A Biblical Perspective Of President Tinubu

As your correspondent yesterday joined thousands of Nigerians and foreigners who are participants in the One Year Bible Study, OYBS, in reading the passage for the day, he was struck by the interaction between Paul and the Jewish High Priest after he was arrested in Jerusalem.

The account in Acts 23, and particularly verse five speaks of Paul apologizing after making a derogatory statement directed at Ananias, the high priest at that time.  

The priest had ordered Paul to be smitten in the mouth after he sought to proclaim himself as a clean and conscientious Jew.

Ananias according to history was a particularly greedy priest and it would not have been surprising that Paul may have heard of him or his notoriety as he was reported to have cheated on the tithes among other acts of avarice.

However, verse five tells us that Paul claimed that he didn’t know that Ananias was the high priest at the time. So, on account of the fact that he was the High Priest, Paul tendered an unreserved apology as the bible quotes him in verse five as saying:

“I did not know, brethren, that he was the high priest; for it is written, ‘You shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people.’ ”

This assertion was directly from God in Exodus 22:28, a fact further amplified in Ecclesiastes 10:20 where Christians are further instructed not to “curse the king, even in your thought.”

On studying these, your correspondent was particularly shaken given the political invectives that many Nigerians have notoriously directed at our rulers. Should we as Christians pull away from the vawlunce that is used in attacking our rulers even when these rulers are contemptuous of good governance?

President Muhammadu Buhari was particularly vilified to the extent of some depicting him as a dead man. He was derided as Jubril of Sudan.

He, however, bounced back from his ill health to a fitter and healthier person. After leaving office, Buhari is even a better person than when he came. So, to what extent did the curses poured on Buhari go?

If Buhari was assailed, President Bola Tinubu has been particularly roasted both by many Christians and Muslims on account of the apparent inconsistencies in his character profile.

It is instructive that the High Priest who Paul insulted was seen as an apologist of the system that was against Christians. Indeed, he was a ruler and not a leader with particularly encompassing dictatorial powers.

Is President Tinubu figurative of this high priest? That question is especially apt given that there is perhaps no president in modern Nigerian history that has amassed as much power as the incumbent. As an aspirant, he confronted and took the APC ticket despite the wiles of the Buhari cabal. He also won the election despite the roadblocks.

Tinubu has crafted the National Assembly leadership in his image with his personal nominees fitted in as President of the Senate and Speaker of the House of Representatives. A former ‘messenger’ in Lagos is Senate Leader while a former chief bodyguard in Lagos is now the Inspector General of Police.

For many Christians, it is particularly difficult to reconcile themselves with the biblical injunction not to curse the ruler in his thoughts especially given the impressions about Tinubu in a large section of the public. That is especially among the 63% of the electorate who voted against him according to the official result as deposed by INEC which is still in dispute.

So, given that Tinubu was declared the winner of the election with about 37% of the total vote, the question as to him deserving the kind of honour that God expects His children to give to a king may be an issue for some.

That difficulty is further stretched by the fact that there is perhaps no president that has come to the throne with more controversial credentials. Well those controversies are not removed by the fact that he is married to a pastor and also has many Christians operating key levers of his political machine.

However, the drawing line for the Christian is that following the May 29 inauguration that God in His mercy allowed to hold, Tinubu has won recognition as president and as the Bible enjoins us, should not only be so respected, but should be prayed for that we may live godly and peaceable lives.

Indeed, a contemporary of Paul’s, Peter in his Second letter to the Jews warned against virulent and vawlunce urging that they should not speak evil of dignitaries. (2 Peter 2:9)

It is perhaps on account of this that two notable Christian political actors, Chief Olisa Metuh and Senator Anyim Pius Anyim crossed the political divide last week to embrace Tinubu. Well, their action may have been interpreted because of their scorn of the Peoples Democratic PDP.

It may be a difficult thing for any serious democrat to acknowledge Tinubu as president given the odious conduct of the election, but replying with resentment will be defeatist and giving in to the trap of the devil in promoting bitterness, anger and malice.

But are we to tolerate the injustices that were perpetuated in the election? Certainly not. Jesus, the Christ was certainly not forgiving of the idiocies of King Herod in His own time, whom He dismissed as that old Fox.

While Christians should pull away from the mischief of political actors, they should look at the broader picture, to wit, that the political prize that many are dying for is only a temporal spell. Allowing your heart to be weighed down by it could well endanger the soul.

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