WHEN SPECTACLE SILENCES SCRIPTURES

When spectacle silences Scripture.

Think on this for a moment. A pastor gathers fellow generals of the faith in a ministers’ convention and boldly declares: “When you are all gone (dead), I will still be here preaching.” It sounds arrogant and almost offensive. Yet that is exactly what Kenneth E. Hagin said to his fellow ministers during the healing revival era in America, and history recorded the fulfilment of those words.

One by one, the frontliners of the healing revival fell sick and died. Mighty men. Anointed men. Gifted men. Men who shook cities with miracles. Yet they died before their time. What was their mistake? They built their ministries on gifts, not on the Word. They were vessels of power, but not always men of deep Word-rooted faith. They carried anointing, but did not always cultivate revelation. They operated in manifestations, but neglected scriptural foundations.

Here is a hard spiritual truth: the anointing that heals others does not automatically heal the carrier. The anointing that delivers others does not automatically deliver the vessel. The anointing that prophesies to others does not automatically guide the prophet. A man is not preserved by his gift; he is preserved by his faith in the Word. Anointing makes you visible, but the Word makes you durable.

Alas! I see this same pattern unfolding in this generation of Cameroonian preachers. Cameroon is bleeding from a plague of non-reading pulpits. We have raised a generation that honours wristbands, anointing oil, blessed water, mantles, stickers, tokens, symbols, and objects more than the Word of God itself. We have replaced revelation with rituals, doctrine with drama, study with slogans, and Scripture with superstition.

History has taught us that fire without truth becomes wildfire, and power without doctrine becomes deception. The Word is what preserves ministers. Men of God, build libraries, not just platforms. As I often say humorously: If God is a Writer, every pastor must be a reader. The future of the Cameroonian Church will not be secured by oil and handkerchiefs, but by minds renewed. Not by gifts, but by groundedness in doctrine.

May God raise in Cameroon a generation of reading preachers, thinking pastors, studying prophets, learning apostles, teaching evangelists, and Word-rooted shepherds. For when the fire fades, when the crowd disperses, when the hype dies, when the stage is silent, when the microphones are off, only the Word will remain, and only those built on the Word will still be standing.

Rev. Bobbs Lyonga Elive