TODAY’S DEVOTION (FRIDAY 6TH SEPTEMBER 2024)
“Behold, I send an Angel before you to keep you in the way and to bring you into the place which I have prepared.
Beware of Him and obey His voice; do not provoke Him, for He will not pardon your transgressions; for My name is in Him.
But if you indeed obey His voice and do all that I speak, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries.” Exodus 23:20-22 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 250TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF IMPACT.
Glory to the Most High God for another Weekend.
Today we want to refresh our minds with truths on spiritual feeding. God spoke to us yesterday about following His plans for our lives. If you missed that beautiful devotional, please go back to it again.
However, following God’s plans for your life will not be cheap.
There will be a lot of challenges and trials. There will be persecution and warfare, depending on your environment and the content of the plan.
But if you are involved in proper spiritual feeding, you will be able to overcome them and keep your eyes on the goal.
In 1st king chapter 19, Elijah really got wearied of following God’s plans for his life due to the warfare in it. But God sent an angel to feed him. The food strengthened him and he recovered. He would after that rise to continue on God’s paths for his life and finish very strong.
His story depicts the importance of proper and regular spiritual feeding to a follower of God’s plan and programs. Proper spiritual feeding, especially on a regular bases, is a major requirement if you will ever succeed in following God’s plans for your life.
So, as we look at this subject, the subject of God’s Spiritual Feeding program, it is my prayer that you find light and understanding on spiritual feeding. Amen and amen.
To start with, understand that a proper spiritual feeding program comes with a season of God’s mercy on men. In other words, whenever God show mercy to a people, He will get them some quality spiritual food so that they will not go back to folly again. And whenever He wants to push them into His plans for their lives, He will do the same.
He will establish some “prophetic and apostolic food or feeding homes” and set great cooks (teaching prophets and apostles with access to the kitchen of His deep things) over them.
Then He will send for them to come and take their seats, eating whatever sound doctrine He set before them, until they grow too fat for the yokes of their enemy, strong enough to overcome the battles and rigors of following divine plans, and fortified to be what He created them to be.
IT IS IMPORTANT TO NOTE THAT THE GREATEST CALL ON THE HUMAN RACE IS THE CALL TO COME AND BE FED. ONLY THOSE WHO OBEY THAT CALL WILL BE SAVED.
It all begins with accepting Jesus Christ as LORD and saviour, and continues with taking a seat in His Spiritual Feeding Home (a strong prophetic and apostolic feeding centre) until you become a temple for Him in the Spirit. You find this pattern in the early Church. The Bible says,
“Then those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them.
And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers.” Acts 2:41-42 NKJV
In other words, they took their seats in “God’s spiritual Food home,” established for them, shortly after surrendering to Jesus, and continued steadfastly, feeding on the apostle’s doctrines through fellowship.
The scripture above shows us that anyone who gives his life to Christ without finding a “spiritual food center,” or “an apostolic and prophetic food home” to sit and be fed spiritually, will take it back as soon as the impact is over.
Some will take it back either by openly going back to the world, living their old lifestyles, or even worst. Others will take it back by secretly going back to their old lifestyles and still coming to church calling it weakness. That is when you cannot see any difference between them and the lost sinners.
I was told of a pastor who went drinking in a drinking spot boasting of how much he has made through tithes and offerings. That is a man who has taken His life back from Christ but still function as a pastor.
One of them was even a speaker in the Rhema Fest that just concluded while Joshua Selman so ministered. The Church today seems to be full of such men and women in ministry. The Bible further described them this way;
“They profess to know God, but in works they deny Him, being abominable, disobedient, and disqualified for every good work.” Titus 1:16 NKJV
We have different ways that we take our lives back from Christ after giving it to him. That is when a life of Holiness will disappear from our walk with GOD. Everything sinful will become acceptable and treated with kids’ glove.
The consciousness towards divine will and ways kindled by a salvation experience will disappear. The Bible calls that the falling away.
That brings us to what the Bible teaches as difference between receiving Christ as LORD, and receiving Him as saviour. I have shared these truths before and felt we should refresh our minds again!
GOD’S WORD DOES NOT DIE. IT IS NEW EVERY MORNING LIKE HIMSELF.
Most of us Christians, live lives that shows that we have received Christ as LORD but are yet to receive Him as saviour. Sadly, it is not just accepting Jesus as saviour that will take us to Heaven. But accepting Him as LORD!
Friend, there is a difference between accepting Jesus as LORD and accepting Him as saviour. LORD means owner, it kills your right, and embraces His right. It kills your will, and embraces His will. It kills your way of life, and embraces His way of life.
That is why the fruit of accepting Him as saviour for some is a form of godliness without character, but the fruit of accepting Him as LORD and savior is a life of true repentance and permanent departure from evil.
Accepting Him as saviour may require the repeatition of what we call “the sinners’ prayer.” So, it can be done with the mouth, but with or without the heart. But accepting Him as LORD is deeper – it requires a heart transformation, resulting in a new life; a life of holiness and righteousness that keeps our spirits quickened towards God’s ways.
You will discover that, people who have accepted Jesus Christ as LORD cannot be comfortable going into a marriage, business, or live in a city and do anything outside God’s will or approval. The apostles knew this secret that was why they never certified anyone saved in a hurry.
They knew if one accepts Christ as savior, without finding a spiritual food house, to sit and be fed until Christ becomes His LORD, he is not established yet. One day he will go back to Egypt (a life of sin, crafted by Satan, using the evil and corrupt systems of the world).
I hope you understand this!! Now, let us close this with one of the major rewards or blessings of making Jesus our LORD and savior in spirit and in truth.
WE CAN FIND IT IN OUR DEVOTIONAL TEXT.
The text says,
“Behold, I send an Angel before you to keep you in the way and to bring you into the place which I have prepared. Beware of Him and obey His voice; do not provoke Him, for He will not pardon your transgressions; for My name is in Him.
But if you indeed obey His voice and do all that I speak, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries.”
The word angel means messenger. It was a messianic expression of the presence of the pre -incarnate Christ among them. In other words, Jesus Christ was the Angel God referred to. He was among the Israelites as a pillar of cloud by Day and a pillar of Fire by Night.
The Bible calls Him the messenger of the New Covenant. But today He is among us through His Word and Spirit.
Making Him LORD involves obeying His word and Spirit, and doing all that He tells us to do (as contained in His word and enabled by His Spirit). When that happens, He will become an enemy to our enemies and an adversary to our adversaries; giving us rest from the days of adversity and slavery to sin.
MAKE THIS SCRIPTURE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR TODAY!
Why do you call Me, Lord, Lord, and do not [practice] what I tell you? For everyone who comes to Me and listens to My words [in order to heed their teaching] and does them, I will show you what he is like:
He is like a man building a house, who dug and went down deep and laid a foundation upon the rock; and when a flood arose, the torrent broke against that house and could not shake or move it, because it had been securely built or founded on a rock.
But he who merely hears and does not practice doing My words is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation, against which the torrent burst, and immediately it collapsed and fell, and the breaking and ruin of that house was great. Luke 6:46-49 AMP