2010 Lagos Conference
The main theme of the conference, held during the first week of November, was ‘What does it mean to be in Christ?’
Held in the old church auditorium of Shepherdhill Baptist Church, Ikorodu Road, Lagos, six speakers brought eight messages on the privileges of being in union with Christ Jesus. Ninety delegates attended, many of whom arrived well before opening devotions, enduring the traffic and transportation difficulties of Lagos (population over 13 million).
Maciek Stolarski, literature director of Grace Baptist Mission, UK, brought two messages, one on the privileges of election and the other on preaching. We were told to see God’s electing love as the family privilege of those in God’s family.
Pastor Joe Jacowitz of Christ Bible Church, California, who pioneered this conference in 2002, brought messages on the privileges of justification and privileges of fellowship and Christ-likeness.
Justifying grace results in God imputing sin on the sinless Saviour and Christ’s righteousness on forgiven sinners. Whoever has entered into union with Christ beholds Christ as revealed in the Bible, and is transformed, by the Spirit of God. Christ-likeness is when the glory of Christ is seen in one’s habits and behaviour (2 Corinthians 3:18).
Ani Ekpo, pastor of Christ Reformed Baptist Church in Port Harcourt, spoke on the privileges of sanctification. He said that, as someone enters union with Christ, that person is at once sanctified, and thereafter the Spirit works in the person during this life ‘to die more and more unto sin and grow in righteousness’.
Grace
Abiodun Longe spoke on the privileges of the gospel. The true gospel is the power of God uniting sinners with Jesus Christ. The ‘health and wealth gospel’, preached in many pulpits today, is another gospel.
Femi Sonuga-Oye, an elder in Sovereign Grace Bible Church, Lagos, spoke on the privileges of adoption, where son-ship is conferred on a total stranger. Out of the mass of rebellious humanity, God, for his own good pleasure, ‘chose some to become his children through the process of adoption’.
Tony Okoroh, an elder in Sovereign Grace Bible Church, Ikeja, Lagos, brought a message on the privileges of eternal security. Believers rejoice, because their life is hid in Christ Jesus; and because Christ is alive for evermore, they cannot perish (Colossians 3:3).
Books were kindly donated by Mount Zion Bible Church, Pensacola in Florida, by Grace Baptist Mission UK, and by London’s Metropolitan Tabernacle.
Tony Okoroh
