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You sense a call to ministry or you are already in ministry and
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Hello and welcome to the Bivo Podcast – A podcast for pastors, church planters, ministers, anyone who is doing the work of ministry and working at the same time. This is your time of encouragement and I’m your host, Ade Sobanjo.
Welcome!
A stroke will change your life. It has changed the lives of millions of people all over the world and it has ended the lives of many as well. I suffered a stroke on April 7th, 2017 and it has changed my life. Without going into details, let me state that stroke is the leading cause of disability in the USA, Canada and the UK, and it may be the same for most other countries too.
So, this is my story of how God has helped me to recover from stroke and to change my life as a result of that. I want to use this opportunity to share with people who are listening to my podcast, the Bivo Podcast, to know me – to get to know what God has done for me, where I’m from, how I’ve come to become what they hear me. You see, whenever I listen to a speaker, I listen to podcast, I always imagine what’s behind the story of this person that is doing this podcast and what are they? What their story? What has God done in their lives? So I’m giving this out to all my listeners, anyone that is listening to this podcast, you can get to know exactly how I got where I am now especially with regards to this podcast.One of the things that has informed or inspired me to get back on this and really do this very podcast, is the stroke and how I recovered and how I want to live my life as a result of the transformations that have happened to me over the period of about 11 months now. It’s about 11 months since the stroke in April 2017.
So there are a few things that I have learnt and over the next couple of episodes or chapters because this is not… I’m going to release every chapter – all the chapters at once and I’m just going to give it out to everyone to listen. And over this next couple of chapters – I don’t know exactly how many – maybe 8 or 9 chapters, I’m going to sharing what I’ve learnt, the things that have happened to me and what kind of a person I am as a result. I’m going to list them and as I go on, I am going to give you details on how I came to really realize some of these truths – things that I have been talking about that they’ve been become stronger. I’ve known them more, I’ve understood them more and I’ve embraced them some more.
So here’s a list that I have. It’s not exhaustive. It’s just something that we can start with. Before I go on to mention those, I want you to know that I’m doing this because I’ve not yet taken out the time or maybe I’ve not taken enough time to write out. I know that our experiences as we go through things, can bless others and the best way to do it now, is to put it out there in audio format and when I have some more time, I can put together a book which other people can read and help them. I remember when I was going through the stroke and wondering about my recovery. I really wanted to know what has happened to other people. I wanted to know also from a Christian background, a believer going through stroke, what is it like? What were the things that they had to do? So it’s good to put that out. I’m putting it out for everyone to really listen. I pray it blesses you and blesses everybody that gets to download this audio series.
So here are a few things that I’ve learnt.
So the way I hope to present my story is to break it down into chapters so that if someone wants to listen to just my recovery story then they can just listen to that episode or that chapter on the recovery. And if someone wants you listen to the different lessons that I’ve learnt, then they will just listen to the lessons. Someone wants to know the background – where were you before the stroke and how did you get to this point before the stroke, then they will just listen to that episode. So, I will share them into those chapters and discuss. I’m just going to discuss as if I’m doing an interview so that I can get this out. I don’t want it to stay too long. It has taken long already and there are some things that I should have put down that I didn’t. So if I put them down now, it’s better than another 2 months when I’ve forgotten some more things.
So, I’m going to go ahead and just begin by saying right now, I’m still recovering from the stroke. It’s not yet 100% but if you see me and you didn’t know that I had a stroke, you wouldn’t think that I had a stroke. In other words, I look as if I’m back but when you watch me walk, you’d notice that there is a limp and when you listen to my speech and compare it very closely with my speech before the stroke, you may notice also that there is a little difference. I do. Maybe no other person does and I think my wife would also notice that but otherwise, you wouldn’t notice. I’m very grateful to God for that and I believe that all that I’ve learnt, is because of God’s mercy.
The chapters that I have written down here is
So that’s the outline of this story and I’m just going to do that as freely… Like I said, I’m going to assume that you are sitting with me at a coffee shop and you want to know, “Tell me about yourself. What happened to you…” I’m just going to answer it that way. It’s not academic. I’m not going to be able to give you very clear references to things or books that I read. I’ll just mention the ones that I have and anyone that I can recall, I will recall them so that other people will get blessed by it. So, each of these recordings, I don’t know how long it will be. I’m just going to talk for as long as it takes to cover each topic and I pray that it blesses you.
So, that’s it for the first chapter. Thank you for staying with me till the end. And see you in chapter 2!
God bless you.
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Transcript
The 2nd chapter of the book and that is “Before the Stroke, What was my Story?” So once again, my name is Ade Sobanjo – that’s pronounced So-ban-jo. Yeah! That’s not how it was pronounced when I was born but I have since changed that. My wife and I, we decided to change our names because the way it was pronounced, it refers to some deity that my ancestors were worshipping. So now as a family, we call ourselves the “Sobanjo Family”… You remember the instrument of the Banjo? Yeah! We are the happy people – Sobanjos. Yeah, Sobanjo. That’s my name, Ade Sobanjo. That is my name.
Well, I was born in Benin City in Nigeria, in 1975. So now, you guys know how old I am. I am the first of 5 children. One thing I realized when I was growing up as a child, was that I don’t get tired. I don’t want to sleep. I could work as long as it takes. If I have to watch a TV program or a movie, as long as the movie is on – unless it’s really very boring, I could just go on and on, just watch it all through the night and then sleep in the morning. So there was the energy – I had lots of energy. I loved running and I loved good food. I loved the Lord and I gave my life to Christ quite early – when I was just about 8 years old. I went to church – I went to Sunday School and I was thought that Jesus loves me and He wants me to be His friend and He wants to be my friend. And by His mercies and by the cross, I’m going to be cleansed from my being naughty. For some reason, the Holy Spirit used that to touch my heart and that’s how I became born again. I gave my life to Christ that day and I remember! I remember God changing my heart and one of the big things I noticed after I got saved is that I began to love. I began to love people more. And it’s still very characteristic in my life. I love the people of God so much. My heart just breaks when I see people of God suffering. I love people and I think it is not me. I think it is Christ just growing bigger and bigger in me. I really believe that God loves people. God loves people because He has poured that love in my heart.
So, I grew up in Benin City. At the age of 11 in 1986, my mum died. She was shot and that made an impact on my life. She was shot by armed robbers. She was really a rising star – she was a chartered accountant and she was doing very well in the city then with my dad. They both owned their own practice as chartered accountants. One day, they went to work on the 1st of August, and that day, they were supposed to pay the workers and armed robbers came and she was shot. To cut the long story short, that was the last day I ever saw my mum on earth. But I’m really looking forward to seeing her in heaven and I’m sure when she sees me, she’ll say, “Wow how come you are here so quickly?” And I will say “Mom, it’s been a very long time.”
[Chuckles]
Yeah! So my mum died at the age of 40 when I was 11 and I believe that I’m still here for a while. I won’t be surprised if I’m still here at 95.
[Chuckles]
So that’s it! That’s my upbringing. I grew up in a loving home while my mum was there. My dad was very heartbroken. He recovered and started doing some great work. God blessed him, God saved him and he really challenged me in Christian walk. I really count some of the things that I do and I enjoy in life now to just seeing my dad pray in the night and really love God and be transformed. I just enjoy imagining and remembering the way my dad just transformed after he got saved. I remember my transformation and my sisters, they got transformed also and I’m so grateful to God for that. My brother is the last born of the family from my step mom. You know, it’s just a beauty to see what God has done with me.
So, I grew up and went to the university to study Electronics & Electrical Engineering in Obafemi Awolowo University in Nigeria. I then went to do my Masters in Electrical Engineering,Concordia University in Montreal. And I was looking forward to working as an Engineer and I felt the Lord say to me, “Start your own business.” So we started a computer company – networking, just helping people set up network for small businesses, set up their websites, maintain their computers and I had a string of customers and clients that I was servicing monthly. The company was growing and then I started a school where I was teaching people the same – do websites, and start their own computer repair company.
It was really getting fine when the Lord began to knock on my heart again that He wanted me to plant a church for Him. Before that, I was part of another church and I was gradually becoming one of the pastors there and I was serving. And the Lord said to me, “It’s time to pull out and plant the church that I’ve been talking to you about.” Yes, it’s true I’ve always had that desire to serve God with all my heart and I knew that God was leading me towards planting a church. So, that’s how I was and I gave in and spoke to my pastor. We were prayed for and in July 2005, we launched the Overcomers Assembly in Montreal West in Canada. So that’s as our first church plant. The story of the church plant is another story entirely. How God led us to that particular church building, how it was just the time when another church was moving out and we were coming to share that space with them. They embraced us, gave us space to put our sign and the money was about i think $400 to rent the place then. My tithe and my wife’s tithe was enough to pay the rent and that was how we started. We didn’t even have any children then so it was just 2 of us, the first two members of the church. To cut the long story short, we started the service, the first service and people came and then people left and then people came and then people left and just the story. And after a while, we give glory to God, we went to plant some other churches.
Before the stroke, I was doing well, working really hard. I’ve always been a very hard worker. I really don’t understand when people get tired. I think the way I was wired, I was wired to work and run and I love to run. I could do all that and I thought I was really very healthy. So when we planted the first church, planted the 2nd church in Quebec, planted the 3rd Church in Kingston Ontario. We were doing pretty well in Kingston Ontario. We didn’t know anyone in Kingston when we got there but the Lord led us again and said, “I’m sending you to Kingston Ontario and I want you to plant a church.’ We got there, rented a space. God so worked miraculously to give us that space. We were already planning on go somewhere, a hotel and the Lord sent us to this person “Go to another hotel, the peachtree in the center of Kingston.” You know what? That space became our space and we eventually moved the church now, the new leadership team, we moved them to a bigger space. It’s rare for you to rent a hotel and it becomes a permanent place for the church to rent regularly all year round. It’s rare. There’s no way we could have known that. And it’s just a beautiful place, open and very central, easy for people to get to. All these we did not by strength, just by God’s grace. But of course, a lot of hard work went into it.
We also have this online business that I do, writing some posts and answering questions – information. I do all that. Prior to the stroke, I will work easily – I’ll just be awake. I didn’t count all these as work. I thought I was just having fun but I would work easily just like 12 hours a day, 20 hours a day. I would do my work in Nigeria. Well, I didn’t say that. After a while, in 2014, we actually moved and we felt the Lord leading us to move to Nigeria in Kuje to plant a church. So, we relocated – family, every one of us, we came to Nigeria to plant the church. Of course, we would go back and forth but we came – the whole family. We came not just one person. We all came to Nigeria and we planted a church by His grace in 2014. We started around November. Before that, we had come earlier. I had come earlier to get a space and begin building – physical building, a structure where we have meetings. So we moved in 2014 to Nigeria and so my work increased in the sense that the church is now 4. After that in 2016, we started another church, the St. Lawrence church in Quebec. So now we have 5 churches that I was overseeing and my wife and I being the pastors – the main pastors in the church plant in Nigeria. It was like from scratch and I would work. I loved this work. I loved the people. I loved to serve. And we will serve them all day long. By 9 o’clock here in Kuje in Nigeria, it’s just 3 o’clock in the afternoon in Montreal. So when we are done with that, 10 o’clock, 11 o’clock, I’m still talking with people on the phone in Canada on and on and I will sleep around 3 o’clock and wake up at 6 o’clock and we are out again the day’s job. That’s how I was. I was having lots of fun. I’d run once in a while; I’d try to eat healthy – Nothing fried and no meat. Just chicken and all that stuff and add some fruits and vegetables but not structured. But to the best of my knowledge, I was doing my best and this was going on and that’s how I was living my life.
In 2017, I started with all my heart, ready to even take this to the next level and it’s amazing that somehow my life has gone to the next level but not the way I thought. So I started the year 2017 saying, “You know what? I’m going to do something that I’ve never done before so that I can begin to see more of God in my life.” One of the things that I started to do in 2017 was take 3 days of fasting. I know fasting is good. I’ve been doing fasting before. So in January, the first day of January, I started a fast – 3 days – just water fast, cleansed my system, spent time to pray, studied the Word and I was being loaded with words. God was encouraging me, telling me that He is with us and He is working on us and things are going… February, the same and March the same – at 1st, 2nd & 3rd of March. April the same – 1st, 2nd & 3rd of April, I was fasting, waiting on the Lord in prayer and that’s one thing I don’t think I did, knowing that fasting… Usually I check my blood pressure and see what is going on. In April, I didn’t. Usually when I’m fasting, I don’t check my blood pressure because it usually goes down. It’s lower when you are fasting. But you know what? This time around I didn’t and I still don’t know it was but I didn’t. Anyway, the fast ended I think on Tuesday or Wednesday. Tuesday was the last day I believe or Wednesday. Anyway, the fast was over and I started eating back and things were good. And on Friday, everything was good and I was living the life, I was enjoying myself – really enjoying the word, enjoying prayer. It’s so fun to spend hours and hours just studying the Word and when you are fasting, you are weak so you are not able to run around too much so you are going to sit down and just face the Word and enjoy. I was really – I was having a great time with God. But anyway, I began to… the Friday the 7th of April began very well. I woke up, ready to go to the church to go and start the day. That day, I didn’t go early. I think I just decided to rest at home, be with my wife for a while before we go. She wasn’t feeling well. Anyway, I heard that the storms had taken out the roofs of the church opposite us – taken out the roof completely. In our church, not much affected and I said, “you know what? I’m going to go.” They were building also a baptismal tank in the church and I wanted to go see. And so I got up, ate my breakfast I believe, got into the van and drove down to the church. That’s when I got off the van and I walked to the place where they were doing the work on the baptismal tank behind the church. As I was standing there, I felt that I was about to trip and I noticed that that is not usual. I’m not supposed to be finding it difficult to get my balance and I noted that and that’s the first time I noted that something was wrong. So I really don’t know when the stroke happened or when it started. I have no clue but that was first sign that something had happened. I didn’t take it serious. I just went into my office and relaxed.
So well, I’m not going to go into exactly what happened on the day of the stroke. That’s for the next chapter. I just wanted to use this opportunity to give you just a background of who I am and what my life was all about. I also think I didn’t mention that usually I don’t take time to sit down and watch TV. I do. Not that I have anything wrong with watching some good programming but most times, my hobby was that I will get home, sit on my computer and just write some blogs and answer some questions on my information sites and just research on things. I love reading about business and about innovation and things like that… leadership. So I will spend more time. And I won’t be tired! I’ll just worked on the computer once I’m home. That’s my… Once the boys are in bed around 8:30 in the night, I’ll take my computer and I’ll work on it for a while before maybe taking some calls in Montreal. So that was my life. It was really lovely, really enjoyable. I was having fun. I was energetic. You will never expect stroke. Stroke was the last thing that you’d think will happen to me at that age and with that level of energy.
So that’s it for chapter 2! Well, that’s the first story about myself. So wait for… stay tuned for the next chapter! I’m going tell you about the day of the stroke, my stay in the hospital and maybe a little bit about my recovery. Thank you and see you soon!
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So, in the last chapter I was talking about my life before the stroke so you kind of have an idea of what kind of life I had before the stroke and now, this is the story of the stroke itself and the recovery, how it happened and what really happened.
So, on Friday, I got to the office and I went to the baptismal tank that we were building and I noticed that my step was not really good. So I went into my office. I’ve been diagnosed with high blood pressure long ago. My first trip to Canada, I had to do a medical check and that was when I was at the age of 25 – just about 25 and I had to check my blood pressure. It was a bit high and the doctor then prescribed medication. When I got to Canada, I went to the doctor’s and they gave me that medication and I was using it for a while. And after a while, I discovered that if I would do exercises, it will go down. I went to see my doctor, they looked at that and it was alright but I was still kept on the medication. And I was using the medication – very little. The medication was called … And I was having to use 2.5mg and I was using it once every 2 days and the pleasure was fantastic.
After a while, I just kept on improving my lifestyle and measuring my blood pressure from time to time. Whenever I’m fasting, I discovered that it will be low and if I took the medication, it will really go low so I usually wouldn’t take it when I’m fasting especially when I’m doing long fasts. But what I didn’t notice was that as I got to 40, some things may have changed. I didn’t really measure my blood pressure during that particular fasting in April. And I still feel that maybe if I had done that, I could have noticed that it wasn’t going down and I would have kept on the medication. But anyway I have the medication in my bag and I took my medication that day and just kept on working but I noticed that my legs had tripped and I wasn’t feeling too well so I called my wife and said, “You know what? I’m feeling weird. Maybe, you gave me the bug that you have.” We laughed and that was it. And I went over. I was able to get up, I went over to the other pastor and heard the story of how they were in the meeting the night before and the storms came and the roof started shaking and it caved in and everybody was safe. Nobody was hurt and I was happy and prayed with them. I went to my neighbor’s and we were doing their school work and just talk to them. But while I was walking, each time I had to walk, I was noticing that my legs were getting a little bit weird. But I didn’t know that this was a stroke. I’m sharing this so that if anybody is experiencing this at another time, they will remember that I heard this story and maybe it’s stroke and they will do something about it. I kept on going and I kept on and I came back to my office, laid down, rested for a while, just laid on my couch [I have a couch in my office]. I just laid down for maybe 30 mins or 1 hour. And as I was doing that, I just felt a little bit better and then I will get up again and do some other things and pray and do some other things. And I kept on doing things – walking around, praying and the more… It started after a while. After about maybe an hour or two, I began to notice that I wasn’t feeling well in my hands also – just lightly. That’s what is so weird. I have heard about stroke before. There’s nowhere you… I think stroke is something that many people have heard about and all I knew about stroke was that it would happen suddenly and it will paralyze [that’s what I thought then] one side of the face or one side of the body. But this was just gradual. I just started feeling weird in my hands. I couldn’t pick it – what it was.
By evening, we had a prayer meeting at 6 o’clock and I think we’d pray at 5. So my wife must have come into the church by 5 o’clock. By the time she came in, I was standing up, I went to see her. I think she looked at my face and she noticed that things were not right. She was talking to my sister who’s a doctor and wondering but for me, I just kept on feeling weird and I started praying. I was praying and declaring that my body is well, I’m healed, I have strength in my hands, I recover my strength and that’s what I was just declaring. I recover my strength. I recover my strength in my hands. By then, it was becoming more pronounced that something was wrong with my right leg and my right hand. I couldn’t hold my iPad the way I would hold it. Not that it was not possible but I couldn’t hold it. And I started feeling a bit weak also – just internally weak. As I was doing all that, I was praying. It was time now for me to come, the Prayer Meeting, I always lead some part of it some other people will lead some other parts of it. And so they were leading their own part and after a while, they called me to do my part and I was able to do my part but I couldn’t finish it. By the time I was done with some of the prayers, I was tired. I had to go sit down and left then to finish the prayer. So my wife really was worried about it and around that time, I began to feel that this is a stroke and I didn’t want to make my wife panic.She also began to think it was stroke and she was wondering if it’s going to make it worse if she says something like that. It was getting dark already at that time – it was past 7 and we were thinking of going to… We didn’t have any registration with any hospital here in Nigeria and we didn’t know what to do. But my dad knows a doctor who owned a private hospital and that was a good hospital.
So, anyway, to cut the long story short, we went home. You know, we went home! We should have gone to the hospital but we went home and we were just wondering, “Will this reverse? Is this just a TIA [Trans Ischemic Attack] at this age and it’s so slow? Maybe it’s just going to reverse after 24 hours.” And we were thinking of all that but you know what? It was getting worse. Around 3 o’clock in the morning of Saturday on the 8th of April, it was already really bad. And my sister said we should get to the hospital as quickly as possible. We called the doctor and he says okay, he’s going to be there. He will come down right away and so we got a friend of ours. So, I got up. I wanted to go to the bathroom to ease myself and I did that. I needed to change into something different from my pyjamas to something I could go to the hospital with. And as I was about to pull that, it just hit me that you know what? You are becoming paralyzed. And I didn’t know any person that had recovered from stroke. So, it just dawned on me that I’m becoming weak and helpless. And at that time, it was too much for me and I just broke down and I was crying. Just sobbing. And my wife came and I just broke down and that was the first time in years… I can’t remember ever ever being broken like that. Since my mom died, I was never broken. I didn’t cry like that even when my mum died.
So, I think something was restored to me that day. I really do believe that because now I feel even more emotional. Something has happened to me. I feel that. So that happened and I think this is going to be a bit longer than the other chapters. Anyway, to cut the long story short, I eventually was able to put my pants on and put on a shirt and I got into the car and I was taken to the hospital. All along the way when people would call to pray with me, I will just begin to cry and tears will just be rolling down my eyes. And all I was thinking was that you know what? I can’t believe I’m on this side of the prayer because I have always been the one from a young age, praying with people. And I remembered the first time I prayed with this guy in my high school – secondary school and he just woke up from his sickness. So, I’ve always believed in Divine Healing and I enjoyed praying for people and seeing them healed. Some, it takes long. Some, not long. Some, they don’t get healed but the joy of just being able to stand with them, pray with them; the joy of seeing them recover, I always enjoyed that. But right now, I was the one being prayed for. And it was breaking me and lots of things were happening in my life. So, we went to the hospital eventually and I was told that this must be something blood related or stuff. Inmet the doctors and one said maybe the blood is in your brain already and there is pressure or something. I felt as if I was nauseous so they put me on a wheel chair, I had to get a CT Scan and eventually, I got the scan done. I’d gotten… there’s a lot of drama that happened in the hospital but anyway, cutting all that off, it was eventually done and I’m grateful to God that there was no rupturing. There was nothing in my brain. It was just a normal attack – ischemic stroke. That means there was no rupture, there was no haemorrhage.
It wasn’t a moragic stroke but the strange thing is that when I got to the hospital, the doctor that was me around for the CT Scan, said I should just be making fists with my fingers. And I could make fists with my fingers but it still kept on getting worse. I was in the hospital. They were doing all they could do but it kept on getting worse. I was put on some IV fluids and all that. And it still kept on getting worse. All of Saturday, I think, it kept on getting worse. I don’t know when the last point was when I couldn’t make any fists anymore. I couldn’t move my right hand, I couldn’t move my left hand, I couldn’t turn on the bed. I think [I’m not too sure of that because I didn’t take note of it]… I think that it ended on Sunday morning but it could have ended in the middle of the night while I was sleeping but I know that I kept on wishing that it’d stop, getting weaker but it kept on getting worse.
I knew that I was praying and things were getting worse, worse and worse and worse. But there was good news anyway and that’s what happened while I was dressing up. While I was dressing up and things were getting worse, I heard in my spirit. I felt the Lord say to me, “You will go through this and you will recover but you will become a different man.” I felt that in my spirit man and that helped me. That’s what I held onto and that’s what I’ve been holding on to all this while. I felt the Lord say to me, “You will go through this…” and I just knew that I was going to go through it and I will recover. And I had faith that I’d recover and when I will be recovered, I will be a different person. I really have changed in my worldview. If you look at me, of course I don’t look so different and I may not speak so different but inside, some things have happened and I’m really grateful to God for all that has happened. I really am grateful to God for my wife. My wife was there for me. She stood with me, did everything. By myself, I couldn’t eat. I wasn’t used to using my left hand to eat, I had to learn to use my left hand. Dressing up was difficult; turning in the bed was difficult. People in the church rose up and started helping me. They were always coming in and visiting me, brought fruits, lots of things – money, help and help just kept on pouring in. The Lord has blessed us by giving the church and the people in the church helped a lot. And I think I started physiotherapy on the 3rd day in the hospital.
So, maybe I should cut this chapter here so it’s not too long. I’ll talk about my stay in the hospital and my recovery in the next chapter. So, let’s stop it here and just say thank you for listening so far.