In what many consider a departure from a practice in which founders of churches handed over the leadership of their churches to their wives or biological children, the founder of the Deeper Christian Life Ministry, Pastor William F. Kumuyi, has vowed not to hand over the Deeper Life Church to his sons.

The General Superintendent of the Deeper Life Church, who clocked 85 years recently, declared that the ministry belongs to Jesus Christ and not to him, and his children do not have any right of inheritance over the church.

Pastor Kumuyi made the clarification while speaking during a church service held last Sunday at the headquarters of the church at Gbagada, Lagos, where he dismissed speculations that he could pass the leadership of the ministry to one of his sons.

The rumour came on the heels of a recent outrage expressed by the global acclaimed Gospel preacher and Bible teacher after a statement by a member of the church who claimed that there was need for a clear succession plan in the leadership of the church. He had discountenanced the statement, maintaining that he was not retiring from the ministry and, therefore, there was not need for the call for a successor.

“People are speculating; is he going to hand over the church unto his son? We’re searching for his first son; we’re searching for his second son,” he said.

He then responded to the question, saying he would not hand over the leadership of the church to any of his sons or family member because the church does not belong to him but to Jesus Christ.

“It’s the church of the Lord Jesus Christ and nobody has right to hand it over to his son,” he said.

He made reference to biblical figures such as Peter, Paul and John, who were pioneers of churches and instrumental to the spread of the Gospel in the then known world but never handed over the churches they founded to their children.

In his words, “Peter did not hand over the church to his son. Paul did not have any son or wife, and Paul did not hand over the church to his son. And John did not hand over the church to his son.”