We expect salvation, not rape in church

Rosenthal Mutakati Ghetto Blast
Not in the aftermath of this Gumbura episode!
Barely a week after the country has turned its back on RMG End Time Message leader Robert Martin Gumbura, who was jailed 40 years for raping his female congregants and with another such case still pending at the High Court, it would be foolhardy for a reasonable man to let his wife leave for church alone without asking one or two questions.
Those quick to anger will slap the wife, while those who weigh facts before jumping to conclusions will ask to accompany the wife.

“Manje kana iri yekuchechi motomira tobaya tose. Ukangoenda wega wobva wangozvizivira hako kuti wedu muchato waparara sedova,” you hear men defending their rightful positions.

Of all the things that can be shared in the world, a woman is not one such.
“Kana chiri chibvumirano varume tigotenderana/Kana tatadza kuwirirana varume tocheka hukama/Vakomana musanditorera, mwana uyu ndinomuda/Maivepiko machinda?/Pandakamusarudza kumuzinda/Iyi nyaya inoperera kumarinda,” sang Jah Prayzah in this song titled Chibvumirano.

True to the song, a person who plays games with another’s wife is worse than a witch whose only acceptable punishment is, in the barbaric world, death.
I am not anti-Christ and will never be, but events of the past few weeks are likely to result in the number of people attending church services dwindling.
The world is begging for answers as to why pastors with a record of sexually abusing women have flocks that are growing by the day.

Is it a search of wonder workers, visionaries or riches that is making people not see the light?
Day in day out church leaders are being made to stand in the dock over accusations of deflowering maidens in church, impregnating married women and even stealing from members of their flock, but people just won’t stop going there. Kwadzinorohwa matumbu ndiko kwadzinomhanyira.

Just like driving a car, checks and balances and even a competence test must be demanded for someone to lead a church.
Church leaders must possess certain qualities to ensure their doctrines do not poison the religious communities they lead.

Lack of leadership qualities affects the way people worship and erodes confidence in God, making sin establish roots in the church and nearby communities. It is better to nip the problem in the bud than having to deal with the contagion effect of lawlessness.

The Bible lists qualities which church leaders must have and I doubt charismatic church leaders of today possess these.
1 Timothy 3:1-7 reads: “The saying is trustworthy: If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task. Therefore, an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. He must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive, for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God’s church?”

Acts 20:28 says, “Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.”

“Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you,” reads Hebrews 13:17.

The Gumbura case is likely to trigger marriage breakdowns as men seek to establish whether their spouses genuinely attend church services or do so to unlock sexual favours from their leaders.

The communities in which we live are awash with cases of bishops and other men of the cloth using titles ranging from priest to pastor, prophet, messenger, leader, Father or baba vezvemweya wrecking the marriages of the people they lead.

Women who wake up early in the morning to clean the priest’s quarters have since time immemorial been accused of having intimate relationships with these religious leaders.

Some have gotten away with it, while a handful have been caught and humiliated.
Only this week, H-Metro ran a story of a “prophet” who ran away from Domboshava to Mahusekwa with a married man’s wife and child.

The woman at the centre of the storm had the cheek to tell reporters that the said prophet performed better in bed than her husband.
Only God knows when these two started cheating, giving the wife the chance to compare her husband’s masculinity with that of the love poacher.

A Harare man appeared in court this week seeking to divorce his wife because she attended Gumbura’s church on the guise of attending that led by Prophet Emmanuel Makandiwa.

Godfrey Chapata told the court that he suspected his wife Amina Mahlatini of having had sexual relations with Gumbura.
Gentle reader, it’s not a one-size-fits-all approach. Not all women who go to church do so in return for sexual favours, neither is it true that every woman who attends church gets raped.

But the problem is that of trust and the few who have misbehaved will spoil the broth for their rather committed peers who attend church in search of God and nothing else.
Attending church trips or even funerals away from home is going to be extremely difficult for most married people.

Their spouses will always voice concern and in some cases refuse to finance the trip so that it does not materialise.
People go to church to seek God and there is no harm in ensuring they worship freely without challenges to their marriages and health.
Gentle reader, most people today do not go to church for fear of being contaminated by views of their leaders.

In the aftermath of the Gumbura case, pastors and other religious leaders must thoroughly search their souls and ensure they effectively serve the interests of Yahweh.
Visiting the houses of parishioners, unless invited, is going to be tricky for pastors.

Known prostitutes are even challenging the morality of people who go to church.
“I am better because I do not lie to anyone. These people who go to church are the worst sinners. They first have to be pure before lying to God about morality. Chinonzi kunamata moyo wemunhu, kwete mahareruya asingapere,” I heard a sloshed woman saying at a bar in Glen Norah last weekend.

Gentle reader, let churches remain houses of God and not dens of robbers.

Inotambika mughetto.