I once took a homeless young man I met on the street to a nearby church I was attending for us to help him. The ushers frowned at me as I led him into the church.
During the church service, I knelt down and closed my eyes to pray and by the time I opened my eyes after the prayers, I did not see him by my side again.
I asked the ushers for him and they said he had left.
"Why did you allow him to leave? He was feeling feverish from malaria. You should not have allowed him to leave. We should have cared for him," I said.
They just frowned and did not reply me.
If he had been a rich man, they would have led him to the front row in front of the pulpit to sit down as a VIP for the pastor or bishop to see the Big Fish they have caught in their net.
To the churches in Nigeria, the poor are liabilities with their poverty who cannot give large offerings and cannot pay big tithes. But the rich will give the church large offerings and pay big tithes for the pastors and bishops to buy SUVs and live in mansions and later buy private jets and become realtors of the largest estates in the country; but neglecting the poor who are often abandoned either as homeless destitute or living in crowded ghettos. But unknown to these worldly pastors and bishops, the poor majority in the church are actually the largest givers to Almighty God, because He calculates what we give by the percentage of what we have as our Messiah JESUS Christ showed us in the lesson of the Widow's Mite written in Mark 12:41-44:
"41 And Jesus sat over against the treasury, and beheld how the people cast money into the treasury: and many that were rich cast in much.
42 And there came a certain poor widow, and she threw in two mites, which make a farthing.
43 And he called unto him his disciples, and saith unto them, Verily I say unto you, That this poor widow hath cast more in, than all they which have cast into the treasury:
44 For all they did cast in of their abundance; but she of her want did cast in all that she had, even all her living."
The Churches in Nigeria prefer the large offerings and tithes of the rich without asking for the sources of their riches, whether from human rituals, stolen money from the public sector or fraudulent practices in the private sector.
Have you ever heard of or seen pastors and bishops picking up homeless destitute and giving them shelter like the Good Samaritan in the Holy Bible?
Majority of the greedy Shylock landlords and landladies and estate agents in Nigeria are among the regular churchgoers and best friends of the pastors and bishops.
The most corrupt Nigerians are not the pagans, but those who claim to be "Christians" and "Muslims" who fellowship and worship in the churches and mosques. But they cannot fool Almighty God. For the Shepherd knows his real sheep and the wolves in sheep clothing.
Who are the bandits and terrorists on rampage in Nigeria? They are the underprivileged children of the poor destitute who the administrators of the government, pastors of the churches and Imams a of the mosques cheated, deceived and exploited over the years without good education, without good accommodation and without welfare.
When you maltreat even your dogs, they will one day turn around to bark and bite you
For Nigeria, the Chickens have come home to roost.
- By Ekeyerengozi Michael Chima, author of "The Prophet Lied", "In the House of Dogs 🐕" and other books distributed by Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Tower Books and other booksellers worldwide.
