In this article, we are going to walk down the lane of history. Do not worry, if you are someone who has a distaste for history, this will be a different form of storytelling. I’m especially not going to dwell on dates and figures, but I want to bring to you certain parts of history that are extremely relevant for the world today.
Why must I do this? Because the points I will be making in the next few paragraphs must be backed up with facts, where else can we glean wisdom if not from the word of God and the experiences of those who lived before us on this earth.
I have come to appreciate the role that history plays in life. Without history, there is no future. We would soon discover that life without history is in spirals.
Hence, I have forced myself to become a rich student of history. Needless to say, this choice has been one of the wisest choices I ever made. History instructs, history teaches, history guides.
My journey through a deliberate studying of a part of history is the motive for this article. I realised that we are in a very peculiar time in the history of the world. And like they say, there are times when history repeats itself. In fact, right now we might be in the middle of what is called ‘historic reoccurrence’.
Historic reoccurrences do not just happen. They highlight a certain principle of life. The principle is that everything that needs to be made has been made, there are no new things happening, only submergence and reemergence of concepts and ideas. This is why we can discover how to tackle present problems by looking at how similar issues have been dealt with in the past.
There was a time in history that was called the Dark Age. You have probably read about the Dark Age. The Dark Age highlights a period in history, in the middle age when there was so much ignorance and devastation. Very few people could read and write because people were not allowed to go to school. The only school people could attend were seminaries and monasteries. Hence, only priests were literate and whatever is given them is also what they have to teach. There were very strict penalties against anyone who did otherwise or violated any instructions of the church. Such penalties were heavy and severe, including burning at the stake or beheading. The Roman Catholic Church at the time, which was the only allowed Church had enormous power and wielded it heavily.
Some people, however, defied the laws of the Church and studied privately especially texts that were banned by the Church. These men studied Science, Anatomy, Architecture etc.
Then came a period which is known as the Renaissance. The Renaissance changed the history of the world. Men began to make discoveries of the world around them. People became scientists, painters, sculptors, anatomists, architects, chemists, physicists, in their droves. The church responded fiercely against many of them. Many men of the renaissance were killed while the work of several others was burned. The aim of this attack was to return men to the dark ages. But then, the renaissance prospered and the church lost grip on people. There was an increase and proliferation of knowledge at this time, but values began to go on a sharp decline because people no longer saw the need for God. Only a few men acknowledged God as the originator of their many discoveries.
What do you expect? When there is a heavy proliferation of guns and pieces of machinery but no commensurate increase in the knowledge of God and values? Several wars broke out in the late part of the seventeenth century and early part of the 18th century.
The wars which also included the first and Second World War led men straight into penury and devastation. People became so poor that they relied on miracles to feed. In fact, by the time the Second World War ended in 1945, more than two-third of people on the surface of the earth were extremely poor.
Again, religion caught up in this world disaster. This was the era when the ‘seed-faith’ movement was birthed, just after the war. The seed faith movement majorly claims that God will supernaturally provide for all your needs if only you will give a certain token to God. The movement’s slogan was where there is a need, sow a seed.
What was the result? Many of the religious leaders and preachers of the movement became extremely rich and powerful like the Roman Catholic church prior to the renaissance while the rest of the ‘givers’, ‘tithers’ etc continued in penury. It was the period of superstitions and mysticisms as it happened before the Renaissance, in the dark ages. Men attributed everything to a miracle or the result of a ‘seed’.
This period also marked a mass exodus of young people from the Church who were on a quest to finding a better life. They didn’t admire the life their parents were living. Hence, hip-hop and night clubs became famous for many people. Materialism also became the order of the day, as people turned God into their slot machines, seeking just for what they hope to gain.
If you have followed this article carefully, you will notice a particular trend. Religion is what is often used to take advantage of people in their time of need. Religion meets people poor and makes them poorer. Religion blindfolds people and aims to stop them from their own renaissance.
While the renaissance was not complete without God, it must be emphasised that many men of the Renaissance maintained their relationship with God. They saw their work, discoveries and research as a means to serve and please God.
Now, because every generation is forty years, if you look at the passing generation there are certain things that will interest you. The last forty years of the world, especially this period of the ‘faith movement’, ‘seed movement’, ‘seed-faith movement’ has been characteristic of the dark ages. Such a movement robbed people of their potential and made them redundant. It produced superstars of preachers and made the majority of church people spectators in a circus show. This period has witnessed the least amount of inventions and innovations. The ground-breaking ideas of the last forty years came from people outside the church. Unlike the Renaissance when men who came out from the Church led the world in every aspect of life, men from the Church now are the least and mediocre of men.
A survey of the world’s first twenty richest people has no Christians among them. There is no ‘seed’ believer among names like Bill Gates, Amancio Ortega, Carlos Slim, Warren Buffet and Mark Zuckerberg. World leading scientists like Stephen Hawkings are atheists. Alan Turing often called the father of computer is another agnostic. Other leading people include Thomas Edison and Rosalind Franklin. Research says less than 10% of leading professionals are believers and Christians. This passing generation was marked with penury, wars, materialism, devastations and recessions.
This is why I dare say that the upcoming generation, my generation will not serve such a God that threw the passing generation in another dark age. My own generation will experience the renaissance again and we will combine it with the knowledge of God. Our generation will not serve the God of the previous generation who was a sugar-daddy God, who blesses people because they brought more or gave more. The sugar-daddy God only blesses people when he is pleasured by his seekers and worshippers. Our own generation will not serve a materialistic God. Our Generation will not serve the say-it and claim-it God. Our own generation will not serve a God that made a super star of one person and turns thousands of his followers to faithful attendees. Our own generation will not serve a God of mammon and ‘me-me-me’.
We will serve a God that gives gifts to all men and makes all men equal partners of the common wealth. Our generation will serve a God who is pleased when his sons and daughters invent, paint, discover, illustrate and serve their fellow men with all that they have. Our generation will serve a God who gives abilities to all men, not because of the sound of coins in the offering plate but because of the abundance of his grace and the richness of his son. Our generation will serve the living God.
We will be people of mercy, we will resist wars, we will appreciate the greatness that only comes in serving others, we will appreciate that we can only serve God when we serve others. This will be the God of our generation.
The passing generation has had it tough, but we will look up with hope. We will prepare differently. We will recognise that the ‘seed-faith’ is not when you put money in another man’s pocket and you expect God to bless you. Seed-faith is when you recognise the gifts God has put within you and you put in the hours required to work that gift. Seed-faith is knowing that God gives inspiration to all men who have prepared themselves, to birth things on earth for the benefit of all humanity. This will be our God.
Dr. Success Global 