Conversations On Faith Crisis by Apostle Femi Lazarus: MP3 Download & Sermon Notes

The Wrong Reason to Need God

The foundational problem with how many believers approach their faith is that they need God only when they are in problems. The design was never that. The relationship with God is supposed to be desired, not demanded by circumstance. Anywhere a person finds themselves in the world — whether in good times or bad — the need for God remains constant because the need is relational, not situational.

False Foundation, False Results

When Christians pray, fast, give tithes and offerings and still suffer, the question arises — why? The answer is not that God's word has failed. It is that someone promised wrongly. Someone who did not know God's word built people on a wrong foundation. If you are established on a wrong foundation, you will sink — it doesn't matter whether the name of God is on it or not.

The fact that people have been given false hope does not mean the right hope is not there. The fact that people have been wrongly established does not mean the right establishment is not there.

The Bible is clear that the one who doesn't work should not eat — whether they pray or not. Even as a pastor or a pope.

Faith as a Seed, Not a Size

The Bible never required enormous faith. It required faith as small as a grain of mustard seed — and the significance is not the size. A mustard seed is significant because it is a seed. It can grow. It is faith that can be anchored on God and keeps growing. As that faith grows, mountains shift.

But faith was never given to engineer God. The premise of all these things is that God is a supreme being who cannot be fitted into any mold of expected answers. There are recommendations for how to pray. If prayer aligns with his will, answers come.

Legal vs. Vital Provision

Understanding what is available in Christ operates on two levels:

• Legal provision — what is available in Christ. Healing, riches, honor, and life itself are legally provided. They exist in Christ as a covenant reality.
• Vital provision — what has been personally appropriated and experienced. Something can be legally available without becoming vitally real in a person's life.

The illustration is this: a father deposits $500 million in a daughter's name in a bank. The money is legally hers. But if she is hungry and cannot access the account, telling a shopkeeper "my father has money in my name" is not legal tender. She must learn to convert what is legal into what is vital.

That is why believers have healing in Christ but still have sicknesses. Riches in Christ but are still poor. The issue is not the provision — it is the knowledge of how to appropriate it.

Eternal life itself is defined in scripture as knowing God. The operation of a believer in this life is therefore to the degree of the knowledge of God they grow in. A phone at 28% battery still has life — but certain functions shut down. The more it is powered, the more functions are restored. Deliberately staying in the word grows that life.

Misapplied Christianity and the Nigerian Problem

Many believers have not learned that they are not the light of the church — they are the light of the world. The wisdom of the kingdom is not meant to stay inside the building. Believers are equipped in church and then sent out to get things done.

Many African Christians have pacified themselves with the idea that the Bible is only for getting to heaven — that the full life promised in it is deferred. Someone has lied to them. Someone didn't teach them. And someone is benefiting from their ignorance. That is precisely what religion is built on: false hope of afterlife enjoyment, while those promising it enjoy life here by scamming the people.

If an average believer will sit with scripture and see it clearly, they would recognize that what is in the word can change nations. Daniel changed a nation. Joseph changed Egypt. The same Holy Spirit is available.

The Life of Daniel as a Model

Daniel 5:11

When the queen recommended Daniel to King Belshazzar, her description of him was not that he was a great prayer warrior. She said he was a man full of the divine Holy Spirit — and then described what that produced: intellectual brilliance, spiritual wisdom, the ability to interpret, solve mysteries, and explain puzzles. There was none quite like him. He could do anything.

Daniel chose to deploy his Holy Spirit not just as a tool for prayer but to change nations. The question is not about the Holy Spirit. It is about those who carry the Holy Spirit but are not changing their nations.

What Death in the Afterlife Means

Death in the afterlife that the unbeliever experiences is not cessation from existence. It is alienation from God. Life in the afterlife is to be joined with God. The hope of resurrection is grounded in the resurrection of Christ — because he rose, those who believe will also be raised by the same glory of the Father.

The essence of what Jesus offers is not limited to eternity. There are clear scriptures showing that life in Christ is available on earth now. 1 Corinthians 2:1-5 speaks of a demonstration of spirit and power — not in heaven, but here. If that wisdom is walked in, God's glory is experienced on earth.

The Real Charge Against the Church

The same God who was present when America was built, when Korea was transformed, when Japan and China became what they are — is the same God available in Nigeria. The problem is not God. Maybe believers have been expecting God for the wrong things. Maybe prayers are supposed to change us so we can change things.

The issue is that Africans have been badly pastored over the years. Revival should naturally affect the world. It did in Daniel. It did in Joseph. If it is not affecting the world around the church, something is missing in the people — not in the word.