The Secret Place of Joseph Ayo Babalola

Joseph Ayodele Babalola was born on April 25, 1904 to Yoruba Anglican parents in the Ilofa Odo Owa area of present day Kwara State. He grew up in a home that honored Scripture and church life, yet his pathway into ministry began far from a pulpit. As a young man he was employed by the colonial Public Works Department as a steam roller operator on the roads of southwestern Nigeria. In October 1928, while repairing his machine, he experienced a startling call from God to leave his trade and preach Christ. The summons marked him for the rest of his days and shaped a life in which prayer, fasting, and bold witness became inseparable.

Soon after this call he was brought to Lagos by leaders of the Faith Tabernacle movement. There he met Pastor D. O. Odubanjo and Senior Pastor J. B. Esinsinade, and he was baptized by immersion in the lagoon behind the Faith Tabernacle building at 51 Moloney Bridge Street. He registered his membership with the church and returned to the interior to preach repentance, renunciation of idolatry, and the power of God to heal. From the beginning his message was matched by an intense hidden life. He withdrew to pray in the bush and on the edges of towns, sometimes with only a bell and a Yoruba Bible in hand, and he fasted regularly as he prepared for open air meetings.

In July 1930 a doctrinal council convened at the Faith Tabernacle congregation at Oke Ooye, Ilesa. While the pastors debated baptism and healing, a wave of power broke over the gathering. Reports from the time state that a dead child was raised to life and that multitudes afflicted with disease were healed. The crowds became too large for any hall and meetings moved into the open. People came from across Yorubaland and from neighboring regions. An assistant district officer who visited incognito reported the vast numbers and found the services orderly. The revival soon became associated with a nearby stream called Omi Ayo, meaning Stream of Joy, where consecrated water was drawn by the sick and the desperate who believed God for relief. It was a season of confession, prayer, and radical turning to Christ.

From Ilesa the revival flame traveled quickly. Babalola preached in Offa and Usi, then in Efon Alaaye and other Ekiti towns. In Efon he requested a prayer ground in a tract of forest the people feared as a haunt of spirits. When he and his companions cleared it and consecrated it to God without harm, many were emboldened to turn to Christ. Local rulers responded to the message and the news spread further through Ekiti and Ondo country. This outward sweep rested on an inward furnace. Those who watched him at close range found him disappearing for long periods of prayer, then emerging to preach with piercing simplicity about repentance, faith in Christ, and the victory of the Holy Spirit over every rival power.

The revival was not without opposition. Alarmed by the mass renunciation of charms and the confrontations with witchcraft, officials issued a warrant from Ilorin. In March 1932 he was tried and sentenced in Benin City to six months' imprisonment. He served the term and returned again to the work, carrying the same habits of prayer and fasting that had shaped him from the beginning. His marriage to Dorcas followed in 1935 and the journeys continued into the Gold Coast and back across Nigeria. His ministry remained a river whose source was hidden. He preached in the open fields, then prayed into the night. He called people to burn the tokens of old allegiances, then led them to the Lord's Table with reverent fear and joy.