TODAY’S DEVOTIONAL (Wednesday 25th August 2021)
“For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them; but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it.”
“For we who have believed do enter that rest, as He has said: “So I swore in My wrath,’ They shall not enter My rest,'” although the works were finished from the foundation of the world.” Hebrew 4:2-3 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 237TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF HIGHER HEIGHTS!
God has been faithful to His word from age to age. In fact, the Bible says He exalted His word above His name. Meaning the most powerful force in His kingdom is His word. If we therefore want to see His works in our Lives we must not neglect His word. We must know what to do with it.
Yes, the first thing to do with His word is to know it. Because knowing His word is knowing His person, His principles, His ways, His power, His Spirit, His promises, His mercies and every other thing that makes Him God.
Knowing His word will help us know His capabilities also. However, we can never know His word without being taught His word. That is why teaching prophets and apostles are the greatest need of the moment and key assets of God’s kingdom.
The next thing to do with His word is to meditate on it, in other to observe and to do what is written. What we are taught must be meditated upon for it to be internalized. When we meditate in the word (both the one we are taught and the word in the Holy Scriptures) good success becomes inevitable.
The next thing we do with His word is to obey it.
Obeying the word is always better than sacrifices. In fact, if we give sacrifices to God without obeying His word, our sacrifices will become sacrifices of fools.
We must obey His word on sexual morality, on purity of our hearts, on showing mercy and walking in forgiveness, on faith, on righteousness and right living, on giving, fasting and prayer, and on all it says to us. The Bible says;
“But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.
For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.
But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does.” James 1:22-25 NKJV
THE WORD OF GOD HAS A WORK BURIED IN IT TO BE DONE.
In other words, the word has demands in it to be met. It is called the demands of the word of the LORD. Each time we are taught the word or given a prophetic word from the LORD, there are some demands in them that we must sense and meet. We meet them by doing the word that requires an action from us.
It is the meeting of the demand in the word that unlocks the power of the word to work in our lives. The Bible says we shall be blessed in what we do if we do the work in the word!
Someone must begin to sense the work to do from every word of God he or she receives.
The next thing to do with the word is to mix it with faith. A word you have not mixed with faith cannot be done. And a word whose work you have not sensed to do, will never profit you!
The first verse of our devotional text this morning says;
“For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them; but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it.” Hebrew 4:2 NKJV
You see, as we get closer and closer to the consummation of all things and the final return of our LORD and savior Jesus Christ, the Bible made it clear that the mystery of God shall be finished. Meaning, we shall come to a perfect understanding of hidden truths in God!
We are also expected to come into amazing freedoms that the truth brings. But that can never happen if we do not learn how to mix the word we are taught with faith. The first verse in our devotional text is simple, instructive, and maybe deep! We can understand it better if we draw some lessons from marriage and family life.
LET US LOOK AT THE SUBJECT OF THE MARITAL CHALLENGE OF BARRENNESS OR THE BLESSING OF FRUITFULNESS.
While in some cases it is the seed of a man that is responsible for bareness, in other cases it is the womb of the woman. The truth is, no matter how fruitful the womb of a woman is, if the seed of the man that enters it is bad, it will never get the womb of the woman pregnant with Child.
On the other hand, a Fruitful womb is the key to conception. If the womb of a woman is not fruitful, no matter how powerful the seed of a man is, that womb will never conceive a Child.
What spiritual truth can we draw from this natural reality?
The good seed of a man represents the word of the LORD, and the womb of a woman represents the spirit of man.
There are Christians whose spirits cannot conceive anything no matter how powerful, effective, anointed, sanctified, miracle-producing and deep the word of God they hear is. In the spirit, conception is the key to delivery; in simple terms, what have not been conceived in your spirit cannot be born in your life.
This is what we learnt on Wednesday and every member of the Cry of the Spirit must get that message. The lesson continues today!
It is what we conceive in our spirits that God’s power will work on and have it born in our lives. If our spirits therefore conceive nothing, in spite of how powerful, effective, creative and wonder working God’s word is, our lives will never have the good things God’s word can produce in it.
WHEN THE WORD IS PREACHED WE ARE EXPECTED TO MIX IT WITH FAITH TO HAVE IT BORN IN OUR LIVES.
Faith come when we see or hear in the spirit realm – when we see things the glory of God wants to bring into our lives, faith is born in us. Things communicated by the word of the LORD must create pictures in our hearts. In simple terms, our spirits must be fruitful enough to conceive the word we hear with our ears for the power of the word to work in our lives.
For instance, if a word on favor, prosperity, healing, deliverance, or holiness comes from the LORD as a living seed (not just some empty words) through the mouth of a preacher to us, and our ear hears it but our spirits did not receive and conceive it, there will be no manifestation of that word in our lives.
In other words, if our spirits are barren, or if we lack the capacity to turn the word into prophetic pictures to be believed and pressed into through pursuit and prayers, the power or the blessings the word was sent to deliver to us will never be delivered to us.
Our devotional text said
“The word did not profit them because it was not mixed with faith in them that heard it”. Consequently, they did not enter into God’s rest. “Until a fruitful and living word meets a fruitful and living spirit over time, a man’s life will never come into God’s fullness and rest for it.”
Often we are troubled on every side and wonder and even blame God’s servants for our problems, particularly when they speak a word to us that we do not see it’s manifestations in our lives. While in some cases it is the word of the preacher that is responsible for the lack of manifestation, in other cases it is the spirits of those who may have received it that is the problem.
David said,
“The entrance of thy word gives light.”
It means when the word of the LORD enters into a man’s spirit, it should produce something in the man. If it is from the living God at an immediate present, it should produce living pictures in our hearts of what it was sent to bring to us.
However, if the word that enters is not from the living God at an immediate present, it will be dead, empty and unfruitful and our spirit if alive and fruitful will have nothing to conceive. On the other hand, if the word is alive, full of revelation, and fruitful, it will not profit you as well if your spirit is dead, unfruitful, and empty of God.
Here is how it works; a rich, living, and fruitful word and a rich, living, and fruitful spirit must meet for any turn around to occur in the life of anyone in the kingdom of God.
Living words are seeds; they are medium of transaction between Heaven and earth. They bring blessings from Heaven to a man’s life. However, until they enter your spirit and plant a spiritual picture of what God is saying to you in it, your life will be barren of the manifestations of that word.
WHAT THEN IS THE KEY TO THE MANIFESTATION OF GOD’S WORD IN OUR LIVES?
Mixing it with faith is the key. The key is one of the simplest keys in the KINGDOM.
We all know that great doors are sometimes opened with very small keys. This key is so small that most times we cannot find it. A fruitful spirit must meet a fruitful word for the manifestation of God’s word to take place in a man’s life. That is the key!
Child of God, are there things that you are yet to enter into? Are there blessings you are yet to come into? The key to coming into them lies in the truths you have just encountered in this devotional today. Get your spirit full of God. Make it alive and fruitful. Then locate a preacher with a true, living, and rich word that will meet your need and feed on it.
Over time, there will be a conception and you will come into the manifestation.
MAKE THIS SCRIPTURE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR THE DAY
“Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience.”
“For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” Hebrews 4:11-13 NKJV