OLUSEGUN ISAAC BLOG

'Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.' (Philippians 3:12-14 NKJV).        Jamaican star Usain Bolt was the fastest man on earth, at least till the 2016 Rio Olympic games when he ran the 100 meters sprint in 9.58 seconds. Some call him 'lightning bolt'. At 32 years of age he was already worth $24 billion according to the Forbes Index. Many know him as a sprint star alone, but he is also a footballer, dancer, coach etc. When asked the secret of his success he made these statements among others: "Those seven guys behind you in that track want it much as you want it. So you have to want it more. This is why you train harder." Another: "It doesn't matter where you start, as long as you finish strong. There are better starters than me but I am a str

A few days ago I came across the verse of scripture below which made me raise my brows. I read the verse again and reflected on the words. They are the words of Jesus Christ. "...And the time will come when anyone who kills you will think that by doing this he is serving God. People will do these things to you because they have not known either the Father or me." (John 16.2,3 GNB). The question that came straight to my mind was, 'Whose fault is that then?' Quickly I answered myself, 'Largely ours as followers of Christ.' Then I sat back and pondered on my own question and answer. Isn't this exactly the situation in our nation now? The media, both the social and the formal, is replete with stories of man's inhumanity to man, foreigners to indigenes, one religion to another, tribe to other tribe. Those inflicting mayhem on their fellow countrymen are mostly the unevangelized apart from the criminal in heart. These peoples have not known Jesus. Like Sa

'So that day they were very happy as they ate and drank in the presence of the LORD . For a second time they proclaimed Solomon king. In the name of the LORD they anointed him as their ruler...' (1 Chronicles 29:22 GNB). Congratulations Nigerians on the big step we have taken upon our successful  change in government as it were. It may be proper, poetically speaking, to say, ' the king is dead, long live the king!' for it is the end of one term and the beginning of another in the same office by the same president even though administratively speaking, there has been a change.       Twice King Solomon was crowned as king over Israel, first by his father King David (1 Kings 1:34,39) and later by the people (1 Chr.29:22). His rule became the most respected, most prosperous and most peaceful Israel ever had. Twice now President Muhammadu Buhari has been sworn in as President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. It now behoves on him to prove his mettle, for history will coun

By Olusegun Isaac         I read a post on social media in which the writer reported that 10 million saints are being rallied to pray for the White House in U.S.A. for God to intervene in the nation's current political woes. The writer went on to ask believers in Nigeria to raise a similar number among themselves and pray a simple one-minute prayer consistently everyday for Nigeria. This plea is welcome indeed but to my mind, SINGING A PRAYER might be easier than finding time to pray consistently without failing. While prayer may be a singular act, singing can be a continuum. So I am proposing that, aside from taking time to pray for the nation, all believers should sing along the old prophetic song given below in the course of our daily activities, singing it everyday until our transformation comes. Concerning this, it is written in Scripture, 'Let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a two-edged sword in their hand, to execute vengeance on the nations, and punishm

      As young lads, one of the things we dreaded most was to be sent to a Reform institution. Our parents told us of the fate of bad boys who ended up in such places as caution to us to be well-behaved. In fact there was the case of the boy in our primary school who put a pen-knife to the neck of another boy but only made a gash there and did not outrightly slaughter him. The victim got well in hospital but the butcher was tried in a juvenile court and remanded in a reform camp at Torpo In the present Lagos State. Reform schools are established by a state or city government, for the confinement, instruction, and reformation of juvenile offenders, and of young persons of idle, vicious, and vagrant habits. I am not sure such places still exist for correction of our juvenile delinquents of the present age. The Lord sent a prophet to King Asa of Judah when he became king saying, "For a long time Israel had  been without the true God, without a teaching priest, and without law; but w

     Just as our praise to the Almighty God ought to be exuberant, so also our worship of Him ought be lavish. We cannot limit our worship of His majesty. The more our worship of Him we render, the more He reveals His glory and releases His grace to us. In my considered view, too many of our worship assemblies are dry, indigent in soul and bereft of spirit.       I attended a training programme organized by a worship ministry based in Lagos many years back. The ministry had invited a worship assembly from the U.S.A. to perform for participants as part of the package. That gathering of worshipers here in Ibadan left an indelible experience with me that I still cherish till today. At the grand finale in the evening, the invited worship team from abroad came up. I can't explain it,  but as the lead singer sang with such passion and eloquence, the lyrics stuck with us and we all joined him singing. As we sang as one, power came downand one by one nearly all of us experienced the anoin

      A well-well-known fairy tale goes like this: Once all the rats on a farm came together and resolved to end the menace of the cat that was killing and eating them in their large numbers. Their final decision was to tie a bell round the neck of the cat so that whenever It was approaching, the jingling of the bell would prompt the rats to hide in safety. They all jumped for joy believing that the answer to the terror of the cat had been found at long last. Then the chief rat announced the next agenda, 'Who will bell the cat for us?' No one would dare! Moral: It is easy to sit and plan great ideas, but it's not easy, perhaps even impossible, to execute a grandiose plan. It is high time we belled the cat of corruption that is inherent in this land, then we would face those other cats like terrorism and bigotry that jumped the fence into the Nigerian farm. Talking and planning alone has failed to stop the menace.      The case of far away Singapore comes to mind here. The

Hear the cry of the Psalmist, "Shout joyfully to the Lord , all the earth; break forth in song, rejoice, and sing praises. Sing to the Lord with the harp, with the harp and the sound of a psalm, with trumpets and the sound of a horn; shout joyfully before the Lord , the King.' (Psalm 98:4-6 NKJV). ' It was the periodical Morning of Praise in our church and a young, dynamic worship minister had been invited from outside to lead in praise/worship. The lively minister and his team soon infested the congregation with their spirited performance such that the excitement went contagious. The atmosphere of praise became so permissive that people yelled, left their seats causing a near commotion. The youth carried their plastic chairs aloft and danced around in formation around the auditorium, while we adults and fairly aged ones, hardly able to participate, gaped in amazement and disbelief. It was incredulous. Praise of God had gone exuberant, almost out of control! This scenari

"If a country divides itself into groups which fight each other, that country will fall apart.  If a family divides itself into groups which fight each other, that family will fall apart." (Mark 3:24-25 GNB). Here's the story of a newly married sister. Directly after her wedding, a former suitor started phoning to tell her he hadn't given up his interest in her. He told her he didn't mind that she was now married and that he would still fulfill all his promises to her if only she would continue to see him. She pleaded with him to leave her alone, that she was very happy with her husband, but he wouldn't give up, rather he continued pestering her with phone calls. Frustrated, she shared her predicament with her husband and the latter planned with his wife to confront the insistent suitor. She took him to the suitor's office and they both disgraced him openly, making him declare publicly that he would thenceforth refrain from disturbing their matrimonial pe

'Go to the ant, you sluggard! Consider her ways and be wise, which, having no captain, overseer or ruler, provides her supplies in the summer, and gathers her food in the harvest. How long will you slumber, O sluggard? When will you rise from your sleep?' (Proverbs 6:6-9 NKJV). I have watched ants in action before and I believe what the bible says of them. As I sat on the paved steps leading to my garden chewing coconut, a few crumbs fell by my side and I planned to pick them up when leaving later. Minutes later when I looked, I saw a number of ants carrying the crumbs away to a far off hole in the pavement. To encourage them, I threw more crumbs on the spot and to my amazement, a larger contingent arrived and were carting the bounty away, some carrying pieces much bigger than their own size! And it all started with one single ant on patrol which found food and ran back to base, not empty-handed, but took with it a piece of the food and brought others back to the discovery. I

'Now the Lord said to Samuel, “How long will you mourn for Saul, seeing I have rejected him from reigning over Israel? Fill your horn with oil, and go; I am sending you to Jesse the Bethlehemite. For I have provided Myself a king among his sons.” (I Samuel 16:1 NKJV).       One of my cousins, very outspoken, spoke to me at a time we were just recovering from the shock of burying the number one son of our parents in my larger family. He said, "Brother, as the first son presently in our family lineage, it's you we'll all be reporting to now. The King is dead, long live the king. Congrats!" How does one respond to that? Is that the reality of the moment? What sort of statement is that one anyway?  So I replied, stuttering, "What about my senior sister?" He pointedly replied, "You are now the oldest male child in the family." That silenced me then but left me reflecting on his didactic expression. Where did he pick it from? What does it mean? The

Recently I bought a copy of the Good News Bible, resolving to read it through this year. So far in it, I have found new meanings to different scriptures that I never knew before. For instance, the  King James Version says in Proverbs 14:31, 'He that oppresseth the poor reproacheth his Maker: but he that honoureth him hath mercy on the poor'. But the GNB version of the same passage says, 'If you oppress poor people, you insult the God who made them; but kindness shown to the poor is an act of worship.' I will not say there is any disparity in meaning between these two translations but the latter opened my eyes to something new, that kindness shown to the poor is an act of worship to God. Really it should be, for God had told us in the scriptures that the kind of sacrifice acceptable in His sight is having pity on the poor; that by so doing we are lending to Him and He will pay back what we have given out (Prov.19:17 NKJV). No doubt, giving our substance to the Lord is of

Jesus gave us a parable in Matthew's gospel. “Who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his master made ruler over his household, to give them food in due season?  Blessed is that servant whom his master, when he comes, will find so doing.  Assuredly, I say to you that he will make him ruler over all his goods.  But if that evil servant says in his heart, ‘My master is delaying his coming,’  and begins to beat his fellow servants, and to eat and drink with the drunkards,  the master of that servant will come on a day when he is not looking for him and at an hour that he is not aware of,  and will cut him in two and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. (Matt.24:45-51 NKJV). Retribution is comeuppance. It is getting one's dues, particularly the bad dues for one's inaction or misdemeanor, in full measure. Shakespeare says in Julius Caesar, that the evil that men do follows after them! In this life there is no getting

'So David inquired of the Lord , saying, “Shall I pursue this troop? Shall I overtake them?” And He answered him, “Pursue, for you shall surely overtake them and without fail recover all.” ' (I Sam. 30:8 NKJV).        I have been pursued before in my dream by a whip lashing, club branding masquerade that refused to turn back until I fell into a ditch, but that was a long time ago as a mischievous lad. As playful boys we have also joined the mob pursuing petty rogues in our neighbourhood shouting, 'Ole, Ole' until we caught them and dragged them to the police station. So I know what it means to pursue a culprit physically until he gets the punishment he deserves. Have you lost something you really treasure to someone else? Have you been cheated out of your right before? Have you ever lost a dispute over your rightful possession? The tendency is to mete out instant justice to the offender by yourself 0and get even. That's jungle justice; it's 'chicken break m

'So I took the heads of your tribes, wise and knowledgeable men, and made them heads over you, leaders of thousands, leaders of hundreds, leaders of fifties, leaders of tens, and officers for your tribes.' (Deuteronomy 1:15 NKJV).      God in His wisdom installs rulers over the nations, chooses leaders among the people and administers justice, peace and order in each land. Nations rule their peoples as they deem fit for their land - democracy, monarchy, capitalism, welfarism, socialism, communism and what have you, but God rules supreme over all. At the time of the reign of King David, Israel operated the monarchical system in which God chose the king and the king in turn chose leaders to administer the nation under his rule by selection not election (2 Sam. 8:15-18). Some last, some don't. Earlier, God had called Moses to lead His people Israel out of bondage in Egypt to become His own chosen nation. Moses led them out and set them on their way to the land of promise but

'Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers; and the Spirit of the Lord came upon David from that day forward...' (I Samuel 16:13 NKJV).      The first three sons of Jesse - Eliab, Abinadab and Shammah, were men of valour who served in the army of their nation. But in spite of their princely qualities and admirable stature, God did not consider them suitable for kingship. Rather, He chose their apparently ineligible baby brother David and made him king over them. The remarkable thing here is that, rather than turn against their 'king' in envy and strife, they faded into the background while still quietly supporting their God-chosen brother, and vice versa (1Sam.17: 17-18). David was installed king in place of the reigning monarch King Saul, and as would be expected Saul desperately sought to kill his rival. But hear what David said to his men when he found a great opportunity to destroy his opponent and persecutor, "T

"The old order changeth yielding place to new And God fulfills himself in many ways Lest one good custom should corrupt the world...More things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of." (Alfred Lord Tennyson).       Lord Tennyson wrote the famous satirical poetic piece 'King Arthur and the Knights of the Roundtable',  as an old English story of power interplay among the royalty. The author clearly illustrates that however magnificent and worthy any institution of power might have been, it is only appropriate in God's divine plan that it should pass away and give way to a newer institution because any institution which lives on and on will only become irrelevant or even corrupt, thus harmful to society. This is why empires rise and fall, kingdoms come and go; the only kingdom that will endure is the Kingdom of God and of His Christ. The bible tells us, 'Now it happened in the process of time that the king of Egypt died. Then the children of Israel gro

 "And if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve... But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord .” So the people answered and said: “Far be it from us that we should forsake the Lord to serve other gods..:(Joshua 24:15-16 NKJV). Let's face it, almost all of us have found ourselves on the verge of decision taking before. The teenager had to choose which course to study at which university; the marriageable youngster had to choose Mr. Right or Mrs. Right (sometimes one out of two or more); which job to do; which place to live or how many children to have. The sad news is, many have chosen by a mere toss of the coin and have regretted their actions painfully thereafter. They failed to bring into their choices the God factor. Right from the Garden of Eden, God had given mankind the privilege of making choices. In Genesis 2, God showed man two types of fruits, those good to eat and one that would lead to death, spiritually

'It happened in the spring of the year, at the time when kings go out to battle, that David sent Joab and his servants with him...but David remained at Jerusalem. Then it happened one evening that David arose from his bed and walked on the roof of the king’s house. And from the roof he saw a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful to behold. So David sent and inquired about the woman. And someone said, “Is this not Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?” Then David sent messengers, and took her...and he lay with her...and the woman conceived...' (II Sam.11:1-5 NKJV).      The story of Humpty Dumpty is not just a nursery rhyme but could also be a proverb. It says, 'Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall,  Humpty Dumpty had a great fall; All the king's horses and all the king's men, Couldn't put Humpty Dumpty together again!' The proverbial aspect may be traced in these questions, What made Humpty Dumpty sit on the fence? What happene

'Where there is no vision, the people perish...' (Proverbs 29:18 KJV)    The great American inventor, Thomas Edison, was an unrepentant visionary. When his mother's life-saving surgery had to be postponed in a dark theater till there was daylight, he started thinking of how incandescent light could be provided indoors. It is reported that young Thomas made ninety-nine failed attempts in his laboratory to generate light but refused to give up. It was his hundredth effort that succeded in producing light and that was the beginning of incandescent light in our world.    I attended Sunday service in one of our churches and I listened to the message in which the young preacher emphasized what he called 'visionlessness'. While one could query the authenticity of this word in proper English usage,  the message delivered was quite motivating, but it left me thinking beyond motivation. 'Visionlessness' could be lack of vision, true, but it could also mean having v

But Jesus said to him, “No one, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.” (Luke 9:62 NKJV)       History tells us that the great General George Washington in his battles at the birthing of America as a nation, employed a peculiar strategy. After the conquest of a battle, he moved on, crossed the river and sets ablaze the bridge on it behind them. First, his own soldiers no longer have the temptation to deflect to the enemy camp; secondly the enemy would not sneak to their camp behind them for a counter-attack!   Moses led the children of Israel successfully across the Red Sea and the Lord closed the sea upon the pursuing enemy Egypt to destroy them. No sooner the people crossed over to the other side after some difficulties than they started hollering to go back to Egypt. Had God not closed back the sea, many probably would have insisted on turning back! God does not expect us to look back with desires to go back to the old sinful

'Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.' (Philippians 3:12-14 NKJV).         Jamaican star Usain Bolt was the fastest man on earth, at least till the 2016 Rio Olympic games when he ran the 100 meters sprint in 9.58 seconds. Some call him 'lightning bolt'. At 32 years of age he was already worth $24 billion according to the Forbes Index. Many know him as a sprint star alone, but he is also a footballer, dancer, coach etc. When asked the secret of his success he made these statements among others: "Those seven guys behind you in that track want it much as you want it. So you have to want it more. This is why you train harder." Another: "It doesn't matter where you start, as long as you finish strong. There are better starters than me but I am a

'And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead the way, and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, so as to go by day and night' (Exodus 13:21 NKJV). During the days of my medical laboratory practice, we went to render a service at the clinic of a military cantonment. We drove to the closed main gate and stopped. The sentry on duty bellowed to us from his cubicle: "Advance to be recognised!" We drove closer, presented our ID's and told him our mission. He looked us over, checked our car contents, then signalled to his mate to pass us in. We went in and accomplished our mission. Moses led the children of Israel to the bank of the Red Sea. When he saw no way forward he hesitated. Not knowing the magnitude of the power he was carrying with him, he lingered and started crying to God. But God told him back, "Why do you cry to Me? Tell the children of Israel to go forward...lift up your rod over the sea and divide it!..." (Ex.