TODAY’S DEVOTION (THURSDAY 4TH JANUARY 2024)
“Awake, awake! Put on your beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city! For the uncircumcised and the unclean shall no longer come to you.
Shake yourself from the dust, arise, and sit down, O Jerusalem; loose yourself from the bonds of your neck, O captive daughter of Zion!” Isaiah 52:1-2 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 4TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF IMPACT.
Glory be to God for the 4th day of the year. It has started rolling; before we know it, we will be shouting another happy new year.
For those who are yet to wake up, we are about eating four days of the year 2024. Those who were born in February 29 will be having a birthday this year; that is after four years. Indeed, this year will be a remarkable one. It is a leap year!
One of the major ways to live the days of this remarkable year, apart from handing over the controls of your life to God, is to make each day count by being purpose driven.
Spend each day serving your eternal purpose in life.
From the records of original intent, Man was created to live for divine purpose, not human needs. In other words, we were not created to be driven by our human needs, but by God’s eternal purpose in time.
We were not created to be driven by our need for money, food, shelter, clothing, marriage, children, jobs, and etc. None of them therefore, should be at the forefront of your life this year.
That is why the Bible says we should not worry. If we become driven by them, if we put any of our human needs at the fore front of our lives, we will fill our lives with worry.
Jesus Himself said we should not spend our day seeking the satisfaction of our earthly or human needs. We should spend it seeking the fulfillment of His will in our lives and manifestation of His Kingdom.
When we become eternal purpose driven, we will be consumed with an undying passion to see the kingdom of GOD come, and His will done in our lives or through our lives as written in Heaven.
Sadly, our needs and worries occupy the most of our lives and reflect even in our most intimate prayer seasons with the LORD.
There are no words to describe what the life of a Christian will become, if he or she spends it worrying about his or her earthly needs. The Bible made it clear that the soul of that person will begin to sink and come under the spiritual elements of the dark world.
THAT IS WHY, EVERY CHILD OF GOD MALFUNCTIONS WHENEVER HE OR SHE BEGINS TO WORRY ABOUT EARTHLY NEEDS.
Let me reiterate again that our LORD and Saviour Jesus Christ, warned that we will add no value to our lives if we spend them worrying about anything. The year is not a year to spend worrying about anything that will not minister grace to you, or add value to your life.
The book of Matthew puts it this way;
“Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body what you will out on. Is life more than food and the body more than clothing?
Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?” Matthew 6:25,27 NKJV
Worrying is like a demon; it does not add to you, it diminishes you. When you worry, you develop negatives about your life. The art of worry itself is simply sitting down on the dark moments of your life, developing negatives.
It is not a good art; it involves cracking your head over things you cannot change and generating excruciating thoughts and feelings about painful things that are beyond you.
It usually leads to a loss of hope about life itself.
Worrying involves the process of trying to squeeze answers from questions that lack human answers. Friend, you will become more confused if you try to find answers to questions that have no human answers.
Yes, there are questions that lack human answers.
Questions like, “why did I marry this man or woman?” “Why did I give birth to this child?” “Why was I born by this man or woman?” “Who is my father?” “Why did my mother die despite praying for her?” “Why did my father die early in life?” “Why was I even born?” “When will I have money to do this or that?” “Why am I not married?” and the like.
Jesus said we should not practice the art of worrying because it will add nothing to us! Worrying has never added value to anyone on the face of the earth. It has only brought miseries.
It has functioned as the birthplace of high blood pressure and all kinds of diseases and evil expectations. It has also functioned as the birthplace of sinful acts, bad decisions, and dangerous turns in life.
ANY MOMENT YOU SIT DOWN WORRYING, YOU ARE WASTING AWAY.
Yes, you are wasting your time, talent, and treasure.
If you spend your days in worry, you do not need a devil to attack you, you have attacked yourself. Satan loves seeing us worrying because that is the time we make ourselves vulnerable to his deception and eventual baptism of foolishness.
Worrying is the wrong foundation to stand on to do anything meaningful in life.
For instance, it is the wrong foundation to stand on and get married. You do not get married out of the worry of dying single. You get married to fulfil divine agenda or prophetic purpose.
Anything you do out of worry will give birth to a terrible Ishmael – situations that will be against you, maybe all your life! So, do not spend any day of this year worrying. Spend it reasoning through life. Spend it serving your generation according to the will of God.
Do not allow worrying initiate anything you will do this year. Let purpose initiate it. For instance, as a child of God, do not go looking for a job out of worry. Look for a Job to become responsible in life; look for a job to become more resourceful to the Kingdom of God.
I have come to discover that God will not place any good thing in the hands of a heart full of worries. He would have to first empty it of its worries.
Nothing succeeds in the hands of one with a heart full of worries.
If money is placed on the hands of one with a heart that is full of worries, that money will never be spent meaningfully. It will be spent according to its worries and wasted completely.
Worrying will bring any life under the power of tormenting spirits and make it vulnerable to any dark thing. It has a way of taking away one’s intelligence and making them very gullible.
MOST LIVES WERE BROUGHT UNDER INTENSE SATANIC ATTACKS THROUGH WORRY!
I have seen worry turn sane people into mentally deranged people.
I have seen worry do things in the lives of people that even demons cannot do! The worry to get married for example, has handed over beautiful women to terrible men and promising young men to terrible women.
Worrying can take a very destructive dimension, especially in marriage matters. If you are a Christian plagued by this dimension of worry, you may wake up one morning to find yourself away from Christ.
Yes, you can wake up one morning hating Church and not even wanting to see a good preacher you once respected because of failed expectations.
Worry has taken people from the narrow way that leads to life to the broad way that leads to death. It is the bedrock of compromise in the Church today. It has become an evil portal opening tool.
Worrying has opened the portals of grave over people and taken them to premature graves. It has placed people in dangerous panic modes and wrecked their lives completely. Yes, it has destroyed great futures by placing people in panic modes.
When you are placed in the panic mode of worry, the death of your peace will be a matter of time.
Worrying has a way of killing anything that gives life to our mortal bodies, that is why people fall sick after deep seasons of worrying. It has a way of blurring our life vision and putting veils on our minds. That is why no one who spends their day worrying can be visionary.
It has a way of killing our faith and impregnating us with doubts about God, and what He may have said to us.
Friend, if we do not learn how to shake ourselves free from the dust of worry, the uncircumcised and unclean will keep finding a place to rest in our lives.
A MAJOR HIGHLIGHT IN OUR DEVOTIONAL TEXT SAYS;
“For the uncircumcised and the unclean shall no longer come to you….shake yourself from the dust, arise, and sit down, O Jerusalem; loose yourself from the bonds of your neck, O captive daughter of Zion!”
The dust of worrying has a way of bringing us into captivity. It has a way of making our lives a highway for demonic traffic. In other words, when we worry, we are few inches away from captivity.
We will begin to do and say things that will shut the peace and freedom of the LORD out of our Lives. Understand that God sent this word to counsel us to stop worrying and make decision not to worry this year.
No one should go into a year worrying. It will shut the person down completely.
None should enter a year recalling painful memories of things they cannot change or developing excruciating feelings by brooding on things that has already happened. We will get ourselves chained by oppressing spirits if we do that, leading to the filthiness of the spirit.
We should all stop living a life of worrying! We should free our hearts from worries so that it can bring forth life to us, and to do that, we must learn what to do with things that make us worry. We should follow what the Bible says about them.
Yes, the Bible is clear on what to do with things that make us worry. It says we should cast them on Jesus, through righteous prayers, for He cares for us. Hallelujah!
When things that put people in worry modes happen to us, we should learn to shake them off by spending quality time in prayer and fasting, casting them to the LORD and seeking that His will concerning them be done in our lives!
I believe God has spoken to someone this morning. It’s my prayers that you use these words, to keep building yourself up in your most holy faith this year, in order not to miss the blessing God has prepared for you. Amen!!
LET THIS SCRIPTURE BE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR THE DAY..
“Rejoice in the LORD always. Again I will say, Rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to all men. The LORD is at hand.
Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ.” Philippians 4:4-7 NKJV