Accost unhealthy church practices — Rev. Dr Ofori

The Moderator of the Global Evangelical Church, Rt Rev. Dr Setorwu Kwadzo Ofori, has called on Ghanaians, especially Christians, to boldly confront unhealthy practices being introduced in the Church irrespective of who is involved.

“Some strange practices and doctrines which have no biblical foundations are gradually creeping into and gaining roots in the body of Christ which no heaven-bound Christian or individual must condone,” he urged.

Rev. Dr Ofori said unless those practices and the people who did them were confronted, the practices would get into the fabric of the Ghanaian society and destroy the core values of the nation and the Church.

Presbytery Conference

The Moderator was addressing the 2019 Presbytery Conference of the Global Evangelical Church at the Global Theological Seminary at Adentan in Accra last Sunday.

The conference was held simultaneously in all the 15 Presbyteries of the church across the country. The Moderator also visited the Tema and Koforidua Presbyteries, where he shared a similar message.

“Of late, we have witnessed the blatant abuse of some women by some men of God who ‘bathed’ them on the pretext of exorcising them, exorbitant sale of so-called mantles such as ‘anointed’ machetes, canes, oils, holy water, among numerous others, to defend themselves against the devil. These are mere exploitations and abuse of the use of mantles without any sound biblical underpinnings,” he pointed out.

He said those practices prevented people from attaining their God-given potential as they relied on the unrealistic promises made to them rather than what God had deposited in them which, at the end of the day, had negative effects on national productivity.

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Confrontation in context

Rev. Dr Ofori said confrontation was not about shouting at people but rather clarifying issues, helping a person to know or be aware of something and speaking the truth to a person for the purpose of personal and communal growth.

“We all need to be confrontational leaders. In doing so, we must be aware that we are doing the work of God. We are perfecting God’s people for better ministry. For the Christian, confrontation must be a spiritual exercise which must be done prayerfully,” he advised.

The Moderator said confrontation should be done for God’s name to be glorified. “It is a spiritual exercise that demands care, respect for one another with a positive aim to transform lives,” adding that, confrontations were not aimed to disgrace people but sometimes they did.

He observed that although the Bible said church leaders must live above reproach (1 Tim 3:2b), it did not mean that “we must not do things that will make others rebuke or confront us.”

Other issues discussed at the conference included the 10-Year Development Plan of the church, disciple making, finance, human and infrastructural development.
Time was alloted for questions and the participants asked questions which were answered by various teams from the head office of the church.

Four teams, made up of the church executive and directors from the head office, were led by the Moderator, the Synod Clerk, the Male and Female Presbyters on the Synod Committee Executive to the conferences in the presbyteries.