TODAY’S DEVOTION (FRIDAY 13TH October 2023)
“We know that whoever is born of God does not sin; but he who has been born of God keeps himself, and the wicked one does not touch him.”
“We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one.”
“And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us an understanding, that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life.
Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen.” 1 John 5:18-21 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 286TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF SIGNS AND WONDERS
We thank the LORD God for giving us another day. We will not be tired in affirming that it is out of His mercies that we are not consumed, for His compassion fails not. Like David would say, “we sleep and wake up because the LORD keeps us.” We all have the power to fall asleep, but none has the power to know what is happening while he sleeps, or the power to wake up. The Spirit of the LORD is responsible for all that. May the LORD be glorified.
Today, we will be refreshing our minds on divine backing. Oh, how we need it in these perilous times. A lot is happening to the human race that if God is not standing by someone, it will not matter who may be standing by them. To start with, understand that mankind was not designed by His creator to live a life without divine backing. From the original intent, you and I were not designed to survive, succeed, prevail, exist, progress or advance without divine backing.
I have come to discover that in the battles of life, our enemies are not actually the problem. Lack of divine backing is the problem. If we can secure divine backing, before we do anything, get involved in anything or with anyone, God will move swiftly against whatever might come against us.
Divine backing can be described in so many ways. We can say divine backing is God standing by man in every endeavor of his life. It is a supernatural support from a loving God to a people who seek Him. It is God standing by you, as a ‘Mighty Terrible One’ (MTO) to help you come out victorious in the battles of life.
When Jesus was in the flesh as man, he never did anything without divine backing. He was able to raise the dead, heal the sick, come out of terrible storms, walk upon the water and do all He did because the Bible says, “God was with Him.” If God is not with you, your life will never produce anything great on earth.
If God is not with you, the enemy will ruin you. If God is not with you, any evil can successfully be against you. If God is not with you, it does not matter who is with you, it will appear as if there is no one standing by you, especially when things that are beyond human comprehension happen to you.
DIVINE BACKING IS GOD BEING WITH YOU.
Paul went through all he went through and still fulfilled both his days and ministry because God was with Him. He said;
“From the Jews five times I received forty stripes minus one.
Three times I was beaten with rods; once I was stoned; three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I have been in the deep;in journeys often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils of my own countrymen, in perils of the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren;
in weariness and toil, in sleeplessness often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness—
besides the other things, what comes upon me daily: my deep concern for all the churches.
Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to stumble, and I do not burn with indignation? 2 Corinthians 11:24-29 NKJV
I think, the request for divine backing, should be at the top of our prayers in life. Except God be with you, it is impossible to go through any of the experiences in this scripture and still be alive. It is impossible to go through the perils of false brethren, the perils of robbers, the perils of nations without GOD, the perils of the weather, and all that is stated in this scripture, if GOD is not with you.
Your life will be consumed in few years without God being with you. For Paul, this apostle of Jesus Christ, his calling was to be a pattern of the Christian faith and complete in his body, the sufferings of Christ. Without divine backing, none of that would have been impossible. But with divine backing, he was able to fight the good fight, run the race and finished his course.
We are the next on God’s list!
Child of God, it takes divine backing to do anything meaningful on the face of the earth today. When I say meaningful, I am referring to God’s definition of meaningful. Your life will remain insignificant without the backing of God. You will remain small without God by your side.
People will come against you like a flood and swallow you up if God is not by your side. David said; If it had not been the LORD who was on our side,” Let Israel now say—
“If it had not been the LORD who was on our side, When men rose up against us,
Then they would have swallowed us alive, When their wrath was kindled against us;
Then the waters would have overwhelmed us, The stream would have gone over our soul; Then the swollen waters Would have gone over our soul.”
Blessed be the LORD, Who has not given us as prey to their teeth. Psalm 124:1-6 NKJV
Divine backing is the LORD being by your side when people rise against you. It is God showing Himself mighty in your life when the wrath of men and women are kindled against you, sometimes justly, other times unjustly. It is God defending and protecting you from the waters, and streams that overwhelm us as we run the race. It is God not giving us over to the teeth of our enemies.
I have shared this story over and over again, but it is not growing Old in my spirit. It is not growing Old because it was created by the eternal God who inhabits a timeless zone. I remember our own little story here in East Africa. When we first came, we knew no one. We were not sent by any missionary group. We were just us and God. I remember worshiping in a particular Church, and meeting a couple that asked my wife and I what organization sent us, when they got to know that we were missionaries. We said to them, “none!”
Then they responded, “wao… you will not be able to do anything meaningful here without foreign backing. That is terrible. You will need financial support from abroad to do anything meaningful here” they said! Now that meeting took place at a time when we have lost all we came here with, by the hands of fraudulent preachers, and had no money left in our hands. We could not even pay our rent then. So, it left me very frustrated and discouraged.
BUT THEN, THE LORD REMINDED ME OF WHAT I SAID MANY YEARS AGO WHILE PREACHING.
I remembered saying to an audience 15 years back, that “if God throws me into an Island, with just my Bible in my hands, with no one to support me, I will fill that Island with people and provision through the preaching of the word and prayer.” So, the Holy Spirit brought that word to me, and pushed me to work it out, now that I am in a place with no support from anyone – an economic island.
We bowed our knees to God who alone we have; the God who called and sent us to East Africa without external support from anywhere. We sought Him and listened to the little steps He asked us to take in response. With a divine decree not to beg, borrow, or mix ministry with buying and selling like many preachers are doing, we soldiered on, seeking Him to make way for us to preach His word and execute the apostolic mandate he brought us here to execute.
Today we have so many friends, sons and daughters in the LORD, birthed by the Spirit of the LORD using our prayer knee and the declaration of His end time message. We are a living testimony that no one needs backing from abroad to do God’s work. We all need backing from above.
If God be with you, it does not matter who is not with you. Out of Him will come out all the help you need to do what He has called you to do. It became clear to us that, “God’s man, in God’s vineyard, doing God’s work, in God’s time, and in God’s way and will, will never lack God’s provisions.” He will never lack God’s provision because of the presence of divine backing.
What is the message of our devotional today? The message is simple. Your life will be less than dust without divine backing. Forces that militates against our progress in life, will neutralize your efforts to succeed in life, if there is no divine backing.
Don’t go into anything without divine backing. If you step into a thing with all the human backing you need, you will achieve little or nothing. But if you step into things with all the divine backing you need, you will achieve much within a short time.
WITH DIVINE BACKING, YOU WILL NOT BE RUNNING IN YOUR OWN STRENGTH. YOU WILL BE RUNNING IN THE STRENGTH OF THE ALMIGHTY GOD.
People will be wondering why you are making such great waves and gaining such great speed. Those who are wise will know it’s not you but something and someone bigger than you. You see, any man who try to copy, or compete with those God is backing, will end up frustrating himself.
When you run against men who are not running spiritually with their natural feet, but the feet of God almighty, you will just weary yourself. The race is actually not to the swift and the battle not to the strong. Its God’s divine backing that makes the difference in life and ministry.
Divine backing is required in every detail of our lives. You will need divine backing to marry that man or woman or to succeed in that business or ministry. You will need divine backing to go through school and come out well.
You will need divine backing to live in a foreign land like we do. You will need divine backing to escape from the sword of your enemies. There are no words to accurately describe what your life will become if you lack divine backing as a Child of God, in whatever you may be pursuing or doing.
Marriages will break down without divine backing. Businesses will fail without divine backing. Churches and ministries will fold up without divine backing. God will open a great door for you but without divine backing, you will not be able to enter.
Again, Paul the apostle wrote down in one of his letters, saying;
“For a wide door of opportunity for effectual [service] has opened to me [there, a great and promising one], and [there are] many adversaries.” 1 Corinthians 16:9 AMP
It’s impossible to deal with the many adversaries that surround divine opportunity without divine backing. Friend, our present world is under the sway of the evil one and his dark realm. He will sway people to speak ill of you, hinder you from achieving, withhold good from coming to you, and build a wall against those God may have raise to help you, basically to prevent them from reaching you. If you do not have divine backing, you will never achieve meaningfully.
A major highlight in our devotional text today says; “We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one.” If you do not have divine backing in whatever you may be doing, the enemy will sway people against you, and there will be no help from God to conquer them.
Now, the question, is how do we secure divine backing? That is what we will seeing tomorrow.
May divine backing never depart from your life. Amen!
MAKE THIS SCRIPTURE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR THE DAY!
“If it had not been the LORD who was on our side,” Let Israel now say— “If it had not been the LORD who was on our side, When men rose up against us,
Then they would have swallowed us alive, When their wrath was kindled against us;
Then the waters would have overwhelmed us, The stream would have gone over our soul; Then the swollen waters Would have gone over our soul.”
Blessed be the LORD, who has not given us as prey to their teeth.
Our soul has escaped as a bird from the snare of the fowlers; The snare is broken, and we have escaped. Our help is in the name of the LORD, who made heaven and earth.” Psalm 124:1-8 NKJV