My Book Review: When Heaven Meets Earth: A Cry for True Kingship

When I first vouchsafed my sight upon Lords of the Heavens, Kings of the Earth by Apostle Kolawole Obaseye my heart fluttered slightly. It was the very title which had weight, as though it were a cry, as though it were a secret not for careless ears. And I knew that I was not going to read just a mere Christian book, I was entering into a holy place where truths which will remain eternal will meet my sinful heart. I felt like I was being watched by the heavens as I opened the first page, and since then I was never the same again. This is not a light read in this book. It is an eye opener. A noisy shout to sleeping hearts of men and women who have lost their identity in God. There is more to it than religion, more to it than prayers, more to it than going to church. No. It has something to do with identity. It is power. It is what the throne of God Himself presents to man. And as I was reading line after line, I felt that this is not a book only, it is prophecy in ink.  At the outset Apostle Obaseye presents an idea that in this world, the earth is not a toy. It is a kingdom as well as a battlefield. Yet this is the cliff-hanging reality-so many of us are in this world treading as though we are slaves, and yet in our creation, we were to be kings. The heavens are in command yet the earth acts to kingship. Who are the kings? This question kept ringing in my soul all through my reading. The writer does not beat around the bush. His words are thunder, but rain. He notes that the problem with many Christians is that they have been content in getting crumbs when in actual sense, God has prepared a throne. Many of us exist in fear, poverty, uncertainties and confusion even forgetting that our father is not only a ruler but the lord of lords. So is He Lord, and what are we? The latter was made very specific that we are not beggars in the kingdom we are heirs. How that truth cut me to the quick. I got the impression that each chapter was a court. Apostle Obaseye was the witness and the prosecutor and I, the reader, was standing trial. He did not spare me, he led me along difficult questions, Am I really living as a child of God? Am I passing in the authority of the Spirit or is it that I am just toting a form of religion that has no power? Am I a churchgoer or am I the king that rules on earth by the Lordship of Christ?   With each page we were getting more and more anxious. I was eagerly awaiting what might come to me by revelation, and clutched my breath in suspense. And when I thought I knew whether he was heading I would open up some greater mystery. He did not talk about the heavens as a far off place, but as something existing now which desires to fight its way into the earth through the lives of the chosen of God. The more that I read, the more I was pervaded with the sense thereof, the sense of that responsibility that sanctifies kingship and that we in it have forfeited. There is no fancy grammar art or theology draped over the writing. No. The images used are short, crisp and straight to the heart. The writer seems to want to avoid some distraction, it almost feels like he did not want some cleverness, no sophistication, just truth. Burning verity. Truth that jars the pillar of mediocrity. And as a Nigerian woman, reading this I felt the fire more deeply. Since I am familiar with how easy it can be to fall into the trap of just enduring here, of existing on food, shelter and grinding, and losing sight that we were created to reign. The threat against a prophet also runs across the book. Gods look down. The earth is weeping. Even creation groans apprehending the revelation of the sons of God. But how much longer do we intend to be blind? So how long will we sit at the feet of sin, doubt and worldly distractions rather than stand in our royal place? That was a question which kept me awake at night. What struck the chord in my mind was the way the writer has made the connection between the permanent throne of heaven and the same soil of earth. He also does not forget that kingship is not a spiritual poetry only, it is practical authority. It is in our praying, in our walking, in our living, in resisting evil, in speaking forth God's word with power. Here in this kingship, Is there no place for fear. Knowing who you are, is what the earth bows only to.    But the suspense does not run out. Although the book enlightens the mysteries, it is still something you wish you had read more on. It arouses a hunger which keeps on the quiet. You would like to read it over again, pray it over again, cry it over again, to pray to God to make you understand His full purpose. Like Apostle Obaseye giving you a key but has left you with a locked door and mutters: The rest depends on how much you are willing to press in. It is awful, but I am broken and built up reading this book. Broken, because I knew what I had been living below my call in. Accumulated, since I felt that heaven had not given up on me. The crown is still glistening, the throne is waiting and the King of Kings is still calling. That struck me to the heart. This is a firm message which is clear that God is not searching for passive Christians. He is even making princes of the skies and rulers of the earth, men and women who will not worship the darkness, who will not be creeping brutes bound to the world by the chains of terror, but who will rule in righteousness, truth and power. Not only pastors, apostles or prophets are meant by this message. It is there for all believers who dare to believe. As a word detective, I find this book to be something larger than the work of literature, it is a spiritual weapon. As a critic, I can claim that the author hit the depths of dodging behind the religious convenience and predicted the real warriors. The only catch which I might call flaw, is that the book does not make you neutral. It is not easy to read it without becoming different. It is required to reform. It requires giving up. It insists that you enter the kingship. To sum up everything before it is hard to say that Lords of the Heavens, Kings of the Earth is the kind of book that you read and then you forget. It is a mirror to which you call back again and again. It is an awakening and trumpet call in the spirit, and it is going to be very soon that the kings are going to wake up. As a female reader who is a Nigerian, I would unashamedly state that this book shook me to the core. It made me remember I am not an average person and my prayers mean something and my fate is big. Be ready should you open its pages. You yourself will be bothered. You will feel tested. You will be busted. Nevertheless you also will rise. And when you stand up, you shall stand up free, A king shall stand up. And maybe that is the grandest appeal of this book that heaven and earth are waiting to have you occupy your place.