We Waited 24 Years To Have Our First Child- Pastor Dennis Inyang

When resident Pastor, Sureword Assembly, Okota, Lagos, Dennis Inyang got married to his heartthrob, Aity 25 years ago, they quickly looked forward to the joy that comes with it – children. They were wrong; this is because it took them 24 years afterwards before the Almighty God finally answered their prayers and had a set of twins, a boy and girl in April, 2015. “We never gave up, although, it was frustrating but we knew the God that we serve will not disappoint,” Pastor Inyang said.

Asked of his fears for his wife after not having a baby for 24 years, Pastor Inyang said the usual anxiety when a woman wants to give birth took over him. “I was praying to God that she should have a safe delivery, have a peaceful birth, let the children be alive and let everything go well.


As Christians, we kept praying and trusting God that everything will go well, God is God of wonders. I was the first to hold the babies because my wife was still in the labour room when the babies were brought out. As I stood there, I just started giving praise to God. Pastor Inyang added that there was never a time he lost hope in God, “I knew that God is always faithful and whatever He has promised, He would bring to pass. As humans, it is not easy to wait for a long time, it was trying times but we give God the glory that He gave us the grace to hold on to Him and believe and hope even against the odds. Even when situations were like we would never have children, we trusted in God and He didn’t fail us.”

Our confidence has always been in God and He would not begin what He cannot finish. There were                  times I wondered when it would be but there was no time I was angry, resentful or feel like God didn’t love me. I didn’t feel any of those emotions. But I knew that God is faithful and He would not allow you to be tempted beyond what you cannot bear. If God allows it, it means I have what it takes to overcome it. You know we went through a lot of things, IVF, it did not work, I did  Immuno Therapy and it did not work but we knew what is impossible with man is possible with God, although that is not to say we didn’t get medical intervention but it was at a time when the prospects were negative on both sides.

The Sureword Assembly Pastor has gone further to Christen the twins Awesome and Gladsome, a name Pastor Inyang say he arrived at because of the awesomeness of God. “There is really nothing God cannot do,” he said. “At the time we had these babies, my wife had stopped seeing her monthly period for like 4 years and a Doctor had already told us that we were not likely to have babies. I was even diagnosed with Oligospermia  but w e trusted God that He will do it, that is why we say God is awesome. We also wanted to capture our joy and we named the girl Gladsome. We are excited and grateful to God. Their native names is Abasiamaobo for the boy, meaning “God has said it” while the girl is Yaknkwonoabasi, meaning “Let me sing onto the Lord.”

Pastor Inyang  advised  couples and women still waiting on the Lord not to give up hope because the gift of having children is God’s. “Hold on to God, believe you are going to have a baby even when it doesn’t appear  so, know that your Doctor’s word is not the last word, rather God has the final word. Live your life and don’t put it on hold because you are yet to have a baby. Don’t run to the Devil for babies, don’t divorce your spouse. You don’t need to marry another wife or go have a  baby outside wedlock. You can still have a beautiful sizzling marriage even when the children are yet to come.
Surround yourself with children and have the joy of fatherhood and motherhood before your own babies come. There is nothing as good as a waiting couple being there for each other. If the man is there for the woman, she will feel confident and rest assured that she would not lose her man to another woman all because she is yet to have a baby.”

“Sometimes, people resort to IVF and other treatments and they come to noting, some even go for medical examination and they come clean on both sides, yet they don’t have a baby. The man should be there for the wife and the wife for the man and they should both hold on to God till the children come.

Inyang advised young couples looking at marriage to look beyond the physical. “You should marry the person you love and who loves you. There is nothing like the joy of starting together and growing. That is the beauty of marriage, that 2 people can build a life together. Actually God’s dream for marriage is not when a successful man marries a girl who doesn’t know what he is doing. Marriage is that both of them mind the same thing, they work on the same dreams and which they can bequeath to the children. That is what marriage is all about and that is the beauty of our marriage.”
“In 25 years, we have been able to build a life together, when I got married to my wife, I never knew I would be a Pastor and she didn’t know she would be a Singer. People look at us today and say… “What a wonderful pair, the husband is preaching while the wife is singing, that was a secret kept in heaven and we didn’t know that. We married because we are truly in love. We have seen people in our ministry who didn’t have children giving birth to  children. I pray for people and they have children but God had kept us waiting for a purpose and it was a very trying period of waiting but looking back, it was worth the wait. When we named our church Sureword Assembly and we kept preaching that the word of God is sure, how else would it be demonstrated if not that we waited for a while and the  word of God came true.