By Olusegun Olanrewaju
An unserious schoolboy who strove against the odds to become an international star in the gospel ministry. This aptly summarises the experiences of the subject of this interesting book; ‘Kumuyi: Defender of the Faith’.
That is the substance of the biography entitled, Kumuyi: Defender of the Faith
Jointly written by the authors and editorial board members, Segun Babatope, Emeka Izeze, Tunde Opeibi, Steve Obidi, Andrew Umoru, and Euriel Momah
With a foreword by a fellow labourer in the vineyard, Pastor Enoch Adeboye, the General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), the 325-paged book (with photographs), was first printed in the United Kingdom (UK) in 2021.
The story begins with the early misadventures of a student who was never unserious with his studies, despite the entreaties of his family, their friends, well-wishers, teachers, and school administrators, who felt he had the potential to do better.
But something was to numb his senses home around Nigeria’s Independence year in 1960 when he decided he had had enough of ‘un-seriousness’.
Far from the ‘promotions-on-trial’ which he had often been subjected to in the earlier grades of study, he then decided and stuck to excellence in the then form four (today’s equivalent of SS2), when he recorded straight As in subjects.
Since then, there has been no looking back. From the average boy that he was, he went on to become an academic, after earning a first-class certificate with honours in Mathematics from a first-generation university in Nigeria, the University of Lagos (Unilag); and on establishing the nation’s first private ivory tower, Anchor University, at Ayobo, in 2014.
Welcome to the world of William Folorunsho Kumuyi, the rather ‘ascetic’ Pentecostal preacher who has widely been described in the dignified as a true ‘divider of the word’.
Private sector experience counts in politics –Eno, A’Ibom PDP guber candidate
*Resources
They say that a book is as rich as its subject.
The book opens with the early childhood plight of the Erin-Ijesha, an Osun State-born boy, who initially subscribed to atheism, to become a leader in the crusade for the establishment of Christ’s kingdom the world over.
Here, we have a faith-based book which, like the forward posits, “Would have remained buried in the womb of time without the hand of a man who perceived the hand of God on his life and yielded all that to God.”
From this premise, we are also introduced to the aims of the authors, mainly well-seasoned journalists, who are now part of the media group of the church, that the subject, Kumuyi, “unconditionally sacrificed a flourishing career on the altars of academics for a passion in the Christian ministry to win all men at all costs for Christ.”
Kumuyi is described as an “exceptional pastor and a doting shepherd, a peerless leader with global influence; a rare human being, embowered in Heaven and delivered on earth to positively transform lives through global propagation” by divine mercy.
*Ministry
From a small bank of 15 initial fellowshippers carefully packaged as ‘truth-seekers’ who were eventually ejected from his university quarters at UniLag (probably for ‘disturbing’ in a serene environment), and later ex-communicated from the Apostolic Faith Church in 1975 for “preaching without being ordained as a minister”, he started what has now metamorphosed into a worldwide congregation known as ‘Deeper Life Christian Ministry (DCLM)), the mother ministry of Deeper Life Christian Church.
*The Focus
The opening pages are dedicated to the milestones of Kumuyi in the journey of existence; birth at a town, Erin-Ijesha, which is blessed with a range of waterfalls from where the state, Osun, derived its appellation as ‘the State of the Living Spring’; and education (including the noble at the legendary school belonging to the renowned atheist, the late Dr. Tai Solarin (Mayflower) at Ikenne, Ogun State.
This was followed by a cut-short teaching career from the secondary school (where he received the gospel message); entry to the university to read Mathematics at the University of Lagos.
A remarkable event was to follow this: To the dismay (and disappointment of family and admirers, he rejected a scholarship offer to study for a doctorate in his field, opting to teach at the secondary school Tai Solarin’s Mayflower) that provided him, an indigent student, the offer of a university education (the circumstances are not narrated).
While teaching at his alma mater, he enrolled for and bagged a Postgraduate Certificate in Education (PGCE) at Unilag, and later started teaching education at another alma mater, Unilag.
The lectureship period coincided with the start of evangelism with a small Bible school, from where he married his first wife, Biodun, an ex-Muslim, now late.
We are also taken through post-call missionary undertakings and discipleship activities, particularly in Kenya, Ghana, and the then Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo).
It was in Ghana that he established the first international outpost, followed by the inauguration of the International Bible Training Centre (IBTC), in 1973 at Ayobo, Lagos, and voluntarily retired from teaching in 1983 to face pastorship.
Kumuyi was also credited by the book with “laying bear new strategic missionary vision for Africa, leading to the first mass posting of missionaries to countries on the African continent.”
In 1985, he planted an assembly in Britain, the same year he held a town-stopping ‘Great Miracle Crusade’ at the National Stadium in Lagos. So great was the harvest in the vineyard that, by 1988, the membership of the flock, according to the book, had jumped from 15 to 50,000, and eventually to some 120,000.
Today, ‘Deeper Life’, as the church is widely known, is said to be the third largest Christian congregation in the whole world. The feat is ascribed to the large decentralisation of the church. In 2001, the church now started a now widely-accepted “success” project designed for mentoring youths for advancement, through an organisation, Success Advancement for Youths (SAY).
‘Struggles’
Apart from the issues that transformed a playful student in his younger days to yielding to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, families, friends, and teachers, among others, to be more serious, Kumuyi himself admitted to his chroniclers that the road to success has not been easy, even in the vineyard of God.
He recalls earlier and continuous failures in the spiritual world, particularly in evangelising ‘idol-prone’ India, where he had to personally interfere in ministry to break the jinx.
*Sections
The book is divided into 14 chapters, also featuring 48 contributors and 20 enabling pastors. The first chapter is entitled ‘A defender of the Faith’. This, critics say, casts a shadow on the import of the larger title, “Defender of the Faith’.
Other topics from chapters 2 to 14, in arrangement, include, ‘Diligent and Uncommon Teacher of the Word’; ‘Dedicated Passion for Youths’ and Children Ministry’; ‘Discipled Holiness Teacher’; ‘Commitment’ (by George Verwer); ‘Dutiful Evangelism/Word Mission Miracles’; and ‘Archetypal Leadership in Social Impact and Trans-generational Influence’, among others.
The net inference from the work includes affirmation of healing from “a spherical, strong and inspiring story from a multi-faceted and quintessential cleric many in Nigeria and the global community have always wanted to know more ultimately.”
It mirrors the affirmation of healing from demonic oppressions beginning at Gbagada, Lagos, headquarters of the church in the 1980s, to supernatural miracles and expansion of the church led by “one of the most influential pastors in the world.”
