Hallelujah Challenge Fever Sweeps Nigeria
The past month saw a wave of religious consciousness sweep Nigeria as people from all walks of life took the Hallelujah Challenge, a 30-day prayer and praise time from 12:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. throughout the month of June. The campaign was led by gospel singer Nathaniel Bassey who thought of using social media as a way to worship God through music.
The response was phenomenal as #HallelujahChallenge became the most widely circulated praise and worship movement in social media. What started with only 1,000 viewers broke records by reaching 72,000 live worshippers (68,300 on Instagram and 9,000 on Facebook) on June 11. Two days later, the Facebook live stream hit 120,000 views.
Most of the e-worshippers joined the online prayer sessions at home while some churches organized vigils for the event. Those who joined the live Instagram sessions including celebrities were uplifted by praise and worship music and listening to participants' testimonies.
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Bassey clearly tapped on the streaming potentials in Nigeria where over 85 million profess to belong to a church denomination. "The Challenge is a mandate from God, and I am just a vessel," he said."Beyond all the miracles and testimonies, God is doing something eternal – something that will outlive generations," Bassey went on to say.
Some skeptics say the views were boosted by the participation of celebrities like Funke Akindele, Kcee, Don Jazzy, Chioma Akpotha and more created a bandwagon effect among their fans. But this was debunked by Christians who said that numbers were already great at 3,000 on the Instagram live feed even before the showbiz stars came in.
One of the effective draws of the hour-long praise and worship session was the number of testimonies that were summed up in the phrase "And God Did It Just Like That." Participants loved hearing personal stories of healing, success, deliverance and miracles just by taking part in the live prayer sessions.
