DIVINE APPOINTMENTS: ‘Sex is a spiritual act’

14 Dec, 2014 - 00:12 0 Views
DIVINE APPOINTMENTS: ‘Sex is a spiritual act’

The Sunday Mail

1212-1-1-DIVINE APPOINTMENTSFounder and Senior Pastor of Glory Ministries, Apostle Pride Sibiya, says his book (“Lets Talk About Sex Babe!”) is dedicated to youths who are battling with the storms of growing up. Tendai Manzvanzvike (TM) spoke to Apostle Sibiya (PS) about his ministry’s work with youths.

TM: Let’s start off with who Apostle Pride Sibiya is.

PS: Apostle Sibiya is a young gospel minister married to Anna Tendai and has been blessed with three beautiful daughters. I am a holder of a Masters degree in Religious Studies from the University of Zimbabwe and also a Pastoral Studies Diploma from Domboshava Theological College.

I am the founder of Glory Ministries, which we founded in 2001 when I was about 25-years-old. We are based in Zengeza, Chitungwiza. We have five main branches which include Glory Tabernacle Church and Youth Alight.

TM: How did Glory Ministries start?

PS: I was an evangelist in the United Methodist Church when God started to speak to me to start a ministry. I went to my leadership and we talked it over for about six hours before the church released me. That’s how we started Glory Ministries.

For the first service, I was actually alone, and the second service we were three and for the third service there were about 10 of us. We had open air services and people would come, but by the grace of God, we have been growing slowly but surely. We now have a number of assemblies around the country and in the region.

TM: How did the one person service feel like?

PS: I felt like I was alone but what kept me was the peace of God for the Bible says in Philippians 4:7 “And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus”. My heart was kept by the sense of satisfaction that at least I was doing what the Creator wanted me to do.

TM: Let’s turn to your youth ministry – Youth Alight. What is it that you do with young people?

PS: I have a burden for young people. I still qualify to be a youth, and at the same time, I have passed through my youth life. So, I feel that I’m responsible for closing the generation gap.

Just like Daniel in the Bible who says he was taken out of the Promised Land into captivity as a youth, but when he entered the king’s palace he “purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the king’s meat, nor with the wine which he drank.” (Daniel 1:8)

In that regard, I think that the youth should have a purpose inside of them to say we will not defile ourselves with whatever is happening in the world. There is a statement that says, “everyone is doing it”, but it’s the responsibility of the youth to say whilst everyone is doing it, I purpose in my heart that I will not defile myself with what is currently happening or corrupt myself.

One of the major things that I feel is a challenge with the youth is the issue of premarital sex. We have tried to discourage our youth from premarital sex.

Many people think that it has to do with fear of HIV and Aids. But I personally think that God did not give us a Spirit of fear to try and stop us from engaging in premarital sex.

It’s important to go back to the word of God to find the original purpose of sex. You will realise that the original purpose of sex is that in the beginning, God made man and woman to be together. That’s why Eve was resident within Adam. But because God felt that Adam wanted a helper, he took Eve out of Adam. Jesus Christ says he never meant for the two to be separate, but to be one.

So, the purpose of sex is for the two that God separated in the beginning and made one. Sex is not just some adult amusement; it’s actually a deeper thing, a spiritual thing whereby the two become one.

However, many of our youths have become one with 40+ people because they think that sex is amusement. Yet sex is a spiritual thing.

I also want to say that apart from an embryo being in the womb of a mother, the only closest way where you open up your soul, spirit and body with a person is through sex. This is why in 1 Corinthians 6 Paul says, it’s not proper for us to have fornication because we will be sinning against ourselves: “but whoever sins sexually, sins against their own body”.

TM: Some end up doing it because of peer pressure, and there is so much of it on TV, the Internet, basically everywhere. How can young people avoid the peer pressure and say that they want to preserve themselves until that moment when they have that spiritual relationship with the partner that God has given them?

PS: It begins with a purpose. You cannot completely shut yourself off from the world. You might say I’ll not watch TV but with the way things are and with the progression of technology, it’s very hard.

It begins with the purpose of the heart. It begins with you receiving Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour. When you do that, the Holy Spirit will help you have the fruits of the Spirit, one of which is self-control.

In my book “Let’s Talk about Sex Babe!”, I tell youths to stop private visits to their fiancé, watching sexual films, to be careful about the music they listen to, to avoid peer pressure or bad company that corrupts, and more.

TM: But you still have problems within the church with young people engaging in premarital sex . . .

PS: In the first chapter of my book, I talk about how – as a young man – one of the church elders said to me: you are young, you don’t know life’s challenges. I told him that it was not about knowing life’s challenges, but as youths we also have challenges at our level.

I shared with him that I had been in love with a lady for seven years, and for those years I never kissed her or touched her breast. I told him that it was a challenge for me, but I overcame it. What I got from the elder was that youths do not have challenges or they take it that what the youths are experiencing is not real life.

TM: Is it possible for the church to teach about sex to primary school children?

PS: That’s why we are here. Church is a place where people come to learn. It is the responsibility of the church to teach the community. Although it is still like taboo to talk about sex, but from a psychological point of view, you only have your children to yourself from when they are born up to when they are ten-years-old. After that, direct them to the Lord.

So from one to 10, that’s when we have to tell them about these things. The Bible says in Proverbs 22:6, “Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.” So, we have to tell them because if we don’t, the world will tell them the corrupted version.

TM: Is this what is happening?

PS: Yes! The world is giving them a corrupted version. So, we really need to do it when they are still young – sit them down and explain these things so that they understand rather than tell them in this day and age when they ask where the baby came from and you say we bought it at the clinic. But when they turn 12, they know that something is happening.

TM: Apart from premarital, young people have other challenges. There is abuse of drugs and alcohol. How are you addressing these issues?

PS: The best way is the solid preaching of the gospel – the true teaching of God’s moral standards – what God expects. We also have practical programmes where we deal with these issues.

For example, we have “Dare Ravarume” for men, not necessarily for believers, where even boys come. The girls’ issues are dealt with under “Her Glory”, a ministry for women and girls (“Girls dzaMoms”).

We deal with these problems from a community point of view. We don’t want to confine them to a church service. We talk around the issues without necessarily condemning them. We stretch out a helping hand to say we are here for you.

We also hold concerts where we go down to their level to attract them. Many run away from the church because they think that God’s standards are boring, church is boring. We win them over that way, apart from prayer and the word of God.

TM: What is the success rate?

PS: This started two years ago, but the success rate registered so far is seeing young people opening up to the servants of God. For me it’s a success to have young people trust me with their secrets.

TM: But there is a feeling that there is too much condemnation from the pulpit, which makes it difficult to confide in the men and women of God…

PS: Coupled with that is the issue of confidentiality. There are two ways of ministering the word of God: the Pharisaic way whereby you are holy and separated from people and everyone knows that you cannot say things to the man of God. You condemn people.

But God has not given us a Spirit of condemnation because Romans 1:8 says, for those that are in Christ Jesus there is no more condemnation. So you don’t condemn, but actually bring people closer to you.

Jesus Christ was God but in order to win us, He had to come to us, to be with us and be one with us so that he could win us. So, the moment you become too foreign, you won’t win anyone.

TM: You have a youth convention starting at the end of this week…

PS: In a week’s time we will hold the Kabob (Glory) Youth Festival. But I want to appeal to us all to continue to pray for the nation of Zimbabwe. I believe that every nation has got a destiny and the nation of Zimbabwe has been known as the bread basket of the region. It all starts in the spirit. We are the bread basket, and we have never failed to be one in the spiritual realm. That’s part of our destiny.

When you look at the spiritual side, you realise that spiritual ministers that come from Zimbabwe are providing bread. Look at people like Bishop Tudor Bismark, Baba Ezekiel Guti. These are not just Zimbabwean fathers. They are breaking bread at an international level.

Even though Zimbabwe is a house of bread, there are times when God allows us to go though certain things but it will remain Bethlehem. We are the house of bread. After this season, there will come another season where there will be restoration, and in the physical, people will realise that Zimbabwe never ceased to be the house of bread.

 

Prayer for Zimbabwe

Father, we thank you in Jesus’ name. We thank you for the nation of Zimbabwe. Father, we thank you for whatever we are going through because we know that you have allowed whatever we are going through, and in you we will put our trust.

Father, we pray especially in accordance to what we have been discussing regarding the youth of our nation. We know that you have given these to us. We know they are the present and future of our nation.

Father, we pray for them that they become Godly people. We pray that the hand of the Lord may hover and brood over their lives.

Turn them to your Godly ways oh Lord. We release your Spirit upon them and upon our nation, in the mighty name of Jesus Christ. Amen!

 

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