could conclude that instant gratification is a fast and easy way to get what we want, it is the desire to escape the normal procedures and processes and to cut corners. It is deciding to run away from responsibilities.

How the Church Encourages

Instant Gratification

Looking at most of our churches today, you will notice that the messages coming from the pulpits are often about miracles and breakthroughs. These terms miracles and breakthroughs are synonymous with quick fix and instant gratification.

Why did I say that? I said that because looking at one definition of a breakthrough by the English Oxford living dictionaries, it says that breakthrough is a sudden, dramatic, and important discovery or development. In other words, the breakthrough is instantaneous; it is sudden. Although the word miracle may originally not mean a sudden or instantaneous occurrence, our pastors and churches have however given such meaning to it. Anytime pastors emphasize miracles and breakthroughs they actually make people think of an instant intervention from God to do something which they themselves could do had they waited long enough to learn the procedures and processes of doing it. Therefore, churches end up breeding members whose focus are on instant gratification and immediate rewards.

So the question is, how do churches encourage instant gratification? Churches encourage instant gratification by constantly preaching about miracles and breakthroughs. When we preach all the time about miracles and breakthrough, we actually make our members pay too much attention to the idea of instant gratification. And hence, the desire to get things quickly without following due process. That is the reason most Christians now focus too much on miracles and breakthroughs because they think if God can do it instantly why should I waste my time learning the process. Little wonder churches that preach this kind of messages are usually jam-packed with multitudes of people, who for the most part are seeking one thing "instant gratification.

This tendency is very common in the African churches. You will agree with me that most of the Christians in the African church today are not different from those kids who couldn’t wait for a second marshmallow in the experiment we discussed earlier. They are so driven by the need for instant gratification that they would do anything to gratify their desires instantly. They would give anything to get an instant miracle or breakthrough. That is why pastors could tell them to bring money, oil, water, stones, salt, apple, etc. for miracle prayers, and they would hastily obey. They would do all sort of unimaginable things in churches today just because of the desire for instant gratification.

Dear friends, it is my belief that such kind of messages that promote instant gratification are detrimental to us as individuals and as a nation. It is because of the negative effects of instant gratification on us as individuals and as a nation that I am coming to you with this book to say that the message of instant gratification needs to be replaced by the messages of delayed gratification. We must start a campaign to teach our churches why they should stop preaching and laying too much emphasis on miracles and breakthroughs. Because by concentrating too much on that kind of message, we produce Christians who are always looking for miracles and running after miracles. We produce Christians who do not want to work hard to become successful but who rather are expecting one instant miracle to make them successful. With the continuous preaching of miracles and breakthroughs, we raise a generation of lazy Christians; we raise a generation of people who want to get something for nothing. And because of the kind of people our churches are raising, we endanger our society and nation at large. We endanger our nation because when these I must get it now-minded people that have been raised in the church go into the society, they are ready to do anything dubious and unscrupulous to get what they desire quickly without working for it. That is the root of bribery and corruption. That is the root of armed robbery and kidnapping, and that is the root of scams and all forms of dubious and shady businesses in our country.

Someone may be wondering and may be asking what is he talking about? How can he say that the church is the cause of the bribery, corruption, scams, and kidnapping that is happening in the country?

To answer that question I will like to say that an understanding of the message of miracles and breakthroughs that are rampant in our churches today will reveal that these messages are simply promoting the craving for instant gratification. They encourage the quick fix and get it now mentality. Comparing this with robbery, corruption, bribery and kidnapping, you will agree with me that people take and give bribes because they want instant gratification, people go into armed robbery and kidnapping because they want to get it now, and people become fraudsters and scammers because they want to get rich quick, without having to go through the process of labour and hard work. They simply want a shortcut to riches. Therefore, to answer your question, I will say that the church by emphasizing miracles and breakthroughs above hard work, processes, and procedures, actually becomes a breeding ground for thieves, robbers, scammers and all sort of corrupt, greedy and self- driven citizens.

Where do the evils like corruption arise from? It comes from the never-ending greed. The fight for corruption-free ethical society will have to be fought against this greed and replace it with 'what can I give' spirit.

A. P. J. Abdul Kalam

Looking at the above quotation, one would notice that the root cause of corruption is greed and greed in itself is a product of the desire for instant gratification. That is why