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

TODAY’S DEVOTIONAL (Sunday 17TH October 2021)

“Then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There!’ do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand.

“Therefore if they say to you, ‘Look, He is in the desert!’ do not go out; or ‘Look, He is in the inner rooms!’ do not believe it. For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. For wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together. Matthew 24:23-28 NKJV

WELCOME TO THE 290TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF HIGHER HEIGHTS!

God has been so mindful of us. It is a glorious Sunday even as we prepare for our global outreach to the nations. We started small, but the LORD has helped us greatly. Truly, no one serves the great God and not experience greater things. We are a testimony of God’s greater things.

If you take a faith gaze into the storehouse of God’s greater things you will see greater mercies, greater kindness, greater pardon for sins, greater revelations of His majesty. You will see greater prophetic insights in His word – the Bible. You will see greater measures and dimensions of His grace and glory. You will see greater truths and auctions.

All these we have experienced this year, and we believe we will experience more next year, God keeping us alive.

People who tap into the storehouse of God’s greater things and respond to them has a way of coming into greater dimensions of friendship with the LORD. That was the dimension David got to before eavesdropping into divine conversations in Heaven.

The man of God literally heard God the Father saying to God the Son;

“…. Sit at My right hand, till I make Your enemies Your footstool (Psalms 110:1 NKJV.”

If David could do this under the law, then we can get much more under grace.

But sadly, we are far behind. I wonder what is wrong with us under grace. We cannot even understand the scriptures – the BIBLE. We only use it. How then are we going to come into the dimension of eavesdropping into Heavenly conversations. Spiritual infancy and false teachings will not let many.

You may not know this, but I want to submit to you that spiritual infancy is the greatest killer of the Church. It has given to the demonic the upper hand, and placed the divine out of the reach of many. Hence, most prophets and prophetic people only eavesdrop into demonic conversations that masquerade as the voice of GOD to them.

That is why they specialize in talking about the Satanic and what evil altars or evil foundations are doing in people’s lives. They cannot tell what God is saying to Himself concerning His redemptive programs on earth.

God takes delight in His kingdom kids eavesdropping into Heavenly conversations and breaking them forth on earth.

However, it begins with understanding the Bible. It begins with encountering truths in the Holy Scriptures in the frequency of apostolic and prophetic grace.

This morning we will be visiting a well of truth that was dug in July 2016 about a prophetic warning Jesus gave to the Church shortly before He went to the cross. The same warning has been sounded from generation to generation by His prophetic voice in each generation. Our devotional text today contains the warning.

It’s my prayer that you find grace to help even as you go through this devotional. GOD bless you richly!

THE TRUMPET’S CALL FOR HYPERSENSITIVITY IN THE SPIRIT.

Two places we hold gospel meetings today as the body of Christ is either in the desert (under tents and camps) or in the inner rooms (conference rooms and Church buildings). Jesus said, in these days, men who appear as servants of God will come to us, saying, “they are our messiahs, and that our destinies is in their hands, mouths, or prayer for us.

They will say, “if you want to get married, succeed in life or ministry or in any other thing obey me and support my ministry.” Some will even coerce others to have sex with them.

He also warned that if people point these people to us saying “look, that is your messiah (a suppose anointed prophet or preacher), he or she is coming here and there,” we should not believe them. For wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together.

Jesus spoke of the horrors of the last days. And warned us that deception – I mean hyper deception – will be the first horror of the last days. It will be the very horror that will usher in other horrors, and it’s happening already.

From suppose men and women of God deceiving people to have illicit sex with them as a deliverance ritual, to financial exploitation through the mutilation of the doctrine of giving called “sowing seeds,” to the use of sand, mustard seeds, water, incense, candles and etc. to invoke miracles, the list is endless.

Actually, from the day Adam lost the likeness of God in the garden till date, mankind has been battling with the consequences of spiritual blindness and lack of discernment; making us cheap preys to terrible predators in the spirit and human realms. Part of the likeness of God that man lost is spiritual sensitivity and deep discernment – which can be simply defined as the ability to see through the eyes of God.

Not seeing things in the eyes of God is dangerous. It is the reason many do not see the spiritual side of who they are about marrying before marrying them, consequently losing their marriages shortly after marriage. Some even losing their lives.

Not seeing things in the eyes of the LORD is the reason many call the unclean clean, and the unholy holy.

IT’S THE REASON WE CALL ABOMINATIONS WEAKNESSES AND ACCEPT DEVILS AND MEDIUMS AS PROPHETS OF GOD.

If there is anything we need this very hour, it is hyper spiritual sensitivity and deep discernment. That is the only way we can deal with the scourge of hyper deception among us today.

Hyper sensitivity is developed or cultivated through a daily activity or impact of truth in or on our spirit man. That is why, slowly both swiftly, God is bringing us to the end of living a Christian life without a word of truth and righteousness to guide us day by day.

David says,

“Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path” (Psalms 119:105 NKJV).

Jesus also said

…“I am the Light of the world. He who follows Me will not be walking in the dark, but will have the Light which is Life” (John 8:12 AMP).

If a Christian life is not guided day by day by a word of truth and righteousness from the Light of the world, it will be full of darkness.

The world is full of moral and spiritual darkness just because of that. Isaiah calls it gross darkness. Only a daily scriptural light from God will see us through this hour.

Man was not made to live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God on daily bases. If you stuck your stomach with bread daily but do not stuck your spirit with sufficient light from God daily, you will not live the life God designed you to live. Consequently, you will never become what He created you to be.

Lack or absence of daily sufficient light from Jesus, the Light of the world, is the reason for bad marital, spiritual, financial and even career decisions. We will just be victims of the deception of the last day. A major highlight in our devotional text says;

“Then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There!’ do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand.

A WISE MAN ONCE SAID, “TO BE FOREWARNED IS TO BE FOREARMED.”

Divine warnings are actually God’s way of arming us before the main days. That is why Satan hates people being warned.

Today He even sways some preachers to give a bad name to divine warnings simply to dissuade men from paying attention. But no one can take away “the stewardship of divine warnings” from genuine apostolic and prophetic ministries.

The key words in our scriptural highlight today are the words; TO DECEIVE IF POSSIBLE, EVEN THE ELECT.

In some of our major meetings around Africa, I have shared the difference between signs, wonders and Miracles. There is a difference between signs wonders and miracles. For instance, Moses did not step into Egypt with Miracles but great signs and wonders. The primary assignment was to break the backbone of pharaoh and reveal the almighty God to the ancient nations, through signs and wonders that no god they worshipped had done or can do.

No god had ever smashed others gods, brought lies, frogs and darkness to a people like the God Moses demonstrated. No one had ever parted even a stream, come to talk of the Red Sea before Moses came. So when the nations saw and heard those signs and wonders, they knew for the first time there was a Mighty One somewhere – one Who is matchless in power and glory.

The role of signs and wonders therefore, is to speak to a people and compel them, through supernatural amazements, to submit to either the almighty God or the many lesser gods in the spirit realm.

Prior to the coming of Moses, the lesser gods had used lesser signs and wonders to steal worship from the people and keep them submissive. Today, the enemy is using sings and wonders the bring people under the ministries of false teachers and prophets.

Satan is good at counterfeiting God. He knows, he will never make impact doing his own thing, hence deceiving people by doing God’s things, in God’s ways, but not with God’s Holy Spirit. That is why the kingdom of darkness is also advancing.

WE MUST UNDERSTAND THAT SATAN USES SIGNS AND WONDERS AS A TOOL TO STEAL, KILL AND DESTROY.

Just as signs and wonders are the redemptive tools of God, so are signs and wonder the operational tools of Satan. Don’t forget, he has no capacity to create. He only uses what have been created. So Jesus warned us that he will use the same tool to deceive, if possible, even the elects in our days. This is where the subject of hyper deception comes in!

God’s way of dealing with hyper deception is through the cultivation of hyper Spiritual sensitivity in the lives of His sons, and impartation of deep discernment through sound teachings.

The Prophet Ezekiel gave us a definition of what deep discernment is. He defined it as the ability to discern between the holy and the unholy. He also defined hyper sensitivity in the spirit as the ability to spot the difference between two things that look very alike.

That is why one of the primary responsibilities of genuine apostolic and prophetic ministries is to

“Teach God’s people the difference between the holy and the unholy and cause them to discern between the clean and unclean” (Ezekiel 44:23).

This has been the main thrust of our Ministry since inception in West Africa in the mid-nineties.

That makes genuine apostolic and prophetic centers (the present day sons of Issachar), the ideal spiritual place to locate and plant yourself in.

It is therefore important that you stop jumping from one kesha to another and from one church to another. There are “Church hoppers” everywhere today! That is why the hawks are on rampage to, feeding on them. It is okay to go from Church to Church looking for truth, but very dangerous to go from church to church looking for miracles.

in these days of hyper deception, if you do not locate one assembly of God’s people that is equipped with God’s amazing grace, the revelation for our present times, and the apostolic knowledge of what believers ought to do now, and plant yourself there, you may lose your soul to hell.

If you keep running from place to place, going wherever someone say to you “look the messiah is coming to this Church or that tent or this camp meeting” you will lose. That is the message of today’s devotional.

May God use these words to build you up and give an inheritance among they that are sanctified! AMEN!

MAKE THIS SCRIPTURE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR THE DAY;

“The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved.”

“And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.” 2 Thessalonians 2:9-12 NKJV