For Apostle Victor Okafor and members of Crusaders Evangelical Ministry, aka Sycamore Assembly, it was all celebration and jubilation galore at the 11th Anniversary and Thanksgiving Service of their Church on Sunday 10th October, 2021 at the Church premises, 8A, Banire Street, Obawole Estate, Iju, Lagos State.
The event which came with pomp and pageantry was witnessed by distinguished members of the Church, members of the host community of the Landlords Association, members of Police Community Relations Committee, CAN Leaders and members from Ifako Ijaiye Chapter, as well as friends and well wishers.
The celebration also marked the formal dedication of the Church with posh auditorium with modern fitted facilities, where people could worship God in comfort.
Speaking in his welcome address the host minister expressed his thanks to God for keeping faith with the Church as all the Church objectives were being realised in record time.
The Church, he said has raised many gallant soldiers of Christ doing exploits for the Lord.
“We thank God for raising people to become kings from despondency, from joblessness to employers of labour, turning barren women to proud mothers, women having still births to joyful mothers of wonderful babies, setting the captives free from satanic oppression, tenants are becoming landlords and members are buying their own cars with ease. There has been no case of still births and infantile mortality. We have every reason to thank God.”
Apostle Okafor who also used the occasion to go down the memory lane to recount how God called him said he had to leave his well paying comfortable job as a staff in the office of a leading global oil company to yield to the call of God, and how he acquired and built the ultra modern Church.
The man of God also took the advantage to advise up and coming ministers of God to depend on God for all their needs.
“Today, every graduate of Bible College is a prophet so as to attract crowd. It is not about the crowd but about the souls. I started in my sitting room when God told me to start, and within a month my house was filled with people and they began to come.
“I made up my mind to announce to say we needed a place of worship. The Lord then said I should give Him a portion of my house. He promised to do a new thing. Miracles began to happen, and we spent 9 years there from 2012 to 2021. When the Lord provided for this place, the owner placed it up for disposal and we bought it, and the works started.
Speaking about the designs and the structure, the helman said it was a product of his imagination and what God showed to him.
“What you see here was from my brain. God showed me where all the departments would be. Everything was according to how God specified. The spirit of God is still speaking. The building has a frontal storey building with added floors as offices with receptions and conference halls. Inside the auditorium are two platforms facing each other, one for the altar and the other as a gallery.
Recounting his breakthrough days, Apostle Okafor said, “It’s been a wonderful journey listening to instructions from God to lead.”
He continued, “In 2017, we hit the TV. For eight weeks we were there without anybody calling us. We almost gave up. We were later persuaded by the station manager to do the ninth episode which we reluctantly and painfully paid for. I had to look for money to do that extra episode. It was during the relay of the extra episode that a woman called, and many things happened, God used us for her situation and the wonders began to continue.
Apostle Victor Okafor who can fluently speak Yoruba is a man of God with the gifts of prophecy and prayers and he demonstrated this at the anniversary when he began to call out people for special ministration under what he called Special Cases, and members were coming out to key into his prophetic releases.
The wife, Mama G.O. was also available to lend a helping hand leading in rendering songs to praise and worship God as the Church also danced gleefully to her numbers.
By the end of the service, there were sessions of praise and thanksgiving, presentation by the Hephzibah Choir of the Church and cutting of anniversary cake as members and guests were treated to another session of feeding and entertainment.
In his vote of thanks one of the Church Elders, Colonel Silvester Uzodinma (Rtd.) expressed his thanks first to God for making the event highly successful, to the members for their supports and contributions, to the general Overseer and Mama G.O. for their prayers and trust in the committee set for that purpose, and for the guests from far and near coming to grace the event.
Present were representatives of Ifako Ijaiye local Chapter of CAN, with the chapter Secretary, Rev. Dr. Festus Odeyemi and others present, the Street Chairman of Landlords Association, and guests like Mr. Akin Obadina, Mr. Kola Olatunji, Mr. Eyetan, Supol Samuel Balogun represented the Police Area Commander, and members of Police Community Relations Committee were represented by Rev. Adetomiwa and Alhaji Idowu.
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