It is said that a man’s dignity can be mocked, abused, compromised, toyed with, lowered and even badmouthed, but it can never be taken from him. There’s the grace for a man to reset his boundaries, restore his image, start fresh with renewed values and rebuild his future.
This, clearly, is the principle that guided Apostle Johnson Suleman as he struggled to rise from being a nameless beginner to becoming one of the most sought-after in God’s vineyard today. Sharing his early days’ experience as God’s servant during the special church events to mark his 19th wedding anniversary, Apostle Suleman disclosed that he learned the hard way and made success of the challenge only because he was mocked. Today, he says, he gives himself a pat on the back and returns the praise to God for getting mocked, rather regrettably, by no less a person than a very senior fellow pastor.
“Back in the day, I gave a pastor my passport to pray for me so that I could travel abroad too. This pastor was always busy with meetings all over; he has travelled to a lot of countries. But rather than praying, he started mocking me and showing people my passport telling them “he is a local preacher, he has not been to anywhere” I shed tears when I got to know this. I confronted him and said “if you didn’t want to pray for me why make mockery of my prayer point? By the Grace of God, today, I have been to over 180 countries of the world for the sake of preaching the gospel. Funny enough, a few weeks ago, the same pastor that mocked me, asked me for a favour and I did it for him triple.”
Whilst he does not gloat over the fate of his mocker, Suleman who now traverses the globe in his private jet, underlines the fact that mocking someone on his deep-seated convictions makes the mocker twice as foolish. The mocked, with grace, most often succeeds because he aims higher striving to climb mountains, forge streams and oceans not without expecting to find the unwelcome silence that mocks his trials.
Penning a lovely message to his wife, Reverend Lizzy Suleman on his social media handles, Apostle Suleman who constantly shares the sweet memories of their meeting 25 years ago, described her as a ‘gift from heaven’. “Thanks Baby for being a golden treasure and a formidable anchor,” he wrote.
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