TODAY’S DEVOTION (TUESDAY 18th FEBRUARY 2025)
“Then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There!’ do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand.
“Therefore if they say to you, ‘Look, He is in the desert!’ do not go out; or ‘Look, He is in the inner rooms!’ do not believe it. For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. For wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together. Matthew 24:23-28 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 49TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF VICTORY
It is another day that the LORD has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it, reflecting on His word. We are products of God’s word and will always need His word to thrive in this dark world.
Today we will be looking at matters of the last days. This is a set of matters that are not been taken seriously yet they stare at our faces on daily bases. Everyone who fears the LORD knows we are living in the last days. The sons of Issachar will tell you we are at the latter end of the last days.
It is therefore important that certain things be always brought to our attention.
First, let us begin with the apostolic need of the hour. There are two kinds of meetings held today. Meetings under tents in desert places or outside buildings, and meetings held in inner rooms or conference centers and church buildings.
Our LORD and savior, Jesus Christ warned us saying that in the last days, people who present themselves as men of God will come to many saying “they are our messiahs, the mightiest prophets, and all that. They will tell us without them we cannot go to God.
He said they will also convince us through signs and wonders that our destinies are in their hands, mouths, or prayer for us.
That if we want to get married, succeed in life, in our finances, academics, ministry or any other thing we may be doing we must either worship them, sacrifice our finances to them, or even have sex with them.
Yes, I have met quite some ladies who were told to have sex with the prophets for their deliverance. This is not a man of God falling into sin.
NO! IT IS A DELIVERANCE MINISTER HAVING SEX WITH A CAPTIVE AS A CONDITION FOR DELIVERANCE.
I have been told by many that one of the requirements for deliverance, especially deliverance from spirit spouses, is sex with deliverance ministers to make the spirit husband or wife jealous. Jesus warned of the rise of this kind of preachers.
He also warned that if people point some so-called men of God to us as our only hope, saying “look, your messiah is in this tent or that camp meetings” or “in this Church building or conference halls” we should not believe them. For wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered.
Sometimes people may not point them to us, we point them to ourselves, especially if they operate in our definition of the prophetic. If they can call our names and tell us hidden things about our lives.
Friend, the apostolic need of the hour is the cultivation of hyper sensitivity in the Spirit and impartation of deep discernment through the teaching of sound, and practical eye opening biblical truths; we need the very apostolic and prophetic truths that the early Church was established on.
We are living in the last days. Jesus spoke of the horrors of these days. And warned us that deception – I mean hyper deception – will be the first horror of the last days. It will be the horror that will usher in other horrors, and it’s happening already.
From suppose men and women of God deceiving people to have illicit sex with them as a deliverance ritual, to financial exploitation through the mutilation of the doctrine of giving called “sowing seeds,” or just “giving,” to the use of sand, mustard seeds, water, incense, candles etc. to invoke miracles, the list is endless.
From the day Adam lost the likeness of God in the garden till date, mankind has been battling with the consequences of spiritual blindness and lack of discernment, making us cheap preys to terrible predators in the spirit and human realms.
PART OF THE LIKENESS OF GOD IS SPIRITUAL SENSITIVITY AND DEEP DISCERNMENT.
Both can be defined as the ability to see through the eyes of God, sense through His senses and hear through His ears.
Not seeing things in the eyes of God is the reason many do not see the spiritual side of things. Example the spiritual side of who they are about marrying before marrying them, churches they are about joining or have joined for years, places of work they are about being employed in, and all other issues or aspects of their lives.
We consequently loose our marriages shortly after marriage because of these things, come into intense financial hardship after a season of financial success, or suffer one fate or the other.
Not seeing things in the eyes of God is the reason we call the unclean clean, and the unholy holy. It’s the reason we call abominations weaknesses and accept devils and mediums as prophets of God. If there is anything we need at this very hour, it is hyper spiritual sensitivity and deep discernment.
That is the only way we can deal with the scourge of hyper deception among us today. David says, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path” (Psalms 119:105 NKJV). Jesus also said …“I am the Light of the world. He who follows Me will not be walking in the dark, but will have the Light which is Life” (John 8:12 AMPC).
If a Christian life is not guided day by day by a word of truth and righteousness from the Light of the world, it will be full of darkness. Jesus taught about the possible deception of the elect that will take place in our times and seasons.
A major highlight in our devotional text says.
“Then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There!’ do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand.
A WISE MAN ONCE SAID, “TO BE FOREWARNED IS TO BE FOREARMED.”
Divine warnings are God’s way of arming us before the main days.
That is why Satan hates people being warned. Today He even sways some preachers to give a bad name to divine warnings simply to stop people from listening. But no one can take away “the stewardship of divine warnings” from God’s end time apostolic and prophetic ministries.
The key words in our scriptural highlight today are the words “to deceive, if possible, even the elect.” In some of our major meetings around Africa, I have shared the difference between signs, wonders, and Miracles.
Yes, there is a difference between signs wonders and miracles. For instance, Moses did not step into Egypt with Miracles but great signs and wonders. The primary assignment was to break the backbone of pharaoh and reveal the almighty God to the ancient nations; hence seeing God do things that no other god had done.
No god had ever or will ever be able to smash other gods, bring flees, frogs and darkness to judge wickedness.
No god had ever parted even a stream come to talk of the Reed Sea. So when the nations saw and heard those signs and wonders, they knew for the first time there was GOD somewhere who is Higher than the gods they grew up to know.
The role of signs and wonders in the kingdom of God, is to speak to a people and compel them, through supernatural amazements, to submit the heart unconditionally to the almighty God.
Prior to the coming of Moses, the lesser gods had used lesser signs and wonders to steal worship from the people and keep them submissive. Lesser forces do make people bow to them through signs and wonders
YES, SATAN CAN USE SIGNS AND WONDERS AS A TOOL TO STEAL, KILL AND DESTROY.
In other words, just as signs and wonders are the redemptive tools of God so are they the operational tools of Satan. Don’t forget, he has no capacity to create. He only uses what has been created.
So Jesus warned that in the days we find ourselves, he will use the same tool to deceive, if possible even the elects.
That is where the issue of hyper deception must be understood! God’s way of dealing with hyper deception is through the cultivation of hyper Spiritual sensitivity in the lives of His sons and daughters, and impartation of deep discernment into our hearts through sound teachings.
The Prophet Ezekiel gave us a definition of what deep discernments is. He defined it as the ability to discern between the holy and the unholy. He also defined hypersensitivity in the spirit as the ability to spot the difference between two things that look very alike.
That is why one of the primary responsibilities of genuine apostolic and prophetic ministries is to “Teach God’s people the difference between the holy and the unholy and cause them to discern between the clean and unclean” (Ezekiel 44:23).
Yes, we are called to teach you Bible truths that will give you the wisdom and grace to be able to spot the difference between two things that look very alike; but one is of God and the other not of GOD. That makes genuine apostolic and prophetic centers the ideal spiritual place to locate and plant yourself in.
Stop jumping from one kesha to another and from one church to another. There are “Church hoppers” everywhere today! That is why the hawks are on rampage, eating them up.
In these days of hyper deception, if you do not locate one assembly of God’s people that is equipped with the grace and revelation of the times and the apostolic knowledge of what Israel ought to do and plant yourself there; if you keep running from place to place, going wherever someone say to you “look the messiah is coming to this Church, or that tent, or this camp meeting” you will lose.
That is the message of today’s devotional.
May God use these words to build you up and give an inheritance among they that are sanctified! AMEN!
MAKE THIS SCRIPTURE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR THE DAY;
“The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved.”
“And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.” 2 Thessalonians 2:9-12 NKJV