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As Nigerians celebrate New Year on Monday, the Senate Leader, Opeyemi Bamidele has encouraged them to be optimistic despite the travails of the nation.
Welcoming Nigerians into 2024, the lawmaker said, the present travails will never truncate God’s plan for Nigeria and its teeming population.
In a statement he issued and sent to DAILY POST, he urged Nigerians to ignore proclamations and prophecies of some those he called religious merchants and live by faith, stressing that 2024 which begins on Monday is full of hope.
He said: “2024 is not a year to live our lives according to proclamations and prophecies of some religious merchants, who are fond of foretelling evil about Nigeria.”
In the New Year message, Bamidele asked all Nigerians not to be discouraged by diverse economic, political and social challenges that posed threat to the peace, progress and unity of Nigeria.
The senate leader said 2024 “is not a year to listen to religious leaders, who are fond of proclaiming negative prophecies about Nigeria and her future.”
According to him: “God’s plan for Nigeria is neither doom nor evil as evident in the Scripture. His plan for us as a people is peace, prosperity and a great future. And it is divinely ordained that His plans shall definitely come to pass if we hold fast the profession of our faith.”
He insisted that Nigerians have a part to play in realising God’s plan, which was that they should continue to daily trust God.
“To fulfil His promises, pray without ceasing for those He had ordained to rule over us and support the Government of Renewed Hope, ” he started.
Bamidele, specifically, urged Nigerians “not to be deterred by what is going on around us.”
If we are preoccupied with what is happening around us, we may be too scared to go into the New Year in faith for a greater tomorrow, he avowed.
“We should all know that we have God who created us only for His glory, plan and purpose. We should therefore not walk by sight. We should walk by faith in God the Omniscient and Omnipotent.
“If we are obsessed with the present conditions of our economy, we will not see the glorious and great future that God has already set before us. If we cannot see such a glorious future, then we will find it to walk confidently into it.
“God did not create us to punish us. He did not create us to languish on earth. He did not create us to be at war. Rather, God created us in His own image, for His glory and according to His divine will. As I always say, our past is a story already told. Yet, our future can be written in Gold,” Bamidele wrote.
Senate Leader Bamidele urges Nigerians to be optimistic in New Year message