Prologue – Why I Wrote this Book
Kwame walked down the aisle in response to the altar call I had made. He was a first year student of the university where I had been invited to preach that Sunday, 6th November 2016. That morning, Kwame almost did not attend the service because he did not have money for his upkeep.
I learnt later that Kwame had lived a quiet but difficult life following a break up of his parents’ marriage in his adolescent years. He struggled financially and worked at a car washing bay during holidays to raise money to support himself in school. He had unguarded liberty as an adolescent which led him into all manner of lustful, erotic situations that corrupted his mind and purity. Though he was in church, it was just a social obligation and did not mean much to him until that Sunday morning. Kwame has followed me since that meeting and has become one of my sons in the Lord.
I meet many people like Kwame at outreaches and gospel crusades that the team at Nkwa.Life undertakes. As much as I will love to personally disciple those who make decisions for Christ at these events, practical constraints of time and distance limits the number of people the team is able to support. I conceived this book as a way to reach these people with a guide.
This book is intended to help people like Yaa whom I met at a secondary school in the Eastern Region of Ghana. Yaa was a truant who had completely lost focus on her education. She sneaked out of the boarding school almost every day to see her boyfriend in town. She maintained about three or four boyfriends because she had this unusually strong urge to have sex almost on a daily basis. When the urge came she moaned helplessly and when it receded she had to find a guy to sleep with. Sex was a pressing need for this eighteen year old high school girl.
Some members of my team brought her to me after that day’s outreach because she spoke to them about her truancy. When I placed my hand on her to pray for her, she firmly grabbed my hand and began to move it away. Her demeanour suddenly changed and she became violent, wrestling the brothers who were trying to restrain her. She kicked her legs, cursed and was in rage.
During prayer, it became clear that there were seven demons oppressing this young lady. We persisted in prayer and the demons left her, leaving her calmly on the floor. When she regained her consciousness, we shared the gospel with her and obtained her contact information in order to follow her up. The contact hours with Yaa has been limited. It is my prayer and hope that this book will help Yaa and others like her to grow in the things of the Lord.
I have sought to discuss the things I learnt as a new believer that helped establish me as a Christian. I came to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ at a Scripture Union rally in Koforidua in 1996. I was fifteen years old and in first year at Pope John Secondary School and Junior Seminary (POJOSS). I developed a hunger for the word of God and prayer. With the help of Brother Sampson Ankomanyi, the SU Vice President then and other leaders, I steadily developed my faith which transformed my life and gave me purpose in life. I carried on learning, growing and sharing my faith through secondary school to the university and into my professional life. I continue to grow and share my faith as a Minister of the Gospel. The topics discussed in this book are those I learned early in my Christian formation and which have proven to be immensely helpful over the years.
As a pastor of an adult congregation in the city, I meet people who have been in church for years but appear not to be acquainted with some fundamental truths of the Christian faith. This book is to help such members of my congregation to grasp the basics and build on their faith. This book is for every Christian, both young and old. It is also for the enquirer, seeking to understand the Christian faith and everyone who wants to know Jesus and walk with Him.
In contemporary times, we find a number of church folk who behave just like people of the world. They have a form of religion without any power. They are like a cloud without rain. They are unfruitful spiritually and appear to use religion merely as a pain killer or as a medium for material gain. They attend church services but their lives outside the walls of the church are a far cry from the image of Christ.
This book is a prophetic call to the church – Let my people grow! It is a call for Christians to appropriate the gifts of Jesus Christ to His church: apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers for the primary objective of growing up into the image of Christ. The objective of Christ’s gifts to His church is “to equip His people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ” (Ephesians 4:11-13).
My approach in presenting the material is to draw parallels with natural growth and to point out biblical concepts that can be likened to certain important natural, biological and social processes in the human being that facilitate healthy development. As much as possible, I allow the Bible to do the talking. In each chapter, I introduce the subject, make brief points and quote the relevant scriptures that support them. To make sure that the reader checks the scripture references, I have quoted most of them in the book.
I intend this book to be a guide which the reader can refer to at any point in their Christian journey. I pray that it will help readers to identify the necessities for spiritual growth and to inspire them to do what is necessary with the help of the Holy Spirit to become mature and attain the fullness of Christ. May God breathe on the pages of this book so the power of the Holy Spirit will teach its readers the truth, move them to faith and spur them on to action in Jesus Name! May the eyes of the blind be open, the chains of the captive be broken, the wounds of the broken hearted be healed, the knees of the weak be strengthened and the sorrow of the mourner be turned to joy. Praise the LORD who gives new life and helps His children to grow. Amen.
Edmund Yirenkyi Fianko
17 December, 2019