Christianity and burial carnivals
Joseph lost his mother at a tender age. He was hated by his brothers who plotted to kill him and sold him into slavery. He made it. Ruth was a widow with no future; she made it as a result of her choice to follow her mother-in-law Naomi and her God.
Esther was an orphan who was raised by a senior cousin in a foreign land; she became queen. Rahab was a prostitute with a bad reputation; she entered into the genealogy of Christ. Jephthah was the son of a prostitute; he became one of the Judges of Israel.
David was the youngest of eight sons of Jesse who was not considered fit to be king. Even after he was anointed, he became a victim of one the hottest pursuits in human history. He made it to the throne.
A widow lost her husband and inherited a huge debt for which her two sons were about to be taken as slaves. God turned her situation around.
God made you a winner, a victorious person. You are destined to win. You are destined for the top. You are the head and not the tail. You are above and not beneath. Rise and take your position!
The seed of greatness is in you. You can’t afford to be a loser. § Losers are never celebrated. § Losers never know fulfilment. § Losers are always relegated. § Losers are despised. § Losers have no friends. The loser’s world is a lonely world. Losers are miserable and frustrated. §
In his book, African Religions and Philosophy, the renowned African philosopher John S. Mbiti says: “For the Africans, death is a separation and not an annihilation; the dead person is suddenly cut off from the human society and yet the corporate group clings to him. This is shown through the elaborate funeral rites, as well as other methods of keeping in contact with the departed.” The relatives of the dead believe that even though the soul of their dead one has gone up to meet the ancestors, it remains also near to them and can be approached through prayers, libations and offerings. Many African cultures believe that the more lavish the burial rites of the dead, the more rousing the welcome the soul of the dead is accorded in the domain of the ancestors. This thought accounted for, and still accounts for, the robust funeral celebrations in the African society.
With the advent of Christianity, the meaning and theology of death have been significantly altered. Christians believe that the appearance of death on the human horizon is the consequence of the disobedience of our first parents Adam and Eve. However, Jesus Christ, by his death and resurrection from the dead, has transformed the meaning of death as an inherited curse for sin to the gateway of eternal life with God. Because Christ died and rose again, Christians believe firmly that God will bring to dwell with Christ all
You are not a loser, and you will never be numbered among losers.
God did not design you to fail. Look at the human body and you will understand what I am saying. God furnished the human body with everything it needs to succeed.
When God made man He gave him a mandate: Genesis 1:26-28, “And God said let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth: And God blessed them, and God said unto them, be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
1. He should have and operate in the image of God. A man or woman who does have the image of God is a failed product.
2. He should be financially and materially. 3. He should be physically sound. 4. He should be spiritually and emotionally sound.
5. He should exercise dominion. He should be able to dominate and not be dominated by anything or anyone but God. By this statement God also spoke your enemies into existence. There would have been no need for the word subdue if there will be no resistance and opposition. Many get disappointed that they are blessed those who have died believing in him. For this reason, our sense of grief at the passing of a loved one is moderated by our faith in the resurrection of the dead. For in death, life is changed, not ended.
This view of death has both historical and philosophical roots. It goes back to the Greek thought on death, which was decisively shaped by Plato. Plato’s notion of death was both dualistic and idealistic. Matter was looked upon as a bad thing. Only the spirit counted as genuinely positive and God-like. On the strength of this view, the human person is a strange creature in which the two contrary realities of matter and spirit coincide. He held that the divine flame of the spirit is imprisoned in the dungeon of the body. The way of the wise man, accordingly, is to treat the body as the tomb of the soul and to prepare himself for immortality through such enmity to the prison house. Death, then, is the great moment when the gates of that prison house are flung wide open and the soul steps forth into that freedom and immortality which are its by right. Death is man’s true friend, his liberator from the unnatural chains of matter.
As presented by Plato, Socrates is an exponent of this idealistic interpretation of death. He celebrated his own dying as a festal journey from the sickness of bodily life to the health of true living. At the moment of death, he asks that a cock be sacrificed to Aesculapius, the customary sacrifice offered in gratitude for a recovery. Death not getting an easy ride. Your mandate gave you the right of dominion.
6. He should be fruitful in everything he does.
7. He should keep on growing and multiplying.
You were designed to be fruitful, creative, productive, effective, prosperous and responsible. You were created to be the head and not the tail; above and not beneath. You were designed to be a winner and not a loser; a victor and not a victim. God created you to express His success on earth; to reflect His nature and show you off to principalities and powers. He planned for you to be fat and flourishing. 1. • Ignorance. Failure to understand one’s purpose leading to satanic distractions and diversions. Ignorance of success principles. company and counsel. Spiritual problems. Unresolved ancestral sins and curses. Unresolved personal sins. Demonic oppression, witchcraft and occult manipulation, Neglect of God. Joshua 1:8 God is getting ready to turn things around for you. The Bible says when the Lord turned our captivity we were like them that dream. • 2. 3. • • • 4.
1. Success us not a destination you arrive at; it is a life-style that produces positive results. 2. It is an attitude. 3. It is choosing to believe the here is interpreted as emergence from the diseased semblance of life which is this world into real and lasting health. Of course, biblical thought, by contrast, sees man in his undivided wholeness and unity as God’s creature, not a dualistic being that can be sliced down the middle into body and soul. However, the full conspectus of the Christian teaching on death finds its deepest understanding in the person of Jesus, who gives life and death a new meaning. The biblical hope expressed in the resurrection gives death a new identity and a new meaning within the Christian economy of salvation. Those who believe in Jesus and who hold the teaching of the Christian faith see death from an entirely different worldview.
For a Christian who believes in the reality of the resurrection, this religious instinct places moderation on his celebration of the dead. There are still many cultural practices carried out during funeral rites that are antithetical to the tenets of Christianity. The clash of religion and culture is one area that remains a battlefield in our attempt to build a civilisation that is marked by values that are true, good, beautiful, noble, right, pure, admirable, praiseworthy, honourable and excellent. In many places, Christians who say they have accepted the teachings of Jesus Christ and the values associated with the Christian Gospel are still clinging to ancestral worship and the prescriptions of ancestral rites and cultic practices. We still hear of dehumanizing cultural practices during funeral rites. best about yourself. Some people only believe the worst things about themselves. They major on their faults and weaknesses. Most people don’t believe in themselves because they don’t know themselves.
You are more valuable than you think.
4. It is starving your weaknesses and feeding your strength.
5. It is not an accident; it is a choice. It is choosing to enjoy what you do. It is choosing to do the right things.
6. It is making success decisions and committing to implementing them daily. You succeed not the day it manifests but the day you commit to success decisions and managing them daily.
7. It is taking success steps daily. Some people have the
They wait for a big break, a big leap to the top:
8. It is refusing to be ruled by the opinion of others. You must realize that first you cannot satisfy or please everyone. Secondly, he who points out my fault is helping me because he shows me where I need to make improvements. It is not a problem if someone says my nose is crooked. It is a problem if it remains crooked after that.
9. It is refusing to allow your stumbling stones to become tomb stones; instead, it is turning them into stepping stones. Stop regretting your past and start planning for a glorious future. This is one area where we really need an evangelisation of culture and a prescription for the genuine conversion of the African traditional humanity.
On the issue of burial carnivals in Nigeria, it is well known in many parts of the world that Nigerians are a boisterous people who love life and like to celebrate lavishly. The character of the average Nigerian is one that is exhibitionistic in outlook. In this light, lavish burial celebrations are a typical Nigerian phenomenon. Ours is a society where wealth and all its trappings command maximum social respect. The more money you have to throw around the more respect and recognition you get. In this social setting of twisted values, that places no restraint on pomp and ostentation, men and women who have insatiable ego for spectacle and glamour and a ballooned sense of their own self-importance find it very expedient to assert their financial power in brazen forms of public exhibition. In living and spending lavishly, they entertain themselves and others with the humane achievements of their wealth. This is partly why burials in Nigeria are conducted as carnivals where the rich display their wealth and the poor are invited to come and eat.
Some people have asked whether a funeral should mourn a death or celebrate a life. The answer cuts across the spectrum. Some funerals are seen as “a painful and sorrowful exit.” This is especially true when the dead is a young person who has not enjoyed the benefit of longevity. The deceased is often said to die prematurely, before his time. This is the thinking in our cultural
10. It is turning your adversities into opportunities; your tests into testimonies, pain into gain, your mess into a message.
11. It is the ability to bounce back from defeat.
12. It is choosing to be a starter and a finisher.
13. It is having and displaying the spirit of a changer. 14. It is being teachable. 15. It is identifying your best qualities and developing them to the fullest.
16. It is developing yourself to become valuable and needed in the society.
17. It is finding out who you are sent to and serving them.
18. It is going where you are celebrated and not where you are tolerated.
19. It is obeying all the commandments of God or obeying God in all things and trusting Him for everything. Joshua
20. It is raising a successor and leaving a good legacy.
God will connect you to helpers of your destiny and you will fly high from now on, in Jesus name. surrounding where long life is seen as a blessing of God, and a brief life a tragedy. In the occasion where the deceased enjoyed longevity, the funeral is seen as “a celebration of life.” This means that the deceased lived life to the fullest. It is here that lavish parties and carnivals are rolled out to celebrate the life of the deceased. Many funerals today are not about mourning death but a “celebration of life.” As our culture discards all-black attire and other formalities of a traditional funeral, families create more personalizedand often more upbeat-experiences to honour the deceased.
However, we should always remember that death is a signpost of human finitude. It reminds us of the tragedy of sin, just as it calls to mind the grace of human redemption in Christ Jesus. Seen in this light, funerals should impose upon us a spirit of sobriety and moderation in the way we live. From the Christian perspective, burial carnivals are a waste of resources and an unnecessary show-off. The idea that the living would go to the extent of bankrupting themselves to commit the dead to the ground should offend Christian sensibility which sees death, not as final annihilation, but as a transition to new life that never ends. The Islamic rites of burial can offer us a convincing ideal about the need to apply simplicity and moderation in funeral celebrations. As Christians who look to “the things that are above,” an overly materialistic and consumerist attitude to funerals in this passing world calls to question the quality of our faith in the resurrection of the dead.