Prophetess Mercy Ayorinde is the mercurial and very supportive wife of Nigeria’s frontline crusader, Prophet Dr Samson Ayorinde, General Overseer, World Evangelism Bible Church, Ogudu Lagos. In this interview with Christian Benefits, she shares the hard training regiments she received from her firebrand husband which she says adequately prepared her for the roles she plays in his ministry.
Beside every successful man there is a woman, as a saying goes. Ma, you give a tremendous support to the ministry of your husband, Prophet Dr. Samson Ayorinde. How did you and this great servant of God meet?
Please, let me correct the above expression. I will say beside the success of Prophet Dr. Samson Ayorinde it is God. Whatever support I give or the role I play in his ministry it is still God. My husband and I attended the Ahmadu Bello University, (ABU) Zaria, Kaduna state. We met when he was rounding off his master’s degree programme while I was preparing for the NYSC when he came visiting my aunt with whom I lived in Kaduna. After he ministered to my aunt, he asked me why I didn’t attend church. Originally I came from a Muslim family, but I was already a deaconess at Gospel Ministry International Church, Kaduna before we met each other.
How did that first contact eventually translate to your marriage to him?
After my NYSC my mummy as I to call my aunt because she was the one brought me up, took me to him for prayers for a job interview at three places, including at ABU. In the course of the visit, my mum added that he should also pray for a good husband for me. I said I wasn’t looking for husband but job. He prayed for me and told me I would be offered a job at ABU, and not too long I secure a job at ABU as he prophesized. Prophet Samson Ayorinde has always been seeing vision ever since I met him. As my mum requested he also prayed and gave me in riddles the description of the man that would marry me. He said the man is watching down from a staircase at the person down the staircase to come up. Along the line, he told me the Lord spoke to him that I’m his wife. We prayed about it, and later courted for three years before we got married. We had been married now for 31 years on, but we have known each other for 34 years. He still jokes with me till now that I don’t know he was the man up the staircase watching me down the staircase to come up.
How did you secure the approval of your Islamic parents to marry a pastor?
When I got born again I stopped going home on holidays for about four years. When my parents heard that I became a Christian they were annoyed. So, I decided I won’t go home until after my wedding. When I told my father that the person I was bringing home as my intending partner is a Christian he said we should not come. Yet we waited for his approval. That was the reason our courtship spanned three years. It was father in the Lord that married me out but all that my parents require for the marriage were monetized and banked in my father’s bank account. When my father heard that my wedding card was out he eventually gave his approval and invited us to come home for our wedding. Unfortunately, the wedding card was already out with Kaduna as the venue. However, we changed the introduction to our family house in Kogi state. My mother didn’t attend the introduction because my father would have fought her for my decision to marry a Christian. But she attended our wedding in Kaduna after she had sent people to beg my father because she didn’t want to be absent at the wedding of first daughter.
Have you been with the prophet from the onset of WEBIC?
We attended different ministries before he started his ministry when our marriage was about four years. When he heard God’s voice telling him to begin his ministry fully he went into marathon fasting and prayer for confirmation. He later resigned from the ministry where he served and began as an itinerant minister; ministering from place to place; Lagos, Kaduna, Ilorin among others. He started as a freelance minister until God instructed him to have a church base and which we started in the house of one of our Assistant Genera Overseers (AGOs) in Ogudu, Lagos in 1995.
The prophet actually is not a church person. He is evangelistic inclined. He started the ministry by holding crusade from place to place. Wherever he held a successful crusade he would put someone be in-charge of the flock or most times turn the flock over to the churches where the crusades are held to nurturing for Christ.
What keeps both of you going strongly in the ministry over the years?
The prophet is a man that often hears God speaks to him. And he obediently abides whenever God speaks to him. Immediately, he discovered his purpose in life as a prophet of God and evangelistic by nature, he faithfully keeps to his life purpose.
Tell us about the role you play in his ministry
Foremost, I’m his prayer partner and a prayer warrior in his ministry. In the early days, as far as his crusade outreach was concerned I only packed his luggage for crusade until later years when I sought for, and got his permission to be involved in his crusade by holding morning session meeting with women during his crusade to minister to fellow women on how to serve God better and on other matters relating to women, including the issue of the fruit of the womb. I also minister to the youths that are waiting for the right husbands at the session. As far as the church is concerned, I always wanted to be at the back until my husband encouraged me and taught me how to preach. In those days he would take me to a bush and ask me to preach to trees as if they are human beings. He will instruct me to shout praise God at the tree and he would shout halleluiah on their behalf. After I finish preaching to trees he would score me. Each time he took me to the bush to preach to trees I tried to beat is previous marks. That was how I developed my preaching skills.
Please share with us some of the things you and the prophet denied yourselves for the monumental success that people are seeing in WEBIC today?
My husband and I do fasting and prayer a lot. By the grace of God I have done 40days fasting and prayer three times since inception of this commission. For my husband his marathon fasting is countless. We fast in January and July every year.
How do you effectively combine your roles as a wife, mother and preacher?
I will answer this from the book of Judges 4:4. Deborah was a prophetess, at the same time the wife of Lapidoth. I believe she was also a mother. These are three offices in the life of women that must not clash. I’m just in church doing the work of the ministry. Immediately I return home I become a wife to my husband and mother to my biological children. I leave the church quickly after service for home to play my domestic role as a wife and mother. I personally cook for my husband.
How will you describe the prophet as a husband, father and God’s servant?
As God’s servant my husband is very passionate about God. He’s always in-door in God’s presence praying whenever he has no ministry engagement outside. As a father, he is a very loving and responsible father and too playful with the children. As a husband, the prophet is very loving and caring to me. If my husband goes out and he is given ordinary as puff-puff he will bring it home for me. He buys gift for me and promptly attends to my needs. He even pays for my hairdo.
Did you study architecture at the Ahmadu Bello University as your husband?
I studied poultry science at the agricultural college of the Ahmadu Bello University. I did general agriculture. In my HND I specialized in poultry science.
Are you fulfilled as a minister of God without practicing your profession?
I’m greatly fulfilled! If I had practiced my profession, I may have end up ministering to fowls and chicken. I’m better off ministering to human beings. I easily get concerned with people’s needs, welfare and challenges. I always see God using me to help people in need.
What is your vision for WEBIC in the next two years?
Our vision is to pay more attention to the educational arm of the church. We also have a vision for fertility hospital to expand our fruitfulness outreach programme.
Tell us more about your Operate Fruitfulness outreach for waiting mothers
Besides the gift of dream, I’m also gifted in ministering to women waiting on the Lord for the fruit of the womb. I do Operate Fruitfulness quarterly programme. Annually, I do Thou Shall Not Be Barren programme. After my first 40days fasting and prayer, my husband, my pastor and my prophet, removed is Agbada (flowing gown), put it on me as a mantle and declared that that is the area of the ministry God wants me to operate to wipe tears from the eyes of women waiting on him for babies, and he anointed me for that assignment. So, I have the delegated authority of the servant of God, Prophet Dr. Samuel Ayorinde to function in that department for over a decade now. The testimonies have been awesome.
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