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Okay. So you know that the one-month midnight ‘Hallelujah Challenge‘ is the brain child of award-winning Gospel singer, Nathaniel Bassey. And you probably also know that the initiative had over 70,000 PARTICIPANTS cut across social media. You may also be aware that it got featured on CNN. Great! But here are three facts you just may be unaware of.  1.  The singer first heard a teaching on ‘Hallelujah’ from Pastor Eskor Mfon, who was his mentor and pastor of City of David branch of The Redeemed Christian Church of God before he went to glory. 2. Nathaniel got the inspiration for the Challenge when he travelled to Israel this year. 3.  Pastor Poju Oyemade of Covenant Christian Centre indirectly played a part too. Like Nathaniel Bassey says, now you know.

CREATOR of television serial, Heaven’s Gate, Pastor Eskor Mfon, first of five children of Mr. Asuquo Ima Mfon, was a dynamic spiritual leader, devoted philanthropist and an innovative entrepreneur whose illuminating light was unceremoniously extinguished on Monday, April 30, 2007 at the age of 54. Pastor Eskor’s innovative plans were put on hold after a sudden illness in June 2006. After undergoing medical treatment in the UK, he and his family were looking to his return to Lagos, when suddenly the Lord called him to glory. To mark the fifth anniversary of the passage, the leadership of Pastor Eskor Mfon Foundation, a registered non-government organisation that works to provide under-served youth, ages 13 to 26, with the training and exposure required to excel in the visual, performing and literary arts decided to extend a hand of fellowship to the Little Saints Orphanage, Palmgrove, Lagos. PEM Foundation was inaugurated by Pastor (Mrs.) Bimpe Eskor-Mfon in April 2009, as a means of sustaining the late Pastor Eskor Mfon’s dreams of empowering a vibrant generation that would emerge as Nigeria’s greatest leaders. Pastor Eskor was a husband of one wife, Adebimpe (nee Osinulu) with whom he had three children: Oluwatosin, Asuquo and Ima. On hand to receive the delegation, was the president of Little Saints Orphanage, Rev. (Mrs.) Dele George who introduced members of her staff and some of the little saints before taking them to the common room where they watched a documentary on the orphanage. “We try to emulate the excellence of Jesus Christ by giving the saints the very best of food, clothing and education. The first set of graduates will come out of Crawford University this year,” she explained, adding that education is the main focus of the orphanage which was established in June 1994. According to Rev. George, the orphanage, the first to be registered by Lagos State government, has made tremendous impact in the state, stating that it has reduced infant mortality and enhanced adoption rate in the state. Stressing the need for families to foster children, she also noted that 40 of the little saints have been adopted to Netherlands. Responding, the widow of Pastor Eskor, Pastor (Mrs.) Bimpe Mfon with her daughter, Tosin and other members of the Foundation in tow, told the crowd that when the unexpected happened in 2007 she never imagined that she would be able to pull herself together and match on. “The pain of losing my husband would just be pain if we do not impact others. I wonder how he managed to impact others while he was here with us; that is why I want his legacy to continue,” she noted. She later presented numerous packs of food items, drugs and provisions including rice, vegetable oil, noodles detergents, sugar etc. for the inmates of the four homes scattered across the different parts of Lagos, with a promise to return for more partnership with the home. “We will definitely come back,” she promised after a briefing by Little Saints Orphanage on areas of major needs in the home. The delegation which was in a hurry to catch up with other engagements for the rest of the day which including a thanksgiving service at their home and the formal launching of the Pastor Eskor Mfon Foundation, PEM Foundation at the Shell Hall, Muson Centre. Culled from VANGUARD NEWS.( https://www.vanguardngr.com/2012/05/for-orphans-a-reason-to-smile-courtesy-of-pem-foundation/ )

Pastor Bimpe Eskor Mfon was all packed and ready to go home in April 2007, after a harrowing nine months of watching her lifetime partner battle a debilitating ailment, only to lose him, to complications arising from a common bacterial infection. This soft spoken woman has gone ahead to author one book and mid-wife some projects her husband championed, even as she remains on track to celebrate his life through living an exemplary life herself. BIMPE’S LIFE It’s been more than one year and the pain is still very raw. Bimpe is a graduate of French who ran her own business for a number of years, but has, since her husband passed, had to run Tie Communications, his PR and Advertising firm. As Bimpe welcomed me to her office in Surulere Lagos, I could see the pain, in the dullness of her eyes, and beyond that, an uncertainty about what she was about to do; grant an interview on how her life celebrates her late husband, Pastor Eskor Mfon. But as soon as she begins to speak of him a smile slowly lights up her face, and the uncertainty disappears, because, as she says, she believes he is in a better place. ‘’Life goes on. I feel guilty that it does, but it does and God is helping. For me it is not about how long anymore, it is about what you do in that life God gives you, and that gift of life is actually a loan because you don’t even know how long it is for. Whether it is one or one hundred and twenty, it is just a question of eternity, where are we going to spend it? Is it with God or with the devil? It was painful and it is still painful but then what sustains is, number one knowing that my husband is in the Lord and then with the hope of re-union, that when I go, I pray at a good old age, I will meet him again which leads me to the next point, if I know that I want to meet him again, then I must work like he did. Impacting lives not just by preaching, but by living whatever he preached. ESKOR’S LIFE AS A GIFT Making sure that her husband’s work is put down for posterity is one of Bimpe’s way of appreciating the gift that he was to her and many others. Pastor Eskor was the Provincial Pastor of The Redeemed Christian Church of God, Lagos Province 4, Head pf RCCG, Apapa family and Pastor of the City of David, which she says was home to all. ‘’ He was tolerant in everything, he never discriminated against anyone, and City of David was home to all kinds of people. He used to say, ‘leave them, let them come to church, let them hear the word of God, the word of God is like  water, it will wash them, it will cleanse them …’ the one thing that his passing has taught me is that we really need to document things for generations to come, that is why I am transcribing his sermons into book form, because you can bless many by some of the things he did, some of his CD’s, his sermons  … when I listen to them I wonder at the insight he had, he really did have a passion for souls, for Jesus, for the work of the gospel, so that is the best way we can celebrate his life … by putting his works together. He was intolerant of mediocrity because he was driven by excellence, yet he was very considerate of people’s feelings’’. The book she authored early last year, Standing By His Grace, is perhaps the ultimate celebration since it is in fulfilment of the promise she made to God during the period of her husband’s illness, that she would give account of God’s faithfulness at the end of it all. This was around about when her husband was to be discharged. ‘’I am going to write about how God brought us through it all, he also planned to write all about his experience, so in writing this I am actually writing for the two of us even though some of the experiences I can’t describe as well as he would have described them. Writing it was very difficult for me, very painful! I was invited to a book reading recently and after I was called to speak, I couldn’t even say a word. It is still too emotional for me’’. The book gives a blow by blow account of the illness, which started off as a tummy upset, taking them all by surprise as they planned her fiftieth birthday. Of course the celebration never took place, rather it was a seemingly unending hospital stay and spiritual battle they fought for Eskor’s life, as well as the love and support they received from family and friends. Writing about God’s faithfulness even after it seemed death had triumphed, is indeed a celebration of one man who only saw good in others. A man Bimpe has known for more than three decades, and was married to for twenty two years. He fathered her three children, and was indeed her best friend. ‘’i remember one of my children said, ‘mummy we were always telling you to have friends, you had only daddy, what are you going to do now?’ I said, well I will make you my best friends now that daddy has gone. Friends used to tease me that Eskor was my only ministry. But you know, given the responses I’ve been getting, it’s all been worth it writing the book. It proves true what my friend Debbie told me ‘you are writing for a woman whose husband is still alive’, I guess it could help women realise that life and loved ones have to be constantly appreciated. COPING WITH THE LOSS Her coping strategy may sound trite to some, but Bimpe says… Continue reading Bimpe Holding On, To CELEBRATE LIFE.