UPND and its interdenominational prayers

Mon, 28 Aug 2017 10:32:54 +0000

Dear Editor,

The Zambia Republican Party president Wright Musoma must be congratulated for giving a religious knowledge lesson and wise counsel on the Public Order Act’s procedural requirements to Pastor Kangwa Chileshe who heads the City of Refuge Ministries and happens to be the losing UPND parliamentary aspirant in the 2016 general elections opposition party’s nominations for Munali Constituency: “It was surprising that the UPND which had continued to shun religious national events such as prayers and fasting would opt to hold prayers for its leader Hakainde Hichilema without having notified the police.”

In addition, the Zambia Republican Party president commended the police for not allowing an interdenominational thanksgiving prayers for the release of the incarcerated UPND leader Hakainde Hichilema from prison which were scheduled for the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Lusaka last week, saying the venue was filled with UPND cadres and that it was a security risk (“Do not use the church in vain”, Daily Nation, August 26, 2017).

Suffice to say, just as the Lord Jesus when he rose from the dead commanded his disciples to do – “Go into all the world and tell them…”

Tell them what? That people should abandon their governance requirements and procedures? Wear party regalia before they can preach Jesus? Organise public events without notifying the security authorities?

Consider the leadership in power inferior? Organise interdenominational thanksgiving prayers together with party cards renewal exercise at the same event?

No, what the Risen Lord Jesus commanded was that those who were eye-witnesses to what happened in Jerusalem and were transformed by believing what they saw and heard, namely that he Jesus had come to fulfill what he was sent by God to do, i.e., to pay the price of sins so that – as he told Nicodemus in John 3:16 – “whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life,” and the proof that God accepted Mission Accomplished was that He raised Jesus from the dead! Offensive message, admittedly, to some; but great message to others!

Problems arise in at least three ways: (i) When carriers of this message assume an air of superiority, looking down on the heathens;

(ii) When the messengers are counterfeit Christians with terror-related arson agenda – the gutted markets and public buildings in the recent past; (iii) when it is thought wrongly that Zambia for instance is a Christian country – an impossible situation – because whosoever mentioned by the Lord Jesus refers not to countries, but to individuals.

Not all pre-colonial Europeans who carried this Good News message of the Lord Jesus Christ to all African nations allowed themselves to be compromised by commercial and political expedience.

 I am old enough to be able to discern which pre-colonial European carrier of this Good News message was counterfeit, and which was genuine. Could the same be applied to the contemporary so-called men of God in Zambia?

To the latter, I am no less grateful than my Pentecostal friends are to Catholic carriers of the same message. In the days of the MMD regime, I asked a Pentecostal adherent how he became a Christian.

 This was his reply: “A Pentecostal televangelist called Nevers Mumba went to preach the Lord Jesus on ZNBC television. I believed, and I have never been the same again.”

I knew what he meant because since I believed in the Lord Jesus Christ after I was a university student at UNZA, I have never been the same again.

Mubanga Luchembe,

LUSAKA