By Ugochimereze Chinedu Asuzu
“When truth is buried beneath silence, prayer becomes performance.” ~ Dietrich Bonhoeffer
So, Pastor Enoch Adeboye is set to lead national prayers for Nigeria’s economic revival. Noble? Perhaps. Symbolic? Certainly. But redemptive? That’s the real question.
Can we really pray the economy into shape while turning a blind eye to policy errors, crony capitalism, fuel subsidy frauds, budget padding, crude oil theft, institutionalized corruption, and a tax law that burdens the poor to enrich the elite?
What a heck! We are not against prayer: God forbid. We are people of prayer. But we are also people of discernment. And discernment demands we ask: How long shall we keep praying over the ruins of a nation while the wreckers sit untouched, even blessed?
Nigeria is not suffering from a lack of prayer. We are drowning in it. Prayer mountains are full. Altars are saturated. Hands are lifted. Voices are raised. Yet the nation sinks, economically, morally, spiritually.
The problem is not the silence of heaven; it is the silence of those who claim to speak for heaven.
Shall we fast while evil feasts? Shall we pray while injustice legislates? Shall we keep rebuking demons and excusing politicians?
Prayer, in its truest form, is not escape, it is engagement. It’s what Elijah did before confronting Ahab. What Amos did while crying out in the courts of injustice. Even Jesus, when faced with the desecration of the temple economy, didn’t call a solemn assembly- He overturned tables.
Pastor Adeboye remains a revered father in the faith. But now is not the time for neutral prayers. Now is the time for prophetic fire, the kind that names the rot, challenges the thieves, and calls Nigeria not just to revival, but to repentance.
Not another round of national prayers that avoid rebuking those who’ve turned public wealth into private inheritance. Not another prayer summit that dances around Pharaoh, but the kind that speaks to him directly.
The truth is: Nigeria’s problem is not the absence of prayer, it is the abundance of hypocrisy. We’ve prayed on every mountain, cried in every vigil, knelt at every crusade ground. Yet corruption still strangles the economy, and the pulpit often grows too timid to name names.
The God we pray to is not mocked. He does not answer prayers in place of justice. He does not restore economies while leaders loot them dry and pastors bless them in return for political proximity. He does not heal nations that refuse to repent, not just from sin, but from systems of sin, dressed in legislative and executive garments.
Can we truly pray our economy into healing without unmasking the saboteurs? Can we bind demons while shaking hands with the architects of poverty?
This is not about rejecting prayer, it is about restoring its power. Let us pray, yes. But let us also protest. Let us fast, yes. But let us also fight, against greed, against silence, against sanctified complicity.
Until the church stops kneeling before power and starts standing for truth, our national prayers may remain nothing but holy noise on blood-stained altars.
“When the righteous lift up holy hands, but the wicked remain in power, what then becomes of the land?”
Let us not just lift hands. Let us raise standards. Let our incense rise, but let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.
* Ugochimereze Chinedu Asuzu
Public Affairs Analysis | June 29, 2025