ABIODUN LONGE: “MY DADDY’S FAITH BECOMES SIGHT” – Tolu Ajileye

ABIODUN LONGE: “MY DADDY’S FAITH BECOMES SIGHT” – Tolu Ajileye

I will enter His gates with thanksgiving in my heart, I will enter His courts with praise. I will say this is the day that the Lord has made, I will rejoice for He has made me glad.

This was one of my dad’s favorite choruses. He would sing it with so much joy and gusto! Well, that song is his reality now. He has finally entered into the very presence of God. I can only imagine his full, unadulterated joy but for me, it’s bittersweet. My heart is filled with joy when I think of him in the arms of his Savior, free from arthritis and his sight fully restored. Then I remember that I won’t see or hear him again on this side of eternity – it breaks my heart. I mourn but not as the world does. I mourn with hope because I know I shall be with him again in eternity never to be parted again.

I feel so blessed and grateful to God because in His mercy, He chose him to be my father. No child gets to choose his/her parents. Daddy was my bible teacher. He would always encourage me to be a Bearean Christian. Don’t just accept it because I said so. Read the scriptures yourself, he would say. I’ll miss all our talks and the way he was intentional about family. I’ll miss his prayers and his counsels. I’ll miss the sound of his hearty laughter.

My father was not a sinless man but he was a man that loved the Lord and people. His love was genuine. I learnt from him how to love my spouse, children and all whom God in His providence brings my way.

Growing up, it was a given in our home that artisans would be served food after working. On a particular day, I was home from school. My dad had a friend visiting and I set the table for him to eat. Later that day, an artisan came to work and I served him food when he was done. After he left, my dad called me and said he thought I told him I was saved? I said yes, wondering where the conversation was going to. He told me Christianity was about obeying and pleasing God and that included treating all men with dignity and respect! He asked me why I went all out to set the table for his friend and then served the artisan as though he begged me for food. He added that even if he had begged me for food, he should still be treated with respect because he was equally God’s creation irrespective of the circumstance God’s providence had allotted to him. I repented of an attitude I never realized I had and that lesson has stayed with me ever since.

My dad introduced me to reformed theology. I remember coming home from the campus and finding a book with the word “reformed theology” on it. I almost freaked out because my mind went straight to the reformed Ogboni fraternity. That was all I could connect with the word “reformed”. I asked him about it immediately. He then took time to explain to me and gave me a few books to read. I came back to him with a lot of questions and he patiently took me through scriptures. He later went on to teach at the Lagos Bible Conference till he practically lost his eyesight due to glaucoma and could no longer minister at churches.

When I married my husband, he wasn’t reformed. A few years later, the Lord opened his eyes to the truth of God’s word. I remember asking my dad why he accepted my husband and gave us his blessing when he knew he wasn’t reformed. Daddy told me that having interacted with my husband at length, he knew as much as it was humanly possible to know that he was saved. Having prayed, he said he was sure it was only a matter of time before the Lord opened his eyes. And that was exactly what happened!

I don’t know the counsels he gave my husband when they had their talks together but he would ask me from time to time if I was respecting and submitting to my husband. He would say, “Tolu, Alaba is a good man. Don’t fall into the temptation of taking him for granted.”

I have so many wonderful memories of his love, care and guidance. That’s all I have left of him and I’ll cherish them forever. For a long time, the thought of losing my daddy filled me with dread but when the thought of losing him started painting a picture in my mind of heaven gaining him, I knew it was a sign that the time was near though I still struggled. He talked about his death as though he was talking about going next door to see a friend and I would say daddy it’s not time. I’m not ready to let you go. He would reply saying all the saints of old have gone and he can’t be an exception. We’d both laugh and move on to other conversations.

On the 1st of January this year, I called him to wish him a happy new year because we had moved to Abuja a few months before. I asked him how he was feeling (he had arthritis). Normally, He would reply that though the outward man was perishing, the inward man was daily renewed. This time, he said, “I’m fine but waiting for my Saviour to call me home and I hope it would be this year”. My mum said he had been telling her the same thing. She said he told her she would miss him but he wanted to go home to rest. His Saviour did call him home on the 16th of February. His faith had finally become sight! He is safe and at rest in his Father’s arms.

A BRIEF BIOGRAPHY OF PASTOR ABIODUN LONGE

Olusegun Abiodun Longe was born on Christmas day of 1941 in Ilesha, the then Western Region of Nigeria to Pa Jacob Ajayi Longe and Madam Abigail Adebimpe Longe, both of blessed memory who were committed members of the Otapete Methodist Church, Ilesha.

He started his formal education at Otapete Methodist School, Ilesha in 1949. He moved to Methodist School, Kano in 1952 and later to Holy Trinity Anglican School, Kano in 1952 where he learnt to speak Hausa. He was in Offa Grammar School from 1959-1963. He worked in Ibadan as Fisheries Assistant with the Western Region Government in 1964 (one of the six young men first employed as Fisheries Assistant by the government). Due to boredom, he decided to resign and pick up a teaching appointment with Methodist High School Ibadan. He found this much more fulfilling though many saw it as an unusual action at the time. Towards the end of 1964, he was employed as a clerk by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Lagos.

In September of 1965, he resigned his appointment with the CBN to proceed to Federal Advanced Teacher’s College which later became College of Education, University of Lagos. This shows the power of ambition as he would rather get an education than be satisfied with being a junior staff in a lucrative industry which was the vogue at that time. He obtained the Nigeria Certificate in Education in June of 1968. His teaching career was limited to only long vacation periods as he immediately went in to study pharmacy at the University of Ife in Ibadan, where the Lord encountered him in October 1968. He obtained B.Pharm Hons in June 1972.

He married the then Miss Olufunmilayo Malomo in 1972. They are blessed with 2 girls, 4 boys, their spouses, and 15 grandchildren.

His pharmaceutical career started with Federal Ministry of Health, Federal Medical Laboratory, Yaba (1972-1973). J.L Morrison Son &Jones Ltd. (1974-79) rising to the post of Marketing Manager. He later moved on to RT Briscoe where he was the Executive of Bristol Myers Products. He was with Menley and James (an arm of Smithkline&French Ltd) where he was Country Manager till he resigned to set up his own business, Gloryland Healthway Laboratory Ltd. He remained its president until the call of God to pastor the Upper Room Baptist Church in 1994.

He was a Fellow of the Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria.

He was a committed member of the Scripture Union, having served on its Area Committee in Lagos State. He was a deacon and Trustee of Shepherd Hill Baptist Church (Obanikoro) until 1987 when what we now know as Upper Room Baptist Church began as a Fellowship Group after some 17 families left Shepherd Hill Baptist Church. He became the Church Leader of URBC in October, 1987. He became the General Overseer of URBC and was ordained as a pastor by Pastor E.A Adeboye of the RCCG on the 8th of July 1995. He voluntarily retired and handed over to Pastor Oluleke Akinola on December 31, 2003.

Pastor Longe was a lover of people. He loved his wife dearly and was a wonderful father and grandfather. He loved God and held firmly to the truth of God’s word. The Holy Scripture was for him, the final authority on all that pertained to life and godliness. He was a lover and preacher of complete family cohesion. His books, “A Christian Marriage in a Changing World” and “Barrenness in the Household of Faith” are testimonies to his call as a marriage counselor. He labored to preach the gospel and the sovereign grace doctrines which he believed. He championed pastoral fraternal meetings in Lagos from 2002 to the end of that decade. He was a co-speaker in many of the Lagos Bible Conferences.

His conviction to pass on the mantle of leadership of the church but at the same time remaining available for the Lord’s service at the URBC was an evidence of his humility and meekness of heart.

Pastor Olusegun Abiodun Longe’s faith became sight on the 16th of February 2024 when he fell asleep and stepped into the physical embrace of his Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.