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Showing posts from May, 2012

Promotion in Christ

John 15:14, 15, ‘You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from the Father I have made known to you.’ In Jesus we are now joint heirs of the promises made by the Father having power and authority and dominion over everything of this world and the one to come through Jesus. Rejoice because we are no longer servants but brothers with Christ, sharing with Him His glory. Having learned everything from Him, we are now empowered with the knowledge of truth and no longer fall prey to the Devil who prowls like a lion waiting for someone to devour. We are now able to resist the Devil in Christ. Then what shall I say of the Day that He promised to come back in full glory, I longingly await for it with joy and hope trusting that I will be made just as He is, having been crowned with His righteousness, because my God is faithful and will not

Selfless and Unconditional Love

John 15:9-13, 17, ‘As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in His love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this that he lay down his life for his friends. …This is my command: Love each other.’ Jesus wholly depended on God the Father while He was on earth, and whatever He received from Him, He shared with us, His love, His power and authority. He showed us a perfect example of humility and obedience submitting to the Father’s will to die at the cross as atonement, a sacrifice, for our sins and to provide a way for our salvation. His love for the Father was selfless and unconditional, obeying to the point of shedding His divinity and living as a servant. His love for us was also selfless and unconditional in that He

The Great Commission

Mathew 28:19,20, ‘Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teach them to obey everything I have commanded you.’ As His time to go back to the Father came, Jesus gave His disciples a charge to accomplish: they were to make disciples of all nations by baptizing them and teaching them to obey His teachings. More than 2000 years have elapsed since His ascension and we who are now His disciples are still charged to spread the gospel of the good news that through God’s grace, whosoever believes in the one and only Son of God will not perish but have everlasting life. Many believers however are scared and ashamed into silence of sharing this knowledge with those in our life for fear of rejection. We believe like Samuel that if we minister unto them and they reject it they have rejected us, we feel obliged to convince and convict them into getting saved. But that is where we get it wrong. In love we

Glory be to God

John 15:7, 8, ‘If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given to you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.’ When we live a life of love through obedience to Jesus Christ, we have the confidence of asking anything from the Father according to His will in the name of Jesus Christ and we shall receive it because we are clothed in His righteousness. By granting us according to His will all that we ask through the name of the Son, God is glorifying the Jesus as His one and only Son who He loves and lives a life of obedience. In this the Son glorifies the Father as being a just God, who is mighty, loving, merciful and faithful to all that believe in the Son giving us a hope that we shall see and enjoy the promises He has made to us in the Son,. As disciples of Jesus, go to the Father with confidence expecting your prayers to be answered and receiving in faith the spiritual gifts and bles

The Tree of Life

John 15:1-6, ‘“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that does not bear fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. Jesus is the tree of life and the church is the branches that are attached to and wholly dependent on Him. Without Him we are nothing but in Him we are more than conquerors. If we allow ourselves to be fully ingrafted in Him, allowing Him to be the supplier of all our needs, feedi

Peace amidst the Storm

John 14:27, ‘Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.’ Jesus Christ gives us peace that transcends above the storm so that even the midst of turmoil, we remain at peace and retain our joy and fear will not overtake us and cause us to despair and loose hope. Where there is peace there is hope and where there hope, there abounds joy. This gives us power over the plans of the Devil so that even when He brings the greatest trials and troubles our way, we will continue to live in faith, believing that we are more than conquerors in Christ who strengthens us, having already received the victory over the challenges we are facing. Peace gives you the assurance that all things will work out for the good for those who have placed their faith and trust in the Lord. With a peaceful heart you will cast away any doubts that the Devil may bring your way through His lies and manipulations about y

Revelation of the Holy Spirit

John 14:26, ‘But the Counselor, the holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and remind you of everything I have said to you.’ The Holy Spirit reveals to us the truth about God, His immense and boundless love for us, His mercifulness and faithfulness, His divine justice and judgment and His sovereign will for us. He lives in us, ministering, convicting, guiding, leading admonishing, edifying as that still small voice within. The Holy Spirit speaks what He hears from the Father, guiding us into all truth and teaching us more about Jesus so that we may know Him more intimately, more deeply to enable us to place our trust and faith in Him. He gives us spiritual gifts to members of the church so that through men, the Son may be glorified and the Son may glorify the Father.

Ingrafted in Christ

John 14:18, 19, ‘I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. Before long the world will not see me any more, but you will see me. Because I live you also will live.’ After the resurrection, Jesus ascended into Heaven and is now seated at the right hand of God, waiting for His enemies to be made His footstool. But for those that are His, ingrafted in Him know that we are not alone but He is always with us in all our daily endeavor guiding us, leading us, ministering to us, reassuring us, preparing the path before us and we are always with him in heaven seated in Him at the right hand of God having the confidence to present our petitions to the Father in heaven. By faith, we are reborn into His likeness and just as He has overcome death by His resurrection, we are also like Him resurrected and with power over the sting of death that came because of sin because the full price for our sins has been paid at the cross by He who loves us, when He cried out ‘It is finished’ while H

The Holy Spirit

John 14:17, ‘…the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept Him, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. But you know Him for He lives with you and will be in you.’ When we accept Jesus Christ in our lives by faith, a wonderful miracle happens, God resurrects our spirit and comes fills us with His Spirit – the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth, making His home with us and what a joy it is to have Him in and with you! For he will always live in us, never leaving nor forsaking us. Then you can have all the confidence to do everything according to His will with the knowledge that He who is in us is greater than those that are in the world. The Holy Spirit convicts us of sin so that we may repent of our sins and receive the forgiveness of God through Jesus Christ, of righteousness so that we may have the confidence to approach the throne of God through Christ who has clothed us with His righteousness and is seated at the right hand of the Father in heaven interceding on our behalf and o

Love in Obedience

John 14:15, 21, 23, 24, ‘“If you love me, you will obey what I command.” … “Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him.” … “If anyone loves me, he will obey my teachings. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. He who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me.”’ God is love and we who He has called to Jesus now love Him because He loved us first. The true testament of loving God is by living a life of total submission and obedience to His will, through His Son Jesus, in our lives. By living a life of obedience to Him, we allow Jesus to come and transform us into His likeness, our minds and our hearts, purging out the impurities within us, molding and shaping us into who He wants us to be in Him, complete and mature just as He is. God is spirit and when we l

Selfish Self Love

John 12:25, 26, ‘The man who loves his life will lose it, while the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me.’ We need to be careful not to exhibit this world’s kind of selfish self love that tends to exalt itself above God. Loving yourself in this manner leads to disobedience and rebellion that lead to Satan’s and Adam’s fall. God does not mean that you must hate yourself but you need to hate and resist the selfish desires of that sinful carnal nature in us that desires to control us and that the Devil tries to use to tempt us into disobedience and rebellion. If we are truly followers of Christ, then we need to gain control over this carnal man/ woman in us and submit in obedience to the command of the Lord just as He did to the Father’s will even to the point of handing Himself over to and enduring a death at the cross He did not deserve.

Life in Death

John 12:24, ‘I tell you the truth, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.’ Life begins with the death of the seed which ceases to exist as a seed but is transformed into a tree. Jesus was the seed of Abraham, through which the world was promised redemption. At the cross, this seed of Abraham was crucified, died and was buried but on the third day and rose again but not as a seed but glorified as the tree of life. Now through that resurrection, many branches have been attached, growing and receiving sustenance from this tree of life. For us also to produce as per God’s will and plan according to His grace as believers of Christ, we need to die to ourselves in faith so that we can be reborn in this same transformation of our Lord, attached to him, the tree of life and being continually pruned by the Father to remove the unproductive elements in us while nurturing the productive elements through the m

The Power in Jesus

John 14:11-14, ‘Believe me when I say that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the miracles themselves. I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father. You may ask me for anything in my name and I will do it.’ Jesus told us that He is in the Father and the Father in Him and therefore they are one, quite a difficult concept for us with our limited way of thinking to grasp. He told us that if we cannot accept what He says to be true based on His word then we should at least accept on the basis of the miracles He performed while He walked this earth as the Son of Man. The miracles He performed were norm defying, healing the sick; making the lame and crippled walk; the blind, even those born blind, see; feeding thousands of people from only a

The Way to Life

John 14:6, 7, ‘Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know Him and have seen Him.’ If anyone wants to have eternal life then the only way to attain it is through and in Jesus Christ, the Son of God. God in His divine wisdom crafted a plan to redeem man from the bondage and slavery of sin through His Son, Jesus the Christ. In Christ, God punished all the sins of mankind to satisfy the justice of His divine law that dictates that the wages or just payment for sin is death and total separation from Him. Through Christ, we exchange our sinfulness for His righteousness, we exchange our weakness for His power and authority over the world and sin, we exchange our condemnation and guilt for His innocence, we become conquerors through Christ who strengthens us, we are victors in Him, claiming victory over sin in a battle that He fought for us, and we g

Trust and Despair

John 14:1, ‘Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, trust also in me.’ As Jesus was preparing to face the cross, He left His disciples a word of encouragement because He knew they were going to face uncertain and disappointing times before His resurrection. Uncertainty and disappointment, because of lack of control over the circumstances facing us, cause us to panic, despair and be fearful. We have troubled hearts but Jesus asked His disciples then and us now that we need to trust in God, the Father and the Son. When we are faced with a situation that is difficult and that seems to have no way out for us, we need to remember that God is all knowing; He loves us and has good plans for us. With this knowledge we can let all our cares and concerns rest in Him and place our complete trust and faith in Him and His ability to get us out of the situation stronger, better and more mature than we could ever do it for and by ourselves. Trust and faith is the only way to defeat fea

Glorification

John 13:31, 32, ‘… Now is the Son of Man glorified and God is glorified in Him. If God is glorified in Him, God will glorify the Son in Himself, and will glorify Him at once.’ Through obedience to the Father, Jesus the Son of God was glorified, being resurrected from the dead in all glory with the power to bring to life, the dead in heart, that is you and me who were living sinful lives. Through that act of obedience God was glorified in the Son as being the Holy, merciful, faithful and just God. By His sacrifice of His one and only Son, we glorify God for His abounding grace and love for mankind. Now when we are born again in Jesus Christ and die to ourselves and submit to live a life of total surrender and obedience to the will of Christ over our lives, we glorify the Son, who is in us by living in righteous not due to our own ability but through Christ who strengthens us. The Son then glorifies the Father through us and we are in turn glorified by the Father. Let us therefore all

God is Love

John 13: 34, 35, ‘A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.’ The world today is very cold. A video about Chinese insensitivity went viral awhile back showing how over ten ordinary people went by a young girl who had been run over by a truck before someone cared enough (ironically it was a person looked down upon by the society) to call for help for her to get medical attention. Unfortunately the young girl did not make it through. Am sure many of us think that if we had been in a similar situation we would have reacted differently, but is this really the case? How many of us when faced with a situation where our fellow human being requires our assistance shrink away, pretending not to have seen them, or move to the other side of the road to avoid coming into contact with them? This is even evident in the church. How many take time to visit with that new

Great Joy in Heaven over Repented Sinners

Luke 15:7-10, ‘I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety nine righteous persons who do not need to repent. Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Does she not light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it? And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says, “Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin.” In the same way I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.’ It grieves our God that even though the price of our salvation has been paid, many still live in slavery and bondage to sin and sinfulness. They still give the power over their lives to Satan that has already been taken away from Him by the Lord Jesus Christ. This is due to ignorance and rebellion and prevents men and women from seeing and understanding the truth. But what joy is in heaven when one of the fallen brothers or sisters is

Strength in Weakness

1 Corinthians 1:27-31, ‘But God chose the foolish things of this world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of this world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things – and the things that are not – to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before Him. It is because of Him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us the wisdom from God – that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore it is written: “Let him who boasts boast in the lord.”’ God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. If you think that you are able to do something on your own, you will lift yourself above God and give honor and glory yourself instead of God. But those that are weak, unable to do in their own strength, God uses them to show His own strength, to make sure that everyone is focused on Him and His will, His purpose, His strength and hence give thanks and glorify Him. It is only a person that knows that he is not

The War for our Souls

Luke 14: 31-33, ‘Or suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Will he not first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and ask for terms of peace. In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciples.’ There is a war going on where two unseen sides are trying to win our souls, the victorious King who wants to give us mercy and eternal life because of the great love He has for us and the Fallen Prince, who wants to take us down with Him to the lake of fire that was created for Him because of His loathing and hate for us due to the great love the Father has for us. Now for those of us that have been selected by the victorious King, heeding His call, are faced with constant opposition from the forces of the Evil one in order to make them fall and lose their resolve. T

Seeking Counsel

Luke 14:28-30, ‘Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Will he not first sit down and estimate the cost to see if he has enough money to complete it? For if he lays the foundation and is not able to finish it, everyone who sees it will ridicule him saying, “This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.”’ Wisdom dictates that before you undertake any venture, you need to know the true and total cost so that you are fully prepared. If you do not do this, you will start a venture and then midway find yourself not able to bear the cost and leave the project unfinished. This is the same with our salvation and our life in Christ. When we receive the word of God and are convicted by the Holy Spirit, we need to know the full cost of surrendering our life to obedience and love of Jesus. If we do this we will be prepared and even expecting the trials and tribulations that may come our way because of this submission. But if we do not count the cost, we will take flight and leave a

Living a Life of Sacrifice

Luke 14:25-27, ‘Large crowds were traveling with Jesus, and turning to them he said: “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters – yes, even his own life – he cannot be my disciple. And anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.’ Carnality is the expressing of loving self above everything else including God. It is when we glory in our abilities, our achievements, ourselves, glorifying ourselves for these things that we have received from the Father. In this state we are proud of ourselves and believe that we do not need God. Jesus gave us a good example of what humility is. He being God in all respect, willingly shed His divinity to come and live and die here on earth as a servant, a death that would lead to His separation from His Father, something that had not happened since the beginning of time. He willingly obeyed the will of the Father to face our punishment that He did not deserv

Transformation

Romans 12:2, ‘Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is – His good, pleasing and perfect will.’ By meditating on God’s word, by submitting to His perfect and good will for us, our minds will be transformed because His word is alive and when planted in a receptive, faithful and fertile heart, just as a small seed germinates and grows, and when it is continuously and constantly watered by His word, it leads to a transformation of your thoughts and the mind. You will find that your thoughts will no longer conform to the patterns of this world but will be conformed to the pattern of Christ. You will find then that you will be able to test everything that comes and happens in your life, knowing and approving the will of God for your life to pass while resisting and rebuking the attempts of the evil one to mislead, tempt and distract you from that wonderful and pleas

Live in the Light

Ephesians 5:8-14, ‘For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light is in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. For it is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret. But everything exposed by the light becomes visible, for it is the light that makes everything visible.’ In Christ we are children of the light and are to be the light of the world. We have been freed from the darkness and its fruitlessness and should receive this truth with joy and power, shedding of your carnality in Christ and living a life that glorifies the one that is in you, (Christ Jesus) a life of love and obedience to His word. Only then can we live and enjoy the fruits of goodness, righteousness, truth, peace, joy, love, hope and all other fruits that have already been released to us through Him. Meditate upon

The Dead Wisdom

Ephesians 4:17-19, ‘So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of their ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, with a continual lust for more.’ We call ourselves scholars, having access to more information than any other civilization that has ever lived in the world before us, yet with all this knowledge, and our own understanding, we fail to know and understand the truth. The truth that God is there and He loves us so much that He prepared a way for us to be redeemed from the slavery of Sin and under the dominion of Satan through His Son, Jesus Christ, who in His unconditional and selfless love for us, took our place and died for us, suffering punishment in our place tha

Restoration for Your Suffering

1 Peter 5:10, ‘And the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will Himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast.’ Life as a follower of Christ is fraught with trials, persecutions and sufferings. This does not mean that we are called to live a life of anxiety or despair but because of His peace that He has given us and His boundless grace in our lives, we are able to live joyful lives even in the midst of our misfortune and suffering. We who are called and have heeded to that same call to follow and obey Christ need to persevere and exercise patience in our lives. We need to look at things in perspective which is that the time spent on this earth is small compared to the eternity of the life to come and also that God is faithful to His word and will keep the promises He has made to us in Christ. He will restore us and make us strong, firm and steadfast not only in the life to come but also in this that

Resisting The Devil

1 Peter 5:8,9, ‘Be self controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.’ The Devil is always looking for an opportunity to destroy us, the beloved of God. We are called to be always alert and have self control, because He will use anyone and any situation to try and attack you and drive a wedge between you and your God. Each one of us faces temptations from the Devil that are directed towards our unique individual weaknesses, therefore they may not be the same in kind but are the same in purpose which is to destroy you and make you feel condemned and unloved by God. You should never let go of your faith in God’s faithfulness, love and power because as it is, the Devil stands condemned because He was defeated by Jesus Christ, at the cross, and now like a dangerous wounded lion, He looks

Living in Humility

1 Peter 5:6,7, ‘Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that He may lift you up in due time. Cast all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you.’ When we are faced with difficulties, trials, problems, stress; we usually tend to get agitated, anxious, worried, angry and frustrated. We blame ourselves, others, the world and even God for our predicaments. At that time we try to get hold of the problem so that we can resolve it, in our own way, by our own might. We do not seek the counsel of the Lord to listen to His wisdom on how to resolve our problems. At this time, in our impatience, most of us adopt the end justifies the means attitude and we end up getting into more problems, digging ourselves even deeper into misery. We suffer because we do not believe or trust in the ability of our God to take care of us, to carry us through by His grace during the difficult times, to give us circumstance defying peace and His everlasting joy. In times of need, we should cast

The Power of Unity

Mathew 18:19,20, ‘Again, I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in Heaven. For where two or three come in together my name, there am I with them.’ The church is a fellowship of two or more believers and where believers gather, Jesus Christ, who is the groom of the church is also present. When we are united, we exhibit and experience the love of God in our lives. When we come before Him in this love and ask for anything in faith, God is faithful and will answer our prayer. This revelation means that a praying husband and wife have immense power to influence and change the world. If they come together in prayer before God, and ask for anything according to His will, they are bound to receive it abundantly above and beyond, what they asked for or imagined receiving. Therefore for our prayers to be answered, we need to stay in unity as a church.

Power over the World

Mathew 18:18, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.’ We have been given authority from heaven by God the Father through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior in whom we have placed all our hope and trust to overcome everything of and in this world. Whatever we bind or set loose from our lives, the Father, who is just and faithful, because we ask in faith, will bind it in heaven, and it will be bound here on earth. All we have to do is to believe in the Son that He sent to redeem and renew us, have faith in that He is faithful and will do all that He promised us.