Dear Pastor @TobiAdegboyega_
I write to you with deep concern—not born out of personal animosity, nor out of a desire to join the chorus of online outrage, but out of a sober burden for the gospel of Jesus Christ and for the many souls who sit under your voice and influence.
I have listened carefully to the viral clip of your sermon, and I have reflected on it prayerfully, conscious of the fact that it represents only a fragment of a longer message. Even with that charitable qualification, what was said—and more importantly, what was missing—raises grave theological and pastoral concerns that cannot be ignored. Permit me, therefore, to engage you plainly, lovingly, and biblically.
1. When you said that “Christians think they can scare people with hell,” were you aware that you were distancing yourself from Christ Himself? Hell is not a Christian invention, nor a manipulative tool devised by preachers. It is a doctrine taught repeatedly, soberly, and emphatically by Jesus Christ Himself. From “where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched” (Mark 9:48) to “these will go away into eternal punishment” (Matthew 25:46), it was our Lord who warned the world most explicitly about hell. When you frame such warnings as mere scare tactics, are you not implicitly indicting the very words of Christ?
2. When you spoke of “the criteria for Christian hell” as popularity and wealth, were you not misrepresenting the gospel entirely? The Bible does not teach that the rich or famous go to hell by default, nor that the poor and obscure automatically inherit heaven. The decisive issue has always been—and remains—the acknowledgement of the Lordship of Jesus Christ and repentance from sin. By presenting wealth and fame as the supposed Christian criteria, do you not risk reducing salvation to a caricature and confusing your hearers about the very heart of the gospel?
3. When you rhetorically asked your congregation whether they would rather spend eternity with saints or with figures like Hitler, were you not appealing to an unregenerated imagination rather than a renewed mind? Why should the prospect of eternity be evaluated by “excitement,” celebrity, or colourfulness? Scripture tells us that the transformed mind chooses the narrow way, not because it is glamorous, but because it leads to life. Does not such framing reveal a troubling disdain for holiness and a subtle glorification of worldly allure—the very things Scripture calls believers to crucify?
4. When you spoke condescendingly of “the saints you don’t know,” did you not betray a theology that has lost its hunger for God? The saints are not boring relics; they are those redeemed by the blood of Christ.
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