Pastor Dolapo Lawal has encouraged believers not to allow people who do not understand their personal journey to shame them for taking their faith seriously.
Lawal recalled listening to Pastor E.A. Adeboye taught about holiness and said such messages reminded him why he refuses to measure his devotion by other people’s opinions.
“Don’t let people say you are doing too much,” he said.
Sharing part of his own story, Lawal said he once smoked so heavily that he was hospitalised.
“I smoked to the point where they admitted me,” he recalled.
He also said he came to faith in Christ from a Muslim background and that his family, seeing the condition he had been in, did not oppose his decision.
According to Lawal, their response was essentially: “If it is Christ that can make you okay, then go to Him.”
He used the experience to explain why people should be careful about judging someone else’s level of commitment to God.
“You don’t know my story,” he said.
Lawal added that it can be inconsistent for people to freely spend their resources on other pursuits while criticising someone for investing deeply in their faith.
His message was simple: do not allow people who do not understand where God brought you from to determine how seriously you should follow Him.