TODAY’S DEVOTION (WEDNESDAY 4TH DECEMBER 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 339TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF IMPACT.
Well, for those who are yet to wake up, we have just eaten 339 days of the year 2024, that is including today. We have just 26 days to the end of the year, according to the Gregorian Calendar.
May it be 26 days of peace, Joy, mercies from the LORD, divine provisions and preservation.
But there is something else. It was not long that we stepped into this year, and it won’t be long, we will find ourselves in another. Time is running out very fast. Each one of us is unknowingly consuming the days allocated to us by the LORD. The question is, are we doing it within His will and ways, or we are just existing?
Even the lilies or sparrows are within His will and ways, or operational system for them. Are we? Are we living our days within God’s operational system for us? Remember, Jesus said we should take time to study or consider the lilies or sparrows.
If we are just existing, then we are marching towards becoming a wasted generation. We have to change that. To change that, there is something most of us do, that we must stop doing. That is what today’s devotional is all about.
It’s my prayer that as we share, someone will find a rhema word from the LORD to make the rest of their days meaningful and blissful in Jesus precious name. Amen!!
One thing that Jesus took time to admonish us not to do, is worry. He said “do not worry.” The reason is because worrying is not a blessing. It is one thing we do that takes us away from God’s ways and will, or God’s operational system for us, and turn us into a wasted generation.
There are no words to describe what the life of a Christian will become, if he spends it worrying about everything that is not happening.
Ordinarily, every Child of God malfunctions whenever he or she begins to worry about earthly needs. That was why our LORD and Savior Jesus Christ warned that we will add no value to our lives if we spend them worrying about anything.
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 put on. Is life not 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 does not add to us in any way, it only diminishes us, especially when we worry about things we cannot change. I can’t forget the millions of times so to speak, that my mum spent worrying about how we will survive? But none of that changed anything.
Things changed by God’s sovereign mercy and not by her worrying.
As you journey into the new year, make up your mind not to worry about anything. If you must worry, worry about not knowing God intimately and not walking in His will wand ways. Nothing else!!
Worrying is you sitting in the dark moments of your life developing negatives; negatives that will turn to consume you.
It is cracking your head over things you cannot change. It is generating excruciating thoughts and feelings about painful things that are beyond you and loosing hope about life itself. It is trying to squeeze answers from question that lack human answers.
Jesus said we should not do any of that because it will add nothing to us!
Worrying has never added to anyone on the face of the earth. It has only functioned as the birthplace of high blood pressure and all kinds of diseases and evil expectations.
It is 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 worry 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. It is the wrong way to live our lives. For instance, it is the wrong foundation to stand on and get married. You do not get married out of worrying of dying single. You get married to fulfil divine agenda.
ANYTHING YOU DO OUT OF WORRY WILL GIVE BIRTH TO A TERRIBLE ISHMAEL – SITUATIONS THAT WILL BE AGAINST YOU, MAYBE FOR A LIFE TIME!
You don’t go looking for a job out of worry. You go looking for a Job to become responsible in the Kingdom of God and yourself. If money is placed on the hands of a heart that is full of worries, that money will never be spent meaningfully. Worrying will bring any life under the covering shelter of devils.
It makes people vulnerable in the spirit realm. That is why faith is a shelter. 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! Worry has handed over beautiful women to terrible men. It has handed over promising young men to terrible women.
Worrying can take a very destructive dimension. Especially, worrying about getting old and not getting married; that alone is a threshold of personal destruction. If you are a Christian plagued by this dimension of worry, you may wake up one morning to find yourself away from Christ.
You will hate Church and even a righteous preacher you once respected to your detriment 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 has turned faithful believers into backsliders.
It is the bedrock of compromise in the Church today and an evil portal opening tool. Worry has opened the portals of grave over people and taken them to premature graves. It has placed people in dangerous panic modes, and ruined their lives.
When you are placed on 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.
Worrying has a way of blurring our life vision and putting veils on our minds. It has a way of killing or impregnating us with doubts about God, and what He may have said to us.
IT CAN KILL OUR FAITH OR TRUST IN GOD.
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 worry 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 freedom away from us!
God sent this word to counsel you to stop worrying and chart a fresh course for your life according to His will, even as we prepare for the new year.
You cannot go into a year worrying. It will shut you down completely. You cannot enter a year recalling painful memories of things you couldn’t change and developing excruciating feelings. You will be chained to oppressing demons if you do.
You must stop worrying! You must free your heart from worries so that it can bring forth life to you. To stop worrying, you must learn what to do with things that make you worry. The Bible is clear on what to do with things that make us worry.
It says we should cast them on Jesus 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 prayers, casting them to the LORD, seeking that His will concerning them should be done!
That should be how to spend the rest of this year, the year to come, and the rest of your life. It will unleash a floodgate of miracles your ways.
You will not fail, in Jesus precious name. Amen!!
LET THIS SCRIPTURE BE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR US TODAY.
“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