The founder of a branch of Celestial Church of Christ in Lagos State, Aderemi Dabiri, has explained the reason behind the invitation of Fuji singer, Alabi Pasuma, and controversial street-hop artiste, Portable, to the church’s praise night event.
The white garment church recently came under heavy criticism for inviting Portable and Pasuma to the church event, DAILY GIST reports.
However, addressing a delegation of the church’s task force who visited his parish to have an audience with him, Dabiri revealed the choice of the two singers was to gain new converts.
According to him, it was not the first time, stressing the pattern of evangelism had worked for him over the years and also resulted in the growth of his church membership.
Dabiri further criticised some gospel ministers for disrespect, noting that Pasuma sounded respectful and agreed with his stance.
He said, “It is not our first time inviting guest artists. We have been doing it without a problem and I can give you a series of instances. We cannot go where they sell palm wine or alcoholic drinks and ask them to accept Jesus Christ.
If I don’t apply wisdom, they will hit a bottle on my head. That was why I thought of a way to bring them into the church.
“I also noticed that there are some notorious boys who cause trouble in the community, disturbing the authorities and engaging in cultism. I wondered how can we draw their attention so that they would have a change of heart.
We have gone to places where they are, and they ended up beating us. Most of the members of my church are new converts, and it was through that pattern that I converted them.
“Some gospel ministers are rude. If you talk to some of them, they respond rudely, but the day I called Pasuma, he sounded respectful on the phone and also agreed with my stance.”
Responding to the concerns the task force team raised about the raging controversy caused by the development, Dabiri indicated that he had no plans to cancel the invitation.
However, he explained that he would reduce the excesses of the artists at the event, especially Portable.
He said, “We will tell Portable not to dye his hair and he should not sing vulgar songs but to sing gospel music. We will also caution him not to dress inappropriately or climb the speakers.
“We will also warn him not to allow his boys to smoke here. We have invited close to 30 military personnel to man the event.”
