Post by livinganewlife on Mar 31, 2006 11:01:58 GMT -5
Nigerian church wants to save Americans
By Rachel Zoll
Associated Press
March 28, 2006
IRVING, Texas -- On the 25th floor of a luxury office tower, a church most people have never heard of is planning to save America.
Its leaders believe Jesus has sent them to spread a difficult truth in the United States: Demonic forces are corrupting society, and only spiritual warfare can stop them.
The Redeemed Christian Church of God was founded in Lagos, Nigeria, by men and women who were once the target of missionary work themselves. Now their church has become one of the most aggressive evangelizers to emerge from the advance of Christianity across Africa.
The Redeemed Church is part of a trend in which African churches are establishing American outposts. Jacob Olupona, a professor at the University of California-Davis, has found hundreds of examples in cities large and small.
"Anyone who writes about Christianity in America in the 21st century," Olupona said, "will have to write about African churches."
At the core of the shift are pastors from Nigeria. Over the last century, Christians there have swelled from a tiny minority to nearly half the population, and its pastors have shown an exceptional talent for winning believers abroad.
In the United States, the Redeemed Church is ahead of all the other newcomers.
It has opened more than 200 parishes in just over a decade, from California to New York, and it is training pastors of all ethnicities to reach beyond the church's base in the African immigrant community. One of its largest congregations, Victory Temple in Bowie, Md., claims 2,000 members.
Fifty miles north of Dallas, the church is building a multimillion-dollar national headquarters and conference complex on more than 600 acres of farmland in rural Floyd, Texas. The site is expected to draw thousands for marathon prayer meetings.
Yet the center of the North American push is a for-profit, satellite TV network, launched in December under the name Dove Media, which broadcasts sermons from the church's world leader -- Pastor Enoch Adeboye -- between reruns of "The thingy Van d**e Show" and "Bonanza." Dove hopes to attract viewers who would not normally watch Christian TV.
"We didn't bring this church to the United States to be another Nigerian church," said Dove chief executive Ajibike Akinkoye. "We are afraid with the way things are going in the world and in America -- allowing people to do what they like, creating their own religion and philosophy -- those people are going to pay for it. We don't want that to happen."
The United States, with its deep religiosity, seems an unlikely mission ground. But the Redeemed Church believes Christianity here has become a lifestyle, not a transforming way of life, and they feel obliged to act. "There is a vibrancy in Africa," Akinkoye said. "We are offering that gift back to America."
Other Nigerian pastors are close behind.
Sunday Adelaja, who founded the 30,000-member Embassy of the Blessed Kingdom of God for All Nations in Kiev, Ukraine, in 1994, has 15 offshoots in this country. He plans to open 250 more within a decade.
Jonathan Owhe started Christ the Rock World Restoration Church in 1995 in New York's Brooklyn borough, then branched out to Tennessee and Georgia -- then overseas to Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan and other countries.
"It's globalization happening to the church," said Rev. Ted Haggard, president of the U.S. National Association of Evangelicals, who visits Africa regularly. "What happened to Ford and Chevy and GE 20 years ago is now in full swing in the church."
The Redeemed Church began in 1952 in Lagos, and opened its first U.S. congregation in 1992. Ministers have since built their congregations by making every worshiper a worker, teaching classes for children, holding events for singles -- even cleaning.
Still, however effective they are at administration, the pastors know their future in America depends heavily on public image. They fear they'll be dismissed as a "foreign" church.
John Garner, who sold the church his land in Floyd, said local residents have been asking him "about that cult coming in." Garner, who is white, is now a church member, and his wife, Marti, is an assistant pastor.
"People don't understand what's going on," said John Garner. "People don't realize they're Christians just like them."
Yet Redeemed Church pastors are already facing an American problem.
The Nigerian church fears being drawn into racial divisions that keep most U.S. congregations segregated. Many Redeemed Church Web sites and fliers feature photos of whites and Hispanics, along with blacks, even though the church right now is overwhelmingly African.
"They are going out and bringing people in, and the way they treat people will keep bringing people in," said Katie Bendorf, 26, one of the few whites at a recent service at Jesus House, a Redeemed Church parish in Chicago. "Everyone knew my name by the second time I came."
By Rachel Zoll
Associated Press
March 28, 2006
IRVING, Texas -- On the 25th floor of a luxury office tower, a church most people have never heard of is planning to save America.
Its leaders believe Jesus has sent them to spread a difficult truth in the United States: Demonic forces are corrupting society, and only spiritual warfare can stop them.
The Redeemed Christian Church of God was founded in Lagos, Nigeria, by men and women who were once the target of missionary work themselves. Now their church has become one of the most aggressive evangelizers to emerge from the advance of Christianity across Africa.
The Redeemed Church is part of a trend in which African churches are establishing American outposts. Jacob Olupona, a professor at the University of California-Davis, has found hundreds of examples in cities large and small.
"Anyone who writes about Christianity in America in the 21st century," Olupona said, "will have to write about African churches."
At the core of the shift are pastors from Nigeria. Over the last century, Christians there have swelled from a tiny minority to nearly half the population, and its pastors have shown an exceptional talent for winning believers abroad.
In the United States, the Redeemed Church is ahead of all the other newcomers.
It has opened more than 200 parishes in just over a decade, from California to New York, and it is training pastors of all ethnicities to reach beyond the church's base in the African immigrant community. One of its largest congregations, Victory Temple in Bowie, Md., claims 2,000 members.
Fifty miles north of Dallas, the church is building a multimillion-dollar national headquarters and conference complex on more than 600 acres of farmland in rural Floyd, Texas. The site is expected to draw thousands for marathon prayer meetings.
Yet the center of the North American push is a for-profit, satellite TV network, launched in December under the name Dove Media, which broadcasts sermons from the church's world leader -- Pastor Enoch Adeboye -- between reruns of "The thingy Van d**e Show" and "Bonanza." Dove hopes to attract viewers who would not normally watch Christian TV.
"We didn't bring this church to the United States to be another Nigerian church," said Dove chief executive Ajibike Akinkoye. "We are afraid with the way things are going in the world and in America -- allowing people to do what they like, creating their own religion and philosophy -- those people are going to pay for it. We don't want that to happen."
The United States, with its deep religiosity, seems an unlikely mission ground. But the Redeemed Church believes Christianity here has become a lifestyle, not a transforming way of life, and they feel obliged to act. "There is a vibrancy in Africa," Akinkoye said. "We are offering that gift back to America."
Other Nigerian pastors are close behind.
Sunday Adelaja, who founded the 30,000-member Embassy of the Blessed Kingdom of God for All Nations in Kiev, Ukraine, in 1994, has 15 offshoots in this country. He plans to open 250 more within a decade.
Jonathan Owhe started Christ the Rock World Restoration Church in 1995 in New York's Brooklyn borough, then branched out to Tennessee and Georgia -- then overseas to Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan and other countries.
"It's globalization happening to the church," said Rev. Ted Haggard, president of the U.S. National Association of Evangelicals, who visits Africa regularly. "What happened to Ford and Chevy and GE 20 years ago is now in full swing in the church."
The Redeemed Church began in 1952 in Lagos, and opened its first U.S. congregation in 1992. Ministers have since built their congregations by making every worshiper a worker, teaching classes for children, holding events for singles -- even cleaning.
Still, however effective they are at administration, the pastors know their future in America depends heavily on public image. They fear they'll be dismissed as a "foreign" church.
John Garner, who sold the church his land in Floyd, said local residents have been asking him "about that cult coming in." Garner, who is white, is now a church member, and his wife, Marti, is an assistant pastor.
"People don't understand what's going on," said John Garner. "People don't realize they're Christians just like them."
Yet Redeemed Church pastors are already facing an American problem.
The Nigerian church fears being drawn into racial divisions that keep most U.S. congregations segregated. Many Redeemed Church Web sites and fliers feature photos of whites and Hispanics, along with blacks, even though the church right now is overwhelmingly African.
"They are going out and bringing people in, and the way they treat people will keep bringing people in," said Katie Bendorf, 26, one of the few whites at a recent service at Jesus House, a Redeemed Church parish in Chicago. "Everyone knew my name by the second time I came."
