The homegoing of British-born Nigerian missionary, Ruth Elton, reputed to be the oldest missionary in Nigeria, who passed on at the age of 91, has reopened an urgent conversation about the unfinished labour of the gospel in Africa’s most populous nation. Her departure, after more than half a century of service in Nigeria, stands as both a benediction and a prophetic admonition: that the vineyard, though richly sown, is still far from fully harvested.
Though Nigeria is celebrated as the continent’s spiritual powerhouse, with teeming congregations and megachurches rising like cathedrals of hope, the shadow of insurgency, kidnapping, and banditry still casts a pall over its religious landscape. The Christian Association of Nigeria mourned that “the altar is yet drenched with tears, the flock still scattered by wolves.” Elton herself once remarked, “Nigeria is not yet Jerusalem fulfilled; the harvest is still plentiful, but the labourers remain too few.” Her words ring like an oracle, echoing Christ’s own lament over the fields white unto harvest.
Her passing is therefore not a mere obituary but a theological summons. Bishop David Oyedepo thundered, “Every opposition to the gospel in this land only proves that the gates of hell are still resisting, yet they shall never prevail.” In the north, where Boko Haram and allied forces of terror sought to uproot faith from the soil, mission work continues under apostolic fire, reminding us of Paul’s testimony: “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair.” Elton’s life embodied that Pauline endurance.
What many fail to grasp is that Nigeria is not a monolithic Christian stronghold but a mosaic of contested spiritual spaces. From the ghettos of Lagos to the creeks of the Niger Delta, from the insurgent-ravaged plains of Borno to the disillusioned youth of Abuja, the nation is riddled with what theologians now call “new mission fields.” Evangelist Yinka Yusuf declared at her memorial, “Mission is not a geographical assignment alone but a soteriological mandate. Nigeria is both Antioch, sending missionaries to the nations, and Corinth, still in need of purification.” Such words unveil the paradox of a nation both exporting and still in need of grace.
Thus, the death of Ruth Elton is not the end of a chapter but the turning of a prophetic scroll. Her life and passing lay upon the Nigerian church a mantle of responsibility: to move from dependency on foreign heralds of the gospel to indigenous apostolic leadership. The final query is no longer whether Nigeria is still a mission field, but whether her watchmen will rise from slumber, take their lamps trimmed with oil, and proclaim until this land is truly redeemed, and the kingdoms of this world become the kingdom of our Lord and His Christ.
– Inah Boniface Ocholi writes from Ayah – Igalamela/Odolu LGA, Kogi state.
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