‘I closed down 5 thriving businesses to embrace full-time ministry’

Evangelist John Goody, is the General Overseer of Mountain of Grace and Victory Ministry, Soka, Ibadan, Oyo State. In this interview with SAM NWAOKO, he speaks on how he closed his thriving businesses to embrace full time ministerial work 20 years ago and his experiences as he clocks 70 years old.

In the 20 years of this work assigned you by God, what are your ups and downs?

Our God is good and very faithful to His promises. I won’t say it’s been rosy but the fact remains that if you are doing the work of God, as you’re sent in total commitment to His will, you must expect ups and downs. And if you remain faithful, God Himself will remain faithful to you. The early apostles never found it easy, even Jesus Christ never found it easy when he was on His earthly ministry. So whatever experiences we are having today is not new, it is a sign that we are on the right path.

Looking back 20 years as a servant of God, there would be some landmark experiences that you would like to thank God for and some you’d rather wish to forget. Would you let us into some of these as you are approaching the age of 70?

In the 1970s, I joined Mandilas Air Conditioning Division. In 1978, I resigned and started my own company in 1979. Things were very good with my businesses. God really blessed my business and at my early age, I was blessed and a point of reference to my colleagues. From Engineering, I diverted to other businesses. Before I came into the ministerial work, I was having about five companies in Lagos, Ibadan, Ilorin and Benin. Along the line, I opened a PKO production company and a soap factory. But when I answered the call of God, the Lord asked me to stop all the businesses, including the electronics sales, Goody Cash and Carry. GJ Enterprises, etc all of them were closed down just to answer the call of God. Then I was thinking if I closed down all these businesses, how would I Survive? How would I live? My children were in schools and universities. However, one pastor counselled me, that the Lord said don’t worry about tomorrow. Answer the call first which I did. And God in His faithfulness did everything miraculously, beyond my expectations. Where my church is situated today at Idi Mango area of Soka was one of my factories which I converted to a church.

You must have encountered some opposition in the course of answering the call. For instance, your wife might have said ‘what is wrong with my husband?’ and so on. What kind of opposition did you encounter?

Indeed, my wife wasn’t happy with it that I accepted the call of God. I remember one evening that she called me into the room and asked me if I was out of my senses. ‘How would you handle all your businesses as you are saying God called you?’. It wasn’t an easy period. It was rough between my wife and I because of the call to ministerial work. I told her ‘I’ve served myself for 50 years, where are the mansions and the haulage vehicles? Let me use the remainder of my years to serve God.’ Yes, indeed it has not been easy because God called me to be in the deliverance and healing ministry. There you have encounters with the devil all the time; the devil will resist you and attack you. However, with all the attacks, oppression, humiliation and so on that I encountered in the work, God delivered me from them all. He confirmed His word in Psalm 34:19. If you are a genuine minister of God and you say you’re not challenged by the devil, check again because once you declare for God, and you’re in the deliverance ministry, you are fighting with the kingdom of the devil and he will resist you.

At what point did you get the call? What happened?

I was on a business trip to Ilorin in 1987 when the Lord visited me in the hotel where I lodged. The state God met me was very sinful and embarrassing. He asked me that night what I was doing with all He met me with.

However, He gave me a message to one of the big prophets in Ibadan. I took the message to the big prophet and he was shocked. He asked if I was a prophet or a pastor and I said no. He said ‘with this encounter, go and prepare to work for God’. He was the one that later ordained me. He ordained me as a deacon in 1992 and in the mid-1990s he ordained me a pastor. And since then, God has manifested Himself in many ways. Barren women conceive and give birth; ruptured kidney replaced, epilepsy healed and so very many other things God has done. The glory is God’s.

How do you think Nigerians can understand God better and enjoy Him? How would you advise someone in search of God or introduce him to God?

The bible says in Matt 12 that we should seek first the kingdom of God and all other things shall be added unto you. Unfortunately, we are after the last, not the first. All other things that the scriptures say would be added, that is what we are running after, not the kingdom of God first. After Jesus Christ fasted for 40 days and 40 nights, He was tempted by the devil, who took him up a mountain and showed Him the whole world in its beauty and glory. He said bow to me and will deliver these to you. Of course Jesus Christ rejected the offer, he refused. Do you know that what Jesus Christ rejected from the devil, because His glory is not on earth here but in eternity where He came from, that is what people are embracing and bowing for today, even by the so-called men of God. People are running after the things of this world and because of this, preaching the right gospel becomes impossible. In the good old days, when a man of God is preaching a sermon of eternity and the word of God, you will see tears rolling down the cheeks of people, which means that that sermon touched their hearts for a change, for repentance. But the sermon today from the pulpit is to make people laugh and make people to clap and say ‘pastor ride on’. Is it a message that touches your heart that would make you to laugh and be saying pastor ride on? That is what we have today on the pulpit. So, whatever is happening to the world today started from the pulpit. The pulpit is there to correct errors, to redeem people from destruction, to expose people to their faults, but the pulpit today is covering people’s faults, even making some people to believe that the kingdom of God is here on earth. It’s sad, but we must keep doing the work of God.

If’ as you’ve pointed out, preaching the right gospel is far from us, how do we salvage the situation? What must we do?

The first thing is self discipline, blinding eyes to the things of the world. The day you are able to say ‘I surrender to you Lord’; the day you’re able to say ‘Lord, what you don’t give me, don’t let me have it’… Today, people are only after the things of this world. There are very few who are still preaching the right gospel, but they are minute and are scarce. If the ambition of the men of God today and the comparison of the success in the ministry is their wealth, their jet and their cathedral, and not how many souls won, then we are in trouble. What interests God is how many souls that return to Him, not your jets and cathedrals and the thousands that gather. If ten gather and you’re able to bring at least six of them to God, then you will have self-satisfaction. This is because the bible says there is joy in heaven for just one sinner that is brought back to God. Jesus said He came for the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

How do you feel at 70?

Glory to God! I feel good and satisfied for how far God has used me and how far I’ve come. I gained employment with Mandilas in 1973, that was what brought me to Ibadan. I worked with them for five years and six months and I resigned, because right from the get go, I had it in mind to serve myself. When I was employed by Mandilas, I gave myself a target – that I will work for only five years, save whatever I can and establish myself. To the glory of God, five years and six months or thereabouts, I gave them my resignation letter but before then, I was able to purchase a brand new Peugeot 404 Pick-up for myself. I got a car for myself and I started my business. Those five years, I used them to deny myself of any comfort or material things because I had a goal.

Any regrets so far… Are there things you would have loved to change?

I won’t refer to it as regrets. But at times I think of when I was in business. When I was in business, as the chairman/managing director, if the branch in Ibadan is not making enough profit, maybe I’d get from Lagos or from Ilorin or from Benin. And then too, I happened to be a major supplier to Dumez Construction Company and I made a lot of money from there too. But now, not to do any of these, because none of the businesses is still functioning and all I depend on is what comes from the church or from whosoever God sends to bless you; when you cast your mind back you’d sometimes wish you were not in the ministry! But there are stages I’ve crossed as a minister of the gospel that makes me to thank God for closing down the businesses because I had encountered some things that would have made me to go back. There are many challenges that would have made me to go back. Is it attack in the ministry? For at least four times, I had a broken ministry. Members would just go, and this was because of demonic attacks as a result of the deliverance I was doing. It’s not every pastor that wants to run a deliverance ministry because they know what it takes and the implications. It’s not an easy thing. Even myself, I went to God several times: ‘God why not use me in another area?’ God said He was not preventing me from going into any other area, like prosperity ministry, but said I should know that if I went to other areas, while He is not stopping me, I should know that I am not working for Him. There was a time God took me out of Ibadan for two years. I abandoned my church here because of a plan of attack in the kingdom of darkness. For those two years I was in the Republic of Benin. When things were okay He said I should return, and I came back.

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