SPECIAL INTERVIEW WITH THE DIRECTOR OF PROGRAMS

Night of Bliss:
Heavens opened in South Africa —
Reverend Tom Amenkhienan

Recently, Pastor Chris Oyakhilome held a crusade many agree has re-drawn the spiritual map of not only South Africa where it took place, but by extension the entire Southern African region. It attracted crowds in their hundreds of thousands from across the region, people whose hunger and thirst for righteousness knows no bound. To the extent, the authorities in South Africa were concerned about safety and crowd control measures. Reason: They have not experienced such mammoth crowd before on a single night, either for a church crusade or even any other activity. In the same vein those who could not comprehend such outpouring of the power of God tried to play down the significance thereof. In this bare-all interview with a group of journalists including National Daily's KELECHI DECA, Rev. Tom Amenkhienan, Believers' LoveWorld Inc. (BLW), a.k.a Christ Embassy's Director, Church Ministry and Programmes, who saw what happened says it was beyond human understanding, such outflow he says could only come from God. Excerpts:
THE impact of the recently held Night of Bliss with Pastor Chris Oyakhilome at the Johannesburg Stadium in South Africa has been described by many as a spiritual tsunami. To what extent does this description capture what took place at the crusade?

The Night of Bliss with Pastor Chris took place in Johannesburg, South Africa on March 28, 2008. That epoch making event was a night to remember. Many were in total agreement that there has never been a programme like that in the history of South Africa so far. I chose to see the crusade as once-in-a-life-time event, because the programme was so unique that it has changed the whole of South Africa and all the Southern African nations that were represented that night.

It was so awesome that one is tempted to say that words cannot qualify it. South Africans themselves attested to the fact that in the history of Christianity and crusades in South Africa, there has never been such a programme like that. Without an iota of doubt, the programme brought joy to the people of South Africa and those who came from all over the world.

Though that was not our first programme with such turnouts as Pastor Chris has had programmes with over 2.5million people in attendance, the last of such programmes had about 3.5 million people that was in Lagos.One thing that is consistent with every programme that our man of God - Pastor Chris holds is the hunger for the word of God that the crowd comes with.

We find that these people are not just miracle seekers, but people who believe and seek to transform their lives. That was what happened at Johannesburg Stadium where people trooped in by 11.00 am for a programme that was supposed to start by 6:00 pm. How do you explain that? Of course, that is how people respond, anywhere in the world to Pastor Chris' programmes.

Moreover, the stadium was so filled that we had to make an announcement for people to stop coming into the stadium. It is unusual that six hours before take-off time, we had to make announcement, telling people not to come into the stadium. I am not sure that any football event in South Africa has ever pulled such a crowd.
At the conception and planning stage did you picture the vastness or imagine the impact of the outcome, and what would you ascribe such success to?

Yes we did. We did envisage the crowd because when we were planning for the programme we knew there was going to be a large crowd. It is important to note that the spirit of God is responsible for bringing people to any of such programme and this one is no different because programme our man of God organizes is always a crowd puller any day.

Yes, we did the publicity and did our works, but the Holy Spirit pulled the people to the programme. The hunger of the people for the presence of God through the man of God - Pastor Chris, drove the people to the programme. Aware of that we made adequate provision for them. That was why we applied for Johannesburg Stadium, Elis Park Stadium and Film B, which are within the vicinity of Johannesburg Stadium.

Planning a programme of this magnitude is not bread and butter, what were the challenges encountered in the process, and what informed the ministry's response and attitude to those challenges?
In fact, just about two weeks to the programme, the authorities came around mysteriously and said that the venues we asked for would no longer be made available to us. There was a great and well coordinated resistance and lots of fights. They tried to stop the programme from holding. But in the end they only gave us Johannesburg Stadium, which would only take a certain number of people. Even at that, when the crowd started trooping in in numbers the situation on the ground arm twisted the authorities to discard blocking the event and allow people to come into the Stadium.

Their initial resistance stopped people from gaining entry into the stadium at first. It will interest you to know that it was during the last minutes of the programme that the authorities asked us to go ahead and use the Field B, which they earlier said we could not use, but then it was late for us to source for visuals and audio but at the beginning, we had made arrangements and they tried to foil our plans.

But did you pay for Field B?
Yes, we made the payment for Field B that was required of us. However, they gave us the field eventually at the wrong time, but by the Grace of God, everything was under control and the programme went very well.

How would you describe the miracles that took place?
How many can I really count? It was awesome. It was like the heavens opened and the power of God was manifested in no small way. And of course, it is very, very normal with the programmes of the man of God Pastor Chris. All the programmes of the man of God that I have ever attended are programmes that are filled with miracles and the wonders of God. All over the place was enveloped with the power of God. Those outside, in the overflow, in the field and those in the stadium, you could hear shouts of miracles, people jubilating at different angles of the stadium and outside; people jumping out of the wheel-chairs, the lame walked; the deaf heard; the blind saw; all kinds of miracles took place. Of note was a lady who was blind for almost six years. She has a daughter that was seven years. The daughter led her by the hand into the stadium. She came with her sister who had another disease for 25 years. Three of them came into the stadium. She was blind for six years, and the daughter was seven years. She had not seen the daughter, in other words, as the daughter grew after one year, she did not know what she looked like. She was seeing the daughter for the first time on the platform there. She saw the daughter and hugged her.

You know there was so much hunger in South Africa, because people were expectant. They knew that when the man of God Pastor Chris comes to town, they would receive their miracles. It was obvious that everybody was expectant. The man of God had barely started ministering when miracles began to take place everywhere; taking place in the overflow, taking place in the stadium. The whole place was filled with the power of God. So many miracles; but how many exactly can we chronicle? How many can we talk about? Some could not make it to the testimony line. I mean, you just see clutches flying in the air, up on the stands, with people rejoicing all over the place, because some of them surrounded this person and saw the condition before getting healed at the time.

A South African Newspaper recently alleged that Pastor Chris paid people to fake healings at the programme, and that the miracles are not real. What is your reaction?
It's really unfortunate that such allegations could be published by a media organisation, because the South African press I know is much more dignified than the report we read of the newspaper. I think it is a soft-sell newspaper and it is surprising that they had to write the things they wrote concerning the programme because what happened was open. There were several thousands of people at the programme. Well, we felt that the newspaper was too low for us to give a response, and from our findings, some people obviously were behind the malicious publications. Those publications were by and large malicious and the same people who were behind the publications were the people who tried fruitlessly to stop the programme from holding. They tried to influence the officials of the city and the stadium to try to stop the programme from holding. They even fought against us, to try to stop the programme but they couldn't. The grace of God was just too strong. When they saw that they tried to no avail to stop the programme, they resorted to this malicious publication against the night of bliss and against the man of God, Pastor Chris. It's funny that someone could conceive of such unfounded lies.

We see thousands of people get healed at Pastor Chris' meetings. Now, if you pay so much like they claimed, where do you get money to pay out to the several people that get healed and for what gains?
Absolutely! What would you gain, what do you want to achieve in paying someone to feign, to be on the wheelchair and to get up, its absolutely ridiculous for someone to think of such a thing, its inconceivable. You know, it's amazing how some people yield themselves to the devil, and how they think. But I am not surprised, because, you see in the days of Jesus it was not different. When he performed miracles, they tried to question it. They tried to even question the source of his power. They said he was using the power of Beelzebub. They questioned if he was a prophet. Some said he was a good man, some said no, some said he was of God. Some said he was not of God. I will read those scriptures to you because it is important for you to know that what is happening now has happened in the days of Jesus Christ and it is not surprising that the man of God Pastor Chris is being criticized like this, because it's the proof of the Christ like ministry, to be criticized in this manner, because they criticized Jesus and those who criticized Jesus still have their descendants today. When you study the Bible you will find that in every generation, people are just the same. While Jesus was doing what he was doing, the critics were busy criticizing. Let me read to you from the gospel according to St. John. I read two portions to you. First of all John chapter 7 and verse number 12. It says “And there was much murmuring amongst the people concerning him, for some says he is a good man, others said nay but he deceives the people. They are talking about Jesus. Some said he is a good man others said others said he is deceiving the people. Isn't this exactly what they are saying about the man of God Pastor Chris? Jesus said; don't be surprised if they hate you because they hated me, so if they criticized the master, Jesus our Lord, why should you feel bad that they criticizing you, it's actually a proof of the Christ like ministry, because how many minister gets criticized like this. How many ministers get criticized for miracles? How many ministers have had the integrity of their personality questioned as a result of healing the sick and casting out devils and pulling crowds? Others said nay but he deceives the people, howbeit, no man spoke openly of Him for fear of the Jews. In order words, even those who knew the truth, some of them couldn't speak openly, because they did not want the Jews to ostracize them from the Synagogue and they were afraid of the Jews. So if they did this. I think that whoever reads all those criticism and publications should go back to history and read the Bible and see that it happened and this is what Jesus said would happen to those who follows him.

Therefore, it is laughable for anybody or organization to degenerate to that level of thinking that someone would be paid to be on the wheel chair. Would you also pay the person to have a swollen stomach, would you also pay the person to have weakness of the limbs? How many people would you pay? You pay somebody in Saudi Arabia; you pay somebody to come from Italy, you pay somebody to come from the United Kingdom and United States, to sit on the wheel chair on what basis?
You see, my question is this, what is the aim of such an allegation? Is it that it is too much for God to raise someone from the wheel chair? Is that the issue, and then secondly, what do you have to say about people who watch Atmosphere on television and they get healed in their homes, does the man of God send them money in their homes so that they can claim that they were sick and now healed. We have seen great men come for our programmes. Intelligent people, medical doctors and even big government functionaries got healed. So, to say that people are being paid to claim that they were healed whereas they were not is to charge these people of being gullible and to insult their intelligence. It doesn't make sense; Of course it is simply yellow journalism for any newspaper or magazine to degenerate to such level of reporting such rubbish.

We have seen miracles upon miracles of people who just by watching the programme “Atmosphere For Miracles” who have received healing. You will remember many years ago Pastor Chris was minister. He was given a word of knowledge about a lady who was wearing a blue dress and somebody was watching somewhere. Hundreds of kilometres from where pastor was giving the word and the lady who was just watching and in the presence of many witnesses, her dad and siblings, she was healed. The man of God gave the word that she had been involved in an accident, that she had problems with her legs and she god healed. That's a miracle; I mean who paid her right there. I want to let you know that it is difficult to make up one's mind to respond to critics, because of the enormity of their spiritual ignorance and spiritual bankruptcy.

If Jesus was here physically, the same controversy around the man of God Pastor Chris would be stirred up by the miracles which he will perform and the same faith which is stirred up in the heart of those who believe in Bible days is what would stir up in heart of those who believe, it's a ministry that is pattered after Christ and you know human beings they criticize what they do not understand.

Don't forget that people tend to criticize things they don't understand, or things they cannot explain, so they try to make light of it. All the critics want is that when you are healed, just ascribe it to Jesus. Though you are healed, don't say it's Pastor Chris that healed you. Don't say it's Pastor Chris that prayed for you. Just say it just happened.

You know, this criticism is a fall-out that proves the impact of this crusade on the critics. The critics cannot forget this crusade. Even in their dreams they can't forget. It is good to understand the strategy of the devil - when God is doing something the devil wants to stop the testimony. That is his strategy, which is his counter attack strategy - That the news should not spread further; that they tell it no more to anybody; that they talk about Jesus no more, and by extension that they talk about miracles no more. That the faith of people be destroyed. The idea is to destroy your testimony. That is why all these things are coming up. But you know miracles are real. What God has done is real. No man can take what God has given to you from you. God is real. When you see criticisms like this, just understand that it is a proof that this is the Christ like ministry.

Why do some of these critics claim Pastor Chris is surrounded by mysteries and is controversial?
Well, first of all, controversial people make Pastor Chris controversial. That is a fact. They are controversial and they tend to make the issue of the man of God, Pastor Chris controversial. Now why are people asking if Pastor Chris is a man of God? It's not a question that is new. They asked if Jesus was the Son of God, if he was a good man, if he was a prophet, having performed so many miracles. I read from two portions of scriptures, in John chapter 7 verse12; John chapter 9 from verse 16 where Jesus performed miracles and the Pharisees says he was a sinner. The camp was split in two. Some were for while some were against. Those who are being heard are the vocal minority and the vocal minority because they are loud does not necessarily makes them right in what they are saying. True, unfortunately there is the silent majority, and in that silent majority, you have a lot of people who have benefited from the ministry of Jesus, but because of the fear of the Jews, the leaders of the Jews, for fear of being ostracized they will keep quiet, so they questioned the integrity of the ministry of Jesus. And if Jesus was here today physically the controversy will still arise. They will still question the miracle, if Jesus was the Son of God, or he was a good man or a prophet.
It's not surprising. I just think that people should go back to the Bible and read it. When you hear things like this, go to the Bible and read it. You will find where these critics belong; you will discover their camp. You will see who their ancestors are because they have been there in every generation.
You know, even in the ministry of Paul, they stirred up a lot of riots against Paul; they said they have come to incite the people, a lot of allegations. It is not surprising that this is happening. Because it is not everybody, it is not every ministry of the gospel that is criticized like this and let me refer to some of those publications, I told you the stories were malicious, not only malicious. A lot of the stories were created and repetitious. Some of them, they say sources. They were created and fictitious. Even the description of Pastor Chris, the claims about Pastor Chris, of these publications were false.