TODAY’S DEVOTION (FRIDAY 23RD JUNE 2023)**
“Those who do wickedly against the covenant he shall corrupt with flattery; but the people who know their God shall be strong, and carry out great exploits.” Daniel 11: 32 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 174TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF SIGNS AND WONDERS.
It’s been 174 days of God’s mercies, faithfulness, and kindness. Indeed, if the LORD should mark iniquity, none of us will stand. There is forgiveness with Him, so that He might be feared.
Sometimes, I look at the life of David, His walk and talk with the LORD, his Psalms, and sorrows, his insights and foresight, his story and history, his gory and glorious moments, and thank God that such a life lived on earth. If he had not lived, I do not think we would have known what we now know about God from his life.
The life of a man’s personal walk and talk with the LORD, (or without the LORD), has a way of teaching us how to walk and talk with GOD. That is why the Bible was written. To let us know how ancient men and women walked with the LORD, and how we should also walk with Him.
It is because of the timeless spiritual treasures in the Bible, that it will remain God’s only true book to the human race until the curtain of time closes. It is a book that will keep guiding us on matters of divine destiny and all other issues of life. That is why people who are far from its contents, will never live lives that God has predestined them to live.
The Bible remains the manual of life and divine destiny for the human race.
You will always fulfill a natural destiny, until you begin to feed from it from day to day under the tutelage of its author, the Holy Spirit. The Bible remains the only true information center and eternal catalyst of anything divine. It is the only book that accurately tells us about our origin and future as humans.
For those who may want to know, I submit to you that, the Bible is not a book but a library. It is a collection of 66 books. The first book, Genesis, tells us where we came from, and the last book, Revelation, tells us where we are going to.
Do not forget, divine destiny is about our origin and our future and how we should live the life in between. It is about the things God has organized that they happen in our lives in time and eternity, in order to help us fulfill our prophetic and eternal purposes as humans. The most beautiful impact the Bible would have on you is this; it will help you develop, and maintain a fruitful relationship with the maker of our divine destiny.
Yes, our Divine destiny has a maker, and Jesus Christ is the maker. He is the destiny maker of all who are saved and sanctified in Him. The Bible says by Him were all things created. Meaning He created us and created our destinies as well.
DIVINE DESTINY IS ALL ABOUT HIS PRE-DETERMINED EVENTS FOR OUR LIFE.
Lacking a personal relationship with the maker of divine destiny, the one who created us and pre-determined the events that should happen in our lives, is absolutely important. That is why no one can release their divine destiny without first cultivating and maintaining a personal relationship with the LORD.
The Bible says it’s His zeal that will perform whatever events He has pre-determine to happen in our lives.
People have said, “life begins at 40.” But I have come to discover that meaningful life begins when we meet Jesus, and start a personal relationship with Him outside the walls of man-made religion. That is why everyone who had ever fulfilled his or her divine destiny, came into the consciousness of divine destiny after having an encounter with Jesus Christ.
For instance, Saul was busy fulfilling the plans and purposes of the devil for the early Church, and taking all that to be his divine destiny until he met the LORD. In his own words he said;
“Indeed, I myself thought I must do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth.
This I also did in Jerusalem, and many of the saints I shut up in prison, having received authority from the chief priests; and when they were put to death, I cast my vote against them.
And I punished them often in every synagogue and compelled them to blaspheme; and being exceedingly enraged against them, I persecuted them even to foreign cities. Acts 26:9-11 NKJV
But one day he met Jesus on the road to Damascus and everything Changed. In a radical encounter with the LORD, he stepped into the revelation of His divine destiny and became Paul the apostle.
You will never step into your divine destiny or the glorious events the LORD has decreed that they happen to you in this life, until you begin a relationship with the LORD, through a radical encounter with Him or multiple slow encounters with Him.
IN OTHER WORDS, YOU WILL NEED AN ENCOUNTER WITH THE LORD TO COME INTO THE REALM OF YOUR DIVINE DESTINY!
And not just an encounter, but a consistent relationship with Him that has “countless hours” in His active presence as a result. In simple terms, a relationship with the LORD that has resulted in you having a peg in the Holy Place. That is one of the major things that will be required for you to fulfill your divine destiny.
If our relationship with the LORD, has not resulted in countless times in His presence, it is not yet as real as it ought to be and will never help us unleash our divine destinies. Our relationship with the LORD must have countless hours in God’s active presence as one of its results.
Everyone who has ever fulfilled his or her divine destiny, through a consistent relationship with the LORD, spent countless times with the LORD in prayer. Paul the apostle said, he fasted often. In other words, he spent countless times with the LORD after the first encounter. That was why He was able to unleash all the LORD called him to unleash and finished very strong.
At the end of his life, he wrote to his spiritual son saying;
“I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.”
“Finally, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give to me on that Day, and not to me only but also to all who have loved His appearing.” 2 Timothy 4:7-8 NKJV
Why was he so sure and audacious? The answer lies in the countless times he spent with the LORD and maker of His destiny. It made that possible.
Friend, what a good soil is to a good seed, is what the presence of God is to a divine destiny. We must all learn to make the active presence of God our dwelling. Yes, on this platform, we have seen truths about the active presence of God, and how it helps us in unleashing our divine destinies. But I believe the LORD wants our hearts refreshed again, because teachings on the presence of GOD can never be enough.
IN A FAST FOOD GENERATION LIKE OURS,WHERE NO ONE WANTS TO SPEND TIME WITH THE LORD, IT HAS BECOME VERY DIFFICULT TO ACCURATELY FULFIL A DIVINE DESTINY.
That is why you see many Christians today fulfilling the plans and purposes of the devil for their lives. We spend quality time on YouTube and face book, soaking other things into our spirits, but no quality time with God’s book. We spend time with movies and political events, but do not spend quality time in God’s presence, absorbing the visions and revelations of the LORD for our lives.
Friend, if you do not cultivate the habit of spending countless times with the LORD, no matter what you know about your divine destiny, it will never be fulfilled. You will face so many hindrances that will stall the manifestation of God’s plans and purposes for your life. A time in His presence every now and then, is one of the most important things your divine destiny will need, to be fulfilled. A major Highlight in our devotional text today says;
“but the people who know their God shall be strong, and carry out great exploits.”
The word “know,” within context, does not describe head knowledge, but intimate knowledge. There is an intimate knowledge of GOD that we can only come into, as a people of destiny (resulting in amazing outbreaks of GOD in our lives), through countless hours spent with Him. That is what our divine destiny will need to be fulfilled.
LET THIS SCRIPTURE BE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR US TODAY!
“Therefore, brethren, seek out from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business; but we will give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the word.”
“And the saying pleased the whole multitude. And they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit, and Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolas, a proselyte from Antioch, whom they set before the apostles; and when they had prayed, they laid hands on them.”
“Then the word of God spread, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests were obedient to the faith”. Acts 6:3-7 NKJV