Late Bishop Emmanuel Mgbejume Failed For Not Putting His House In Order --- Prophet Igbodo

By Emmanuel Egbuchinem
      Following the outcry of the first son of late Bishop Emmanuel Mgbejume, over his exclusion in his father's property and the tussle rocking the Bishop's family over who becomes the General Overseer of the Ministry Of Reconciliation Evangelism Explosion (MOREE), after the demise of their late father; as published in Ika Mirror Newspaper, Edition Vol, 2 No 2, on page 16, dated Saturday May 2 to Saturday May 9, 2020, with the headline "M.O.R.E.E Saga: Tell Me Why I Should Not Be Part Of My Father's Property -- Nwachukwu Mgbejume To Family Members -- Says My Mother Should Be G. O.
    Based on the above development,  a foremost General in the Lord's Vineyard, Prophet Joseph Igbodo, the General Overseer of Divine Faith Evangelical Mission International, Agbor, has bared his mind on the issue in this comprehensive interview he granted Ika Mirror Newspaper crew at the headquarters of his Church in Agbor recently. He also advised members of the body of Christ and General Overseers of churches on how to handle such issues before their exit to eternity.
Happy Reading:
Good Morning Sir, Please may we meet you?
Ans: Good Morning Gentlemen, I am Prophet Joseph Igbodo, The General Overseer of Divine Faith Evangelical Mission International, The Proprietor of Job Orphanage Home and The Proprietor of St. Stephen Trust Widows Home, all in Agbor, Ika South Local Government Area of Delta State; these are my ministries.
Ques: So your Ministry is just centred on assistance to humanity and service to God?
Ans: Yes.
Ques: You are aware about the death of the General Overseer of the Ministry of Reconciliation Evangelism Explosion (MOREE), and after his exit there have been disagreements over who should succeed him as the General Overseer of the Church; how would you describe that situation?
Ans: That issue, is a shame to the body of Christ because with what is on ground, we have seen that late Bishop Emmanuel Mgbejume, failed in his assignment woefully for not putting his house in order, and for not being able to put his Ministry together before he died.
Ques: How do you mean by not putting his house together? Can you throw more light on that?
Ans: Yes, I know him, but I never thought he would act this way, because I thought that with his age and experience in the Ministry, he supposed to know that his house should be the first thing to put in order, because the Holy Bible says that if you cannot rule your house, you cannot rule the church; that is the word of the Lord. For the first son to come up and start begging his mother to become the General Overseer, and to come out and start saying I will fight for my rights, is a shame; and when you look at the way the son cried out in the publication before me in Ika Mirror Newspaper, it means that the young man is not composed, he wouldn't have gone to the media to say such a thing. That is why I said that the late Bishop failed, because any person who is a General Overseer ought to raise vibrant Pastors, whether he is your biological son or not; you raise the person to take over from you. When you discover that you are about going to meet your creator, you will gather the Pastors and Elders of your church together and tell them that this is the man that passed my examination, if I go, he will take over as the General Overseer, after which in the presence of the gathering he will anoint him as the Overseer, once he has anointed the person's head with the oil, it becomes a stamp and authority; then everyone will now be aware of who is going to be in charge later. So, in his case, he never did his homework well, that is why what happened to Jacob and Esau, is what is happening; when you read how the son is talking, you will see that he doesn't even have knowledge; because if you don't serve your father you will miss a lot. A child that serves the father will get the blessing of his father; the Bible book of Ephesians says Honour your father and your mother so that your days will be long, if you honour your father and your mother the blessings of your father and mother will rest upon you. From what I read in the said publication, the father and mother didn't bless their son and the son is just crying like the way Esau cried, this his son is not different from Esau; it is a very big error that the man made.
Ques: The man said that he is the Pastor in charge of the Oyigbo branch of the church owned by his father in Port-Harcourt, he also disclosed that he usually come to assist his father with farm and other domestic works, so there is confusion here, is it that the man is lying or that the man is not their son? Because a person who have served must surely reap something, why this development?
Ans: Let me ask you a question, if you keep good and better and they asked you to choose from the two, which would you choose?
(Response) Better.
 So, it is immaterial whether he assisted his father with farm work or not; based on what the father had done, the father disqualified him that he is not qualified to lead the church. Hence, the person whom the father approved to take over as the General Overseer, not withstanding his position in the family according to their father's decision is more qualified than his elder brother; so Jacob was better than Esau.
Ques: Even with all what he claimed that he did for the father?
Ans: It doesn't matter whether he is the Pastor of a branch of the church, or whether he assisted the father in the farm; the father saw that he is not capable; there is no way the father would have picked him irrespective of his position in the family. It not written in the Bible that it's only the first son that will succeed his father's business. The father has right to will anything to the best of his children, even if she is a woman. The truth is that their father would have made it publicly to his children and the entire congregation of the church and in their presence pour oil on the head of his successor and anoint him for leadership; and not assigning another person to come and anoint the new General Overseer, that is a wrong anointing.
Ques: Even the man that came to anoint the new person as General Overseer, was not there when the man was dying; the recorded speech was only played and he doesn't even know whether the record was arranged or not; don't you think it was also wrong of him?
Ans: If the man who came to anoint the person has a Ministry and his children are working in different establishments and he brings any of them to take over from him, it is the same thing that is unfolding in this issue that will also happen in his Ministry; there is no wisdom in such act.
Why I am saying this is that we who are General Overseers should learn from the mistakes of others and start correcting ourselves. As a case study using Holy Ghost And Fire Ministry, that was what he did, the church was growing yet he never picked anybody neither did he informed his congregation about the person who will become the next General Overseer after his demise. Immediately after he died, his brother came back from one of the overseas country to become the General Overseer; today, the church is no longer in existence. This is usually what happens at the death of a General Overseer who fails to do the needful before their exit, I used Holy Ghost And Fire Ministry, as an example because the founder when he was alive was playing politics that cannot hold water, you cannot deceive, you cannot change God's system and today the place is a desert because he was unable to encourage and raise up vibrant Pastors.
    If as a General Overseer you are unable to bring up Pastors and you are saying that your wife will become the General Overseer after you. Well, I don't want to mention names, most of the persons that had their wives as General Overseers in both Ika South and Ika North East Local Government Areas, none of the churches is progressing, the churches are not doing well, while some of them are now into farming or trade.
If i may ask, Is it a must that your wife or your son must succeed you as a General Overseer? I use Pastor Adeboye, the General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church Of God, as an example, Pastor Adeboye, is not the biological son of the late founder of the Redeemed Church, but go and see how the Ministry is expanding today. How do you carry someone that is  incompetent to come and start leading a church? The son is now saying that a Five man committee had been constituted to look into the matter, why did the late  Bishop not performed his home work properly? What is the business of the Five man committee? They don't know about the administration of the Ministry, because every Ministry has it's own administration.
As a man of God are you afraid to inform your children about your intentions? Look at Moses in the Bible, Moses, Aaron and Miriam, were siblings of same parents but God said that the greatest among them was Moses, and that was the man he used. So why must this issue become a Saga?
   The son is crying with grief like Esau, asking the mother to become the General Overseer; the mother is just like her late husband who made the great mistake by not telling the church in advance when the Bishop was healthy, rather it was at the point of death that they recorded him, saying that if he dies, so so so and so is what you should do; that is wrong, people outside your Ministry do not have the right to come and decide who will be the General Overseer; as I said earlier the case study is Holy Ghost And Fire Ministry, those doubting what I am saying should go and see what happened to the Ministry.
Ques: So, are you saying that it is wrong to have constituted the Five Man Committee?
Ans: The Five Man Committee is not necessary. The real people that are in the church who have been with the late Bishop from the beginning would have been able to stand up and say; yes, see what our Bishop said and it was in our presence that he anointed his head and ordained him to take over the leadership of the church after his demise.
    Again, Pastors in Ika land should stop doing what is not right, most especially us, who are General Overseers, we should bring up Pastors outside our biological children when we discover that our children are not ready. One of the reasons why we don't like to raise other people is because we are selfish and busy accumulating the money that is coming to the church; some General Overseer cannot pay their Pastors handsomely neither do they take proper care of the Pastors; same goes for their members, they cannot take good care of the flocks, that is why you see such churches having problems; Elijah brought up Elisha.
   I am warning those going to Aso Rock government house in Abuja and government house Asaba respectively, to put up structure and call it church, while their children are in London peddling cocaine, with the other working as a Photographer in Aso Rock Abuja, later when the founder of such churches die, they will go and call the son that is a Photographer or the one peddling cocaine to come and become their new General Overseer, such churches will die because it will not work. It is time men of God begins to raise up people whom God have anointed in their churches. We who are called General Overseers should forsake selfishness and desist from dirty politics.
Ques: Can't The Pentecostal Fellowship Of Nigeria, help in resolving the issue?
Ans: What has Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN), got to do in this issue? An association that cannot stand are they the ones that will put the church in order? Why did PFN not put Holy Ghost And Fire Ministry in order?
The men of God in the two local government areas of Ika land should learn a lesson, mostly ministers in Ika North East because the politics within the area is destroying their work, they believe in building mushroom churches without having deep  understanding of the real word of God, they do not know that the issue of successor is very important, that when you handover to a good and qualified person the Ministry will excel greatly; apart from the Holy Ghost And Fire Ministry, which I am using as a case study, check other ministries who lost their General Overseers, the Ministries are nowhere today because their founders were selfish without putting in place a viable successor; they thought that church administration is a family affair where they can manipulate and play politics with, they should refrain from such practice.
   In this matter, I am only sorry for the late Bishop's church because he never did his work. For his son coming out to cry is a shame, he should enter house; as the first son you didn't meet up and Ministry is not by one being a first son; but it's all about the grace of God that is upon your life coupled with what you are able to do.
   Where the late Bishop Mgbejume, made a mistake is that he should have called all his Pastors, Elders with members of his congregation including his children and inform them that he is of age, hence he wants to let them know of the particular son among his children that will succeed him as General Overseer, after which he will give them the reasons which qualified the lucky person for the appointment, then after the approval of the general house, he will call up the young man in their presence and ask him to kneel down and say; with the powers vested in me as the founder of this Ministry, he will then pour oil on his head and anoint him, saying I anoint you as the next General Overseer after me, in the name of God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, Amen. Not calling Five Man Committee, the Committee is there because of the mistakes of the late Bishop.
Ques: If at the end of the day none of the children emerges as the new General Overseer, because at the moment they are fighting for who will become the General Overseer of the church, without knowing the challenges bedeviling the Ministry, at the end won't it affect the vision of the church?
Ans: I have told you my mind, I said what happened to Holy Ghost And Fire Ministry is already unfolding, because when a house is divided against itself it cannot stand. The wife of late Bishop Emmanuel Mgbejume with her husband and their children did not act in wisdom.
   King Solomon, said that it is good to gather wealth, but what matters is who to takeover.
Ques: What is your advice to the young man?
Ans: My advice to the first son is that he should go and continue doing what he is doing, he is not the General Overseer, he should stay clear from the seat and remain as the son of late Bishop Emmanuel Mgbejume. If the father shared anything to him, good, but if he didn't share anything to him, let him be contented and start praying for his own children so that they will not be like him, because he has lost the blessing of his father.
Ques: What is your advise to the entire family?
Ans: I will advise them that  whosoever their father mentioned before his death should be made the General Overseer. They should ask their mother in order to know who their father mentioned to takeover from him as General Overseer because she had always been with him. The person should takeover and anyone who goes against him will be under a curse.
Ques: So, what of the constituted Five Man Committee?
Ans: The Five Man Committee should only make sure that they are carrying out the instruction and adhere strictly to the administration of the church as laid down by the late Bishop; and not that they are coming in to cause segregation.
Ques: So, the faceoff and agitation that is being witnessed presently among them is uncalled for?
Ans: If their mother and the children do not handle the matter carefully with wisdom the church will scatter, and before they realize what is happening the church will be empty. They should learn lesson from the case of Holy Ghost And Fire Ministry, which has gone into oblivion.
Ques: Your advice to General Overseers?
Ans: To us who are General Overseers, I urge us to stop emulating Holy Ghost And Fire Ministry, we should stop following the example of MOREE; instead we should copy from the Redeemed Christian Church of God, whose late Founder before his demise handed over the mantle of leadership to Pastor Adeboye as the General Overseer, a man whom he raised up as a minister of God. I encourage General Overseers to handover to whosoever and from whatever tribe, provided he is a qualified person chosen by the Lord.
Ques: Finally, your advice particularly to the Ministers were such issues are springing up?
Ans: For the General Overseers of the churches that are in the two local government areas of Ika South and Ika North East where I belong to, especially the genuine ones; should not be looking at their wives nor their children as those to succeed them because there will be challenges if they are not the ones who God has in mind for such purpose. Anybody can succeed you, if you are a honest man of God; you will be able to raise up ministers that can perform effectively.
We General Overseers should stop looking down on our Pastors, we should be determined to bring up people that will be fully committed to do the work.
Just like this young man (referring to one of his Pastors) working with me, if I wake up one day and discover that he is the one to takeover from me, I will give him. As the Founder of the church, if i am able to raise ten vibrant Pastors, I will pick the best person among them in order for the church to progress exceedingly.
On a final note, the summary of all what I have been saying is that as General Overseers we should allow God to choose our successors. Thank you.