Israel Oladele Ogundipe is the General Overseer and founder of popular Celestial Church Of Christ, Genesis Global. Recently he opened a new branch in Lateef Jakande way, Agidingbi, Ikeja.
The ”church” is directly opposite Chicken Republic. This worship centre is one with a difference.
In this brief encounter, the man of God explains the peculiarities of the new centre and how its not 100% a Celestial church:
Why the Ikeja branch
It is just a branch. The new Ikeja branch is basically for convenience to serve the need of people going from the area to the mother branch in Alakuko. The new parish is devoid of the usual Celestial doctrine where you must be in garment or put off your shoes and stuffs like that.
You know, in the typical Celestial setting, you have to pull off your shoes because you have the altar. But as a transformational leader, this branch is a place we want to grow the youth, it doesn’t matter where you worship, just come and be discovered. Its a place where talents are discovered. Its a place for Seminars, Conferences. Its a place where you can still worship your God without wearing the white garment.
But this sounds contradictory to what Celestial is known for
Not at all. You know, all Churches are claiming Jesus, but Jesus didn’t claim any church. He said upon this rock I will build my church. He didn’t mention any church in particular.
You see, you have to be a rule breaker if you want to be a game changer. Like in our church, we don’t do stream bath, go to the bush for stuffs neither do we use anything traditional. What we do is not contradictory as long as what am doing is impacting lives.
Breaking limits and boundaries. Thinking outside of the box. I assure you, its not in anyway contradictory.
How do you explain this to Celestial leaders that you have a branch that operates at variance to the doctrine
A Celestial parish must have a altar. But this one does not have such. Its not a Parish, but a Centre. My mission is to win souls, call entrepreneurs together, bring people together to come train people and impact life, its not connected to the church or religion, but to humanity.
Because Christianity is not a religion, but a way of life. So I don’t think anybody is going to ask questions for thinking outside of the limitations of doctrine. Like yesterday ( the day before this encounter) my wife preached, but normally women are not allowed to preach in Cele, so instead of me attacking or questioning the establishment, I had to think about how my wife could be relevant. She was a Muslim and later a Redeemer and she has got a lot inside of her.
Do you envisage attack over this
A:When Jesus was alive, He was not valued by the Pharisees and Sadducees. He came to preach grace but the former duo preached law. If you give people attention, they will give you direction.
Am not interested in what anybody is going to say about what am doing as long as am convinced of the assignment God has given to me. I can not be caged.
And I must not die with the lot inside of me that is going to be good for my generation. There are lots of people who like to worship in freedom, where there are no restrictions, where you don’t have to pull your shoes to worship, where you want to listen to a woman speak at conferences.
It will only be a problem if I bring my wife to a Cele church where there is altar, that’s when they can attack me. I’m giving to my generation what they need and want.
We are going to be talking about love, humanity, not religion. You know, talk about unity and stuffs like that. And we have somebody there who is into leadership training as the Pastor of the Centre. It’s good to pray, but I have discovered that the problem of this country is leadership. Its zero.
And where will it start from, it’s from our own generation. We will be disappointed if we think things will change without ourselves changing. Some people don’t want to be connected with Celestial, but wants to be connected with Israel Ogundipe, Genesis Global. Am going to have a Conference soon.
A stand out Conference on Real estate, starting your business and online business. Its not all about coming to church and everything is spiritual and seeing vision. That is what I’m trying to do. Am trying not to go against laid down foundation hence, the need to think outside the box. Growth come from change and change is the only constant thing in life.
So, this new place is not a branch of your other Celestial church in the real sense of it
Yes, thats why we call it Chapter, we call it Campus. For instance, there is a program am going to have now. Am bringing Student Union leaders of schools in the state together for a talk on leadership and generation next.
One of the things that am passionate about is how to touch lives but I don’t want to be too churchy about my giving project.
I want to do this in an atmosphere where though free of restrictions, but with praise and worship. We are going to create that spiritual atmosphere and people will be encouraged to give their lives to Christ. Its like what would I do to connect that bridge between the Pentecostal and Orthodox churches or stuffs like that. God sees my heart, there is so many things I wont be able to do if am to connect the whole thing to the Celestial church.
You seem to have a few things at variance with the denomination you belong to. Your activities over time has brought you into some kind of confrontations with the leaders. If I may ask, why the preference for the Celestial church in the first place.
Well, you must know the place of your assignment. Coming to Celestial was a prophetic conviction.
I grew up as a Christ Gospel apostolic church boy but God said its in Cele he wants to use me.
What would you want changed in Celestial church
Ha, nothing o. I can only talk about Genesis. For instance, I may want to talk politics now and the leadership may object to it. Like now, I may want to bring a team of Choir or singers to our program, but they may be averse to wearing garment or putting off their shoes. I won’t allow tradition cage me when I run a ministry that is transitional. It is the place of the holy spirit, directing and leading me to know what next to do.
Author
Fisayo Ajibola
