Founder of Laughter Foundation International Ministries, otherwise known as babies’ factory, Pastor Gbenga Oso, spoke with Sunday Oguntola on the uniqueness of the church on the eve of its 20th anniversary. Excerpts:
There are people who believe the church should have been a ministry. What would be your reaction to them?
For me, I don’t see any difference between ministry and church. Either church or ministry, there is only one goal – that people should go to the kingdom of God.
And secondly, we meet the physical needs of people. That was what Jesus did when He was here. There were three basic things He did when He was here. He would preach, heal the sick and do deliverance. Then, there were times he fed people with physical foods.
So, Jesus was meeting the spiritual and physical needs of people, which is what a church or ministry is expected to do. If they are sick, they must be healed and live healthy lives. If they don’t have children, they must have children. That is what church or ministry exists to do.
But there is the argument that need-oriented ministries and churches tend to raise people to use, rather than love God. What do you say to this?
A Church or ministry is expected to meet the spiritual and physical needs of people. Doing one without the other means you won’t see people in the church.
The major thing that draws people to God is meeting their physical needs. When you see churches and ministries with population today, it is because they are meeting the physical needs of people. People don’t go to church mostly because they want to hear the word of God or love God. They are going because they have a challenge, which they believe can be addressed in such a church or ministry.
But after you have baited in people, what do you do with them?
In this church, apart from the fact that the main focus is for people to have children, I always say it is not the major emphasis. The major emphasis is to make the kingdom of God and go to heaven because there is life after here.
If someone has all the children and go to hell, it is just a waste of efforts on the part of the pastor and waste of life with the person involved. So, we tell people here that they must serve God, shun ungodliness and love people.
After then, they must have the good things of life. They must have children and have money to take care of them. So, the two are combined. But preaching to people without meeting their needs is not what Jesus sent us to do.
He didn’t do that. He would first of us preach to them and meet their physical needs. And that is what we are doing.
Those with specialised ministries or churches like this impose consultation fees or ask people to do something before sharing testimonies. Is that what obtains here?
That kind of thing is not found in the Bible. It is not part of what we do here at all. During the times of Jesus, he didn’t take money from anybody for consultation or something. We don’t ask people to do that either. People see me when they have to see me; of course they are procedures because of security and all that.
When they have testimonies, we just ask them to write everything in a sheet of paper. We look through and take the ones we consider major. Most times, we always don’t know what they want to say and we never ask them to sow anything.
There are people that do things and there are people that don’t do. What they do depends on what they have. But we have never asked them to do anything or bring anything at all. It is not part of our culture here.
At 20, why is the church not involved in any relationship with Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) or Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN)? Is that deliberate or you have anything against the bodies?
No, we don’t have anything against them. We are a member of CAN, though not registered and all that. If there is a need to do that, we will do. Their officials come here and all that. If there are procedures to follow to register….
… They haven’t told you or you didn’t ask?
Well, they haven’t told me but if I feel the need to do that, we will do it. But if PFN or CAN is doing anything, we will support from here. It is not compulsory all of us register. It is not compulsory, but if there is a reason to register, we will do that. We believe we are a member of the body of Christ in this nation. And if we have to register, we will do that. If anything is needed, we are part of it.
You also don’t invite ministers from outside the church. Is that also deliberate?
That is because this is a highly specialised ministry. We have what we are aiming at; basically praying for people that want children and all that. It is a specialised ministry and God has to have prepared you to be able to do it.
Besides, we have people we have trained in-house to handle our ministrations over the years. So, we don’t really need ministers from outside here.
And you don’t honour invitations from other churches too?
I do but not always most of the time. I just like to face the thing God asked me to do. My joy is to see people that come here receive their breakthrough and all that.
Once in a while, I go to other places but not many times.
Does that mean those who already have children have no place in this church?
They do because the kingdom of God is the basic here. But we have some other programmes in the church, though not the basic. Childbearing is the basic. We know that if members have children and no money to take care of them, they will suffer.
So, first Sunday of every month, after service, we hold a service for like 30 minutes to pray for their careers and businesses. We call it the billionaires’ service. If they don’t become billionaires, they will become multi-millionaires.
We also pray for singles to get married because there are many of them eligible but it is not happening for them. Whether we like it or not, there are reasons beyond them responsible for this.
We also have a prayer service for pregnant women. Women must carry pregnancies for 40 weeks and many of them lose their pregnancies. But we don’t have that here because we pray for them and encourage them to go to good hospitals.
