After finishing at Wesley College in Ibadan, he became headmaster at the primary school in Remo, Ogun State.
From 1957 to 1958, he was posted in Germany in an effort to resolve some of the problems that were facing African and Asian students there.
Church members held him in such high esteem that items he had touched during his services were believed to have healing powers.
In the process of preparing a doctoral thesis for the University of London (in 1955), Idowu discovered that all the available material on African religion appeared to be inaccurate, condescending or simply ridiculous.
As a result, he set out to describe the religious beliefs of his own Yoruba people according to universal theological concerns such as the nature of the Deity, morality, and the ultimate destiny of mankind.