SAM ADEYEMI: THE RETURN OF THE REMOTE CONTROL PASTOR
-How Pastor Sam Adeyemi ran Daystar Church in absentia for almost 3 years.
*Says I did it in obedience to God.
*We are a pioneer and model Church.
To even say that we missed you sounds like an understatement. Honestly, it was hard not being here on Sunday. Hey! Like a joke, I just say, “Will it be next month?” And we kept making attempts but the messages were clear, they were sharp! And I had to say, “Hello!” In December, it was 40 years since I gave my life to Christ!-
I accepted Him as my Lord and Saviour as a teenager!” And so I cannot hear God and pretend that I did not!
Everything that we did that brought us here was ‘God said’! Because the real big deal was Daystar Christian Center! ‘You left Daystar Christian Center! You relocated and all of that’! Who in their right mind would leave something as huge as this to go and do what?
When it is not that village people caught up with that person! It was just a test of obedience! That’s all!
So we got to realise that it is easier to read the stories of the people in the Bible, Heroes of Faith is what we call them, but when it comes to live the kind of life that they lived!- Walking in Covenant with God and obeying when it is easy and when it is difficult!
That obeying, is the one that is not easy because we had to ask God and He said, ‘Go and read Hebrews 11 and the likes of Abraham, Noah and see which of which was easy’! ‘Leave your country!
Leave your relatives and father’s house and go to the place that I will show you! He didn’t even know where he was going!
Because at times at those points, I felt like explaining! I felt like releasing Press statement saying, “Na lie…!” And something will just go viral there! Ah! Ah! Because people were just manufacturing narratives!
And then the Holy Spirit said, ‘When Abraham was leaving, when people asked him where he was going? What did you think that he said? “I don’t know!” “Baba, where are you going?” I don’t know! They said, “And you are going?” He said, ‘Yes, I am going! God told me to move’!
So the Holy Spirit said, ‘Why do you want to turn a revelation into an explanation?’ Why do you want to explain what you don’t even understand? I kept quiet! You know? It was simply a test of obedience and we are grateful to God that He brought us through it!
I won’t deceive you, it was hard! It’s hard being away! So when things are not working well, when you are struggling and God says, ‘Move’! It is easier because even where you are, you don’t like it!
But, ‘Move’! When you are successful? ‘Move’! When things are working? That’s hard! But ‘Move’ is ‘Move’ because God knows everything! And then at some point, I said, ‘Lord! Okay!
Give me Scriptures’! And then, He gave me Acts 16:6-9.
Paul and his team wanted to go to Asia and God said, ‘Stop’! And then, they wanted to go to Bithynia and the Holy Spirit said, ‘Stop’! Then they went down to Troas and Paul had a dream and saw a man that said, ‘Come over to Macedonia and help us’! So they took that to mean that God wanted them to go to Macedonia. And they set off to Macedonia.
So it was Asia that they wanted to go and they ended up going to Europe because God has His eternal agenda.
And I said, ‘Okay! I will take that as a redirection! There is something You want to help us in Daystar to do!
There are new dimensions You want to move us into! And then He gave me John 12:24, ‘Except a corn of wheat falls to the ground, it remaineth the way it is but if it dies, it brings forth much fruit… He said, ‘I am taking you through a death and resurrection experience and you will drag Daystar Christian Center with you through that experience’. I said, ‘Okay!
Why don’t many people experience reinvention in their lives?
Why do people get stranded?
Because dying is not easy!
Your current state needs to die for your new state to evolve!
So towards our wedding anniversary last November, He said, ‘The crucifixion part is finished, your resurrection season is here, your much fruit season is here’! That new plant that never existed before; the creative power of God on display!
That’s the season now!
That’s why we name this year what God has called the season!- It’s our much fruit season! So He gave those three powerful words to describe the season- Resurrection, Restorations and Resurgence. Amen!
So we are grateful to God! It was a test of obedience!
It was also a test of resilience and long term sustainability of our Church. Yeah! Because at first it looks like, ‘You relocated and after two years, two and half then the Holy Spirit said, ‘Take your eyes off those things and pay attention to what I am doing’! How many Churches, even businesses can their leader leave for two years and they will still be alive and not descend into crises? Then I said, ‘Ah! It’s true oo.
For you to be a founder and in your lifetime for God to give you the opportunity- You are physically away for three years and what God used you to build is still alive and running!
Then you know that whatever happens if you are not there anymore, it will continue! It’s a blessing! And you know?
Finally, the Holy Spirit helps us to appreciate that it’s a new dimension to leadership because while narrative is that, ‘Oh! They left!
They have been away! We were away physically but we were not away! Coro helped the whole world to realise the value and efficiency of technology so we were here! We were preaching, were we not?
Every other Sunday, we preached and in the last two weeks we did December 31st together. We even preached live oo, yeah! from Atlanta.
We were live in the service, we were seeing you and you saw us! Live! Leveraging technology!
We were running our regular meetings with the management team! Yeah! We were running the operations! We were getting the reports every week like we normally did!
Every Monday for years, I will get the report, attendance of human beings and cars and everything! Financial report! Everything was running normally!
There was a period you know? Just after the lock down, we were meeting almost every week for seven months! We went through every part of Daystar Christian Center changing the operations into hybrids so we came up with a document, ‘The Daystar reinvention strategy’!
That’s what we have been working on! So we were fully engaged! Right now, Atlanta is six hours behind Lagos, so we would wake up in the morning and the Electronic Mail (E-Mail) is already full because it is Daystar Christian Center Nigeria issues that we deal with first because it’s almost closing time in Nigeria.
We were fully engaged, so we saw that God was moving us ahead into the future like He does with Daystar Christian Center- He moves us because we are a pioneer Church, we are a model Church! It’s our destiny!
So a magazine interviewed me in the United States of America. It will be released in the next two weeks, so that was what they were interested in- You have been away for almost three years, how did you build the Church? What did you do? What are you doing? That the Church is building well. I said, ‘Systems! People!
So on the cover of the magazine, my picture is there and they titled it, ‘Remote control- Sam Adeyemi’s lessons in long distance leadership! I said, ‘Hey! That’s a nice way to describe it’!
So whatever it is that looks like a bad thing, God is using it to introduce new models to the whole world! So we are grateful to God! And remember, when that said, ‘What did you do? I said, ‘Systems and people’! And they said you must have good people and I said, ‘Exactly! We have good people!
So yesterday, it was a great joy, you know? To meet with all our workers.
Most of whom were here physically and others joined us online from all other the world and we just wanna say, ‘We are proud of you, your commitment to God and to this vision is unparalleled!’
We are grateful to God for you!
We are grateful to God for our Pastors!- Amazing people! See, nobody is perfect so there is no where that you will group people together that there will be perfection.
No marriage is perfect for example, am I right? No family is perfect! The same thing with an organization.
So some people focus on the imperfection but they don’t realise that with all the imperfect people you have in our Church, the Church did not descend into crises, the changes that happened were massive!
Not only were we away physically, the next most senior person, the Chief Operating Officer (COO)- God also moved him to the next assignment and we were not present to even pray for him like we normally do when a Pastor is leaving, the prayer was online!
It was huge and the Church is still standing! So, we are grateful to God and we say, ‘Thank you to you for your love, prayers and commitment! The God that pronounced this season, The much fruit season-
The growth of a new plant is a miracle, He will work miracles in your life in the Name of Jesus! This sacrifice that we all made will count for something for many years to come in the Name of Jesus Christ!
I appreciate my Sweetheart and my ‘Left ventricle’. God will do your own! (Speaking to singles).
More especially for one thing, ‘You know? You are following a man and He says, ‘God told me this and that’! And after sometime it looks as if you are following a madman.
You will have serious options to make! But I’m grateful to God that she is God fearing, that she hears God and so there was no problem- We were on the same frequency!
Help me to appreciate Pastor Nike Adeyemi.
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