TODAY’S DEVOTION (SUNDAY 14TH JANUARY 2024)
“But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.” Matthew 7:26-27 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 14TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF IMPACT.
God has been gracious and we give Him the glory. He has been speaking to us things on this platform that are capable of making us sons and daughters of Impact in His Kingdom.
It is important to understand that, Impact in God’s kingdom is not possible without being in God’s perfect will for your life. The only impact you will make if you are not in God’s will, is an impact that will destroy your life at the end.
We will therefore begin today’s devotional by refreshing our minds on matters of divine will.
Every mature person knows that it is wisdom to be in divine will, and foolishness to be in what looks like it. Being in divine will is the most secured place to be on the face of the earth. You will not enjoy this year if you will not spend it in divine will.
Spending our days in divine will is what attracts constant supply of grace to our lives, and grant us the unction from God’s throne to function on earth and do anything meaningful with our lives.
Spending your days in divine will involves doing anything God assigns you to do with your life on earth.
Yes, there is something God wants us to spend our entire life doing; that thing is living our days fulfilling His predetermined purposes for our lives. We made that clear few days back.
If you want to bring down whatever sin or Satan may have erected in your life, step into God’s predetermined plan or will for it. You will generate so much power if you do; yoke breaking power.
Anything you do not want in your life can be completely taken down by stepping into GOD’s pre-determined plans. The only place Satan is completely rendered powerless in a man’s life, is the place of using our lives to do only what God wants done with it.
Satan will prefer having us in what everyone sees as God’s predetermined plan for our lives, which in spirit and in truth is not. He will prefer us having that than having us in what God really ordained for us.
SATAN KNOWS THAT ONCE WE ARE OUTSIDE GOD’S PREDETERMINED PLANS FOR OUR LIVES, HE CAN BE IN PERFECT CONTROL OF EVERY PART OF US.
So many lives, marriages, finances, careers, families, businesses and etc, are in perfect control of the evil one because they are outside God’s will. You find them not bothering about God or His will for them.
Consequently, so many have been destroyed because their lives are built on the sand of humanistic philosophies, secular humanism and other things that look good, instead of God’s will.
Once it is giving them money or what they crave for, they just take it to be God’s will.
Few people really know how dangerous that kind of life can be. The fact that one is getting results out of a thing, does not make it God’s will. Satan these days, give people favorable results to keep them succeeding outside God, until crisis break out.
People are literally sold out to purposes and plans God never predetermined for them. They are sold out to humanism. Humanism is the common way of solving problems without involving God. They see no reason why God should be at the center of their lives, in truth.
Some prefer Him to be at the center of their confessions instead of the center of their lives. Hence, living a life that is opposite God’s ways and will.
Humanism was not originally God’s will. God never ordained that we lead our lives based on the wisdom of men. He never intended that human wisdom become the bedrock of our lives. If we therefore, build our lives on Human wisdom, if we remove Christ from the equation, whatever we will have, will be built on “sand.”
Whatever is built on sad will either destroy us, or get destroyed at the end.
The Bible says anything built on sand will be destroyed by the floods, winds or storms of life. But that which is built on the rock will survive the floods, winds, and storms of life. Sand represents human or demonic wisdom, but the rock represents the wisdom of God.
Anything we found on the sand of human or demonic wisdom (marriages, families, jobs, businesses, finances, faith, careers, ministries, etc), will not stand. But whatever is founded on the rock of God’s will, ways and wisdom will stand.
THAT IS THE CORE TRUTH OF OUR DEVOTIONAL TEXT TODAY.
I have said it repeatedly that the floods, storms and winds of life are not a matter of “if,” but a matter of “when.” They are not conditional but unconditional.
No matter how prayerful, anointed, supernatural, or aligned you are with God, they will come. No matter how much you know and apply to your daily life, these things are inevitable; they will happen. They are normal occurrences of an earthly life. But the difference is in how they leave you,after they may have happened to you.
Will they leave you standing, or flattened? That is the hundred million dollars question we must all answer.
If your marriage, finances, faith, career, business, ministry or family is built on the rock, the floods, storms and winds of life that come against them will leave them standing but if they are not built on the rock (divine wisdom), the same forces will flatten them down.
For instance, I have heard of marriages that came under the storms of adultery, and persistent unfaithfulness from one of the spouses,standing after the storm. I have also seen some flattened by just a text message to an opposite sex that did not even suggest any form of infidelity.
The difference was in the foundation; one was founded on the rock of divine wisdom, the other was founded on the sand of human and demonic wisdom!
The difference between marriages, finances, businesses, faith, health, expectations, jobs, churches, ministries, visions, plans, provisions, and whatever concerns life,that is left standing after a storm of life, and the ones flattened, lies in what they are founded on.
They are either standing on the sand of humanistic ideologies, or on the rock of God’s predetermined plans and purposes for a man’s life.
This year, should be spent building our decision on the rock of God’s will, ways, word, and Spirit. We should spend it building our decisions on the rock of God’s wisdom.
Our devotional text today says,
“But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall”
Doing whatever the word says to us, especially at an immediate present, is one way to build our lives.
IT MAKES DISOBEDIENCE VERY COSTLY.
If we learn to do whatever the word says, we will be in divine will. No one does whatever the word says, without finding themselves at the center of God’s will. And don’t forget; being in divine will is the most secured place to be on the face of the earth.
Meaning, doing whatever the word says, the best way to live our lives on the face of the earth. It will attract constant supply of grace and the “Unction” to “function” and prevail over prevailing circumstances, especially in the midst of terrible storms of life, floods, or winds.
No storm, flood or wind of life can throw down a church, ministry, family or minister of the gospel founded in God’s will and ran in God’s way. No evil force can successfully through down a marriage, family, or financial life founded in God’s will and run in God’s way.
If your life is established on God’s predetermined plans and purposes for it, you will lead a blessed life.
As we bring this devotional to a close, I want you to understand that your faith, prayers, or fasting will never eliminate or stop the storms of life, floods or winds. No!
But you can survive all of them and come out stronger if you will apply the wisdom of being in divine will and running your life according to God’s word to your daily life.
May the LORD use your adherence to this word to cause His blessing to rest upon your life, in Jesus’ precious name! AMEN!!
YOU CAN MAKE THIS SCRIPTURE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR THE DAY;
“To You, O Lord, I lift up my soul. O my God, I trust in you; Let me not be ashamed; Let not my enemies triumph over me. Indeed, let no one who waits on you be ashamed; let those be ashamed who deal treacherously without cause.”
“Show me your ways, O Lord; teach me your paths. Lead me in your truth and teach me, for you are the God of my salvation; On You I wait all the day. Remember, O Lord, Your tender mercies and your lovingkindnesses, for they are from of old.”
“Do not remember the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions; according to your mercy remember me, for your goodness’ sake, O Lord. Good and upright is the Lord; Therefore He teaches sinners in the way.”
“The humble He guides in justice, and the humble He teaches His way. All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth, to such as keep His covenant and His testimonies.”
“For Your name’s sake, O Lord, Pardon my iniquity, for it is great. Who is the man that fears the Lord? Him shall He teach in the way He chooses. He himself shall dwell in prosperity, and his descendants shall inherit the earth.”
“The secret of the Lord is with those who fear Him, and He will show them His covenant.” Psalms 25:1-14 NKJV