A South African prophet, Theo Bongani Maseko of the Breath of Christ Ministries in Daveyton, has caused a stir yet again after he made his church members drink engine oil.
According to him, it tastes like honey and drinking the oil demonstrates “the power of God”.
Photographs of people drinking the fluid during church service were posted on his church’s Facebook page. They had a caption which read:
“The fullness of Christ is in this bottle. Healing and strange deliverance #Mark16:17 -18.”
In an interview with The Star on Monday, Maseko confirmed he had made his congregants drink the chemical. Asked why he had used this method, he said it was “to demonstrate the power of God”.
“When we pray over anything, its poison dies. So it can’t harm people. Nothing happened, no one has been to hospital,” he said.
On the contrary, he said, congregants who had drunk the engine cleaner had been “saved, healed and delivered”. He backed up his claims by citing Bible verses.
“Jesus spat on the ground and made mud. He took that mud and smeared it on the eyes of a blind man and, instantly, that blindness was healed.
Mark 16 v 17-18 says ‘in My name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues. They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover’,” he said.
Maseko said no one needed to go to the hospital.
This practice has however been condemned by South Africa’s Commission for Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Religious, Cultural and Linguistic Communities. Its Chairperson, Thoko Mkhwanazi-Xaluva, was livid at the latest incident.
She urged religious leaders to rally together and bring an end to what she described as “reckless” abuse of Christianity.
“A lot of people are going to die one of these days; we are fortunate that has not happened. A lot of people’s lives are at risk here,” she said.
