Leadership is About Servanthood and Services – Rev. Canny Canice
The Senior Pastor of the House of His Power Ministry, Rev. Canny Canice has made a call and appeal to Nigerian church leaders and younger generations of ministers of the gospel to be patient and allow God to do the process of development and growth in them by Himself.
Rev. Canice made this appeal during his message, the Making of Servants at the ministers conference of Spoken Word International Conference (SWIC) 2024, themed, “Beholding the Glory of God” organized by the ministry.
He said, “we are living in a world where everyone want to be a leader, professing that, we shall be the head and not the tail. But no one wants to be a servant, and serve as a servant-leader.”
Buttressing his points with scriptural references, Canice said, since we are born, God has been preparing us to serve Him. “It took God several years apart to prepare Moses, Joshua and Joseph respectively to diligently served Him and humanity in their generations as first a servant, before becoming servant-leaders.”
“The major challenge facing the church and the christendom today is that people don’t want to follow the process of service before becoming a leader. With the indomie and fast food generation we have, everyone want to make it as fast as possible, and this is seriously affecting the church generally”, he lamented, and advised, “Every church leader, leading on the high level or on the low level, either you are leading 20 congregations, or 1 million congregations, should be patient and allow God to do the process by Himself.”
My challenge today is for leaders to follow the process, the younger pastors should diligently and patiently follow the process of development and growth. They may not have known the process God has taken through the people, they are looking up to and trying to copy their success, those that have built 5,000 to 100,000 auditoriums. They should not attempt to make it at all cost without the process. We have different people of different cycle, God made Abraham at the age of 75, He made Joseph at the age of 30, let everyone wait for his own process to be completed and allow God to commission you”, Rev. Canice stated.
L-r: Rev. Apostl. Wisdom Uba, Rev. Dr. Canny Canice, and Rev. Dr. Leonard Odimegwu
Berating the rate at which most minister of the gospel crave, hunger and pursue titles and self praise, Canice explained that, as a minister of God, James started writing by stating James the servants; Jude, John and Peter in their writings, also used the word, the servant called to serve. They didn’t come to the gospel as Jesus relations, they came to the gospel as servants. If it were to be in today’s world, when you read the book of James, the younger brother of Jesus, it would have been written as, “I, so, so, Jesus’ younger brother, of the same father, and same mother from the same womb. I am writing to you what my brother Jesus told me to write.”
“We are in the world, where the crave, hunger and pursuit for nomenclature titles have been valued more than the kingdom values, because the world likes titles. This is the world we find ourselves, a world where everyone wants to be addressed and accorded with recognition, adulation, praise, and honour. The world value should be different from the kingdom value. The world value wants to be the head and not the tail, but the kingdom value means you have to be a servant to lead. Title does not cast out the devil, but the Christ in you makes you stronger”, he said.
Suggesting the way out, Rev. Canice said, “We need people that will go through the training process. Because, someone who cleans a chamber, has access to case files, or is a court clerk, does not make the person a lawyer. You want to be a lawyer? You must go through the process of having a first degree, go to law school to pass the bar exam, and then you can be called a lawyer or a barrister. This is to say, “that you are a worker in the church, you sing in the choir or a personal assistant to the G. O., does not qualify you, you still need to go for training. The Bible says, study to show yourself approved, as a worker that need not to be ashamed.
We are having bad leaders because of bad training. Jesus didn’t stay with the disciples for one week, He stayed with them for three and a half years. In today’s secular school, that’s about a bachelor degree of four years of studies. He taught them so much even when He was going, He said they’re going to be at an advanced level. “But today, what we do is, following our fathers in the Lord and doing things the way they do it. Without proper training, we copied them, whether they’re doing the right thing or the wrong thing. Unfortunately, it is only in the church no one bothered for training, because we believe we have the Holy Ghost. In everything we are called to do, we need training, and let us be trained to do it right”, he admonished.
Highlights of the 5 days SWIC programme was the maiden matriculation ceremony of International Bible College, Holland in collaboration with Freshword International Bible Network, Nigeria, and thanksgiving service to climax the conference.
