TODAY’S DEVOTIONAL (Thursday 24th June 2021)
O Lord, You have searched me and known me. You know my sitting down and my rising up; You understand my thought afar off.
You comprehend my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways. For there is not a word on my tongue, but behold, O Lord, You know it altogether.
You have hedged me behind and before, and laid your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; It is high, I cannot attain it. Psalms 139:1-6 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 175TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF HIGHER HEIGHTS.
Today marks another full circle in the prophetic annals of my life. I was born 45 years ago on Thursday at 9am. Technically, as I write this, my mum was on her way from the farm, with a fire wood on her head, heavily pregnant with me.
She would latter get home, drop the fire wood and move to the toilet after feeling pressed. Not knowing it was labor pains. I would later be born close to the toilet with no one around to help her. The first person to see me would be a hunter who was returning form hunting. The rest as they say, would become history.
45 Years ago, the LORD allowed me to be shot into time or born, as we call it.
Child of God, it’s been a journey, but when I think of the goodness of Jesus Christ and all He has done for me, my very soul shouts hallelujah! I was looking for words to use in capturing what is in my spirit this day and I found these gracious words from David, and made them our devotional text.
He said to the LORD;
“O Lord, you have searched me and known me. You know my sitting down and my rising up; You understand my thought afar off.
You comprehend my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways. For there is not a word on my tongue, but behold, O Lord, You know it altogether.
You have hedged me behind and before, and laid your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; It is high, I cannot attain it.” Psalms 139:1-6 NKJV
The beauty of the book of Psalms to a man’s soul sometimes can be beyond explanations. Most times one does not know how to sum up God’s goodness and mercies in his life until he reads the book of Psalms. It gives us the exact words that help us in spiritual articulation while giving God thanks.
David must have been one of the best voices God usually hear from the earth in his days. He was not educated in the best ancient institution of learning, but spoke wisdom that Philosophers cannot decode – things that will take eternity to unpack. If you look at the beauty of the words that came out of his mouth, you will understand why I said his voice must have been one of the sweetest that was leaving the earth to Heaven in his days.
There is no killer of the sorrows of sin like the mercies of GOD. Just make sure you do not cover your sin. Confess and repent and you will see great mercies taking you to highest peak of God in your life!
When I consider how I would have been dead by now, partly due to Childhood illness, and when I got caught up in the perils of personal sins, I see the power of GOD’s mercies and marvelous help. Indeed, there is no neutralizer of sorrows like the mercies of GOD. There is no SHIELD like the LORD. Even when people have written me off, He brought me to my feet.
THAT IS THE SUM UP OF THE STORY OF MY 45 YEARS ON EARTH!
David said;
“I will sing of the mercies of the LORD! With my mouth will I make known thy faithfulness to all generations!”
I pray a generation listen to me this morning! I pray someone will tune to the Spirit of the Living God and allow Him to speak to his or her heart this morning.
When the enemy had the whole of me in His snare, God’s mercy rose for me and said “NO!” When he surrounded me with death, hell and grave, God’s mercies mounted a resistance against him. When I walked in the flesh and made a life of sin, iniquity and trespass my dwelling, He came in for me in my tears of repentance.
When I did all I did to ruin my life and the enemy came to use it to burry my calling completely, the LORD came as my mercy seat and took away my judgment. If you say I am a shining star in God’s kingdom, you have said He is shining through me because I am no star but a candidate of His mercies. There is nothing about me that shines. It is His light that we all see shining through me to the nations.
I spent the better part of my 45 years, carving out a history that will have buried my story. But His mercy came and made sure my prophecy was not defeated.
THAT IS WHY AM CELEBRATING TODAY!
Like David I will say this morning “the Knowledge of what God’s mercies has done in my life is too wonderful for me”. It has resisted and destroyed, not just the plans of the enemy against my life, but my own foolish plans that would have also beg against my life!
Most times we find ourselves focusing on the plans of the enemy against our lives, we do not think of our own plans that are even more dangerous. I can say my plan for my life was even more dangerous than the plan of the enemy for my life. But God defeated them all and brought me to my broad places.
In life, you must watch for your plans against your life. They can be more dangerous because they are subtle and accepted and you do not even pray against them. Hence, they can harm you more than the plans of the enemy against your life.
No one has ever prayed against his own plans; plans that runs contrary to God’s will and way for their lives. That is why when we come under the attack of our plans for our lives, only the resistance God’s mercies build for us can see us through.
I have come to realize that the strongest and most effective resistance on earth is the resistance that God’s mercy builds for us!
The resistance of God’s mercies rewrote my story and gave me a brand new life and ministry. It stood against the anger of the enemy, the lies he swayed people to tell about me, the bitter betrayal he swayed some to execute against me, my own evil plans against myself and sorted me out.
So many thought I was dead and gone forever. The enemy had a party and conducted my funeral but the resistance of God’s mercies came through for me and stop him and his. Today I am 45!
There is no fuel for living like the oil of God’s mercy. Even when you have burnt out and feel like packing up and giving out, God will release this oil upon you to start running the race again. For 45 years I have seen that happen severally.
You will never know how the oil of God’s mercies look functions, until you get to the place where the desire to live becomes a burden. I gave up severally. I contemplated suicide 5 times. Four of the five experiences was out of the pressure of hell. One was the type that Elijah had when Jezebel mounted pressure against him.
I HAVE TESTED GOD’S MERCIES SO MUCH THAT PEOPLE DO NOT KNOW THAT EVEN THE HAIRS OF MY HEAD ARE SUSTAINED BY HIS GRACE.
Take the grace of God out of my life and I will fall like a dead tree. It has kept me from sin, severally. Brought me out of sin countless times. It has helped me to overcome temptation and neutralize evil forces as often as my heart beats.
My imperfections would have destroyed my perfect calling if not for the grace of GOD. I can testify that I know what it means for GOD’S grace to be sufficient for a man. Jesus took away all the defects in my life and gave me what many have considered to be a standard of holiness, truth and Christian living!
When I see how Churches, pastors and fellow believers take me as a standard, I feel so unworthy. I see the power of God’s grace at work in my life.
Sometimes when the LORD gives me a word to preach I will remember when I was trapped in the same error, sin, iniquity and trespass he wants me to cry against and feel so unworthy. I am a product of God’s grace. That is why I tell people any grace that is not taking you away from sin, iniquity and trespass is grass and not grace.
When grace finish walking in you, the once defected you, will become perfected you. People will be seeing you as a standard of righteousness and a pattern for their lives. The once blemish you will become unblemished in character. God’s grace will carve that out of your life and use the carvings to show the people how they ought to live by looking at you.
Friend, God’s grace is the strongest removal of defects I have ever seen – His prophetic Grace which I call the prophetic anointing removed defects that made me unusable. On this 45th year of my life on earth, I will say I am what I am today by His grace and mercies. He hedged me behind and before, and laid His hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; It is high; I cannot attain it.
Please join me to appreciate this GOD!
I WANT TO AT THIS POINT APPRECIATE ALL THE SONS AND DAUGHTERS OF JESUS CHRIST WHO HAVE CONTRIBUTED IN ONE WAY OR THE OTHER, IN MAKING ME WHAT AND WHO I AM TODAY. My Biological and spiritual parents, my biological and spiritual family, friends and well-wishers.
I ALSO WANT TO THANK MY ENEMIES, FOR THE ROLE THEY PLAYED TO BRING ME HERE. If not for them, maybe I would not have spent extra time fasting, praying, studying, crying unto God for mercies and finding Him in my tight places.
Yes, the pressure my enemies mounted on me and the role they played was to destroy me completely, but it pushed me to seek God and made me touch things that I would never have touched if they had not attacked me. So I say to them “Thanks for the role you played.”
MAY THIS SCRIPTURE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR THE DAY.
“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.” Psalms 124:6-8 NKJV