The video was brief, almost careless. A man in a black Range Rover, a flash of an object in his hand, the internet quick to cry: gun! And in Lagos, where rumour travels faster than traffic, the clip spiralled like a match to dry grass.
That man was Paul Adefarasin, the towering preacher whose voice fills stadiums during The Experience, one of the world’s largest gospel concerts. A figure used to grand stages suddenly found himself cast in a low-budget drama, accused of brandishing a firearm.
Police summoned him in June. The state commissioner even warned that pointing a stun gun could breach Nigerian law, as such devices sit in a gray zone of prohibition. The thought of a pastor wielding one unsettled many, especially in a country where faith leaders carry moral weight.
Yet this week, the storm faded. After questioning and statements, police declared the device a non-lethal stun gun, not a firearm, and cleared Adefarasin of wrongdoing. Case discontinued. A scandal that began with thunder closed with something closer to a sigh.
For Adefarasin, drama is hardly new. Raised in Lagos, educated in England and Miami, and once wrestling with drugs before a rebirth, his journey has been anything but linear. He returned home in 1990, founded House on the Rock four years later, and built it into a global ministry.
His pulpit style blends architectural precision with evangelical sweep. His wife, Ifeanyi, preaches alongside him, their partnership both romantic and theological. Congregants speak of his charisma, his books line Christian shelves, and T.D. Jakes calls him a spiritual son.
So perhaps it is fitting that even a viral stumble ends in restoration. The stun gun is back in its case, the Range Rover no longer scrutinised. And the pastor? He will likely continue with his work at the pulpit this Sunday, preaching not of weapons but of grace, as if nothing ever sparked at all.
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