The Sun News On-line/man in the pulpit

The new Bishop of Osogbo Diocese of Methodist Church of Nigeria, Bishop John Adeleke Bamgboye was born 63 years ago in Aagba town in Boripe Local Government of Osun State. With the call of God, the young John in 1972 evacuated the goddess of Iron (Ogun) from his cousin’s house at Aagba.

He established the first Scripture Union and Township Bible Study Group in Iseyin. In 1984, he received his call to Methodist Church and was ordained into the ministry from Arowole Circuit, Ogbomoso.The Prelate of Methodist Church in Nigeria, His Eminence Sunday Ola Makinde, consecrated Rt. Rev. Bamgboye on January 20, this year. In an interview with Daily Sun, the pioneering Bishop of Osogbo Diocese of Methodist Church speaks on different issues.

My journey into the ministry
My coming into the ministry is not my making. Generally, nobody wants to come into the church ministry because of the financial aspect of it but it was laid upon my heart. God called me into the ministry and I answered His call, it has not been rosy. I was called in 1970 at Akure in the School of Agriculture and I did not leave my secular job. My first station was Iseyin but the pressure was so much that I could not combine the two together, so I had to resign my appointment as an Agric officer in the Ministry of Agriculture and I joined full missionary work. I was just preaching around as an evangelist, I was carrying out missionary works around the rural areas. It was after leaving the place that the spirit still says that I should come to the church ministry. I was outside the church ministry for about 14 years before I finally answered the call in 1984. Then I went to the Emmanuel College of Theology which is ministry school.

Corruption among leaders
That is the problem we have, corruption is contagious. It is easier to destroy than to kill, it is now difficult for leaders to check corruption and that is why we are fighting against it now. Corruption is like a darkness, there is no way you can fight darkness but to bring light which will make darkness to vanish. So, it is only God that can do it. If we call God and deviate from idolatry, the problem will be solved. If we have good leaders and we start confessing positive things about our country, I know God will have mercy upon us.

Leadership is very vital if corruption will go away because water runs from top down. Everybody is corrupted, either up there or down here, you will only do it according to your own grade. You cannot even condemn the leaders because you need to ask yourself, are you faithful with what you are doing? It is just like an axe with its own little power, but you only see the giant up there, we are all involved and if we have good leadership who will show examples for others to follow, it will help us and that is what has been evading Nigeria for so long.

We have prosperity and everything but leadership is bad, mismanagement, it is a terrible thing which all of us should rise and fight against. Everybody should weep for the country because anybody who comes to the government will be looking for the way you can have your own share. We must have the fear of God in our mind in this country, we must start from our own end, everybody wherever you are, try and be honest, first try to pull out the log in your own eyes before trying to pull out the stick in other’s eyes. If I can be a small light wherever I am, others will be light everywhere.

Politics
Politics must not be a matter of do or die. It should be clear to all that the law of retribution stands even in politics. Whatsoever one sows, he must reap. His generations could also be part of sharing in the evil effects of such happenings. I call on political functionaries and aspirants to play politics with the fear of God and according to the rules of the game bearing in mind that they will all give account of their stewardship to God and receive a reward for what they have done.