THE CRY OF THE SPIRIT DEVOTIONALS – BY RICHARD E. S. TAKIM

TODAY’S DEVOTION (Wednesday 15th April 2020)

“Better is a little with righteousness, than vast revenues without justice. A man’s heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps.” Proverbs 16:8-9 NKJV

WELCOME TO THE 106th DAY OF OUR YEAR OF REJOICING

We have been in Corona Holidays for some days now, so long as Church fellowship, work and private businesses are concern. But to me it has not been like a holiday because all my activities apart from seeing people for counseling are still going on. It seems like I am getting even busier than before.

As I studied this phenomenon that is unfolding with me, I realize something.

What really keep some of us busy (or not busy), is not the world out here but a world out there – a world beyond this world. I feel so disconnected from this holiday. I found out that truly there is a world beyond this world that have been keeping me busy for over 28 years.

It was a revelation to me when I realized through this lock down that I have not really been part of this world in a sense.

I found out that if your employment or appointment letter is not of this world, your job description will not be on a sheet of paper. If your job description is not on a sheet of paper, it will either be on the tablets of your heart like it was for Moses, or the inner chambers of your spirit like it was for David. You will find your work schedule not in synch with the timelines of men.

When men will be sleeping, that is when you are resuming work and when they are on holiday, that is when you are being kept on your toes by your out-of-this-world work schedule,

Here is the thing, if your job description is not according to the timelines of men, then you are working for someone not living in this world, but in the glories of Heaven. Working for such a supernatural being will make it impossible for the world out here to control your activities because your daily routine, or Job schedule, will fall into the prophetic hypothesis I just stated above.

I feel like am working in a different world in this world.

I now understand in a different light what Jesus meant when He said, “you are not of this world.” Indeed, if one is not of this world, crisis moments like this (namely the Corona Virus lock down) has a way of proving it further. If your calling is not of this world, most things about you will not be of this world.

I also saw what it means to be seated together with Christ in the Heavenly places in a New LIGHT.

If we are really seated, Corona virus lock down will not unseat or unsettle anything we may be doing. We will find ourselves still seated, doing whatever God may have called us to do irrespective of what may be happening. We will just find ourselves, carrying out our God given responsibilities and still be obeying all government rules.

YOU WILL FIND EVERYTHING ON ITS OWN RAIL, THERE WILL BE NO CLASHES ANYWHERE!

Today is the mid-day of the month! Middle days are unique days. They are days one need to sit down and check out how he or she must have fared in the month, and that is in all aspects of life, then pick up any pieces, if there is any, and plan the rest of the month in other to come out with a better result. That is one of the major principles of planning.

Talking about planning, most people do not live their lives according to divinely predetermined plans. This can be extremely dangerous, especially in an uncertain world like ours. I just stated what I found out from the Coronal Virus lock down. If you are in God’s plan, you will still be busy even when you are told to stay at home and not even come out. You will be reaching out and doing things that were predetermined for you by GOD.

God planned our world so perfectly that there is no flaw. In the same way He planned our lives so perfectly without flaws. We only see flaws when we do not walk according to His plans. In that way, we can see that planning is part of divine wisdom. An Old axiom says, “failure to plan is planning to fail.”

As you go through the Bible and even take deep gaze at creation, you will see that the divine wisdom of planning is gloriously on display in all of God’s creation. From the supply chains, to consumption chains, God so planned creation that it provides food for itself. Science discovered it and called it food cycle.

I have come to realize that so long as you are in your own food cycle, you will never lack what to eat or give to others to eat. That is why Jesus said to us “do not worry… Consider the lilies”. That means locate your own food cycle and position yourself there like the lilies, and you will never lack food to eat.

He planned the Sun to shine at certain time and the moon to come up at its own time so man can determine between days and night.

One day a little boy said to his father, “God is foolish. He did not position created things very well. Why should the big trees bear exceedingly small fruits and the pumpkin fruit grow from a very tiny plant on the ground?”

HE MADE THE STATEMENT WHILE SITTING UNDER A BIG TREE WITH HIS DAD.

Now, while he was still speaking, it was like the tree heard him and released some fruit on his head. Then he realized that if it was some pumpkins that had fell on him, he might have passed out. That was when he appreciated the wisdom in how GOD planned creation. He said to his Dad “that was stupid of me, thanks to the tree.”

Man was created in the image of God, and God is a master planner. We ought to be planners too. Planning is the progressive way of stepping into a glorious future. Through planning, you can preserve your life.

If you look at humans, you will realize that a lot have cut their lives short for lack of planning. Youths are growing up today without a plan for their lives. A life without a plan will lack momentum, it will be full of fantasies and failed hopes.

I realized that the greatest desire of so many who have no plans for their lives is to get married. You find them developing desires that they are either not due for or have not being prepared sufficiently for. One major thing you must do as you walk with the LORD is to listen to His voice and plan your life around it.

You can plan how you want your life to be when you get old, by making sure you don’t do what will turn you into a sick old man or woman at old age now that you are young. The Bible is full of what not to do when you are young so that you can have a beautiful old age.

I have come to realize that some people who suffer diabetes at old age did not plan their sugar or other forms of food intake at their youthful age. Some poor people who are old today messed up their economic lives and did things that destroyed God’s plans for their economic prosperity when they were young. It is important to walk with the LORD planning your life around His word and His ways.

I have come to realize that in matters of financial prosperity, power from God is what brings the economic prosperity of the righteous, but it takes wise planning to preserve it. Wise planning does not just preserve the wealth of the righteous, it also creates it.

I HAVE SEEN GOD USE WISE PLANNING TO TERMINATE LACK AND POVERTY IN THE LIVES OF MANY.

If you read the Bible, you will realize that most things about enduring riches in the Kingdom of God depends on wise planning. People are poor not because of the devil sometimes but because of their brains. They do not put it to work. God will never work where you have not put your brain to work sometimes. He blesses the works of our hands, and the works of our hands are first the works of our brains.

I have come to discover that when God put money in your hands, and you do not put your brain to work, that could be the last money you will ever get.

God could give you a job just for you to use the entire salary to create streams of income for yourself and become an entrepreneur, then serve Him from that financial fountain. But if you do not sense that, and then plan it out, you will move from that job to other jobs and remain a financial slave all your life.

Many of you have put your mouth to work all your life but have never put your brains to work. The things your mouth have said are uncountable. You have put it to work saying all sorts of things with it, but your brain has been lying dormant in the realm of productive thinking. That is why you are where you are. If it were your brain that you were putting to work instead of your mouth, things would have been favorable for you.

Learn to put your brain to work, direct it towards productive thinking.

Some have used their brains towards sexual thinking, becoming poor and sick in the process. The brain was not given to us for pornographic fantasies but for productive thinking. Sadly, some have even used their sex organs more than their brains. Today they are in very terrible situations. Time has come for someone to give his or her brain the place he or she gave to his or her sex drive. Time to lock up your sexuality in the prison and start using your mentality.

For the righteous, the brain is extremely useful in allowing us to tap into God’s preplanned programs for us. That is why when the Holy Spirit comes on us, He does not come on us from our feet but on our heads. The primary intent is to set our minds on fire towards productive thinking. That is how God brings us into our food chain.

AFTER A TIME WITH GOD, YOU ARE EXPECTED TO BECOME PRODUCTIVE IN YOUR THINKING!

Michael Faraday got a breakthrough in his lab and finally discovered Electricity after attending a Bible class. But we usually discover who to marry or lie to after attending a Bible class or church service. Little wonder many Christians are poor of the prosperity of the righteous! A generation that does not know how to yield to the Holy Spirit and get into productive thinking from time to time, will always find itself in trouble waters.

Now, how do we plan as children of God? Do we just sit down and start drawing out plans? The answer to that is no! if we just sit down like the world does, draw out plans for ourselves, and take decisions based on that that will be Babylon or a system carved out by the Antichrist spirit. Which brings me to the three kinds of planning systems in the world today.

The first is the “human planning system” where men engage their minds to chart a course for their lives. Then we have “demonic planning system” where devils are engaged by men to help chart the course of their lives. And finally the “divine planning system” where you engage the Holy Spirit to help you sense God’s plan for your life concerning each day, month, or year and then engage your mind in productive thinking.

Productive thinking is turning what you sensed God wants you to do into workable steps. That is one of the secrets of progress.

For the righteous, decisions of life are taken based on divine planning system. Your life will not be free of any demonic attacks or destructive human errors if you wrapped it around the human or demonic planning systems.

For instance, every divorce case is a product of a marital alliance outside the divine planning system. Every trouble home was instituted either through the human planning system or the demonic planning system for marriage.

POLYGAMY WAS FOUNDED OUTSIDE GOD’S PLANNING SYSTEM FOR MARRIAGE.

It was the family of Cain that started it. You can bear me witness how it has destroyed so many lives and wounded so many people.

Whenever you turn God’s things into your own image and likeness, pains are inevitable. And the only way out of such problems is to repent – go back to God’s planning system for such things. A key highlight in our devotional text today says, ““A man’s heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps.”

You have lived outside God’s planning system for too long, now it is time to shift. Get into His planning system for your life in all aspects and things will be good. Your miracles, blessings and accomplishments are waiting for you there.

MAKE THIS SCRIPTURE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR THE DAY;

“For I know the thoughts and plans that I have for you, says the Lord, thoughts and plans for welfare and peace and not for evil, to give you hope in your final outcome.” Jeremiah 29:11 AMP