Month: January 2014

Morning Dew

 

Key Passage: Acts 20:35 – ³⁵ In everything I have pointed out to you [by example] that, by working diligently in this manner, we ought to assist the weak, being mindful of the words of the Lord Jesus, how He Himself said, It is more blessed (makes one happier and more to be envied) to give than to receive.

 

Key Text: Acts 20:35 – “It is more blessed to give than to receive. “

 

 

Have you ever asked yourself what the meaning of life is? Have you ever wondered what your purpose is here on earth? Have you ever thought that this life is a futile experience? Many great minds and sages of the past have trod this same path and ended with many hypotheses that end up confusing people all the more. Today, I want to give you a perspective, crafted by the creator Himself to help us find meaning in life. Jesus said in John 14:6 – I am the way the truth and the life. In order words the true meaning of life can only really be discovered in Him.

Taking this deeper, I arrived at a conclusion many years ago, that God created me for a purpose and that purpose is not about me, it is about Him and those He wants me to touch or reach. As I plumbed this truth a bit more, I came to the conclusion that everything God made me and gave me is for someone else. I live to be a blessing and so should everyone. It is quite amusing to watch people running helter skelter trying to achieve certain milestones in order to earn the respect of people. In other words they want to be considered relevant. What an irony? You can’t seek relevance if you are in your purpose. Your purpose is your relevance.

One of our old leaders in the church made a very incisive remark about this rat race matter that has just stuck with me. He said it in a most humorous way, and if you were not sensitive, you could miss the depth of his sarcastic comment. I quote as best as I can “We work very hard to earn money we really don’t need to buy things we really don’t need to impress people we really don’t like and to be accepted by people who would never really accept us and we never really enjoy being around.” Honestly think about this again. Is this why you are alive? Is this what you are about?

Let me give you a tip as I have discovered. Today’s passage says “It is more blessed to give than to receive.” This is the key to life. If you give of your self, your time, your energy, your talent, you would start to really enjoy life. Jesus said it is more blessed to give than to receive. Meaning you are in a greater state of blessing, when you are giving than when you are receiving. Man was not designed to be selfish. Man was not designed to live for himself. Man was created to live for a purpose outside him.

So I want to make a very sweeping statement if I may today. “To give is to live and to live is to give!” If you give you will live. Life will become meaningful. You will understand why you are alive. If you just take and keep taking and keep splurging on what you have, you will one day realise you have wasted life and you are bankrupt emotionally and have lived an empty life.

We need a paradigm shift! The Western materialistic, hedonistic, Greek mindset tells us we have to get. So people live to get. But the truth says we live to give not get and when we give then we get. We get more than material things; we get life. Jesus said I came that they may have life and life more abundantly.

Think for a moment about those who are truly great. They all lived to give. They all gave their lives for a cause outside themselves. Jesus said I have come to seek and save the lost. He gave His life for the redemption of man. God gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.

Start giving today. Give your time to help a helpless neighbour. Give your money to send a poor relative to school. Give your time to comfort someone who is hurting. Give your life to Jesus and He would give you a life you never knew you were capable of living.

Start Living! Start giving!

 

Let’s Pray: Father, I thank you for this understanding. From now on help me to live to give. Show me each day, starting with this day, who I can give to and what I should give them. Thank you for giving me your Son, Jesus Christ. In Jesus name I pray. Amen. 

Morning Dew

 

Key Passage: Exodus 14: 1-31

 

Key text: Exodus 14:15 – The Lord said to Moses, “Why do you cry to me? Tell the people of Israel to go forward.

 

Inertia is defined as the ‘tendency to do nothing or to remain unchanged’. Most people suffer from some degree of inertia and in order to convince themselves that they are progressing, they go back to the past and try and relive old experiences. Honestly, these attempts always end in failure and frustrations. God is always moving forward and we must follow Him. Yesterday is dead and gone. Try going back to yesterday and see how futile an attempt it is. Today is a brand new day and no matter what happened yesterday, you have an opportunity to make good today what you lost or failed to do yesterday and more. To be forward looking and forward leaning is godly. It means you expect your future to be better than your past. So let’s move forward.

 

3 things about Going Forward.

1. 1.    You can’t go forward if you are looking backwards or holding on to the past. There comes a time that you must let go of your past (Mistakes, hurts, failures, disappointments, good times, bad times etc) and go forward. Luke 17:32 remind us to “Remember Lot’s wife” Because she was looking back, she could not make it out of Sodom. God told Samuel in 1 Samuel 16:1 – The Lord said to Samuel, “How long will you grieve over Saul, since I have rejected him from being king over Israel? Fill your horn with oil, and go. I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite, for I have provided for myself a king among his sons.
2. 2.    You can’t go forward if you are bound by fear – Fear causes paralysis. Most people cannot leave their comfort zones because they are afraid of the unknown. Afraid of failure. Afraid of what people would say. Fear is an evil force and can rob you of the very best God has ordained for you. ‘Fear not’ says the Lord.
3. 3.    You cannot Go Forward if you are lazy – Many people are lazy, lethargic and simply stuck in a rot. God does not like lazy people. God is always at work and so must we. Proverbs 19: 15 – Slothfulness casts into a deep sleep, and an idle person will suffer hunger. Proverbs 22:13 and 26:13 tells us that ‘The sluggard says, “There is a lion outside! I shall be killed in the streets.  The sluggard says, “There is a lion in the road! There is a lion in the streets!”  As a door turns on its hinges, so does a sluggard on his bed. The sluggard buries his hand in the dish; it wears him out to bring it back to his mouth. The sluggard is wiser in his own eyes than seven men who can answer sensibly.’

 

To Go Forward, let us learn from the bible.

 

God told Moses to go through the Red sea. It took faith and absolute trust in God. As they moved they discovered that the God of Open doors had built multi-lane motorway for them in the Red sea.

 In Joshua 3:3-17, God told Joshua to cross the Jordan with the children of Israel, when the river was at full flood. As they stepped into the river Jordan, the discovered the God of Open doors had commanded the Jordan to reverse and He had built a big Bridge for them to cross over.

 In Joshua 6:1-2 – God told Joshua to advance against the fortified walls of Jericho. As they obeyed by going forward, they discovered that the God of Open Doors had sent a divine bulldozer to smash the wall and He has created a grand stairway for them to climb into the city of Jericho.

 Today, Jesus says ‘I am the one who holds the keys of David, whatever door I open, no one can shut it.’ Jesus is the God of the Open Doors. He says Go Forward. Whatever you do with your life this year. Make sure you are going forward. As you go forward, you will discover the God of the open doors has gone ahead of you. He has made a way where there seems to be no way.

 

Let us pray: Father God a word is enough for the wise. This day I choose to go forward and leave my past behind. I am determined that my good past will not deny me of my best future. Father, in Jesus name, forgive me for my past errors and mistakes and I also forgive those who have done me any harm or wrongs in my past. I am pressing on to my glorious future and I fully believe that the best is yet to come. Lord of the open doors, here I come. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.

 

Morning Dew  

 

Key Passage: Exodus 14: 1-31  

 

Key text: Exodus 14:15 – The Lord said to Moses, “Why do you cry to me? Tell the people of Israel to go forward.

 

It has often been said that the good is the enemy of the best. Too many people never see the best God planned for their lives, simply because they get stuck in the past and hold on to a ‘good thing’.  

In this year of open doors, let us consider the key scripture for this year, taken from Revelations 3:8 – “‘I know your works. Behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one is able to shut.

First thing we need to consider here is the word, Behold or See. God says open your eyes or ‘shine your eyes’ as we say in Nigeria. See. This is not physical sight; this is spiritual sight. These are the eyes of the heart. This is seeing by faith. Or better stated, seeing through God’s eyes. Seeing what God sees. If you look at something’s in the natural, you may not see anything valuable or significant or worse, you may see serious opposition and great barriers. You may not see an open door. So it’s important to have eyes to see. Proverbs 20:12 says- “Ears to hear and eyes to see, both are gifts from the LORD”. Hebrews 11:1 – Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

Second thing to consider is that God has set before us an open door. The key word here is the Set Before. That statement means it is right in front of you. So the open door is not behind us, but in front of us. Which means if you are looking back, you would not see or go through the open door. So stop looking at the past, think of the future. The past is dead and gone. The past is past. Today is passing away and the future is pregnant with divine possibilities. 

Jeremiah 29:11 declares “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.”

Philippians 3:12-14 – Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Isaiah 43:18-19 – “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old.  Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it.

In the key text today, we see that God told Moses to tell the children of Israel to go forward. They had just come out of Egypt, the army of Pharaoh was hot on their heels. They had come to the edge of the Red Sea. There was no physical road ahead of them. God then said they should ‘Go forward’.

This is our situation this year. We have finished 2013, we are now in 2014. God says we must Go forward. Go forward in your Christian walk. Go forward in your prayer life. Go forward in your witnessing. Go forward in your businesses. Go forward in your education. Go forward in your relationships. Go forward, Go forward, Go forward.

Today, be determined to go forward in your life. This year is a year to move forward, not reverse or go to your past. As you move forward, you will discover that God has indeed set before you an open door, which no man can shut. You will discover that Jesus is waiting for you on the other side of your open door. Just go forward.  

Let’s Pray: Father God, I thank you for all my glorious past. I thank you for the future you have planned for me. Lord, please help me this year not to hold on to the past, but like the Apostle Paul, help me to let go of the past and lay hold of the future. Father I’m excited about the future you have for me. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.  

Morning Dew

 

Key Passage: Matthew 9: 14-17

 

Key Word – Matthew 9:17 – “But new wine is put into fresh wineskins”

 

Achieve 100 percent of your resolutions this year!

Change they say is the only constant in life. At the beginning of a new year we all make promises to do some new things and change something we do. These are all laudable, but have you wondered why very few achieve these changes we so resolutely propose at the beginning of every year. There is something in everyone that resists change and would do everything to keep the status quo. Could it be just the fact that we are unsure of the outcome of changing? Could it be human obstinacy and stubbornness? Whatever it is change is good and change we must, but let us learn from the Master, how to truly change.

The passage we are considering today tells us Jesus model for change. He said you must put new wine into new wine skins. This says if you want change you must be ready to let go of something to get something else. Or better stated, you must give up the old before you can truly apprehend the new. This simple, but profound truth is at the core of most failed yearly resolutions. Most of us hold on to our old ways and expect to somehow access the new ways we so desire. Jesus said categorically that it would end up in ruin.

Let’s plumb this a bit deeper. Jesus said no one puts new wine in old wine skins. He said the new wine will ruin the old wine skin and the wine will be wasted. For you to have a behavioural change, you must first stop and renounce the old bad behaviour. If you want to get closer to God, you must stop spending so much time in front of the telly. If you want to earn more, you must stop wasting your time on unprofitable ventures. If you want to lose weight, you must stop eating junk food. If you do not stop something, you really cannot bring in the new. You really have to be ruthless and let go of what you do not want, so you can lay hold and cultivate what you really want.

I know this sounds so basic and simple. But it’s the simple things that we fail to do that truly create most of our failures. This year you will succeed in Jesus name.  Just decide and stop what you don’t want and them embrace what you want. It is that simple.

Now another simple point to note is that Jesus recommends that to change the wine skins you may need to fast. Fasting is not pleasurable for the body and the flesh, but it sure has great power in subduing the flesh and allowing the spirit to gain ascendancy. Fasting is denying your self some pleasures. What you want to change is mostly associated with some pleasure. So if you can deny yourself that pleasure, you are on you way to a successful transformation.

In 2014, make a difference and allow the new wine of joy and success to fill your life as you let go and stop completely those things that have hindered your joy and success in the past year. Trust me the Master knows best! Have a blessed and successful 2014.

 

Let’s Pray: Father God, as we begin this New Year, I really want to successfully achieve the goals I set for myself. Lord, please help me to identify the things I am doing that will hinder me and grant me the grace to stop them. Then help me to embrace the things I want so I can successfully achieve them. Lord, give me the grace to fast for change and deny myself as much as I need to enable me apprehend the new. I ask this in Jesus name. Amen.

 

 

Morning Dew

 

Key Passage: Revelations 3:7-13

 

Key Word: Revelations 3:8 – “Behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one is able to shut.”

 

 

The bible is clear that God controls the times and the seasons. No matter what we think as humans, God still orders the times and seasons and as such it is wise to always try and hear what His plans are for the times and season we live in. I know many prophetic words have been given about 2014, and we pray that God will truly bless this year. But I need to first thank God for 2013. It was a challenging year on many fronts, but when God told me that it was going to be a year of double grace, I did not fully understand it. On hindsight, I needed the double grace of God to stay on track and survive that year. God really sustained me in 2013.

Coming to 2014, what we are hearing is that this year is the year of ‘Open Doors’. As the main scripture shows, God has set before us an open door, which no man can shut! This year will be a year to venture out and do things that hitherto have eluded us. It is a year to be adventurous and step out of our comfort zones and attempt great things. It’s also a year when God will release insights and intelligence, so we are ahead of the game. He will empower us to have the utterances that will move the heart of kings. He will clothe us with great favour and elevate us as we dare to believe Him.

It is also a year to be very sensitive to the leadings and promptings of the Holy Spirit, so we can take advantage of the openings He shows us. It is a year to move with reverence for God and banish all fear of man. Human wisdom cannot access these open doors. We need the mind of Christ.

Let me give you a scenario that best exemplifies what the open door is like. As Israel came out of Egypt, they came to the Red Sea and there was no way forward in the natural. All the armies of Pharaoh were hot on their heels. Moses enquired of the Lord and he was given the instruction to move forward. No one could have imagined what happened next. As Moses obeyed and stretched his rod across the sea, the sea parted and showed a highway right under the sea. As you may know Israel crossed over on dry ground and the army of Pharaoh attempting to follow this path, were covered up by the sea and they drowned. This is the mystery of the open door. It is like an automatic door that is shut and only opens to let you in when you approach it. So faith is essential in accessing the open door.

Whatever your plan for this year, remember God is for you and He has gone ahead of you and will make a way for you. Do not fear; only believe.

Say aloud with me “2014 is my year of open doors in Jesus name”. Amen.

Let’s Pray: Father God, I want to thank you for 2013. For showing your faithfulness and strength, in sustaining me. Thank you for the doors you have opened and set before me in 2014. Give me eyes to see and ears to hear, so I can take advantage of the open doors you show me. I am excited at the possibilities You have released for me this year. I expect great things in Jesus name. Amen.