Does the designation, “Christian,” denote someone of sound character who is honest, godly and peace-loving; one of virtue or full of vices? The truth is it does not!!! If one cannot even treat a fellow man/woman as a human being…how can one even be Christ like?

An Indian philosopher (Mahatma Gandhi) once said: “I love your Christ but I hate your Christians because your Christians are unlike your Christ.” Let me safely assume that he had some pastor/Christian friends, but what he saw in their characters and behaviours must have shocked him. There are good ‘Christians’ (very few) and the fake ones. Indeed, many professing Christians are much more dishonest and deceitful than the average unbeliever.

We seem to forget that people are supposed to be drawn to Christ because of what they see in us. We move our mouths in prayer, but our hearts are of immovable stones, filled with deception and garbage. Truth appears to have taken a long flight to Mars. Nothing is sacrosanct anymore. The worst part is that we even lie to ourselves.

First of all we don’t love our neighbour as ourselves! What most of us Christians regard as prayers and spend the quarter of our lifetime doing is nothing but incantations that should never be heard in churches but in shrines and witches’ covens and in some cases fetish practices have been introduced in the name of prophetic actions or acts of faith – completely unbiblical.

We turn God into an assassin to uproot people from positions they’ve worked very hard for…and as for our enemies, we’re always calling death to come and take them away…so which table will ‘God prepare before us in the presence of our enemies’ when we’re killing  them off? These enemies are destroyed with fanfare at every night vigil, only for them to resurrect again and again. Christians spend a lifetime engaged in this outrage, conveniently forgetting “bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.”

Africans are ‘Christians to the core’ yet we are more decadent and sickening. Why Africa is not a beacon of/to the world just beats me. We pray and fast (even though the fast never manifest on our waist lines) at every given opportunity but we are still begging and we’re still quoting ‘I’ll never borrow and I’ll be the head and not the tail’ – and until we get aid, nothing gets done. Many people attend churches with the Christian tag for reasons NOT connected to their faith. Some do to seek forgiveness for their sins and hope to keep sinning and coming back for more forgiveness, some to cure illnesses and others move with the crowd to show off their new attires/footwear and enjoy the every Sunday merriment and, some to look for husband and wife. How can one’s mind be on Christ if he/she is seriously eyeing the chorister? If you don’t go to church/belong to any church, it’s the gravest sin you can ever commit in the eyes of a Christian, but inhumane practices done to his/her fellow human is right.

It will be hard for a wealthy man to enter the kingdom of heaven (I didn’t say)…but we love the prosperity messages. ‘Sow a seed that will provoke God, it is written that he that sows into the secret place of the most high shall buy aeroplanes, build mansion, drive exotic cars, a miracle will happen before next week Friday, Jesus needs only 50 people to donate…… be fast before Jesus flies away’ and people do it hoping to buy the latest cars…Who are we deceiving? Your target is to live good as the pastor (who may be stupendously wealthy) so why are you on the look out to go to heaven? Even though that wealth may never come……Even when the blessing comes, we’re not going to give to the poor because we’re greedy for more so we sow it back into the life of the pastor to get more wealth (assuming your seed brought about your wealth but not you working hard with your hands and smart with your brains).

A story I read on a website put a smile on my face – about a Kenyan pastor who is charging his church members so he can ask God (on their behalf) if they’re going to heaven or hell…If you’re hell-bound, you pay more then he’ll cleanse you from all unrighteousness and people paid/paying. Good niche! Yes, it’s daylight robbery but come to think of it, his services are needed because our lifestyle is definitely not going to take us to heaven.

Waiting for judgement day before we go there (or not) is too long a process. Just pay, let him ask his god, keep our mind at rest, live anyhow and just walk straight to heaven when we die. If you like the traditional method (forgetting that you fall in one of the categories  I’ve listed), you cannot go through Jesus Christ because he is also on sale in the market (church) in the form of olive oil, holy water, holy handkerchiefs and honey….how possible can you go through him? Too many markets!!!

We can make life very ‘heavenly’ with our way of life and taking responsibility for every ‘idiotic’ choice we make in life. Until we clean the filth in our hearts and in our closets, let’s stop disturbing people to draw closer to God because we don’t even qualify.